Before getting pregnant, I’d always heard about “that pregnancy glow.” Little did I know that the “pregnancy glow” is caused by increased oil production due to hormone fluctuations. For women who have oily or combination skin, pregnancy can mean a return of acne like you haven’t dealt with since high school.  For some women, pregnancy can be the first time they’ve had to fight acne.

There are a lot of wives’ tales about how to deal with acne, as a clinical trial statistician, I thought I’d help weed through those tales and give you some tips on what has actually been proven to work.

First, you need to know what you are dealing with.  Blackheads (open comedones) and whiteheads (closed comedones or milia) are caused by oil trapped in clogged pores.  Blackheads are exposed to air, causing the clog to oxidize, while whiteheads are covered over with skin.  Pimples are clogged pores where bacteria has entered the clog and is feeding on the oil and dead skin cells, causing pain and irritation.

The main thing needed to fight acne is gentle cleansing and exfoliation.  Harsh cleansing and exfoliation can actually increase oil production in the skin, causing the acne to worsen.  Many cleansers claiming to fight acne actually contain irritating ingredients to make them “feel” like they are working.  Skin care products should not cause your skin to tingle, that isn’t a sign it is working, that is a sign that your skin is irritated.  After cleansing, your skin should feel clean and normal, not dry, tight, or tingly.

Everyone reacts differently to ingredients, but common skincare ingredients that are irritating include: ethanol, denatured alcohol, ethyl alcohol, methanol, benzyl alcohol, isopropyl alcohol, sd alcohol, ascorbic acid, camphor, eucalyptus, menthol and peppermint.

Another common misconception is that eating chocolate causes acne.  There is no evidence to back this up, but there is some recent evidence that high glycemic index foods may increase acne.  If you find excluding a certain food works for you, then it may be possible that you have a sensitivity to that food.

Eating well and staying hydrated improves skin function, which can have an affect on acne, so it is important to drink enough water and eat a healthy balanced diet high in antioxidant rich foods.

Recommended skin care routine:

1. Use a gentle, water-soluble cleanser. I recommend using cleansers formulated for sensitive skin rather than for oily or acne-prone skin, as they tend to not include irritating or harsh ingredients.  I don’t recommend bar soaps, as the ingredients used to keep the soap in bar form can clog pores.  A few cleansers I recommend are: Boots Expert Sensitive Gentle Cleansing Wash, Olay Foaming Face Wash for Sensitive Skin, Paula’s Choice One Step Facial Cleanser for Normal to Oily/Combination Skin, and The Body Shop Aloe Gentle Face Wash for Sensitive Skin.  These aren’t the only good cleansers out there, look for fragrance- and dye-free cleansers without irritating ingredients.  If you have body acne, use a wash cloth to wash the affected areas morning and evening.
2. Exfoliate. Topical scrubs are often harsh, look for a gentle one, or just gently massage skin with a damp washcloth.  BHAs, or salicylic acids, are the best chemical exfoliants for acne-prone skin.  Some people may be concerned because BHAs are related to aspirin (which is verboten during pregnancy), but the amount absorbed through the skin into the blood stream is negligible.  I like Paula’s Choice 2% Beta Hydroxy Acid Liquid because you can buy a pump spray from the site to screw onto the bottle, allowing you to spray the liquid onto hard to reach areas like the back.
3. Topical disinfectant. There is no need to use a topical disinfectant if you only have blackheads or whiteheads, since there is no bacteria involved in these blockages, but if you are fighting pimples, you will want to include a topical disinfectant in your skin care regime.  Benzoyl peroxide and tea tree oil have both been shown to effectively disinfect the skin, with benzoyl peroxide being found more effective than tea tree oil.
4. Remove blockages. Gently removing blackheads, whiteheads and pimples manually is pretty much the only way of quickly getting rid of them.  The key word in that sentence is gently.  You can get a facial from a licensed esthetican who does extractions.  You can also buy a comedone extractor tool to do this yourself at home, or you can cover two fingertips with tissues and gently squeeze the pore to release the blockage.  Just be sure not to be too overzealous removing blockages.  If it doesn’t budge with gentle pressure, it should not be removed.  You don’t want to damage the surrounding skin or cause an infection in the pore.
5. Sun exposure. One of the treatments German doctors recommended for fighting acne is 15 minutes of unprotected sun exposure every day until the acne gets under control.  Light therapy is a legitimate treatment for acne, although in the US, it is generally done with lasers.  During my last pregnancy, while gentle cleansing and exfoliation helped, it wasn’t until I tried the sun exposure treatment that I completely rid myself of body acne.  Germany is at a fairly northern latitude, so if you live nearer the equator, I would recommend lowering the time of unprotected sun exposure. Only you can decide if you’re willing to risk sun exposure.  Personally, I felt, given that I am of southeast Asian descent, have a medium skin tone, don’t burn hardly at all, and given the limited time I would be doing it (just a few weeks), that it was an acceptable risk for me.

