Prenatal Health
Lekha Pant
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January 25, 2023
Pregnancy duration practices
I've heard that 80% of the learning happens when the baby is in the womb.. can anyone please suggest practices that help me to make this time period more fruitful for my child?
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Vaishali Khanna
Shyft Habit Coach
Experts say that your baby will probably be able to remember certain sounds and tastes from the womb after she's born.
Towards the end of the second trimester, your baby starts to hear. While her main soundtrack is your heartbeat, breathing, voice, pumping of blood and gurgles of digestion, she can also hear muffled noises from outside your body. While a daily dose of Mozart during pregnancy won’t make your baby a musical prodigy, she may recognise and be soothed by it when she hears it again as a newborn.
There's no evidence that playing your baby classical music will make her more intelligent. However, listening to music is a lovely way for you both to unwind. So do pop on anything calm and soothing, and enjoy the music together.
When you play music to your baby in the womb, her heart rate may increase and she may move more. Shortly after birth, she may respond to particular pieces of music that she heard regularly in the womb, by becoming more wriggly and alert.
January 27, 2023
Vaishali Khanna
Shyft Habit Coach
In the same way, your baby may also show that she recalls and is comforted by other noises heard while in the womb. These could be the theme tune of your favourite TV programme or a story frequently read out loud to her. She may also prefer your voice to others, and pay extra attention when you speak.
One study found that if music was played while mums-to-be relaxed, the same music would soothe their newborns. They ceased to cry, opened their eyes, and made fewer jerky movements. So it looks as if babies may associate their experiences in the womb with whatever their mother is feeling at the time.
It’s not only the sounds your baby hears in the womb that she's likely to remember later. What you eat while you're pregnant affects the flavour of your amniotic fluid, and it's thought that your baby may also be able to remember the different tastes that she experiences.
January 27, 2023
Vaishali Khanna
Shyft Habit Coach
Some experts believe that this familiarity with flavours can help to establish breastfeeding, as your diet also affects the flavour of your breastmilk. Your baby may even prefer these familiar-tasting foods during weaning.
One study showed that babies whose mums drank a lot of carrot juice during the last trimester preferred carrot-flavoured cereal rather than plain. This highlights the important of a varied diet while you are pregnant, as it may help your baby to enjoy a wider range of different foods.
January 27, 2023