But as soon as you announce you're expecting, you may be bombarded with advice from every angle -- well-meaning friends, relatives, medical professionals, even strangers want to weigh in on what you should or shouldn't do, and it's easy to feel overwhelmed by their conflicting recommendations.Our Bodies, Ourselves: Pregnancy and Birth will help you sort fact from fiction, giving you the most accurate research, up-to-date information, and the firsthand experiences of numerous women who have been exactly where you are today. You'll get the tools you need to take care of yourself and your baby during and after your pregnancy, from tips on eating well during pregnancy to strategies for coping with stress and depression. Learn everything you need to know about:CHOOSING A GOOD HEALTH CARE PROVIDERSELECTING A PLACE OF BIRTH UNDERSTANDING PRENATAL TESTINGCOPING WITH LABOR PAINSPEEDING YOUR PHYSICAL RECOVERYADJUSTING TO LIFE AS A NEW MOTHER OUR BODIES, OURSELVES: PREGNANCY AND BIRTH IS AN ESSENTIAL RESOURCE FOR WOMEN THAT WILL GUIDE YOU THROUGH THE MANY DECISIONS AHEAD.

    By about six months, when babies can sit up unassisted, grab things, and munch on them, they are ready to join the family at the kitchen table and discover real, solid food for themselves. Baby-led weaning sets the stage for healthy eating habits in the years ahead by helping babies learn to feed themselves, to gauge appetite, and to love a variety of nutritious foods. Now, with The Baby-Led Weaning Cookbook, cooking family meals that your little one can share will be a cinch. Gill Rapley and Tracey Murkett—coauthors of Baby-Led Weaning, the book that started the movement—collect 130 recipes perfectly suited for baby-led weaning, as well as: • Straightforward advice on which foods to start with• Essential at-a-glance information on nutrition and food safety• Healthy ideas for quick snacks, delicious desserts, and meals for the whole family• Anecdotes and quotes from parents who follow baby-led weaning• Tips on minimizing the mess, keeping food the right size for little hands, and more! The Baby-Led Weaning Cookbook will give you the recipes and the confidence to create exciting, enjoyable mealtimes that encourage little ones to develop at their own pace.

    The rapid changes in your body, your lifestyle, and your very identity call for a certain mental agility. Mindfulness can help you meet the challenge and approach every experience with your new baby with open eyes and an open heart.Easy ten-minute meditation exercises and yoga poses throughout this book will help you cultivate greater flexibility and mindful awareness during pregnancy, childbirth, and your baby's first year. Whenever you have a moment to spare, open Mindful Motherhood and discover a skill that will help you find balance and fulfillment during those times when you feel most overwhelmed.Co-published with the Institute of Noetic Sciences (IONS).Mindful Motherhood contains what so many other parenting books omit:: the consoling information that each mother has the ability to know, deep within, how to care for her child. Mindful Motherhood is a gem.-Christiane Northrup, MD, author of Women's Bodies, Women's WisdomWise, soothing, and helpful-this is really good stuff for new mothers.-Jack Kornfield, author of The Wise Heart

    A lot of the advice you’ve been given about what to eat (or what not to eat) is well-meaning, but frankly, outdated or not evidenced-based. In Real Food for Pregnancy, you’ll get clear answers on what to eat and why, with research to back up every recommendation. Author and specialist in prenatal nutrition, Lily Nichols, RDN, CDE, has taken a long and hard look at the science and discovered a wide gap between current prenatal nutrition recommendations and what foods are required for optimal health in pregnancy and for your baby’s development. There has never been a more comprehensive and well-referenced resource on prenatal nutrition. With Real Food for Pregnancy as your guide, you can be confident that your food and lifestyle choices support a smooth, healthy pregnancy.

    In Raising Good Humans, you’ll find powerful and practical strategies to break free from “reactive parenting” habits and raise kind, cooperative, and confident kids.Whether you’re running late for school, trying to get your child to eat their vegetables, or dealing with an epic meltdown in the checkout line at a grocery store—being a parent is hard work! And, as parents, many of us react in times of stress without thinking—often by yelling. But what if, instead of always reacting on autopilot, you could respond thoughtfully in those moments, keep your cool, and get from A to B on time and in one piece?With this book, you’ll find powerful mindfulness skills for calming your own stress response when difficult emotions arise. You’ll also discover strategies for cultivating respectful communication, effective conflict resolution, and reflective listening. In the process, you’ll learn to examine your own unhelpful patterns and ingrained reactions that reflect the generational habits shaped by your parents, so you can break the cycle and respond to your children in more skillful ways.When children experience a parent reacting with kindness and patience, they learn to act with kindness as well—thereby altering generational patterns for a kinder, more compassionate future. With this essential guide, you’ll see how changing your own “autopilot reactions” can create a lasting positive impact, not just for your kids, but for generations to come. An essential, must-read for all parents—now more than ever.“To raise the children we hope to raise, we have to learn to become the person we hoped to be…. This wonderful book will help you handle the ride.”  —KJ Dell’Antonia, author of How to Be a Happier Parent   “Hunter Clarke-Fields shares her wisdom and personal experience to help parents create peaceful families.” —Joanna Faber and Julie King, coauthors of How to Talk So Little Kids Will Listen

