INFANT HEALTHY DEVELOPMENT

Years later, I wasn’t working and during this time of unemployment, I decided to care for an infant as a favor for someone. While caring for this child, I noticed something that just didn’t seem right developmentally. At this point in my life, I had only completed couple of years at the community college and that included only one child development class which I’m sure was Intro to Child Development, I’m sure it wasn’t enough to make any diagnosis. However, I knew something just wasn’t okay with this baby. The infant was approximately 9-10 months old and would gag on food like oatmeal due to difficulties with chewing. I also notice that there were other milestones that the child was not reaching that a child for this age group should have met. I knew I was not an expert and the worst thing I could have done was compare this child to my own children because my twins were premature, and all children are a little different and can be a few weeks behind or ahead. However, one thing I knew was that children should be able to chew by the time they are 10 months old, which led me to assume that this child’s food must have been constantly mashed up before feeding and maybe it was for fear of the infant choking. Although I can understand the fear, and a little fear is okay; however, too much fear will interrupt the child’s development, and that’s what appeared to be happening with that infant. The alternative was that that the infant had some delays, which I doubted at the time…let me explain. I began to feed the infant food that required chewing and I did not give food that could be swallowed easily. The infant just needed to work on developing the chewing muscles and that’s what I worked on. The infant did gag for a bit, but the more I worked with the infant, the better things became. I really wanted to speak with the parents about it, but some information you just know would not be very well received, so I never said anything other than what the child was able to eat and how well the infant was doing. Within a few weeks, the child had reached the developmental milestone regarding feeding.

Since then, I completed my Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology and Bachelor of Arts degree in Human Development, Early Childhood Development and I previously worked as a Family Support Specialist where I taught child development to new mothers after they came home from the hospital. It was while I was in this position that I became a Certified Trainer in Infant and Toddler Care. Which leads me to my main goal of this blog, part 1 of the Healthy Development of Our Infants. I know I have already been talking, but that was me giving you my background which began my love of infants and my experience pre-education with an infant not meeting an important milestone. Now I’m going to talk about the “Healthy Development” of infants in utero until delivery because that is different than just plain “development.”

So, what does it mean when one says healthy development of the baby? Well first of all, I believe it all begins with the mother. She must be healthy and taken care of for her infant to be on the right track for healthy development. When mom is pregnant, she should not be stressed because the baby can feel all that mom can feel. Let’s talk about when a woman first finds out that she’s pregnant and she decides to keep the baby; whether she is married or not; whether the man stays, or he leaves. From this moment on, she must make the decision for herself and that baby that she is carrying to take care of herself, physically, emotionally, and psychologically because she wants to (1) carry the baby to term, and (2) do her best to give birth to a heathy baby. Now let’s remember, God is the one in control, but we must still do our best to take care of ourselves so that we can say that we did what we were supposed to do during the duration of the pregnancy.

Prenatal care is very important during pregnancy. Most people think that it’s just to check the baby, but it’s also to make sure the mother is okay as well. I have three children, that came from two pregnancies, and I will tell you, those prenatal visits were very important. I went to monthly prenatal visits both pregnancies, but with my daughter, I had one ultrasound visit at around my six-month mark. With my twins, I had monthly ultrasound visits to ensure healthy development. I will say, I hated those monthly appointments for a few of reasons. These are the reasons: (1) the parking lot did not have an elevator and I always had to park above level 8 with a toddler. This 2-year-old refused to walk up or down the stairs, so I had to carry her. Good thing she was very petite and weighed under 25lbs. (2) I had a drink a ton of water and could not go to the bathroom until the ultrasound was over…remember, I was carrying twins, not fun. (3) My second trimester was in the summer. So, the bright side of it was that my doctor appointments were in San Francisco, so it wasn’t too, too hot.  My husband, then boyfriend was at work, so I attended those appointments alone. I know some might say he should have taken off work, but let me tell you, my hormones are different when I’m pregnant, I’m not a very nice person and I don’t like certain people around me very much and he was one of those people. Saying all that to say, I didn’t like the appointments, but I knew they were important, and I made sure that I was present for each one. So please make sure you attend all your appointments, including all of your lab work whether you like needles or not, it’s very imperative. You need to know if you have gestational diabetes or anything else so you can adjust accordingly and immediately, for your sake and the baby’s.

Another thing that is important, prenatal vitamins. Please make sure you take your prenatal vitamins daily; it’s needed because they provide what you and your baby both need. Also, if you are on medication, please do not stop taking your medication until you speak with your health care provider first. I know as mothers, we immediately begin to worry about the medication harming the fetus/baby, but if you have a chronic physical or mental illness, you must also be concerned about your own safety as well. Please speak with your doctor first. However, if you are planning your pregnancy, please speak with your health care provider about what will need to happen with your medication if you decide to get pregnant. By having this conversation, you will already have a plan in place.