On-the-go diapering
You’ll be diapering your baby literally thousands of times before potty training. At least you’re getting more skilled at it by now. By the time your career as a change artist comes to a close in about 2½ to 3 years from now, you’ll be able to perform the drill with one hand and a blindfold on. In the meantime, diapering, especially in public places, can present a real challenge. At this age, babies can have real “blowouts” at any time. Explosive poopy diapers don’t always wait for the plane to land or the next clean restroom off the highway, so it pays to be prepared.

• Take along a changing pad. Most diaper bags come with a removable pad that can be unfolded for use wherever you are.

• If you drive with baby, carry a clean-up kit in the trunk. Carry essential baby-diapering supplies in a box in the trunk of your car: at least three disposable diapers; tissues or a roll of toilet paper, paper towels, and a bath towel; a sealed package of wet wipes; a bottle of water; a plastic bag for soiled clothing.

• You’re on the road and there’s no clean bathroom. Put a changing pad (or paper towels, newspaper, or a washable article of clothing) down on the backseat of your car and lay your baby down on it for a quick change.

• Master the art and science of lap diapering. It can come in handy in airplane bathrooms or in other tiny or dirty places. Sit in a chair (or on the toilet seat) and unfold a waterproof pad onto your lap. Place your baby with his head at your knees and his feet at your belly. Now, unstick the tabs on the diaper and unfold just the front. Take a fresh diaper, stretch it open, and slip the new diaper under the soiled one. Now remove the soiled diaper and roll it up, sealing it into a wad using its side tabs. Close up the front of the new diaper. Do not drop the baby.

• Improvise in a diaper emergency. What happens when you run out of diapers, and you’re on the road? Your baby can probably wait if the diaper is only wet, but poop’s another story. If you’re diaperless and far from home or a store that sells diapers, try sticking a maxi-pad to the inside of baby’s clothes. Or, if her clothes are ruined, sit her on paper towels (and remember, carseat covers are washable).

Baby crying

If your baby cries a lot, check to make sure that you’re feeding her on demand instead of trying to impose someone else’s idea of a schedule on her, such as, “Only feed the baby for 20 minutes every 3 hours.” Another reason for your baby’s fussiness could be that her digestive system is still immature, which may be causing her stomach discomfort.

For millions of years, crying has helped to protect babies and keep them alive and well-fed—it’s an important means of communication for a baby. Nature has made crying anxiety-producing to adults so that they will race to fix whatever’s wrong with the baby. But sometimes crying doesn’t help the baby at all; it just exhausts and frustrates her parents.

Picking up the baby may be a simple solution. One experiment with newborns asked half the parents in the study to carry their babies for at least 3 hours a day beyond feeding time. The other half of the parents was instructed to carry their babies as usual. The moms who carried babies averaged 4.4 hours of carrying, while the others spent 2.7 hours (only 1.7 hours difference). The mothers’ diaries at 8 weeks showed that even though both groups of babies had the same number of crying episodes, those who had been carried cried 43 percent less every day.

But, some babies cry no matter how much they’re carried. It’s important to make sure your inconsolable baby gets a thorough checkup to rule out any undetected health issues. There may be an underlying physical problem that’s causing pain or discomfort. More than half of all babies experience reflux in the first months of life. This happens when the lower esophageal sphincter (the “stopper” that holds down food in the stomach) is relaxed, causing the baby to spit up. For some babies, the problem can be severe and cause them to cry more than usual. Other fussy babies may have lactose intolerance; difficulty digesting certain milk components; or they could have constipation; an inner-ear infection, or a hernia.

Crying across cultures
In Western cultures, people believe that crying is “normal” for a baby, and we’re used to seeing babies and young children having meltdowns in public. You may be surprised to learn that babies in non-Western countries seldom cry.

Our babies cry more frequently and for longer periods each day than babies in non-Western societies, in which infants spend most of their time in states of quiet alert with few episodes of intense crying. In some countries there’s not even a word for “colic.”

These differences in crying may have something to do with cultural differences in parent-baby closeness. American parents don’t always respond very quickly to their babies, and studies show that American babies spend about 67 percent of their time alone, in comparison to Korean babies, for example, who spend only about 8.3 percent of their time alone.

Meanwhile, in the daytime, a peaceful, calm, and predictable environment works best to keep your baby quiet. Babies, like adults, need times during the day when they can zone out, even though they’re awake to assimilate things and make their own discoveries. Stop and ask what your baby’s face, head, arms, shoulders, and body are trying to tell you before you swoop in to jiggle, talk, and distract her.

SCENARIO: Your neighbor says her baby just adores the way his mobile spins and makes music. Your baby has the same mobile, but when you turn it on for her, she becomes tense, her skin changes color, and she starts fussing. You wonder if something’s wrong with your baby, but you notice that when the mobile is still and silent, she gazes calmly at it. You let her simply watch it for a few days, and then you gradually move the mobile a little with your hand. A day or two later, you turn it on again, and she seems no longer to be upset by it. You’ve both learned something.