What is the best sleeping position for a baby with colic
I often get asked what is the best sleeping position for a baby with colic. Have a watch of my video or read the transcript below:
Hey parents, so I’ve just had someone ask me what’s the best position for your baby to sleep in to help colic. So, like most of my videos, this is my spin on it which is there’s not one answer for that question. If there was, no babies would have colic because you’d all know the best position for them to sleep in and, like magic, no babies would have colic.
So, if you watch my other videos, we’re going to talk about “Little Meerkat” baby and “Little Frog” baby. The “Meerkat” has got the stiff neck; little “frog” baby is curled up in a ball and wants to be like this. So there’s, I’ve seen videos of doctors with a “magic hold” for your baby and they take this baby and they wrap them up like this or they do the Lion’s one like this and then all of a sudden, miracle, that baby’s sleeping. Okay, that’s one baby. That cannot work for all babies because they’re all different.
So my view on this would be we want your baby to be comfortable enough that they can sleep in all sorts of different positions. Surely you know of a baby that somehow sleeps front, back, side; you put them anywhere and they’re asleep and you’re like, “uh, my baby doesn’t do that. I have to hold them the whole time like this or like this.”
So the idea would be to get your baby able and comfortable enough to sleep because they’re relaxed and soft in any position. The other thing is you’re told not to put your baby on the front. So lots of babies like their front but you’ll be worried about putting them on the front because, you know, the current instructions are not to do that. So then we have a problem there.
Okay, so little “Meerkat” babies, strong neck, they like their front because they’re like this. They don’t like laying on their back like this. Little “frog” babies are like this; they also don’t like their back because they have to stretch out. But you hold them up like a little froggy like this. The “Meerkat” babies or a combo baby would be froggy legs, strong neck. So you hold them like this, you’ll see that they’re like this and you literally got them here or they’re on your lap and then they’re in the sling here and their head’s like this. So they’re all different positions because every baby’s different.
So it’s not one position but there’s a specific position which is really awkward for you because then you have to hold them like this. And if they’re really bad, you are holding them all night in this position, in this position, or this position. So the idea is that they’re soft, that they lay on their back. So watch my video, “does your baby hate laying on their back?” So I would help this with cranial osteopathy, releasing this tension out so they lay on their back.
So my answer is the best position is if your baby’s relaxed and can lay in any position rather than a very specific position that they are comfortable in and you have to get them in that exact position and then hold. You go to move them to put them down and they wake up. So, okay, you’ve got this position to lay in, this position’s laying, but then you’re holding them all night in that exact position. You’re not after that, you’re after a comfortable baby. What if they got loads of wind or reflux? Why not fix that? So then they’re not waking up in wind pain or they’re not waking up with the reflux because you’re like this.
So my question or my answer is there’s not one answer. The big answer is to get your baby comfortable so they can lay in whatever position they want. A little frog baby like this will lay on its back, on its side. It will stay like this but won’t lay on its back. Does this make sense to you? Leave me some comments and I’ll answer. But very interesting if you can get where I’m coming from which is every baby is different so there is not one position for them to lay in. You want to get your baby able to lay in different positions. I hope this helps, thanks.
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