The Firstborn Child is the Family Lab Rat
Oct 10, 2008 
Kevin Leman--
No doubt about it. There’s truly something unique about firstborns, the leaders of the pack. They can take the world by storm—and accomplish more than you think is humanly possible, because they are exacting and precise. You may be one of them. Or you may be one of them and not know it. Why would I call a guy like Steve Martin, who is the youngest kid in his family, a firstborn? And why would I call Martin Luther King Jr., who has an older sister, a firstborn? Because you can be number eight in a family of nine, like my mother, and still be a firstborn.
“Uh, Dr. Leman,” you’re saying, “how could you be a firstborn if you’re not born first? That makes absolutely no sense.” Ah, but it makes perfect sense. It’s not about who came out of the womb first; it’s about the relationship that child has with his parents. Are you the only son or the only daughter in the family? Are there five or more years between you and the sibling above you? Did you have a critical-eyed parent?
You see, the firstborn child is the lab rat of the family. The new parents practice on the firstborn. There isn’t a firstborn living
who hasn’t said to her parents at some point, “Wait a minute. You’re not going to let her do that, are you? You never let me do that when I was her age.” There’s also not a firstborn who hasn’t heard, “Listen, I don’t care what your brother did. I expect more out of you, young man.”
A firstborn in a park reaches down and picks up some dirt, a cigarette butt, or any other foreign substance, and puts it in their mouth. What do the parents do? They freak out. “John, call 9-1-1! Take her to ER! Swab out her mouth!” Fast-forward six years later. The third-born child picks up the same foreign substance, chews it, and swallows it. What does Dad do? He looks at Mom, shrugs, and says, “It’s good roughage. Good for the colon.”
As little cubs get added to each family’s den, the birth order changes because the family changes. If a firstborn is discouraged by a critical-eyed parent, the secondborn can usurp his role. And if the second child is one of a different gender, that child is also a firstborn. Because new parents work that firstborn over, projecting their own unfulfilled dreams on that child, the firstborn tends to be reliable, conscientious, tends to do things “right,” and predictably drifts toward perfectionism. That’s why today you’re a leader, an organizer, a visionary, a doer, a planner, and why you’ve risen to the top of the pack. Yes, you’re top dog, hands-down, but your greatest challenge will be to let other people win—to be joyful for others’ successes and to come alongside them to make those successes happen.
Your words and your actions leave an indelible imprint on your spouse, children, and coworkers. Use that firstborn power wisely.
Liked the post? Read more from Kevin Lehman--
Autism and The Gluten-and-Dairy-Free Diet
Oct 7, 2008 
Tracey Seaman, a single mom of two adolescents, is the test kitchen director for Everyday with Rachel Ray magazine,
and has been a food editor, stylist, and recipe developer for over two
decades. Among the many publications she has contributed to or worked: Food & Wine, Gourmet, Martha Stewart Living, and Martha Stewart Kids. She lives with her family in New Jersey. Seaman is also a coauthor
of Real Food for Healthy Kids, (HarperCollins, 2008).We buried Dad on my daughter’s third birthday. (He had taught me how to make eggs when I was five.) My son was just a year and a half and had started to talk. Suddenly, about a month later it was like someone shot out the light and left us all in darkness. I was “lucky” enough to get a last minute, cancellation-list diagnosis for my son from Isabelle Rapin, a neurologist guru at Albert Einstein Medical Center in the Bronx who only worked on Mondays. P.D.D. (a developmental delay—not otherwise specified) was what she told me, after my boy was observed. The process was painful and so surreal because the change happened quickly and without warning, and Darren did nothing she prompted or requested. Dr. Rapin said we needed an overnight EEG (to make sure he wasn’t having seizures) and referred me to a more local neurologist, who suggested speech therapy and a behavioral program. It didn’t take long for my husband to mentally sail off to the land of denial.
A friend at work said her friend’s sister’s son received a diagnosis like Darren’s. His mom had taken all gluten and dairy out of his diet and he was as good as new in six months. Back then all I could do was promise myself and my child that I would bring him back from wherever he was, if it was the only thing I ever did for the rest of my life. I told my friend I was going to try the suggested therapies first and see what happened.
After about nine months of therapies—forty hours a week is suggested for early intervention (two hours would have been
covered by my county but I was wait-listed for one hour, but through the assistance of my family we were able to get at least a total of five hours a week)—there hadn’t been any change. As this time passed, I began to observe that Darren had stomach pain and wondered if it was from milk. I asked our pediatrician to do a food allergy test and he actually told me the insurance company would be mad at him. Naturally he suggested I switch Darren to soymilk. When I found a new doctor, through the help of my friend’s sister’s friend (whom I did call by that time), the test showed that Darren had a slight sensitivity to wheat, dairy and a few legumes but the worst was his sensitivity to soy.
