Breast-feeding.

Breast­feed­ing is a par­tic­u­lar­ly cru­cial peri­od, which is the tran­si­tion from intrauter­ine life to the inde­pen­dent exis­tence of the baby. After all, a child is born com­plete­ly depen­dent on his moth­er, and all the nec­es­sary nutri­ents are trans­ferred to him through milk, as was intend­ed by nature.

It is often said that the bear­ing of a baby does not end with child­birth — for at least 9 months after that, the moth­er must feed her child, pro­vid­ing not only nutri­tion, but also the usu­al con­nec­tion.

What are the absolute ben­e­fits of breast­feed­ing? Moth­er’s milk is con­sid­ered opti­mal for a child imme­di­ate­ly after birth. By the way, all women have a dif­fer­ent com­po­si­tion of milk, which means that it is pro­duced tak­ing into account the needs of a par­tic­u­lar new­born. How­ev­er, donor breast milk will be bet­ter than arti­fi­cial mix­tures — in the event that the moth­er can­not orga­nize full breast­feed­ing for any rea­son.

Wom­en’s milk con­tains more than 400 com­po­nents that ensure the opti­mal devel­op­ment of the child. Some of them are respon­si­ble for the for­ma­tion of the immune sys­tem and con­tribute to the pro­tec­tion of the grow­ing body. Some com­po­nents help the baby’s gas­troin­testi­nal tract to pro­duce nor­mal microflo­ra. Breast milk also includes amino acids that are involved in the for­ma­tion of the baby’s cen­tral ner­vous sys­tem. Accord­ing to sta­tis­tics, chil­dren who received breast milk for at least a year grow up more bal­anced and capa­ble of learn­ing.

Milk also con­tains spe­cial enzymes that facil­i­tate the diges­tion of milk and allow you to make the most of all the vit­a­mins it con­tains.

By the way, today the ben­e­fits of not only milk itself, but also the first colostrum are obvi­ous, and even a few drops of this liq­uid will be bet­ter than a larg­er vol­ume of donor milk. There­fore, it is not sur­pris­ing that child­birth should end in a nat­ur­al finale in the form of ear­ly breast­feed­ing. After the baby begins to breast­feed, the moth­er under­goes uter­ine con­trac­tions, mak­ing it easy for the pla­cen­ta to come out. In addi­tion, ear­li­er breast­feed­ing con­tributes to a bet­ter recov­ery of the moth­er’s fig­ure.

But phys­i­o­log­i­cal caus­es are far from the only ones. Much more this process gives in terms of psy­chol­o­gy. After all, all nine months the baby stayed inside the moth­er, being in close con­tact with her. Instant with­draw­al from his native envi­ron­ment will cause him severe stress. But the baby near his moth­er’s breast will expe­ri­ence almost the same “pre­na­tal” sen­sa­tions famil­iar to him — this is both the smell and the beat of the moth­er’s heart. It is not sur­pris­ing that breast­feed­ing for a baby is not just a process of sat­u­ra­tion, but also a way to relieve stress, an oppor­tu­ni­ty to return to the famil­iar envi­ron­ment. In addi­tion, breast­feed­ing is also impor­tant for the moth­er, because in close con­tact old ties are not bro­ken and new ones are estab­lished, that is, there is a process of rec­og­niz­ing each oth­er. Such feed­ing is also com­mu­ni­ca­tion, which is why it is believed that it is unde­sir­able for a moth­er to be dis­tract­ed dur­ing feed­ing (nei­ther on books, nor on con­ver­sa­tions, nor on TV).

Keep in mind that the child is sim­ply com­fort­able being close to the moth­er — he will not eat more than nec­es­sary and will not seek solace in the process of eat­ing food in the future. Extra body con­tact, includ­ing breast­feed­ing, for an upset baby will pro­vide a sense of secu­ri­ty, self-con­fi­dence and the safe­ty of the world.

If you want your baby to become an active dis­cov­er­er, then do not be afraid to hold the baby in your arms more often. It is this “habi­tat” that is more famil­iar to him than the closed space of the bed. Yes, and feed­ing “accord­ing to the sched­ule” today can­not be called rel­e­vant — the baby is able to set a sched­ule for him­self, while the moth­er must “go on about” his bio­log­i­cal rhythms and needs. The num­ber of attach­ments of the child to the chest dur­ing the day should be such as to ful­ly sat­is­fy all his needs — both in com­mu­ni­ca­tion and in food.

In addi­tion, moth­er’s breasts are a com­fort­able way to con­nect with the out­side world, not to men­tion the fact that for the baby it is also deli­cious food. Yes, and the baby’s appetites should be tak­en into account — some­one prefers to eat a lot at a time, while some­one needs fre­quent and short-term appli­ca­tions. How­ev­er, all the incon­ve­niences asso­ci­at­ed with feed­ing will more than pay off in the future — after all, these are invest­ments in the future health of the baby and his psy­cho­log­i­cal com­fort. To ensure com­fort and unload­ing of the spine, spe­cial prod­ucts have been devel­oped — baby feed­ing pil­low. So do not ignore the needs of your crumbs, but you should lis­ten to his desires and ana­lyze his behav­ior. Mutu­al under­stand­ing achieved between moth­er and baby at the ear­li­est stages will fur­ther strength­en fam­i­ly ties.