When a baby appears in the family, one of the issues that concern young parents will be whether and how to give water to the newborn - how, when, what?
Mom immediately begins to worry, is it really necessary to finish babies, and what is fraught with a decision "for" or "against."
As a rule, the opinions of grandmothers and pediatricians are diametrically opposed, therefore, when deciding whether the baby needs water, we will be guided by the type of feeding it.
Ministry of Health warns!
It is very difficult to unequivocally answer the questions - how to give water to a newborn, when to give water to a newborn, what water to give to a newborn. Almost 30 years ago, the World Health Organization adopted a document outlining what the rules for good breastfeeding should be. One of these rules convinced that no other food should be offered to newborns - only mother's milk. A separate list is made up of those options that are due to health indicators. According to WHO rules, a baby is considered to be a newborn in the first four weeks of life. The Ministry of Health is not recommended to give the baby water to drink before he turns six months old: until he begins to eat complementary foods.
Important arguments
Of course, parents will not immediately understand if the kids need water or not. And in order to understand how to give water to newborns, when to give water to newborns, what water to give to newborns, it is necessary to understand what the consequences of dosing of a baby will be. The main argument of WHO is that the work of organisms of both the baby and the mother can be disrupted.
Dysbiosis may develop. The first six months of a small child’s life, his intestines are sterile. Using his mother’s milk, he is inoculated with beneficial microflora. It is thanks to the milk in the digestive system of the infant that the correct balance of bacteria will be constantly. If you crush the crumbs with enviable constancy with water, along with breastfeeding, this will upset the balance of microflora and lead to the onset of dysbiosis. Studying the WHO studies, you can find out that children who drank exclusively their mother’s milk for six months were much less likely to have gastrointestinal upset. Water at an early age represents an extra burden on children's kidneys, which are formed after the baby is born - until his three-month age. If you drink it, the kidneys will be too loaded. They will have an additional burden, because their main task is the obligation to remove excess salts from the baby's body. In the mother’s milk, there are not enough salts, so they do not need to be removed.
The kid may be malnourished. So nature arranged that the ventricle of a recently born child is able to process food for a single intake, equal to the volume of a sixth of the weight of the baby. The baby has certain characteristics of the nervous system, so the incoming water will cause a deceptive feeling that he was full. In addition, the baby will not receive mother’s milk, which he vitally needs in order for him to fully develop.
The volume of milk produced is gradually decreasing. It is known that the sucking of the mother’s breast is an excellent stimulus that stimulates the production of milk in it. And when the baby is offered water, he will naturally suck out less milk. Do not bring your baby water at night. Natural nightly feeding will increase the amount of prolactin, a hormone that promotes milk production during daylight hours. It turns out that when a small child clings to his mother’s chest at night, he thereby provides himself with the right amount of milk the next day.
The baby may refuse to breast. Usually mothers prefer to give bottle water to their babies. It is well known that liquid from such a container comes much faster and lighter than milk from my mother’s breast. The baby needs to try to suck his mother’s breast, extracting tasty and healthy milk from it. If the baby is “lazy” or weak, he may not want to take the breast at all, choosing a bottle.
Does a newborn need water?
Those who consider themselves to be opponents of WHO claim that the baby needs water from the very beginning of his life. True, the evidence of those who agree with this stand up to criticism with great difficulty.
Milk is exclusively food. And thirst can be quenched with water. Here it is necessary to remember that according to the consistency and qualitative composition of mother's milk, it is customary to divide into "front" and "back". The "front" can just give an opportunity to get drunk baby, because it consists of water as much as ninety percent.
There is a chance of dehydration. In adults, the water balance is restored by water, in which salts are added. A newly born baby is no exception to the general rule. Mom’s milk for him will be a great option for replacing saline: it contains the optimal composition of salts and minerals for the toddler.
When the baby is sick, water can remove all viruses from the body, and besides, it is convenient to dissolve drugs in it. Mommy’s milk is also just wonderful to cope with all these functions. The medicine that was dissolved in it will be absorbed by the baby much faster, and it will be drunk by him more willingly.
Water is needed if there is heat or the air is dry. It would seem, indeed, the way it is. After all, we are all accustomed to drinking water on hot summer days. But no! It turns out that breast milk can quench the thirst of the baby in full. It already contains the required amount of liquid, because this milk consists of 85-90% water. With increasing ambient temperature, it will become more and more watery. The baby almost does not feel the difference between when he wants to eat or drink, because the centers that are responsible for such sensations are located in the center not far from each other. So that a recently born baby can get drunk, you can simply attach it to your mother’s chest.
A bottle of water can calm a baby. For this case, in which the process of sucking becomes the main one, there is its own alternative - the nipple, mother's thumb (naturally, clean).
Water can eliminate infant jaundice. Bilirubin, due to which jaundice begins, is able to dissolve precisely in fat, and not in water. From this we can conclude that it is with mother’s milk containing the best fat composition for the baby that it will be better and easier to be excreted from the child’s body.
Water for babies
Doctors are sure that when the baby is breastfed - mother's milk, then at the beginning of his life he does not need water. And it's all about mom's milk. 9/10 of it is water, and everything else is vitamins, fats, carbohydrates and proteins. Just that there is a significant amount of water in the milk, and the baby is enough to get drunk.
Doctors believe that water is acceptable only in cases where a young child has fever or diarrhea. You can add some water with dill or fennel to the baby’s diet (this is the case when he begins to have colic).
It is the parents who will judge whether a healthy, recently born baby, who is a baby at this stage of her life, needs water. It is desirable that in the diet of the baby she appears at the same time as complementary foods. And this is provided that the child has no digestive problems. Some of the kids do not perceive water the first time, and they only begin to drink it after a month, or even two.
Water for the artificial kid and those who eat mixed
For newborns, who, as it happens, are artificial, a significant amount of protein enters the body with food. That is why they need water from the very beginning. When food for the smallest is calculated, the total amount of food for the crumbs of water is not taken into account. Those babies who are on mixed feeding, water will also not be superfluous.
When is it acceptable to offer water to newborn babies?
Those children who are infants, it is better to give water to drink only after they ate. Before feeding, you should not drink: in newborns very small, the volume of the ventricle is about 250 ml. Drinking at least a sip of water, the baby then does not get exactly the same amount of mother's milk.
Of course, make the final decision about whether to give water to the newborn, if so, how, when, and which one, only parents should decide. If you start from the norm, then the baby under the age of six months of age should be offered about 200 ml of water per day. If the baby is sick, then, on the advice of pediatricians, the amount of water that is offered to him should be 30 ml per kilogram of the child’s weight. He may not drink all the water, he should not force the baby.
Those babies who are breast-fed can be offered water between the two feedings, if you can see that the baby began to worry.
So, we have already figured out whether or not to give some water to the kids. If the parents still decided to offer it to their children, then they need to remember that they do not need to force the kids to drink; instead of ordinary water, which, however, should be of high quality to avoid allergic reactions, gastrointestinal tract disorders, difficulty breathing, you can offer raisin water, very useful for constipation (1 tablespoon of raisins is steamed in a glass of boiling water and infused for five to ten minutes); during the heat, instead of giving the baby drink water, it is better to ventilate the room, wipe the child’s body with water, moisten the air in the room with a spray gun; if you give the baby a drink, then it is better to do this with a spoon or bottle with a dispenser.
By and large, it is better to drink a small child when he reaches for water himself, because he better know what is required in order for him to feel good.
