Update to previous post

MSNBC posted an article two months ago entitled "Extra Pregnancy Weight Doesn't Mean Fat Kid."  Interestingly enough, it was based on a human study.

Tons of pictures of Jack to be posted tomorrow

But first a rant.  I'm postponing the post that I started earlier today because I just have to vent about the most infuriating news article that I've read in years.  Possibly ever.  Not exaggerating.  It's hit close to home in several areas that I'm very sensitive about.  You'll note my comment is the first one about the article, written two and a half hours after the initial post.

Slate.com, my favorite magazine, has links to Newsweek articles in its margins, so when I saw the headline, "Can Pregnancy Weight Gain Cause Childhood Obesity," I panicked.  The implied answer to the question was "yes," and I packed 60 pregnancy pounds on my small frame (let's just say I gained more than half my original body weight).  The recommended pregnancy weight gain for healthy weight women is 25-35 pounds, 28-40 for underweight women, a category I didn't quite fall into. Fortunately it's all gone now, and I'm still not really sure how that happened.  So my initial reaction was one of fear for Jack's future health, as bizarre as that sounds since I've been worried for over half his life that he was too skinny.  But that's mother guilt for you.  (On a side note, all you moms seriously need to read "Perfect Madness," a book about how perfectionism among moms has escalated over the last 20 years, is reaching ridiculous levels, and how we as a society can work to fix that.  All of you need to go out and buy it.  Except you, Stacy--the copy I ordered you is already on its way.)

Right.  So my reaction to the headline was horror for the fate of my son, but as I got a few lines into it, I was horrified for a different reason.  The article cites a study done after researchers noted that children were more likely to have weight issues if their mother was overweight than if their father was overweight.  Rat pups whose mothers were overfed (doesn't say by how much) during pregnancy turned out to be way fatter than their fat peers whose mothers ate healthily.  Both sets of rat babies were fed a high-fat diet.

The article makes such 'reassuring' (said with loads of sarcasm) comments as "that doesn't mean that everyone who is obese is metabolically programmed in utero," and "overweight women don't always produce overweight kids" (emphasis mine in both).  Seriously.  It's all Mom's fault.  And one researcher is quoted as saying, "We'd recommend that women try to lose weight [before becoming pregnant]."  That would be reasonable to recommend for overweight or obese women planning to become pregnant but would not be true for underweight or normal weight women.  A responsible way to word this would be, "We'd recommend that women obtain a healthy weight before becoming pregnant."

It went on to say that "studies indicate that most pregnant women--whether they started out normal-sized, overweight or obese {note: it clearly ignores the possibility of an underweight woman becoming pregnant}--are gaining more weight during their nine months than the national guidelines currently recommend."  I can see how the study authors and article authors might think that they should perform a public service by telling women not to overdo it.  

But I see another side.  As a former anorexic (I was seriously ill all through high school and had occasional, relatively minor relapses throughout college), I see the possibility of pregnant women restricting their intake to a dangerous level based on these study results.  I envision the possibility of calorie worries and pound anxiety hounding women for nine months.  

I also question whether the weight guidelines should be revisited by health professionals.  Most mommies I know started out normal weight and gained more than the recommended amount.  And it wasn't because of junk food cravings.  It was because, like me, they were just amazingly hungry for nine months (or at least a year if they breastfed).  As a friend of mine put it when we were both about 8 weeks pregnant, "We're supposed to gain 5 pounds during the first trimester?  Yeah, I've gained five pounds in my big toe already!"

Nearly every woman I know has worried, if only fleetingly, about the risks of getting pregnant (or the inability to do so) "late" in life.  It seems like despite the increasing prevalence of women having successful pregnancies in their 40s and even 50s, all pregnancy literature has the looming threat of "35" hanging over it, as if pregnancy after that age was impossible and irresponsible.  Women don't need that overblown pressure.  And I think we could all get behind the idea that we really don't need to compound the pressures on those who are already pregnant by adding generational weight concerns to their worries.  Let's wait for the human studies before we start writing articles that create anorexic pregnant women.  Who knows what kind of damage starvation during pregnancy can have?  Oh, wait, that's just one more thing for women to worry about...  

The media seems to have tremendous guilt about having been a factor in an eating disorder epidemic among teenage girls.  Apparently the media needs to be informed, however, that teenage girls aren't the only audience susceptible to irresponsible images and comments.

