I’m cruising through what once was a daunting reading list for my DONA International certification requirements. To make the most of my reading, I’m going to share my book list here. I hope this makes up for all the book reports I blew off in my 18 years of public education (I didn’t really read enthusiastically until graduate school).
Keep coming back – I’ll add to the list as often as I can.
Entry 5: The Happiest Baby on the Block, Dr. Harvey Karp, MD (not on DONA required reading list).
The Happiest Baby on the Block promises to be, “The new way to calm crying and help your newborn baby sleep longer.” As I’ve said before, I’m reluctant to buy into promises like this because they’re usually more about slick marketing and don’t take into consideration my child’s unique temperament. But in the case of The Happiest Baby on the Block, I’m sold! This book (and it’s video counterpart) had a significant and lasting impact on my early parenting.
Dr. Karp’s premise is that human babies are born “early” because our heads are so big – big enough to accommodate our big brains. While our newborns have remarkable sensory and interactive capacities, they are not fully ready for the outside world for 3 or 4 months after birth. Karp dubs this period “The Missing 4th Trimester” – a time when newborns need to be held very close to mother and father and treated to womb-like sensations.
From the premise of The Missing 4th Trimester, Karp talks about why babies cry (to get our attention) and the myths and facts about colic (abdominal pain). And he explains that, among babies’ many reflexes there is a built-in calming reflex that enables them to be soothed. While the soothing techniques are not new or novel, Karp points out that they may not feel natural in our culture.
The specific techniques Karp recommends using to calm fussy babies are boiled down to “The 5 S’s”:
1) Swaddling – tight wrapping
2) Side or Stomach – holding or laying baby on her side or stomach (NOT for sleep – for soothing)
3) Shushing – loud white noise
4) Swinging – rhythmic, jiggly motion
5) Sucking – sucking on nipple, finger or pacifier.
Karp says these techniques need to be done with vigor (while maintaining safety, of course) and provides detailed descriptions. Here are links to an interview with Dr. Karp in which he outlines the entire book. You can find lots of videos about he 5 S’s on You Tube.
As I revealed at the beginning of this review, I’m a fan of The Happiest Baby and the 5 S’s. I swaddled my son for several months and my husband was a 5 S’s pro by the time our son was 4 weeks old. We created a cocoon-like environment as much as possible for his 4th trimester and witnessed his emergence from it around 4 months of age. How remarkable it was to watch this little being awaken to the outside world!
Recommendation: Worth the $14 investment for a new book or free from the library, which also has the DVD. Your midwife, doctor or doula might also have copies in their lending library. And be sure to check You Tube for 5S’s videos!
Entry 4: Misconceptions: Truth, Lies and the Unexpected on the Journey to Motherhood, Naomi Wolf.
Naomi Wolf is the author of The Beauty Myth (1991), which examines how images of beauty negatively affect women in practically every possible area (employment, relationships, personal wellness, etc). So right there, readers can expect Wolf’s Misconceptions to be activist in its stance as it uncovers the realities of US maternity care and birth practices. And, to be sure, she delivers on this expectation.
But the real surprise in this book is how Wolf weaves her own tender experience of fertility, pregnancy, birth and early motherhood. I found personal her story reassuring for all its honesty. That, in her words:
Motherhood, good motherhood, motherhood in the real world, from conception to birth to caring for an infant, is an epic commitment of the will to work in tandem with the heart and the instincts. It is far from an idealized, impossible love. It is a tough slog.
Yes it is.
And so Wolf examines, through her own story, the societal context of mothering (from conception to birth to mothering). She talks about the difficulties of relationships, employment, and postpartum depression. And in the massive central chapter, “Behind the Birthing Room” Wolf uncovers how the US birth industry operates (too often, literally!), often failing women and causing what Wolf calls “ordinary bad births.” In my opinion, this isn’t a chapter for women who are in vulnerable places with regards to their own birth paths. Upon my first read, I had to scan most of it myself – I was just not ready for some of the sad truths that Wolf reveals. If you’re struggling with birth trauma, may I suggest skipping “Behind the Birthing Room” until you feel ready?
The last surprise Wolf delivers is a heartfelt and activist-bent “Mother’s Manifesto” at the conclusion of the book. A call to action, in it Wolf proclaims the need for maternity care reform, real family leave and flexible work options, more communal play places for children and respect for motherhood. It’s an upbeat way forward.
My recommendation: This is a powerful book that I think aspiring parents, parenting parents, care providers and policy makers should read. As with my caution earlier, for me there were difficult subjects that I needed to come back to when I felt less vulnerable about my own birth experience. $14 paperback from Anchor Books. I got my used copy for $8 at Orca.
Entry 3: The Baby Book: Everything You Need to Know About Your Baby from Birth to Age Tw0, William Sears MD and Martha Sears RN.
This is a 750-page must have! It’s an all-in-one baby reference book for the first couple of years. My copy is especially dog-eared from our son’s first 6 months. Now that he’s older it’s a nice reference for developmental milestones and offering reminders that the toddler behavior we’re seeing is, well, normal toddler behavior.
We got our copy of the Baby Book when I was around 7 months pregnant. It was a nice companion at that time to the Sears Pregnancy Book.