Since I had been a recipe developer for a number of years I wasn’t completely unglued by the news. I had already done some research and found several catalogs, which carried gluten-free mixes, and I bought a gluten-free cookbook. The mixes and cookbook were both disappointing, so I concentrated on trying to devise my own recipes for baked goods that were gluten, dairy and soy free.
By the time Tanya and I were working on our book the number of autistic children had reached 1 in 166, and it is even worse now. (In my state of New Jersey it is 1 in 97.) For that reason and also because we have seen children with asthma improve when dairy was removed we decided to include a chapter on food sensitivities in Real Food for Healthy Kids.
Take A Sneak Peak Inside At HarperCollinsTeach Your Children Well: Embracing Their Inner Spinach Lover
Autism, Green Vaccines, And Jenny McCarthy
Editor
Are You a Slave to Technology?
Oct 7, 2008 
martial
arts master and philosopher, Rosenfeld is a contributor to national
magazines, including Vogue, Vanity Fair, and Parade, has been seen on
Fox News and other networks, and heard on numerous national radio
programs. He consults and speaks on the subject of chronic pain for the
pharmaceutical industry and others in healthcare. He has written The Truth About Chronic Pain and several novels.Arthur Rosenfeld--
In the Industrial Revolution, we designed machines to save us effort. Later, we created devices to save us time. The Holy Grail was to have the opportunity to spend more time with our family, to cultivate ourselves, to contribute to the community—in short to do what we wanted to do not what we had to do.
Early innovations saved us from backbreaking, lifespan-shortening work, but lately our inventions have taken an insidious turn. With the exception of a few miraculous medical tools, they now do us as much harm as good. The demands we make on ourselves in the face of our technology create stresses that literally kill us. The silicon chip, and cutting edge manufacturing have set a new pace for life on Earth, a pace better suited to our creations than it is to us. The machines we inhabit, the bodies we are, have vibrations, harmonics, rhythms and limitations that differ from those of our creations, but we often decide in favor of our creations rather than in favor of us. We have, in short, become slaves where once we were masters.
The solution became clearer than ever to me the other night when playing the new video game, Spore, with my 8-year-old son. Brilliantly conceived, Spore explains the process of evolution far better than I can. It involves creating a creature and helping it grow to meet the challenges of increasingly complex environments—to see it evolve from a single–celled organism in a primordial soup to a space traveler colonizing distant planets. The game reveals much about how the forces of nature act on us, and also the pressures we put on ourselves by letting our population run amok. To secure our place in the sun, we are driven to ever more competitive and ruthless behavior, and to use any tool and weapon we can find to survive.
What is a human being to do to find more meaning, less stress, greater fulfillment, and less complexity and speed? I was deep in the game when it hit me. I could decide against playing, bow out, and simply turn it off! What a metaphor for the world outside the personal computer. So obvious, so simple, so doh! but so few of us do it. Bowing out is an option that comes with increasing consciousness. It means to cooperate rather than contend, to use technology with awareness of its benefits and its costs, to emphasize depth, slow down, pay attention, achieve happiness by substituting spiritual goals for material ones. Be a person, not a bug! Let the spore of you fully flower.
More Better Living Tips From Arthur Rosenfeld--
9 Tips For Surviving Tough Times
Turning The Nation Around From The Bottom Up
Your Skin--A Mind-Beauty Connection
Oct 5, 2008 A FirstLook Feature
Book Review: The Mind-Beauty Connection: 9 Days to Reverse Stress, Aging and Reveal More Youthful, Beautiful Skin (Free Press, 2008) by Amy Weschler, M.D.
Author Amy Weschler is one of only two physicians in the United States board certified in both dermatology and psychiatry. She is also a member of the RealAge Scientific Advisory Board.
Following in the recent tradition of whole-body medicine, Dr. Weschler has identified the correlation between health, aging skin, and the mind in her new book. All of these factors play a part in how we look and feel. As a doctor, the most common skin problems she sees are premature aging and adult acne, both of which are frequently caused by stress and exhaustion.
Key points of The Mind-Beauty Connection:
- 70-80% of our health and longevity is up to us.
- Skin cells need water, oxygen, vitamins, nutrients.
- Cosmetics are not regulated by the Food and Drug Administration.
- The only proven wrinkle-reducers and age fighters are retinoids.
