As a native Southerner, I have to say that Brooklynites have officially taken this whole Southern chic trend too far. I thought it was kind of cool when Williamsburg restaurants like Pies ‘N’ Thighs popularized cheese grits. I took mild umbrage when Park Slope hipsters started wearing trucker caps ironically (How would y’all like it if smirking truck drivers began sporting porkpie hats and goatees?). But now Brooklyn’s Canarsie neighborhood has tornados?! I’m sorry, but it’s my birthright to huddle in terror on the bathroom floor, and y’all can’t have it! I don’t know just what we Southerners are going to do about it, but I can tell you there’s some angry talk down here among the regulars at Bubba’s Bagels, Espresso, and Cannoli Hut.
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Moon pies: Tasty even before Southern became cool.
Round Midnight
As a parent I wonder, more than anything else, “How will I guarantee lifetime employment for my child’s future psychotherapist?” This week I was perplexed to learn that letting my infant cry at night probably didn’t do the trick. According to a new Australian study of infant sleep advice, those of us who hoped to scar our children for life by allowing them to cry some at bedtime will need to dig a little deeper. The results may especially shock proponents of attachment parenting, the theory that an infant’s future mental health is best ensured by a tight hug and a jumbo bottle of Super Glue.
The Australians took 326 7-month-olds with sleep problems and taught half of their parents evidence-based sleep interventions. Parents in the intervention group used either “controlled comforting,” in which they waited a little longer each night to check on their crying infants, or “camping out,” in which, as I understand it, they built a fire and ate s’mores. By contrast, parents in the control group received a firm pat on the shoulder and a sympathetic expression.
Earlier studies had already demonstrated that the sleep interventions improved both infant sleep and maternal depression. The new study followed up parents and children at 6 years, using an extensive battery of mental health tests to prove that yeah, the kids had no hard feelings, and the parents had gotten over their guilt. Researchers do not report whether parents ever lost the excess weight from the s’mores.
Point and Clique
In high school it’s easy to resent the “cool kids,” at least if you’re not one of them (ahem). But popularity comes with its down sides, and not just the stress of deciding whose awesome car to take to that amazing party where you’ll totally make out with that other super-hot person, although I can only imagine how stressful that must be. A new study from Southern California adds another burden to teen popularity: tobacco addiction. Researchers polling 1,950 mainly Hispanic 9th and 10th graders found that kids were more likely to smoke if their peers ranked them as “popular.” And I thought the only thing my Coke-bottle glasses could protect me from was flying pebbles!
In Short...
Don’t you hate how it takes you forever to build a spiel for parents on a given topic? I’ve been working on my asthma-action-plan patter for years now, and I’ve gotten to where I can review the stoplights, the controller and rescue medicines, the spacer and mask, the school medication form, and the flu vaccine in under 17 minutes, if I speed-talk like I’m giving the lease requirements in a car ad.
Now, thanks to a new study in the New England Journal of Medicine, I’m going to have to add another five minutes on growth restriction from inhaled corticosteroids (ICS). It appears the earlier data demonstrating that the initial decrease in height velocity is only temporary is just plain wrong. (Admit it. You knew it was too good to be true.) It turns out kids on chronic ICS lose a centimeter of adult height on average, which means that not only will I have to talk about the risks and benefits of ICS in greater detail, I’ll have to explain the whole metric system! It could be worse. At least I’m not up in Brooklyn tying to find the perfect craft beer to pair with a Moon Pie.
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).