Baby massage – Research and Tradition

If you live in India and also learn about best practices from the net/books/doctor, its likely that you have the most conflicting opinions when it comes to baby massage and its tough to find out what to do.

This is a list of my conflicts and current decisions:

Smoke, kajal, powder, etc: Doctors say that the old practice of “dhuri” for the baby is not a good idea. In fact, lady from the free breastfeeding lectures by Breastfeeding Promotion Network of India goes ahead and says bluntly, “Its the woman who has given birth, not the baby. If you have such a strong belief that the warmth of the smoke creats strength, do what you want with the mother, but get the baby out of the room and away from the smoke.” Kajal carries risk of infection, may have traces of lead and can block the tiny tear ducts. Powder can get into a baby’s lungs and as such must not be used anywhere other than the diaper area if you must. No brainer there. I follow these guidelines and let the old women mutter about “today’s people”. That goes for oil in the ear, nose or any orifice.
Straightening legs: Its common practice in India to stretch the baby’s legs out to strengthen them. Fact is that the baby will “unfurl” in three months or so anyway. The fetal position is not something they can switch off at birth, and it brings them security, conserves energy and is actually quite a good thing. I tell the massage woman not to use force, and if the baby cries, then that is the end of whatever she is doing, and she must move to the next thing. It goes against her every idea of doing the best she can for the baby, so I really have to watch like a hawk on this and bluntly tell her that it is enough of something if the baby complains. And mostly he doesn’t.
Oil on the scalp: The fontanelle needs to be oiled to be closed is a common belief. Actually, like a cold lasts for a week or seven days depending on if you take medicine, the fontanelle will close approximately in two years or twenty four months depending on whether you oil it or not Pressure on the soft part is a bad thing. However, soft touch on the scalp is soothing, so I go by whether the baby seems to like it that day or not.
Exercise: The massage woman gently moves the baby’s limbs to exercise him. This is great and Nisarg loves it most days. When he doesn’t we don’t do it, because if he is jerking in resistance, I imagine it will do more harm than good.
Swaddling: A typical baby massage and bath will be followed by swaddling as sure as the sky is blue. The baby seems to enjoy it and sleeps soundly, so its great. However, this swaddling is typically done very tight, which can cause hip dysplasia in the baby. What I do is ensure that the baby is open and free most of the time, and loosen the swaddling when the woman goes.
Hair removal: The massage woman has talked herself hoarse in one ear with the mother in law in the other – the baby hair on his forehead must be removed, or he will turn into an ugly, hairy grown up. Needless to say, they talk, I listen, and do nothing in that direction. If hair removal were such a great idea, we’d encourage our four year old daughters to get their eyebrows trimmed. Hair removed will grow again, and any changes in appearance are cosmetic till the hair falls out on its own. If it were a permanent solution, there would be no need for permanent hair removal ads for grown ups. We’d all DIY at home.
Oil for baby massage: Okay, this is a big one. Doctors tell you to go with coconut oil. The massage woman will recommend edible oils but use whatever you provide. Fancy friends will insist that olive oil is the thing (a status thing, since olive oil is a “good”, exotic and expensive oil and no “commoners” in India have even heard of olives). Others would recommend Johnsons baby oil. Here’s what I found. Doctors and tradition solidly of the same opinion, and backed by my experience of the baby. Coconut oil wins hands down. Excellent for the skin, inexpensive, no undesirable reactions on the skin…. Olive oil caused rashes on Nisarg – for whatever reason. Johnson’s baby oil is a liquid paraffin based oil. NOT a good idea for massage, though I guess its fine for applying on the skin to keep it from drying. There have been many instances of skin rashes from this oil among people I know, online and people the massage woman knows. I have yet to hear of anyone regretting using coconut oil on a child. I have heard that almond oil is good too. A pediatrician friend said, “Don’t create such a production out of it. Use your mother-in-law’s coconut oil, almond oil, or cooking oil from the kitchen. If something creates a rash, discontinue it.”

So, what are your experiences with advice based on research, tradition and social opinions? How do you manage? What choices do you make?

Baby Signing Time

Okay, so I’m on a roll with educational resources for babies. Another absolutely awesome resource dropped into my lap last week. A friend with a grown up baby gave me the first episode of – Its Baby Signing Time!

