Infant Massage: The Loving Touch

by Miriam Galilee, Massage Therapist and Instructor

Before your baby was born you expected a smooth delivery, a healthy baby, and an easy move into your new job as a parent.

But your baby has been born prematurely or with medical problems. Or maybe mental or physical disabilities appeared later. Suddenly a host of professionals are a part of your life.

The doctors, nurses, therapists, teachers, social workers and others all have important roles in the care of your baby, but you may feel left out – without a role of your own. You may be overwhelmed with appointments, directions and guidelines as to how to touch, feed, hold, position and exercise your baby. It’s easy to feel lost, confused and helpless.

WHAT CAN I DO?

One of the professionals caring for your child may suggest that you learn to massage your baby. Infant massage is a powerful way for you to create and build a deep, healing, loving relationship with your baby under difficult circumstances.

WHAT IS INFANT MASSAGE?

Infant massage is a system of touching and stroking your baby in a way that expresses love, support and protection. It is a unique and specific way to create and strengthen a special closeness and awareness between parents and baby.

To survive, we need touching as much as we do food. Humans can go through life blind, deaf and completely lacking the senses of taste and smell – but survival is not possible without touch.

Infant massage is a therapeutic and effective tool to promote your baby’s health and wellbeing. It will establish you as an important member of the team of caretakers, and it will make you and your baby feel wonderful.

WHAT ARE THE EMOTIONAL BENEFITS OF INFANT MASSAGE?

Massage helps you to welcome your new baby into the family. Your touch can tell your baby how life can be pleasurable, painless, and relaxing. It shows acceptance, tolerance, and love, and it can help create a sense of security, reassurance, and safety for your baby.

BONDING is perhaps the most profound and powerful of all human contacts. This first tie between you and your infant will help shape the way your child relates to the world throughout life. Don’t worry if an early hospital stay separated you from your infant – bonding is an ongoing process, so it is never too late to bond with your infant. Some of the elements that create bonding are:

EYE TO EYE CONTACT: The eyes are fascinating, compelling, and stimulating. Evidence suggests that a baby’s vision starts working when the baby first sees the “bull’s-eye” shape of the mother’s eye and nipple. Some parents say they first felt a “belonging” with their baby when they gazed into each other’s eyes for the first time. Keep steady eye contact when you massage your baby.

TOUCH: There seems to be a specific touch behaviour when parents meet their newborn. They lightly massage, stroke, and touch with their fingertips.

VOICE: Parents typically use a high-pitched tone when speaking to their newborn, which works well with baby’s sensitive hearing.

There is a strong link between your speech and your baby’s physical response. When your baby moves to your voice, you are encouraged to communicate more. As you talk, sing and coo to your baby during massage, the two of you are bonding.

ODOR: Mother and infant can recognize each other by odour. The close contact of massage makes that link stronger.

HEAT: The mother’s body provides the exact temperature that the unborn baby needs for warmth and comfort. After birth, your warm touch helps create the closeness of bonding.

WHAT ARE THE PHYSICAL BENEFITS OF INFANT MASSAGE?

Infant massage affects all systems of the body.

• Increases cardiac (heart) output
• Makes digestion an breathing more efficient
• Increases circulation and speeds up the development of the nervous system
• Increases weight gain and creates a deeper, better sleep
• Relieves stress, gas and colic
• Increases body awareness for both parent and infant, and shows parents how much relaxation, stimulation, pain and pleasure the baby can endure.

MY CHILD HAS SPECIAL NEEDS. CAN INFANT MASSAGE HELP?

Yes! Before birth, your baby is tuned in to the mother’s rhythms and routines – her sleep-wake cycle, the rhythm of her walking, the beat of her heart, her breathing, and her daily routine. After an ordinary birth, you can help your baby set an “internal rhythm” by following a steady routine in the early days.

But a hospital stay may be necessary if your baby is born prematurely or with a disability. Most hospitals give excellent medical care, but there is often little regard for the baby’s need to establish an internal rhythm. Often, the lights are always on and the nursery is noisy. Under these trying circumstances, your baby may decide that:

Because infant massage is a routine – rhythmically repeated, done softly, painlessly, and lovingly – it helps your baby establish a sense of order, balance, calmness, and trust. Your baby learns that:

For more information:

This non-profit organization offers parent training in many US cities. Write or call for more information.

These books are also good resources for parents:

EFFECTS OF INFANT MASSAGE

1. Helps caregivers connect and bond with their babies.
2. Helps relieve babies of stress/calms them down.
3. Helps regulate gastro-intestinal tract.
4. Helps resolve birth trauma.
5. Helps parents connect with their babies at the end of a work day – can help compensate for their absence, decrease the discomfort of the parents at having to leave their child, helps parents relax.
6. Improves immune system response – in “Touching” it states that touch can double the baby’s antibody count.
7. Increases circulation and oxygenation of the bloodstream, and decreases toxicity.
8. Helps strengthen the constitution of the baby.
9. May increase their sleep length time.
10. Helps development and tone of organs (sends “Chi” to organs).
11. Contributes to balance in the midline.
12. Facilitates peripheral nervous system dev elopement.
13. Increases body awareness, and body self-esteem in child.
14. Increases nerve stimulation – increases myelination around the nerve sheath.

BASIC MASSAGE TECHNIQUES

1. Stroking and Touch Release
   1. A light stroking of fingers down body part (eg. arms, legs etc.) from top to bottom
   2. Visualize the tension being drawn out by your hands
   3. Use verbal cues “let the tension go, Relax, give me the tension” etc.
   4. Shake hands periodically to keep them loose and relaxed.
2. Pause briefly at joints (elbows, knees and shoulders) and extremities with a gentle moulding of your hand around the joint.
3. Swimming Stroke
   1. Firmly and slowly.
   2. An be used on shoulders, back, lower back, buttocks and down legs.
4. Counter Pressure
   1. Usually in the small of the back or buttocks
5. Figure Eight
   1. In the small of the back for back labour
6. Harp
   1. 2 fingers gently down either side of the spine
7. Two Fingers
   1. Pressure at each vertebrae on either side of the spine
8. Strokes
   1. From forehead down over head, back, right to the tip of the coccyx
   2. Cross over, down and off starting at the shoulders
9. Pressure
   1. An occipital points at the base of the skull
10. Lower Pressure
    1. Just under ischial spines at buttocks
    2. Push up and in then release
11. Hand Massage
    1. Firm folding pressure on thumbs and finger tips
12. Foot Massage
    1. Firm folding, pressure on toes
    2. Cradle feet under ankles and hold
    3. A good time to breathe with a labouring woman
    Remember: hands placed at varying positions up the back aids in centering the level of breathing being used.

Strokes for the Legs and Feet

Squeeze Each Toe

Walking

Stroking Top of Foot

Swedish Milking

Touch Relaxation

Strokes for the Arms and Hands

These strokes are similar to those for the legs and feet. Your baby receives the benefits of increased circulation and warmth for his arms and hands as well as a release of tension.

Begin with Touch Relaxation to let your baby know you would like to massage his arms and hands.

Never forcibly pull your baby’s arms away from his body to do a stroke, but gently stroke his arm allowing him to relax and gradually extend his arm to you. Continue to use Touch Relaxation throughout the massage to encourage your baby to let go and relax his arm.

Indian Milking

Squeeze and Twist

Open Hand

Strokes for the Stomach

I love you

Strokes for the Back

Back and Forth

Swooping to Bottom

Swooping to Ankles

Small Circles All Over Back

Combing

Strokes for the Face

Stroke Down Sides of Nose

Smile on upper and Lower Lips

Small Circles Around Jaw

Over Ears and Under Chin