There are many risks in the administration of anesthesia – whatever kind it may be. There may be adverse reactions because of the entry of a needle into the spinal column. The medication itself may also cause side effects. Some of the complications include toxicity due to high amounts of anesthesia or a spinal block. The maternal blood pressure may drop, there may be allergic reactions, fetal distress, headaches or any neurological injury. The biggest side effect of using epidurals however, is that the labor process slows down significantly if an epidural is administered.

Though paralysis due to administration of an epidural is very rare, it is still a possibility. Nerve injuries could be caused due to undue pressure while injecting the anesthesia or use of forceps.

A recent study indicates that people who have a thankful attitude also have higher levels of happiness and optimism and are less likely to be affected by stress or problems. As a mother, it makes me feel so proud of my daughter’s attitude. But mind you, our child’s attitude did not come about overnight. It took time for my spouse and me to instil this attitude in our child. So if you want to know the specific steps in teaching your children to develop a grateful attitude, then read on.

Lead by example. Make saying “thank you” a part of your habit. Let your everyday talk be seasoned with gratitude. In this way your children picks up that attitude. Say “thank you” to your spouse whether or not your child sees or hears you. Also express appreciation to what your child has done or is doing. Whenever we ask any of our children to pick up a toy on the floor or to hand out something to us, we would always say thank you after they do what we ask for. Aside from saying “thank you,”  we also tell them “very good”, “wow, my child is obedient”, “I appreciate what you did” or such other phrases to express gratitude.

Allow kids to help in household chores. This could mean asking them to keep their toys, cleaning the table, washing fruits or vegetables to be cooked, and many more. When you ask your kids to take part in the housework, they will realise that it is not easy work and they will appreciate more their parents’ efforts for them.

Encourage them to say “thank you.” Explain to them that it is part of good manners to express thankfulness to someone for what they have given or have done for them. For little children, this takes time to sink in so when someone gives them something or a gift, lead them to say “thank you.” But this of course should not be done in a demanding way. When your children gets used to saying thank you, the next time you won’t have to tell them because they will initiate doing it on their own. Just like what happened when my eldest child for the first time on her own said, “Thank you for the milk, Daddy.” This really made me and my husband so pleased.

Make gratitude a part of your daily routine. You can establish this during the times when family members gather together such as dinner time. Before you start eating or while eating, each one can take turns in share something he or she is thankful for. Even the little ones can share what they want to thank for. Saying a prayer of thanksgiving to God can also be a daily practice with the little kids after waking up and before going to bed. Another practice could be writing a list of what you, your spouse and your children are thankful for. This is similar to counting your blessings and thanking God for them.

Write thank you notes. Whenever someone gives you a gift, always write a thank-you note which you can share or impart to your kids. This will make your children realize the importance of gratitude.

Learn to say “no” to your kids. As a parent, it is normal for you to have the tendency to give all that your child needs but it is unhealthy if you give everything your child wants and asks for. Your child might appreciate less or might not appreciate at all what you are giving him or her. So, to lead your child to realize that not everything she wants or asks will be given, practice saying “no” to him or her. Consequently, this will also make your child appreciate those times you grant what he or she longs for.

However, findings in a recent study tell us that formula is just as good as breastmilk. Professor Carlsen of the Norwegian University of Science and Technology said that breastmilk doesn’t necessarily make a baby healthy. It’s the condition of the mother during pregnancy that makes a healthy baby.

The findings of this study points to the importance of mothers taking care of themselves during pregnancy. Also, it gives a mother more freedom to decide on how to feed her baby without pressure from others or feelings of guilt.

What do you think? Is breastmilk essential for mums and babies?

But authorities think otherwise. Patty and Jacob are now facing charges of illegal tattooing, cruelty against children and reckless behavior.

