Maternity 33

week 30: food tips for you and your family

I have a dear friend who started a nutrition consulting business several years ago to help busy bodies find a healthy diet. I signed up for her class when my first child was nine months old: I wanted to rebuild my body and energy, recover from childbearing, breastfeeding, sleep deprivation and pretty radical changes in my lifestyle. She customized a “rebuilding” diet for me and I have stuck to most it for three years. I changed my breakfast menus to include much heartier meals with lots of protein (I eat eggs, beans, cheese, and occasionally rice, sausage and veggies); I eat seasonally (fruits and veggies are delivered to our door from a local farm, once a week) and I take vitamins daily (or as often as I can recall, mostly vitamin C+D). 

Recently, my friend wrote a humorous account of the various types of food personalities she encounters in her clients. I read along, looking for my “type” : instead I found that she should expand her list to include the working parent. I described this person (myself) as “on her feet all day long; doesn’t eat much junk food because she has banned it from the house and from her handbag; can’t recall the last time she had a two course sit-down meal in peace because she is regularly interrupted by children, colleagues, teachers, baby-sitters, laundry, delivery men, the urge to get to yoga class etc… As a result, the busy parent doesn’t prioritize chewing!!!” You can see the blog post here and my comment here.

This got me thinking: what are the things I do to bring good food to my mouth and my family’s belly every week? Read on for three habits that work really well for me.

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week 28: three problems my children solved

Several months ago, a friend asked me what I missed most from my life before children. I was able to answer that question really fast: sleeping in, not being interrupted and travel to off-the-beaten path locations. She didn’t ask what I had gained from having children, maybe because she expected mention of love, fun and cuddles. Yet, had she asked that’s not what I would have said. My answer would have been considerably more pragmatic. My children have greatly increased my quality of life.

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week 25: chocolate

I’m having trouble keeping up with my blog routine: I suppose this is symptomatic of being back at work, and having less time for musings and writings. However, I will complete my 33 post challenge, and I will do so before my 34th birthday (October).

When you don’t seem to have enough time in the day and you need a “pick-me-up” to get from a busy morning to an active afternoon, I have one emergency remedy: very, very dark chocolate. In the depths of sleep deprivation, when baby was a few months old, I ate 100% cocoa chocolate after lunch, to fend off the inevitable coma, on days when I had no time for a nap. I always have 75% cocoa dark chocolate in my cubboards, for days when I come home from work and fear I may not have the requisite energy for evening play and bedtime routine.

Chocolate has experienced a revival in the United States, and San Francisco is home to many small manufacturers who delight at experimenting with new flavors and spices. So I have fun shopping for my emergency remedy. I also have fun hiding it from my son: I’ve resorted to burrying wrappers deep into the trash, placing chocolate on the highest possible shelf, sneak eating it while he plays or watches TV, etc.. I suppose life comes full circle: I recall spending inordinate amounts of time searching through my parents’ kitchen cabinets, on the look-out for hidden sweets!

Do yourself a favor: eat chocolate after reading this…

week 22: yoga

My first yoga class was in 1999 - that’s a long time ago. I’m no acrobat and I don’t do things that will make your jaw drop, but yoga has been a fixture in my life for longer than I can recall. I moved to San Francisco in part to live in a city that was a mecca for yoga and healing arts. I live within walking distance of 10 yoga studios!

I have what is called a “home practice” — i.e. I know how to make the time and space to practice yoga on my own, in a quiet room, on a lawn, or in a little corner of a hotel room. All I need is a mat (which travels with me, everywhere I go).

In my experience, yoga is essential to parenting. If anything, it’s a stress reducing technique, but it’s also a focus enhancing technique. And with all the multi-tasking you must do as a parent, I find that quiet moments spent concentrating on one activity are life savers.

Here are some tips on how to bring yoga to your life, or to the next level…

1) Just do it. Start with 10 minutes a day, or just doing child’s pose straight out of bed, when you stretch in the morning. Commit to one class per month. Do a 45mn routine once in a while, when you have a break from parenting, or life. If you do a little yoga every year, every month, every week, every day, it will, slowly become part of you. And then, there is really no turning back. It’s like swimming, skiing, walking — once learned, never forgotten.