The idea being that babies develop an awareness about their needs and desires long before they are able to express them. Thus, babies often cry out of frustration, because they are unable to get their needs met.

Teaching them the baby (read very basic) version of sign language empowers them to communicate more fluently with you, thus removing much of the stress of guesswork for both of you.

There is an additional bonus – research shows that children who gesture a lot learn to speak early and develop better mental abilities.

There are supposed to be four episodes, though I’ve seen only one. What we saw, we liked. Nisarg was entranced with the lively music and bright colours. I was entranced with how clearly and charmingly the whole thing has been created. Its literally lessons on sign language woven with music, words, and plenty of practice time. I had never imagined that learning could look so much like a fun video. Nisarg doesn’t understand anything at all, but approves anyway, if his stare and waving limbs are to go by.

He’s still young, but in a month or so, I guess we’ll have all the episodes.

Really, sign language is not just for deaf and dumb children, but for all children who are not able to speak – babies qualify.

Tips on teaching a baby to clap

Oooookay, I think we have cracked the clap code (though not actually clapped), which if you consider that Nisarg is not even 3 months yet, is pretty amazing.

The little guy has figured out that its all about swinging his hands together, but doesn’t yet have the co-ordination to quite make them meet….

If you want to teach your baby to clap, and he just stares back and blows spit bubbles at you, the following tips might help:

Don’t hurry. ENJOY the fun you are having with baby, no matter what it ends up as. Babies sense you enjoying yourself, and it tempts them to enter the action you are leading.
Pick your time. Don’t just pester the poor darling morning and night. The idea is to find a time when baby is alert, awake and quiet.
Talk baby talk with your baby. Get his attention. You want him really looking at you, observing.
Clap with an exaggerated movement (with an obvious swing of your hands). Laugh and share the joke with baby and do more baby talk.
Do this a couple of times, and baby will likely get buzzed enough to wave his hands. Get all excited about that, and clap some more and wait, as though you are fully expecting him to do the same. If baby doesn’t respond, fine. Do something else. Repeating clapping a couple of times, or playfully clapping his hands together will work as interactive fun, but don’t turn it into a lesson. It will not make him clap, if he stops enjoying it.

This is it. The whole session. Praise whatever swings baby makes, and clap in response. Eventually, the little darling is going to figure out how to make the hands meet when he swings them.

Baby weight gain and bonnissan

I had written earlier about how Nisarg was having problems with gas and diarrhoea and the doctor had prescribed Bonnisan. Then I wrote about how after just two days, Nisarg had normal baby poop for the first time in his life.

Well…. half a month later, we haven’t had a single loose bowel movement yet, and Nisarg is filling up quite well, with chubbying cheeks and slight hints of plumpness that we associate with babies. I don’t think he’s ever going to be one of those round babies, but hey, he’s healthy, active and putting on weight steadily. He also put on an inch in height – he’s now 22 inches.

I don’t know what he weighs, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s put on a kilo from the last appointment to the next.

Maybe its just regular growth, but I’m of the opinion that the Bonnissan really helped. He just was cranky (for him) and slow to grow since the gas set in till before we started with it.

Neopeptine drops for infants with gas

Okay, like I said that the baby’s loose bowel motions got sorted by Bonnisan, the other helpful miracle we had with the gas was Neopeptine.

This is apparently something with digestive enzymes, and it really helps cut the amount of gas discomfort the baby goes through. Unfortunately, it took us a while to discover how to use it.

So, if you are using Neopeptine for infant gas, here are some tips, which we wish someone had given us:

You have likely been advised to give Neopeptine only for extreme colic, like we were. This makes you tend to wait for quite some time before the baby’s screaming forces you to use it. Don’t wait. Use it at the first sign of gas.
If your baby is suffering from gas, don’t give doses only when he is in pain. Give them for a day or two, as long as you aren’t giving him more than three times, though we have given him four or even five doses once on the first day, when he was in a lot of trouble.
Give the drops before feeding.
Neopeptine helps baby move the gas easier, but you can help it along. Give drops, burp, feed, burp, wait for some time, burp again.
Moving the baby’s legs will also help him pass gas, which will not hurt your situation.

Have you used Neopeptine? How did you use it? How was your experience?