- "A good moisturizer will do more for you than drinking 20 gallons of water a day." (See pp. 31 for necessary ingredients.)
- Americans have about 50 minor stress attacks each day.
- Stress affects the mind, body, skin, and aging.
- Eat: fruits & vegetables, nuts, seeds, olive oil, lean protein, and whole grains.
Dr. Weschler writes that approximately $2 billion is spent on antiaging creams each year. Not promoting any particular product (This is key.), she explains what to look for when making purchases. Before running to the store, we are encouraged to take her skinage test and her self image test, defining how old our skin is when compared with our chronological age, helping us to understand ourselves better. I found the self-image test to be quite interesting.
Dr. Weschler also answers common questions and gives a 4-step wrinkle fighting strategy and lists 7 free things to do for your skin. Her biggest beauty bargains can be found on p. 34--it's great!
Should you read this book? Yes. Many of us are still unaware of how to take care of our skin, nor are we always aware of the importance of doing so. How we look and how we feel are a clear reflection of who we believe ourselves to be.
5 Stars
Related--
Autism, Green Vaccines, And Jenny McCarthy
Sep 30, 2008 Book Review: Mother Warriors: A Nation of Parents Healing Autism Against All Odds (Dutton, 2008) by Jenny McCarthy
Jenny McCarthy is well known for her acting abilities and her relationship with Jim Carrey, but Ms. McCarthy has drawn incredible attention to autism from all sectors of our society in her public fight for the greening of vaccines.
As the mother of a child who developed and recovered from autism, Ms. McCarthy has built upon her successful first book, Louder Than Words: A Mother’s Journey in Healing Autism, with this best seller—Mother Warriors. 
Offering her own experience to readers, who will cry and rejoice with her, Ms. McCarthy narrates throughout and tells the stories of other Mother Warriors too, including Lisa Ackerman—founder of Talk About Curing Autism, and Katie Wright—daughter of the founder of Autism Speaks.
Mother Warriors points of view:
- There is a battle raging between the medical community and mothers fighting for their children.
- No one believes that autistic children can recover, but they can. They are not just misdiagnosed.
- Some pediatricians are unaware of autistic symptoms—leaky gut, dysregulated immune systems, inflammation, food allergies, eczema, constipation, fungal overgrowth, viral/thyroid/cholesterol issues.
- Autism is an epidemic.
- The American Academy of Pediatrics needs to focus on alleviating fears and concerns of parents instead of trying to prove them wrong. The “AAP is years away from recognizing how we are making our kids feel better, it is up to the mothers of this generation to teach other mothers.”
- Glutathione is a natural antioxidant in the body, but is low in most children with autism.
- Alternative therapies are healing autistic children: hyperbaric oxygen, methyl B12 shots, gluten-free and casein-free diets, L-carnitine supplements as examples.
- Defeat Autism Now (DAN) is a group of doctors and scientists who are leaders in healing children with autism.
Mother Warriors also brings to mind questions about the future of children with autism:
Why is the divorce rate in autism families at 80%? Why aren’t our vaccines green? What will happen to these 15-year-olds who are still wearing diapers?
The beginning of the book hosts an introduction written by Jay N. Gordon, M.D. Assistant Clinical Professor of Pediatrics at the UCLA Medical Center. A Former Senior Fellow in Pediatric Nutrition at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Institute cites that aluminum exists in vaccines and comments further that diet and alternative therapies lessen the symptoms of autism.
Mother Warriors includes a resource section for organizations and doctors around the country who are experienced with healing autism. A portion of the proceeds from the sale of the book will go to Generation Rescue to support families in need of care and fund autism-related scientific research.
Why is Mother Warriors a best seller, even though it flies in the face of our established medical community? Moms know. Mothers birth their children, nurture them through sickness, and know them better than anyone else. Carrying their children’s pain within them, they are the ones who recognize when change must occur. I myself am the mother who once defied doctors who believed my son would die. Mother Warriors—a book of hope.
5 Stars
Related--
Healing the New Childhood Epidemics of Autism, ADHD, Asthma, and Allergies
Autism: A New Cultural Competency
Editor
Autism, Recovery, Autistic, Kelly Jad'on, Green Vaccines, Jenny McCarthy, Mother Warriors, Book Review, 5 Stars, Healing, Autism Speaks, Talk About Curing Autism, Symptoms, Glutathione, Alternative Therapy, Defeat Autism Now, Best Seller, American Academy of Pediatrics, Jim Carrey, Hyperbaric, methyl B12, casein-free diet, gluten-free diet, Jay Gordon