The Perfect Way to Soothe a Crying Baby

Last Updated on October 5, 2024 by Joshua Isibor

Soothing a crying baby is not an easy task especially if you’re new to handling babies. The cry of a baby can frustrate you at some point, this happened to me years ago when I went to see my elder sister.

On a hot afternoon, she decided to visit the groceries to get some foodstuff. As she was going, she left me with her 4-month-old child. Not up to 30 minutes as she had left, the baby started crying. Believe me, the cry lasted for more than an hour. I was just praying for the mother to come and breastfeed her child.

Babies cry for different reasons, in one of our previous articles we talked “about baby cries and their meanings” in that article you’d be able to know the different reasons why a baby cries. It could be that they are hungry, feeling feverish, or having discomfort. Sometimes it’s quite easy to calm them down either by changing diapers or feeding them.
Soothing a baby the hard way is not always nice to do, all you need is patience.

12 ways to soothe a crying baby.

1. Encourage Sucking

This is the process of helping your child find her finger or thumb to suck whenever he/she starts crying. You can also offer your finger for them to suck too; this is also a way to soothe a crying baby. Sucking here doesn’t fill their tummies but it helps to calm their nerves.

Overdoing this has a side effect because many children later find it difficult to stop sucking their thumb. I once had a neighbor who had a 7years old child who sucks her thumb.
One reason why I like this method is that it can be used by anybody at least before the mother comes and breastfeed the child.

Another form of sucking is nutritional sucking; this is by breastfeeding the child. It is one of the commonly used adopted methods to soothe a crying baby. I would say that this method works a lot but not in all cases, which is why you have to read the rest point.

2. Turn up the Tunes

When your child is crying, trying “lullabies” is one of the best options. Look for interesting genres and songs to sing… while singing for your child, it is very important that you put on a smiling face. You don’t have to show an expression as if you were compelled to sing the song. All you need to is smile, you can hold her hands while singing.
Music is life!! Music is something that we can’t stay without!! One beautiful thing about music is that it helps to relax the nervous system.

3. Entertain them

This may look funny to you, you should also know that young babies get bored too. Even as an adult, when you have nothing doing you would say “I’m so bored”. But how can a young baby express this?? Young babies only express most of their feelings through crying.
For you to save them from getting bored, You can entertain them by putting on the TV OR visualizing some actions yourself either by playing with their toys or making silly noise.

4. Carry them while standing

Carrying a child while sitting might not soothe the crying of the baby, but standing up without doing NO 1, 2, and 3.may work perfectly fine. I’ve experienced this on more than 8 occasions. What happened was that While the baby was crying, I stood up and carry the child then the child stopped crying. Immediately I sat down the baby started crying all over.
I don’t really know why babies like it but it works too.

5. Rock in a Chair or Glide

Rocking a baby is one of the sweetest approaches to soothe them when they cry.  When he/she is fussing, you can put them in a motorized baby swing, automatic cradle, or vibrating bouncy.

When using these machines it is very important to take safety seriously. Firstly you need to know how they operate to avoid causing home accidents. Most of the stuff I listed here doesn’t entertain 12kg+.

When rocking your baby with this machine, make sure you don’t leave them alone for a very long time because they may fall asleep and possibly fall out of the baby swing.

6. Play it back

This involves you recording them whenever they cry; it could be audio or video format. Whenever they cry just play it back for them and you’ll see them stop crying because babies love to hear their voice. I can proudly say that I’ve tried it and it worked for me.

7. Turn off the lights

Babies can easily get so tired of the lights of everyday life and noise too. You should know that babies are used to the darkness and quietness they experienced in the womb, so when you block all these stimulations, it can calm them down.

8. Make a laughter track

Sometimes babies the only way at that point is to make them laugh. Here, you don’t need to be a standup comedian or pass through some training to do this. Just do anything you know that can make her laugh

9. Massage

using your hands to run your babies feet.

This is also a powerful ritual you can use to calm your little one’s cries. Here, you can get a special baby massage oil or lotion.
When massaging her you don’t need to be hard while doing that unlike when massaging an adult.

When your child is crying, it’s not a must you get a special baby massage oil, you can use your hands to massage her fists, fingers, rub her palms and also massage the soles of her feet.

10. Get outside

Sometimes the reason why the child might be crying may be that the environment is stuffy so taking the child outside can make her stop crying.
Fresh can work wonders for a fussing child.

11. Give them something to hold

When a child is crying you can try giving that child a toy, phone, pen, book, or something to hold onto. This might reduce the crying.. they may have seen you writing with that pen before but giving them the pen too may stop them from crying.

12. Try the “colic Carry”

Photo source: Flickr

The “colic carry” involve putting pressure on the child’s tummy, this actually helps to relieve colic and gas.
How to do this?
• This is the process where you use your hand to stabilize here and rub her back. This can be done when you lay your child on her tummy and cradling her head in your hand.
• You can also do this by laying her across your lap, raising one knee in her tummy, and also supporting her head.
• Holding her firm, with her abdomen on your shoulder.

ALSO, READ  Familial Factors Affecting Childhood Development and Growth.

Originally posted 2020-12-17 12:28:07.