Consequences of Stress on Children's Development

Poverty affects children on a global level, not just children of the United States. As a young child, I was raised by my single grandpa. He by no means could afford to pay for me and my three siblings. He had to rely on his Social Security Income, and his retirement just to pay the rent. I remember him also having to spend all day in the local Welfare office to apply for food stamps for us. Although, we were at the low-income level, we still had food in the fridge and clean clothes. There are many things that I remember when I was a young child- like not having the cool or hip clothes that my friends had, or more than three pairs of shoes, but I had family, happiness, and parental guidance. One of the ways that I dealt with our hardship was to make friends at school and not to let my financial hardships embarrass me. I remember my friends telling me that they loved to come to my house because my grandpa made the best beans and rice ever. They never judged me for my clothes or shoes, my friends came over and we played, and some even spend the night. Japan is one of the biggest financial powerhouses in the world, but they still suffer from poverty. Not only parents suffer from economic burden, but children are the ones who suffer the most. According to Masanori Matsumura, “a primary school teacher for 30 years, a growing number of children in Japan today cannot even afford classroom supplies "such as paints or craft materials." He adds, "The expanding poverty is hitting the most vulnerable victims – children." (Murakami, M. 2010). Parents are having to work more than one job just to make ends meet, which leads to parents not having time to spend with their children. “Children grow frustrated – even turn violent in some cases – when their parents are not around to take care of them because of the resulting neglect by parents” (Murakami, M. 2010). There are other consequences to being poverty level as well. Parents cannot provide for school lunches or pay for health insurance, which leads to poor health. “The local media, for instance, reported that 33,000 children across the nation did not have health insurance” (Murakami, M. 2010). To overcome the issues of poverty, Japan is relying on tourists to spend money at their shops, food, and vacation resorts. “Another policy guarantees free senior high school education for everyone, with the government pledging to pay 120,000 to 240,000 yen (1,287 to 2,574 dollars) for each student, depending on the schools’ and parents’ incomes” (Murakami, M. 2010). Although poverty strikes everyone, there are certain measures that can be done to help allocate for spending, but if children are important enough, society will do everything in their power to ensure a safe and healthy future for the children. References Mutsuko, Murakami. (January 8, 2010). Japan’s rude awakening: Poverty hurts. Retrieved from. (http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=49915).

child Development and Public Health

Today I am going to talk about Breastfeeding and why I feel that it is an important topic relating to public health and healthy child development. Breastfeeding is the best form of nutrition for a child’s first year of life. Breast milk contains all of the important nutrients and antibodies that an infant’s body needs for proper growth and brain development. Breast milk is also convenient because there are no bottles to carry around and it is always warm and ready to eat. Breast milk offers a mother and her baby a time to bond because of the closeness and interacting involved in breastfeeding. “Babies who are exclusively breast-fed are less likely to get sick, because breast milk provides them with antibodies against any disease to which the mother is immune” (Berger, 2009, p. 154). As a currently breastfeeding mother, I feel that I am offering my baby Sophia with the most nutritious meals that I can offer her. I have always wanted to breastfeed. I have had difficulty with breastfeeding my first daughter due to hospitalization and her death in 1996, my second daughter was an emergency cesarean and she wanted nothing to do with the breast. As I have successfully been breastfeeding for 8 months now, I have learned a great deal about the benefits as well as, the dedication to my child. Breastfeeding requires a lot of time and patience because there is no given time to complete a task when you have a hungry baby. But the closeness and bond that comes out of breastfeeding is the greatest gift one can be blessed with. I would never trade it for the world. In other countries, where majority of the population is at risk for HIV, breastfeeding may not be the best for the baby. “Other researchers find that bottle-feeding may sometimes be better, such as when the mother is HIV-positive or uses toxic or addictive drugs” (Berger, 2009). In Africa, where mothers may have HIV it is sometimes encouraged because the risk of contracting the disease is “less than their risk of dying from infections, diarrhea, or malnutrition as a result of occasional bottle feeding (Cohen, 2007). Information such as breastfeeding can impact my future work because breastfed babies tend to be sick less often and their immune systems are stronger. Also, it is important to learn about the benefits of breastfeeding to help parents to create better bonds with their infants and to offer their babies all of the nutrition that they need. I feel that having information about breastfeeding is important to share with others so they can raise their children via breastfeeding to reduce infant mortality, obesity, heart disease, and various other killers in children. References Cohen, Jon. (2007, March 9). Hope on new AIDS drugs, but breast-feeding strategy back-fires. Science, 317, 1315-1317. Berger, K. S. (2009). The developing person through childhood (5th ed.). New York, NY: Worth Publishers.

