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THE ABCs OF BACKUP CHILD CARE
by Kathy Sena

YOU’VE GOT THIS childcare thing down. Your four-year-old loves preschool, you have a part-time babysitter for your toddler and your third grader is happily breezing through school. Then something happens. Your preschool director decides to shut down the school with less than two days’ notice (as ours did); your babysitter gets sick; your third grader forgets to tell you about that teacher in-service day. And your boss is demanding the XYZ project by 3 p.m. Wednesday — or else.

What do you do? First, don’t wait for the inevitable to happen before making back-up child-care plans, experienced parents advise. Start planning now:

BEEF UP YOUR NETWORK
On the Monday after our preschool closed, my friend Judith (hereafter known as “Saint Judith”), already juggling two preschoolers and a home-based business, volunteered to watch four additional kids so other parents could go to work. In return, those parents have come to her aid on other days. To minimize crisis-mode stress, work out such arrangements with friends in advance of “those days.”

CONSIDER SHARING CHILDCARE
Occasionally sharing a babysitter or nanny with another family, which we did for a few weeks after our preschool went kaput, can benefit everyone. The kids have a play date, the caregiver appreciates the extra income and you don’t have to miss work. Just make sure all parties are satisfied with the agreement.

CHECK REFERRAL AGENCIES
Locally based Child Care Connections, www.childcareconnections.info/ provides free referrals to registered/licensed child care programs (see box at right for details). Parents can also try Child Care Aware, at www.childcareaware.org <http://www.childcareaware.org> , is a nationwide referral service that can help you find a local preschool or childcare center. The National Child Care Information Center (part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services), at www.nccic.org , offers a wealth of information for parents regarding all aspects of selecting childcare.

KEEP SAFETY IN MIND
In the rush to find appropriate childcare when you’re pressed for time, make sure don’t give safety issues the brush-off. Always check references for care providers. And check your list of potential preschools, child-care centers or in-home care providers with your local licensing board.

Also, remember to check for safety hazards. According to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, about 31,000 children ages 4 years and younger were treated in U.S. hospital emergency rooms for injuries that happened in child-care or school settings in just one year. In a recent national study, CPSC staff visited a number of child-care settings and found that two-thirds of them had one or more potentially serious hazards. The CPSC suggests checking the following:

• CRIBS: Make sure cribs meet current national safety standards and are in good condition. Look for a certification safety seal. Older cribs may not meet current standards. Crib slats should be no more than 2 3/8 inches apart, and mattresses should fit snugly.

• SOFT BEDDING: Be sure that no pillows, soft bedding or comforters are used where babies are sleeping. A baby should be put to sleep in a crib with a firm, flat mattress.

• PLAYGROUND SURFACING AND MAINTENANCE: Look for safe surfacing on outdoor playgrounds; at least 12 inches of wood chips, mulch, sand or pea gravel, or mats made of safety-tested rubber or rubber-like material. Check playground surfacing and equipment regularly to make sure they are maintained in good condition.

• SAFETY GATES: Be sure that safety gates are used to keep children away from potentially dangerous areas, especially stairs.

• WINDOW BLINDS/CURTAIN CORDS: Be sure miniblinds and Venetian blinds do not have looped cords. Check that vertical blinds, continuous looped blinds and drapery cords have tension or tie-down devices to hold the cords tight.

• RECALLED PRODUCTS: Check that no recalled products are being used and that a current list of recalled children’s products is readily visible. Displaying a list of recalled products will remind caretakers and parents to remove or repair potentially dangerous children’s toys and products.

Kathy Sena is a freelance writer and columnist who frequently covers health and safety issues for Montana Parent magazine.

