Parenting & New Baby Advice Blog

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The first half of the third year may remain difficult for you and your child as far as issues of control and dependency are concerned.  Although your child’s language and self-care skills are more advanced, in some ways your child continues to feel like a tightrope walker, occasionally teetering with uncertainty over what she can and cannot do.  Try to recognize your child’s need for independence.  By promoting independence along with emotional support, parents can help their children through this stage.  An extra cuddle or more lavish praise for the good things that the child is doing helps to counteract some of the normal negativism.

One management technique that works quite well with toddlers is the use of praise to help your child develop a positive self image.  You should encourage and delight in your child’s new accomplishments and achievements.  Praise [“That’s good! I like that block tower”], hugs, and kisses are important ingredients in promoting a good self-image.  At two and three, a child’s self-esteem-how she feels about herself-is often a reflection of her perception of her parents’ opinions of her.  Interest in and enjoyment of your child’s play set the tone for a healthy self-concept.

One of the most difficult jobs parents have is setting reasonable limits for their children.  Letting your child know what’s expected, what’s tolerable, and what’s unacceptable is a long term process that continues well into the teenage years.  As early as in the first year, for example, you are setting some limits by not letting your child stick her fingers into the electrical outlets.

Some potential conflicts can be defused by rearranging the environment, so you don’t have to worry about your child’s hurting herself, breaking your valuable vase, or eating a poisonous plant.  Childproofing the major living quarters in your house allows your child to safely explore many interesting and different objects.

Of course, changing the environment will not take care of those times when a direct confrontation is necessary.  It helps to quickly and adeptly address the situation.  Tell your child what you don’t like about what she is doing.  Give her a simple reason why, for example, pulling the tail on the cat hurts the cat.  Parents don’t need to use more than one or two sentences of explanation.  Ask the child to stop, if that doesn’t work, put the child on a chair for a few minutes either in the same room with you or in a different room.  After the allotted time has elapsed, you can talk about what happened.  Later in the day, but not immediately afterward, be sure to let your child know that you still love her by giving her a hug and kiss.  On a particularly bad day, you may even want to engage her in a very special time just for the two of you.  The earlier you begin to set aside a special chair or place to be used for thinking about unacceptable behavior, the sooner your child will learn that some things just mustn’t be done.

In the early years, parents take on the roles of caregiver, teacher, and playmate.  Creating an emotionally supportive environment is essential for your child to become independent yet aware of her parents’ love and acceptance.  On occasion, behavioral extremes are acceptable for two tear olds.  As a regular pattern however, the child who is always out of control or overly compliant is telling you something.  These are warning signals that suggest that you should take a good hard look at your disciplining techniques.  Ask yourself: Are my methods so loose that the boundaries of acceptable and unacceptable behaviors are unclear?  Am I so rigid in setting limits that my child is afraid to upset me by resisting my controls?  Am I providing enough time for relaxed activities and play with my child?

By the end of the third year, with increased growth, maturity and confidence, your child will become willing to relinquish some of her insistence in being independent.  She may even give up some of her executive independence [“I want to do it myself!”] for your love and affection.  Great pleasure is obtained from praise and attention.

Participation in such body management activities such as feeding, toilet training, and dressing becomes a matter of routine.  Although many three years olds continue to have high activity levels, their activity begins to be more directed, with a far less frenetic quality.

The secure three year old may be willing to allow you to help her set limits.  This new stage has been called the stage of volitional dependence because the child’s dependency needs can now be brought under her control.  Your child will be less impulsive and more manageable; an occasional explanation of rules will be understood-and actually followed, too.  For example, when you are working in one room, you may no longer have to worry about leaving your child to play in another, but instead may be able to trust her not to misbehave. 

Given the opportunity, parents and babies naturally form a strong relationship with each other.  This relationship is often called the parent-infant bond.  For the parent, this bond is woven of love and responsibility.  For the infant, it is his first-and perhaps most important-relationship.

