Mother knows best, as they say, and when it comes to parenting advice, it seems that the older generation such as your mum, aunties and uncles and mothers-in-law have plenty of childcare tactics they would like to impart to you as they have had years of experience raising you.
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But times have changed. Back in the day, the older folks didn’t have Google they could bounce knowledge or get up-to-date research from. In fact, the smartphone wasn’t even invented.
Child car seats were seen to be less necessary than the sarong, breastfeeding was not encouraged and babycot bumpers and bedding were essential items every infant should have in his crib.
Unsolicited advice was always forthcoming and they never failed to tell you: “You should or shouldn’t do this and that” because that was how they did things a long time ago. But do these kinds of advice hold water today?
Check out these 8 “pearls of antiquated wisdom” you might want to take with a large pinch of salt or ignore altogether in today’s age of modern parenting.
Advice #1 You Should Not Listen To: Put Baby to Sleep on his Stomach to Make him Sleep Longer
This piece of advice from the older generation mums has caused a lot of confusion, especially to millennial mums who are now told contradictory advice.
Back in the day, most if not all mothers were advised to put their babies, especially newborns, to sleep on their stomachs, because “babies sleep longer and more peacefully this way.”
They also argued that should the baby vomit or spit up in his sleep, the vomit would flow out of his mouth on to the bed and not flow back into his throat where it may become a choking hazard.
These reasons made sense and also came with a promise that every sleep-deprived new mum appreciated because a soundly sleeping baby meant longer rest periods for mum. Who could resist?
Today, however, there is an abundance of evidence that says stomach sleeping is associated with a much higher risk of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) or cot death. It has been found that stomach sleeping increases the risk of SIDS by 1.7% to 12.0%.
The studies postulate that when babies are put to sleep on their stomachs, they may be rebreathing their own exhaled breath resulting in carbon dioxide buildup and low oxygen levels, or experience upper airway obstruction and ─ being tightly swaddled which restricts movement ─ may be unable to dissipate body heat leading to overheating.
Babies should never be tightly swaddled or let to become too hot or too cold. The ideal room temperature is between 68° and 72°F (20° to 22.2°C).
Babies, especially newborns, have immature systems as they are just beginning to adjust to life outside the womb. This includes their lungs, their hearts and other organs.
So while the older generation may be right about stomach-sleepers sleeping longer and deeper, that may only be so because babies may be experiencing sudden decreases in blood pressure and heart rate control. That is why they go into a deep sleep and take longer to arouse, but that may not be a good sign.
Advice #2 You Should Not Listen To: Plump up the Baby Cot with Protective Bumpers
Baby cot bumpers used to be ubiquitous items stocked on the same baby store shelves as baby mattresses and pillows back in the day.
In the years 2000 to 2011, it was found that baby cot bumpers were associated with many cot deaths because the sides of bumpers can drop and suffocate, strangle or entrap baby.
Baby cot bumpers are foam padding pieces that are used to pad up all the sides of the cot to prevent baby from bumping his head. They also came in pretty designs and frills to complement the overall look of baby’s bedroom design. Unfortunately, they also caused SIDS. It is always better to be safe than sorry.
Advice #3 You Should Not Listen To: Put Rice or Rice Cereal in Baby Bottle to Keep him Full Longer
“My mother told me to mash small amounts of rice or baby cereal and put it in baby’s milk so that he gets full faster and sleep longer,” said a mother who was preparing to deliver her third child.
She said she had been doing this for all her children and that her mother had been doing this as well when she raised her and her siblings.
Although nothing untoward happened to the babies, this piece of “hand-me-down” advice is ill-advised.
Paediatricians and experts say adding any solids, whether its rice or rice cereal, is a choking hazard and aspiration risk, not to mention cause a change in stool consistency and constipation.
A baby’s digestive system is not ready to take on solids until he is at least six months of age. Rice and rice cereals are regarded as solids.
Adding them into his bottle before the proper time to wean, will cause the baby to gain excessive weight. It may even delay the child’s ability to learn to eat from a spoon. Solids should be fed from a spoon and not drunk from a bottle.
Some babies with gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD) may be advised to have a thickening agent added to their bottle in order to help reduce reflux, but this advice should only be practised if it comes from a doctor.
Advice #4 You Should Not Listen To: Wean Baby Earlier than Six Months Age
The World Health Organisation (WHO) and UNICEF recommend that children initiate breastfeeding within the first hour of birth and be exclusively breastfed for the first six months of life.
However in the 1970s or 1980s, many parents practised weaning their children by the age of four months, some even earlier, by three months of age!
The idea was to get the child to be independent of mother as soon as possible. However, this can cause problems to baby’s digestive system as it is being forced to digest solids before it is ready to.
Other risks include heart problems and obesity later in life. Back in the even-older generation of the 1950s and 1960s, parents loved fat babies.
