Find out why babies want to be held
You could spend 8 hours holding a newborn baby and it still wouldn’t be enough for them. Newborns might be tiny and look every inch of an angel, but they are very complicated human beings. They scream, squirm, giggle and cry. Parents are continuously baffled as to why newborns want to be held all the time. Are you wondering about the same thing too? Let’s find out the answer together.
Are newborns clingy?
Newborns come in two types: clingy and extremely-clingy. Parents have a lot of trouble embracing this because they are cranky and tired from lack of sleep and from holding their baby the entire day.
Even when they aren’t sick or don’t have any colic, newborns want to be held all the time because they need it. After nine months of being nestled in mother’s safe, warm and comfortable womb, these tiny babies are not used to being alone. They are easily stressed and agitated when not held by their parents. In a nutshell, newborns want to be held, rocked and soothed until they fall asleep. So yes, they are clingy.
Put down the baby
Parents have different methods when it comes to handling a clingy baby. Some prefer to carry their babies on demand while other parents prefer to let their baby cry it out until they sleep on their own. The most effective thing for parents to do is to let babies feel secure and fulfilled without having to pick them up.
RELATED: How much sleep do babies need?
Get you baby to feel loved without being held
How to do it
Don’t expect babies to just lay in their crib happily without any help from the parents. Parents should start by making the crib as comfortable and interesting as possible. Put an overhead mobile with colourful attachments or colourful pictures on the ceiling. These crib add-ons provide great distractions for babies and will prevent them from crying as soon as they wake up.
Newborns want to be held but parents shouldn’t give in quite so easily. Instead of picking them up, parents should resort to stroking or patting the baby. Comfortably swaddling babies in blankets and rocking the babies in their cribs or in baby swings are great ways of soothing cry babies too.
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Slowly but surely
As long as parents consistently use soothing methods that do not require holding, their babies won’t mind not being held and being in the crib all alone.
Parents, do your newborns want to be held all the time? How did you handle the situation? Please tell us your story. Still don’t know how to handle clingy newborns? Watch this video to learn more techniques:
