1. Task one critically reflect on the meaning of the flowing sentence " the key to seeing these infant initial seeking and feeding behaviors is to permit both mothers and baby to be calm, relaxed and interacting with each other, with no other agenda"
There are many factors which influence an infants feeding behavior and most of these factors are determined by the mother. Failure to maintaining a conducive environment for a child’s feeding behavior may result to poor feeding and hence child malnutrition. Once this occurs, the infant is prone to illnesses that are nutrition related. It is therefore the mother’s responsibility to ensure that the infant feeds in the best way possible without hindrance that may be caused by factors within the particular environment. An infant’s feeding environment is hence considered to be one of the most important in enhancing the feeding behavior that it acquires during the growth and development period.
Research has revealed that many factors have to be achieved to for an infant to achieve the nutritional balance required for healthy growth. A calm and relaxed environment has been known to be one of the most effective when it comes to breastfeeding an infant. To ensure that the child is relaxed, the mother has to ensure that the posture in which the baby is placed when feeding is comfortable (Wiessinger, West, & Pitman 2010). Failure to this may result to the infant being restless therefore not feeding as required. The mother should also enhance relaxation of the infant by ensuring that it is well clothed and therefore fully comfortable. If the infant is at some point too hot or cold then gaining relaxation while feeding would not be possible. It is therefore the sole responsibility of the mother to ensure that such factors are well maintained so as not to interfere with the feeding habits of the infant. The child has no role to play in maintaining calmness and relaxation when feeding. A peaceful and relaxed infant will be in a position to feed to the fullest and have enough sleep thereby resulting to good health.
Likewise, the mother has to be relaxed and calm as well if the infant has to be well fed. This is as well the obligation of the mother to ensure that she is in a good state of health both physically and psychologically before proceeding to feed the infant. A stressed mother may not be the best when it comes to breastfeeding because she may fail to feed the infant to full satisfaction (Wiessinger, West, & Pitman 2010). This is an aspect of underfeeding which may result to the child being prone to nutritional related illnesses. The mother acts as a directive to ensuring that the infant follows its instincts when it comes to feeding. Constant interaction and socialization with the baby is encouraged from the part of the mother. A mother who is physically or psychologically unfit may not be in a position to interact well with the infant and this may result to poor feeding of the infant. The mother acts as the guide to assisting a newly born baby to feed. The feel of the mother’s breast on the baby’s chin is an important interaction that triggers the baby’s need to open the mouth and beast feed.
2. Task two: Identify and explore an area of confusion you have in the FERTILITY & CONCEPTION.
There is a state of confusion that arises when it comes to creating a complete distinction between fertility and conception. The two aspects are closely related and this may be the reason why the confusion comes up. The term fertility simply refers to the stage in the menstrual cycle when the male and the female gametes fuse to form a zygote. A woman is therefore considered to be fertile during the menstrual cycle when ovulation successfully occurs without any form of contraception. This therefore involves a lot of hormonal activity which should not be altered because it may result to infertility. Alteration in this case may involve the use of contraceptives which lead to some of hormonal imbalance.
Conception refers to the menstrual stage when the fusion of the male and female gametes has completely fused thereby forming the embryo. This is quite different from fertility which is simply considered to be the potential of the female and male gametes to give rise to a young one. The latter is the actual formation of the young one in the womb. In some situations people will tend to think that conception comes before fertilization and this is one of the factors that results to a lot of confusion. The vice versa is what happens fertilization has to occur before conception. Therefore, conception can be said to be a result of fertilization of the female gamete by the male gamete.
Conception is the first stage in human development that results to the formation of the fetus. Fetal formation is the first stage that signifies that conception has taken place. If conception fails, then there is no formation of the fetus and life cannot be said to exist. Misinterpretation of conception and fertilization is another cause behind the confusion between the two processes. Some people will have no clue of what conception is as well as fertilization. This alone creates a lot of conflict as to what precedes or succeeds what. Conception succeeds fertilization and failure to knowing this fact is enough to create a lot of conflict in thoughts and understanding of human development.
There are a variety of factors which influence the fertility of an individual. Research has revealed that nutrition is one of the most important factors that influence the fertility of an individual. Poor nutrition may result to low fertility status while good nutrition results to high fertility in an individual. Obesity has been associated with low fertility and such people should seek medical attention from medical specialist so as to maintain their fertility to the required levels. Emphasis has been much laid on female fertility compared to male fertility. Irregular menstrual cycles have been noted in most obese women hence the greater emphasis laid on them.
Fertility precedes conception and this is the reason why the aspect of fertility has been fully researched on. The probability of a person whose infertility is low to conceive is as well low. Research has revealed that poor health habits such as smoking have adverse effects to the fertility of men and women. Such habits including other forms of drug abuse should be discouraged so as to maintain a good health status in relation to fertility of men or women. Fertility should not be so much interfered with because it can be seen to be the basis of life.
3. Identify and explore how your prior knowledge has influenced the way in which you received the information presented to you for (genetics and Fetal Development).
This lecture was basically about genetic mechanism and the role of chromosomes to determine sex as well as abnormalities. At the beginning, when I was just done pre reading, I got curious as why such lessons were being conducted in a quest to understand more their sole purpose.
A question lingered my mind as to what the significance of the data which I was being given was since I was a nurse and I mostly operate to patients not in the laboratory department. Genetics involves a lot of laboratory experiments as well as observations and that is why the need to know arose (Lenhoff 2008). That was actually not the only challenge I faced as even practicing the topic was a problem owing to the position that I held as well as the area into which I operated. This made me come up with the assumption that `such scientific data was only helpful or rather understood by doctors and the laboratory technicians only as they were more educated or rather informed. After doing much reading on the topic and getting to get information form a variety of resources, my attitude towards the scientific data changed. I actually found out that even nurses can find assistance from such data and that it is not limited to only doctors or laboratory technicians. The research helped me immensely as I got know how to incorporate the information that I acquired with my routine practice or rather daily activities. The study gave me a lot of insight of certain things and diseases such as the condition of patients suffering from may be sickle cell anaemia or hemophilia or even a couple who have plans to get married but unfortunately their blood tests bring out unexpected results such as abnormal observations; may be one of them is infected with a certain disease like sickle cell and this proves to be a problem to many people (Lenhoff 2008). The main point here is that the information that I got made me get more knowledge on such matters. It would enable me to detect any irregularities and therefore it would be my duty to inform the victims of their condition and without this information it would be impossible for me to do such a thing. Conclusively the information is important to every nurse.
The internet I came to realize is yet another useful and helpful source of knowledge. This is because it enables one to look for anything that they may be wanting to acquire information on and in my case it was genetic disease. The main task of being a nurse is not forgotten as it is to take good and proper care to patients with all kinds of diseases and those with genetic disorders or rather abnormalities also fall under that. The need to educate such people on matters pertaining to genetic blood diseases is there but it is so unfortunate that people do not take the matter seriously teenagers mostly in this case. The lecture surely proved to be of assistance to me and I actually learnt a lot.
References
Wiessinger D, West D, and Pitman T, (2010). The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding, New York:
Ballantine Books.
Lenhoff M, H, (2008). Conception to Birth: Human Reproduction, Genetics, and Development,
Chicago: Kendall Hunt Pub. Co.