Do you think Patty Marsh is right in saying that people shouldn’t really make a big deal out of what she and her boyfriend have done to their kids? Did you see the tools that they’ve used? She said that her kids don’t think that she and her boyfriend have done anything wrong. For me, that’s a very lame excuse. As a parent, her job is to teach her kids right from wrong. Unless of course, she doesn’t know the difference herself.

Just plain fun

1. Fly a kite at an open field. Spend an afternoon of fun and childish excitement as you try to pretend to be kids for a while.

2. Buy tickets to your spouse’s favourite band’s concert. Even if you’re not fond of his or her kind of music, just go. This is a great way to show your spouse that you’re willing to “sacrifice” for him or her.

3. Play a game of chess or cards. Have fun interacting with each other. It doesn’t matter what you play as long as you have fun.

4. Visit a pet store and get yourselves a pair of turtles. Name them Edward and Bella, after the Twilight main characters, to remind you both of your commitment to love and cherish each other.

5. Have a photo shoot. A lot of photo studios are offering packages for couples who want to capture their memorable moments. Buy new clothes and go to the salon to have a makeover before heading off for the photo studio or the location of the shoot.

6. Record your very own music album. There are a number of music booths that allow you to sing and record your voice to create your very own CD. Showcase your singing talent while enjoying each other’s company.

7. Go to the cinema and enjoy the latest movie offering. Choose a movie that you will both like.

8. Hide a “treasure” somewhere in your house and ask your spouse to find it. Be creative when making the treasure map and give your spouse a little bit of challenge.

9. Create a casino atmosphere in your home and go gaming. Instead of using money for bets, use personal prized possesions such as cellular phones, notebooks or jewelry.

10. Try doing some online IQ tests. See who has a higher IQ, you or your spouse?

11. Bring your spouse to a comedy bar to get a good dose of fun and laughter.

12. Spend a night just going bar-hopping. Just make sure that either one of you will still be able to bring yourselves home.

13. Head off for the local pool and have a swimming competition. If your spouse doesn’t know how to swim, then you can give him or her free swimming lessons.

14. Play hide and seek in your house. Try to hide in the most unusual places to make the game more challenging.

Enjoy the Great Outdoors

15. Go biking together. Enjoy nature and each other’s company while keeping your bodies healthy.

16. Take a leisurely drive in neighbourhood areas on a weekend. Enjoy the scenery while relaxing after a stressful week at work.

17. Buy fresh fruits and vegetables at an organic farm. To learn how farming is done, go around the farm with a tour guide.

18. Hike up to the peak of a mountain and take pictures of each other and the view.

19. Pretend to be Tarzan and Jane as you swing from tree to tree at the Forest Adventure. Get ready for a real adrenaline rush!

Accomplish Something Worthwhile

20. Do some arts and crafts. To make this activity more worthwhile, choose to do a craft that will be useful for your home.

21. Find areas in your home that need to be improved. Work together to make your home look nicer.

22. Try to learn a new language together. French would be a great choice. To practice, try talking to each other using the new language.

23. Invent a new dish and cook it together. Make sure that you use ingredients that are special and exotic. Compile all your recipes so you can make your own cookbook.

24. Do a research on both your genealogies. Who knows, one of you might be a descendant of a royalty?

25. Enroll in a dance class and learn how to salsa or tango together. Once you’ve mastered all the moves, go dancing at a local club to showcase your newfound talent.

26. Take part in some environmental protection initiatives such as the Plant A Tree Programme. Give the tree a name and pretend that it’s one of your children.

27. Spend an afternoon at a historical site to relive the olden days.

Satisfy your food cravings

28. Visit an exotic restaurant and dare each other to eat the weirdest item on the menu.

29. Go to an eat-all-you-can restaurant and have an eating contest.

30. Join a multi-cultural food safari to savour the specialties of various countries.

31. Visit your favourite dessert shop and order your favourite cake. Share on a big slice to make it more romantic.

32. Splurge! Dress up and eat at a fancy restaurant.

Help Others

33. Clear out your wardrobes and storage areas. Then, donate the items that you wish to dispose to an orphanage or an elderly home.