Childbirth here and elsewhere

My first birthing experience was a rather traumatic one. I was 17 years old and was having contractions at 35 weeks pregnant. The doctors told me that it was false labor because I was 5 weeks early. They sent me home after telling me that I was one cm dilated and once the shot they gave me to stop the contractions started to work. Later that evening I was sitting down to eat dinner that I prepared for me and my husband at the time and a sudden pain started again. This time it lasted for a day and a half. I timed my contractions and went to the hospital once they were 5 minutes apart. The doctors hooked me up to the monitors and measured my contractions. After one hour of monitoring I went from 2 cm dilated to 8 cm. it was now time to have my very first baby. I was in a hospital in California, which included a private birthing room. I was placed on a birthing bed, and my feet were strapped to stirrups. The nurses gave me an episiotomy and I did not have any medications or pain relief due to the fact that I was already in the later stages of labor. It was 11 pm and they called the Doctor on call to come and deliver my baby. The doctor performed the incision so I wouldn’t tear while performing natural childbirth. After about thirty minutes of pushing Anna Marie came out. At first the doctors were not sure if her feet or he head was coming out first. That alarmed me. Anna was born with her skin peeled off from head to toe. She was bald and had no fingernails and eyelashes. She was rushed to the ICU and treated as a burn victim. She only weighed 5lbs. 8 oz. and she was determined to have a rare skin disorder. She was then transported the next day to Children’s Hospital LA, where they placed her in Neonatal ICU solitary unit. She then passed away three and a half weeks later due to an infection that lead to her heart. Anna Marie’s skin biopsies were stored for future testing in case any other children would be born with the rare skin disorder. Anna’s case was a rare and unique one because further findings were that there was no disease known to man that was exactly like my Anna. I laid her to rest in the family cemetery and have had two more children since. My two little girls now are my blessing from Anna, for I have always wanted to have a daughter of my own to love and hold. The reason I chose to discuss my story about Anna is because I experienced a healthy pregnancy, I ate the right and nutritious foods, I exercised lightly, and I had prenatal care. Anna gave medicine a sample to study and learn from. Anna gave us a little bit of her life to see the world outside the womb, and to greet her mommy and daddy. I feel that her little bit of life gave me strength and knowledge about Child Development in regards to skin diseases and incidents that we have little knowledge of. Feel the world can learn from her and in hopes that no other child will have the same outcome. I performed some research about birthing in Korea. It seems that they have most of the same technology that the US has in birthing. They perform cesareans like the US does. Korea has one unique method of birthing such as a birthing pool. It is only used for non placental deliveries. I feel this is a comfortable way to relieve contractions while getting ready to birth. Korea also performs episiotomies and they have private rooms for the baby to room in but only through private consultations with the Doctor prior to the birth. (http://www.korea4expats.com). I have noticed a few differences with Korean tradition of birthing than with Western procedures. In Korea the husband or father is not present in the birthing room, “Korean births are not always in a private room” (http://www.korea4expats.com). I feel that the birthing experiences in Korea are similar to the US, but the father not being present leads me to believe that the father to child bond is not as strong as in the US or in hospitals that allow fathers to be present. References Korea 4 Expats. com “Having a baby in Korea-Giving Birth” (2011). Retrieved from (http://www.korea4expats.com/article-giving-birth-in-korea.html).