Ep. 30: How do we navigate our parenting decisions within our cultural framework?

07/01/21 • 88 min

From the moment a family is expecting their first child, decisions are made about how that relationship is going to work, decisions that don't always match reality. The addition of a new person to the family - and a rather helpless one at that - changes everything. Here we have a baby who needs and expects certain things. Food. Warmth. Care. We also have parents who often live in cultures that tell them what to expect from their baby. And as I talked about last week with Dr. Helen Ball, often the messages parents get are incongruent with their realities. This week the discussion continues with Dr. Cecilia Tomori who has spent a career doing in-depth, ethnographic work on how families navigate and negotiate the tensions that affect parenting decisions, particularly from a moral framework of how we make the decisions we do. From colonialism to convenience, you may be surprised at all the ways parenting decisions are influenced. Dr. Cecilia Tomori: https://nursing.jhu.edu/faculty_research/faculty/faculty-directory/cecilia-tomori and https://www.ceciliatomori.com/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/DrTomori Books by Dr. Tomori: Breastfeeding: New Anthropological Approaches: https://www.routledge.com/Breastfeeding-New-Anthropological-Approaches/Tomori-Palmquist-Quinn/p/book/9781138502871 Nighttime Breastfeeding: https://www.berghahnbooks.com/title/tomorinighttime Relevant Articles: https://dro.dur.ac.uk/28335/ https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/24694452.2018.1558628?journalCode=raag21 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0277953616305135

Previous Episode

Ep. 29: What is the relationship between feeding and sleep in infancy?

"You must breastfeed!" says the medical professional. "Don't you dare sleep with your baby!" says the same medical professional. The tension between how we feed our babies and how we sleep with them is a real problem for many new families. As primates, we are expected to stay close to our young, and that includes nighttime, and this has profound implications for our feeding journey. As we discussed last week, breast or chestfeeding grief is real and many families struggle with it, but some of this comes from advice that may be well-intentioned but harms that feeding relationship. This week I got to talk to the expert herself - Dr. Helen Ball - researcher of the effects of sleep location on feeding and vice versa about this very issue. She also happens to be one of my favourite people to talk so this episode was an absolute joy for me. If you think that how you sleep doesn't affect how you feed your baby or how you feed your baby doesn't affect how you sleep, you're likely in for a bit of a surprise. Dr. Helen Ball: https://www.dur.ac.uk/research/directory/staff/?id=121 Durham Infancy and Sleep Centre: https://www.durham.ac.uk/research/institutes-and-centres/durham-infancy-sleep-centre/ BASIS Website: www.basisonline.org BASIS Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BabySleepInfoSource/ BASIS Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/basis_babysleepinfosource/ Articles of Interest (a small selection of many): https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1046/j.1523-536X.2003.00243.x https://adc.bmj.com/content/89/12/1106.abstract https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0264683021000033147 https://anthrosource.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1525/aa.1999.101.1.143 https://adc.bmj.com/content/91/12/1005.short https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/icd.519 https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Helen-Ball/publication/30053712_Breastfeeding_and_mother-infant_sleep_proximity_implications_for_infant_care/links/0fcfd50c45a22d9d36000000/Breastfeeding-and-mother-infant-sleep-proximity-implications-for-infant-care.pdf https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10995-015-1798-7

Next Episode

Ep. 31: What are the myths we're told about nursing beyond infancy?

When you thought about nursing, did you think about how long it would go? Did you think, "I will absolutely be done by one because that's old enough"? Then find yourself with a 2-year-old attached to the boob and worry that they're too old? Or perhaps you were okay with that from the start, but still face comments, questions, and accusations from others about this? Welcome to nursing beyond infancy - something most of the world does, but which those of us in WEIRD - Western, Educated, Industrial, Rich, and Democratic - countries seem to have some odd ideas about. This week I am joined by Meg Nagle, IBCLC and founder of The Milk Meg, as we debunk some of these myths that you may have been told so that you can, in the words of Meg, keep on boobin' with less stress and worry. The Milk Meg: https://themilkmeg.com/ All Tied Up*: https://amzn.to/3qUHcEs Boobin' All Day Boobin' All Night*: https://amzn.to/3qT7Nln Some articles on nursing older children: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2720507/ https://search.informit.org/doi/abs/10.3316/INFORMIT.674686961104750 https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0890334404266969 * Amazon Affiliate Link