One year ago today we posted our first blog post Maiden Voyage and what an adventure it has been! In honor of Two Peds in a Pod’s first birthday we reprint Dr. Kardos’s post “Let ‘Em Eat Cake”:

After completing my pediatric training, I worked for a couple of years in a large pediatric office before I had any children of my own. I was always struck by the Life Event of a child’s first birthday. This milestone carries so much meaning and emotion for families. My patients’ parents described huge birthday parties with characters such as Elmo walking around or Moon Bounces, large catered affairs with numerous friends, family members, and entire neighborhoods. Often I would see a child sick in my office a few days before such an event with parents who were panicked that their child might be sick on his Big Day, or I would see a child for his one year well check and hear many details about the enormous party. Of course I also saw plenty of children a few days after their first birthday party who became ill, most likely, from a well-intentioned friend or relative who was already sick and passed the illness on to the birthday child at the party. I heard about the kids who clapped for the Happy Birthday song and kids who cried and one who vomited from excitement… all over the birthday cake. Many of my patients had their first full blown temper tantrum during their own over-stimulating first birthday party.

I remember not quite understanding why parents go through such effort and expense to throw a party that their child will never remember at a developmental stage where 99 percent of children are having stranger anxiety and separation anxiety. Well meaning famillies would often forgo daily routine to skip naps, eat at erratic times, and then expect their birthday child to perform in front of a large crowd singing loudly at them. “My husband and I will do it differently,” I would tell myself.

Now, three of my own children later, I must apologize for not quite understanding about that first birthday. I remember waking up on the day my oldest turned one year. My pediatrician brain first exclaimed “Hurray! No more SIDS risk!” Then my mommy brain took over, “Ohmygosh, I survived the first year of parenthood!” This day is about Celebration of the Parent. I finally understood completely why my patients’ parents needed all the hoopla.

Because I am actually a little uncomfortable in large crowds, my son’s first birthday party included all close relatives who lived nearby, people he was well familiarized with. Some pediatric tips I had picked up which I will pass on:

1)      Sing the Happy Birthday song, complete with clapping at the finale, for about one month straight leading up to the birthday. Children love music and hearing a very familiar song sung by a large group is not as overwhelming as hearing an unfamiliar song.

2)      Plan mealtime around your child, not the guests. If you are inviting people close to your heart, they will accommodate. Dinner can be at 5:00pm if that’s when your child usually eats, or have a lunch party that starts midmorning and then end the party in time to allow your child to have his regularly scheduled afternoon nap. Most one-year-olds are usually at their best in the morning anyway.

3)      If your child becomes sick, cancel the party. Your child will not be disappointed because he won’t understand what he is missing. You as parent would have a lousy time anyway because all of your attention will be on your ill child and you will be anxious. Your guests who are parents will appreciate your refraining from making them and their own children sick.

Recently while performing a one-year-old well check I asked about my patient’s birthday party and her parents told me “Oh, we didn’t have a party. It was like any other day, although we did give her a cupcake for dessert.”

Now THIS is a pragmatic approach to parenting because, again, no child will ever have memories of her own first birthday. However, I hope the parents did take time, at least with each other, to congratulate themselves and to feel really good about making it to that huge milestone in their parenting career. I hope they savored their accomplishment as much as their child savored the cupcake.

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How far we’ve come, and it is all thanks to you. We’ve watched with excitement as our readership climbed from two hits (from our husbands) to almost 20,000 hits. Two Peds in a Pod now has email and Facebook subscribers. You can find us through directories such as Technorati and iTunes and recently, Two Peds expanded to the West Coast of the United States with a bimonthly column in Family Magazine Group. Some of our Face book friends hail from Canada and we consistently receive hits from the United Kingdom. Looks like our goal to impact one million kids around the world may not be a far-fetched dream.

Our greatest reward is when people say to us, “That blog post was so helpful.” We are thrilled to reach out to many families.

While our main podcast recording studio continues to be our kitchen table, we also recorded with one mom’s group in their living room and another parenting group in a child care center.  From focus group back out to cyperspace!

We still depend on you to tell other families about our site. Our sources of inspiration continue to be our patients, your children and our own clans. Please keep those topic suggestions coming! As working pediatricians and parents like you, we want to continue to be your reliable (and sometimes amusing) source of sound pediatric information.

Thank you for reading, listening, commenting and letting your friends know about Two Peds in a Pod. Let the adventure continue!

