How does the first hour of a child's life affect their entire future?

The first hour of a child's life is greatly underestimated by both doctors and parents. Parents are simply not taught that the first hour after birth determines both the baby's relationship with the mother and his sense of security throughout his life. What should the first hour of a child's life be like so that he grows up to be a self-confident and successful person?

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The first minutes after birth

These are the most important minutes for mother and child. During these minutes, the first contact between mother and child should take place. It determines their relationship for life. For the mother, this communication is important to awaken her maternal instincts. For the baby - because during these minutes he imprints the image of the mother, this phenomenon is called imprinting (from the English "to imprint", "to seal"). And for the newborn, his first contact with the mother is also important to form his feeling of affection and love as such.

What is newborn imprinting?

When a child is born, its nervous system and many other systems are not yet fully formed. That is why a person is considered immature. And that is why scientists have hardly studied the first minutes and hours of a child's life. But the whole point is that these first hours form the relationship between mother and child for life. The mother's first contact with her child forms her maternal instinct, and the child's sense of security in this new world.

Imprinting for a newborn baby is the ability to remember, imprint in memory the distinctive features of people and phenomena that it sees. Therefore, it is very important for a child to see its mother within the first hour after birth. According to research, a child in the first hours after birth is able to distinguish and imprint objects that are 25 cm from its eyes very well. This is the distance at which the mother holds the baby in her arms during feeding. This discovery - imprinting - was revealed to the world by Konrad Lorenz, an Austrian physiologist and Nobel laureate. He studied this phenomenon on animals and applied it to humans in 1935.

Lorenz identified the so-called sensitive period in the first 24 hours of a newborn's life, during which the child must form a strong connection with the mother and imprint her image before his eyes. And without contact, this is impossible. If there is no such contact, it is very difficult to form a sense of security in the child in the surrounding world. He can grow up restless and weak. And vice versa, if you give the mother and child the opportunity to communicate in the first day and especially in the first hour after the baby is born, he will grow up self-confident and capable of love. His attitude towards his mother throughout his life will be positive and mutual, because in these first days the mother's maternal instinct is formed accordingly.

The first hour of a child's life and its impact on the rest of his life

The first hour of a baby's life should consist of several phases that follow each other in a strict sequence. These stages cannot be ahead of each other, because otherwise full imprinting will not occur. If a woman gives birth naturally and the baby stays with her during the first hour, all processes of communication between mother and child occur automatically, they do not need to be regulated artificially. If a child is born by cesarean section, these connections are initially largely interrupted. During natural childbirth, the baby receives a large portion of maternal hormones before entering the world, which are very good for strengthening its immune system and have a great influence on the behavior of the little person. If a person does not receive these hormones due to an interrupted or incomplete birth process, his behavioral reactions are also disrupted.

Stages of imprinting

There are two stages of imprinting. They take up a day after birth. These stages are extremely important and cannot be confused. Primary imprinting is the first 1-2 hours after birth. It is divided into the first 30 minutes after birth and the next hour and a half. The entire life of the baby and its relationship with the mother completely depend on the first half hour after birth. If there is no contact with the mother during this time, then the second stage of imprinting does not occur, and after it, another important stage does not occur - secondary imprinting, which occurs during the first day after birth.

So, the first 60 minutes after birth, or the time of primary imprinting. Doctors divide them into 4 important time parts.

The first quarter of an hour after birth – relaxation or awakening

At this time, the first contact between mother and child will take place. The child has been born, spent a lot of time and effort on it, and now must regain strength. He must scream to start the lungs working, and lie at the mother's feet to regain strength. At this time, the child can snore, sneeze, even cough - his respiratory tract is thus freed from accumulated mucus. And the child also adapts to the new temperature environment and air. At this time, the mother can feel him, massage his back, thus helping him to breathe.

There is a huge benefit to this: firstly, the first tactile contact occurs, which allows the mother and baby to recognize each other (like animals when they lick newborn babies). Secondly, the baby develops a sense of security from the mother's touch. And thirdly, the baby's blood flow improves, and breathing is restored.

If such contact does not occur (and in our maternity hospitals the baby is often taken away from the mother in the first half hour after birth), then the baby does not develop a sense of safety in the surrounding world. On the contrary, the message goes: "It's dangerous here! There is no one to protect me."