The bigger and fatter they were, the better the omen as big babies were a sign of flourishing health and robustness as well as an indication that the family was well-to-do enough to feed its children very well.
That line of thinking has changed. Nowadays, it is well-known that babies who are extremely overweight such as being 20% above the average for their height and skeletal structure have a big risk of being overweight in later childhood and adulthood.
Obesity is associated with increased risk of illness, disability and death. It was reported in the New Straits Times that childhood obesity is on the rise in Malaysia where 1.65 million Malaysian schoolchildren are expected to be overweight or obese by 2025.
On the flip side, delaying weaning can also be bad as it delays tolerance for the variety of nutrients needed to support growth.
The late introduction of allergenic solid foods has been found to increase the risk of allergies in the growing child.
Advice #5 You Should Not Listen To: You should be Strict on your Children so that they Grow Up Successful
Asian families are known for their strict and undemonstrative ways of upbringing. Study! Study! Study!
Children must be at the top of their class and excel in everything they are put to do or else!!
The cane is the No: 1 instrument of corporal punishment in many families. But being too strict actually undermines a child’s attempt at doing the right things. It shows the child that the parent is intolerant and not open to communication.
Children are always eager to please their parents and worry about their approval. If they are always criticized or compared to others and shown up or put down for not doing as well, it will break their self-esteem, sometimes for good.
In the end, you will likely end up with children who are anxious and indecisive rather than successful.
If your own upbringing had been austere, remember you’re a mum of the 21st Century. You don’t have to follow the old ways.
Advice #6 You Should Not Listen To: Put Chilli on his Thumb to Stop him from Sucking it
Babies will put their fingers into their mouths. It is a natural rooting or sucking reflex that begins even before birth to prepare them for nursing when he is born.
Thumb sucking makes babies feel secure but it may develop into an unacceptable habit that goes well into late childhood whenever they feel stressed, need soothing or when going to sleep.
You may hear some aunties tell you to put chilli powder or hot chilli oil on those fingers to make him stop the habit.
The same advice is often given for weaning a child off the breast when comfort nursing becomes the only way they can go to sleep. (Read “When Mum is Used as a Pacifier“).
Although it may turn out to be a “sure fire” method (in more ways than one) to stop unwanted habits, there are many other approaches to wean a child off the breast or stop him from sucking his thumb other than putting chilli to burn his mouth. But then, it’s a piece of advice that still goes around in Asian parenting circles even to this day.
Advice #7 You Should Not Listen To: Don’t Pick Up Your Crying Baby or you will Spoil him
This is another common old generation advice: “There is no need to carry your baby every time he cries, you’re just spoiling him and letting him manipulate you into carrying him all the time.”
Especially for newborns and those under six months of age, a 2017 study confirms that parents should pick up their babies every time they cry.
The research from the University of Notre Dame’s Department of Psychology found that it was impossible to spoil an infant by holding or cuddling him.
A positive childhood with lots of affection and quality time leads to healthier adults with better coping skills. The research studied more than 600 adults and found that those who were cuddled as children grew into more well-adjusted adults with less anxiety and better mental health.
The first four to six months of life for babies is one of the most important times for babies to develop that special bonding with their parents and their primary caregivers.
So the next time you are berated by anyone for comforting a crying baby, remember, your baby is probably frightened about being out here in this strange new world.
Besides, it is well-documented everywhere that for babies to truly thrive, they need to be held and touched soothingly often.
Touch delivers neurologic, behavioural and cognitive benefits to a developing infant. Babies who are not held, nuzzled, and hugged enough can even stop growing, writes Psychology Today.
This piece of information was highly publicized in 2010 and your parents or relatives may not have been aware of it in their day.
Advice #8 You Should Not Listen To: It’s OK not to Use a Child Car Seat
It is highly probable that when you were a baby and a toddler, you were cradled in your mother’s arms as an infant or grew up sitting on her lap or left free in the backseat while you were being driven around in the family car during outings.
“Nothing happened to you back then”, you might hear your parents say, “why would car seats be needed for children now?”
A Compulsory Child Car Seat ruling was supposed to have come into effect in January 2020 in Malaysia, mandating all children below 135cm tall to be strapped into an approved child car seat. This enforcement, however, has been postponed indefinitely due to various reasons.
Although it is not yet law, that doesn’t mean that responsible parents cannot take the initiative to expose their children to the risk or getting injured or worse, killed, while travelling unsecured in a moving car.
Even at moderate speeds, a child can be crushed or thrown against the dashboard, the windscreen, the back of the front seats or even out of the car completely when the vehicle suddenly brakes.
A law doesn’t have to be enforced for parents to take steps to protect their children in every way they can. The video above shows you why.
And that rounds up how parenting and childcare have changed over the years and what worked in the old days may not work in these times.