CHILD CARE CONNECTIONS HELPS PARENTS LOCATE QUALITY CHILD CARE
Child Care Connections (CCC) is the only resource and referral agency in Gallatin, Park and Meagher Counties. CCC supports families and the local economy by encouraging quality child care and safety through the following services:

• Scholarships for families struggling with the high cost of child care;
• Free referrals to registered/licensed child care programs;
• Consumer education to help parents find quality care;
• Consultation and guidance for individuals interested in starting a child care program;
• Training and support for child care professionals;
• Financial reimbursement for nutritious meals served in child care and education to promote lifelong healthy eating habits;
• Safety programs dedicated to preventing childhood injuries;
• Child safety seat resources and
• Babysitting courses for area youth

The staff at CCC, located at 317 East Mendenhall, Suite C in Bozeman, is trained and dedicated to offering these services to ensure positive outcomes for children and families.

Call (406) 587-7786 or 1-800-962-0418. Hours are Monday –Thursday: 8:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m. and on Friday: 8:00 a.m.-4:00 p.m.

5-11
GOING GLUTEN FREE
by Donna Bush

The first thing Barbara Bailey noticed was the rash. Her son, Bryson, eight at the time, had itchy red blotches on his chest, abdomen, and the inside of his elbow. Concerned, Barbara started paying closer attention to Bryson’s diet and looking up information. She noticed that he got wheezy after eating anything with wheat in it, like their Friday night pizza. He was shorter than most of the boys in his class and didn’t seem to be growing at the same rate. His stomach was bloated, what Barbara called “Buddha belly.” So she scheduled an appointment with an allergist.

A blood test revealed that Bryson was allergic to numerous foods, including rice, oats, milk, potatoes, and corn. Surprisingly, wheat wasn’t on the list. However, the blood test showed high levels of the antibodies that can be indicators for celiac disease, and that’s what Barbara suspected Bryson had. Finally, another doctor suggested a small bowel biopsy, which is the next step in diagnosing celiac.

In celiac patients, the villi that line the small intestine are damaged by gluten, a protein found in wheat, rye, and barley. The villi are fingerlike projections that aid in nutrient absorption. In people with celiac, the villi are often flattened, rendering them nearly useless for absorption of essential vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients. The disease has been linked to anemia and osteoporosis. It can also lead to stomach cancer and infertility.

Celiac disease is a hereditary, autoimmune disorder. Symptoms may vary widely, but often include bloating, gas, diarrhea, weight loss, fatigue, vomiting, and the telltale rash like Bryson had. According to pediatric gastroenterologist Dr. Henry Thompson “It is not surprising that wheat wasn’t on the list when (Bryson’s) allergy testing was done. It won’t show up in allergy testing.” He added that although the disease is hereditary, it may go unnoticed. “If a family member is diagnosed with celiac disease, others (family members) with quirky, unexplained symptoms should consider being tested, even as adults.”

In fact, Bryson’s father and paternal grandmother both show signs of having celiac, although his father’s blood test came back low enough that he’s not had a biopsy. “We just never put it together,” Barbara said. “We’d think, ‘Well, it’s heat rash,’ or, ‘He has asthma,’ but we didn’t connect his symptoms.”

A Mayo Clinic study published in July 2009 reported that the disease is 4.5 times more common today than it was 50 years ago, and researchers do not know why. There is no cure for celiac disease, which affects about one percent of the population. The only treatment is to maintain a strictly gluten-free diet.

So families like Barbara’s find themselves with a dilemma: how to accommodate one child’s special dietary needs while still preparing food that the rest of the family can eat? Barbara didn’t want the rest of the family to have to enjoy certain foods in secrecy. But it was difficult to find foods that didn’t contain wheat, rye, or barley. Furthermore, gluten is a key component in hydrolyzed vegetable protein—made from wheat—which can go unnoticed to the untrained eye on a list of ingredients.

“One of the hardest aspects of a gluten free diet is learning what is safe and what isn’t,” says Belgrade mom Cindy Tirrell. “It’s overwhelming to read the ingredients list on every product and then wonder if a certain ingredient is truly gluten-free or not. It gets better with time and as you start to know what is safe, it won’t take near as long to shop for items.”

Cindy, her two young children and her husband have eliminated gluten entirely from their diets. She blogs about celiac disease and gluten sensitivity at glutenfreemontana.blogspot.com, says Bozeman has a lot of gluten-free options.

