Tag Archives: motherhood

About IBD Podcast 136 - Pregnancy and IBD: The PIANO Study With Uma Mahadevan, MD

Pregnancy and IBD: The PIANO Study With Uma Mahadevan, MD – About IBD Podcast Episode 136

Pregnancy while living with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) feels scary. But thanks to the groundbreaking Pregnancy Inflammatory bowel disease And Neonatal Outcomes (PIANO) study, there is now so much more data and information to help moms and their doctors make decisions. Dr Mahadevan began the PIANO registry in 2007, which followed women and their babies through pregnancy and after. What was learned from this registry was how IBD medications, and especially biologics, affected pregnancy, birth, and infants. Learn how Dr Mahadevan has grown PIANO over the years, the most important findings so far, and how pregnant women can join the study and help the next generation of moms with IBD and their babies.

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About IBD Podcast Episode Cover - Episode 93 - Motherhood Unplugged With Natalie Hayden

About IBD Podcast Episode 93 – Motherhood Unplugged With Natalie Hayden

It’s one thing to talk to your physicians about becoming pregnant when you live with ulcerative colitis or Crohn’s disease. But what about  getting the benefit of experiences from the mothers who have been through a pregnancy, birth, and breastfeeding journey? Former news anchor and current blogger and Crohn’s patient Natalie Hayden gives her experiences with pregnancy and receiving biologics, as well as how she has participated in research during her pregnancies and the benefits it offers her family.

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About IBD Podcast Episode 82 - If I Take Care of Myself, I'm Also Taking Care of You

About IBD Podcast Episode 82 – If I Take Care of Myself, I’m Also Taking Care of You

After hearing from my 10-year-old daughter, it’s now time to hear from my 13-year-old son. My kids are in hybrid school, and for my 8th grader, this means he goes to school in person two full days a week, with 3 days of distance learning at home. We are managing it as well as I think we can expect. However, my son brings up a small wrinkle in regards to the “return to normal” to which we are all looking forward. It is going to be challenging for us to go back to our prior pace and there will be new struggles along the way. Be sure to listen to the end to hear my son’s tips for parents on how to talk to their kids.

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About IBD Podcast Episode 81_ How Would You Feel if I Got COVID?

About IBD Podcast Episode 81 – How Would You Feel if I Got COVID?

How often do you check in with your friends and family about how they’re doing during the pandemic? Families have had to make difficult choices regarding school, playdates, and extracurricular activities. We are all concerned about how our kids are faring during the pandemic. But are we asking them about their worries and concerns as often as we should? Amber sits down with her 10-year-old daughter to talk about hybrid school, concerns about getting sick with COVID, what kids are missing right now, and what they want to do when the pandemic is over.

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About IBD Podcast Episode 77 - Back to School In the Pandemic With Dr Brad Jerson

About IBD Podcast Episode 77 – Back to School in a Pandemic With Dr Brad Jerson

Back to school will be quite different for families across the United States and the world this year. There aren’t many answers to be had to our questions, yet we must make decisions with the best information that we have at this time. I speak with Dr Brad Jerson, a Pediatric Psychologist in the Division of Digestive Diseases, Hepatology, and Nutrition at Connecticut Children’s and an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Connecticut School of Medicine about how we can prepare our kids, and ourselves, for the school year. We discuss the behaviors we can model for our children, how we can talk to young kids about mask wearing, and how to engage kids of all ages in conversation about their fears and anxieties during this time. 


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About IBD Podcast Episode 71 - I Evaluated What Was Really Important to Me

About IBD Podcast Episode 71- I Evaluated What Was Really Important to Me

How does being diagnosed with a chronic illness affect your path in life? For Mariah Leach, a rheumatoid arthritis diagnosis came out of the blue and put her at a crossroads. She decided to take the road towards patient advocacy. What started as a way to process her feelings and keep family and friends updated about her condition through her writing has evolved into a calling. Today, she has become a tireless advocate for people living with rheumatoid arthritis and as a resource for parents with chronic illness. It’s Mariah’s goal to ensure no one feels alone in their parenting journey. To that end, she has developed Mamas Facing Forward to support parents and foster the connections she was missing in her first years as a mom.

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About IBD Podcast Episode 65 – I’m Going to Make the Best of This

Ostomy surgery is a life-saving procedure that can improve quality of life, but that doesn’t mean it is always easy to accept. Stephanie Hughes founded The Stolen Colon after having surgery to place an ileostomy to treat her Crohn’s disease. She’s an ostomate, but she’s also a writer, a woman, a wife, a mother, and a resource for people in the IBD and the ostomy community. She shares her journey through Crohn’s disease and acceptance of her ostomy with me, including what her kids think of her stoma, how she manages issues around privacy, and what happened when a person who didn’t know she had an ileostomy told her that ostomies were smelly. Listen all the way to the end to hear how Stephanie’s advocacy in the ostomy community touched one family and gave them hope. 

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Reporting from Advances in IBD 2019: Parenthood Project Consensus Statement

Reporting from Advances in IBD 2019: Parenthood Project Consensus Statement

One of the presentations I attended at Advances in Inflammatory Bowel Diseases (AIBD) in Orlando, Florida in December 2019 was regarding the IBD Parenthood Project. The American Gastroenterological Association (AGA) has put together a clinical care pathway for pregnant women who live with IBD. The pathway was created with input from representatives from different specialties that may care for pregnant women with IBD, including gastroenterologists, maternal-fetal medicine specialists, teratologists, lactation specialists, and patients.

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About IBD Episode 55 - You Have to Take Care of Yourself

About IBD Podcast Episode 55 – You Have to Take Care of Yourself

Being diagnosed with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) at any time or at any age is challenging. However, the pre-biologic era was especially difficult because of the lack of treatment options and the absence of some of the legal protections that are in place today. Danielle O’Connor tells her story of being diagnosed with ulcerative colitis at a young age and how she managed her career as a special education teacher through many hospitalizations and surgeries.

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10 Ways to Get Your Kids Involved in Activism

Summer of Activism: 10 Ways to Get Your Kids Involved in Advocacy

We tend to think of politics as being for adults. But how do adults become engaged citizens who take part in their community? They start as children, learning from parents about the importance and benefit of volunteering, voting, and understanding the challenges and opportunities in their community. There’s so much that parents can do to raise children to be active community members. In addition, some of the many skills that are learned along the way, include public speaking, networking, teamwork, strategy, and communication. Continue reading