Empathizing

Becoming a parent is one of the biggest changes a person can experience. Being responsible for another and very vulnerable human life is a heavy task. To fit in another life, with other needs and other, non-intellectual, ways of communication, into an already existent and highly structured life can be a alost impossible task. In their urge to be of help health care providers offer programs and structures to help parents to take care of and nurture their baby in a structured way that fits into their adult ways of living, assuming that what works for adults will work for children as well. What is easily forgotten is that babies are not tiny adults and do have different needs in other to grow and develop well. Surpassinf these innate needs of infants to be almost uninterruptedly in close human encounter and frequent small naps and feeds can lead to serious negative consequences for physical and phycho-emotional great and development. A well-designed research done by Tetio of the University of Pennsylvania showed that not the sleep routines and maternal behavior are key factors for sleep quality of young children (0-24 months) but the maternal emotional availability. These results acknowledge the hypothesis that parental emotional availability in the sleep context increases the sense of safety in their children, which in turn leads to better sleep regulation and quality in infants and toddlers. Other research again and again shows that not ony emotional availability but also physical proximity is important for a baby’s well-being. Swaddling an infant tightly and putting him in bed alone to sleep are a shocking contradiction to that notion: it only works to keep the child from crying and thus the parents from using physical violence when they get frustrated in reaction to the desparate crying of the child that needs his parents to hold him. Page encourages parents (and health care providers?) to have themselves tighky swaddled to feel how that is. How do you feel: safe, at ease or …? How long can you stand it?
Aney M: ''Babywise' advice linked to dehydration, failure to thrive. AAP News 1998 14:21
van Veldhuizen-Staas CGA: Over het huilen van baby's (1998, 2005). http://eurolac.net/index.php?p=87
van Veldhuizen-Staas CGA: Inbakeren - wat en hoe; waarom wel of niet (2001, 2005, 2006) http://eurolac.net/index.php?p=88
Tetia DM,  Kim BR, Mayer G, Countermine M: Maternal Emotional Availability at Bedtime Predicts Infant Sleep Quality. Journal of Family Psychology Volume 24, Issue 3, June 2010, Pages 307-315
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2010-08/ps-fis081010.php
Swaddling New Born Babies: An Exercise for the Parents; Posted by Debbie Page on Wed, Mar 02, 2011 @ 05:45 AM op http://www.thenewbornbaby.com/breastfeeding-blog/