Right brain development in infants

There is a wealth of information on right brain development in infants and how it can’t be started early enough and resources and all that. Like any other obsessed mother out there, I’m researching ways to entertain him in a manner that stimulates his development, and so far am doing pretty much exactly what came instinctively anyway.

Talking a lot to him, teasing him to win those smiles, carrying him around and showing stuff, making funny faces and exaggerated actions, etc.

The funny part is that the actions get him looking all solemn and puzzled at me when I’d have thought he’d laugh. He looks like he wants to ask “Hey, you okay? You seemed fine a minute ago”

What I’m planning to do:

Flash cards. He still sleeps most of the time, and seems supremely uninterested in the flashcards most of the time. So I guess this is going to be an acquired taste. At the moment, he’ll look at the cards very briefly and mostly look at my face as though trying to figure out what in the world I’m trying to do.
Touch: He gets his massage and bath every day, and we often cuddle at bedtime. Other than that, he loves touch in general. Stroke his head, body, face-but-NOT-nose, and he’s virtually purring. I give him lots of other stuff to touch too – the plastic of his toys – hard, soft, bags…, rubber mat, soft cotton swaddling cloth, other cloth materials, sponge, wood, …. whatever we can lay our hands on
Smell: So far, we like a couple of perfumes and sneeze at frying smells from the kitchen. Vicks , milk and baby powder are at the top.
Movement: I carry him around in my arms, in a sling…. lift him high, dance with him in my arms, … He pretty much enjoys it all indiscriminately
Mimicry: I do all kinds of stuff for him to copy. So far we have managed to stick our tongues out (both imitating me and when told), clap (sort of) and blink. He will suck instead of kiss, and we understand the sign for milk (I like to imagine), but can’t copy. I guess he’s too hungry and small to focus while hungry yet. Thing is, he enjoys all this stuff and is mostly waving arms and feet full power with that undecided half-smile on his face.
Music: He likes most music (other than a couple of really loud songs, and Anup Jalota) Favourites being nursery rhymes in Marathi, and Usha Uthups Karadi Rhymes followed closely by Shakti and Ghulam Ali.

And here I am, saying that I don’t get to do much because he sleeps so much. I guess its more about being aware of how much we are doing.

Nightmare night

Last night Nisarg cried, and cried, and cried. Poor chap. He vomitted a couple of times, had loose stools, gas…. and was utterly miserable.

He wanted to be held all the time and still sobbed on and off.

Nothing worked. feeding, burping, music….

Just as I was about to rush him to the ER of the nearest hospital, he started nodding off, utterly exhausted. Poor little boy. Care….fully, I put him down, and after a few sobs, he was out. Such a tiny body, so tired from the discomfort and crying.

I was a goner too. I was tired myself, but all wired up. Sleep didn’t matter if I could just bring him some comfort…. Luckily, at 4am, this nightmare story ended from sheer exhaustion on his part. After staying awake for another half hour or so to just be sure that he was ok, I slept like a log.

He woke up in the morning with a ear destroying scream, and I was like, “Not again….”. I began telling Raka how we were taking him to the hospital immediately after feeding, and he started getting ready.

Just to be contrary I think, Nisarg drank and drank and drank like he was starving, belched like a drunk sailor, and was peacefully sleeping before his burping was done. He didn’t even stir as I put him down.

Raka and I looked at each other in disbelief. Apparently, the guy was just hungry after his difficult night.

I’ve been looking at him warily all day, but so far, so good.

Teething before 2 months

Is Nisarg teething?

Everyone I shared this doubt with thinks I’m nuts. For one, he was born early. For another, he’s not even two months old yet. Its supposed to begin after four months and supposed to be even later for babies who come early.

Since yesterday, he’s been fussy on and off for no apparent reason. I put him down to nap, then he wakes up almost immediately after, except for the night, which so far continues to be blessedly smooth.

He’s suddenly started drooling, biting his fingers and sometimes (rarely) sucking his knuckles. I can see two white bits under the gum where his two lower front teeth could come. I can also feel those teeth with my finger, though they are inside.

To me, it really seems like he’s teething.

Dayum, this motherhood thing is one thing after another. Seems just yesterday I was complaining about not being able to sleep because of backaches from a huge front. Now, I can sleep very well, but am still exhausted. First the birth, then coming home, breastfeeding every two hours, diarrhoea, gas pains, figuring out pee communication, worrying about his weight gain all through and just as I was celebrating two days of a regular healthy infant, its now this teething thing, or something that seems remarkably like it.

