Unsettled Baby
At Newborn Home Care we know that when a baby is content, there will usually be a few things helping her to be in that space.
She will be comfortably feeding or satisfied with the food in her tummy; close to her parents where she can see them, perhaps connected skin to skin or cuddling in their arms; comfortable in her nappy and not overdressed.
When awake, she will be soaking in lots of sensory delight from the people and space around her, and when she is asleep, she will be taking the rest she needs.
Each of these states promotes a strong biological basis for the healthy development of your baby’s neural pathways, which continue to embed and develop over the first year or two of life.
Neuro-protective Developmental Care is a specialised lens that approaches the care of a baby with their brain development in mind.
We know that a baby's brain lays down neuronal pathways in response to the experiences they have from birth, which is why it is important to seek early help with a baby who is unsettled with feeding, sleep and the hours inbetween.
In the newborn period, the most common cause for unsettledness is feeding difficulties, usually related to sub-optimal positioning with breastfeeding.
Getting in sync with your babies needs and exposing them to healthy, diverse sensory stimulation supports the laying down of healthy organised neural circuitry.
Let us show you how.
Bringing your baby back to a calm state when he is crying hard is the first important step to addressing whatever is upsetting him. This is achieved beautifully with full skin to skin contact and gentle soothing in the early weeks, which helps him dial down and reset his nervous system.
It's something either parent can do - and it has a proven benefit to his neurological well-being.
You might consider changing the environment she is in when she is crying because, just like us, babies get bored in their own home too.
Taking a walk outside... the gentle sway of their body hugged onto yours ... the sensations of noises and breeze ... these are nourishing and comforting to a baby.
Observe how often these simple measures calm your baby.
Some Crying is Normal
As hard as it is for parents to hear, it is actually developmentally normal for infants to have unsoothable crying episodes. Babies are wired with a neurological susceptibility to crying this way in the first 4 months of life, commencing around 6 weeks of age.
This is thought to be related to the gradual disappearance and uptake of embryonic neural brain tissue into the cortex of the more mature infants' brain.
Conditioned Dialling Up
When babies become upset and distressed in relation to something that has happened, they can react to that same situation when it re-presents itself with a habitual response. This is called 'conditioned dialling up' and it is fuelled by the sympathetic nervous system being triggered by an unpleasant or unfulfilling situation for the baby.
Fussing with Breastfeeds
There are few things more concerning to a parent than when their baby is not feeding well. It seems to strike at our sense of providing for our babies who are so small and dependent on us, and it can bewilder a mother to feel as if her breast is being rejected by her child.
Newborn babies who cry or fuss and back arch at the breast are doing so for a reason.
Could it be Reflux?
It is normal for a newborn baby to bring up milk - and do so often.
Having a steady supply of burp cloths around the house to put across your shoulder for these times, is a wise move. Bringing up milk during and after a feed is particularly common, so don't let messy spills and perking concern you. Your baby will grow out of this eventually.
But when a baby is crying and won't be put down after a feed, many parents wonder - could it be reflux?
Is Baby Hot or Soiled?
Babies have basic and primitive needs when it comes to bodily comfort.
They like their temperature between 36.6 C and 37.2 C, otherwise they can become unsettled.
If your baby is fussing, you might like to check her temperature and consider whether she is over-dressed or covered up too much? A hot baby will dial up very quickly and have a high heart rate, which will heat them up even more.
Is My Baby Over-tired or Bored?
This is quite a huge subject to unpack as parent's perceptions have been strongly influenced by old ways of framing infant behaviour as having sleep/ eat/ play cycles that parents work with according to time on the clock. It also runs parallel with a burgeoning 'sleep training' industry that operate from the paradigm that a baby needs to be taught to self-settle and to learn to run one sleep cycle into the next.
Crying Going to Sleep?
A newborn baby is different to an older infant. In the first month or two most babies will sleep a lot more and cuddle off easily after a feed. We can share some tips with you to help her drop off into contented sleep and talk a little about the disconnect that sleep training and sleep routines have with a baby's natural biology.
Does my Baby have a Tongue-tie?
Have you been told your baby has a tongue-tie? And is he fussing and crying with feeds?
Whilst a complete and classical tongue tie will often need treating, there are varying degrees of membrane attachment under the tongue, sometimes referred to as 'partial tongue-tie', that may at first appear to be an impediment to breast feeding, when they do not in fact have to be.
