If you’re in the middle of dealing with an infant with colic, you probably think that the phrase “good news” does not belong anywhere on the same page with the word “colic,” but it does. We all know that colic is not easy to go through, not for the baby and even less so for the frazzled mother.

But there is good news in the midst of this. The good news is that your baby, even though she’s been crying for hours on end and will likely go through the same routine several times per week at roughly the same time of night until she’s about four months old has absolutely nothing seriously wrong with her.

Doctors have no real clue concerning what causes colic. Some theorize that it may have something to do with intestinal distress, while others think it may be caused by the lack of stimulation for a newborn baby outside of the womb compared to the constant stimulation she enjoyed while she was tucked all snug and warm inside your tummy.

Btu experts all pretty much agree on one thing: colic is nothing to worry about. Most experts these days tend to agree that colic is just the extreme side of what is normal for a healthy baby. In other words, they figure that all babies do a good amount of crying, and colicky babies simply excel at it.

In other words, even if your baby does have colic, she is perfectly normal. Even if we grant you that colic isn’t “normal,” per se, you would have to agree that any condition which affects 1 out of every 4 babies is fairly commonplace, and not something to be terribly worried about if it doesn’t threaten life or limb (and it doesn’t).

Of course, the fact that colic is relatively normal doesn’t make it any easier to go through. There is much good advice available on the subject of surviving colic, and we won’t repeat it all here. Suffice it to say that you will only have to ride the storm out for a few weeks, and then colic will pass forever into the rearview mirror.

When you ask this question, you need to realize one fact before you go any farther: for some pregnancies, you simply cannot prevent stretch marks. Around 50% of women get stretch marks due to pregnancy, no matter what they do to try to prevent them.

Just because stretch marks are likely doesn’t mean you shouldn’t attempt to keep them from appearing, however. While you might not be able to keep them away altogether, there are a few things you can do to reduce the risk of getting stretch marks, or at least their severity:

• Understand what causes them. Stretch marks come from – you guessed it – your skin stretching beyond its normal boundaries in a relatively quick period of time.
• Control the pace of your pregnancy weight gain. If possible, try to spread your weight gain out over your pregnancy. Obviously, you can’t control how fast your baby grows, but you can eat a healthy diet and talk with your doctor about the pace of your weight gain.
• Some herbal remedies can help. There are herbal mixtures made up of things like cocoa butter, Vitamin E, and chamomile that may, in some cases, help prevent your stretch marks. These remedies can, even if they don’t prevent stretch marks, help your body recover from them, and help them to be less visible to the eye over time.
• Moisturize. There are even moisturizing creams that are aimed specifically at helping with stretch marks. Often, they use some of the same herbal remedies mentioned above.
• Eat a balanced and healthy diet. This will help to keep your skin strong and healthy. Healthy skin is better able to stretch, expand, and contract. It won’t prevent them altogether, but it might help reduce the severity of your stretch marks.

None of these steps are guaranteed to keep you from getting stretch marks. Often, they just come with the territory of being pregnant. However, if you follow these tips, you do reduce your risk, and you will probably find that your own stretch marks aren’t nearly as severe as they might have otherwise wound up being.

If there’s one thing that we truly know about babies it is that they like to suck. A baby comforting herself via sucking on her thumb is so common as to be cliché. From the beginning of time, babies have been sucking their thumbs as a means of comfort. It’s normal and natural for babies to do this, and it’s not unusual by any means.

While the thumb has been around for a long time, the pacifier is a relatively new occurrence. Babies can also use a pacifier to help themselves calm down. The modern idea of the pacifier has been around for more than a century, appearing in the early 1900s. Before that, parents would use any number of materials for baby to suck on, including things like cloth and even silver.

For many babies, sucking is comforting. A baby’s instinct is to suckle when he’s hungry, of course, but also when he is tired or when he is stressed. Most infants will fall asleep suckling. When babies get older, sucking can still help to soothe. You can’t and shouldn’t feed a baby every time he tries to suckle, because sometimes he’s not hungry but rather just needs comfort.

Most of the time sucking on a thumb or a pacifier won’t cause any permanent damage. Most dentists believe that there’s no danger to the teeth unless your child is still sucking by the age of four years old or so. If that’s the case, you might think about doing something to break the sucking habit.

Experts aren’t always in agreement about whether sucking a thumb or sucking a pacifier is better for your baby. Chances are pretty good your baby prefers one or the other anyways. While there is some evidence to suggest that thumb suckers may maintain the habit longer than babies that use pacifiers, it isn’t set in stone. There is also some research that suggests a pacifier at nap time may reduce the risk of SIDS, although more research in that area is needed.

If you’re concerned about your baby’s sucking habits, talk to your pediatrician. She may be able to offer some helpful advice.