Home Sweet Home

We finally have furniture!  And internet.  Disgustingly enough, it only took about a week longer for our entire household of goods to travel across the Atlantic and halfway across the continent than it took for AT&T to set up our internet service.  Ugh.

Likewise, the closing was slow to happen--it was supposed to be on the 16th but was moved back to the 18th because of our mortgage guy's mistake.  The 16th would have been a beautiful day to move in.  The 18th was a constant downpour.  Still, we made the best of it, with Nonna and Pops's much-appreciated help.

About two weeks ago Jack started going through an amazing burst of language development.  It started with a sign language breakthrough.  I had been doing baby signs off and on since about Christmas, but I was sure it was going nowhere.  Then out of the blue, Jack started making the sign for milk.  I have been trying to work on making sure he really knows what he's "saying," so I haven't introduced a ton of new signs since then, but Jack knows how to say food/hungry (although he seems to think it means "put the thing I want in my mouth"), more, all done, and bath.  He's working on "I need a diaper change."  And he's made up his own sign that seems to mean "I like this music," which is distinctly different from his dance moves.  Yes, he has dance moves.  I'll try to get it on video. 

Just after his sign language skills skyrocketed, Jack's vocal language development sped up a lot.  He now says dada, yum, bubble, ba (for his pacifier), and ball consistently, is starting to say doggie (it sounds more like "ge," rhymes with "key"), and says mama when I bribe him.  (I'm getting kind of shameless about it now--I'm almost to the point of letting him having one of his trinity (cell phone, keys, and wallet) if he says mama.  Almost.)  He even said "light" perfectly once, while pointing to the bathroom light.  That one was truly impressive.  He pointed directly at the light and said "light" in a very non-baby voice, shocking both Ben and me.  Jack's never come close to replicating that one, but we both heard it clearly that one time.

During Ben's time off, Jack learned a plethora of cool party tricks.  He will now put his hands on his head when you tell him to, will clap on demand, gives high-fives, kicks and tosses his tie-dyed beach ball (Jack picked it out, not me), and will occasionally give kisses when I pucker up for him.  Ben's trying to get Jack to do a fist bump to signal that they're Rams fans, but I'm trying my best to undermine that effort because Jack will remain a Chiefs fan if I have anything to say about it.

So I'm going to be better about blogging from now on.  I kept putting off posting this because I wanted to get pictures of Jack in front of the house.  And I kept putting that off because I wanted Jack not to have a massive bump/bruise on his head.  But Jack seems to have a constant bump somewhere now that he's decided he can run.  Every time one injury is almost completely healed, he gets a new one.  Fortunately he doesn't seem to slowed at all by it--he's still our sweet, active little boy.

A One-Year-Old lands in St. Louis

Seriously?  It's been almost a month!?  Lots to fill you in on.

Ben "retired" (his term, not mine) on April 1.  Since then we've been crazy busy planning the move and a birthday party, but since he doesn't become re-employed for another two weeks, hopefully he'll get a little downtime in soon.  We did manage to take a trip to Windsor Castle, Bath, and Stonehenge.  Beautiful.  But we were so wiped out by that that trip that we cancelled the additional day trip to Canterbury that we had hoped to go on.  It's been unbelievably fantastic to have Ben home, both for helping take care of Jack and for rediscovering how much we love spending time with one another.  I don't think I could have gone through such a stressful two-week period with anyone else in the world by my side. 

Jack turned 1 on Sunday, officially putting him in the toddler as opposed to infant category, which has made me a little sentimental.  Of course, he is now walking so much and so well that it would be hard for me to deny that he's a toddle-er.  He's seriously all over the place.  Even those of you who saw him our last few days in London wouldn't believe how well he's now walking just a week later!

The birthday festivities lasted all weekend--from the crawfish boil that Grammy and Granddad held for him in Houston on Friday through the massive family blowout at Nonna and Pops's house in Warrensburg on Sunday afternoon.  Jack loved it--he was all smiles all the time.

Jack's birthday presents from Ben and me included, among other things, a rocking horse with a bit of a twist and a set of nuts and bolts for him to twist.  But his favorite present from us seems to be his toy baby grand piano.  Super cute.  He looks like Schroeder while banging on it.  I promise to post lots of pictures as soon as I find our camera cord that's somewhere in one of our suitcases.