Psychoanalysts have theorized that a first love relationship a baby experiences with a parent sets the stage for all later interpersonal relationships.  They contend that if you don’t have this necessary relationship in your formative years, you won’t be able to love as an adult.  A number of psychologists and psychiatrists have found support for this view.  For example, John Bowlby, a British psychoanalyst, studied children growing up without parents in the first years of life; these children often had problems relating with others and forming bonds later in life.  From such studies, psychologists have recognized what parents knew all along-how important sensitive, responsive, and consistent parenting is to the healthy development of a child.

However, it is also important to point out that babies may not have to be with their parents all the time, despite the current emphasis in Lamaze classes and parents magazines on the position that there is a “critical period’ for parents to bond to their babies.  Supporters of this position state that parents who are separated from their newborns after birth will have difficulty forming that essential parent-infant bond.  Citing studies conducted with animals, they point out that mother mice will often refuse to care for their young if they are separated right after birth.  Fortunately, humans are not mice, and more recent research suggests that human mothers generally quite able to go on to be good mothers even if they have to be separated from their babies as a result of prematurity, illness, or other reasons.

Nonetheless, positive changes have occurred because of recent recognition of the process of bonding.  Many hospitals have dramatically humanized the way in which parents and babies are treated…  Parents are allowed greater contact with babies, particularly in intensive care nurseries.  There, parents can now often participate in the feeding, handling, and general care of their babies right away, instead of waiting until their infants are released from the hospital. 

Face Recognition

By seven months, your baby may have begun to respond differently to different people.  This happens as babies sharpen their visual perceptual skills and learn to recognize people by their faces, by seeing either a full face or a profile.  Face recognition is a gradual progress acquired over the first eight months of life.  Some babies can read their parent’s facial expressions too, because they are able to see subtle differences in faces.  As with many developmental acquisitions, visual discrimination and perception of faces help your baby to maintain contact with you.

Stranger Anxiety

By six months, [sometimes earlier], your baby may have developed a very clear and strong preference for one parent or the other.  This presence is exemplified by your baby’s crying and clinging to you as a new adult approaches-“stranger anxiety.”  Babies in our culture often show at least some form of stranger anxiety.

One baby who had to be hospitalized for a short period of time quickly learned to cry hysterically at all people in blue coats because some of them were doctors and nurses who were sticking him with needles.  Just think how much cognitive processing occurred inside the baby’s head for him to make those associations.

Another baby who infrequently saw his grandmother cried as she approached to hold him.  It is natural for grandparents to feel rejected by a grandchild’s crying, but if the phenomenon is placed in the context of normal development, they should understand.  If you have this problem, suggest that they wait awhile to become reacquainted with your baby before picking him up.

There are wide variations in the time when stranger anxiety develops and in the strength of reactions. Some babies always react more strongly than others.  They scream hysterically, look terrified, and cling tightly to you.  Another baby may give you a dirty look, as if to say, “Are you sure you want to hand me over to this strange person?”

When your baby’s fear of strangers is at its peak, it is very tempting to sneak out of the room when you want to leave him with a babysitter.  However, if you do this, your baby may become more upset than if you tell him that you are leaving.  Forewarning older babies and children, telling them what is going to happen next, is a useful technique to lessen and sometimes to prevent distress reactions.

Stranger anxiety may peak, seem to disappear then reappear over and over again over the course of the next year, depending on your baby’s experiences, temperament and way of handling new situations.  The process of becoming independent is begun at birth but is certainly not finished within the first three years of life.  It continues in different forms throughout you and your child’s lifetimes.

Babies’ temperamental qualities may affect differences in the strength of reactions to strangers, but other factors-the setting’s familiarity, the tiredness of the baby, and past experiences with strangers-may also come into play.  Parents who bring their babies to work with them may find that their babies exhibit little stranger anxiety, because they are used to seeing so many new faces every day.  What is important to understand is that your baby’s fear of strangers is a healthy reaction and a part of your child’s normal emotional development.

