In the earlier post I put myself first – ChooseToChallenge 6 – I had mentioned about Montessori ways of handling babies needs while making sure you get your basic needs met.
As noted in the post, when baby cries, we drop things and rush/run to handle the child’s needs. Instead of rushing to handle babies or toddlers need, we can respond to their needs in Montessori or other respectful ways.
Note: This is only if you already know baby is in a safe space. When in doubt, trust your instinct and attend to your baby. However if you are clear that baby is crying for feed or diaper change or water etc., you can follow Montessori/respectful ways to handle babies need, while ensuring your basic needs are met as well. If not for your basic need, you would at-least have time to prepare for babies food, or bottle or diaper essentials.
While picking a crying baby is really helpful in the initial nursing days – this probably deserves another post – but a quick snapshot on why
- Babies have several hunger cues to indicate that they are hungry – hands near their mouth, trying to put hands in their mouth, opening mouth and trying to eat your nose or your elbows etc. These are hunger cues. When babies are picked up and nursed during their hunger cues, nursing process can be better. The next stage is babies fussing, and one of the final stages is babies cry loudly when they don’t get food after indicating via the previous signs. At this point, babies are frustrated and they are more likely to chomp or nurse super fast once latched which could further cause issues in nursing journey – like blisters. Hence it is better to identify these hunger cues and nurse newborn babies once the hunger cues start to have a peaceful latching & nursing process.
Having said that, life trickles back in once we move past newborn phase or for parents with multiple kids, it is not always possible to attend to kids on the sign of first hunger cue.
Also in the first few weeks, kids eyesight are not that far, and hence sign language may not apply, but still listing these suggestions since they are quite useful around and beyond 3-4 months of age.
- Use baby sign language. E.g. for nursing/milk, the sign language is opening and closing fist – google for pictorial or video of this.
Now, learning sign language sound overwhelming – but don’t be. Learn just 2-3 signs – e.g. food, water, etc. whichever is critical and whichever could cause baby to cry or toddlers to have meltdown.
Hence in the scenario explained in the above post, you can go check on baby, use breastfeeding sign language and it would help calm the baby down instantly – and you can use that time to take a quick break and get back to baby. - Talk to babies and toddlers. Second example. It is lunch time, your toddler is showing signs of hunger and starting to fuss – banging on table or clinging to you and about to have a meltdown.
Our initial reaction is rushing and fussing and running to get food on the table. Similar to the How to talk so toddlers listen – my-way or cry-way? cry-way of communication, this sets an incorrect mode of communication to the baby or the toddler.
The precedence we are setting is – “hey, once you cry, I am going to run and rush and get that done for you – so every-time you need something cry loudly and watch me run a marathon race“.
Obviously this is not intentional, but that is what toddler perceives from this rushing response.
Instead, tell kiddo calmly, ‘ I am preparing your lunch, and it will be in your table in 5 mins, I know you are hungry, let us count to 5 while you wait. or sing a song while you wait etc.’ - Mindset reset: This can be really hard for folks who get triggered by baby cries or toddler meltdowns. and hence it maybe twice as hard to let go of this rushing habit or running habit, which means you have to practice twice as hard to respond and not rush. Also, if you have family members who get triggered by cries and push you to rush, you may have to work with them and set expectations ahead. or ask them to step out while you handle this yourself. or ask them to handle the baby while you get basic needs met.
Note:
As with any other method, sign language and talking to kids – both of these take time for kids to adjust to. Initially kid may not recognize the sign language for nursing or food or water. however, if you use the sign with every feed, kids start associating this and then when you use the sign, they realize that it is feeding time. Again, learning just 2-3 signs can be quite helpful.