“It seems like you can find most any gluten free replacement pre-made, such as ice cream cones, instant oatmeal that’s certified gluten-free and chicken nuggets,” she said. “Try different brands, and don’t be afraid to try your hand at baking. There will be failures, I still have them, but it’s a learning exerpience and, with time, it gets better.”

Cindy’s children are ages three and one so have not encountered issues related to eating safely at public school.
“From what I’ve seen from lunch menus there isn’t a lot that is safe but I would recommend parents talk with the school to see if they can arrange for lunches from home to be heated up so their child isn’t always stuck with a cold lunch,” she said. “My kids attend day care and I provide all of their lunches. I let them know what their dietary restrictions are—snacks and treats are a big thing that we need to be cautious about. Things like Whoppers, licorice, and Play Doh aren’t safe for kids on a gluten-free diet, and when cupcakes are brought in for parties it can be very difficult when they’re left out.”

Cindy keeps gluten-free cupcakes and frosting in the freezer, so “if there is a party I can just pull some out and frost them so my kids don’t feel like they aren’t included and I don’t have to stress about baking some cupcakes before the next day. The hardest part is trying to keep my kids from feeling like they are different or don’t belong. I do a lot of baking to keep this from happening.”

Back to the Bailey family. In the first six months after changing his diet, Bryson grew three inches taller. Celiac disease can stunt a child’s growth, but at nearly eleven years old, he has caught up to the other kids in his class. His rash is now completely gone. As a family, they chose to concentrate on the positive. “From the beginning, we emphasized what he could have, instead of focusing on what he couldn’t have,” Barbara says. And that has made a big difference. “He is responsible for himself. If he really wants to eat something with gluten in it, he knows he’s going to pay the price later. But he has adjusted well. He takes leftovers for lunch instead of a sandwich. He can’t buy lunch at school, but he can still buy milk and not feel left out. He knows that if he wants it, we’ll find him an option if it’s available.”

Julie Cunningham, co-owner and instructor at Cunningham’s ATA Martial Arts in Bozeman, is strictly gluten-free for health reasons. She was glad to discover the many restaurant choices available to her in the area. “I do pretty well, all things considered,” she said. “A whole lot of exploration and then some heartache when I learned I can’t eat at some of my favorite places. But on the whole, Bozeman has amazing resources for someone like me.”

Julie’s line-up of favorites includes:
The Naked Noodle: cheap, tasty gluten-free alfredo, Thai, you name it! Why didn’t someone tell me sooner?
La Parilla: yummy yummy, fast, home-made and cheap!
Santa Fe Reds: those enchiladas are incredible!
18 Miles to the Border: incredible fresh food and actually has a gluten-free menu.
Montana Aleworks: gluten-free pasta and other items.
Nova Cafe: of course. Fabulous array of baked goods (see cookie recipe on page 12)
Sola Cafe: gluten-free sandwiches are yummy. Also carries some gluten-free products.
Food for Thought Specialty Deli: all food is made fresh, on-site by a registered dietitian for all types of diets, including gluten-free.

Outback Steakhouse: really helpful people, a tremendous gluten-free brownie, and a whole gluten-free menu.
Dave’s Sushi: everything but the unagi is safe. They even fry things in rice flour! They have tamari sauce just for people like me.

Cindy Tirrell also recommends:
Columbo’s Pizza: for the gluten-free pizza crust.
Sweet Pea Bakery: for gluten-free tortes, tarts, Opera cake and cheesecake.
Cindy continuously updates new offerings on her blog, if you want to check there before trying a new restaurant.

Area stores carrying gluten-free products include:
Community Food Coop
Foodworks (Livingston)
Rosaurer’s Huckleberry Market
Montana Harvest
Lee & Dad’s IGA (Belgrade)
Oak Street Natural Market (also serves gluten-free prepared foods)
Town & Country (Bozeman and Livingston locations)

Donna Bush is a freelance writer and married mother of two. She enjoys cooking and entertaining, and writes about family health and fitness at http://www.examiner.com/x-12262-Boise-Healthy-Living-Examiner, and www.familyfitnessfiles.com.

