Baby's head development

As we all know, the baby's head is very small in the mother's belly, probably not even as big as a fist, but when the baby is born, the baby's head will develop faster and will be bigger than in the mother's belly. The shape of your baby's head is the perfect starting point. Generally, as a baby's head develops, he or she will need to rely on you to support her or her head and neck for at least the first month. Maybe we don’t understand the development of the baby’s head now because we are still young, but we should try to understand:

5 factors that affect your baby's head shape

The skulls of newborns and fetuses are quite soft and can be easily deformed by external forces. The main factors that affect head shape are:

1. Abnormal fetal position: for example, transverse position or head facing up. On the day of birth, it can be found that the pressure of the uterus on the head causes a special head shape.

2. Multiple births: Twins or multiple births may compete for space or squeeze their heads against each other, resulting in an irregular head shape.

3. Use of external force during delivery: Vacuum extraction and forceps are used during induction of labor, which sometimes causes hematoma. After birth, if the baby is unwilling to sleep on the side of the hematoma, his head may be tilted.

4. Sleeping posture: After the baby is born, he always lies in the same position, resulting in an irregular head shape.

5. Nutrition and disease: Malnutrition of the mother during pregnancy or intrauterine infection of the fetus can cause congenital brain maldevelopment in the child and cause microcephaly or hydrocephalus. If the expectant mother does not supplement vitamin D and get enough sun in time in the late pregnancy or after the birth of the newborn, the baby may suffer from vitamin D deficiency rickets, causing square skull and other head deformities. Therefore, if the baby's head shape is caused by nutrition or disease, symptomatic treatment must be given first and then the head shape can be corrected.

*Delayed closure of fontanelle mainly refers to the situation where the baby is over 18 months old but the anterior fontanelle has not closed yet. It is often seen in rickets and cretinism.

*Delayed closure of the fontanelle is rarely caused by hydrocephalus or other reasons leading to increased intracranial pressure, and you should go to the hospital for further examination.

For more information about baby walking, please see here

Generally, after 10 months, babies can stand with the help of the handrails and then walk sideways holding the bed rails. How to teach the baby to walk at this time?

First of all, when babies are first learning to walk, in order to prevent falling, they should choose a place with a large range of activities, flat ground, and no obstacles to learn to walk. If you learn to walk indoors in winter, you must pay special attention to avoid coal stoves, radiators, and sharp and angular objects indoors to prevent accidents. At the same time, the baby should be dressed in suitable shoes and light clothes to facilitate walking.

Secondly, when the baby is just starting to learn, you can let the baby learn to walk in a walker. When the steps are more stable, parents can hold the baby's hands or one hand to let him learn to walk. You can also hold the baby's armpits from behind or pull him with a towel to let him walk forward. After a period of training, the baby will slowly begin to try independently, and parents can stand in front of him and encourage him to move forward. At first, he may stagger, lean forward, stumble into your arms, and be unable to stop his feet. This is normal because he has not yet mastered the center of gravity. At this time, parents should continue to help him practice and encourage him to walk boldly the second and third time. Gradually, as you become more proficient, you will walk more steadily and farther, and it won't be long before you can walk independently. When he was over one year old, he could walk quite steadily.

So we should correct the baby's head shape when he is young. Bad habits will only lead to poor development of the baby's head, resulting in an incomplete head and various large and small head problems. As expectant mothers, we should learn how to protect the baby's head development before the baby is born. After the baby is born, we should pay more attention to observing the baby's head and make sure it is not tilted. We should not let the baby's head always face in one direction. We should help the baby change the direction of the head more often to make the baby's head develop more soundly and healthier.