Health
Vernix on Your Newborn: Why It's There and What to Do With It
Most newborns arrive with some amount of waxy white coating on them — sometimes a thin film, sometimes thick deposits in the creases and the hair. It...
4 min read
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Showing articles tagged with: #birth
19 articles found
Health
What the Apgar Score Shows: How Newborns Are Assessed at Birth
Within minutes of a baby's birth, a midwife or doctor assigns an Apgar score. Most parents hear the number mentioned and have some sense it's a pass o...
3 min read
Parenting
Parenting After a Traumatic Birth
The birth was supposed to be the start of something joyful. For around one in twenty women — and many more after specific complications — it instead b...
12 min read
Health
Your Newborn's First Examination (NIPE): What They're Actually Checking
In the first three days of your baby's life, a clinician will do a careful, structured examination of them — the NIPE. It looks like a relaxed top-to-...
7 min read
Health
The Apgar Score: What It Measures and What It Means
If you watched closely in the moments after your baby was born, you may have noticed the midwife or paediatrician doing a quiet count and writing some...
5 min read
Family Life
Raising Twins: Development, Bonding, and Practical Realities
Twins are not "two babies" in the parenting sense — they are a different category of operation. Two simultaneous wakings at 3am. Two simultaneous napp...
10 min read
Parenting
How Partners Can Prepare for Labour and Birth
The role of a birth partner has been studied unusually carefully, and the conclusion is more concrete than most "be supportive" advice would suggest:...
6 min read
Parenting
Returning to Exercise After Having a Baby: A Guide to Postnatal Fitness
The messaging around returning to exercise after having a baby is inconsistent and often unhelpfully rushed: social media celebrates mothers "bouncing...
4 min read
Parenting
Perineal Tears and Episiotomy: Recovery After a Vaginal Birth
The perineum is the area between the vaginal opening and the anus, and perineal tears during birth are among the most common birth-related injuries —...
4 min read
Parenting
Pelvic Floor Recovery After Birth: Why It Matters and How to Help It
Pelvic floor dysfunction after childbirth is one of the most undertreated conditions in postnatal women — partly because it is normalised ("of course...
4 min read
Health
Newborn Weight Loss and Regain: What's Normal and When to Act
Almost every newborn loses weight in the first week, and almost every parent worries about it. Here's the short version: up to 10% of birth weight is...
6 min read
Health
Monitoring Newborn Weight: Loss, Regain, and the Numbers That Matter
The number on the scales gets more attention than it deserves and less context than it needs. A single weight tells you almost nothing; a trend across...
6 min read
Parenting
Signs of Labour: How to Know When It's Starting and When to Call
There are two opposite fears about going into labour and almost everyone has both. One is showing up at the hospital after the first twinge and being...
9 min read
Parenting
Pain Relief in Labour: All the Options Explained
There is a particular tone in some antenatal preparation that suggests labour, with the right breathing and the right mindset, will be challenging but...
11 min read
Parenting
Gestational Diabetes: Diagnosis, Management, and What It Means for Your Baby
Gestational diabetes is one of the more common complications of pregnancy, and one of the more consistently misunderstood. The diagnosis comes from a...
5 min read
Parenting
Fathers and Partners at Birth: The Experience, Emotions, and Aftermath
The standard antenatal class spends roughly five hours on what the labouring person will experience and roughly five minutes on what the partner will...
13 min read
Parenting
Birth Options and Choices: Understanding Your Maternity Care Pathway
The argument is sometimes framed as natural birth versus medical birth, which is not a useful framing for actually choosing where to have a baby. The...
7 min read
Parenting
Birth Trauma: When Childbirth Leaves Lasting Harm
Birth trauma is one of the most underrecognised experiences in the postnatal period. It sits uncomfortably between two cultural messages: the high sig...
6 min read
Parenting
Writing a Birth Plan: What to Include and Why It Matters
"Birth plan" is a phrase some healthcare staff have learned to greet with a slightly raised eyebrow, having seen plans that don't survive contact with...
5 min read