Baby carrying offers many benefits including bonding, stimulation for the child and flexibility for the parent, writes Sylvia Thompson
In the United States, they call it baby-wearing. In Britain, it's called baby-carrying. Whether in a pouch, a shoulder sling or a more traditional wrap around cloth baby carrier, carrying babies has become fashionable again for all the right reasons.
Claire Scott, the mother of two children, aged eight and six, describes herself as "evangelical" about the benefits of carrying your baby with you as much as possible during the day.
She says, "on an emotional level, I found baby carrying relieved the stress of early parenting. Babies love to be held. They thrive on the closeness of being near another person.
"They are comforted by the heartbeat and naturally rocked by the motion of the body. Also because your baby can eat, sleep and be entertained in a sling, the baby fits around your life, not you around hers as is so often the case."
Scott says that unfortunately parents are seduced by much of the baby equipment on the market nowadays. And more worrying, many babies spend a lot of time in car seats, which are then removed and clicked into stylish buggies without the baby being touched at all. One study even suggested that many babies are suffering from a mild form of sensory deprivation because of the excessive use of car seats and prams.
"Four out of five mothers in Britain use a pushchair to transport their babies, rather than carrying them in a sling. The baby equipment market is one of the biggest in the world and parents don't need most of it. All they need is a good sling and emotional support," says Scott.
International breastfeeding support groups such as La Leche League have been long-term advocates of carrying babies in slings. Studies have found that having your baby close to you stimulates higher levels of prolactin which in turn increases milk production.
Jenny Uí Shé, an osteopath from Gorey, Co Wexford starting using a sling with her son Aaron (four months) within a few days of his birth.
"It makes parenting easier. You can nurture the baby and continue with your own activities as well," she says.
In terms of the physical health of the wearer, Uí Shé suggests slings with wide shoulder straps and good support for the lower back are preferable to slings with tiny straps which can cause shoulder pain.
Meanwhile, Scott has taken her personal zeal for baby carrying one step further and now sells cloth slings which can be used for babies from birth to over a year. Her website (www.closeparent.com) gives details of five different carrying positions for newborn babies, babies four months and older and babies from 12 months.
Generally speaking, babies need to be carried facing inwards until they are about four months. From then on, they can be carried facing outwards. Crucially, babies can of course be carried by mums, dads, grandparents, aunts and uncles, extending the care and support system for new mothers.
Scott is also working on a documentary on the benefits of baby carrying incorporated with the so called Continuum Concept, to be broadcast on Channel Four in the autumn. In the documentary, she visits two families every week or so from before their babies are born until the babies are about six months old, giving tips and advice on parenting following the Continuum Concept.
The Continuum Concept was developed in the 1980s by Jean Liedloff, following extended periods of observations of parenting among Indian tribes in South America. Liedloff argues that babies "should not be put down at all" and by focusing on managing this physical distance between babies and parents (how long should they sleep for, how long should they play for etc), we are setting up an unnecessary adversarial relationship with our babies.
"I saw the relaxed and happy people in the forests of South America lugging around their babies and never putting them down . ..
"The baby passively participates in the bearers running, walking, laughing, talking, working and playing . . . these activities of community life form a basis for the active participation that will begin at six or eight months with creeping, crawling and then walking," she says.
"A baby who has spent this time lying in a quiet crib or looking at the inside of a carriage will have missed most of this essential experience."
Paradoxically, Liedloff says the crucial difference between the Yequana tribe's approach to child rearing is that they are not child centred. Once children have gone beyond the baby-carrying phase, she says it's even more crucial that we aren't child centred.
"It appears that many parents of toddlers, in their anxiety to be neither negligent nor disrespectful, have gone overboard in being centred upon their children instead of being occupied by adult activities that the children can watch, follow, imitate and assist in as is their natural tendency."
• See also www.continuum-concept.org and www.llli.org/FAQ/babywearing. In Ireland, slings can be bought from www.happybabysling.com