Developing Attachment: Inconsistent Response to a Baby's Distress

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AboutKidsHealth - The Hospital for Sick Children

12 жыл бұрын

An example of inconsistent response to a baby's distress. Find out more at:
www.aboutkidshealth.ca/Article...
Developing Attachment: Inconsistent Response to a Baby's Distress
This is a sample from a full dvd called "A Simple Gift: Comforting Your Baby"
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This video does not constitute medical advice, and is not meant to be used or relied upon by anyone without additional guidance and supervision from a qualified physician. Do not perform the procedures described in this video unless your child's physician has reviewed this video and provides you with specific instructions and directions about performing these procedures.
VIDEO TRANSCRIPT
Parents often react inconsistently to their baby's distress. Sometimes they can be loving.
Other times they are angry, and at other times they may ask their child to worry about them.
Watch this mother's response to her child's cries. "Stop that! I don't want you to do that. Stop it!"
Here's another example, "Come here, honey. You scared me. I thought something terrible had happened. Come here now. Mommy was just so scared. You make mommy feel better. Give mommy a hug. Make mommy feel better."
As you can see, once when this baby hurt himself, his mother got angry. And another time the mother got more upset than the baby.
"You scared me. I thought something terrible had happened." By doing that, whether she meant to or not, the message the mom gave her baby was that her own needs were more important than her baby's.
These babies stopped going to their parents for comfort because they don't want to upset their parents. It's important to remember it's not up to a baby to meet a parent's needs, it's the other way around. It's up to you to meet your baby's needs. A child who gets a loving response only some of the time, has to work very hard, often by clinging and whining to get their mother's attention. They don't know what to expect from the parent and are not sure how to get love and affection. They can become very demanding.
In the long-term, children who are unsure about themselves, and their parents, are likely to have problems getting along with other people. Here's another way this mother could have responded to her child.
"Shhh." [mother rocking child] See how this time the mum focuses on the baby's needs. See how she paid attention to her baby. Calmly picked him up, held him close, and reassured him. She responded to her child on a loving way, and a baby whose parent responds in this loving way, learns that he can count on his parent to be there when he needs her. Babies, whose mothers respond in a loving way, learn to trust that their needs will be respected and valued. And they in turn learn to respect and value other people's needs.
In other words, they can go on to form good, close relationships with their parents and with others.

Пікірлер: 16

@vanessasimmons1175 2 жыл бұрын

I never let mine cry. I always cuddled them. Ppl would say you’ll spoil them, they need to learn. My daughters have grown up confident, caring beautiful humans.

@oiltycoonbillionaire Жыл бұрын

That's wonderful to hear

@Rooted_Locs 7 ай бұрын

I’m the same way. My little boy is only 7 months and he is the sweetest little thing. The doctors are always impressed by how quickly I can soothe him after his vaccines.

@ladym.9268 6 ай бұрын

I think it's worth noting that children of ANY age want to know that their parents will treat them with love and consistency. So even if your children are older and out of the toddler/baby phase, you can still work on being more consistent. I think it would make a difference for many older children and teens too.

@alexishill3342 2 жыл бұрын

Thank you for this. So many parents don't know this, and that makes no sense to me.

@numa.k 2 жыл бұрын

Years later and this is still VERY relevant.

@creative45630 9 ай бұрын

This should be standard education for expectant parents… arguably way more important than classes about birth

@hollyofhori 2 жыл бұрын

This is very insightful and eye opening. As a new mother, it's extremely stressful on it's own to raise to child but taking into account so many other factors, it's easy to have a reactive moment of anger at the sign of your child's distress. I do it myself, and absolutely hate myself the next moment for reacting like that when all my child wants is me, and to know it's okay. You never want your children to be hurt or sad, so it's natural to have a negative reaction to those things, but you have to be equal parts logical and emotional in those moments to truly give your child reassurance. I tell myself this every day, and seeing it embodied in a physical form helps greatly to motivate myself to be a better parent, and react with understanding and not my own distress, it truly only makes things worse in the moment and the long run.