Throughout the pregnancy, we carry our babies inside our belly, protecting them while they continue to grow and develop every week, until the day of their birth, when they are ready to go out into the world.
However, the fact that we no longer take them inside does not mean that they already have the skills and abilities to survive on their own. In fact, the first three months after delivery are known as the "fourth trimester", because although the pregnancy is over, the baby still needs us as if he were inside us.
The fourth quarter theory
Some years ago we shared the theory of the fourth quarter proposed by Dr. Harvey Karp, in which it is affirmed that human beings are born three months in advance, having enough maturity to survive, yes, but not alone.
According to this theory, the discomfort they feel being outside the uterus after nine months, it would be the reason why during its first three months of life there are sleep problems, cramps, anxiety. And it makes a lot of sense!
Let's put ourselves in the place of a newborn baby for a few seconds: having spent nine months in a safe, warm, welcoming and quiet environment, suddenly a good day comes out of it, to meet the world and a million stimuli around it.
Lights, sounds and new sensations totally different from his old home now reach him. In a matter of minutes, live a very drastic change of environment. Doesn't it sound easy or pleasant? Sure now we can better understand why Babies still need us so much during their first months.
In Babies and more The second nine months, the extrogestation of the babyReturning to the theory of the fourth quarter, it could be said that human beings are born "half-cooked", because unlike other mammals that are born as soon as they are able to walk or run, we are born only with the minimum basic skills to survive.
This is also something that is mentioned when we talk about extrogestation or external gestation, which refers to the first nine months of life after delivery and in which the baby completes its minimum development to start exploring the world beyond their parents. But for now, we will focus specifically on the fourth quarter.
He is no longer within you, but he still needs you
Knowing all this, it is easier to understand and understand why the first three months of our baby's life is called the fourth trimester. And it is that during this stage, rather than presenting it to the world, we must continue to provide an environment as similar as possible to the one I had when I was inside the uterus.
In Babies and more Emotional education in the first months of life: how to stimulate your babyWe must also take into account a fact that personally fascinates me about the development of the baby: his brain grows faster in the hours and days after delivery, until the third month of life, in which it reaches half of what will be its adult size.
Therefore, in addition to attending to your physical care during the fourth quarter, It is also important to take care of your emotional well-being, and this will be achieved by keeping it close, seeing him in the eyes and creating an emotional bond with him from day one.
So turn a deaf ear to that famous belief that babies "spoil" and take it in their arms whenever you can, because now more than ever, he needs to feel your warmth and contact, that they will provide you with the security you need during that fourth quarter, in which you are already outside your belly, but still need you.
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