34. Volunteer at a local charity or go on a short-term missions trip to poor villages.

Surprise!

35. Prepare your spouse’s favourite breakfast and serve it with a love letter. Make sure that the love letter sounds really romantic.

36. Drop by your spouse’s workplace during break time to have a quick snack with him or her.

37. Wake your spouse up in the middle of the night and invite him or her to go outside to watch the stars. Just hope that your spouse will see your good intentions and will not get mad at you for interrupting his or her sleep.

38. Surprise your spouse by coming home from work early. Prepare his or her favourite dish and set the table extra special. Be his or her personal server for the night.

39. Come home with a bunch of slowers and a bottle of your spouse’s favourite wine. Grab a mat and have a picnic right in the middle of your living room.

Be intimate

40. Write down your family’s goals for the next five years. Make sure that you list down specific ways on how you can achieve these together.

41. Be poetic. Write a poem for your spouse then it to him or her over a candlelight dinner.

42. Have a themed romantic dinner at home. Make sure that you make it extraordinary by putting up nice decorations. Don’t forget to prepare the background music.

43. Do the laundry together. Not only will this make the task seem lighter but it can also help you bond together.

44. Go to your roofdeck and watch the sunset together. You can also do this at a beach.

45. Hang out at a hotel’s lobby lounge as they usually provide great music entertainment. Have a heart-to-heart talk with your spouse over two cups of coffee.

46. Devise a way to start a fight with your spouse just so you could “kiss and make up” later.

47. Chill out while watching planes land at a park near your local airport. Bring some food so you will have something to munch while enjoying the sight of landing planes.

48. Set a “re-commitment night” where you and your spouse will say your wedding vows all over again in front of your children. If you don’t have children yet, you can invite your friends over.

49. Sleep in on weekends. Wake up at lunch time to have “brunch” in bed.

50. Tell your spouse to meet you at the place where you first met. Act like you’re strangers and relive the scenes when you first set eyes on each other.

I know, if we only had a choice, we’d rather spend all our time with our little ones. But then we live in the real world so we have to face reality. And reality includes bills to pay, food to put on the table and a host of other obligations. So we really have to work and earn a living.

Lifehacker.com lists some suggestions on how parents can spend more time with their kids. One particular suggestion is to rearrange your work schedule so you’re free to “be a parent” when your kids are awake. What you can do is to ask to start work later so you can send off your kids to school. Another suggestion is to try using webinars so you can do training, seminars or presentations without wasting precious hours waiting in airports or sitting in planes.

Speaking of travel, you can also combine work with pleasure. Try to schedule your business trips on Mondays so you can treat your family to a vacation during the weekend. A sure way of cutting down your work hours is to start delegating some of your responsibilities to your employees. This way, you spend lesser time at work and more time with your kids.

You can also bring your children to work on some days. Tour them around your workplace so they will have an idea of what you do at work or you can ask them to help you with some of your tasks.

Some of these suggestions look very useful, although some are hard to put into practice. What other ways can you think of that will help parents have more time with their kids? Share your views with us below!

The Photosynthesis Song

The Rocks Song

The Water Cycle Song

The Atom Song

The DNA Song

Whether it is parenting, finances, work related maters or even something related to your relationship, working it out together enables you to look at things differently and also handle it with relative ease, which otherwise would not have been possible. Additionally, by experiencing stress together and sailing through it successfully, you actually strengthen your bonding.

More importantly, while handling stressful situations, it is important never to lose sight of each other or of your relationship. Laughing through tough times will ensure that you last while tough times do not. Listen to each other, nurture each other and you will see how easy it is to sail through the tough moments of your life.

For any successful relationship, it is important to actually listen to what your partner is saying and try to act accordingly or at least fulfill his or her desires. Intimacy is very important for the strengthening of any relationship and this should not be diminished due to stress.

