Health

Small Babies Cause
Big Amounts Of Stress

CHARLYN FARGO
Speci4l to The Jewish News

ith the arrival of a new
baby comes not only the
proverbial bundle of joy
but a bundle of apprehen-

Call for an appointment to come in and talk to us about the many options
you have in reducing lines, wrinkles and scarring. Get individual attention
from expert physicians who care about their patients — one at a time.

Non-Surgical Treatments
All Cosmetic and Reconstructive Surgery
• Laser for Facial Wrinkles
• Surgery of the Face & Nose
• Photoderm for Facial & Leg Veins
• Liposuction
• Breast Surgery
• Collagen Replacement Therapy
• Hair Transplants
•Tummy Tucks
• SoftForm Facial Implants
Private Office Surgery Suites • Over 16 Years Experience

•

Willaim J. Vasileff, m.d. • A. Kevin Muiderman, m.

(248) 644-0670 • 525 Southfield Rd. • Birmingham

You can't always be there for
Morn & Dad in Florida...
but we can!

We watch out for your loved ones every day

Our Care Managers provide professional,
compassionate support

Your parents can live independently, and you will
still have peace of mind

Full needs assessment & individualized care plan

Coordination and monitoring of support services

Serving Boca Raton, Highland Beach, Delray Beach

10/24

sion.
Parents often are stressed and
intimidated by how to deal with new
babies, says Dr. Mary Dobbins, a
Springfield, Ill., pediatrician. And they
often carry with them unrealistic .
expectations and a host of folklore.
Dobbins' first message to a new
parent is: "Babies are not just little
blobs to be put on a schedule that is
convenient for you."
She wants to dispel some of the
most common misconceptions:
• That babies shouldn't cry much.
• That babies cry if they are hungry,
so a bottle is the solution.
• And that babies should sleep
through the night before long.
Dobbins is concerned that new par-
ents sometimes get off on the wrong
foot because of misinformation.
"Teen-agers (having babies)
have a picture of a sweet little
baby," says Dobbins. "Who
could ever think a baby could
be stressful?
"It's incredibly rare to have a
family with a new baby who is
not overwhelmed and stressed.
When the baby gets here, I
often hear from new mothers
that it's so much harder than
they expected."
Few new parents expect a
baby to cry as much as they do,
have diaper rash as often as
they do or wake up at night for
as long as they do.
"If you added up all the cry-
ing in a day, it would be
hours," says Dobbins. "It's a
developmental thing. Babies need to
cry."
Robin Coffey, 25, of Taylorville,
Ill., has worked to learn to get to
know the habits of her 9-week-old
son, Brandon.
"He's cried less as he's gotten more
comfortable with me and Brian (her
husband)," says Coffey. "Actually, I
thought this would be more stressful
than it has been. I guess I prepared for
the worst.
"It's easier than I thought. I was so
nervous at first. You kind of get into a
routine. He sleeps a lot more than I
thought he would."
Brandon wakes every three hours to
take a bottle.

"I was surprised how much of this
comes by instinct; a lot of it just came
naturally to me," says Coffey.
She was not sure, though, how to
help Brandon learn to sleep by him-
self.
"I asked the doctor, and that first
night she told me to put him in his
car seat in the cradle and wrap him u
really tight in a blanket. It worked."
She also wasn't sure when to start
feeding cereal.
"Every time he would cry, we
would think he was hungry," say
Coffey. "But I learned to distinguish
his cries, and the doctor told us not to
start cereal until later because babies'
stomachs aren't fully developed at
first."
Kari Vincent, also of Springfield,
whose daughter Jordan is now 7
months old, never had been around
infants or even baby-sat before she
and husband, Todd, had their daugh-
ter.
"I put her on somewhat of a sched-
ule. She eats four or five times a day.
She doesn't really cry that much excep

when she's tired. Ever since she was
born, I put her in bed and let her cry
10 minutes or so. I know her cry no
and I can tell when she's not going
go to sleep.
"I never thought I'd be so busy as
mom," says Vincent. "That was sur-
prising. Before I had her, I taught 10
aerobics classes a week. I thought I'
keep doing that. Now I teach two.
That's all I can do."
Sara Harkness, an associate profes-
sor of human development and
anthropology at Penn State Univers
studied 54 Dutch and 36 American
families concerning infants' sleep pat
terns.

SMALL BABIES

on page132