r/ScienceBasedParenting

Wondering if anyone had any advice for helping kids be process oriented vs outcome oriented? My soon to be 3 year old has recently started saying “I can’t” and pouting whenever something doesn’t work out for him on his first try, often refusing to try again. He hasn’t always been like this, it’s a very recent development, but I’d like him to start finding satisfaction in the effort and less in the result. Is there any literature or solid expert advice on this?

Is there any clear cut determination of how long allergens stay in your breastmilk? Example: my 3 month old has a suspected dairy & soy allergy/intolerance. No blood in stools or rash, just gas/colic/reflux. Anyway, I have cut out both but if i selfishly want to indulge in something with dairy and/or soy, are there studies or anything showing how long they would be present in my milk? I have a decent freezer stash of DF/SF milk so hypothetically could I give him that for x amount of time until the delicious forbidden foods are out of my system?

Based in Australia, 38 weeks pregnant and getting anxious about OB advice related to vaccine for visitors. My partner and I have taken all recommended vaccines- flu, RSV and whooping cough. We also have my parents from overseas living with us and my brother and SIL, who would be regularly visiting us and the newborn. When we had enquired with our OB about vaccine for them, his recommendation was there is no need for visitors (even grandparents who will be living with us) to take any vaccines as I have taken all the vaccines which sufficiently protects the baby and there’s no actual advantage of cocooning the baby by asking people around us to get the vaccine. So we didn’t ask them to get vaccine.

Now I’m panicking especially about my brother and SIL not getting the vaccines. The grandparents are more or less cocooned at home with minimal activities/ going out of home. However brother and SIL have full time jobs so obviously are out a lot more and use public transport and it’s winter here so it’s flu season out there too! They will be happy to take the shot but I don’t know if there’s enough time for the immunisation to fully kick in now too.

Please share research for effectiveness of vaccination for regular visitors actually protecting the new born and if cocooning as a strategy is effective?

Thank you!

I have mixed feelings about this. My son just turned 5 months, and from what I’ve read online, I shouldn’t practice sitting with him. Instead, I should let him attempt to sit independently when he’s ready, since sitting him up too early could potentially hurt his spine.
For now, I mostly let him play on the floor. Eventually, he rolls onto his tummy, which he tolerates pretty well, but he doesn’t roll from tummy to back yet.
Unfortunately, we won’t see his pediatrician until his 6-month appointment, so I’m hesitant to practice sitting with him before then. I’m curious: What have you learned about this, and did you practice supported sitting with your baby or wait until they did it on their own?

As the title says, in reference to testing toys for lead.

We recently got a test done at our child's one year appointment that showed elevated lead levels. Nothing super high but we're being sent in for a venous blood draw to verify her levels.

We are renters in an older house and plan on getting paint and water samples tested, however I'm also wanting to try and test the toys, as almost all are gifts from family and I don't know where most were purchased.

From my understanding and research there is no good way to test toys at home, though I do have some swabs in the mail for an at home kit just to try something. Is there any solution for trying to find out if the toys are safe? Even if I threw every single one out, how do I ensure new ones are safe?

Please let me know if the flair is incorrect, I'm not really sure

I have a 5 month old and both my husband and I work from home. I have my own business so am completely flexible on my hours and only work 2-3h a day (however also on the weekends), while my husband looks after the little one. Both our work is on our laptops and sometimes also on our phones. Occasionally, I work short bursts of time (15-20min) on my computer or phone while the baby is playing by herself on the floor next to where I sit. I am very strict about my baby never looking at a screen unless it's for family calls (we live quite far away form our family), and I never scroll social media or watch series or the like around her. Whenever she starts fussing or seems otherwise unhappy I of course attend to her immediately.

My mum (who lives in a different country so has never seen how our day looks like) keeps commenting on how parental screen use can negatively affect babies / small children (main point is about hindering their language and social development, making them prone to feel neglected and hence to act out). Is there any evidence for this? All studies I find seem to focus on screen time for infants / children, not them witnessing parent behavior.

My son was born in May at the 50th percentile and since then has had bad reflux and never consistently latched to the breast, so has been primarily fed with expressed breast milk (no formula).

It has been a difficult few months of having him constantly fight feeds, in and out of hospital & on and off Gaviscon & Omeprazole.

He consistently falls below his daily food quota (minimum target is 720ml and he has between 600-700 usually.

At 1 month he had dropped to 16th Percentile, at 2 months down to 6th & now just as he’s turning 3 months he’s down to 1st Percentile.

The doctors, health visitors & midwives are not worried currently as he is otherwise healthy. He is very active throughout the day, has been smiling since 1 month old, started rolling back to front at 2.5 months old and generally outside of feeding times is a very alert, happy baby and seems to be hitting all his developmental targets.

He also has plenty of wet nappies each day and does at least 1 dirty nappy each day too.

Has anyone else experienced this? It’s been a constant worry for us since birth

My son is 8 months old. His mother and I are no longer together and are working out a parenting schedule. Her position is that overnights away from the primary home are not developmentally appropriate at this age, that he needs the consistency of one sleep environment, and that this is what’s in his best interest. She created these milestones and routine on her own based on her own research without me as soon as we split and I had the assumption I was getting 50%.

For context on caregiving history: I was involved throughout the pregnancy and have been an active hands-on parent since he was born, including a large share of the day-to-day care. He is no longer breastfeeding. This isn’t a case of an absent parent asking for overnights out of nowhere.

I’m currently only allowed to see him once a week for roughly about six hours.