    And yet, this painfully common human experience is so rarely talked about. How do we continue functioning? How do we tell our partner what we need? How do we deal with emotional dumpster fire that is the aftermath of a miscarriage? How do we not kill the fifth person who tells us “You can always have another baby.” With unflinching honesty and fearless humor, psychologist Dr. Sunita Osborn addresses the relevant but often unspoken topics following a miscarriage including the impact of miscarriage on a relationship, hating pregnant people and all things baby after miscarriage, your relationship with your body after miscarriage, and how to move forward (not past). Informed by her clinical expertise and her own personal experience with miscarriage, the Miscarriage Map offers women, their partners, and loved ones with the nitty gritty realities of a miscarriage, the accompanying emotional roller coaster, and specific steps to take to help them get through this loss.

    Ignoring good information isn’t the right course, but just how does one tell the difference between solid studies, preliminary results, and snake oil?In this friendly guide through the science of infancy, Science of Mom blogger and PhD scientist Alice Callahan explains how non-scientist mothers can learn the difference between hype and evidence. Readers of Alice’s blog have come to trust her balanced approach, which explains the science that lies behind headlines. The Science of Mom is a fascinating, eye-opening, and extremely informative exploration of the topics that generate discussion and debate in the media and among parents. From breastfeeding to vaccines to sleep, Alice’s advice will help you make smart choices so that you can relax and enjoy your baby.

    Wels is a well-known powerhouse advocate and has become the main voice in the industry. The marketplace for this book is constant, as the US birthrate hovers over 4 million babies born per year, and the word is getting out about the benefits of using modern cloth versus disposables. Wels is a continuous presence on her popular blogs and is often featured by other bloggers in the industry. When Wels talks, her audience listens and responds, and her audience grows. She even received a Congressional Award for her work from Maine Senator Olympia Snow. These are not your mother's cloth diapers!

    They fear drinking less will be boring, involving deprivation, difficulty and significant lifestyle changes. This Naked Mind offers a new solution. Packed with surprising insight into the reasons we drink, it will open your eyes to the startling role of alcohol in our culture. Annie Grace brilliantly weaves psychological, neurological, cultural, social and industry factors with her extraordinarily candid journey resulting in a must read for anyone who drinks. This book, without scare tactics, pain or rules, gives you freedom from alcohol. By addressing causes rather than symptoms it is a permanent solution rather than lifetime struggle. It removes the psychological dependence allowing you to easily drink less (or stop drinking). Annie’s clarity, humor and unique ability to blend original research with riveting storytelling ensures you will thoroughly enjoy the process. In a world defined by ‘never enough’ Annie takes us on an intellectual journey through the world of alcohol and specifically the connection between alcohol and pleasure. She dispels the cultural myth that alcohol is a vital part of life and demonstrates how regaining control over alcohol is not only essential to personal happiness and fulfillment but also to ending the heartache experienced by millions as a result of secondhand drinking. Finally, with perfect clarity, this book opens the door to the life you have been waiting for. Read this book. You’ll be glad you did.

    Not literally of course, but you’ll be slap bang in the middle of nine months of flying hormones, back rubs, and too much talk of childbirth - you’re in for the ride of your life. And you're going to be a dad. Fatherhood is just around the corner – are you ready? Most pregnancy books are for the mother but this one is just for you, the new father. We guide you through nine months of joy, excitement, fear, lots of big words, and an expanding bump, so that you emerge from this emotional rollercoaster ready for anything your new born baby will throw at you (which will either be sick, poo or regurgitated milk). From how your baby grows month by month to how to support your partner (it’s the little things that count, we tell ourselves), international bestseller Pregnancy for Men is your survival guide to the whole nine months.