Parents as “Refueling Centers”

With your baby’s ability to crawl and move away from you comes the desire to use you as a secure base from which to explore.  A developmental progression can be observed-your baby will first cling tightly to you, then move away, return for an occasional hug [or “refueling”], and then move off but continue visually checking in to make sure you haven’t gone anywhere.

While younger babies require a lot of holding, feeding, and playing on your lap, mobile babies no longer need as much of your continued, close at hand attention.  You may even be able to leave the baby in another room as long as you remain available and maintain some verbal communication. [Of course, you want to make sure that the room is sufficiently “baby-proofed” so your baby’s safety is not in danger.]  In one study mothers and babies conducted in a two room laboratory, the babies would not let their mothers leave them behind in one of the rooms, however, as long as the situation was under the babies control, and they were the ones who chose to go into the next room, the babies ventured out of their mother’s sight and explored.

Your availability and occasional reassurance should be supportive of your baby’s exploratory behavior.  Babies at this age, who are allowed this controlled freedom to explore with the reassurance of verbal contact with the parent out of sight, seem to fare better on later tests of emotional and cognitive abilities.  Allowing your baby some freedom of exploration and control over the environment and not interfering unnecessarily with what she wants to do will enhance your relationship with her.

Executive Dependence

Some scientists have called this exploratory stage at six to twelve months one of executive dependence, when a baby continues to be very dependent on his caregivers, but also has some control over them.  Your baby easily may become a tyrant at this stage-for example, he may cry because he wants a cookie and then becomes frustrated because he no longer remembers what he wanted.  Your baby can keep you hoping, trying to second guess what his needs are.

While your baby’s continued dependence on you may be annoying and frustrating at times, meeting his basic needs is essential for healthy emotional and cognitive growth.  Your responsiveness and your habit of attending to and appropriately acknowledging your baby’s signals, requests, and demands will enable him to become effective in his interactions with the world.  That kind of attention teaches your baby to think, “If I do something, I can have an effect.  I can make something happen. 

Your children will react to the actual presence of the baby in different ways, depending upon their ages and personalities. However well prepared they are, they will at first almost surely be surprised and most likely be disappointed. The baby is neither the playmate your toddler or preschooler secretly expected, in spite of your warnings to the contrary, nor the smiling, gurgling picture perfect, infant your older child probably visualized. Even the baby’s sex may be disappointing, and the fact that he or she does nothing but eat, sleep and cry-and monopolize your attention-surely will be.

Your main enemy at home will be time, especially if you have a toddler or preschooler, there’ll never be enough of it. Many mothers feel guilty of neglecting the older child, because the infant takes so much time. Psychologists tell us that underlying that guilt is anger at being torn between the two children. One way to help yourself feel better and to make your older child feel wanted is to include him or her in every possible part of care for the baby. Even a two year old can fetch a diaper from upstairs, perch on a stool beside you at the dressing table, or help you pat the baby dry after a bath. Little kids can sort the baby’s laundry, help you gently pat up a burp after a feeding, and “entertain” the baby with nursery songs and finger plays.