According to UPI, non-profit CLIC Sargent asked 4,000 new moms and found that despite having lost contact with old friends, these women gained new ones. So if you feel left out because you still haven’t got new ones after your first kid, then it’s your fault. Because this survey proves that you should actually be making more friends now.

Where you’re most likely to find these new friends? Well, the top 10 places in their list are school playgrounds, mother and baby groups, daycare centers, coffee mornings, childbirth classes, school plays and concerts, exercise classes and health clubs, church, village halls and fundraising events.

Honestly, if you look at the list, you will notice that half of these doesn’t really have anything to do with motherhood. So making friends or losing them doesn’t really depend on whether you have kids or not. It all depends on how you make yourself visible to people. You don’t really have to wait to be a mom before you start making new friends.

I guess one big reason why this survey is weird is because it comes from an organization that’s involved with childhood cancer. Anyway, how’s your social life now that you have kids? Is it any different from the way it was before?

In reality, a lot of marriages are crumbling apart because of several reasons one of which is spousal abuse. Abuse in relationships is not determined by gender. Women can be abusive just as much as men although statistics show that it is usually the women who come out as victims. Abuse also happens regardless of age, socio-economic status and cultural background.

Abusers in a relationship exhibit behaviour patterns that are meant to intimidate, dominate or coerce their partners.  Abuse can be done not just through physical violence but through emotional acts as well.

Forms of Abuse

Emotional Abuse
This happens when a husband or wife degrades, humiliates or manipulates his or her spouse using words or other emotional and psychological tactics. For example, a husband who abuses his or her wife emotionally can criticize everything she does or call her ugly names. He will always try to make her feel wrong or inadequate. He can spy on all her activities and even forbid her from seeing any of her friends. In extreme cases, abusers can threaten to hurt themselves or other people. The aim of this kind of abuse is to make a victim feel worthless and totally dependent on his or her spouse.

Physical Abuse
This kind of abuse occurs when an abuser uses physical actions such as hitting, slapping, punching, kicking or choking. All these acts are meant to threaten or hurt a victim to keep him or her under his control. Physical abuse can also include sexual abuse where victims are forced to have sex or do sexual acts against their will. This is usually done through physical force or by using drugs that can make victims fall unconscious. In some cases, sexual abuse is done by using psychological manipulation or coercion.

Financial Abuse
Since an abuser’s goal is to gain absolute control over all the decisions and actions of a victim, he or she can use money to do this. Abusers can abuse their spouses financially by rigidly controlling their financial activities, sabotaging their jobs, making career-related decisions for them and stealing money from them.

Signs of Abuse in a Relationship
Victims of abuse are usually blinded from the reality of their situation. They are usually afraid of seeking help as they are hopeful that their spouse would still change. Abusers are usually very good with words and often successful in convincing their victims that their possessiveness or jealousy is driven by love. They can also make other excuses for their behaviour such as a traumatic childhood experience, a bad day at work, or even the victim. Sadly, victims easily fall for these excuses.

No one deserves to go through pain even in the hands of a loved one. Recognizing that you are in an abusive relationship is the first step to breaking free from it. The most common sign of abuse in a relationship is having an unhealthy fear of your partner.

According to experts, abuse goes through a six-step cycle. First, the abuse then comes the feeling of guilt, after which comes the part where excuses are made. Then, abusers will exhibit normal behaviour to keep their victims. When a victim is convinced that his or her spouse has changed, then the abuser starts fantasizing about starting the abuse again by making a lot of rationalizations. Then, they plan another abuse, after which comes another set of abusive actions. The cycle just keeps on going that it is sometimes easy for victims to think that a spouse has changed when in fact the abuser is only going through the “normal behaviour” part of the cycle.

In our culture, it is uncommon for married people, especially women, to come out against their spouses. If you are unsure whether you’re abused or not, most likely you are. Immediately seek the help of a professional so you will know how to protect yourself from future abuse and leave the abusive relationship safely. Once you have decided to break free, healing can begin to happen in your life.