Add Comment I recently met a friend’s 10 week old baby, whom everybody at the gathering agreed that this was one of the most beautiful, gentle, relaxed babies that they had ever met. He was unfussed by all the commotion around him, slept, woke, fed, and just went with the flow. He was passed around and not at any point was he irritated. The only time I heard him cry – and it was hardly a cry – was to let mum know he was hungry. He was immediately fed and all was well again. What was so different about this baby?? Now I’m not going to tell any mother how they should or should not be raising their child, I just want to open a few minds and show what these parents are doing... Every mum seems to cop criticism for their parenting and I am not trying to criticise any mum - everyone does what they can. Many, many babies who don't fit this story still grow up to be beautiful children and adults. This is simply what I have noticed from this baby and how he fits into the continuum. This baby was born in the comfort of his home, with mum, dad and an independent midwife. There were no interventions – no drugs, no poking and prodding, and no stresses imposed by hospital protocols. This baby was born normally and naturally. Baby was born calmly. Mum and Baby knew what they were doing and trusted each other. All of the right physiological reactions for each of them occurred – the reflexes, the movements and the hormones for love and bonding were released. The baby was allowed to crawl to mum’s breast for his first feed. The other thing that people noticed at this gathering was that Mum and Dad never once put Baby down. He was constantly carried by someone, with Mum or Dad nearby. Baby also sleeps in the same bed as Mum and Dad, and in the middle of the night when it’s time for a feed, everyone hardly wakes because they are so in tune with each other’s needs and can help each other. This baby has had its needs met since day dot. All a baby needs is love and nutrition. This baby will not once have felt insecure because he will always know where mum or dad is. He will never feel that he is alone and afraid. He will never be irritated for long because he is hungry, because Mum is always there to provide food for him. Even when he is asleep He still knows where Mum is because he can feel her comforting heartbeat. What else is there to cry for? He knows mum is there to help and will always be there. Maybe a dirty nappy or if he really is crying maybe he is not well? But in general there is not much else to cry for... He’s got the love and attention He needs by being held. I know a lot of you reading this may think ‘Well this baby is going to grow up needing mum all the time, and not learn to be independent’ but in fact the opposite is true. Up until the age of 6, a child’s brain is purely ‘downloading’. They take in everything and anything and aren’t thinking for themselves until age 6. So while this baby is downloading everything around him, he sees how to interact, how to behave in social situations, how to go about day-to-day activities like his parents from a very early age. Work is not seen as work but rather an activity that is just done. He sees all this rather than the roof of a pram or the view from a playpen – He is amongst it. There will be a point where he will choose that he wants more independence rather than it being forced upon Him and this will usually be at a younger age than other children. He will grow up believing that all his needs can be met. He will grow up feeling secure and loved and deserving of love. I don’t know if the parents have learned about the Continuum Concept, or if it was only instinctively that they followed this way of parenting. Either way, I’m sure if you asked them, all of this apparent extra effort that many would assume with this style of parenting, is actually not really work, and that it is actually loving and enjoyable. Of course, because every mum and baby and family is different, not all of this will necessarily work easily for everyone, but the continuum concept provides some fantastic ideas to consider. If you want more information look up – The Continuum Concept or Natural Parenting www.continuum-concept.org/ http://www.naturalparenting.com.au/ How does it work? It prevents ovulation, it changes the fertile mucous barrier and if fertilisation still occurs, it affects the uterus lining to prevent implantation. If used as directed the pill is 97-100% effective to prevent pregnancy, though it is not always used as directed. The pill is generally seen to be safe because millions of woman use it every day. Most of these women are unaware of any of the side effects or complications of long term pill use. I have looked after many healthy, intelligent women who never realised or considered the possible effects on their bodies, and after 10+ years on the pill decide that they are ready to have children and find it extremely difficult. Adverse Effects of the Pill: BLOOD CLOTS – Women using 2nd Generation Pills are 4 times more likely to develop blood clots (thrombosis) and women using 3rd generation pills are double that again. Hence a higher likelihood of developing a stroke or a heart attack. BIRTH DEFECTS – Babies conceived straight after coming off the pill have an increased risk of miscarriage due to a birth defect. It is generally recommended to give yourself 3-4 months after coming off the pill to attempt to conceive. I would recommend even longer to get your hormones back into a good cycle and to clean up your internal environment and rebuild your nutrient levels. VITAMIN and MINERAL STATUS – the pill can deplete iron and folic acid in women which are essential nutrients for pregnancy. Folic acid deficiency is associated with neural tube defects. Low iron will also affect your energy levels. CANCER of REPRODUCTIVE ORGANS – Cervical cancer was found to have an increased incidence in women the longer they used the pill. The risk increased from 37% higher after 4 years of use, 60% increase after 8 years and 77% after 12 years of use. BREAST CANCER – some studies show a reduced incidence in pill users, other studies disagree. It has also been found that after stopping use the risk came back down after about 10 years. POST-PILL INFERTILITY – this is diagnosed after 6 months of coming off the pill with no ovulation. As the pill affects the fertile mucous, it can take a long time to return to normal. Also you probably have not ovulated since you started use of the pill. It can take a while for these intricate hormonal relationships to return to a regular routine (6 months or longer is definitely not uncommon!). There are also the usual symptoms that most women are aware of – weight gain, loss of libido, depression, skin changes, nausea – and this is by no means a complete list! So what can you do instead? There are some natural methods that are as effective as the pill and the other synthetic hormone alternatives – techniques such as Billings (mucous) method, which you could combine with barrier methods while you’re learning or if you were ever unsure. The beauty is that you are learning the rhythms and patterns of your own body so you know when you do or don’t need to be careful. When you do want to conceive you already know your patterns, and then when you are breastfeeding and your cycle may not be regular yet, it is still accurate. There are also no side effects. You may also like to learn temperature methods (which work better when used with the Billings (mucous) methods). IN ONE GENERATION WE HAVE CHANGED THE SHAPE OF OUR FACES! An evolutionary change like this usually takes several generations to occur, but humans have done it in ONE. So who cares and what does that matter?? The reason it has changed is due to malnutrition, especially in pregnancy. (These changes were not due to cross racial breeding). Our diets in the last century have become more processed and refined, and lacking in the ‘good stuff’. Mothers (and fathers) don’t have the vital nutrients for the foetus to develop properly. This has led to the last couple of generations requiring major dental work (like braces and extractions) to straighten the teeth or to fit them in our smaller, narrower mouths. In the study ‘Nutrition and Physical Degeneration’ by Weston Price, he found that isolated towns, who grew and prepared their own food freshly, had minimal, if any, dental decay. These people did not brush or floss or use toothpaste. Whereas civilised towns in the same country had much more pronounced dental decay. An example (but by no means an isolated incident) is the Gaelic children of the Isle of Harris, who ate plenty of fresh oats and seafood, had 1 tooth in every 100 with evidence of decay. 10 miles away at the shipping port to get to the Isle, the Gaelic children of Hamlet of Tarbert, who ate processed foods, had 32.4 teeth in every 100 with dental decay. He also found that not long after roads were put in, the rate of dental decay increased dramatically as these once isolated people had access to more processed foods, introduced by travellers. He also found that milk consumption made no difference in the rate of decay or quality of the teeth. The shape of our mouth is SO IMPORTANT for our health. On the most basic level, we need good teeth and a strong jaw to eat to survive. If there are problems with your jaw or teeth this can give you headaches, upset your balance or give you low back pain. Each tooth also has nervous connections to various parts of the body which can also then be affected. For example: Your hamstring muscle will have a specific tooth that has a matching nerve supply. If this tooth was removed, the hamstring muscle will not work 100% because there will always be mixed messages going to the brain now that the tooth is gone. There are many of these connections all over the body. The shape of the mouth will also affect your sinuses and eyesight, and will affect the development of the brain. What can you do to prevent dental problems, and get enough nutrients? -Eat BASICS. Fresh fruit and veges, grains. Fresh is best, avoid as much processed