Let your hold the baby on a pillow, in a big chair, when you are close. If your bottle- feeding let him or her hold the bottle for a few minutes, and demonstrate the way to gently pat the baby’s cheek to see the baby’s head turn. Warn the child about the anterior fontanel [the soft, boneless spot at the top of the baby’s head], but don’t be unduly alarmed if he or she touches it; it’s protected by a firm membrane. Do be sure to supervise very carefully any “help’ or playing with the baby. Be sure your child understands that he or she must never try to pick up or carry the baby. Avoid any possibility of harm to either child by putting the baby in the crib or in an infant seat inside the playpen if you have to leave the room. Feeding time may be difficult, especially if you are nursing the baby-a time when your toddler or preschooler feels left out and is apt to show displeasure with you by getting into trouble. The feedings that come when your older child is napping or gone to bed for the night, or when someone else is in the house to provide distraction, will be the ones to which you can devote your attention entirely to the baby, providing the eye contact that is important. When your older child is present during feedings, settle yourselves on the sofa and cuddle him or her with your free arm as you read or watch television together. Or sit comfortably on the floor, with your back braced against a piece of furniture, and watch or help while the child works with puzzles, games, or coloring projects. The baby won’t suffer; your touch and the sound of your voice will be soothing. What if your older child wants to try nursing again? It won’t hurt, if you are agreeable to the idea. The chances are that one quick try will be enough. The child won’t like the taste of your milk and probably won’t be able to suck properly. Wanting to go back to nursing is only one of several signs of regression you might expect, and they won’t necessarily show up immediately after the baby arrives. A return to baby habits concerning toilet training, eating, sleeping talking, or dressing may be more of a sign of stress than of jealousy. Whatever the cause, your child is trying to get your attention by competing with the baby on the baby’s own level. The best way to deal with regression is to go along with it patiently and without showing anger or disappointment; it will pass. Be generous with praise with any mature behavior and reward it with grown up privileges, such as staying up a bit later than usual or going on an important errand with Daddy. 

From the moment of birth, there are already characteristics of both of you and your baby that allow you to begin developing a special relationship.  Newborn babies themselves are very effective at getting their parents and other adults to take care of them.

Physical Appearance

Have you ever noticed that most animal babies are considered cute and cuddly?  Some scientists believe that this is nature’s way of ensuring that animals [including human beings] care for their young.  This is why your baby’s physical appearance alone makes you feel warm and good inside.  His large head and rounded features make him look “cuter” and more “babyish.”  In fact, the more any baby has these features, the more positively he is seen by adults in general.  Studies report that adults look at chubbier babies more and express a greater desire to play with and take care of them.  Even parents have been found to be more responsive to their children when they are “cute’ than when they are not.  Apparently, new babies endear themselves to their parents and grandparents, in part at least; just by the way they look.

Reflexes

Many of a newborn’s reflexes [unlearned behavior patterns] serve to ensure physical proximity to his mother.  During your baby’s first examination, your pediatrician may demonstrate how your baby’s hand forms into a tight grasp around your finger.  In the early months, the grasp reflex is so strong that your baby can almost support his own weight.  When a newborn is startled by a loud noise or a sudden change in position, his arms flail out to the side and then are quickly brought together, as if he were trying to grab onto his mother.  This reflex is called the Moro, or startle reflex.  This and other reflexes are believed to be remnants from our evolutionary ancestry.

The Cry

Any parent can tell you that a baby’s crying is a very unsettling sound, one that is not easy to tune out.  Although annoying, your baby’s cry should be thought of as her first means of communicating with her.

Crying is a highly adaptive response from an evolutionary viewpoint, probably designed to get the caregiver to tend to the baby’s needs.  In fact, four out of five times that a parent interacts with her baby, it is because the baby cried.  Crying alerts you to your baby’s needs.  Most parents quickly respond by trying to find out what is wrong, checking to see if the baby is cold, wet, or hungry, or if she is just bored.  In fact, babies may have different cries for different reasons.  Parents can often recognize what their babies’ mean.

Many parents think they can actually identify their newborns by their cries.  This may be an actual perception.  Psychologists have studied the acoustical features of individual babies’ cries with sophisticated technology-spectrographs that record sound patterns.  They have found that babies may be identifiable by unique “cryprints.”

Although all babies cry, wide variations occur in how much time a baby spends crying.  Some babies may have “three month colic”; others may cry only when distressed, hungry, angry, or in pain.  Fortunately, by three months most babies will dramatically reduce the amount of time they spend crying.

You can help your baby to cry less, it has been found that parents who quickly attend to their babies’ crying by picking them up during the first three months seem to have babies  who cry less at nine months.  Contrary to old wives tales, you are not “spoiling’ your baby by comforting her and relieving her crying.

