Читать книгу Sister Lilian’s Babycare Companion: Complimentary and traditional care - Lilian Paramor - Страница 54

All mothers know that a baby’s cry signals distress of some kind or the other, and many of these cries soon become familiar and are fairly easily solved with a bit of experience and time. And if one’s baby does not cry too often or for too long, most moms survive this quite well – after all, women know that crying can also provide a welcome release of tension and emotion. It is when nothing you do seems to help and the crying persists that you feel desperate, and, understandably, begin to think that something serious must be wrong. This can erode all mothering confidence, often contributing to, or causing, postnatal depression.

You can find out more about typical reasons for crying, as well as how to interpret Baby’s body language and cries elsewhere in this book, but when Baby’s cries are particularly distressing to you, one of these tips often soothes the cries and your nerves:

•No matter the time of day, run a deep, warm bath and soak with Baby for a half hour. Place a facecloth over Baby’s tummy and offer a breast- or bottlefeed.

•Massage your baby. Try gentle circular fingertip movement between the eyebrows, on the temples and behind the ears. All-over massage daily will gradually calm Baby too. You can also lie your baby on a big birthing ball and gently roll forwards and backwards, both on the tummy and back.

•Play soothing or melodious music to which you can dance with Baby, reminding him of days in the womb with music played during pregnancy.

•Place Baby under a tree where she can watch the constantly changing mobile of leaves blowing in the breeze, the clouds grouping and dappled sunlight making pretty patterns. Change Baby’s cot mobile too – imagine being exposed to just one tune or one set of dangles all the time!

•Take Baby into bed with you if night-time crying is pitiful. Often this is the only way you can get some sleep. Remember, you need to survive this phase well and finding solutions that work for you is all that is important.