When we are expecting a child, we hear information from all directions that can sometimes contradict each other, and the same is true for the subject of babywearing. As parents-to-be and new parents, it can be stressful. Carrying your child skin to skin, carrying your baby in a wrap or in a baby carrier while going about your business because your hands are free, carrying in a vertical position, horizontal position, 2 hours a day, 15 hours a day..
Keren, the co-creator of the brand Love Radius, expert in physiological babywearing, shares her thoughts on the subject in a video: why babywear? If you prefer reading, the video has been transcribed below. The text will be divided into several parts to facilitate your understanding.
" Hello, I am Keren, the co-creator of the brand "Love Radius", "Je porte mon bébé" and the training center "l'école à porter" where I have been supporting parents, parents-to-be and healthcare professionals since 2006 in the practice of babywearing.
So today this won't necessarily be a tutorial video in which I show you or explain to you how to do things. Here, we'll be on a different level, which is in the "being" and in what we are when facing babywearing or this novelty called babywearing.
So you see, we are not all equal when it comes to novelty. We could sometimes describe it as difficult, because it is unknown. It is part of something that destabilizes us, sometimes surprises us. And since we are not all equipped — we are never equipped to face novelty — we can approach it head-on with a great deal of hesitation.
Just like me, right here, right now. This is the first time I've spoken like this in a live session, in front of people I can't see but who I know are very much present. I feel awkward, embarrassed, moved, and it's not always a very pleasant sensation. I could describe this novelty as difficult, hard to bear, and I would ask myself: why? Why do I have to do this? Particularly in relation to babywearing, or young parents who want to carry their baby and have choices to make: which positions, which tool? To face this novelty, there are decisions to be made.
So, I wanted to offer you 5 strategies for approaching novelty in the face of learning, and to actually suggest things that work for me, that have worked for us as young parents too, and that I see working for other parents when I meet them at workshops.
Remember your forgetting
So, the first thing we could put in place to develop this approach in the face of novelty linked to learning, first I would say: Remember your forgetting. So what does that mean? Remember the first time you assembled a piece of furniture with a square. That can be very complicated even the tenth time. Or another example: remember the first tenancy agreement you had to read, or a contract your bank manager gave you before opening a savings account. Or simply the first time you tied your shoelaces.
So I try to remember that first time and I don't really remember it, actually. Because today, when I tie my shoelaces, it's easy for me. I don't remember those difficulties. Perhaps sometimes it takes a child, who comes along, and who reminds me, when I see them facing their difficulty, their frustration, their tears, their frustration, and even my own frustration, to remind me just how difficult it was before. And precisely, since it no longer is for me, I can help them, I can say "you'll get there, you'll see, you practice and then it will come". Why? Because it was difficult and now it isn't anymore.
This forgetting shows us how ultimately fascinating it is that the body and the heart remember what is useful to them in order to keep progressing and moving forward. We no longer remember our earliest difficulties.
Being a parent, the art of imitation
Another way to approach this novelty, which can sometimes be difficult when it is linked to learning, is actually to remember that being a parent is ultimately the art of imitation. Now, among my close circle, I don't always have a source of inspiration and I don't necessarily want to imitate my mother, my mother-in-law, or my sister. It's sad to say but that's sometimes how it is.
So I need to find, to recharge, to invite into my life people, even from afar, who inspire me. Whose way of doing things with their children I admire, or dads who act in an interesting way with their children. To be able to read, to draw inspiration from the works of authors such as "Donald Winnicott", "Daniel Stern", "Maria Montessori" and many others whose names I could mention (I will add links to them).
So, to cultivate ourselves, to ultimately elevate ourselves, to educate ourselves, in order to become the parents we wish to be.
Learning to understand
The third point is that learning, studying, will help me understand. And I want to try to break down this word called "understand". I am a foreigner and so one of the books I love most are dictionaries in which all the words come to sleep: it is the hotel of words. When we look at the word "understand", we see that in its etymology, it means "to grasp with intelligence", embraced by thought, something that will give me additional keys to be able to interpret the baby with their language which is not verbal but pre-verbal.
And even if I haven't understood everything...
And even ultimately, if I haven't understood everything, haven't read all the books, or haven't found the right people around me or those who inspire me, and I'm standing here in front of my baby right here right now. I need to change the diaper, I need to give the first bath and I am completely destabilized, moved, stressed, I feel useless, I feel slow, I feel completely thrown by this experience in which I feel like I have no control over anything. Besides, the baby tells me so explicitly, with their crying, with the way they express themselves "no no actually you're not doing it right at all".
And yet I stay, and I carry on, and I continue. Why? Because I have to, because that is actually my function, because ultimately, that is what being a parent is. You stay there, despite the fact that it's not immediately rewarding right here right now, this unique experience. Because that is what being a parent is.
The first function is to protect. You are there, your instincts tell you that there is someone who needs you, who is weaker, who needs assistance, help in order to move forward, to progress, and you are there to protect them despite the fact that it is difficult for you.
Momentum and first babywearing attempts
And precisely, the fifth point is more related to time, to timing, to the occasion. This means that if I've really done everything, I've read everything, I've researched, I agree, I've watched all the tutorial videos, I've read the instructions, I've even gone to see a babywearing consultant, I've educated myself on the idea of babywearing, on how to do it, I've even practiced with a stuffed animal, and so I come, I pick up my baby and I tell him "come on, let's go, let's try" and then, it doesn't work. He doesn't agree, he gets upset, he wriggles all over the place. For me it's an incredibly exhausting experience, my heart is racing at 200 beats per minute.
No, precisely. It is up to me, as an adult, to know and understand that if it's not right now this moment, it will be right after. It didn't work this time, the baby wasn't available, wasn't in the right mood, but there will be another moment, after. It is me as an adult who must manage to understand that there is a temporality, "that there is now and that there will be a moment after" and that the moment after may be the right moment.
There we go, I hope this time has been beneficial. In any case, for me, this first experience was not easy at all and I am glad to have overcome these difficulties with courage, because being courageous does not mean never being afraid. Being courageous means being afraid and going ahead anyway.
Thank you for listening to me!
See you soon."
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