Vaccination Awareness

Last Saturday,  I attended a "PLAY" event organized by Mommy Mundo and sponsored by GlaxoSmithKline.  PLAY is an acronym for Protection, Love, and Activities for Young Kids.  This is a disease awareness campaign which was recently launched by Mommy Mundo, to promote its advocacy on vaccination as the best defense against diseases.   You can read more about that here.

Superfood - The Philippine experience

Last week, Save the Children released their Breastfeeding Report entitled Superfood for Babies.  What made this report very interesting was that it included updates from the recent battles over the Monster Bill.  The report also emphasized on how overcoming breastfeeding barriers will save lives of children.

The report identifies 4 categories of breastfeeding barriers, namely: community cultural pressure, health worker shortage, lack of maternity legislation and the big business barrier.

Recently, I shared a photo of a mom who breastfed in the toilet because she was uncomfortable to breastfeed in public.  There was also no breastfeeding station or bench where she could comfortably nurse her baby.  Aside from community barriers, more common would be family pressure.  Filipino families are closely-knit and several new families live with their in laws.  Most of our parents were born during the time when formula marketing was most prevalent.  Hence, they grew up with the thought that formula milk is best.    Thus, I truly believe that breastfeeding seminars should properly be addressed to the people surrounding the breastfeeding mother.  Save the Children's blog summarizes it well:

The real scandal is not breastfeeding late, but that too many moms don't get the support needed to breastfeed early -- or to keep breastfeeding, should they want to.

Nursing Antics of my Older Baby

Erik is now 1 year old and is still a milk monster.  I can say that he is really a BOY compared to my first born N who was a gentle nurser.  Even when he was younger, he was a little piranha - finishing our sessions in about 6 minutes compared to N who took her sweet time and sometimes nursed up to an hour!
As a busy toddler, E has gotten into the habit of pulling when distracted - ouch! Lately, it has been happening quite often.  So when it's time to nurse, E and I shut ourselves inside the bedroom. Then in 5 minutes, N comes in and starts distracting him!  I've actually come to the point of anchoring his head just so he won't suddenly pull away.

Wisdom from Arugaan

In the course of my breastfeeding advocacy, I am most thankful to have met and worked with Ines Fernandez and Velvet Escario-Roxas of Arugaan.  Their work and advocacy is truly admirable - selfless, no hidden agenda and working only towards the upliftment of breastfeeding and protection of the rights of mothers, infants and young children.

What I most especially love about Arugaan is that they work within the needs and lifestyle of each family.  Each Filipino family is different.  In all the times that we have worked together, I have never felt obligated or guilty about the lifestyle that I chose to have for my family.  I never felt pressured to become a vegetarian or give up certain products we use.

Summer Fun with KidzArt

N is her father's daughter.  She loves arts and crafts - her streak of creativity inherited from her photographer dad Stanley.  She had her first art class when she was 2 years old. Since then, every time she gets a chance, she always asks to do arts and crafts at home - whether simply drawing, cutting and gluing paper, tracing, etc. etc. In fact, during her daddy dates with Stan, she manages to get Stan to always buy more things for her art kit!

aftermath of a daddy date