By Lucy Corkhill
20th February 2014
It’s hard to say no sometimes when the insinuation is that if you don’t buy that temperature monitor for your baby’s bath you’re endangering them. Advertising plays on a new parent’s natural desire to protect at all costs, and ramps it up into a sense of anxiety. Could this kind of bedding give our child asthma? Is the bath too hot? Will we hear our baby if we don’t have a monitor? Will they grow properly if their buggy isn’t ergonomically sound?
It’s worth remembering (I had to remind myself as a new mum) that these are all modern anxieties. Show any simple-living tribesperson our western baby paraphernalia and they would no doubt be terribly confused. What do we really need all this stuff for? Is it to assuage our feelings of disconnection? It’s well known that people buy as a way of filling emotional holes, and I began to wonder if we did the same thing with our children. By buying the latest gadgets, were we trying to prove our love and commitment as parents? Or smother the feeling of not having a clue what we’re doing?! That was the question that began to seriously bug me as we were urged to buy one item after another. There are lists everywhere of what your new baby needs – Google it and you’ll discover that no new baby is safe/happy without a myriad of products pandering to all their parents’ fears and concerns.
So, here are just some of the things you’ll be told you ‘need’ and why you probably won’t:
Baby monitors – if you keep your baby close to you, you won’t need a baby monitor. Co-sleeping, rocking to sleep, breastfeeding, and cuddling all negate the need for this bit of kit. Really, if your baby is so far away from you that you’d need a monitor to hear them, you’ve got to question whether this set up is best for your child. Babies flourish with skin to skin contact and a sense of parental closeness so placing them alone in a room far away from you with the idea that they learn to ‘self-soothe’ may help create.
Bath thermometers – This was a weird one for me. I never doubted that I would be able to gauge a safe temperature for my son’s bath until he came along. Then I was convinced by nervous health visitors that I needed the temperature to be exact and there was no way I could know that by using my elbow – heaven forbid! Fast forward a few months and I soon realised the elbow test (I remembered my mum and dad using it) was effective and much safer – after all, a thermometer can go wrong, your elbow can’t… We are taught not to use our instincts and rely on outside implements for these most basic of tasks, but taking back our power is important – we can bathe our children without another piece of plastic.
Sterilising equipment – this is mind-bogglingly complex now with electronics companies bringing out huge plastic sterilising bays. If you need to use a bottle – if you’re expressing or unable to breastfeed – wash it thoroughly in warm soapy water, using a scrubbing brush to get to the inside. Then submerge it in a pan of boiling water for 10mins – the old fashioned, simplest way of sterilising.
Baby bedding – before we had children I had no idea what a cot bumper was. As soon as I found out, I became temporarily fixated on acquiring one, suddenly besieged by parental nerves that our son would nightly clonk his head on the bars of his cot. In the end, he didn’t use his cot, but slept in the bed with us and I had two cot bumpers kindly donated by friends gathering dust in the loft. We were also given a grobag which has been a real godsend in our heating-less house; it had been pre-loved for many years by a friend’s daughter but was cosy and warm and has served our son well. As our son has moved into a co-sleeper, we tuck him up in piles of blankets – a true mismatch of quirky bits and pieces we’ve acquired over the years including a colourful blanket crocheted by his great great aunt. Seeing the nursery in the house of an expectant friend recently, I thought how nice it looked with the matching baby bed-linen, curtains and (aha!) cot bumper, but I wouldn’t give up the cosy sense of my baby nestled up to me in bed under the cloak of night for any pretty embroidered baby linen in the world.
Buggies – Save a fortune on the latest all-singing, all-dancing buggy – complete with latte holder – and pick up a sling or make your own. It’s the best way to carry your baby; you get to hold them close to your heart and they are soothed by the rhythm of your movement and your heartbeat. Plus you have both hands free to attend to other things and don’t have to struggle with narrow pavements, buses, steps etc. Forsaking the buggy also frees up a great deal of room; ever visited friends and fallen over a huge buggy in the hallway? You can just hang your sling up with the coats, ready to go for next time!
Beds – There are such an incredible range of beds on the market for babies that it can feel a bit overwhelming. Should you get a little Moses basket to have beside your bed? Or a hammock that hangs down over the bed? Opt for a cot-style bed that grows as they grow? The easiest – and cheapest – way to avoid all the confusion is to take baby in the bed with you. You’re far more likely to get a good night’s sleep as you can breastfeed on demand without waking. And your newborn will feel comforted and reassured having you right there with your familiar smell and warmth.
Baths – Take the baby in the bath with you. You’ll get wonderful skin-to-skin contact and warm cuddly time, and your baby gets to explore the exciting sensations of bathing whilst safe with you. It helped me enormously to let go of the idea that children need to be bathed every day. While bath-time can be a useful winding down ritual for fractious babies, signifying imminent bedtime – your baby doesn’t actually need to wash every day. Cleaning their faces and then their bottoms with a warm flannel is about the extent of our bathing rituals in the thick of winter. Our parents will remember their own childhoods, when one day a week was designated as washday and the tin bath was placed by the fire for the bathing of all the family (pity the poor person who got the last dip!). That sounds about right to me.
Lotions and potions – Most babies now have more products than their mums! There are so many products it can be boggling. Starting at the basic end of the scale, you find bath lotions and shampoos. Then there are creams for the skin and scalp, lotions for massage and fragranced after-bath potions all beautifully and convincingly packaged – even, I noticed recently, baby perfume (I kid you not). I took a leaf out of a friend’s book and used nothing in my son’s bath or on his skin but good old water. For massage, I used olive oil with a drop of mandarin essential oil to help with his digestion. It was good to see how healthy his skin was with no dryness or scaly skin, but what was perhaps surprising was the fact he smelt so sweet! Next time you feel compelled to purchase a bath goodie for your child, consider their skin’s natural oils and whether they really need it. If they’re plagued by eczema, try a muslin bag of oats and chamomile flowers in the bath for their soothing anti-inflammatory properties. Not only does your child’s skin benefit by finding its natural PH balance, but you can end up saving lots of cash by freeing yourself from a dependence on baby bath and body products.
Musical mobiles – this is one of those things that Western parents often purchase to do the job of soothing baby to sleep without them. Though there are some sweet ones on the market, you will also come across some beastly monstrosities that hang over your baby’s cot on a huge plastic arm. Your child is far more likely to respond to the comfort of your voice and, when they are really tiny, the rhythm of your heartbeat, than a tinny musical mobile. Choose a relaxing song that your child really loves and have this as your bedtime song – one you sing to them just before bed to signify sleep time, and eventually they can join you in singing. If you feel you can’t spare the time, imagine your child’s memories in years to come – hearing mum or dad’s voice is incredibly reassuring and builds resilience.