What works to soothe a crying baby varies depending on your baby’s age.  Once you have determined that your baby is warm, dry, and fed, age old soothing techniques can be employed, and these will change with your child’s developmental changes.  Of course, the best way to quiet a young baby is to pick her up.  Next comes holding a very young baby so she can look over your shoulder, combining closeness and distraction.  Newborns also like to be swaddled in receiving blankets.  Rocking, giving something to suck, and providing some sort of auditory stimulation, like music, will help reduce newborns’ crying about half the time.  Sometimes, touching your baby or just being nearby can make her stop crying.

Looking Patterns

Although a newborn baby can’t see things very clearly from a distance, he is quite able to see your face when you hold him in your arms.  In fact, that’s about all you see.  Newborns tend to look at areas of high contrast [like a black object on a white background] and the outside of images [like a hairline on a face].  Thus, a parent’s face is an optimal visual stimulus for a baby.

Cuddliness

When you hold your new baby, you may notice that he naturally molds his body to cuddle with you.  This molding ensures maximum body contact between the two of you and makes you feel warm and tingly.

Unfortunately, not all babies like to cuddle as much as their parents would like, but may squirm in their parents’ arms.  This may just be their nature-and not a reflection of parenting skills.  Developmental tests of infants, such as the Brazelton Neonatal Behavioral Assessment Scale, measure newborn’s reactions.  In one of the tests babies are rated from “very resistant to being held” to “extremely cuddling and clinging.” One study indicated that mothers had difficulty teaching “resistive” newborn babies to cuddle.  The more a mother tried to cuddle an unwilling baby, the less the baby cuddled.  If your baby does not want to be cuddled all the time, don’t be alarmed or assume you’re doing something wrong.  Remember that your baby is an individual, and adjust your desire to cuddle him to his responsiveness to being cuddled. 

The majority of new mothers leaving the hospital today breast-feed their babies, at least at the beginning-about 60%. This is especially true for middle-class and professional women, which the majority of older mothers are likely to be. Age does not seem to have any great effect on breast-feeding. It is not commonly known that any woman who has had a baby can breast-feed, and that in other cultures grandmothers breast-feed their daughter’s children. Occasionally a much older mother may find it a problem to produce enough milk, due to hormonal problems, but this is rare. Many hospitals now give great support and encouragement to mothers who want to breast-feed, recognizing that it is the best food for a baby and that there are emotional rewards for the nursing mother.

The American Academy of Pediatrics issued a strongly worded policy in 1997 that suggests women nurse for six to 12 months, because of a strong association between breastfeeding and immunities for babies from a variety of ailments. But some women decide they do not want to breast-feed. There is no reason to feel guilty about this. There are excellent baby formulas available now that are made to match the nutrition of mother’s milk as closely as possible. Bottle-fed babies also thrive. Love is more important than the way you choose to feed, though many mothers choose to express their love through breast-feeding.  Breast-feeding is best for a baby because it is a living substance transmitted directly from mother to baby, containing white blood cells, antibodies and other substances that help protect the baby against disease.

We haven’t yet identified all these protective properties. It is composed of exactly the right nutrients for human babies and is produced in exactly the quantities the baby demands. After the birth a mother produces colostrum, a yellowish fluid rich in antibodies, which protects the baby from infection. Colostrum also contains protein, water and minerals in just the right proportion for the baby’s first few days, and a natural laxative, which helps the baby’s bowels start working. When the milk comes in, it is also perfectly balanced for the baby’s needs. The milk changes slightly in composition as the baby grows. Research has shown that milk produced by the mothers of premature babies is different from normal breast milk, and is ideally suited for them. When the baby first goes to the breast and sucks, it takes the watery foremilk stored in ducts behind the areola, the pigmented area around the nipple. The baby’s sucking sends a message to the brain to let down the bulk of the milk, and the hormone oxytocin the same hormone that makes the womb contract in labor and at orgasm-is released, causing the muscles around the glands producing the milk to contract and squeeze the milk through the breast to the nipple. The baby usually takes the bulk of the feeding in the first ten minutes or so at the breast. But enough milk is always produced so the feeding can last much longer than this. 

