Big impact for little hearts

Recently, I read about two Texas Moms who are campaigning for a test to be performed that detects heart defects in newborns. Unfortunately, the mothers lost their newborns unexpectedly – but their passion has propelled them to convince the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to officially recommend the test to states.

This year, the Texas House passed a bill requiring hospitals to test newborns, and the Senate will consider it next.

My reason for drawing attention to this is simple: my children were each diagnosed with heart murmurs during routine examinations by their pediatrician. It is a benefit to our community and our families that these tests are a standard screening at Texas Health hospitals and are done on every baby prior to discharge.

Are car seat accessories safe?

I have a confession. My biggest fear of having a baby isn’t childbirth, or sleepless nights, or making breastfeeding work or even leaving my baby to return to work after maternity leave. It’s the car seat. Why am I so terrified of what is basically a glorified piece of plastic? No clue. But I am.

Whenever I think of car seats I just want to curl up in a ball and ignore the reality that come October I will need to know how to install one, or even worse before then I’ll have to sort out which model to buy. Perhaps I’m most scared because I know from my job at Texas Health Resources that in the Dallas-Fort Worth area 80 percent of individuals who come get their car seats checked actually have install the car seats incorrectly. I spend so much time in my car it terrifies me that I might do something so important wrong.

And with the age of Pinterest if you even begin looking at car seats there are even more options for how you can supposedly make your baby more comfortable. But then I start wondering as I look at the cute accessories: is that needed? Is it safe? The one comfort to me in the whole car seat process is that I know that all car seats must adhere to the safety standards put in place by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) and have specific manufacturer instructions that need to be followed. And I’ve also learned that most manufacturers warn against using unregulated products because they were not crash-tested with their seats.

With all that said I turned to Melissa Smart, a certified child passenger safety technician at Texas Health, to ask her to give me the lowdown on all those products I see floating around regarding car seats.

Here’s her take on the most common items:

What the BRCA gene mutation means for my family

“Mommy, when I’m a mommy will I have to get cancer, too?”

My 5-year-old daughter asked me this a few months ago. I was hoping she wouldn’t remember that I ever went through cancer. But something jogged her memory of the days that mommy lay sick in bed for days after each round of chemo.

How’s a mommy supposed to answer this – especially knowing that, like Angelina Jolie, I have a BRCA gene mutation that I passed on to my daughter?

Eating for Two: Good Nutrition for Carrying Twins

Question: What kinds of foods did you eat while you were pregnant?

This is probably the number one question I get - eating while pregnant.  Even as a dietitian this became a serious struggle for me when trying to keep a balance of what I was supposed to provide my body and the two babies inside of it and what I actually wanted to eat.

I never dealt with nausea (thank goodness) in the early months at all, ever.  I was expecting the most horrible morning sickness due to the fact that I was walking around with hormones through the roof, but I never got sick.  On the nausea end of things- I can recommend simple carbohydrates to soothe an upset stomach (saltines, dry toast, apple sauce, bananas).  These will help it to subside and pass quickly- pretty much the only food sources that will work on that issue.

Carrying twins I knew I needed more calories than a normal pregnancy.  The daily recommended caloric intake for normal-BMI women pregnant with twins is 40-45 kcal/kg- which meant I needed anywhere between 2,200-2,500 calories/day.  For the most part I was able to hit this goal every day, but it was definitely easier said than done towards the end of my second trimester.  I would focus on small meals often throughout my day.

Paying it forward

Holly Natale, left, and Jacqueline Fox, right, donate gifts to
NICU manager Michelle Kelly  for Moms at Texas Health Plano .

Jacqueline Fox knows how tough it is to be a pregnant Mom on bedrest or to have a preemie in the neonatal intensive care unit.

That’s why this Mother’s Day, instead of getting pampered, she organized a mom-to-mom gift exchange at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Plano – for Moms facing those medical challenges this holiday, from Moms who have previously been in their place. A total of 16 Moms donated 37 gifts for Moms spending part or all of Mother’s Day in the hospital.

Mommy Sign

There is this scene in “For Love of the Game” where Kelly Preston’s character is explaining to Kevin Costner that she believed men and women should wear signs around their necks, basically saying who they are or their mood at any given time (one example was “shallow”).  Love that movie.

In years past, I could have used a “Sister.” With brothers a number of years younger than me, it would have been helpful for all the disapproving glances I got from people who I assumed I was a (EXTREMELY) young mother. It’s also a sign I would have worn proudly – being “Sissy” or “Sis” to my four brothers is by far my one of my two most cherished roles in life.

During my time trying to conceive, I would have worn an “Infertility” sign to ward off questions, help people understand why the 12 pregnant bellies that just passed me in the grocery stores made me want to run crying to my car. That sign would have said just about everything that needed to be said about that time in my life.

The Terrible Two’s

Preparing for my daughter’s second birthday causes me to sit back and reflect on the dreaded phrase for many parents – “the terrible two’s.”

My firstborn never ceases to surprise me. Counting to ten, trying to speak in complete sentences and proudly singing her ABC’s, her constant mental development and comprehension makes me smile from ear to ear.

On the other hand, some of her actions make me shake my head and wonder if she actually came from my womb.