Sincerely,
Julie Kardos, MD and Naline Lai, MD
©2010 Two Peds in a Pod℠

Two Peds in a Pod has made its way from Pennsylvania to California. Check out The Family Magazine Group. This informative print and online group of family magazines now features a bimonthly article from Two Peds in a Pod.  The Family Magazine Group reaches a print audience of 350,000 and an online audience of about 100,000 each month.

(We’re on page 16)

Julie Kardos, MD and Naline Lai, MD

In honor of Father’s Day, we bring you our second “Top Ten” list.

Top ten skills you acquire as a father:

10. The ability to attract swarms of women if you walk in the park or the grocery store with your infant.

9. Tolerance of temperature extremes at the skating rink or on the ball field.

8. Not being completely grossed out by spit up on your nicely pressed shirt.

7. The ability to sit patiently through a 3 hour ballet recital, school music concert or graduation.

6. The ability to sit patiently through an endless one hour television show featuring some sort of dancing and singing animal and then to stand in an hour long line to buy the stuffed toy version of the animal.

5. The skill to coach teams for which you last played the sport twenty years ago.

            4. The ability to swing a child, “again!”, “again!”,  and “again!”

3. The ability not only to get through a day after one (or many) completely interrupted night’s sleep, but to wake up in the morning having forgotten about the interruptions.

2. An ability to seize the moment and create great memories for your child: you ignore the dishes, the garbage, and the dirty bathrooms in lieu of an impromptu wrestling match.

1. Ability to love more than you ever thought possible, and the ability (finally) to understand just how much your father loves you.

Happy Father’s Day from Two Peds in a Pod!

Julie Kardos, MD and Naline Lai, MD

© 2010 Two Peds in a Pod℠

As Mother’s Day approaches, we give you our first Two Peds in a Pod “Top Ten List.” 

Top Ten Skills You Acquire as a Mother

     10)  Not being completely grossed out by another person’s poop.

 9)  Ability to sense the “moment before the vomit” and to hustle your child to the nearest garbage can or toilet before it’s too late.

 8)  Ability to lick your own finger and then use it to clean a smudge completely off your child’s face.

 7)  Ability to get through a day (after day after day) after one (or many) completely interrupted night’s sleep.

 6)  Willingness to show up at work or just go out in public with dried spit-up on your shoulder.

 5)  Ability to use your “momometer” by touching or kissing your child’s forehead to tell if he has a fever (with fair degree of accuracy!).

 4)  Ability to see through walls in order to tell that your child did not wash his hands after using the bathroom.

 3)  Ability to see directly behind you to know that your child is getting into trouble.

 2)  Ability to wield the Magic Kiss that can make any and all boo-boos better.

 1)  Ability to love more than you ever thought possible, and the ability (finally) to understand just how much your mother loves you.

Rejoice in your abilities!

Happy Mother’s Day from Two Peds in a Pod.

Julie Kardos, MD and Naline Lai, MD
©2010 Two Peds in a Pod

For all the kids who received separate seasonal and 2009 H1N1 (Swine flu) vaccines last year, there is good news from Kimberly Parnell, PhD, our favorite flu vaccine vigilant-scientist-mom (see the last H1N1 vaccine blog post). The World Health Organization, who meets on a yearly basis in February to decide on the strains for the upcoming fall’s “flu shot” has decided to roll the new/novel H1N1 into this year’s Northern Hemisphere vaccine. 

Winter flu season … it’s only nine months away !

For more detailed information:

 http://www.who.int/csr/disease/influenza/recommendations2010_11north/en/index.html 

Naline Lai, MD

© 2010 Two Peds in a Pod

Haiti, one of the poorest countries in theWestern Hemisphere, was struck by a devastating earthquake last week.

If you are looking for a way to help the children, consider donating to the American Academy of Pediatrics Friends of Children Disaster Relief Fund. The American Academy of Pediatrics has used this fund in the past to respond to disasters that affect children in the US, such as hurricanes Katrina and Ike, and worldwide, such as recent earthquakes in China.

 The fund provides emergency relief to pediatricians and the children they treat by:

• Addressing primary health care needs of children;

• Supporting medical services (example: power generators for medical facilities, replacement of medical equipment damaged by the disaster);

• Supporting future disaster preparedness and response programs with a special focus on children.

