Going Green with Baby

"The creation of a thousand forests is in one acorn," Ralph Waldo Emerson once said. When it comes to little acorns, Mother Nature's wisdom doesn't fall far from the tree.  When it comes to building healthy babies, however, a Mom awakens to her own Mother Nature and  to the immense responsibility of creating a safe environment for her child both inside and outside the womb. Suddenly everything around her from the food she eats, the cleaning products she uses  to the baby-gear she purchases become not just the landscape of her life but the friends or foe's to her child's well-being and future. It can be overwhelming and time consuming to research. 
 
Going green means more than just buying the organic vegetables (although that's a great start!). It means taking a look at the impact the environment will have on the baby, a highly sensitive being whose foundation for health starts with it's source surroundings. That means revisiting the lead content of your lovely old house to the chemical cleaners you use in the sink to the paint you use in the nursery. 
 
It also means understanding the impact that a baby has on the environment (a baby generates three times more garbage than grown-ups). Multiplying 12 diapers a day times 360 days times three years for starters. Or considering the huge investment you will be making in toys and gear in the years to come and how much energy it took to create those high-end gadgets, strollers and wipe warmers.  These are just a few of the considerations a family faces as they become aware of their choice to bring a child gently into the world. 
  
And of course, there's the birth to educate herself about and prepare for too.  There are more studies every day supporting that a gentle birth is made more possible when a woman enters the laboring process as healthy as possible--well nourished and in a safe environment free from physical and emotional hazards. Another reason for her to consider the health of the baby as her own. They are intertwined... 
 
 
Of course, the idea of going green sounds wonderful in spirit and she may be more inspired than ever. But she is also in a state of complete and utter transformation of her own body, lifestyle, partnership, job and identity. Turning inspiration into determination is no small feat in the face of such changes to a woman's life. As doulas, we support families every day who are struggling with making the most nurturing choices for their child and for the environment. Providing support for families in the childbearing year, we ourselves have struggled with keeping up with the latest and greatest inventions. 
 
At long last this is the green friendly baby guide that can give families the resources they need to make those choices with a peaceful mind, knowing their babies are being received gently as Mother Nature intended. 
 
Going Green With Baby is like one of those little acorns with a thousands forests inside it! A must have for every parent whose hopes lie in our newest generation of little ones.