The day your baby comes home is one of the most important of your life. Becoming a parent brings the joyful sound of a baby’s coos, grunts, and gurgles, but it also comes with the distressing sound of your baby’s tears.
From their earliest moments, babies can only communicate in one way—by crying. It’s how they tell us when they’re tired, hungry, scared, or not feeling well, and that’s just for starters. Newborns may cry between 1 and 4 hours per day, and you’ll spend plenty of time wondering what they’re trying to tell you.
There’s no magical way of translating precisely what your baby’s cries mean, but you can develop a relationship and learn to better anticipate and understand what your baby is trying to communicate.
What Your Baby’s Tears Might Mean
Most babies won’t say their first words until they’re between 12 and 18 months old, and before that, they communicate through body language, babbling, and crying. Most of the time, you can comfort them by checking on these usual suspects.
- Hungry: Even adults get cranky when we’re hungry, and we have the ability to ask for or get a snack whenever we want. When your baby gets hungry, the only thing they can do about it is cry.
- Tired: It takes a lot of work to grow up, so babies are frequently tired but can’t always regulate their sleep cycles. Until your baby learns to self-soothe, they might cry when tired and need your help calming down and getting to sleep.
- Dirty Diaper: No one likes being wet or soiled, not even babies. If your baby is crying, a dirty diaper is one of the first things to check. A quick peek in the back of the diaper should answer the question, and some brands come with color-changing indicators to let you know when your baby is wet.
- Air Bubbles: Babies sometimes cry after feeding because they need to be burped. The same thing can happen from pacifier use, crying, or any other action that traps air in the stomach. Try a couple of pats on the back, gentle rubbing, or other burping techniques to release the air and relieve the pressure.
- Sickness: Everything from upset stomachs, earaches, headaches, and other ordinary human ailments can impact your baby. If your baby has gas, bicycle their legs and gently push their knees to their chest to help relieve the pressure. Earaches and other ailments may need medical attention, so reach out to your pediatric provider if you are concerned.
- Teething: Baby teeth can emerge as early as four months, and the process can be painful. Keep an eye out for your baby chewing on toys and other objects and excessive drooling. Gnawing or sucking on objects like pacifiers and teethers can soothe the pain. You can also try refrigerated teethers or a gentle gum massage. If the pain remains too intense, talk with your pediatrician about over-the-counter pain relievers in weight-appropriate doses.
- Stimulation (too much or too little): Like anyone, babies can become overstimulated. Because everything is new and unfamiliar, your baby may be even more likely to get overwhelmed easily. Especially when you consider that babies tend to be the focus of a lot of attention from friends and family. Make sure you prioritize your baby’s comfort and call it a day when they’ve had enough. By contrast, babies will sometimes demand attention, and the fastest and healthiest way to end the tears is to cuddle and comfort them.
- General Discomfort: Sometimes, there’s no apparent cause of your baby’s tears. Maybe your baby is uncomfortable; perhaps they’re hot, their feet are cold, or their socks are too tight. Pay attention to body language to see where the culprit might be.
How to Comfort Your Baby When Crying
- Keep a regular feeding schedule: Feeding on a regular schedule can help prevent your baby from getting overly hungry. At the same time, pay attention to your baby’s tears and feed as necessary. As your baby grows, your baby may need to eat more often. Pay attention to signs like lip smacking, looking or gesturing toward breast or bottle, and sucking on hands or things nearby.
- Swaddle: Wrapping your baby up in a tight (but not too tight) blanket makes them feel comforted. It may even help them fall asleep. Remove any toys or other distractions and move them to their crib if you start to see signs that your baby is tired.
- Cuddle: Hold your baby in your arms, either on their stomach or on their side. Not only is it comforting, but it can also help resolve tummy trouble.
- Shush or swing: Make gentle shushing noises while rocking your baby. It’s believed to soothe them by reminding them of the sounds and motions they experienced in the womb.
- Sucking: The natural suckling instinct helps babies to nurse, but it’s also comforting. Nursing or using a pacifier is soothing to babies, and a pacifier may be especially helpful when your baby is teething.
- Take a trip: Put your baby in a stroller or car seat and go for a walk or a drive. If your baby falls asleep, head back home and put them to bed in their crib.
- Soothing bath: Run a warm bath for your baby. Warm baths provide both a sensory and psychological effect for your baby that helps calm them down.
- What if nothing works? If your baby cries excessively and doesn’t respond to your interventions, it may be an indication of an underlying problem. Talk to your pediatrician if you need help or if your baby has other symptoms like a temperature, vomiting, rash, etc.
Remember to Take Care of Yourself!
When babies are distressed, parents tend to get distressed, too. All of that crying can be overwhelming for parents and caregivers. The good news is that it will get better with time. Most babies cry less and less as they get older, and they learn other ways to communicate and self-soothe.
In the meantime, you’re likely to feel stressed out and exhausted from time to time. You might lose your patience and struggle to cope, especially when you’re tired at the end of the day. During the first weeks and months of your baby’s life, you’ll focus almost all of your attention on taking care of them, but it’s important to carve out time for yourself, even if it’s just a few minutes at a time.
Try to get enough sleep and make time for things you enjoy. Ask for help from friends and loved ones. See if they can babysit for an hour, run errands, or help with meals to free up a few minutes for you to decompress. The more you can take care of yourself, the better equipped you’ll be to care for your baby.
If you feel like you’re losing control of your emotions, place your baby in their crib and go to another room for 15 minutes or so. As long as they’re just ordinary tears, it’s okay for your baby to cry it out for a little bit while you take a breather. Postpartum mood disorders affect one in six women. So, if you’re having trouble managing your stress or feeling negative emotions toward your baby or yourself, reach out for help!