I only wish this book weren’t so herkin’ huge, cause we could have really used it in the hospital. It contains a short section on newborn jaundice that would have answered several questions and concerns about our baby. Hard to believe, right?! We were in a hospital, after all. We’d have thought we’d get complete and balanced information there about our newborn’s health. But I tell ya, it wasn’t until we got home and read the section about jaundice did we understand how common it is, the type we were dealing with, and how close we came to being backed into a very typical (and unnecessary) scenario of supplemental formula feeding and phototherapy. And days more in the hospital. Happily we were able to get help from a friend (who is a certified lactation consultant) and our midwife and avoid the unnecessary scenario. I still wish we had had the Sears book with us.
Some of the high-points that I appreciate about the Baby Book:
- Encyclopedic – good reference
- Nutritional guidance for the breastfeeding mother (including common “fussy foods”) and family nutrition for new eaters
- A chapter on nighttime parenting
- Month-by-month developmental milestones.
The criticisms I’ve heard personally about the Baby Book (and most of the Sears’ books) are about the focus on attachment parenting style. For some families, the main principles of attachment parenting are just too far to one end of the parenting spectrum when compared with their own style. Aside from families for which that is true, I’ve heard from a few full-time working mothers that there are aspects of this book that made them feel guilty or patronized about the decision to work outside the home. That being said, I think the Baby Book is so plentiful in practical information it’s worth the investment.
A new copy runs $22. We picked up one used at Orca (don’t remember how much – $15 maybe) and a garage sale bargain for $3. Yep – it’s so good our family has two copies!
Entry 2: The No-Cry Sleep Solution, Elizabeth Pantley (Not on the DONA list).
I read Pacific Northwest Native Elizabeth Pantley’s No-Cry when my son was about 4 months old. Typical of infant development, my son’s sleep patterns changed noticeably between 3-4 months of age. He was awakening to the world – and all night, for that matter! Despite our swaddling and using most of the “5 S’s” (see my future review of The Happiest Baby on the Block for more about this), Sammy was awakening every 45 minutes all night. It sucked!
Pantley offers a “sleep solution”. For me, I don’t buy promises of “solutions” when it comes to my child’s sleep. My kiddo is a light sleeper who wants to be very close to mama and papa. To me, there’s no “solving” this fact. It’s his sleep temperament. But that doesn’t mean Pantley’s book wasn’t helpful. It was.
Here’s where Pantley really helped our family: She recommends creating sleep logs to track baby’s sleep patterns AND family’s pre-bedtime routine and responses to baby’s wakefulness. She recommends doing this for 3 nights. We did it for 5 because we just couldn’t recognize any patterns for the first couple nights.
Creating the logs and tracking behavior was SO helpful! It helped us realize two major things: (1) That we lacked a predictable pre-bedtime routine, and (2) Sam really did have patterns in his wakefulness. We just lacked a team-oriented and systematic response to his wakings. Making the observations recommended by Pantley and following up with creating a bedtime routine and team plan for wakings took us in the direction of better, if not perfect (no, it’s still not perfect!) family sleep. She then explains how to practice your new routine for 10 days and then make adjustments.
The other thing Pantley does that was especially helpful to me is provide some basic information about infant sleep facts and safety checks. The safety checks helped me settle down for sleep, in that my postpartum anxiety often kept me up at night worrying about my son’s safety (a la SIDS, etc), even when he was fast asleep. In fact, Pantley devotes a full chapter to mamas who need help getting to sleep once baby is sleeping.
Please note that Pantley tends towards the attachment parenting end of parenting philosophies, with its family beds, on-demand breastfeeding, baby wearing (carriers) and the like. And a thorough critique of “cry it out” sleep methods comes with that philosophy (if that wasn’t already evident from the book’s title).
In my experience, every book about infant sleep is bound to be met with criticism and conflicting opinions. But I think Pantley’s tools for helping families observe and then design their own plan for supporting good sleep overrides philosophical differences. These are tools that can be adjusted for many different parenting approaches.
My recommendation: Worth the investment if the world of sleep feels chaotic for your family. Try to find it used. My new copy in paperback published by McGraw Hill was $15.95 at Orca.
Entry 1: Operating Instructions, A Journal of My Son’s First Year, Anne Lamott (not on the DONA reading list but on the Bastyr – Simkin Center Postpartum Doula training list)
Anne Lamott is a powerful story teller and in this journal capturing her son’s first year she takes us on a heartfelt journey. Lamott’s acerbic humor is not for the faint at heart, at least not for mamas who might be in the throes of deep postpartum depression…Or maybe it is. I read this journal after my son’s first year – well into my recovery from postpartum anxiety and in a good space to laugh at grim motherly humor. It’d also be a great prenatal read.
Lamott is a deeply Christian woman. That might be a draw for some and not for others. For me, her expression of faith fit hand-in-glove with her story of the ups and downs of single motherhood. She’s also a recovering addict, which factors into her story profoundly. Lamott shows us how powerful is the cushioning of a social support network – leaning on friends, family and her church community. Best of all, Lamott’s story demonstrates how joy and sorrow can coexist – that to reach the highest place of absolute joy in life may, indeed, require equally deep travels to the darkest places of grief.
Be prepared to laugh your ass off and the cry some. It’s a fast read and inexpensive in paperback copy from Ballantine. I got my copy at Orca for $7.50.