food as possible. If possible buy local and organic foods. Nothing artificial! But if you’re a patient of mine you wouldn’t be doing that anyway. No sugar-free ANYTHING. -Cook more meals yourself. The more basic food you start with the better. You know what’s in it, it will usually be less processed and be more nutritious. -Don’t drink water with your meal. This will increase the likelihood of developing reflux, which affects the gums. Give yourself at least 30 mins before and after eating. -Chiropractic adjustments. Because it works on the nervous system there are many things Chiropractic can help with in the jaw, regarding the teeth and cranial system. Obviously this is the easiest to fix in babies when the cranial bones are soft and movable, and before the teeth erupt, however plenty can still be done to improve in adults -See a holistic dentist who won’t jump at the chance to pull teeth out. They are there for a reason and usually don’t need to be taken out. If it’s because there’s not enough room, look at making more room in the mouth rather than taking out the teeth -You may also need a vitamin supplement. Australian soil is so depleted of many vital minerals and nutrients. We have the 2nd lowest levels of selenium in our soil (behind NZ) and this may be linked with increased thyroid problems and reduced immune function. References: Nutrition and Physical Degeneration by Weston A Price Applied Kinesiology by Keith Keen Healing With Whole Foods by Paul Pitchford How much water are you drinking in a day? How do you know if you’re having enough? Is tap water as good for you as filtered or spring water? The average person should be drinking about 1.5-2L of clean water everyday - more if you are exercising, or drinking tea, coffee or alcohol, which are diuretics. We are made of 75-80% water, so if you are not regularly changing the water in your body, you are left with all the stagnant yucky cells and not flushing them out. It’s true that our liver gets rid of the toxins in our body but if it doesn’t have fresh water to cleanse the body, it still works, it’s just sluggish. Some more obvious symptoms of dehydration are headaches, dry skin and lips, poor circulation, faintness. It will also affect your liver and ileocecal valve which will upset your digestion and you can experience some diarrhoea or constipation. Another important symptom of dehydration is the pain of old injuries returning for no apparent reason. When you are dehydrated, the nervous system doesn’t work as well, and signals will follow a path of least resistance. When you have an injury it is very important at the time and so sets up (plasticises) an easy path to the brain. The injury heals but this old pathway remains. When you haven’t had enough water, this is the path that signals will follow and it appears to your brain that your old injury is back! Tap water vs filtered water vs spring water: I think that most people understand part of why filtered water would be better for us than tap water – because we don’t know what is in our old pipes. But there is even more benefit to drinking filtered water. The government in NSW insists on adding things to our water that we really do not need, whereas in other states they recognise the problems that it causes. The chlorine added to water to disinfect it would evaporate if it was in clean water, but it’s not clean and will combine with any organic substances in the water to form CHLOROFORM (a cancerous chemical that does not evaporate). Chlorine destroys Vitamin E, increases vascular disease and destroys the gut’s good bacteria. Fluoride is even more controversial. It is used as a mood alterant and a tranquiliser. If fluoride was really essential for healthy teeth, a fluoride pill would be much more economical for the people that actually needed it, than state wide water treatment facilities. Calcium fluoride is the form of fluoride that is beneficial for teeth, yet it is sodium fluoride that is added to our water. This is a toxic by-product of the aluminium and fertiliser industries, which was very difficult to dispose of until the government were persuaded that it was essential for tooth decay prevention. Before this it was used as rat poison. It inhibits thyroid function (encouraging weight gain), damages the immune system, and increases inflammation. Filtered water really is essential NOW, even spring water that is near agriculture or livestock areas, with run off of pesticides etc, isn’t 100% safe but it’s much better than our tap water. Recently I heard that the government is trying to enforce Fluoride in bottled water, ‘because the benefits greatly outweigh the risks’. Please don’t just believe this because a doctor on TV says it’s safe. There are safer and healthier alternatives. Contact Pure Water Systems at Burleigh on 1300 808 966. Reverse Osmosis is the only filtration system that will get rid of ALL the junk! |  About the BlogHands on Health Chiropractic shares with you some helpful information regarding healthy living ArchivesCategoriesAll |
RSS Feed