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Back to Basics: Taking Care of Baby

Basic Care from Holding to Diapering

By Laurie Dove

Carma Shoemaker sat on the floor with her infant son, holding his new sleeper first one way and then the other.

"There were so many snaps in the crotch area that it must have taken me a half an hour to figure it out," says Shoemaker of Chester, Va. "It's funny now, but wasn't then. I was home alone with my new baby and I cried after not being able to handle all those snaps."

Nearly every new parent knows the feelings of insecurity that set in once their newborn comes home from the delivery room. Somehow, infants always seem much larger in the hospital, less fragile when surrounded by well-wishers and a medically-trained staff. Once taken home and parked in a way-too-big infant carrier on the middle of the living room floor, what new parent hasn't stared at their newborn and thought, "Now what?"

Shoemaker, whose son is now 13, remembers her own trial-and-error early days of parenthood. Today, Shoemaker is a nurse and writer and has two other sons, ages 10 and 5. She says her early mistakes were all part of becoming a seasoned parent.

"The best advice I could give a new mother is to not worry about what you don't know," says Shoemaker. "The important things, like hugging and loving, will come to you. The other things aren't hard to learn. And, as long as a baby is always handled gently and with love, parents don't need to be afraid of making mistakes. These mistakes make for great memories and wonderful stories when the kids are older."

"People are always afraid they're going to spoil a baby by holding it too much," says Carrie Siebenmark, a registered nurse in the Wichita, Kan.-based Wesley Medical Center's postpartum department. Siebenmark, who sees more than 400 new mothers each month, always tells her patients this simply isn't true. "Hold your baby," she says. "It isn't possible to spoil a baby by holding it too much."

Want to see more?

• Baby Gear: What
• Talk about it!
• To Have and to Hold: Cradling and Loving Your Newborn
• Bathing Your Little Beauty: How to Give Your Newborn Baby a Bath

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