For advice fighting non-pregnancy related outbreaks, there are other options available, I would recommend reading Paula Begoun’s advice on fighting acne at any age.  She also has a great blog post on how to correctly pop a pimple.

Are you dealing with acne?  Do you have any advice?

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I have been thinking long and hard about posting about this very delicate subject. It works different for everyone. It took us now just over two months to get to the point where I can say with reasonable confidence that we have made it! Our daughter not only wear no nappies during the day, but she also has minimal little accidents. She still wear nappies during the night, though, and may be wearing them at night for a little while longer.

My daughter is just over 30 months old now and goes to daycare three mornings a week. In September she will start going to Kindergarten every morning. She has to be dry and clean by then. This is one of my Kindergarten’s rules.

So, when the daycare said; just before Easter weekend; that they would start taking the nappy off once she gets there in the mornings, after Easter, we decided to take the challenge up ourselves! I ordered a book called Potty Training in one week by a British Childcare Author called Gina Ford. Now, I have to be honest and say that I did actually think that we could do it in one week! My husband was to be home from the Thursday through to the Monday, with my daughter home from the Wednesday afternoon through to the Tuesday evening after… We read the book and I thought and still think it is a good guide.

Gina Ford gives advice to start thinking of toilet training a toddler once they are 18 months old. She does state not to start before they show the signs and levels of ability that would indicate if the toddler is ready for potty/toilet training. These are:

1. He/she is over 18 months of age
2. His/her nappy is often dry when he/she gets up from a nap or when the nappy stays dry for a couple of hours.
3. He/she is aware when doing a poo. Look out for things like a toddler going very quiet or starting to concentrate on nothing definite; pointing to his/her nappy or says poo or pee pee once he/she has done it.
4. He/she can understand and follow simple instructions.
5. He/she is eager to participate in taking off his/her own clothes and understands what pulling up or down means.
6. Can point to body parts when you name them.
7. He/she has the ability to sit still and occupy him-/herself for 5 to ten minutes with a toy, book or a video.

Gina say to not start training if your toddler does not show all these signs. Also, don’t start training your toddler if you are moving within a few weeks or having another baby or if any life changing things may happen in your household.  And do not potty train your toddler on holiday!

Furthermore  Gina Ford advices to put time apart for specifically training your toddler and not having any other obligations or commitments. To limit outings at least the first few days and to try not to use the telephone.

This is why we decided to potty train our daughter straight away. She showed all the signs and it was summer so we thaught she would not get too cold if she was wet and it would be less clothes to wash! Less layers to pull up and down for her also. As number two is on the way it would also be a good idea to get our daughter trained well in advance of the baby being born and her starting kindergarten.

We got the potty, we got the toilet seat and I also found Gina Ford’s advice on getting some other things ready very helpful. These were:

1. Two potties, that is if you have two bathrooms… Keep them handy and you don’t have to rush around… (Get your toddler to pick them)
2. Child’s toilet seat. These are designed to fit onto normal toilet seats but makes the set smaller for little bottoms… (I once forgot to put the seat on the toilet for my daughter… poor girl sunk well down into the toilet bowl! She was ok and dry, but I felt really bad about it but happy that I had just cleaned the toilet!)
3. A Cushion covered with a polythene bag and then a removable cover (I used a old folded towel) to use in the pushchair or car seat or when every you are going out… In case of accidents! Gina says that if you make it a special cushion, the child is less likely to think of it as a safety net and more likely to try to keep it dry… Well, my daughter never needed it until now…
4. Eight pairs of underpants and shorts - basically eight changes of clothes - per day!!! Elasticated is best and wide enough for toddler hands to pull down. Gina advises not using pull-up nappies as this may confuse toddlers… So I went for the eight pairs… Remember to only use easy clothing too. No vests with poppers or dungarees or trousers with belts! Speed in taking clothes off is important!
5. Books, video’s, stickers, small toys. Anything that you can keep together and that would occupy your child for a length of time. I found that things my daughter has not seen or played with for a while was better. Keeping these away and offering one item at a time is good too. My daughter got confused if she had too much at a time so she lost interest all together.
6. A star chart. A star for a use of the potty and a big star for several times because your toddler is so clever… This did not interest my daughter at all! We had to use a different method for making her feel she had done something special… More about this later.
7. Face cloths for drying small hands on. This is easier for toddlers to use. If they are printed with cartoons or something your toddler like, even better.
8. A Booster step to help short legs reach the loo seat. Be careful choosing this. I got just the first one I could find, but it was far from high enough! My daughter is quite tall and I would not say our toilet is high, but she could not reach! In the end I gave her the ”Tummy Tub Two step stool” I had gotten together with the “Tummy Tub” for baby number two. This works perfect as it even has two heights. She likes it for its bright design and it has storage for a special toy…
9. Two buckets. One for wet clothes - filled with cold, soapy water. The other filled with lukewarm water and a bit of mild disinfectant to clean any misses.
10. A towel kept under the potty and around the potty was useful to me.
11. I kept several pieces of cloth available to dry up any misses.
12. Wet wipes, baby wipes or even better flush able toilet wipes designed for toddlers as well as facial tissues for wiping little bottoms.

