OUR BABIES

Wairarapa Times-Age, 25 July 1940, Page 10

OUR BABIES

’ Published under the auspices of the ’ Royal New Zealand Society for the Health of Women and Children (Plunket Society). ’ “It is wiser to put up a fence at the top ■ of a precipice than to maintain an ambulance nt the bottom.” POPULAR ERRORS ABOUT BABIES. 1. That baby requires a binder in the early days of life to support the muscles of back and abdomen. Nothing could be further from the truth. To grow strong and perform i their work the muscles require freedom from any restriction whatever. Just think for a moment on what happens to an arm or leg that is bandaged because of some injury; the muscles - quickly lose tone, become flabby and more or less useless, and need to be carefully trained again to do the work they did previous to the injury. The same applies to the muscles of baby's back and abdomen; they must have free play to exercise strength to support the back and abdominal organs. The objects of using a binder for the first week or so of a baby’s life is simply to hold a small dressing on the cord navel until the forrher separates and the navel is healed. This usually takes about a week, after which the binder can be dispensed with entirely. For this purpose a muslin binder, made of twc thicknesses of material about five inches wide and 27 inches long, is best. The muslin binder has decided advantages over the flannel one that is still commonly used in that it is soft and will not irritate baby's skin as wool does, also it is a more suitable material for laundering purposes.

2. That infantile ailments are a necessary evil and might as well be allowed to happen as soon as ? possible to get them over. } This is an ignorant and dangerous fallacy so far as baby is concerned. r The healthy child who has been breast s fed in infancy has a natural protection ' from and a resistance to infection up ; to a certain point , and providing ; reasonable care is taken in protecting ' him from strong sources of infection t l he may escape so-called “necessary” evils altogether. Any ailment, however . slight it may be, means a temporary check to the child's progress. The following extract is taken from Sir T'ruby King’s book “The Story of the Teeth”: “During illness of any kind all work in the direction of building and repair is imperfectly done. Hence it is that nails are marked with a groove after fever, the bottom of each groove consisting of the portion of the nail which was formed during illness. For the time being all the nails are thus locally ‘ trimmed, but this matters little since nails are constantly growing and being cut off. Not so with the enamel of the teeth. . Enamel is formed in infancy and in childhood, and if there are thin, soft, or badly formed portions due to attacks of diarrhoea, etc, during the time when the enamel is in the course of formation, the teeth will tend to decay wherever there has been an inadequate deposit of the necessary protective covering. “A check sustained in early life always leaves a permanent impress on the organism, whether plant or animal. Farm crops which have been blighted in the seedling stage may flourish afterwards and give a good yield, but not so good as if the plants had gone straight ahead. Trees which have been transplanted or diseased in infancy, though they may grow remarkably well afterwards, do not attain the ultimate stature or perfection of trees whose progress has been subjected to no such temporary interruption.”

3. That baby chews his hands because he is hungry. This may be a symptom of hunger’, but as often as not it is also a symptom of indigestion. Baby chews his hands because he has discomfort and is wanting relief. In both these instances the cause can be found by inquiry into baby’s present and previous condition and the amount and quality of his food. The baby who is overfed will be cross and restless and chew his hands in an apparently ravenous fashion, a habit which is detrimental to health and to the formation of the jaws. In a healthy infant the instinct to suck or chew is a very strong one. and from the moment of birth the newborn infant finds his hands very quickly in this respect. Nature has implanted this instinct in the infant for the preservation of life, but instincts may become perverted and develop into bad habits] if they arc not controlled and trained l to fulfil their rightful purpose.