For healthy brain development



For healthy brain development, a child needs to feel secure and protected stress can have long-term effects on the developing brain it can also create health issues for the heart and the immune system

 Any baby who has too much stress will react badly what happens is that our brain circuits that deal with stress and anxiety and fear or anger the kinds of things that

 we experience when we're stressed will learn to fire more frequently and then we learn to deal with new things that come along as 

If they were stresses as if they were threats one of the things that happen is that our  endocrine system our hormones change we get more of a hormone called cortisol


Which is a stress hormone


 Which is a stress hormone and that clearly affects the way the brain is wired up and it also affects the rest of our body so there is evidence for 

An example that babies who have a lot of stress in their first couple of years end up in a dolt hood with more heart problems more heart attacks and things like that so the effects are intense and they're very long-lasting clearly things like anger and violence 

Are hard on babies so is deprivation and being left alone for too long there are other kinds of things like disputes between parents or violence in a home or divorce or illness


parent or violence


 And a parent or violence in a neighborhood all of these things can cause stress directly to the baby if he's exposed to it but they also affect the baby because they affect the caregiver and if a caregiver is very stressed it's hard for the caregiver to be able to respond effectively sensitively to the baby in ways that reduce the baby stress

 There are a couple of things that parents can do when they recognize stresses in the home that might affect the baby one is to think about how they can protect

 The baby from those experiences so if you expect somebody to be coming in and causing a big fuss in the house and a lot of fighting maybe it's a good time for the baby not to be there parents can also learn 

How to disagree in ways that are less stressful for those around them another kind thing to think about is how are the stresses affecting you as the caregiver for the baby and taking a little bit of time and stepping back and getting yourself regulated so that when you're with the baby you can regulate

 The baby being a parent is not easy there are ways to get support and help there are free services for future parents and parents of young children such as healthy babies healthy children programs

 Ontario early years centers parenting and Family Literacy centers community action programs for children Canada's prenatal nutrition programs best start hubs family resource programs and parenting programs such as the Incredible Years and nobody's perfect to find out about local services contact your public health unit or ask your health care provider,