11 Ways To Support Body Awareness In Your Infant
If anyone is in touch with their body, it’s a newborn baby. It is in their nature to keep their body awareness for life, however, unfortunately, due to many factors in our society including the prevalence of digital screen technology, mass marketing to children, and materialism in our culture, our children can easily lose touch with their body’s innate sensitivity. Bringing sensory awareness to the way you relate to your baby provides an excellent foundation for trusting their instincts, feeling secure in who they are, and eventually calling on their body signals to make good decisions.
At this vulnerable stage of life, babies need touch to thrive. Try these suggestions to provide sensory input that they can manage, imprinting your infant with safe, positive experiences of their body.
- When you put your baby down, hold her against the front of your body, with your baby facing you. Support her head with your hand while you hold her against you and lower your own body until she comes to a rest on her back. This provides a sure sense of security for her and promotes bonding. It helps her feel the support and safety of your body and basic closeness to you while she is being lowered. Being put down too fast can startle and frighten your baby. Holding her against your body and supporting her head prevents this. And provides a warm, safe, secure feeling of connection. It is a very tender experience. You may enjoy the closeness, too.
2. Talk to your baby about his body, about what you see when he tenses up or relaxes. Tell him when you see his fists clenched and legs rigidly locked as he yells in frustration. Notice what type of contact he likes — some babies like to have their faces stroked and some do not. Tell him what you observe. He will understand your words far sooner than you expect him to. And he’ll make connections between the gentleness in your voice and the gentleness in the way you handle him, even before that.
3. Pat your baby, jostle her back, stroke her legs and arms. Be aware of her responses to all the ways you pat and stroke her. If she recoils, she might just not like having her leg patted that way. Many kids have sensory sensitivity and until they can tell you, “I don’t like having my leg patted!” it’s your job to notice what she does and does not like.
4. Play silly touch games like Round and Round the Garden, or Criss-Cross Applesauce. This type of play is bonding and helps your baby to enjoy being in her own skin, in her body, and in the world.
5. Practice Kangaroo Care — or some version of it — even if your baby isn’t a preemie. If you aren’t familiar with Kangaroo Care, this method dramatically changed the infant mortality rate of premature births in Bogota, Columbia, and has since been adopted worldwide. The many benefits to a preemie from Kangaroo Care also benefit full-term babies. Kangaroo Care promotes regular breathing and heart rate, skin temperature, better sleep, diminished stress, decreased crying, longer periods of alertness. In addition, skin to skin contact (SSC) is found to improve the immune system (this is true for adults too). It is also calming for the parent and promotes bonding of course.
6. Breastfeed. Breastfeeding provides another opportunity for SSC (skin-to-skin contact) with your baby and has many of the benefits of Kangaroo Care. The amount of time taken in KC is an important factor so it shouldn’t be dismissed just because you breastfeed your baby. Breastfeeding also provides you with a chance to lie down, providing a much needed rest for a new mom — if you nurse your baby on the bed. For more on the many other benefits of breastfeeding, visit your local LaLecheLeague website.
7. Pat the bottoms of your baby’s feet when she is upset. According to Seattle physical therapist Carla Corrado, this is grounding for a baby and will help her to calm down. Grasping and holding her feet might also help.
8. Use a front carrier that faces your baby toward you, not away. Front-to-front is more personal, your baby’s body is designed to conform to yours and for these reasons (and others) front-to-front baby carriers promote bonding. In addition to all of that, front to front carriers allow your baby to see your face which is both fascinating for your baby and neurologically and socially important. It also minimizes stimulation, which is especially important in an infant.
9. Pay attention to your baby’s facial expressions and physical tension when a group of friends or relatives want to pass your infant around so everyone gets a chance to hold him. It might not bother him being passed around among loving relatives, but it might. So notice his comfort level. Think about it — would you want to be passed around by a bunch of people without your permission?
10. Learn infant massage. The benefits are not only for your baby, but parents who massage their babies also experience calmer, diminished stress, increased immune systems and really love the sweetness of bonding with their baby in this way. You may well find classes on infant massage where you are located, and there are many excellent books on the subject.
11. Consider the family bed. I know, I know, it’s not for everyone. But if it appeals to you at all, give it a try. I speak from experience when I say that when your baby wakes up in the middle of the night, it is infinitely less disruptive to your sleep if all you have to do is roll on your side to help her, rather than get up and go to the crib. It was not a problem in our family to transition the kids to eventually moving into their own rooms when they were around two.
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