My husband took our 5-day old to his first pediatrician visit today and they said a dimple with hair were two markers for concern. He has an ultrasound scheduled for next week. I’ve of course spent the day googling and crying because I wasn’t diligent with my pre-Natals nor folic acid this pregnancy and feel like this could have been avoided.

My question is, is it almost always a sign of spina bifida occulta or a tethered cord? Are there times where it’s actually truly nothing or is having both markers pretty much a done deal? Nothing was caught in pregnancy sonograms so I’m extra caught off guard but yeah, sorry, just rambling now.

Our newborn is now one month old and is often times very fussy. We believe it might sometimes be because he is hungry, but we are wondering how much is too much feeding.

We are feeding only breastmilk (either directly from the breast or expressed). He tends to feed around 3-4h, with roughly 7 meals a day.

When he was around 2 weeks old he used to eat for around 25minutes from the breast (stopping on his own) or around 80ml from the bottle. Then he started getting more and more fussy, and we saw he kept making hunger signs after a meal (sticking tongue out, sucking noises), especially after bottle.

At 3-4 weeks we ended up already with around 40minutes for breasts and 120ml for the bottle. Now he still seems that often he gets fussy either as soon as we stop feeding or maybe 5-10 minutes later, and often associated with the sucking noises. We did try to weigh him a few times before and after breastfeeding to approximate how much he east at the breast (50-100ml per feeding). But with the bottle, even after 130ml he is sometimes still showing hunger.

Is there "too much"? And why is this only for the bottle? (We are using the smallest teat, the Premature from DR Brown, so he is not eating too fast, otherwise, he was gulping a lot).

I have seen varying information and am trying to find how effective the MMR against measles is when administered at 6 months. I understand it is believed to have better efficacy at the 9 month mark, but am looking for numbers at 6 months. TIA

My babies is five months old on Sunday and he started rolling from stomach to back maybe three or four weeks ago and he’s probably done it about 8 to 9 times altogether.

Maybe even slightly more but it’s not daily like today was the first time he rolled in about two days two days ago. Maybe he went a couple of days without it as well. The other week he went a whole week without doing it.
Not sure if I should say his met this
Milestone or not.

I am a first time mom to a 4 month old baby boy. We chose not to circumcise. I was under the impression that the way to take care of his penis was to basically treat it like a finger when washing and never pull back on the foreskin.

At our four month visit the doctor pulled his foreskin back and told me that she could tell I wasn’t doing that because it looked like the skin was fusing together over the penis. It did not look like that to me and I felt really uncomfortable when she pulled the skin back. She said I should be doing this once a day but not in a forceful way. Again, I was under the impression that I should not be doing that ever and that as he grew up it would loosen on its own.

I have had negative feelings about the pediatrician before, like with her opinions around breastfeeding and getting upset with me when I told her we were combo feeding and how she made me feel like a failure of a mom. I also feel she has been pushy about circumcision, where when I said that we were not planning to she said it is cleaner to.

I want to find a new pediatrician for him for reasons other than the foreskin advice, but because of that I was wondering what the protocol is that is best. Should I be pulling back his foreskin at all?

hi
earlier today my friend came over to hang out w me and my baby. i have rules everyone has to follow but the biggest one is no kissing baby. she knows, respects, and has talked to me about agreeing w the decision not to do that. well, i was cleaning up the dinner we had when i turned around and she said "im giving her water from the glass"... HER glass. i froze in the moment and i just said ok. at that point she was already doing it and im terrible at confrontation especially w someone who has genuinely never broken any of my boundaries in the six years ive known them! this obviously wasnt malicious and she is one of my greatest friends but makes me very scared for my baby as far as herpes and cold sores go. can anyone find studies or links to ease my nerves? should i take her to the doctor in the morning? my friend didnt have any visible sores but that doesnt mean they arent inside her mouth. its very early in the morning now so i do plan on asking her some very open questions abt whether or not she does get coldsores in a bit but im freaking out:/ i do not get cold sores and would be so sad if this one instance where i was so careless costed my baby:/

My 3 mo old has been diagnosed with Torticollis and we’ve had our first PT appointment. We’re doing the recommended stretches at home however, I’m at a loss of what positions she can be in throughout the day. At 3 months, she’s too young to sit, it’s not recommended to have her lay on her back during the day, and I can’t hold her the entire day. We’re working on tummy time but can only stay for 5 min sessions before she becomes frustrated and cries.
Any recommendations or advice would be greatly appreciated.

I am looking for a good brand of omega-3 fish oils for my kiddo but I'm having a difficult time finding the right brand.

•Oil drops (no gummies)

•No added flavors or extra stuff

That's all I want. But finding a brand has been difficult

Hello everyone!

I have studied Chinese for a total of ten years, and lived in China for four. I am mostly fluent but as everyone may know, Chinese is a difficult language and I definitely am nowhere near native fluency but have no difficulty communicating in friendship and daily life.

Everyone I know wants me to teach my kids (2yo and 4yo) Chinese but I have avoided it so far because I'm afraid of teaching them my grammatical errors and pronunciation errors.

Is there still a benefit to reading to my kids in Chinese and doing Chinese songs etc if I am not natively fluent?

I was wondering if anyone has any input into difference for a baby in day care vs being cared for by family.

I am in the very fortunate position that when I return to work following maternity (my daughter will be just over 12 months at the time) my parents in law and my mum are gonna support with childcare meaning my daughter will be with them for 3 days, me 1 day and my husband 1 day.

So far they have all been very respectful of our parenting decisions I.e. no screen time and food and nutrition.

My question is - is she missing out on anything by not being around other babies and children?

Ideally I want to keep the family care until school around 4 years old.

Thanks in advance!