2) Get a book, or read a magazine. Here are my favorites
Ashtanga Yoga For Women - Ashtanga is an intense form of yoga that takes you through a scripted routine 6 days a week, approximately 90mn a day. It’s not suited for parents, because I don’t know anyone who has that kind of time, BUT it’s great for getting a sense of how yoga can bring emotional stability and enhance your focus. Ashtanga was developed by men, for men, and some poses are just hard for girls. So this book bridges the gap between Ashtanga and women. And even if you are a parent, read it, to learn the basic standing poses - a 20mn sequence that is a great warm up for any work-out.

The Woman’s Yoga Book -  this is a much more versatile book which you can use at all stages of your life. It shows a few gentle sequences to deal with everything from mood swings to cramps. If you have 20mn of quiet time in a day, use it as a source of inspiration for the few stretches you will do.

Yoga Journal - I buy this occasionally, to fantasize about the yoga vacation I’ll take 10 years from now! On a more practical side, they have articles on anatomy and yoga sequences that provide immediate use!

3) Teach someone: it is well known that the best way to learn something is to teach it. Teaching takes many forms. It includes introducing someone to yoga. Ten years ago, I introduced my sister to yoga and she’s now a pro - her practice sustains mine because we can talk about it and share our discoveries. I’ve organized yoga classes for my parents, when we are on a family vacation. My husband and I have a new year’s tradition: we take a restorative yoga class on Jan 1st - it’s his only yoga class in the year, and it involves some snoring! Most recently I taught a 35 minute class to a set of executives at our annual board retreat - it was great to prepare the class and walk novices through basic stretches and breathing exercises. It felt as if I had a concrete life skill to share.

week 18: food diversification

When it comes to introducing real foods into a baby’s diet, the French have a neat concept: food diversification. The idea is to widen the child’s sense of taste and texture and introduce them to the fantastic world of foods and flavors.

My daughter is 5 months old and I have started with the first step: introducing broth in her milk. Other than the occasional formula bottle and a little rice cereal that I mix into it she has been mostly breastfed, so I was eager to capture this milestone on video. I also wanted to see if she would enjoy it as much as I thought she would, as she has been oggling the food on our plates for many weeks.

Watch this video, you won’t be disappointed.  

Read on for recipe information

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week 14: tools of the trade

I live in a city and often visit other cities with my children. I have a few “tools” to ensure practical access to my important belongings, while retaining a modicum of style:

• easy reach sunglasses
• a back pack to keep my hands free
• flat shoes to make sure I can sprint when needed.

As I walked our Parisian neighborhood yesterday I laughed at the fact that I had completely copied my mom on these items.

The apple never falls far from the tree.

week 10: becoming your family’s “triage nurse”

Illness is the number one enemy of productivity. It’s hard enough balancing home and work: add one sick person to the equation and it becomes impossible. And while, in your past life, you only had to worry about your own health, you are now vulnerable to the aches and pains of several other people. And toddlers are full of bugs! 

I’ve struggled mightily to limit sickness in my home. We don’t drink from the same cups, nor eat from the same dishes. We wash hands compulsively. I try to avoid public transport at rush hour. The list goes on. Yet, I’ve had no success in staying healthy. Actually, this past winter has been a real ordeal in terms of minor bugs and at times it felt as if we could never leave our home, as one of us was sick. In the darkest moments I envisioned a home-bound life, and seriously wondered how I could ever again become a productive member of society.

There is no magic solution to this problem. However, as I have spent three years building up my medical experience and essentially acting as my family’s triage nurse (the people who sort through minor and major problems when you check in to the hospital), I have come up with two measures that help us get back on our feet as soon as possible and limit the time spent healing.

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week 4: what to do if you have mastitis

I breastfed my first child for 8 months and never even heard of mastitis until it struck me furiously on the 6th week of my daughter’s life. Mastitis is an inflammation of the tissue around milk ducts in the breast. It usually starts with a plugged milk duct, and can develop into a bacterial infection if the duct is not cleared. Symptoms include fever, muscular soreness, tender and red breasts. If you get it, your first reaction will be to want to know how or why you got mastitis. Don’t bother, I’ve found no good reason. And i’ve now had it twice in 3 months. You need to know what it looks like when it creeps up on you and you need to know what to do about it immediately, so that you don’t end up with unusual pain, or abcesses.

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