Under construction: tid bits about the baby brain!

Your baby is busy doing A LOT of work! Let yourself be amazed!

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  • A healthy baby is born with 100 billion neurons. That's almost double the amount adults have. These neurons are packed into a brain about half the size of an adults.

  • Your baby's brain is the fastest growing body part from birth to age three.

  • A newborn's brain is a third the size of an adults brain. It doubles in volume about 90 days from birth.

  • A baby uses 60% of its energy growing their brain. Adults use 25%.  

  • Roughly 700 new brain connections (synapses) occur every second as baby relates to the world around them. 

  • Nurturing touch strengthens neural connections (synapses) in the brain. i.e. it builds strong, healthy brains.

  • When your baby won't let go of you...and wants only you...part of the reason why is they are developing their long term memory during this stage of development. 

  • Nurturing connection impacts brain development during baby's first three years which positively impacts their life-long skills of problem solving, communicating, self-regulation and building relationships. 


Info from Mental Floss and Zero to Three: Early Connections Last a Lifetime


Developmental Movements

In postnatal yoga class (and my other therapeutic yoga and somatic movement classes), I sometimes explore reflex patterns and developmental movement. It provides adults and parents the opportunity to re-learn movements we practiced as babies which enabled us to lift our head, arch our back, roll, sit, stand, walk....and integrate primal survival reflexes.

If you're curious to see these movements in action in a baby body (and some variations) - check out this video.

Better yet, get on the floor with you babe (belly down, on the same level as them) and watch them "grow" their brain through their movement! Try doing some of what they are doing. Yes! If you practice moving in this way again, it will "grow" your brain too!

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Movement to feel more human