Caroline Deacon - Babycalming - Simple Solutions for a Happy Baby

Simple Solutions for a Happy Baby

Thorsons

An Imprint of HarperCollins Publishers 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

Thorsons is a trademark of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd

First published in collaboration

with National Childbirth Trust Publishing 2004

© NCT Publishing 2004

Caroline Deacon asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

Extracts from Dream Babies by Christina Hardyment (Jonathan Cape, 1983,) are published with kind permission of the author © 1983 by Christina Hardyment

A catalogue record for this book

is available from the British Library

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Source ISBN: 9780007159024

Ebook Edition © JUNE 2016 ISBN: 9780007380022

Version: 2016-06-29

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Introduction: Why the Three-step Plan Works

Your Baby from Birth to Toddlerhood

1Why Do Babies Cry?

2Getting Used to the World: The First Six Weeks

3Learning about Routines: Six Weeks to Six Months

4Getting Sociable: Six Months to Two Years

5The Need for Boundaries: You and Your Toddler

PUTTING THE THREE-STEP PLAN TO WORK

Step One: Feeding

6Feeding Your Newborn

7How Much and How Often?

8Night-feeding

9Your Baby’s Need to Suckle

Step Two: Comfort

10Recreating the Womb

11Using Sound and Movement

12The Power of Touch

13Comforting the Baby Who Has Colic

14Feeding the Baby with Colic

15Is Your Colicky Baby Oversensitive?

16Treatments for Colic

Step Three: Sleeping

17How Sleep Works for You

18How Sleep Works for Your Baby

19Can You Train Your Baby to Sleep Through the Night?

20Helping Your Baby Fall Asleep

21Helping Your Baby Stay Asleep

22All Change: Sleep and the Older Baby

23Who Sleeps Where?

24Sleeping Safely

25Putting it All Together: What’s Going to Work for You?

Appendix: Cows’ Milk-free Diet for Breastfeeding Mothers

References

Useful Organizations and Further Reading

Further Reading

All about the National Childbirth Trust

Index

Acknowledgements

About the Publisher

After all the anticipation during pregnancy, when your baby finally arrives, no matter how organized you are, life will feel pretty chaotic amidst the excitement and wonder. New parents in particular are thrown straight in at the deep-end – after all, your baby doesn’t come with a handy manual – and the sense of responsibility can be overwhelming.

Like most people, you are probably used to running your life with one eye on the clock and the other on the task in hand: you have a routine and normally expect to do certain things in a certain order throughout the day. Because of this, it is natural to hope that your baby will fall into a routine that will complement yours and enable you to plan and manage your day-to-day life.

At the same time, you also hope that your baby will be happy, feed easily and sleep well. If he cries, you would like what he needs to be obvious, so that you can know how to respond. However, many babies do not appear to behave like this: they cry seemingly without reason, they sleep in fits and starts or they want to feed all the time. They don’t seem to have an internal clock and they show no interest in the clock on the wall!

Your baby spent his first nine months being held, rocked and moved around in the womb. He was in constant contact with his mum and could hear her heartbeat, her voice, feel the warmth of her body and the sensation of being tightly held. He expected things to continue like this after birth: being in constant contact with another human being, feeling warm, snug and secure. If he thinks has been abandoned, he cries, a response that has evolved over millions of years to make sure a responsible adult picks him up and keeps him safe. If he is hungry, uncomfortable, tired or bored he will cry.

A psychologist called Maslow pointed out that in order for human beings to be fulfilled, reach their potential and enjoy life – ‘reach self-actualization’ is how he put it – they need to have their basic needs met. You can’t sit and concentrate on a book or film if you are hungry, thirsty or need the toilet. Great philosophy or art will pass you by if you are homeless and worried about your safety.

Babies are like this, too – if their basic needs are not met, they cannot be happy and secure, and although there are lots of similarities between adult needs and baby needs, there are differences, too.

We all need to have enough to eat and drink, and we need to have times to rest and sleep. We all need to feel safe – for grown-ups this might mean that the rent or mortgage is paid or that our homes are secure and we can sleep soundly at night – but for your baby, feelings about safety are a little different. Babies expect adults to fend off danger, so for your baby, safety is about human companionship. If there is a reliable grown-up nearby, then he can relax.

For your baby to feel happy and contented, you need to fulfil his three basic needs:

• Contact

• Food

• Sleep

Over time, the way you meet these needs, and the balance between them, changes. This is perhaps one of the most difficult things to grasp in parenting – the rules change all the time, and what worked today will no longer be appropriate tomorrow. Where we often go wrong is in thinking that methods stay constant.

For instance, feeding a baby whenever he is hungry, day or night, is perfectly appropriate at two weeks, but is no longer appropriate at two years. Sharing your bedroom, if not your bed, with a baby of five weeks is safe and easy; sharing your bed with a five-year-old is less easy; sharing your bed with a fifteen-year-old would certainly be odd! Responding the instant your baby cries when he is little is appropriate; responding to a toddler who is yelling for sweets is not kind in the long run.