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About Bonding Some parents feel an immediate bond with their baby, and for others it can take a little more time. Erica discusses the range of feelings that many parents go through on the path to finding a loving bond with the baby that’s even stronger than they could have imagined. Parenting is a big secret club of people who know a type of love that surpasses everything they’ve know before. If we could all remember that everyone was someone’s baby at some point the world could be a better place. |
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Bathing Bath time can be a great bonding activity for dad. In this video Erica demonstrates what you need to know about giving baby a bath: checking the water temperature, how to clean your baby, when to use soap, drying off baby, and more. |
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Breastfeeding 1: Doing It Right When latching for breastfeeding it’s important for the baby to have a wide open mouth and proper positioning of the baby. In this video, Erica explains basic latching technique for breastfeeding. |
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Breastfeeding 2: Managing Everyday Erica discusses breastfeeding recommendations of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP). |
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Crying Baby: Colic Colic is crying that shows up at a specific time every day – generally toward the end of the day. Colic can often be the result of the baby being highly reactive to stimuli; about 1 out of 5 babies tend to have this quality of being highly reactive. There are few techniques that often help with Colic such as: checking the latch when feeding to ensure the baby is not taking in too much air, and decreasing stimuli. In general Colic doesn’t last longer than 6 weeks. |
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Crying Baby: Hungry Baby Most of your child’s behavior from now until he moves out is because he is hungry or tired. Newborns have a non-nutritive need to nurse. Feeding quiets the baby if the baby is hungry, and sucking stimulates the intestinal tract movement. |
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Crying Baby: Maintain Sanity How do you maintain your sanity and manage stress when the baby won’t stop crying? Even if you’re not sure if you’re “doing it right,” you’re showing up. And this is how you establish trust with your new baby. |
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Crying Baby: Physical Check When your baby cries, do a physical check to see if there is anything you can make better for the baby. |
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Crying Baby: Pick Up the Baby Your child adores you. Babies are wired for two things, they are wired to eat and they are wired to bond. The habitat of the newborn is the parent - so many times simply picking the baby up will quiet a crying baby. |
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Crying Baby: We will begin to learn why You will begin to notice it’s a particular pitch or particular fuss associated with what the baby wants. It’s not magic, you will learn from experience – essentially by the baby training you over time. |
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Help! I'm a sleep deprived parent. Sometimes when you have a baby, it’s not all about parenting the baby, sometimes you need to parent yourself too. Here’s one important thing that everybody says, and nobody does: sleep when the baby sleeps! |
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My baby doesn't know the difference between day and night. Newborns exist of a 24 hour continuum of: eat, sleep, cry, poo. We exist on a day/ night continuum. Babies aren’t born understanding the difference between night and day. Our job is to teach the baby that our day/ night system is MUCH better. |
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One Thing A Day A huge part of those early weeks with your new baby is just learning what it means and the time it takes to change diapers, give baths, feed your baby, and get to the pediatrician. It is critical to take the pressure off yourself in the early days of parenthood. A realistic and kind perspective on the early days of being a new parent and having some perspective on the parent’s learning curve will make the first time with baby a lot easier. Here, Erica helps new parents set realistic expectations for those first few weeks at home with the baby. |
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SIDS: Decreasing the chances SIDS stands for sudden infant death syndrome. It is when for an unknown reason the respiratory center in the baby’s brain shuts down. We don’t know why this happens but we do know some things that the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends to help decrease the chance of SIDS. 1.) baby sleeps on back 2.) baby sleeps on a nice firm mattress with “no extras in the crib” 3.) breastfeeding 4.) no cigarette smoke around the baby 5.) baby sleeps in proximity to the parents (having bassinette/ crib in the parents’ room) |
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The Soothing Positions Babies cry less when we attempt to respond to their crying-it doesn’t mean we always figure it out, and it doesn’t mean that sometimes it may be appropriate to put them down when crying-however, for the most part we get happier smarter babies when we respond to their crying in a nurturing manner in the first three months. There are many holding tricks to soothing a newborn. Watch as Erica demonstrates a few positions that can help your baby get more comfortable in the early months of soothing. |
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Umbilical Cord Care Each time that you change the baby, you swab the umbilical cord stump gently with a bit of alcohol on a cotton ball. The umbilical cord stump will eventually dry up and fall off – this will take about a week and a half. |
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Warning Signs: Dehydration Your baby should seem to have a ridiculous amount of pee, he should be wetting about 8-12 diapers after the first day, and the baby’s urine should be pale in color. If you’re seeing six or less wet diapers in a 24 hour cycle, or if you are seeing dark colored urine or crystals in the urine then you would want to check in with your pediatrician. |
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Warning Signs: False Warning Signs There are some things you will notice in the first few weeks that will seem like warning signs but are normal and common in newborns. These include:
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What do I need on the changing table? Learn about everything you need (and don’t need) on your baby’s changing table. |
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What your baby's poop will look like Newborn’s bowel movements change through the first five days of their lives. Their first bowel movements are something called Meconium, a dark tar-like poop. Meconium’s sole purpose is to make you feel like a failure in the first few days of parenting, because it’s like trying to wipe tar off your baby’s behind. After a couple days, the meconium has passed through the system and your see greenish bowel movements, a few days after that your baby’s poo will look yellow (the yellow indicates a pure breastmilk bowel movement). This transition is healthy and indicates that your baby is getting enough food going in. |
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Where Are the Professionals?!
Many parents can feel a little startled in the early days by how alone they are in the new process. We see our care providers so frequently at the end of pregnancy, have an intensive labor and birth experience-and then are essentially done with that professional relationship. We’ve yet to establish an on-going relationship with our pediatrician so there is often a support void in the early days at one of the most transformational times of our lives. |