Which brings me to our other big news--we've made our move!  After two days of the movers packing and many tears with Stacy (and lots more once we were actually apart), we left for the airport hotel Tuesday night.  The 10 1/2 hour flight to Houston was amazing.  Jack took 2 naps of over an hour and a half each.  As we were getting off the plane about half the other passengers stopped to wave bye-bye to Jack and tell him by name that he had been such a good boy on the flight.  He also slept the entire 2 hour flight from Houston to Kansas City.  Amazing.  

Monday we made the trek to St. Louis to see our house for the first time.  Nonna and Pops and Uncle Stephen and his girlfriend Kelly did a fantastic job--we were thrilled to see where we'll be living.  Unfortunately we've hit a little snag in the closing process (it's a long story), so instead of closing tomorrow morning as we were supposed to, we now may be staying with Uncle Stephen a few more days and not closing until Thursday or Friday.  Really frustrating, but now we're in the home stretch.  Of course, we won't have much to put in our brand new house (which is over 3 times the size of our London flat!) at first because our shipment from the movers isn't supposed to arrive until mid-May!  So I suppose a few more days shouldn't make that big a difference!

We'll be sending out an email to everyone with our new address and cell phone numbers, and again, once we get settled I promise lots more pictures and more frequent updates.  Just because we're closer to home doesn't mean I'm going to stop the blog.

Moving plans and a barrage of photos

Things for the move are starting to fall into place.  Ben's last day is next Tuesday, April 1, the movers are coming April 7 and 8, and we're leaving April 9.  We'll spend a few days in Houston with Ben's parents, then head to Kansas City to spend a day or two with my parents.

And then we'll move into our new home!  We've bought a brand new place (still a week or so from being finished!) in Brentwood, which is one of the really close in suburbs, one that doesn't feel like a suburb at all.  There's a public elementary school 3 blocks away, a Catholic elementary school 3 blocks the other direction, a park 4 blocks away, and it's within a mile of two Paneras, a Whole Foods, a Target Greatland, a highly rated Cajun takeout place, and a Sonic.  I will be in midwestern middle-class American consumerist heaven without having to be in midwestern middle-class American suburban hell.  So perfect.  Strangely enough, one of my mommy friends in London used to live on the street where we'll be living, so I'll also have someone to give me tips on the area.

Jack has been completely over chicken pox for about two weeks now, and it looks like the only scar he may carry is just above his right eyebrow--the only spot you can see on my previously

 posted picture.  But here's a picture of him at the height of his spottiness.  Also as you can see, his umbilical hernia is still bulging, especially with all the stress walking and wiggling puts on it.  Dr. Hay has continued to assure us that it's nothing dangerous or painful and that it should heal without surgery within the next year or two.

Speaking of Dr. Hay, Jack has his last visit with him last week.  Although it was a little early, Jack got the two 1-year immunizations and amazingly didn't make a single cry--not a peep!  I really hope that we can find another good pediatrician in St. Louis, because I'm going to miss Dr. Hay a lot. 

Our Easter was very nice and was punctuated by a weeklong visit from Jack's Grammy and Granddad.  Easter was also especially good because Ben had a 4-day weekend (Good Friday and Easter Monday are national holidays here) during which he only went into the office for a total of an hour and a half!  We seized the opportunity to take a daytrip to Cambridge and an adventure to the London Aquarium.  During the past week Jack's intermittent attempts to walk

 without his walker started coming more frequently and became more prolonged, and he is now

regularly taking 4 or 5 steps on his own!  While I still can't catch him in the middle of the floor, he walks the triangle between our two loveseats and our coffee table so frequently that I have

caught some video of that.  Being Jack, he's not doing this movement thing halfway, so instead of walking staggeringly like most babies, Jack seems to have mostly skipped standing and walking all together and has moved straight into running.

A few other random pictures:

During his chicken pox confinement, Jack developed a very strong attachment to the vacuum as his new favorite toy.  It's a Dyson, so I have to admit I like it a lot myself, but Jack's attachment transcends mine by far.  He not only runs to it screaming with excitement any time I open the hall closet, but he also pushes it along the floor as if it was his walker.  A difficult feat, but he does it well.  I'll post video of it some other time.

This is a picture of Jack's zebra after snack time today.  

One of Jack's favorite snacks are fake Cheetos--organic puffed baby food corn sticks covered in carrot powder that taste reasonably good but like their unhealthy counterparts tend to make a pretty big mess.  Today Jack decided that he wanted to share his snack with his zebra, leaving it with a nice orange smudge near its mouth.  So sweetly generous that I think I'll leave it there.