Baby's first smile to mom

Any hardships of the postpartum period, the constant lack of sleep and the incredible fatigue of the mother, accumulated by the end of the first month of the baby’s life, lose their meaning when the baby begins to smile at her in return.

First smiles

At first, the child’s smile has a reflex nature and is not related to the fact that he is able to see or hear. Unconsciously smiling baby can even a few days after his birth. This smile does not play a social role yet and simply shows that the baby is well and calm at this moment. Often you can see it on the baby’s face when he sleeps, bathes, or immediately after feeding.

In order for it to become aware, a certain time must pass. And this is not surprising, because more than a dozen facial muscles take part in the appearance of a smile. The most important thing is that its appearance is preceded by complex brain activity, including recognition of the emotions of a loved one, transmission of nerve impulses to the desired area of ​​the brain and subsequent relaxation of the facial muscles. Usually the child begins to smile consciously when the period passes from 4 to 8 weeks from the moment of birth.

When does the baby smile?

By the end of the first month, as well as during the second month of the baby’s life, his smile may already be a reaction to:

• some pleasant or fascinating event (mom claps her hands, sings a song, agukaet with a child) When does the baby begin to agitate?;
• pronounced facial expressions of an adult (sometimes a reaction can even follow a clear image of the face, for example, another baby on a magazine for mothers or on a favorite toy with big enough eyes, nose and mouth).

The kid gradually learns to maintain eye contact with an adult, to respond to interesting sounds and gentle touches, so external factors can now determine the smile of a child. Although the baby still does not know how to listen carefully, it is useful at this time not only to talk to him kindly, but also to include calm music (for example, classics), to place a mobile with funny toys and a pleasant melody above the crib.

We smile and develop

At the same time that the child begins to smile actively at his mother and other close people, he can swing his arms and legs and gradually begin to “walk” in response to an appeal to him.

All these phenomena make up what is called a revitalization complex. It consists in the fact that the baby is able to capture a pleasant sound or face for him and respond to them with a smile, joyful cries, physical activity, rapid breathing.

Depending on the situation (for example, an adult manifests his emotions more or less pronounced), the infant can also increase or decrease the intensity of its behavior.Also, the baby can begin to smile, make various sounds, bend its back and move its legs even before the adult turned to him. Then the revitalization complex is a kind of call for communication, which over time helps the baby learn to apply more and more diverse ways to contact with parents.

It is believed that this complex is formed somewhere from the third week of life of the crumbs and reaches its greatest development by the 3rd or 4th month, after which the child’s behavior becomes more complicated. If by the age of 2 months your child has not begun to smile actively, this does not mean at all that his development is not going “right”. Children are all different and rarely one of them develops “by all the rules”.

Nevertheless, scientists have long noticed that the lack of emotional and bodily contact of the mother with the baby directly affects its development. The components of the revitalization complex are less pronounced, some components, such as joyful humming, may be absent altogether.

While the child has not yet discovered a smile as a way to interact with people close to him, try to help him. To do this, it’s enough just to often take the baby in his arms, stroke him, gently talk to him, tell him rhymes, sing songs and, of course, smile more often. Such simple actions on the part of a mother who unconditionally loves her child will sooner or later lead to the fact that the baby will one day wide open his eyes and shine to his mother in response to her smile with his trusting and joyful smile.

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