“The first time my son stared into mine, I felt like he wanted to tell me everything he had been through since he was conceived. Her little face was focused, her gaze deep, I was hypnotized, totally receptive, it was magic! Marion is not the only mother to be overwhelmed by the intensity of the gaze and the facial expressions of her newborn baby, who seeks to get in touch with her as soon as he comes into the world. This is also what the child psychiatrist Daniel Rousseau, who has been working for more than twenty years in a nursery in Angers, noted: “Children absolutely need to communicate from the first day of their life. Far from being inactive, infants are real Wi-Fi, that is to say high performance wireless communication systems, which actively scan in their environment the best affective terminals, the most stable and benevolent, to come. connect to it. Like little marsupials, they seek to exchange, to attract attention, to exist and to lodge in the brains of adults! This innate ability of babies to communicate takes a lot of effort. They are always very active, and strive to build the positive and reassuring emotional relationships that are forged with their parents, because it is eminently vital for them.
Communication through the gaze
How do babies connect to us? What tools do they have at their disposal to relate to adults? First the Regard. They immediately plunge their eyes into ours, seek contact and capture our attention with extreme competence. The second tool for immediate connection is their bodies, which they know how to adapt to the body of the adult who wears them. If a baby feels good with a person, he manifests his well-being and his desire to communicate by abandoning himself, he snuggles, comes to curl up, hang on, stick to the body that carries him. Conversely, if he is not in tune with the adult who takes care of him, he squirms, stiffens, contracts, it is difficult to carry him … After looking at him and abandoning him of the body, listening is the mode of communication that the baby puts in place from the first weeks. Infants are very sensitive to the human voice, they love to hear talk, they love the lullabies their mom sings to them. As soon as we address them, they turn their heads, attentive, intrigued, astonished, surprised … And of course, the baby responds to requests, in his own way, by his facial expressions, his movements, his body attitude and his smiles. . The appropriate facial expressions, the smiles addressed, the significant facial expressions appear in effect from one month.
Babies need words and attention
What do these Wi-Fi babies expect from us once they connect to us? That we meet their needs and their requests in an adapted way, quite simply. When we enter into communication, it’s good to have feedback from our interlocutor, and toddlers are no exception to the rule. A baby expresses everything he feels, his emotions, his feelings, his hunger, his thirst, his sensations, his minor inconveniences, his emotional state, his colic, his fears …
And when he expresses his feelings, he expects us to recognize him, to welcome him and to tell him something about it.
Meet the needs of your baby
It is not enough to observe your baby and comment on his “exploits” by exclaiming “He smiled! He stuck his tongue out at me! “You have to address him directly:” You smile at me! What a beautiful smile you give me! It makes me happy, you are so charming when you smile! You are happy ? “Or if he makes a face:” You have a stomach ache, you’re hungry, you wonder what that noise is? It’s the neighbor’s dog barking, or a passing fire truck, don’t worry. The more we respond to his gaze, his gestures, his smiles, his facial expressions, the more we listen to him, the more we send him feedback on what we perceive of him, and the more he enriches his repertoire. Apart from acknowledging receipt of his messages, a baby also absolutely needs to be met as accurately as possible, without making it wait too long. His physiological needs of course, but also emotional. To be the object of constant attention, to be encouraged, reassured, stimulated, cuddled, caressed, kissed, rocked, listened to … Finally, it is quite simple to be good parents, you just need to talk to your child about this. what he feels and what he lives, to suggest words that contain him, to tell him about the world from the first moment.