Baby sitting is a way of life and it’s the only way some parents can ever get out of the house without their children. The American Academy of Pediatrics Injury Prevention Program has printed a useful guide of reminders about baby sitting. Here are some of their suggestions which I completely agree with: • Check […]
Most small babies love to be carried and cuddled, but some do not. If yours is an uncuddly baby, he may seem to resent the physical restriction of being held. • Instead of molding himself to the curves of your body, he probably wriggles and fights. He may hurt your feelings; you may have to
Sometimes a baby seems to come out of her mother’s womb and into her arms and heart in a single move. Parents sometimes describe a feeling of instant recognition, so that all the waiting and wanting of pregnancy and labor culminate not just in a baby, but in this baby. But that kind of instant
Many six to nine month old babies won’t sit on a lap at all. They grab for clothes or hair and haul themselves to use the adult’s knee for a trampoline. It’s another couple of months before your baby is able to support his full weight, though. But once he can, it won’t be long
The home that’s safe and comfortable for you can be a literal deathtrap for your crawling or newly-walking baby. Don’t leave childproofing your home until the day she gets moving, you could be one day too late. • Try to see the environment through a crawling baby’s eyes – that means getting down on the
Coping with a baby who can’t be comforted is definitely the downside of parenting. When you’ve tried everything and your baby still cries, he can come to be seen as a baby who won’t be comforted, a baby who’s rejecting you on purpose. If you feel yourself getting angry, try to hand him to somebody
Your baby’s first smiles are for anyone, but a month or two later, his smiliest smiles are just for you, and he’s starting the first and most important love affair of his life, a love that will keep on building to give him the foundation for all the later loving of his life. Every baby
Conventional crawling means progressing across the floor on hands and knees, but babies aren’t concerned with convention — only with getting across the room to see something on the far side! Crawling can mean different kinds of progress. Some babies never really crawl at all – they develop rolling over to a point where they
A security blanket, or “cuddly” can be any soft piece of material or toy which a baby, usually six to nine months old, adopts as his very own. Psychologists dignify these bits of blanket or worn, smelly teddy bears with the name, “transitional comfort object.” They deserve the dignified name because cuddlies take on very
Adults often ask me, “What question do you hear most from teens?” The most frequent concern that teens have, and the one most often voiced by patients, and in letters from readers of our books is, “Am I normal?” This question can be asked in many different ways. One teen might say, “I’m fourteen, but
