5 minute read
Why is my baby crying?
Christian Bates qualified as an Osteopath and Naturopath in 1997. In 2008 he opened the award-winning Perrymount Clinic in Haywards Heath and he also won the CAM award “Outstanding
Contribution To The Community” in 2013 due to his work with babies and for writing the book 'Calming Colic'. One of my pet hates is the common advice that “all babies cry” and to “wait until 12 weeks and your baby’s colic will go”. This is typical advice for a new parent. If they were to do some internet searching for help with a colicky, crying baby they might also get information such as “there are no known causes of colic”, “colic is not understood” and there “is no cure for colic”. None of which are true. There is lots of science to back this up now and getting this information to mums in an easy and effective way to help their baby is what I am passionate about. My 20 years experience as an osteopath and naturopath and the research I have done has led me to find that the causes for colic are actually known and understood, yet not told to those that need the knowledge; new mums! There is certainly plenty you can do to help a colicky, crying, upset, not sleeping baby. Also let me clarify here that I’m not speaking about a baby that is crying because they are tired, need a nappy change or are hungry. The babies I mean are excessively crying, even though they are fed, clean and not tired! The mum doesn’t know what to do, feels helpless and just doesn’t understand what’s wrong with their baby. Unfortunately there is no “magic” cure for a colic, crying baby, if there was everyone would have it and there wouldn’t be any colicky babies! Instead there are a number of “causes” that have triggered a baby to have colic, wind, reflux and excessively cry. These are what a mum needs to understand to help her baby. Once you know the “cause” you can apply the help. A very common cause of an upset baby occurs after antibiotics, which upset the balance of good / bad gut bacteria in the baby’s gut. Just like they do when adults have them. Huge amounts of research comes out almost daily on the benefits of good gut bacteria and how it is preventative of disease but can promote problems when out of balance. I love reading research on this and translating it into useful help for mums and their baby. New research shows that the bacteria starts to get established in the baby whilst INSIDE mum during pregnancy, not just picked up at the delivery. This gives the opportunity for mum to start to help her baby’s bacteria balance whilst pregnant. For example, a mum could take a probiotic herself in the last trimester to encourage this. I very often use probiotics specifically designed for babies after they are born, especially if mum has had antibiotics, which is very common. A mum can take these and pass them in her breast milk or because they are in drops, they can be given direct to baby. They are very effective. I am very happy to help you with these if you want to email me.
More recently, research has been revealing the powerful affect that a mum’s diet has on the bacteria in her breast milk and so affects her baby’s gut bacteria. Also that the foods she eats promote the correct growth of good bacteria in her baby. It wasn’t so long ago that all mums were told that what they eat has nothing to do with what’s in their breast milk. This simply isn’t true and guess what foods are great for bacteria? Healthy foods! Things like fruit and vegetables which have fibre that feeds good bacteria. Something like a Mediterranean style diet that also contains healthy fats. I love helping mums look after their own health to help their baby’s health. This might include improving a little on what a mum is eating because usually it is very much snacky, grab foods as they are tired and rushed. Foods like this can be a common trigger of wind in a baby as sugary foods create wind. A simple tip I have for mums is to look at the food you know you are really over-doing and eating multiple times every day. This is the one you are often “overloading” on. It’s also fascinating to understand that a mum’s stress or relaxation can pass to her baby via breast milk or amazingly by just holding her baby, so applies to bottle feeding mums too. A mum’s state of stress or calmness “rubs off” onto her baby and so her baby takes up the emotional state the mum is in. This is scientifically proven. So if a mum is able to take some time to relax, deep breathe or even meditate she can “pass” this more relaxed state to her baby and relax them. This activates the calming side of the nervous system for both mum and baby. It is often called the “rest and digest” side. Who doesn’t want their baby to be better at resting and digesting! Did you know “stroking”, is scientifically proven to be extremely relaxing for babies? It promotes the release of chemicals for love and decreases stress hormones. If you baby is upset, try gently and slowly stroking them on their bare skin whilst you cuddle them.
There are many approaches that can be used to help a colicky baby and each one will be more or less relevant to different babies. Each baby is different, each delivery is different and each mum is different. Some babies will need help to balance their gut bacteria as they had antibiotics, other babies may need more hands on help, using the extremely gentle cranio-sacral therapy, as they perhaps had a forceps or ventouse delivery or got stuck for a long while. In my approach I use as many ways as possible to help mother and baby as quickly and safely as possible. Christian has since created an online colic solution which also includes every other piece of advice he has from his 20 years of helping mother and baby. For a free trial of this course visit: www.calmingcolic.com/trial