Most hospitals have made-up bottles of formula readily available. This is a great temptation to a mother who is having problems with breast-feeding and who is very tired. If you are certain you want to breast-feed, resist this temptation! It takes some time to establish breast-feeding and there are often some initial problems, but they should resolve themselves shortly. Some babies who get used to the bottle find it is more difficult to take the breast. Babies who have had bottles sometimes reject the breast altogether. Mothers who want to avoid cow’s milk because of eczema and asthma in the family should also resist the temptation to give a bottle. 

Many of the ways you can save time center around good organization. Of course, definite scheduling of your time is impossible now; you can’t be sure exactly when or how often your baby is going to need you. Every plan you make that involves other people or a specific time must be expendable of have an alternative. This way, you can shift gears at a moment’s notice when your baby requires an extra feeding or when some other normal but unanticipated takes place. At the very least, you’ll want to consistently allow more time than you think you’ll need for everything. Experienced parents have found many ways to save themselves time and confusion as they go about the business of life with a new baby. Here are some of their ideas:      

• Keep shopping lists, lists of chores that must be absolutely done, and lists of thank-you notes to be written for baby presents. By writing everything down, you free yourself of having to remember details at a time when you are most apt to be forgetful and preoccupied.
• At night, do as much as you can to get ready for the next day. Set the table for breakfast, lay out clothes for yourself and the baby, pick up the newspaper. Any nuisance chores and decisions you can handle ahead of time will make the day start that much better.
• Cut down on time consuming trips around town by banking by mail and shopping by phone or through catalogs whenever you can. Try to do several errands when you are out, and plan them so you waste the least possible amount of time driving around.
  Practice doing two things at the same time: make out a grocery list or do your stretching exercises while you talk on the phone; fold the laundry as you watch television; or clean the bathroom as the tub fills.
• Above all, do not rush, “Haste makes waste” is a cliché, but it is as true today as it was when it was first uttered by someone who knew that the faster he or she tried to do something, the more likely it was that there would be an accident.

You’ll probably feel a little awkward and clumsy the first few times you diaper and dress your baby, but with a little practice, you’ll be handling him with ease and confidence. Use a waist high table of some kind even for a tiny baby so you won’t have backaches. An old dresser with a pad on top will now, but modern changing tables have built-in safety straps to hold your baby when he is old enough to squirm and resist. If you use disposables, diapering is almost automatic: lay the baby on the diaper, fold the front half of the diaper up over the baby and fasten it with the convenient attached tapes. [Those tapes sometimes tear, instead of throwing a diaper away, mend it with masking tape.] To keep wetness from soaking into outer clothing, use disposables with elasticized legs and turn the plastic top of the diaper to the inside. A cloth diaper can be given a figure eight twist at the crotch for both double thickness and a tighter fit. Pin the back of the diaper over the front, slipping one or two fingers between the cloth and the baby’s skin to keep the pin from sticking the baby. Use a pincushion or bar of soap to hold diaper pins [do not use ordinary safety pins, and keep them out of the baby’s reach] Never hold pins in your mouth. Whichever kind of diaper you use, lay an extra one over your baby boy to avoid being squirted while you change him. 

The kinds of clothing you select for your baby will reflect your own taste and inclinations. Some parents are willing to spend the extra time necessary to iron natural-fiber, woven- fabric because they like the look of a dressed up baby; others opt for simple knit clothing that needs little care. Whichever kind of clothing you prefer, look for garments that will be easy for you to put on and take off the baby-those with few, if any buttons, necklines with large enough openings to fit easily over the baby’s head, and sturdy crotch fasteners that make diaper changing easier. 

