I saw a reel on how african doctors will slap the baby for them to cry and i know for a fact that this is true and there must be a reason behind it but i just don’t get it
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A good cry is part of the assessment of a baby’s health immediately after birth (APGAR score). Activity (moving arms/legs); Pulse; Grimace (response to stimulus) Appearance (color-is the baby pink or blue) Respiration (good cry=good airway)
surfactant should be produced naturally before birth in the baby’s lungs, reducing surface tension of fluid in the lungs and allowing the baby to breath air.
Sometimes, particularly with premature babies, insufficient surfactant is produced and the baby may need to be intubated .
This is a principal concern during childbirth, hearing a cry confirms this is all ok.
All birth attendants (midwives, doctors, paediatricians, nurses) are trained in neonatal resuscitation, one of the first steps of resuscitation is stimulating the baby. Rubbing and drying the baby. This stimulation often helps a stunned baby cry and gets them breathing and happy.
To the parents or people who haven’t attended a birth before this can look aggressive or even rough. But I assure parents that a firm rub with a soft towel is not nearly as rough as their baby being squeezed between and under the pelvic bone minutes prior.
And It definitely isn’t harder than in dry my toddler after bath time either.
Edit-spelling
To see if they’re alive.
To make them breath on their own.
To clean possible mucus or clogs on/in their mouth and/or nose.
AYA5? Holy cow. My 1st instinct was to do a little trash talking about your lack of basic knowledge on the reproduction process. But then I realized I’m old with kids. I’ll allow the question with no judgment if you’re under 20 yrs old.
Universally, I recommend searching for documentaries on baby development in the womb. The new imaging technology lets you literally watch a baby develop and the newest science is mind-blowing. Sober, drunk, stoned, alone, with a friend, Mormon, atheist… as long as you’re not a Democrat you’ll realize what they mean when they say “the miracle of life”.
Zing. But seriously… babies are miracles. (TODDLERS ARE ASSHOLES)
My son got stuck and help was called, they were kneading my stomach like you would bread to try and help him out. Anyway, when he finally came out he was purple, rushed into and incubator and given oxygen. They wanted him to cry to open his airways and make sure he could breathe on his own.
You know when you get new paper bag, you’ll wave it in the air to fluff it up to it’s intended size, before putting things inside. Newborn baby lungs are sorta like that. They gotta take a deep breath to fluff up an unused lung and crying does that. Also, such stretching is said to be painful, so more crying and more stretching, more breathing and more oxygen. lungs of stillborn babies sink cause they aren’t fluffed up.
Story time: I wasn’t breathing when I was born because my lungs were filled with meconium (don’t look this up unless you have a strong stomach). I wasn’t crying. So the doctor had to suction out the meconium, and boom, baby me started screaming like I was supposed to.
My son didn’t cry straight away. He looked around, coughed a little, then I felt him take his first breath and he cried. I still can remember how that feels, I could feel his lungs contract beneath my hands
It is a sign that they’re healthy. Screaming/crying etc helps them clear their system of fluids from being born.
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