Episode 19

The Power of Infant Massage & Kangaroo Care



Is baby already here?  Learn Infant Massge with me!

Desiring the highest level of perinatal support?

Looking for birth affirmations or shifting your thoughts around pregnancy and birth?

Longing for a homebirth or VBAC?  

Need Lactation Support?

 Looking for Postpartum Support?
 Postpartum Planning Session

Struggling with newborn colic, sleep or bonding?

19. The Power of Kangaroo Care & Infant Massage 

Cultural Traditions of Infant Massage
  • Infant Massage Research
  • Kangaroo Care
  • Kangaroo Care Research
  • Work with me 
Cultural Traditions with Infant Massage
  • Indian Massage
  • African Massage
  • Russian Massage

Infant Massage Benefits for Baby:
  • Faster weight gain
  • Improve cardiac and respiratory output
  • Better sleeping patterns
  • Release of hormones for food absorption and digestion
  • Skin stimulation
  • Improvement of muscle tone
  • Enhanced neurological development •Improvement of sensory awareness
  • Provide a special communication/development of non-verbal communication
  • Promotes self-esteem and respect
Infant Massage Benefits for Parents
  • Parents feel more confident in their ability to read baby’s cues
  • The parent’s ability to soothe and meet baby’s needs
  • A parent’s healthy self-esteem as baby responds, validating their
    skills and role as parents
  • Increase the parent’s confidence to follow their intuitive sense
  • The release of hormones from the mother to nurture the baby
  • Enhance communication and respect
  • Infant Massage as a family tradition
  • Can be a time for parent and child to communicate in a relaxed and
    playful manner
  • Special time between father and child
  • Assist older siblings to welcome a new baby to the family through
    their participation in giving a portion of the massage with appropriate touch/pressure; learning to understand the baby's needs, and by their receiving an age appropriate massage to decrease incidence of possible jealousy
Infant Massage Benefits for Society
  • These may promote, or encourage:
  • Secure, healthy attached children
  • May help reduce child abuse by reducing parental stress.
  • May prevent sexual abuse by teaching consent and bodily autonomy
  • May help to prevent IPV later in life due to secure infant attachment.

Kanagaroo Care
  • Parents should be seated comfortably in a quiet, dimly lit room with some privacy.
  • Position the baby, dressed in diaper on your bare chest for a minimum of 20 minutes. For warmth, you can cover the baby's shoulders and back with a blanket, as long as their chest is skin-to-skin with yours. Always be sure that any blankets are away from your baby's face.
  • This bonding time can be experienced by parents of any sex. If kangaroo care is performed around feeding, place the baby with the non-breastfeeding parent after the feed.
Kangaroo Care Research
Nils Bergman Physiology and research provide overwhelming evidence that kangaroo mother care is not only safe but superior to the use of technology such as incubators, Depriving babies of skin-to-skin makes alternative stress pathways in the brain, which can lead to ADD, sleep disorders, colic, among other things."
 
KanGURU: Susan M. Ludington, PhD, CNM, FAAN is a
Susan M. Ludington, PhD, CNM, FAAN who has tested Kangaroo Care's use as a treatment to improve cardiopulmonary stability, decrease apnea and bradycardia frequency, improve sleep, reduce agitation/irritability, reduce pain, and enhance maternal and paternal attachment/interaction with the infant, and maternal stress.
 



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Information courtesy of Stefanie Melo