When people first find out they’re expecting a baby, besides all the excitement, uncertainty and nervousness, there are naturally a lot of questions! A big one I hear a lot is: “wait, what do babies really need?”. I will try to answer this question in two parts, from my perspective as a Montessori guide who’s been lucky to know a lot of precious newborn babies.
In this piece, I’ll go over the needs of the newborns as a fresh human being, and how we can welcome them as parents and caregivers. In a next piece, I’ll talk about how the different spaces in the home support the newborn’s needs, and give some practical suggestions for items that you can purchase or make in preparation of your baby’s arrival.
Babies are already really awesome and capable at birth, and the things they need from us are truly the simplest but most important of all - understanding, empathy, connection, an enthusiastic welcome into the world of humans, and the invitation to join us in building the shared project of humankind. As they get used to life outside the womb, our job as grown-ups is to bridge the gap and guide their journey. Let’s start from the beginning:
Maria Montessori referred to the newborn baby as
“… this being who, in the birth process, must undergo an adaptation worse than sudden, who literally passes from one existence to another.”
She describes the shift he or she experiences:
“Until this moment, he grew gently in a warm fluid created especially for him, protecting him from any imbalance or any drop in temperature, light and sound … Yet at birth he is ejected from this home to live in the air. Without the least transition, he is pushed from perfect repose to the exhausting world of being born. His body is crushed almost as if he had passed between two millstones, and he comes to us wounded, like a pilgrim who has journeyed from a distant land.”
I find this framing refreshing and important. We often forget to think of the baby’s life before birth, what that environment was like for them, and the intensity of the journey they must make in order to reach us on this side! When they are born everything is new, as if they were an alien arriving on a different planet: gravity and the weight of the body, that once moved effortlessly through liquid and now offers so much resistance, new sensations from touch, temperature changes, breathing, eating, eliminating, all the lights and noises - and if you think about it, the usual scenario that a baby is born into isn’t very soothing for a new person experiencing all of these sensations for the first time, as it can be very busy, bright and noisy, with doctors and nurses moving and testing their bodies before they even have a chance to lay on their mother’s body (this is sometimes necessary and urgent, of course! but not always.).
I find it incredible how newborns can already use their sense of smell and sight + the rooting reflex (turning their heads from side to side with an open mouth when they feel something touching their cheek) + stepping reflex to find their way to the breast and nurse! Skin-to-skin right after birth (in the so-called Golden Hour) is something you can include in your birth plan, even in most hospitals, to allow for this moment of bonding.
All of this is the baby’s job to decode and integrate - a very hard job! But already so early, babies are capable, and ready to tackle these challenges - in utero they are moving around and kicking, sucking their thumbs for comfort, touching their own face… during birth the baby can be an active participant, making their way out of the womb by twisting and turning, in sync with the mother’s body. After birth babies can even find their mother’s breast and promptly start to nurse - so that they have food, warmth and safety from the beginning. Babies are also capable in the sense that they communicate their needs by crying, ensuring our attention and care is available.
In Montessori, we use this term to refer to the first 6 to 8 weeks after birth. I remember the first time my teacher trainer said that symbiosis means “a life together”. This is a period where the baby and mother adjust to their new relationship, where the baby is now outside but still heavily dependent on their mom for survival. It can also be thought of as the beginning of an “external gestation”, and maps well onto what is now referred to as the “fourth trimester”. In fact, Silvana Montanaro (a Montessori 0-3 teacher trainer) described the first months after birth as
“a precious occasion for a second gestation: this time with the mother’s arm as a container and with the mother’s breast as a placenta and umbilical cord. In addition to a very clear biological necessity, there is also an important psychological reason for exterogestation. The human newborn, while still being supported by the mother, is capable of entering into and participating in a wider and richer human environment.”
She is talking about the fact that the human baby is born physically very immature, and gets a chance to “finish” gestating in a social human environment, which provides rich nourishment for the developing person. This social presence, to the newborn, consists of three important forms of contact: holding, handling and feeding. In each of these, the newborn needs us to see them, learn their cues, responses and rhythms, and do things with them instead of to them. We must remember that our baby needs time to take everything in and process it, and we can help them by doing things slowly, talking about what we are doing, pausing, and looking for signs in their faces and bodies.
In the symbiotic period, the newborn baby needs their mother so, so much! For this reason, it’s important that the mother care for herself and her needs, and that the person (or, ideally) people near her also care for her wellbeing - ensuring that she gets rest, nutritious food, and support as she navigates her new role.
