Protecting your children; their health and development can start even before you are fortunate enough to see two lines on your home pregnancy test. A health diet and life choices can ensure a safe environment for a baby to be brought into.

20 some years ago people thought that The placenta shielded a developing baby from the outside world. It seems that a lot of research is being done to test that theory. The umbilical cord of 10 children, collected by the red cross (after the cord was cut), was tested and contained trace amounts of: pesticides, consumer product ingredients, burning coal waste, gasoline, and garbage. This is almost hard to believe.

It seems that they have updated the theories on a womb protecting a baby from the environment. We now know that pollutants are absorbed into the body through the lungs and skin. These pollutants then travel thru the mothers’ body and into the umbilical cord and placenta. This then exposes our unborn children to the world’s toxins.

These toxins have been shown to cause cancer, affect the brain and nervous system, and linked to birth defects in laboratory test animals.

To choose earth friendly options across the board is now what we must do to protect ourselves, our children, and future generations. Some ideas for your family are listed here.

Breast Feed Your Baby!

Nutrients found in colostrum and breast milk will protect your baby and provide the nutrients and immunization from illness that no man-made formula can compete with. Make the first year of your baby's life one filled with breast milk.

Organic Baby Food

Is organic baby food the right choice for our children?

It makes sense to feed our children food free of pesticides and preservatives. Especially since they grow faster than we do and eat more food pound for pound than we do, thus getting higher concentrations of toxin’s per pound than we do. Even Gerber has an organic baby food label called Tender Harvest. But remember when making organic choices not all vendors are approved as 100% organic with no preservatives or pesticides. It will serve you well to research your area for safe well known organic food stores.

Diapers

Using disposable diapers is handy but is filling up our landfills fast and biodegrading slow. Cloth diapers services can make diapering for the environment easy. If you have to diaper with disposables, try bleach free, earth friendly, free of plastic and oil toxins.

Toys

There are lots of parents starting up small business’ with organic toys and clothing. When searching for your child’s toy keep in mind that they will most likely put it in their mouth. So organic toys are a great option. There are lots of organic toy stores on the Web. Such as Natural Toy Store, and Ethic Baby. With the world at our fingertips it is getting easier and easier to make safe choices for our children. Organic clothing is also much easier to find thanks to the internet.

School Lunchrooms

People are making great changes in the school lunch choices for our children. Check with your child’s school to see if they offer healthy lunches. If they do, Thank them, if they don’t make a suggestion that they start to offer it. If they have enough parents asking for it, they will take notice.

Together we can make a difference.