5 Ways to Soothe a Newborn by Mimicking Your Womb + Reasons why Your Baby won't Stop Crying

hey mamas we all know that it's normal for a baby to cry but maybe you're sitting here watching this video with a crying baby in your arms thinking but I didn't expect them to cry this much or maybe you're an expecting mama who's just trying to fill your toolbox with as many tips and tricks as you can before your baby is born either way this video is for you because Anna I'm sharing common causes for fussy babies and how to soothe or remedy them I'm Bridget and I'm a doula in the San Francisco Bay Area but I'm also a mom and myself and I love helping moms navigate through all the seasons of motherhood so to be encouraged and confident about your pregnancy birth and motherhood make sure you're subscribed to my channel and have hit the little bell so you're notified each time a new video comes your way being a parent is hard work and having an unhappy baby can make things even harder by the end of this video you're going to have five ways to help calm your little one and several things that could be causing your baby to cry and remedies to fix them the first thing that I want to mention in this video is that crying is your baby's way of communicating with you when there are newborns sometimes it's hard to decipher their cries but the more that you engage with your baby and learn about them the more you're gonna understand them because babies have different cries for different needs so when your baby is crying the first thing that you're gonna want to try to figure out is why they're crying and it's usually because babies either hungry tired has a dirty diaper is either too hot or too cold or just needs some of your loving and once you assess what's going on with baby you're able to respond to their needs if they're hungry you feed them if they've got a dirty diaper you change them and so on but sometimes after you've met your baby's needs are still crying and they're just working themselves up and it can be stressful if you don't know how to help them so this is when you put into practice the 5s is to help soothe the baby so these five s's were developed by dr. Harvey Karp and basically helped imitate the safe cozy intimate environment that babies experience in the womb so the first s is swaddle so I've got my swaddled baby here and swaddling your baby helps bring them back to that snug feeling that they grew used to being in your room your womb for nine months not only that but it also helps them avoid the startle reflex that babies have when they like throw out their arms suddenly in a response to like a noise or unexpected touch so swaddling is really gonna help them settle enough to make the following s's more effective the second s is side lying or stomach position now the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends babies to sleep lying on their backs but that's actually the worst position to be in when they're when you're trying to calm a fussy baby now I'm not telling you to have your baby sleep on their tummy but what you can do is hold your baby in a side-lying position so that you so that they have more pressure on their stomach and that's a lot more soothing and calming you can also hold them over your shoulder so again there's just more pressure being being put on their front so either higher up on your shoulder or even on your chest is going to help them calm down if they're having kind of like a fit now the third s is shushing now when your baby was in the womb they never experienced total silence and now that they're out of they're out of the womb total silence isn't really going to suit them so a great way to help that crying baby is by showing them in like that repetitious kind of pattern so you can do this simply by using your voice in their ear when you have them in this nice sideline position you are able to be really close to their ears so that they're able to hear it well or you can even use a sound machine and if there's one product I encourage every single parent to get its a sound machine I personally love the hatch baby sound machine because it has several white noise options and even lullaby options and at night light but there are lots of options that you can choose from and I will link a few great ones down below now the fourth is for swaying or swinging again we're trying to replicate the environment of the woman for nine months your baby has had almost constant movement so while your baby is swaddled nice and tight and you're holding them either in that sideline position or over your shoulder and you've started showing them or maybe you've turned on the sound machine now you can start swinging them gently but semi quickly and then to make that even more effective I recommend throwing in a little bounce in there along the way so while you're doing this like swaying motion or like this you kind of do this like bouncy swaying movement and that like almost always does the trick for a fussy baby now if your baby is calm enough and doesn't need to be held you can also put them in a swing which usually helps them stay calm and asleep but usually in order to calm them down initially you're going to have to hold them because babies are going to respond better to being held the last s is sucking and babies love to suck because it triggers a hormonal response that actually calms them so you can let them suck on a pacifier or even your finger or if you're holding them like this where their tummy is on your tummy you can even nurse them if Mama's doing this but obviously if daddy's doing it then you're just gonna give them a pacifier or up here give them a pacifier or you can just let them suck on your finger like this now if you've done all of these essence and your baby still isn't able to settle and kinda seems to be the norm for almost all hours of the day there are a few things that could be going on now keep in mind that colic in babies is pretty normal but call it crying is usually about three hours total in a day so if your baby is crying five hours six hours eight hours a day in a day that could tell you that something besides colic is going on also know that colic in babies usually Peaks around that six to eight week mark so that's when you might experience it at the worst but it often gets better after that point so if it's not colic what could some of the reasons be the first thing that it could be is indigestion where gas is trapped in their little belly and baby's having a tough time trying to get rid of it so what you can do if that's the case is a little digestion massage now ideally you'll do this when baby is already in a more calm state just because if they're crying and all worked-up their belly is gonna be really tense and this mitten this massage will be less effective so after you've done the five s's and the crying has subsided for a little bit you can do what's called the eye levy massage so you'll be doing this when your baby is laying down and nice and so you're gonna be doing this when your baby is laying down but so you can see her better I'm gonna just lift her up and the first thing that the fir like stepping the massage that you're going to do is on the left side of her belly and you're gonna do an eye for the eye and then you're gonna do an upside down L like this for love and then you're gonna do an upside down you for I love you and you're gonna keep doing that for about three minutes or so so let's do it again you'll do I love you and what that's doing is helping get any trapped gas