talking, seeing movies, doing things that are “for big kids only” (babies can’t eat ice cream—ha!), or just hanging out. And make sure the big kid gets to spend some private time with Mom too.
• Teach them about safety rules. Your older children are probably going to want to hold and carry their new sibling. If you’re going to allow it, they have to understand the proper way to hold a baby (supporting the head at all times), and they must go along with your rules about the whens and wheres. Children under about twelve shouldn’t be allowed to carry a baby up or down stairs. And children under nine or ten should do all their baby holding sitting down.
Safety First
It may seem strange to talk about safety at a time when your baby is practically immobile and can’t possibly get into any serious trouble. But even at this age babies can do the most surprising things. Here are a few precautions you should take now to start making your home a little safer:
• Avoid beanbags. Most beanbag chairs and baby rests have been taken off the market, but there are still plenty of them in garages all over the country. There is more than a coincidental link between beanbags and suffocation deaths.
• Never leave the baby’s car seat—with the baby in it, of course—balanced on anything. A flailing arm or leg, even a sneeze, might move the car seat enough for it to tip over.
• Put together a good first aid kit. You’ll find a list of items on page 204.
• Take an infant CPR class. Instruction is usually available fairly inexpensively at your local Red Cross or YMCA.
• Take a quick look at the safety measures described in later chapters (pages 199–205, for example). Start putting together the materials you’ll need and get into the habit of doing such things as pointing pot handles toward the rear of the stove.
First Smiles
WHAT’S GOING ON WITH THE BABY
Physically
• By the end of this month, many of your baby’s innate reflexes will have disappeared. Sad but true. Nevertheless, she still holds her arms and legs away from her body, and there’s plenty of twitching to go around.
• Lying on her tummy, she can now easily hold her head up at a 45-degree angle. And when she’s sitting (a position she probably prefers by now—even though she can’t get there or stay there by herself), she’s a lot better at keeping her head straight.
• Your baby is now beginning to reach for objects. Grasping and unfolding her hands, which were once purely reflex actions, are slowly becoming voluntary. If she manages to grab something, she may be able to hold on to it for a few seconds before dropping it.
• The neurons in your baby’s brain that govern vision are going through a major growth spurt. As a result, her vision is improving, and she’s paying a lot more attention to what’s going on in her world. And because you’re such an interesting sight, she’ll follow you with her eyes everywhere you go.
Intellectually
• As her brain develops, your baby will appreciate more complex patterns. Instead of the simple, relatively motionless outline of your face, she now prefers your eyes and mouth, which are constantly changing shape. Toward the end of this month she may begin to stare intently at very small items.
• If you touch her cheek now, she probably won’t start sucking—an indication that she can now tell the difference between your finger and a milk-bearing nipple.
• She is also now able to accommodate herself to various situations. If you’re holding her upright against your shoulder, she’ll hold herself differently than if you’re resting her on your knees.
• She gets excited when she sees familiar objects, but she has no sense of “object permanence” (which means that as far as the baby is concerned, anything she can’t see simply doesn’t exist). At the same time, though, she’s developing a primitive understanding of cause and effect: when she cries, you take care of one of her needs.
Verbally
• Leaving behind the grunting and squeaking, your baby is expanding her vocabulary to include some delightful cooing (a combination of a squeal and a gurgle), as well as some impressive oohs, ohhs, and ahhs.
• Crying, however, is still one of her favorite ways of communicating and is in no way a comment on your parenting abilities.
Emotionally/Socially
• And now, the moment you’ve been waiting for: your baby is finally able to smile at you (sorry, but until now those things you thought were smiles were probably just gas), which she’ll often do in response to something that pleases her.
• As she becomes more and more interested in learning about her world (a process that hopefully won’t stop for the rest of her life), your baby will really enjoy regular changes of scenery.
• Her range of emotions is still fairly small, limited mostly to excitement and distress. But she’s giving you a lot of hints about her future personality.
• She’s awake about ten hours a day. Although she’s stimulated more by touch than by social interaction, she’ll stay awake longer if there are people around to amuse her.
WHAT YOU’RE GOING THROUGH
Thinking about Sex
Most OB/GYNs advise their patients to refrain from intercourse for at least six weeks after giving birth. But before you mark that date on your calendar, remember that the six-week rule is only a guideline. Resuming intercourse ultimately depends on the condition of your partner’s cervix and vagina, and, more important, on how you’re both feeling. Many couples begin having sex again in as little as three or four weeks, but it’s not at all uncommon for couples to take six months or longer to fully reestablish their prepregnancy sex life.
Many factors—both physical and psychological—influence when and how a couple decides to resume their sex life. Here are a few:
• One or both of you may be too exhausted, too stressed, or just unable to fit it into your schedule. And one or both of you might worry about being interrupted by a crying baby, which has a tendency to limit spontaneity.
• When you had sex with your partner before, she was the woman you loved. Now she’s also a mother—a thought that may remind you of your own mother and can be a big turnoff. At the same time, in your new capacity as parent, you may remind your partner a little too much of her own father. She may also find it tough to reconcile her roles as lover and mother, and may see herself as unsexual.
• Your partner may not have fully recovered from her episiotomy or C-section.
• Your partner may be embarrassed if milk leaks from her breasts when she’s aroused. A lot of men find leaking breasts erotic. But if you don’t—and she senses your feelings—she may worry that you don’t find her desirable anymore.
• A lot of women find it difficult to think of their vagina as