We started with taking our daughter with us to the loo and letting her sit on the potty with her clothes and nappy on. We allowed her to watch as we demonstrated what happens and we described what we did. We used simple language, not using complicated words. It helped using words other people use too and that she may have heard before.

Then we started showing her what wet and dry was. Letting her play with wet and dry clothes and telling her when she was making a cloth wet with water etc. Just chatting to our daughter when we were doing every day things like washing and drying our hands helped.

It didn’t take our daughter long to understand these things. She quickly wanted her nappy off when sitting on the potty. Although nothing happened most of the times, we moved on to stage two - this is when the long weekend started and my husband was at home so he could help.

On day one we just let her run around in one room. She didn’t much want to wear any clothes and we let her run around without. We kept all her favourites together and kept her occupied in the same room. This helped us not to have to run around too much with buckets and potties etc. We kind of got a little area ready for the potty with everything around it. A little throne room!!! We kept drinks at hand to give her at regular intervals.

We kept asking her if she wanted to sit on the potty and took her to the potty every 10 minutes. Sometimes she used it straight away and we made a big fuss about her being such a big girl and using the potty. Sometimes it took 10 minutes and other times she would sit there for ten minutes and get up just to wet the floor… We never got angry at her for missing the potty or getting to it too late. We never made what she did look dirty or disgusting. We tried to make her feel proud of it. Never said it was smelly or horrible. It is important not to make little ones feel they are doing something that isn’t acceptable. Using insensitive words or actions could put a toddler off using the potty.

By late in the afternoon we felt quite tired and felt that we could just not continue and needed to get fresh air. We put a nappy on our daughter and took her to the park, quite against Gina Ford’s advice of not giving up half way through as it could confuse a little toddler. As it happened, she stayed dry all the time and we got a breather.

On day two we started again. We got everything together and started giving our daughter stars for every triumph. Soon we realised she could just not be bothered by the stars, however shiny and bright they were! She started “acting out” when we took her to the potty so we read the “troubleshooting” part of the book and decided to give her a small treat for every triumph… quite against our nature… We do not believe in teaching our daughter that she would get something for being good or doing something we want her to do. This worked. Later she asked for the treat and we said only if she used the potty. Then she would ask for the treat afterwards and once she was using the potty most of the times, the treats simply ran out! This only worked because she was not used to getting treats as a normal part of her day. She really was not used to sweet treats…

By day 3 we could see a definate positive turn. Our Daughter started using the potty at regular intervals with us just reminding her to use it if she needed it. At the end of the day she was very red in the face when she forgot to go to the potty and had wet herself. Throughout training our daughter to use the potty, we would take turns at taking breaks so that neither of us got too tired or disheartened by accidents.

When it was time to go back to childcare on the Wednesday, we didn’t put a nappy on our daughter. We had put the towel in the buggy for her to sit on and it was dry by the time we got to the daycare. There they kept her out of a nappy and she was dry all day.

Since then we always kept a change of clothes and wet wipes as well as a plastic bag on hand. Sometimes we needed two changes until we got to the point of rare accidents. It was more the poo that she had a hard time with. It felt as if she just did not understand the way it had to happen. My daughter kept doing it in her pants. Not on purpose but just because she just did not understand that she had to work to get it done sometimes. She did not understand that she had to push. Maybe she was a little constipated too. So we kept an eye on her when she got quiet and when it was due to happen and took her to the toilet. Most of the times, she would sit there and get up, not doing it. Sometimes she would run to the toilet just to pass wind. Then she realised that nothing really happened… Sometimes it took two days or longer for her to have a poo. I got worried and even thaught of putting her back into nappies to see if it would help. It may in some cases help. We gave her more fruit and fibre. We limited dried apples and bananas as well as any refined foods.