Anyone else had a child that teethed this early? Developmentally, he should be counted a month old or something. He’s still very tiny and not on the weight charts for his age at all. I’m just hoping that this doesn’t create a setback in his weight gain….

Teaching baby to clap

Okay, let me say that I tried, and he seems to get it, but I have no clue how it happened.

I noticed that he will try and imitate things I do, so I made faces. He will stick his tongue out when I stick mine out. He will stare at my face when I smile with no intention of copying. He will smile when I raise my eyebrows with no movement other than blinking around his eyes…

Another stage in this saga was me trying to teach him to clap. I clapped my hands when he was paying attention, and he gave me one of those intent stares that make it clear he has no plans of doing any such thing. Small claps make him all puzzled, and ones where I move my hands obviously entertain him, but no go on doing it himself.

Until this morning. Raka had to leave really early, so we woke up around 5am. Imagine my surprise to see Nisarg next to me wide awake, and clapping!!!

Well, they were not real claps. Sometimes the hands came to the center at slightly different times, other times he hit his stomach, still other times, he brought his hands together and clasped them tight. However, there was no doubt that he was trying to clap.

I promptly sat in front of him and clapped without a sound to help him see the movement, and his legs got into the fray, kicking into the air with excitement. He tried once more.

And… that’s it.

We went back to staring at me while I clapped.

Looks like my guy was trying to clap as a part of playing with his hands and didn’t appreciate the distraction of mom teaching something.

Hmmm… so if you’re trying to teach your baby to clap, here is what I suggest you do:

Please share in a comment how you managed to do it.

Elimination communication at 7 weeks old

Yesterday, I realized that Nisarg cried for a couple of minutes before peeing, and was able to rush him to the wash basin in time to take a diaper free leak quite a few times. I was thrilled, right until before the MIL told me to call up the doctor. Why is it that the baby is crying when he isn’t even wet yet? He must be in pain.

There went my joy at having successfully conquered the gas pains a couple of days ago. In a panic, I called up the doctor, who was busy, busy again, and again, till I could have reached throught the phone to yank the receptionist’s hair and to tell her that this was an emergency!

Finally, I was able to speak with her, and…. anti-climax. Like so many of my worried calls, this one barely rated a yawn. No, nothing to worry about. Babies do it. He will grow out of it….

Why in the world was everyone acting like this was a bad thing to be concerned about or grown out of?

It looked to me that my baby was telling me clearly that he didn’t like being wet, and was crying in anticipation of the upcoming wet, or to tell me, or from fighting the losing battle to prevent the wet…. In any case, it told me that he needed to take a leak and to provide him with appropriate support. Which is good, right? Isn’t that the direction to grow in in any case?

He’s small. So what? He just doesn’t like being wet.

Just to test, I put a disposable diaper on him, like for the night, and he didn’t cry for hours. Possibly, because it doesn’t let him get uncomfortably wet like the cloth ones. So obviously it wasn’t pain from passing urine.

The other mystery got solved in a flash of insight. Why was he telling us so clearly all of a sudden? I realized that he was telling me all through, but what with the gas making him cry all the time, and my own incompetence with understanding him, I didn’t realize till the Bonnisan drops cured the gas and thus the overtiredness. Once the clutter was removed, the normal crying for communication remained, making it seem like it started suddenly.

This was further “confirmed” when I woke up from a nap to change his diaper. I knew that I had to change his diaper even before the crying registered fully and I awoke. Indeed, he was about to take a leak. So somewhere, unconsciously, I had learned to recognize his “pee” crying.

Wow!!!! It suddenly makes me feel like I understand him so much better.

Update: So much for my excitement. This is actually a method to train babies to potty A reader here, Laurie has shared the following links:

http://www.TimL.com/ipt
http://www.pottywhisperer.com

I’ve read them very briefly, but they seem informative. Looks like Nisarg and I discovered a very good way of learning to toilet train all by ourselves. See, I knew this guy was smart. Thank you Laurie.

Update two: Oops. Looks like “Elimination Communication” is a method too. A friend called it so, and I thought she was just talking about what I was telling her happened with us….

Nisarga

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