Priceless information for your first week as a new parent

After giving birth, your baby has to adapt very quickly to the world outside the womb. How does she do that?

Heart
During birth, your baby's heart rate drops from 140 to 120 beats per minute. After delivery, your child will have an increased heart rate again, because she does not feel very comfortable shortly after birth. After about half an hour, she relaxes and her heart rate drops again.

Temperature
Your baby was in a kind of tropical swimming paradise in the womb. once out of the amniotic fluid, it cools down quickly. Just like after swimming, the rule is: dry thoroughly. Your baby cannot keep her body at the right temperature yet. Not even when she's on her stomach. It is best to keep her warm with a cloth and hat.

Head
If your baby is just born, her head will often have an elongated shape due to the pushing. Usually there is also a fluid retention. It will have shrunk after a few hours and disappear after a few days. If your child has been collected with a vacuum pump or forceps, her scalp may be slightly sore or damaged. She can also have a serious headache from this.

Muscles
Because your baby is stressed right after birth, her body is tense. Her muscles relax again when she gets used to it, after about an hour. Usually only then does she fall asleep to recover.

Your baby sleeps a lot. Up to eighteen hours a day. She divides those hours into short naps of about three hours, after which she wants to drink again. And when she has enough, she indicates this herself: she squeezes the nipple or teat out of her mouth and turns her head away. In this first month, your baby can gain as much as a kilogram.

Your baby squeezes her hands together like fists, only when she is startled do they open every now and then. This means she is still withdrawn, which is normal for the first month.
Research shows that a baby can recognize its mother's scent from up to 20 mothers. Your voice is also familiar, because of course she has heard it from the stomach for months. How do you know for sure that your baby can hear properly? Shortly after birth, she will receive a hearing test.
Babies can see colors, but see much less than you. Especially if they have just been born. In the beginning, they especially find large color contrasts interesting. They now only see real sharp at a distance of twenty to thirty centimeters (7.87 to 11.81 inches).

You cannot really play with your newborn baby and she is not ready for a box full of toys. Too many stimuli. For now for her it's enough to study your face and she is a fan of skin-to-skin contact.
What she also loves: a music box or mobile with clear shapes and contrasting colors. Loud noises startle your baby, but that doesn't mean she can't get used to everyday noises such as the vacuum cleaner or a slamming door. It is not necessary to sneak around the house while she is sleeping; when she was still in your womb it wasn't quiet around her either. How about just the beating of your heart, that's like a 24/7 drum concert for a baby!

*the use of the word “her” also refers to “him” in the text of the entire website. This choice is made for readability