Infant Massage Classes
Why massage your baby?
'Massaging your baby simply communicates love, releases tension, and helps you better understand your baby's needs.'
-Vimala McClure-founder of the IAIM
Increasing evidence is proving that positive touch and massage provide enormous benefits for babies and their parents and in turn, society as a whole. Many cultures massage their babies and family members on a daily basis and consequently grow up to be less selfish and aggressive, and more sociable and loving.
Main benefits
Stimulation:
There is no stimulation more effective for babies than their parents' touch and interaction. Baby's first form of communication is through the skin and the stimulation of the skin is essential for physical and psychological growth. This can be achieved through positive touch and massage.
Massage improves the function of the body's systems responsible for breathing, circulation, digestion and elimination, hormones, immunity and brain growth. It enhances all the senses, especially touch.
The stimulation of these systems leads to greater weight gain, being more alert and active, better bowel movements, stronger and more co-ordinated muscle tone, greater ability to fight infections, earlier language development and more sophisticated emotional growth.
Relief:
Since massage stimulates most bodily systems, it can relieve many discomforts such as teething pains, wind and colic, constipation, congestion and excess mucus and growing pains. It can be very helpful for babies who seem agitated a lot or have trouble sleeping.
Interaction:
Interaction through touch, eye contact, hormone release and immitation communication are greater when massaging baby. These are subtle but powerful ways to communicate and enable you to understand and be responsive to your baby's individual needs, empowering you as a confident parent.
In turn, this promotes trust, respect, love, empathy and greater self esteem and reduces agression, selfishness and antisocial behaviour in later life.
Infant massage is particularly good for building an attached relationship and bonding with your child if you have found this difficult for any reason. It can reduce the risk of developing postnatal depression and promotes successful breastfeeding.
Relaxation:
Babies experience stress! Whilst an amount of stress is necessary in humans, our fast-paced lives, homelife and birth circumstances can leave many babies frustrated with built-up tension and anxiety (leading to agitated and stressed parents!). Regular massage helps babies to cope with and release this tension, pain, fear, and stress.
Stress-relieving, sleep-inducing and feel-good hormones are released during massage, helping to regulate sleep in babies and relax and calm parents.
Details of classes
The course is for once a week for 4 weeks, each session lasting about one and a half hours. The cost is from £60 which includes written material and bottle of massage oil. Once you have taken a course and have learnt the principles and strokes, you can continue to massage your baby on a regular basis. You are of course, welcome to attend as many courses as you like.
Group classes are usually about 4-8 babies. The benefits of being with a group are that you meet other parents, with whom you can discuss parenting issues and create a network. Please call for details of upcoming classes. If you would be willing to host a group in your home, a reduction would be given off the cost of the course-please contact me to discuss this option.
Individual sessions are available in your own home. The benefits of individual classes are that you can arrange the days and times to fit you or your partner's schedule, the course can be tailored around your baby's individual needs, it can be easier if you have more than one baby and some people feel uncomfortable in group situations.
Click to contact me regarding these courses.