Feelings, feelings and more feelings!

We all know it: emotions. We wake up with them and go to bed with them. Scattered throughout the day, we experience a variety of emotions, based on the situation around us and how we feel about it. Emotions influence our actions and send a message to the outside world. It is therefore important to be familiar with emotions and know how to deal with them. But did you know that this starts at birth? Emotional development starts on day one and slowly grows with you. As you read this, your little baby may be busy expanding their world. Depending on their age, they will become increasingly aware of their own feelings and those of their caregivers. In this blog, we take you through your child's emotional development: how does it start and what can you expect?

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Even before the child comes into the world, you feel for it. The baby learns from within how you are doing and what is happening outside the womb. To some extent, they share the same feelings that you experience and respond to loud noises outside the abdomen. The feelings you feel, and so do they, can have an effect on the child after birth. So it is important to pay attention to your feelings and your mental health.

The first months

There he/she is: your newborn child! Very little happens during the first few weeks and they mostly sleep, but that doesn't mean they don't have feelings yet. Babies can have basic emotions. In the beginning it will be about satisfaction/dissatisfaction, but in the second month emotions such as joy, happiness and sadness are added. They expressed their feelings directly when they were present. This can cause your little one to suddenly start crying, or the very first smile to appear on their lips. Emotions controlled your child's actions. They cannot regulate these yet.

When your child reaches three months of age, the actions of others will affect their feelings. Babies may smile or express satisfaction in response to something you do or to his or her toys. They will also imitate people around them by imitating sounds. They are fascinated by their own voice and yours.

Months 4 - 6

During the second quarter of the first year of life, your child will communicate more and better. They let you know when they want to be picked up by raising their arms. In addition, the feelings become more intense over time; the difference between positive and negative feelings will increase. In addition, interest in the feelings of others increases. Your little one will try to imitate the feelings and facial expressions of others.

The reaction capacity continues to grow; the baby reacts to the feelings of you and others around him. For example, they may become sad when you are angry and look away when you are sad. Actions also affect the child's mood - for example, your child will cry when you stop playing.

Around the fifth month, your baby starts to laugh. In addition, they expand their emotions to include anger and frustration. Both emotions will be visible on the face. It's good to remember that babies don't mean anything personally, but just live "in the moment". Everything they do is in response to a situation.

Babies also increasingly start to have a preference or dislike for certain things or situations. They may react negatively to food they don't like, or become frustrated when trying to do something they can't yet do.

When month six comes, your child may experience mood swings - they can get angry from one moment to the next. Fortunately, there are also many positive milestones to note this month: babies will stick out their tongues and share their attention. This allows them to pay attention to more than one person and follow your gaze. There is also a chance that they will turn their head when you call them by name.

Month 7 – 9

During this period, your child will experience a new feeling: fear. Babies can now react anxiously when a stranger approaches them or when you disappear from sight. This is because babies in this phase can distinguish familiar people from strangers. In this way, they bond with a selection of people they prefer to live near. This may mean that your baby no longer wants to sit on your neighbor's lap, even if it was different before. This is also called "ignorance". Another word for this is "stranger anxiety."

This can be a difficult period for you as a parent, as it becomes difficult to go anywhere. Another development that comes after the unfamiliarity is separation anxiety. Babies realize that they and you are not one. In other words: they acquire their own consciousness.

When you disappear from sight, your child may suddenly start to cry. Your child does not understand that you will eventually come back; she thinks you are going away forever. This can cause crying and requires a calm, soothing approach. It is important to take your little one's feelings seriously.

Don't worry! Experiencing separation anxiety is part of emotional development. This usually happens in children between eight and eighteen months old, although exceptions are possible.

Babies will need more signals about emotional reactions from you during these phases. They see this as an indicator of whether something is "safe" and use it to be calmed. They also use it to see what they think of something. For example, if you make a dirty face when eating asparagus, there is a chance that the baby will do the same. Their preferences are based on yours. And if you become emotional about a visit to the store or doctor, or leaving the child at daycare, your child may associate the places with sadness. This is known as "social referencing" or "social cues" in Dutch. This phenomenon occurs mainly in infants.

In addition to the clinginess, separation anxiety, and social referencing, there's more room for play, and your baby can increasingly link their facial expressions to feelings. They are now familiar with all the basic emotions: interest, joy, surprise, anger, sadness, disgust, and fear. And they increasingly enjoy games like "peekaboo". Now is a great time to play social games with your baby!

Besides expressing their own feelings, they can increasingly read other people's gestures and facial expressions to determine how someone is feeling. They can also point to something and then check if you are actually looking at the object. This is the next step in sharing attention, as previously discussed in month six.

Month 10-12

The end of the first year is in sight, followed by even more milestones for your little one. Your baby's awareness is increasing, and they can show more and more emotions. The feeling of 'shame' now comes into play when they do something that isn't allowed. Plus, your child becomes even more sensitive to the approval and disapproval of others.

By the twelfth month, a new era begins: your child's emotional development expands with the first words. Babies can then communicate with physical gestures and small words. Still, the emotions will still feel as intense as before. This will only decrease later in life, when they have learned to regulate their emotions.

But for now, you'll have to settle for unregulated emotions for a while. Look at it on the bright side: you can communicate with your child before they even turn one! That is truly a milestone to celebrate and be proud of. Your baby will probably share this feeling with you, just like the previous feelings!