In part one we touched on such under-considered aspects as environmental toxins, nutrition, and immune issues that can have a negative effect on healthy fertility. (And commenter Anna helpfully added that there has been an association made in animal testing between GMO foods and infertility.) Two other fruitful areas to explore when faced with the dismaying diagnosis of unexplained infertility — or to optimally foster healthy fertility — are frequently overlooked entirely: electromagnetic fields, and the staggering power of our minds to influence our bodies. {Read the rest of this post at mothering.com}
Archive for the ‘Parenting for Peace’ Category
Reconceiving Conception: 5 Likely Suspects in Unexplained Infertility (Part 2)
Reconceiving Conception: 5 Likely Suspects in Unexplained Infertility (Part 1)
Maybe you’ve been trying for a year or more to get pregnant and it’s not happening. Maybe you’ve gotten checked out and been given that frustrating non-diagnosis of medically unexplained infertility. They don’t know what’s wrong. You don’t know what’s wrong. What you do know is that you just want to get pregnant!
Once fertility treatment came into its own around twenty years ago, that is where the attention and research money for infertility went. {Read the rest of this post at mothering.com…}
Silver Reflections on Motherhood ~ My Son is 25!
I was taken by the crucible called motherhood a quarter-century ago: my son Ian turns twenty-five today. The baby who was born smack on his auspicious due-date (seven-eleven!) arrived to find a mother in emotional disarray, to say the least. I have said it countless times, in keynote talks…classes for grad students…casual conversations…and even in my book: Motherhood brought me to my knees. Cracked me open. Excavated me. {read rest of post at mothering.com}
Rhythm and Routine for the Slower Days of Summer
When my son and daughter were in school, every June when summer vacation came I used to let out an audible sigh of relief. For one thing, I’m not a natural early bird, but for all of the years of our kids’ infancy and toddlerhood I was of course required to act like one! Once both children were in school, we were all happy to retire the alarm clock when summer arrived — or at least reset it for a more leisurely time.
But I remember the Waldorf teachers often urging us as we set off for summer, “Keep the form.” Meaning, keep some rhythm and structure to the days, even though school is no longer the primary organizing principle. (Some ideas on that in a moment.) *** Read the rest of this post at mothering.com ***
Images:
Petrov Escarião under its Creative Commons license
kevin dooley under its Creative Commons license
OakleyOriginals under its Creative Commons license
Should Anti-Violence Efforts Begin In The Womb?
It’s hard to think of a baby being violent or destructive, but the seeds of violence may be planted before a child is born, according to research at the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing.
Research carried out there and reported last fall in the journal Aggression and Violent Behavior suggests that attention to health factors during prenatal development could prevent violence in later life. Citing recent research demonstrating a biological basis of crime, article author and Penn nursing assistant professor Jianghong Liu explains, “‘Biological’ does not mean only genetic factors, but also health factors, such as nutritional deficiency and lead exposure, which influence biological processes.”
To read more, please see rest of post at mothering.com.
Source:
ScienceDaily
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mahalie under its Creative Commons license
Inviting Fathers In: Attachment Begins in Pregnancy
A mother’s attachment to her baby often begins long before birth. By the last trimester many mothers feel like they know their babies, having been enjoying for months their familiar, reassuring movements in the womb.
But what about fathers? What are their experiences during those wondrous nine months? How does the attachment process begin for them? Is a father’s only option to look on with wonder (and sometimes envy) at the beautiful relationship forming between his once-doting partner and this tiny interloper? 
Is it the extent of his calling to act as back-rubber, chauffeur and coach? Do these “staff support” roles reflect the monumental potential influence fathers have in their family’s life? (more…)
Wonder-Bred: Nourishing Intelligent Minds in At Least 12 Ways
As I watched the solar transit of Venus this week, it was a vivid reminder of one of the most important Parenting for Peace qualities: wonder.
A fundamental need of the young child until around seven is an atmosphere in harmony with his natural impulse to celebrate beauty and feel reverence and awe about almost everything. But what does our culture do in this techno-materialist age? We foist upon even the youngest child a flat world of facts and commentary. At a time when the child most needs wonder and reverence, we explain away all sense of the miraculous (more…)
Empathy: An Organic Anti-Bullying Program
This morning on The View they shared the story of a mother who was arrested for throttling a boy who had allegedly texted unspeakably awful things to her daughter (including — and I’m surely not getting this exactly correct, so pardon my paraphrase — “you’re so ugly I wouldn’t even rape you”). Evidently his tirade of abusive texts had been going on for some time, and the daughter had made anguished comments to her mother that hinted at possible self-harm. When Mom and daughter happened to see this boy at the mall one day…and evidently with sangfroid he reported he was not going to stop the cyber-bullying…well, if you’re a mother, you can probably imagine how she felt as she ended up with her hands around his neck.
That very ability, to imagine it — the feelings of a mother whose child is being mercilessly bullied and whose repeated attempts to get their school’s attention and help, to no avail — that is empathy: (more…)
Honoring Adolescence, Tending Teens
Few words strike such terror in the hearts of parents as “teenager.” On my final night in London last week I gave a talk at the London College of Spirituality entitled “Nurturing Evolution: Raising Ourselves and Our Children as Peacemakers.” Since many of the attendees were young people yet to begin families, I harnessed the fact that they were not so long ago teenagers: I invited them to connect with their “inner adolescents” and together we rode on that wave (more…)