    Laura alone delivered the next three children, assisted by her belief that giving birth was a natural process for which a woman's body had been well designed. Therefore, she saw no need to involve the medical establishment. Her personal birth experiences confirmed her belief, and subsequent research has convinced her that with the proper mindset delivering one's own baby is the safest, most fulfilling way to give birth. Tribal women and animals can help show the way, if one is humble enough to learn from them. Shanley gives numerous references, both historical and contemporary, to support her theory. She tells of her own experiences in childbirth as well as those of other women who have given birth without medical assistance. Although many contemporary writers deal with the concept that we create our own reality according to our beliefs, no one has applied this notion to birthing experience to the extent that Laura has.For many generations, society has assumed that childbirth, with its associated fear, pain, and risks, must take place in a hospital setting in the presence of medical professionals who have no relationship to the parents and their baby. Laura Kaplan Shanley rebuffs the context of this assumption, which treats childbirth as a disease rather than as a natural process. In Unassisted Childbirth, she calls upon the thousands of years during which women gave birth without medical intervention--arguing that with the proper beliefs, women are capable of and can opt for delivering their own babies, with or without their partners. Shanley, who had her own four children at home without medical assistance, explains how women's apprehensions contribute to most difficulties encountered in labor. In addition, she points out, only after the practice of placing women in infectious hospital settings began did the risk of hemorrhaging, sickening or even dying in childbirth increase.

    But a medical revolution is underway that can solve this problem: Astonishing new research is revealing that the health of your brain is, to an extraordinary degree, dictated by the state of your microbiome - the vast population of organisms that live in your body and outnumber your own cells ten to one. What's taking place in your intestines today is determining your risk for any number of brain-related conditions.In BRAIN MAKER, Dr. Perlmutter explains the potent interplay between intestinal microbes and the brain, describing how the microbiome develops from birth and evolves based on lifestyle choices, how it can become "sick," and how nurturing gut health through a few easy strategies can alter your brain's destiny for the better. With simple dietary recommendations and a highly practical program of six steps to improving gut ecology, BRAIN MAKER opens the door to unprecedented brain health potential.

    If you want the real deal on pregnancy, you've come to the right book! Drs. Yvonne Bohn, Allison Hill, and Alane Park are three top obstetricians who have personally welcomed more than 10,000 babies into the world. But they've been on the other side of the ultrasound too--as mothers themselves, they have each experienced the joys and anxieties of pregnancy firsthand. Morning sickness . . . unexpected contractions . . . midnight feedings . . . even serious complications . . . they've been there! Now they share everything you need to know about this exciting, life-changing journey. Written in a clear and friendly style, The Mommy Docs' Ultimate Guide to Pregnancy and Birth offers the most up-to-date medical guidance. It's packed with real-life stories from new moms and practical tips straight from the Docs' office. From pre-conception to postpartum, you'll find answers to your most pressing questions, including: Can birth control pills cause fertility problems? When will I start showing? Which prenatal tests do I really need? Is my baby getting the right nutrition? Is it true that I can't touch a cat, eat sushi, or color my hair for nine months? If I get a cold, is it safe to take medication? How do I create a birth plan? What if I go into labor alone? If I've had a cesarean delivery before, will I need to have one with my next pregnancy? How can I make breastfeeding easier? This extraordinarily comprehensive guide also includes chapters on diet and exercise, high-risk pregnancies, and the most often-repeated myths. Complete with illustrations of your baby's development, The Mommy Docs' Ultimate Guide to Pregnancy and Birth is your reassuring resource for a healthy and stress-free pregnancy.

    Lack of sleep, never-ending housework, and new fiscal concerns often lead to conflict, disappointment, and hurt feelings. In And Baby Makes Three Love Lab(TM) experts John Gottman and Julie Schwartz Gottman teach couples the skills from their successful workshops, so partners can avoid the pitfalls of parenthood by: - maintaining intimacy and romance - replacing a culture of criticism and irritability with one of appreciation - preventing post-partum depression - creating a home environment that nurtures physical, emotional, and mental health, as well as cognitive and behavioral development for your baby Complete with exercises that separate the "master" from the "disaster" couples, And Baby Makes Three helps new parents positively manage the strain that comes along with their bundle of joy.

    Yet so much about motherhood happens in your head. What everyone really wants to know: Is this normal? -Even after months of trying, is it normal to panic after finding out you’re pregnant? -Is it normal not to feel love at first sight for your baby? -Is it normal to fight with your parents and partner? -Is it normal to feel like a breastfeeding failure? -Is it normal to be zonked by “mommy brain?” In What No One Tells You, two of America’s top reproductive psychiatrists reassure you that the answer is yes. With thirty years of combined experience counseling new and expectant mothers, they provide a psychological and hormonal backstory to the complicated emotions that women experience, and show why it’s natural for “matrescence”—the birth of a mother—to be as stressful and transformative a period as adolescence. Here, finally, is the first-ever practical guide to help new mothers feel less guilt and more self-esteem, less isolation and more kinship, less resentment and more intimacy, less exhaustion and more pleasure, and learn other tips to navigate the ups and downs of this exciting, demanding time