How Dads Can Bond With Babies

Much has been said and written about the bond between mothers and their babies.

Fathers can also bond with their babies. Their presence and participation in the lives of their infants can be a positive factor in their development and for the family in general.

A father’s part in a baby’s relationship can start before the infant is even born. Dads can talk to the baby while she is still inside the mother’s abdomen – Infants are thought to recognize a dad’s voice in this situation once they are born.

Dads can help research different things to help get ready for the newborn period and can help get the nursery environment in order.

They can go to parenting and breastfeeding classes with the future mothers to learn processes ahead of time.

Once the baby is born, dads can assist mothers with breastfeeding, changing the baby, dressing and undressing the baby, and in helping put the baby to sleep.
“Kangaroo care,” where the father places the baby on his warm bare chest for skin-to-skin contact, can help keep the infant warm and also help calm the baby.

As infants get older, fathers can feed them with a bottle when needed. Burping a baby can also be a shared task.

Mothers and fathers have different strengths when it comes to raising infants.

Mothers may carry the babies in their bodies and furnish milk for them. They tend to be a calming and soothing force in their interactions with their babies.
On the other hand, dads tend to be more active and aggressive with their infants. They tend to play with infants more than mothers do.

Their style of play tends to arouse and excite their infants, causing babies to really stretch emotionally to figure out what is going on during these sessions.
This helps the infant have a healthier emotional range and to better regulate their emotions.

Dads tend to use different words than moms when talking to their infants. This helps to expand their vocabularies and can also speed up language development.

Back before the Industrial Revolution, fathers usually worked closer to home and were much more involved in the lives of their babies.

Only after the onset of the Industrial Revolution when dads went farther away to work did moms become expected to be almost solo caregivers for their infants.
There is no reason that dads cannot become more bonded with their babies once again.