Then, just a couple of days ago, her face got red again and she seemed to be beginning to do the poo in her pants again… I jumped up and asked her to go do it on the toilet. She ran to the toilet and did it on the toilet! She proudly told her dad that it had happened. Then the next day the same thing happened again. Slowly I am getting less worried that she would be dry and clean every day. Yes, our daughter still sleep with a nappy every night, but she wakes up most mornings asking for her potty. Most of the time her nappy would be dry. Some nights she would wake up asking for it. We try not to give her a big drink within two hours of her going to bed and if she has one, it would be only a sip of water. This hepls with the waking during the night as she usually slept through the night.

At the moment, our daughter still wakes up really early to use the toilet and wants us to help her. So she wakes up fully and does not go back to sleep. It does not help that it is already light outside by 5:00 in the morning… Hopefully this will change some time…

I liked having Potty Training in one Week by Gina Ford. I believe it helped us a lot. The little book is not expensive and has some really good advice. There is plenty of examples and advice for when things isn’t going to plan. Gina Ford does not guarantee potty training in one week, just says that it could be possible. Well, it didn’t happen for us, however hard we worked at it. I would refer any of my friends to the book for help with potty training.

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Coming soon to a store near you!

Boon has a preview of their upcoming new additions to their bath line.  There are quite a few interesting and unique bath toys shown in their Facebook gallery.  Boon will be selling rubber ducks that are PVC, phthalate and bpa free, and the item I am probably most interested in, Scrubble (shown above).  The Scrubble squirts water, but unlike other similar products, the Boon version comes apart to dry. The tops and bottoms are also interchangeable. 

More to come, I am sure!

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I’ve been trying to live a greener life, so in that spirit, I figured it was time to give up all the tampons and sanitary pads I was throwing away every month and try out one of the reusable menstrual cups that are on the market. While the DivaCup is quite popular among Americans, I chose the Mooncup, because it is manufactured in Europe.

The Mooncup is made of medical grade silicone and is inserted into the vagina like a tampon. It then collects the menstrual flow in its 1 ounce (30mL) cup, which is about a third of the entire typical menstrual flow. You should be able to get by with emptying it every 5 to 8 hours, as it holds quite a bit more than a tampon would. When dumping out the cup, you can clean it with mild soap and water, or if it’s not convenient, just rinse it with water or wipe it clean with some toilet paper. It should be more thoroughly cleaned though in between periods.

The first time I tried the Mooncup, it took me a couple tries before I got it in place properly, but that was really the only time I had problems with placement. It was uncomfortable at first, but you are supposed to trim the stem gradually until you get the right fit. I cut half off, then ended up cutting off the whole stem. During the first few days, I was aware of it, similar to how it feels when a tampon has moved out of the proper position and is sitting low in the vagina. With regards to mess, I don’t think it made any more of a mess than using a tampon, especially if you are not flushing the tampon (which you really shouldn’t do), but are wrapping it and disposing it in the trash.

I knew I had a heavy flow, the website says most women have a flow between 2-4 ounces, so I figured I’d be at the upper end of the chart. Well, whoa Nelly, I learned a lot about my period in my week-long trial. I learned that I’m off the chart there. During my heavy flow, I wasn’t able to go all night without leakage. During the day I was having to empty the cup every 2-3 hours. Instead of being completely horrified by this (which you may be right now, too much information?), I found it kind of empowering. I’m a science/biology geek, so getting this in touch with my body was pretty fascinating. Then again, I can see that if you’re the squeamish sort, this might be a hard product to get used to using.

I will never use a tampon again. I’ll still probably need a couple pads every month as backup on my heavy days, but outside of those days, I wasn’t using any backup at all, and it was wonderful. I highly recommend this product to every menstruating woman. Not only is it less hassle than dealing with pads and tampons, it’s better for the environment. A couple of other pluses: you can go to a nude sauna during your period without worrying about about the tampon string showing, and if you have pets in the house, you don’t have to worry about them going through the trash and tearing up your used sanitary pads.

The Mooncup can be ordered in Europe for 20 Pounds (or 25 Euro) from Mooncup.co.uk, and in the US for $22.90 from Amazon.com

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Ever wish there was a portable solution for washing up when you don’t have access to soap and water?  Well there is and it’s great on sticky hands and ice cream smeared faces alike.

MomSpit is an alcohol free moussing liquid designed to clean, moisturize and lift your senses with its fresh scent and dirt removing magic. Inspired by the original, it’s made to clean those dirt disasters when you’re not near a kitchen or bathroom sink.

MomSpit is available in the US, Canada and the Bahamas.

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