What it is
Babywearing is the practice of wearing or carrying a baby or child in a sling. Babywearing literally means “wear you baby” as you would do with a shirt or a jumper.
Babywearing has been practised for centuries around the world. In the industrialized world, babywearing has gained popularity in recent decades, partly under influence of supporting of “attachment parenting”; however, not all parents who babywear consider themselves attachment parents.
Benefits of babywearing for your baby:
- Mothers' oxytocin is increased through physical contact with the infant, leading to a more intimate maternal bond, easier breastfeeding and better care, thus lowering the incidence of postpartum depression.
- Infants who are carried are calmer because all of their primal/survival needs are met. The caregiver can be seen, heard, smelled, touched, tasted, provide feeding and the motion necessary for continuing neural development, gastrointestinal and respiratory health and to establish balance and muscle tone is constant.
- Infants are more organized. Parental rhythms (walking, heartbeat, etc.) have balancing and soothing effects on infants.
- Infants are "humanized" earlier by developing socially. Babies are closer to people and can study facial expressions, learn languages faster and be familiar with body language.
- Independence is established earlier.
- Attachment between child and caregiver is more secure.
- Decreases risk of "flat head syndrome" caused by extended time spent in a car seat and by sleeping on the back. None of the babywearing positions require infants to lie supine while being carried. Infants can even be worn while they sleep, also decreasing sleeping time spent in a supine position.
Benefit of babywearng for the wearer:
- Babywearing allows the wearer to have two free hands to accomplish tasks such as laundry while caring for the baby's need to be held or be breastfed. Babywearing offers a safer alternative to placing a car seat on top of a shopping cart. It also allows children to be involved in social interactions and to see their surroundings as an adult would.
- Many sling users have found that it is easier on the back and shoulders than carrying their infant in a car seat. The weight of the child is spread more evenly across the upper body.
- Slings can also be a fashion statement. They come in many different designs and colors and are available in many different types of materials.
- Breastfeeding and babywearing often go hand in hand. Many baby slings offer mothers privacy and for many mothers, the option of nursing hands-free while tending to other activities or household chores.
- Babywearing can help premature babies and babies who are slow weight gainers to gain weight at a faster rate.Since the baby is held up close to the mother, the baby will be able to be nursed more often and often for longer intervals. Kangaroo care is well-studied and has shown clear benefits to premature and ill infants.
- Babywearing can aid attachment by encouraging closeness during bottle feeding and freeing at least one hand.
- Daycare providers and foster parents often find that babywearing allows them to better meet the needs of multiple children by freeing hands during times when babies need to be held.