Joanna Zepeda is one of the many Doulas at the North Houston Birth center and she offers the following services: Doula Services, Encapsulation (Capsules, Tincture, Salve, Print), Child Birth Education (Birthing From Within™), Dancing for Birth™ Classes, and Birth Story Medicine® Session. During social distancing, sometimes birth can feel isolated and lonely. However, Joanna has made sure that you will still feel connected during birthing classes either in-person, over the phone or over zoom. Call her anytime for the class schedule and information: (713) 298-0838

by Anna Marie Trotmann, Nutrition Consultant
Now that summer is here it’s important to make sure you and your family stay hydrated. The importance of drinking enough fluids each day is crucial for many reasons: to regulate body temperature, flush out toxins, prevent infections, deliver nutrients to cells, and keep organs functioning properly. Being well-hydrated also improves sleep quality, the ability to think clearly and helps with weight loss. Fluids also carry nutrients to your cells, they flush bacteria from your bladder, and prevent constipation. According to Harvard Health a healthy person needs 30 to 50 ounces of fluid per day. What you drink is as important as how much you drink.

What are You Drinking? 
Of course water is your best bet, but you may find that you are reaching  for drinks that have a lot of added sugar –  a soda, sweetened ice tea, juice, orange juice, energy drinks, or an Icee. Even Vitaminwater has 32 grams of sugar in a 20 ounce serving.  
The American Heart Association recommends that women consume no more than 100 calories of added sugar a day or 6 teaspoons,  men 150 calories a day or 9 teaspoons. Kids 2 -18 should have no more than 6 teaspoons of added sugar. Given these parameters let’s take stock of what you are drinking. The average American consumes 39 pounds of sugar per year from soda and other sweetened drinks. 
Most Americans consume nearly 20 teaspoons of added sugars each day. That’s more than triple the recommended daily limit for women and double for men and off the charts for kids. Sugar-sweetened beverages like soda and energy/sports drinks are the number 1 source of added sugars in our diet.  A 12 oz can of regular soda has about 150 calories and 10 teaspoons of added sugar.   Let’s be honest, who drinks a 12 oz can of soda? 

Rethink Your Drink 
Our bodies don’t need a lot of added sugar to function properly, so it’s important to be aware of how much sugar you consume.  Added sugars contribute zero nutrients, plus added calories that can lead to serious health problems down the road. 
You may consume more sugar than you realize. Added sugars include any sugars or caloric sweeteners that are added to foods or beverages during processing or preparation (such as putting sugar in your coffee or tea.  Added sugars or added sweeteners can include natural sugars such as white sugar, brown sugar and honey as well as other caloric sweeteners that are chemically manufactured such as high fructose corn syrup. 

How much is Just Right? 
Think of your daily energy need as a budget. You’d organize your household budget with “essentials” like rent and utilities, and “extras” like a vacation and entertainment. In a daily calorie budget, the essentials are the minimum number of calories you need to meet your nutrient needs. 
You can budget your sugar intake the same way.  How do you figure it out? Read food labels: syrup, molasses, cane juice and fruit juice concentrate mean added sugar.  Most ingredients ending with the letters “ose” (like fructose and dextrose) indicate added sugar. 
Replacing sugar: Enjoy fruit for dessert most days and limit traditional desserts to special occasions. Cut back on the amount of sugar you add to things you eat or drink on a daily basis.  Enhance your drinks with spices – try cinnamon, nutmeg or ginger, add fresh fruit to your water such as citrus fruits, try adding fresh herbs like lemon thyme and mint with sliced cucumber.   Drink sparkling water and add a squeeze of lemon or lime or both. Try unsweetened tea with mint or a slice of orange.
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Get Everyone Involved

• Create and post signs around the house about drinking water
• Limit purchases of sugar-sweetened beverages. Think of unsweetened tea and water. 
• Have water drinking challenge that aims at consuming the appropriate amounts of water daily 
• Try healthy ways to flavor water: infuse with fruit, herbs and other flavorful options. Get creative. 
• Bring your water bottle with you…. Everywhere! Make your water bottle an essential part of your daily life in everything you do. 
• Do a family think-tank activity to brainstorm creative ways to increase water consumption 
• Make a poster like the one below and keep it in sight to remind you and your family just how much sugar is in various drinks. 

During this season of life, especially if you are pregnant or breastfeeding, there may be extra anxiety and stress. Pregnancy and breastfeeding is an already difficult job to do each day, but add on the extra burden of worrying about getting COVID, or not being able to go to the store and you have overwhelming feelings of being out of control. This is okay. Try to take a few moments to take a few breaths. Each generation has struggles, and this generation is no different. One generation lived without refrigerators, some lives without AC, and some even lived without homes! In fact, many people around the world still currently live without all three of those things. America is a first world country, it is am amazing place to live, but it is full of luxury. We want things not and we want it comfortable! Or else! However, America is not immune to illness and we are feeling that now. We are feeling the reality that we truly are no different than other countries and now if our time to show our faith as a God fearing nation. 

For MANY ARTICLE on pregnancy, breastfeeding and COVID, please click on the link below. You will be taken to a website with article like: 
~ What should pregnant women do to avoid the coronavirus?
~ Should pregnant women wear a mask or face covering?
​~ How will COVID-19 affect prenatal and postpartum care visits?
~ How can I stay physically healthy right now?
~ How can I manage stress, anxiety, and depression?
~ Would a home birth be safer while COVID-19 is spreading? 
~ What will happen during labor and delivery if I have COVID-19?
~ Where will my baby stay after delivery if I have COVID-19?
~ Can COVID-19 pass to a baby through breast milk?
~ How can I avoid passing COVID-19 to my baby?

We must act quickly to fortify established birth centers, and make birth centers a real option for birthing people in every city.
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“Is your birth center open?” the worried voice said on the phone.
Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, we have received a growing number of calls like this. These callers, often people far along in their pregnancy, want a safe place to give birth, somewhere that is not a hospital overwhelmed with COVID-19. What they seek is the safety of a freestanding birth center, a homelike facility where prenatal, labor, birth, and postpartum care is provided in the midwifery and wellness model. But right now, our heartbreaking answer to each caller in Detroit and Boston, where we are raising funds to open birth centers, is “No, not yet.”
In the coming six weeks, roughly 400,000 babies are expected to be born in the United States, based on 2018 numbers. But in communities across the country, people—especially Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC)—have little to no access to birth center care. As a result, they are being subjected to a health-care environment that pits their human right to birth in a trauma-free setting against a flailing system’s response to a global crisis. We, the leaders of Neighborhood Birth Center (Boston) and Birth Detroit, have been working to ensure that birth centers are a real option for pregnant people in our communities, and to develop a birthing infrastructure that transforms the culture of birth for generations to come.