In Babies and more We always talk to you about how important it is to give love to children, to spend time with them, to hug them, kiss them, take them in their arms, to give them massages, to spend time with them, to enjoy that contact, caresses, hugs, that they feel loved, content, satiated by human warmth. The touch makes the affection and the children, the babies, need that rubbing, that contact, that affection.
Why do I say this? Because we have known for a long time that skin-to-skin contact is very beneficial for newborn babies, both premature babies and those born at term. And if not, ask this baby we are talking about today. They gave him up for dead at birth, his parents hugged him to say goodbye and what nobody expected happened: he woke up.
It is the story of Kate and David Ogg, a couple who were trying to be parents for 3 years when one day, unexpectedly, they knew they would be parents of twins. They had been pregnant for 26 weeks when there were complications and they informed him that they would give birth to the babies. They still did not know what the sex of the babies was and, at birth, the emotion was immense when they learned that one was a boy and the other girl.
However, the joy disappeared quickly. Silence invaded the delivery room and the doctor asked the couple if they had already chosen a name for the child. "Jamie," said the mother. Then the doctor gave them the bad news. Jamie had not survived childbirth. It showed no signs of life.
Kate, in tears, took the baby in her arms and put it on her chest. David, the dad, accompanied them in that hard time.
I felt it cold, I felt it inert, and felt the need to do something. Kate asked her husband to she will take off her clothes and lie next to her. He needed his heat and he needed the baby to get as much heat as possible. There he had it, close to the heart, with his ear attached to his chest so he could feel every beat, hugging him and being hugged by David as well. He started talking to her, explained that she had a little sister named Emily, and told her to be calm, because she was going to be fine, but she asked him that wherever she was, she would help them take care of her.
They had a good time with him, while they kept talking to him and explaining who they were, who was the family that was waiting for him so much, what plans they had for him. They were saying goodbye. They gave him all his warmth so that he had a goodbye full of love. Suddenly, they began to notice that it moved, it breathed and they called the midwives, who came and said no, that they were just reflexes, that "he was already dying" and that they had to "say goodbye." But it is very difficult to say goodbye to your baby, when you have hardly arrived or say hello, so almost as a defense, refusing to accept reality, they hugged him harder. It was at that moment when what happened accelerated the events. Jamie opened his eyes and took his father's finger with his tiny hand.
The warmth of his parents, the affection of that moment, the refusal to let him go, the contact, the firmness of that hug. All this made Jamie decide to fight and not let go. He returned to the world that had just seen him be born and he did it to stay.
The parents explain, since then, that when they returned home they could not stop touching them, of being with them, of having them skin to skin, because they were clear that it was what had saved Jamie's life.
Now the two children have grown up and even have a little brother. His father hugs them every day and sometimes he even feels that he hugs them too hard, but he does so because he often comes up with the memory of how close he was to not having Jamie.
Is there any doubt about how important are arms and hugs for children? Are there still those who tell recent parents that they should not hold their babies?