The first contact between a mother and her baby after birth stimulates the production of so-called bonding hormones – oxytocin and prolactin. Prolactin also stimulates the production of breast milk, which the mother needs to fully feed the baby. In addition, the secretion of bonding hormones helps the mother better understand her baby on an instinctive level in order to better satisfy his needs when he cries.

During the first 15 minutes after birth, the baby must not be separated or taken away from the mother, because even the umbilical cord cannot be cut at this point. The baby must be placed at the mother's feet so that the remaining blood from the umbilical cord flows into the baby's circulatory system. This is his blood, which the newborn must not be deprived of - it will give him strength and strengthen his immunity. The fact that all the blood has flowed from the mother to the baby can be determined by the fact that the umbilical cord has turned white. Then it can be cut.

Time for the baby's active phase

This phase occurs 15-40 minutes after the baby is born. It is very important for the baby and the mother, because at this time the baby develops a search or crawling reflex, and it should not be interrupted under any circumstances - this is a huge shock for the baby, which affects all his behavior throughout his entire life. The baby should not be turned from his tummy to his back - he should try to crawl to find the mother's nipple. Progressive methods of childbirth in enlightened European countries assume a mandatory opportunity for the baby's search reflex to manifest. He is not taken away from his mother until the baby has made an attempt to crawl and find the mother's breast.

As soon as this happens, the baby opens his mouth wide and clenches and unclenches his fists. The mother herself must correctly insert the nipple into his mouth, having previously expressed a few drops of milk. This is extremely important for the child, who receives nutrition and self-confidence, and in the mother this simple action forms a powerful maternal instinct aimed at caring for the child and a strong attachment to him.

When latching the baby to the breast, there must be mandatory eye-to-eye contact. This is very important so that the baby:

• remembered the image of the mother;
• learned to look directly into the eyes of another person.

If there is no eye contact with the mother, the child, who then grows up, will feel awkward looking into the eyes of another person all his life, his gaze will be darting, he will constantly look away. Few people know that this depends on the first 15-40 minutes after birth. And that self-doubt originates from this very moment. In order to make up for lost time later, it will be necessary to engage in a special type of therapy (rebirthing), which returns the child to the origins of his birth and the situation associated with this moment. This is a breathing psychotechnique according to the method of the American psychotherapist Leonard Orr, the purpose of which is to free the child from the psychological trauma received at birth.

The baby does not learn to latch on to the breast right away – it may take 3-8 attempts by the mother. All this time, she must try to correctly place the nipple in the newborn’s mouth. Finally, he learns to latch on with his gums and tongue. It takes the baby up to 30 minutes to suck on one breast, and if this is not enough for him, the mother puts him to the other breast. When the baby gets his portion of milk, and the mother – her portion of “motherhood hormones”, both can move on to the next stage of imprinting – the rest phase.

Resting stage

As a rule, it lasts from 1.5 hours to 4 hours. During this time, the baby, having sucked the mother's milk, sleeps, and the mother, having received relief, also rests and recovers after childbirth. This is correct, because the organisms of both must get a break and prepare for the next stage of communication - secondary imprinting.

Strengthening the skills and connection between mother and child

In the first 24 hours after birth, the baby should not be taken away from the mother, as was always the case in maternity hospitals in our country, especially in Soviet times. After waking up after the first healing sleep, the mother and baby should consolidate the effect of the first contact and receive a second contact. This strengthens the relationship between them for life and forms a mutual attachment. This attachment and relationship are broken if the mother and baby wake up separately from each other. But it is necessary that upon awakening the child again receives the mother's breast and eye contact with her.

The mother again teaches the child to correctly take the nipple into the mouth and extract milk from it. This skill is formed throughout the first days after birth. Knowing and feeling that the baby always has milk, he gets a feeling of reliability and security, satiety and well-being for the rest of his life. If the child wakes up and finds neither mother nor a source of feeding nearby, he becomes very worried, feels abandoned and unprotected - and this feeling again remains with him for the rest of his life.

For the mother - especially the first-time mother - this moment is also very important - it forms her attitude to the child, also for life. Many women after the first birth (and subsequent ones) do not always feel this connection. All because of improperly conducted contact. That is why the first hour and first day of the child's life affect his entire future and his relationship with the mother. Young mothers should know this and give birth in those maternity hospitals where the health and psychological state of them and their children are valued.