The Crying Newborn

     The old song says, “Fish gotta swim, birds gotta fly”. You can add, “Babies gotta cry”. Nothing is more frustrating (and irritating) to new parents than a baby who is fussing and crying and they don't know why.

     Relax. The baby is just as frustrated as you are. He only knows he wants something. We have to experiment each time he cries to find out what it is. Start with the basics: “Wet – Hungry - Tired.”  Always check the diaper first – even if you just changed him five minutes ago. Don’t rely on the “color change strip” technology on the diaper surface. The smallest spot of urine or stool can upset a baby.

    Next, check hungry. As I mentioned in “Advice on Breastfeeding”, try both breasts twice (back and forth) before deciding they are completely empty. Then, if Junior is still rooting and acting hungry, give him a bottle of formula or expressed breast milk. Let him drink until:  (a). he stops eating   or    (b). more formula is drooling down his neck than is going in his mouth   or   (c). he is asleep. (After the feeding, it is good to put him up on your shoulder and walk around a bit while patting his back - not so much to burp him as to allow him to throw up any extra formula on your shirt.) If he is still crying and you know that he is dry and not hungry, you can be certain that he is tired.

      Newborns would like to be held 24 hours a day with a nipple one-quarter inch in front of their mouth. This is why baby slings work. The baby is carried in a sling across the mother’s chest with the breast in front of his face. If he fusses, he is simply switched to the other side. Babies love it. However, this system necessitates that the mother walks around bare-breasted all day and doesn’t work well during a Minnesota winter.

     The tired baby wants you to hold him with the breast (or pacifier) in his mouth the entire time he is sleeping. Lay him down and he wakes up and cries. Pick him up and he falls asleep again….and again…and again.

It’s good to teach your baby to settle himself down. If you teach him that he needs to be held and rocked to go to sleep, that’s what he will demand. If you don’t want to have to pick him up and hold him every time he wiggles himself awake, there are alternatives.  In the uterus, he slept while you walked around doing things, so, he is used to having a little motion while falling asleep. You can rock or carry him or put him in a rocking, swinging or bouncing device (but please don’t drive him around town in the car all night). If you hold him until he’s quieted down, then lay him down and let him fall asleep even if it involves some crying.

     Parents need to remember that what worked yesterday may not work today. One day, the baby loves to be swaddled. The next day, he wants to be wide-open wriggling on a blanket. One day, he loves to swing in the chair-swing, and the next day he hates it.

     Don’t get frustrated. Just smile wearily and remember that he has been thrust into a world that is totally different from what he has been accustomed to for nine months. You need to cut him a lot of slack.