 Naline Lai, MD and Julie Kardos, MD
© 2010 Two Peds In a Pod 

For families with young children, holiday time can be magical yet stressful. Often families travel great distances to be together and parties tend to run late. Fancy food and fancy dress are common.  And winter holidays, well, they occur in the winter, usually during flu season, stomach virus season, and in general multi-illness season. Here are some suggestions about how to keep your kids healthy and happy during this time.

We preface by referring you to suggestions # 1, 2, and 3 of Part 1of A Happy, Healthy Holiday. HANDWASHING, HANDWASHING, AND HANDWASHING will prevent spread of germs. In addition:

1.      Traveling 400 miles away from home to spend the week with close family and/or friends is not the time to solve your child’s chronic problems. Let’s say you have a child who is a poor sleeper and tries to climb into your bed every night at home and you have chronic fatigue from arguing with her/walking her back to bed. Knowing that even the best of sleepers will often have difficulty with sleeping in a new environment, just take your “bad sleeper” into your bed at bedtime and avoid your usual exhausting home routine of waking up every hour to walk her back into her room. That way everyone gets better sleep. Similarly, if you have a very picky eater, pack up her favorite portable meals and have them available during the fancy dinners. (But when you return home, please refer to our podcast and blog posts on helping your child to establish good sleep habits and on feeding picky eaters.) Good sleep and good nutrition keep children and their parents healthy and happy.

2.      Think of giving your children a wholesome, healthy meal at home before a holiday party which you know will be filled with junk food and food that may seem “foreign” to your children. Hunger fuels tantrums, so eliminate that meltdown source by taking them to the party with full bellies. Also you won’t feel guilty letting them have some of the sweets because they already ate a healthy meal.

3.      Speaking of sweets, ginger-bread house vomit is DISGUSTING.   Dr. Kardos found this out first-hand with one of her children after a holiday party where the hostess served the kids a beautiful (and generous sized) ginger bread house for dessert. While Dr. Kardos was engrossed in conversation with a long lost friend, one of her boys over-ate. Make sure you supervise what your child is eating at parties. 

4.      If you have a young baby, be careful not to put yourself in a situation where you lose control of your ability to protect the baby from germs.  Well-meaning family members love passing infants from person to person, smothering them with kisses along the way. Unfortunately, kisses can spread cold and flu germs, as well as stomach virus germs.

5.      On the flip side, there are some family events, such as having your 95-year-old grandfather meet your baby for the first time, that are once in a lifetime. While you should be cautious on behalf of your child, you can balance caution while looking at the whole context of a situation before deciding whether or not to attend a gathering.

6.      Once you have children, their needs come before yours. (Of course there is a healthy balance-but that is a talk for another day.) Although you have anticipated a holiday reunion, your child may be too young to remember it.  An ill, overtired child makes everyone miserable.  If your child has a cold, is tired, won’t use the unfamiliar bathroom, has eaten too many cookies and has a belly ache, and is in general crying, clingy, and miserable, just leave the party. You can console yourself that when your child is older his actions at that gathering may be the stuff of legends, or at least will make for a funny story. 

7.      For the allergic families- think twice before you drag in a live Christmas tree into your house.  The trees are often covered in dust and mud.  Washing the tree off with a hose in the driveway will keep the sneezing down to a minimum.  Every year Dr. Lai tells families about rinsing off the tree in the driveway. Most parents dismiss the idea as too time consuming.  However, she is pleased to report that a family recently told her they did rinse the tree and it did help keep the allergens at bay.

8.      No one else baby proofs.  Remember this when you are on the road. We worry less in our own homes.  But with their medication pills lying on the end tables and their menorah candles within a toddler’s reach, other people’s homes should make us more cautious.  One year at holiday time Dr. Lai’s family was in a hotel room and her six year old came running up saying “look what I found”…It was a pill of Viagra. 

We wish you all the best this holiday season.

Julie Kardos, MD and Naline Lai, MD
©2009 Two Peds in a Pod®

“Three things we know for certain: a child is a gift, being a good parent is a blessing, and being a pediatrician is a privilege.” –author unknown

This Thanksgiving, we want to thank you, our readers, for allowing us to help you help your children. We are grateful to you for telling other families about Two Peds In A Pod because when you get right down to it, our information is only good if it reaches people. Thank you for your comments and questions. Keep them coming!

From both of our families, we wish you all a Happy Thanksgiving.

Julie Kardos, MD and Naline Lai, MD
©2009 Two Peds in a Pod®