Over the years, a commonly accepted immunization schedule has evolved. Most doctors follow it, although there are some acceptable variations. The schedule is designed to give your child the maximum protection available as soon as possible. The reason some shots are not given earlier is that the child’s own defense system hasn’t matured enough to develop immunity. For example, a number of years ago, the measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine were given to infants at twelve months. It was discovered that many of these infants didn’t develop protection against these illnesses because their own defense systems weren’t able to react to the vaccine correctly. The date was changed, and now the vaccine is much more effective.

Immunization and Testing Schedule

• 2 months – DIP and TOPV
• 4 months – DIP and TOPV
• 6 months – DIP
• 9-12 months – TB test
• At least 15 months – MMR
• 18 months – DIP and TOPV
• 2 years – HiB and TB test
• 4-6 years – DIP and TOPV

DIP [diphtheria-tetanus-pertussis vaccine]: This immunization is given as a shot, usually in the thigh. Many children have no reaction to it. Some have swelling and redness at the injection site, as well as some fussiness.

TOPV [trivalent oral polio vaccine, also called the Sabin vaccine]: Your child is given a small amount of liquid to swallow. Side effects from this vaccine are very rare.

MMR [measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine]: This vaccine is given as a shot. Your child needs only one shot to have lifelong protection from all three viruses.

TB Test [tuberculosis test]: Some doctors feel that routine tuberculosis testing is necessary and do it on all children. Other doctors feel that this testing is not needed and do it only when they believe the child is at risk of exposure to this disease.

HiB [hemophilus influenza type B vaccine]: This relatively new vaccine protects children against developing several types of infections including one type of meningitis [infection of the coverings of the brain and spinal cord]. This meningitis is more common in children two to six years old who are exposed to a number of other children, such as in day care centers, or who stay with babysitters who care for four or more children. Although this type of meningitis isn’t common, if your two to six year old child is in day care or with a babysitter, you should discuss the HiB vaccine with your doctor.

Boosters: After your child has his childhood shots, he’s all set unless he is going to be traveling in certain foreign countries or until he turns twelve. The tetanus shot provides protection for five to ten years.

Smallpox: The immunization used to be routine, but it has been discontinued because the risk from the vaccine itself is greater than the risk of getting smallpox. This disease has almost been wiped out worldwide.

With goodwill and a sincere desire for communication, you may very well be able to take the best that your parents and other older relatives have to offer and tactfully teach them the best of what you know, without lowering your standards or sacrificing your values. First, use the many available resources to back up your opinions. We all tend to believe what we read, and women of the older generation held doctors and experts in high regard, so show Grandma the passages in books and magazines that reinforce your opinion. Quote your pediatrician to her. Share with her the literature you have from organizations such as the La Leche League (International, USA,

Canada) and the National Childbirth Education Association. Tell her what you’ve learned from people whose opinion she respects-you neighbor, whose children she always admires, or your sister or sister-in-law. Sometimes simply stalling is a good technique. Thank her for her advice, and say and do nothing more about the matter. Or “forget” to try her method, or tell her you’ll probably “start soon.” With good humor and consideration, you can probably work things out with Grandma so you at least approach the ideal relationship, in which you are working together for the benefit of your child and in which the child is more important to both of you than each other’s opinions about child care are. Bear in mind that the ultimate benefits of your rapport with Grandma will go to your child, whose relationship with her is priceless.

 The bottom line in dealing with Grandma or anyone else is that you are the parent, an intelligent and well informed person, and you have the right to determine what is best for your child and to raise him or her as you see fit. In the end, if you have to, you can remind these people that they chose their ways and you will choose yours. Of course, all this is easier with acquaintances or strangers, who will perhaps surprise you with their audacity in telling you what to do or asking you impertinent questions about the way you are caring for your child. You do not need to justify your actions to such people; you can avoid confrontations by simply thanking them politely for their interest and going your way. Do be sure that you are actually being criticized before you react. Remember that the more insecure we are, the more we tend to infer criticism when none was intended, and that we all tend to overreact to situations in which our children are concerned. There are few issues important enough to force confrontations with relatives and friends.