Nova Café Gluten Free Peanut Butter Cookies
½ c / 4 oz butter, room temp
½ c packed brown sugar
½ c white sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
½ tsp maple extract
½ c natural chunky peanut butter
1 ½ c rice flour
½ c corn starch
½ tsp baking powder
½ tsp baking soda
½ tsp cinnamon
1 tsp guar gum

Mix butter and sugars on high speed with paddle attachment until well mixed. Add eggs and extracts and mix on high until fluffy. Add flour, starch, baking powder and soda, cinnamon and guar gum to food processor and mix. Stir in peanut butter to butter/sugar mixture. Slowly add flour mixture while mixing on low speed. Portion mix onto greased cookie sheet with large greased ice cream scooper. Bake at 325 degrees for 13-15 minutes.

Gluten Free Play Dough
½ c rice flour
½ c cornstarch
½ c salt
2 t cream of tartar
1 c water
1 t cooking oil
Food coloring

Mix the ingredients together in a medium saucepan. Cook and stir on low for 5 minutes or until it starts to thicken and clump together. After cooled store in an airtight container or plastic bag. Courtesy of Celiac Spruce Association.

As a parent of a ten and thirteen-year-old, I recently attended a “House Party” put on by Bozeman’s Teen Pregnancy Prevention Coalition (TPPC). The weeknight gathering brought together health educators, teachers, school counselors, nurses, and community members, as well as friends and neighbors of the hosts.
Together we discussed our challenges, fears, thoughts, and ideas relating to our children and sex. It was interesting, eye-opening, inspiring, and the take-away was clear: The best thing we can do for our children is to talk early, talk often, and make ourselves approachable and available on matters relating to sex.

TPPC is an all-volunteer organization whose mission is to prevent unintended teen pregnancy. Their strategy is to reach out to parents to get them to be more active about discussing sexuality with their children and to be approachable and available when their children want or need to talk. They believe that parents can and should begin talking about sexuality when kids are very young. This might mean using biologically-correct names for body parts as early as kids are talking, and teaching how the reproductive system works by age eight. Certainly, when you’ve made these forays into the topic it’s easier to talk about other aspects of sexuality when the same kids are tweens and cringing (or swooning) at the sight of a kiss on the silver screen.

Typically, when—and if—parents have the sex talk with their teens, it’s just that—the sex talk. Think about it. When we teach our children about manners, money, morals, or hygiene, we discuss the topics frequently over the course of many years. But when it comes to sex, we are more likely to get the talk over with in one fell swoop—or, of course, not talk about it at all. The reasons for this are many—complex topic, embarrassing to talk about, kids don‘t want to talk about it, adults aren‘t comfortable talking about it—but if talking about sex with our children is what it takes to reduce the chance of teen pregnancy, then we need to buck up and do it. While some believe that by providing information to our teens they will be more apt to have sex, evidence shows just the opposite—parents who talk about sex with their children have teens who wait longer to engage in sexual activity.

Bridger Clinic in Bozeman is a good resource for parents and teens. They have health educators at the ready, providing families with the tools they need, such as conversation starters and tips, books and workbooks, videos, private appointments, and workshops. The puberty-focused “Growing Up” workshops, geared to ten-twelve year old girls and eleven-thirteen year-old boys, are engaging and active, with a video, art project, games, and discussions about the concerns that kids and parents have about puberty.

“These children are so pre-occupied with the physical, social, and emotional changes that they’re experiencing during puberty,” says Cindy Ballew, one of the clinic’s health educators. “Caring adults can really help them deal with the confusion that accompanies the journey.”

These small group workshops get rave reviews from participants, cost $20 per family (scholarships are available), and take place multiple times each year in Belgrade, Bozeman, and Livingston.

