Strollerderby : yale

C-Sections May Hinder Mother-Baby Bonding

Hannah Tennant-Moore — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 19:07:00 GMT

With nearly a third of babies in the U.S. delivered by C-section, many researchers are wondering how if, at all, the experience of undergoing labor contractions, which release hormones that are linked to maternal behavior, affects a mother’s bond with her baby.

A new study from Yale University has found that women who give birth vaginally are more responsive to their babies’ cries than women who give birth by C-section. This increased responsiveness may be linked to the brain's innate response to natural birth, since brain scans on post-partum women indicated that the areas of the brain that are linked to motivation and emotions were less active in women who had had had C-sections.

This research does come with some important caveats. The brain scans were conducted on 12 women—six of whom had given birth naturally and six of whom had had Caesarean sections. 12 is pretty small number. Also, the women who had their babies delivered by C-section had all elected to do so. So there is certainly the possibility that the maternal differences the researchers found between the two groups were due to a personality difference between mothers who choose natural births and those who opt for C-sections, even when medically unnecessary.

Lastly, the brain scans were conducted on women two to four weeks after birth. Clearly, this is no indication of what kinds of mothers they will be in the long term.

Photo: BBC

Woman Sues After No Meds C-Section

Eat Chocolate, Protect Your Baby

Amy Kuras — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 18:33:00 GMT

Finally, some good news about pregnancy and what we might choose to eat or drink during those nine loooonnnngggg months.

Researchers at Yale University studied more than 2200 pregnant women between January 1996 and September 2000, and found those who reported eating at least five servings of chocolate a week were 40 percent less likely to develop pre-eclampsia than those who consumed less than one serving a week.

Preeclampsia is rare but serious, sending the mother's blood pressure soaring and often leading to premature deliveries and babies at serious risk of dying. It's scary stuff and the cause is unclear.

Researchers believe the chemical theobromine , which occurs naturally in chocolate, could be responsible for the protective effect. They tested the levels of theobromine in the umbilical-cord blood of babies born to mothers in the study. It found a correlation between women who consumed the most chocolate, therefore those whose babies had the highest concentration of theobromine, and a significantly reduced incidence of preeclampsia.

And this is my favorite pregnancy-eating quote ever from any expert, ever: Lead researcher Dr Elizabeth W. Triche said, "Because of the importance of preeclampsia as a major complication of pregnancy, a detailed assessment of chocolate consumption is warranted."

I'm anecdotal proof: Two pregnancies, a preexisting love for chocolate and carte blanche to indulge (what? It made the baby move), and no preeclampsia either time – low-ish blood pressure and overdue babies, actually. Almost makes me want to get pregnant again so I can justify my sweet tooth.

Son, perhaps you should consider a trade

Brett Singer — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 18:15:00 GMT

Not only is it impossible to get junior into that elite Kindergarten, once you do, the little rat won't be able to get into college. At least that's what the numbers are telling us this week.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Harvard admitted 7.1% of students who applied this year, down from 8.9%. Yale and Princeton showed some drops as well. OK, you say, that's the Ivy League. As Garfield might say, big fat hairy deal. But, in yet another example of why we really shouldn't listen to Garfield (especially regarding college advice), state schools such as the University of Texas are showing a similar trend.

Although The Journal reports that many high school students are "freaking out" about the news, I would like to remind children everywhere that Dr. Phil McGraw attended the University of North Texas, which, according to U.S. News and World Report, is a fourth tier school. And he's done pretty well for himself.

In all seriousness, I think it's possible to get a good education in a number of different venues, but it's undeniable that the Ivy League and other top-tier schools offer connections and resources that are sometimes harder to come by at other institutions. The other aspect of this is the pressure it places on kids, the ones who are "freaking out" because they may not get into the college of their choice. More stress is never a good thing. Hopefully this news won't make crazy parents who started obsessing over college while their children were in utero start to act even crazier.

Look at it this way -- you can use all that money you saved to take a really nice vacation.

image: College Planning Specialists, and webdesign-guru.co.uk

To Afford Tuition, Quit Your Job

Brett Singer — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 18:23:00 GMT

You know those letters you get that tell you to starting to save now for the kids' college? Here's a better idea: just quit your job.

Brown has joined Harvard, Yale, Dartmouth and Stanford and will offer free tuition to students whose families earn less than $60,000 per year.

One way they can afford this is to increase tuition by 3.9%, inching ever closer to the $50,000 mark for one year of tuition plus room and board (the New York Times says the amount is $47,740). As my lovely wife says, cool - we'll just stop working when the kids graduate high school.

I'm not saying free tuition for those who can't afford it is a bad thing. In fact, it's quite good. But you wonder whether or not the financial aid folks will take into account factors other than income, such as where the family lives - it's just a tad more expensive to live in Manhattan than it is to live in Sheboygan. It's also a fair question to ask just how many students will actually be admitted who can't afford to pay. It's easy for a school to say they'll take all comers in a press release, but what do the numbers look like? Even Brown doesn't have the kind of endowment that Harvard does, and therefore could not likely afford to have a freshman class full of folks who pay $0 for their education. Also, is there a grade requirement, like there is with scholarships, or is the formula purely income based? And what about private wealth that isn't considered "income" on a tax return? I went to school with someone whose family could afford to pay full freight, yet she received a huge amount of financial aid because her father was good at "fooling" the I.R.S. I'm still not completely clear how my mother paid for my college education on her single-mom salary (I don't know what that salary was, but let's just say she didn't exactly work at a hedge fund). I just know that I graduated without a single loan. I worked part-time (about 20 hours a week) while I was in school to earn extra cash for books (OK, and beer).

As a Manhattaner with two kids in private school, we're not saving for college anymore. What's the point, when we're paying for school already? We just figure we'll keep working until college is paid for and try to save for retirement. Then, when the little buggers graduate, it's party time!

photo: Dorsetforyou.com