The Importance of Newborn Care

After going through 9 month of pregnancy, labor and delivery your little angel is finally here. You hold him or her in your arms, in disbelief that you could create something so beautiful. You hardly notice your pain or sleepiness when you're around the little one.

Most of the time recovery does not take as long as it used to. Years ago, after delivery, a mother and baby would need to stay in the hospital for one week before coming home. Today a mother can usually go home after 24-48 hours with her new baby.

When you get home you'll feel entirely different than you felt at the hospital. There isn't a staff to wait on you hand and foot. There isn't a nurse coming in and out to check on you through the night. 

There are some things that you will need to do once you are home with your baby.

Newborn Care at Home

Once you get home with your baby you realize that you are the only one that is responsible for taking care of your baby. You may start to panic or get anxious when you try to remember what you need to do. Normally the hospital will send you home with the directions on how to clean the umbilical cord and circumcision care if you had a little boy circumcised. Although you may doubt yourself, if you take the time to think things through you will be able to do it.

Your baby may start to cry suddenly, and again, you might feel like you don’t know what you should do. Remember that your newborn should only cry if they are hungry, wet or sleepy. They may also need to be held for reassurance. If after you have fed your baby, changed its diaper and held him or her and they are still crying you may want to call your pediatrician for advice.

Most of the time the baby just needs to feel secure and you are the best thing for that. You may want to swaddle your baby using a blanket which makes them feel very secure. 

Bathing your newborn baby is another project that may be overwhelming to you at first. There is more to it than putting your baby in warm water and washing them off. First you need to gather all the supplies needed to give your baby a bath. Make sure there are no cool drafts to blow on your baby while they are exposed, as this could really make your little one uncomfortable.

Ensure the water is warm enough but not hot. To test the waters, you can buy a thermometer that floats in the bath water to let you know the temperature of the water. Another method is to submerge your wrist in the water. You should be able to tell if it is too hot or too cold and you will be able to make the necessary adjustments.

Keep the baby covered as much as possible and when you are done bathing you may want to put a hat on your baby’s head like the one they gave you in the nursery. Babies can catch a cold when their heads are exposed to cool temperatures. Having their heads covered helps them to maintain their body temperature. Take it off, though, if your baby starts to sweat.

Don’t be surprised if you don’t get much sleep the first few months. Baby’s like to eat every two hours when breastfed and every 3-4 hours when formula fed.

After fixing their bottle and feeding them, you can not lay them down until after they have burped the air out of their systems. If you lay them down without burping there is a chance that the air pocket will force its way up while they are lying down and cause them to spit up some of their formula. The baby may get strangled or choked on the spit up and you won’t know it. Burping sometimes takes a while so be patient, it’s worth it.

Taking care of a newborn baby is a very big task. But your baby depends on you for all of his or her needs. Correct newborn care is very important in setting milestones for months to come.