The Five S's

Because Owen was over a week overdue, I was able to attend the infant care class that I had missed a month earlier because I was away on a job interview. A lot of it I was exposed to in the Expectant Dad's class, but there was some new material that they hadn't covered in the Dad's class. The most important by far are the Five S's for soothing a baby:

1. Swaddling
2. Side/Stomach lying
3. Shushing (white noise)
4. Shaking *Gently* or Swaying
5. Sucking

I'm telling you, these S's are magic! I guess it's really no surprise that Sucking is on the list. And I guess to some extent you could say the same thing about Swaddling and white noise, but I would say most people would agree that these alone don't stand a chance against wailing baby. What's truly amazing is how the first four work together. When I was watching the video of this technique in class, I wasn't all that impressed by the Swaddling at first. Often times it just made the crying baby cry all the louder. But as soon as the instructor positioned the baby on its side, there was usually an unmistakable calming effect. This doesn't work unless the baby is sufficiently swaddled. Often times you could just stop right there because baby was no longer crying. But for the babies that had lost their mind, he made this obnoxiously loud, continuous SHHHHHHHH..... right in the baby's ear, and at the same time started to gently jiggle their head side to side (back and forth from the baby's perspective). Once again, magically these babies would stop crying in a short time. Once they start to quiet down, the instructor would back off the volume of the shushing. And for the baby that has passed the point of no return, a pacifier was added (but I'd guess that rarely does a baby get this far).

So anyway, it didn't take long before the opportunity to try out this technique presented itself. Amazingly it worked like a charm on Owen. The first time I tried, he cried more when initially swaddled, and then definitely quieted down when positioned on his side. With the Shushing and Shaking (*GENTLY*) added into the mix I was like Robert Redford in The Horse Whisperer.


After a couple of times you start to wonder if there are any drawbacks to doing the Five S's. But when you think it through, the answer is probably not. For example, will the baby become addicted to this? The answer is maybe, maybe not. If so, how much different is it than a baby who is soothed by a parent holding it and bouncing it around the room, or a baby that's soothed when rocked in a rocker. I guess the real question is will this impair his or her ability to sooth themselves. To my thinking, no more so than any of the more classic methods of soothing a baby. The bottom line is that the baby is being comforted BY YOU when you do this, and he or she comes to understand this. Unfortunately, I don't think that this taught in very many places, but it should be.