OUR BABIES

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22204, 6 March 1934, Page 6

OUR BABIES

By Htobu.

Published under the simple#* of the Royal New Zealand Society far the Health of Women and Children (Pluakat Society). "It it tcittr to put up a fence at the top of a precipice than to maintain an ambulance at the bottom .” OVER-STIMULATING BABIES. One of the commonest mistakes made by the modern mother is the overstimulating of her child. This happens especially in the case- of the first baby, and nurses frequently come across infants •who have been brought to a state of great irritability, restlessness, and broken sleep owing to the following mistakes:— 1. The mother arranges no set times for the baby to get ample, unbroken, quiet sleep and rest. 2. The baby is "shown off” to everyone who visits the < home and to any friend met outside.

In this matter the mother is not alone to blame. There is a general tendency to touch and handle a baby, to pat its cheeks, to*“chuck” it.under the chin, to snap the fingers before the baby’s face, and “ goo ” to it. People who ought to know better act in this thoughtless way, and persist until the baby responds by laughing and kicking. Children thus roused and excited _ where they ought to be resting or getting to sleep tend to become more and more nervous, and they fall off ag regards nutrition and growth. The opposite condition to the aboye—namely, undue passivity and monotony—is also harmful; but in the case of babies living at home over-stimulation is infinitely more common and more injurious. In this connection I _ cannot do better than quote the following passage from the society’s book “ Feeding and Care of Baby" (page 102:

"Natural Mothering and Moderate Handling Beneficial.

" Babies who are allowed to lie psssively in cots and who do not get suffi* cient ‘mothering’ tend to be pale, torpid, flabby, and inert, and they often develop rickets or waste away with marasmus. This has been a common fate of babies boarded in institution* or licensed homes, and physicians have remarked how much rarer are such diseases where the baby, though placed under otherwise similar conditions, gets a good deal of handling through the presence of older children. The stimulation afforded. by simple, natural handling is beneficial and necessary, but much ham is done by excessive and meddlesome interference and undue stimulation.

" Injudicious or Excessive Handling or Stimulation Highly Injurious.

"Where there are many callers, a first baby is apt to lead the life of an infant prodigy in a side-show, decked out for exhibition half its time, and always at hand for special performances before special visitors. '. ■

"The putting-up of food (or ‘regurgitation ’) by babies soon after feeding is generally attributed to the nature or quantity of the milk or the manner, of feeding, but in reality there may be little or nothing wrong with the food or with the times or system of feeding. Mother or nurse often bring on Regurgitation by handling a newly fed baby, ■ carelessly (fondling, rocking, jogging,. ■hr jolting him), instead of gently putting him into big cradle. It is true that, if an infant is subject to colic, he may benefit by being carefully eat up for a few minutes just after feeding (or even in the middle of the meal) to enable the wind:to come away, but he " Should not be jogged or patted .after a meal. Indeed,, habitual patting on the back, done at any time of day, is highly; injurious. Many women thoughtlessly and almost mechanically pat a baby to soothe him whenever he is uncomfortable or fretful, and in this way they may insidiously bring ,on serious indigestion, accompanied by inability to keep down a sufficiency or food. “Considering how readily sea-sickness, train-sickness, or swing-sickness .is induced in adults by infinitely less ; disturbing movements, one cannot wonder that infants often become profoundly upset by injudicious handling. ,If a woman's whole aim were toinduce vomiting she could not set about it more scientifically than when, picking up her baby and deftly balancing it face'downwards with the belly and chest supported on her open palm, she to rapidly pat the back with the other hand., thus subjecting the stomach to a series of direct concussions and while the head dangles face downwards over her wrist.

“Apart altogether from the manifest absurdity of this particular practice, every woman should realise that any form of jolting, swinging, rocking,. or concussion may induce giddiness in babies, just as it would in adults, and thus indirectly upset the stomach through, the nervous system. Babies' are sometimes sent to the Karitane Hospital suffering from emaciation, vomiting, and grave nervous debility, attributable almost solely to this one factor. The same mother has been known to encounter similar difficulty in rearing child after child, and has arrived at the conclusion that her progeny had some grave inborn tendency to irritability, restlessness, and vomiting until the contrary hag been proved by removing the latest arrival to the charge of a quiet, sensible, trained Ibaby nurse.

The above was written about 25 years ago, but nurses tell us that “ never letting the baby alone” is still one of the gravest and commonest faults met with in their daily round. Even where the mother has been persuaded not to have the baby in bed with her, she will keep the cot close alongside her own bed, and will reach out her hand from time to time in the night and will touch, feel, and often wake the child. in order to reassure herself —not realising the harm she is doing.