For older teens, the clinic conducts sex-ed workshops with 8th and 10th graders, which cover peer pressure, relationships, contraception, sexual behavior, sexually transmitted diseases, and statistics on sexual behavior and pregnancy.

Stephanie McDowell, associate director at Bridger Clinic says, “While the message at the forefront of these workshops is waiting—abstinence—the clinic’s point of view is that these children are going to engage in sex at some point in their lives, and whether that happens in high school, college, out of college, or as a married adult, they should be knowledgeable and prepared.”

Perhaps the first step we must take towards educating our children is to realize that pregnant teens are from all walks of life and are truly the “kid next door.” Do any of us believe with 100% certainty that our child will not have sex? As much as we’d like to deny it, the “kid next door” might be our own. Once we acknowledge that our child might choose to engage in sexual activity, the responsibility becomes ours to provide them with the tools they need to make good choices.

Cindy Ballew also teaches sex-ed at the middle and high schools, and says, “I always survey classrooms when I teach and it is disappointing to see how few of these students have been given information and the opportunity to talk and ask their parents questions about sex. Even in 2010!”

A nation-wide, state-by-state study done by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in 2008 shows that in 2007, 45.7% of Montana high school students and 59% of Montana’s 12th graders have had sexual intercourse.

Statistics on teen pregnancy in the U.S. are sobering. For starters, the US has the highest teen pregnancy rate in the industrialized world—twice as high as England or Canada. Three out of ten teenage girls in the US get pregnant at least once before age 20. Fewer than half of teen mothers ever graduate from high school and under two percent earn a college degree by age 30. Eight out of ten fathers don’t marry the mother of their child and are too poor to pay adequate child support. Two-thirds of families started by young, unmarried mothers are poor. Sadly, these statistics perpetuate themselves in the children born to these teen parents.

Where do we go from here? First know that when asked which forces most influenced them in sexual decision-making, teens were more likely to say parents (38 percent) than friends (32 percent). Then, consider that if more children in this country were born to parents who were ready and able to care for them, we would see a significant reduction in a host of social problems, from school failure and crime to child abuse and neglect.
Let’s challenge ourselves to do something positive with this information. Let’s stand tall in our role as adults and take the responsibility that is truly ours. Let’s talk to our children, be there for our children, and provide them with the tools they need to make the best, safest, most sound decisions they can so they can live their best lives.

MYTHS THAT TEENS BELIEVE INFLUENCE THEIR DECISIONS ABOUT SEX

Everyone is doing it.

You’re a prude if you want to wait.

People can tell if you’re not having sex.

You can’t get pregnant the first time.

Only boys put on the pressure to have sex.

Girls can’t get pregnant during their period or if they have never had a period.

Sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) can’t be passed except through unprotected intercourse with multiple partners.

TEN TIPS FOR PARENTS
The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unwanted Pregnancy provides a wealth of information, studies, and statistics on sexual behavior and teen pregnancy. They offer these ten tips that can help teens delay becoming sexually active or encourage those who are already having sex to use contraception carefully.

• Be clear about your own sexual values and attitudes.

• Talk with your children early and often about sex, and be specific.

• Supervise and monitor your children and adolescents.

• Know your children’s friends and their families.

• Discourage early, frequent, and steady dating.

• Take a strong stand against your daughter dating a boy significantly older than she is. And don’t allow your son to develop an intense relationship with a girl much younger than he is.

• Help your teenagers have options for the future that are more attractive than early pregnancy and parenthood.

• Let your kids know that you highly value education.

• Know what your kids are watching, reading, and listening to.

• Develop a strong, close relationship with your children from an early age. (That said, it is never too late to improve a relationship your child or teen, and they have a great need for a close relationship with their parents and for their guidance, approval, and support.)

RESOURCES
National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unwanted Pregnancy

www.stayteen.org

www.healthvideo.com

Teen Pregnancy Prevention Coalition and House Party Contact: teenppc@gmail.com

Bridger Clinic, Inc., www.bridgerclinic.org and 406-587-0681 x 13