bubbles like through her intestine so that it can escape so another thing that you can do is tuck their knees to their bellies so kind of like this just like that so it's kind of like their knees to their chest and then bring them back down and flex them a little bit and then push them back up to their chest like that and you do that just like five ten times and that's just gonna help again push that gas bubble down so that they're able to release it so another tummy related issue that can result in a lot of crying for babies is reflux and reflux happens when babies milk gets backed up from their stomach because of a sphincter or like a little gate if you will in their esophagus that isn't fully developed so because that sphincter isn't fully developed that sphincter or that gate isn't closing all the way as it should which allows milk and stomach acid that breaks down baby's food up into the esophagus resulting in a lot of spit up discomfort and crying if you notice your baby like arching their back when they're nursing and they're like going like that like they're not really liking drinking milk or even from a bottle they're just like arching their back away from their bottle or from the breast or if they're refusing to eat or vomiting a lot these could point to an issue with reflux now the good news is is that this reflux usually is going to fix itself by six to twelve months but the bad news is is that no one wants baby to be feeling uncomfortable and persistently crying for six months before the reflux heals itself so some things that you can do to help your baby with reflux are feeding your baby with our head slightly above their belly to help keep the milk going and staying down as much as possible so you know if your bottle obviously you can have them propped up on a pillow under your arms so that their heads higher than their belly or if you're nursing nurse them kind of at an angle so that their head again is higher than their belly so that milk is going and staying down also burping your baby either between sides if you're but if you're breastfeeding or halfway through a bottle feed will really help and then just keeping your baby upright upright for like 15 20 minutes after feeding them is going to really help them again be digesting that milk the last thing I'll mention about helping them with reflux is possibly trying like shorter more frequent feeds instead of like a lot of milk all at once because that can sometimes overfeed them and result in that reflux and spinning up and even gas so those are just a few things that can help with your crying baby if you think that reflux is the issue now if these tummy issues persist it may be because your baby has a food intolerance or allergy often babies with tummy issues have an intolerance to like dairy gluten or soy so if you're nursing you may need to cut those things out of your diet so baby isn't getting it through your breast milk or if you're formula-feeding you're gonna need to look for a hypoallergenic one or get goat's milk which is actually one of the best replacements for breast milk so mama if you're trying to figure out what's making baby so upset all the time and a suspected food allergy it's worth bringing it up to your pediatrician or even possibly just trying an eliminate elimination diet to see if that helps your baby so another reason for persistent crying that isn't actually commonly assessed as a condition called infant torticollis and that's when baby favors one side of their neck over the other so remember that your baby has been in your belly for nine months and as they grew they ran out of space so typically what this is going to result in is a baby that's been in a position with their neck bent a certain way for a long period of time and then when they're born they tend to favor that side or that side is stronger than the other also babies go through a lot as they're born they have to twist and turn they have to flex our neck their scalp molds and they have to push through the pelvic bone so your baby has put up with a a lot of physical exertion and strain which can sometimes result in maybe like a tweet necked or their nervous system just isn't running on all cylinders so if you notice your baby's head is often tilted one way like he's favoring one side over the other or if whenever you lay him on his belly he really only faces himself like in one direction so maybe he's always facing the right side or he's always facing the left side or when he lifts his head he's kind of always got his head tilted to one side over the other then those are some indications that he may he or she may have infant torticollis another thing to be looking out for is that if baby really doesn't like to nurse on one side it's really hard to get them to latch or they seem really fussy on one side it also might be an indication that they have a tweet neck so if you're noticing those things it might actually be beneficial for your baby to see a chiropractor obviously you can talk to your baby's pediatrician and see if they see signs of torticollis or you can just go straight ahead and book an appointment with a chiropractor or a masseuse who specializes or has at least a lot of experience in infant care so I will say that a lot of pediatricians are pretty cautious about pointing parents in the direction of a chiropractor because if a chiropractor isn't careful or experienced with infant care they can further hurt the baby instead of helping them but with any kind of care for your baby you want to get the best and the safest and I've talked with parents who have struggled with unhappy crying babies who went and saw a chiropractor and returned home with a different baby so always do your research ask other parents were referrals and make sure whoever you see has had plenty of experience with babies you can also go see someone who is experienced in infant massage and you can really learn a lot from them and then do a lot of the movements on your own and so there are specialists sometimes midwives or birth or postpartum doula who have been trade trained in infant massage and doing these massages can possibly help alleviate some of the discomfort that baby is having and also just provides time each day where it's just you and baby and baby is you know calm down and you and him are just able to bond and relax together well mama I hope this videos giving you some tools to use to help you and your baby find a rhythm and groove without so many tears if you've been a part of this YouTube channel community for a while you know that we're all about empowerment and encouragement through learning about this thing called motherhood so if you have any tips for soothing or caring for a newborn comment them down below and if you've got questions ask away so I or another mama can offer some encouragement or kind words of wisdom so thanks for being with me in this video mama and I will see you in the next one

Channel: Bridget Teyler

Views: 498,850

Keywords: my baby won’t stop crying, how to calm a baby, what is colic, how to soothe colic baby, how to relieve gas for babies, how to make baby stop crying, how to make a baby sleep, calming a fussy baby, hatch baby sound machine, swaddling a newborn, baby massage, gas relief for babies, help baby relax, birth doula, newborn care, ways to soothe a newborn, best way to soothe a baby, soothing methods for babies, how to soothe a baby, soothing a fussy baby, soothe a fussy newborn

Id: EKMcXNiJtkI

Length: 13min 46sec (826 seconds)

Published: Mon Dec 16 2019