Newborn Baby Senses Under Heavy Bombardment In First Couple Of Weeks
For mums, the first couple of weeks is having to deal with the lack of sleep, fluctuating hormones and the challange of having a tiny, helpless infant to look after. But let's not forget - it's a pretty difficult time for a newborn baby too! For him or her, there's a huge adjustment that has to be made to this new, sensory-full world. For baby, this is the time when they need to start of learning how to interpret the world around them, the noises, smells, the sensation of touch and being touched. Every sensation they will experience is entirely different to that they have experienced whilst in the womb. Try not to overload their senses at this time. Soon your newborn will be able to see a distance of around 8 inches (20 cm) so try to encourage and develop this ability with bright coloured toys. Don't worry about providing extra stimulation at this stage as they'll have enough to cope with by just being in this new wild world.
They'll also be working on a way to block out all the unwanted stimulation too! Sleep is certainly the most effective way to do that and for most of the first two weeks a newborn will naturally block out much of the stimulation by going off to sleep - effectively "shutting down". Indeed, they may well spend the most part of of every day asleep, waking up only for feeds. This is normal and ideally you should settle them back down to sleep after an hour or so of being awake to encourage this process. With three weeks this relatively peaceful chapter will come to an end as a little one becomes more and more alert, and with it becomes more demanding and a lot fussier!
It will seem like an enless cycle of feeding, more so if you are breastfeeding where you can expect to feed far more frequently. They'll demand their feed, which ensures a good supply of milk and help meet their nutritional requirements. If you are bottle-feeding you'll wanty to look at doing so every three or four hours. This may mean waking the newborn for a feed during the day if they happen to be asleep, again to encourage a regular supply and feeding routine.
Take a look at the
Baby Sense range of nursery products including the
Baby Sense Book.
This is an original news article © The Kids Window
| Products available to buy at the Kids Window |
|
|
|
scroll down to see more