The kid acquires a muscular feeling long before birth. He begins to feel himself in space, barely moving with his mother in the tummy. This is due to the musculo-articular (kinesthetic) feeling, which is improved in the first year, giving a powerful stimulus to the development of the child. And together with our hero muscles develop themselves - in fact the muscular system in crumbs more or less ripens only to 12 months.
Not a calf, but a child
A small calf, barely born, stands on its thin legs and runs briskly after her mother. People are not ready for this.
Muscles of crumbs make up 23.5% of the body weight (in the adult - 42%.) And the baby's musculature is worst of all formed: in the adult, they account for more than half of the muscle mass, in the case of crumbs - 1/3. But that's interesting: the number of muscle fibers in a child after birth does not change - muscles are built up only due to their thickening and development.
Do the newborn baby's little fingers and legs twitch when he tries to move them? In the first days of life this situation is normal - the children's muscles still have increased excitability.
Get a Bonus for your Tone
The human muscles never rest - even in a dream they do not relax completely. The minimum voltage, which is stored at rest, doctors call muscle tonus. He is higher the younger the child. Interestingly, in a relaxed state, your baby would take up to twice as much space and by the eighth month of pregnancy it would not fit in the mommy's tummy! To fit into it, the crumb had to be grouped into the position of the embryo - the physiological hypertension of the flexor muscles is supported by the central nervous system. And this does not mean that the muscles flexing the handle-legs, the child is stronger than those that unbend limbs. It's all about the difference in tone! By the age of 4-6 months, he will be leveled, and then the crumb will be ready for active development of motor skills.
The normalization of the tone is closely watched by a pediatrician and a neurologist to prevent the formation of motor disorders. About the fact that everything is going on as it should, doctors judge on the motor activity of the baby, special diagnostic methods and the positonic physiological reflexes of a small child (the involuntary tension of certain muscles allows the child to take this or that pose). The appearance and extinction of these reflex reactions are very important.
If the tone and reflexes associated with it do not go through the sequence of the changes that they have made in the right time, this can lead to a delay in motor development, gait disturbances, and in severe cases, the formation of infantile cerebral palsy (cerebral palsy). Fortunately, if a young child has been paid attention to the tone and physiological reflexes of the small child in the first months, the threat of this serious illness can be prevented: everyone knows that in the first year of life the nervous system has a tremendous recovery potential.
Options to choose from
Increased tone (muscle hypertension, hypertonia)
The child looks chained, inactive, clamped. Even in sleep, the legs are constantly tightened to the tummy, the arms are crossed on the chest, bent in all joints, the fists are clenched, the thumbs are covered on top by the other four. Having woken up, the crumb does not stretch sweetly all over the body, as it should be to a healthy baby: this is hampered by tense flexors of the limbs. Such babies can from birth confidently hold their heads, delighting with their achievement of parents, although this is evidence of too high a tone of the occipital muscles and should rather alert. The fact is that in the norm this skill is finally formed only in 3 months.
Reduced tone (muscle hypotension, hypotension)
The child is not very modest and relaxed. The baby looks limp, the legs and arms are straightened, like a cotton doll, while they are too strongly bent at the elbow and knee joints - more than 180 degrees. The children's palms are opened, the handles are hanging down and turned outward, the grasping function is weakened - the child does not hold at all the finger of the mother's finger or toy, or does not do it well enough.
Another disturbing symptom: the baby laid out on the changing table on the tummy does not bend the handles in front of the chest to lean on them, but pulls them aside or back. The crumb is as if spread out on a changing mat in the "frog pose." Hypotension does not always manifest itself so clearly: in the first months of life, the tonus simply may not be high enough - in fact at this age physiological muscle hypertension is considered the norm.
Uneven tone (dystonia)
The most common variant of violations of the physiological reflexes of a small child. In this case, the baby has signs of both hypertonia and hypotension. At the child some muscles are relaxed, others are clamped. Usually, against the background of a general lowering of the tone, there are periods of its increase, which are associated with emotional stress or a change in the position of the body.
Asymmetry of muscle tone
Also not uncommon in infants. If on one half of the body it is higher than on the other, the body of the crumb bends like an arc, the head and pelvis rotate toward tense muscles. In this case, there is an obvious asymmetry of the gluteal and femoral folds. When the baby is laid out on his tummy, he immediately falls on that barrel, where the tone is strengthened. In this case, it is very important not to allow the development of the so-called spastic tortoise.
Keep in mind: in the first months of life, the position of the infant's head relative to the body (positonic and cervical reflexes) affects the state of the muscle tone: if the head is turned to the right or left, even in a healthy baby the tone becomes asymmetric. That's why, before evaluating muscle tension, the doctor will ask you to hold the child's head. This is necessary for it to remain exactly in the middle during the inspection.
Pozotonic samples
Asymmetric reflex
Put the child on the back and slowly, without pressure, turn his head to the right shoulder. The Crochet will immediately accept the "fencer's pose", which makes an attack, pulls out a tiny pen and straightens the leg on the right, bends the limbs on the left, if you turn his face in the opposite direction, everything will repeat like in a mirror.
Symmetrical reflex
Put the baby on the back - the back of the neck to your hand and gently tilt his head to his chest. In response, the crumb bends the knobs and unlocks the legs.
Tonic labyrinth reflex
The baby lying on the back increases the tone of the extensors (the child appears to be opening), on the tummy - the flexors (the baby pulls the bent knobs and legs under him). With hypertension, they are strengthened or persist longer than necessary, and when hypotension is weakened or completely absent.
Infant on fitball
To bring a muscular tone in order to the kid the exercises on fitbole for aerobics - or simply on the big inflatable beach ball will help.
The child lies on his belly on the ball, the legs are bent in the form of frog legs and pressed against the convex surface of the ball.
The child lies, hugging back to the surface of the ball. You should firmly hold it by the sides and smoothly swing from side to side and back and forth - 10 times in each direction.
Effect of the pendulum
Tense muscles relax at any pendulum movements - when you cradle the child in his arms, in a cradle, a stroller, half sitting in a high chair, which can be turned into a swing or rocking chair. A more difficult method is to give the baby a fetal position and shake the crumb in this position. Place the child on a changing table on the back, cross his arms on the chest, bend the legs, bringing the knees to the tummy, and fix them in this position with your left hand, and the right - gently tilt his head forward. Gently holding the baby in this position, smoothly and rhythmically shake the crumb to yourself and from yourself, and then from one side to the other. Repeat the exercise only 5-10 times.
Relax for children's muscles
Reduce the muscle tone will help relaxing massage, which can be done several times a day, for example, while you are changing clothes. Gently stroke the back, arms and legs of the baby with the back or palm surface of one or more fingers, in a closed state.
Put your open palm on the back of the child (along it) and, without taking your hands off, easily and gently move the infant's skin to the right and left, up and down movements that resemble sifting the flour through a sieve. This method is called baby massage therapists.
Take in your hand a brush lying on the baby's back and slightly shake it, holding your forearm. In the same way, massage the entire baby's pen, moving up. Then do the same with both legs. This is the so-called shaking.
Grab your own hands clenched muscles of the child's handle or legs. Softly and gently, at the same time, quickly and rhythmically shake and shake them from side to side, to the right and to the left. Such a technique experts call felting.
In the end, you still have skating. This method consists in the fact that the handle or cranium leg lying on the support is processed in a manner reminiscent of rolling the dough.