Earrings (and circumcision): Why waiting means love.
Before I begin with today's post, fyi! Layla didn't get the J&J ad. Aw. The ad came out last Sunday and I haven't posted about the shoot because I don't have her pictures yet, so I'll post about it as soon as that's settled. Anyway, it was worth a try. And for a few hours, I discovered what it was like to be a bitter mother. Haha! Carry on!
After a long day last Tuesday, I took Layla to Doktora Paulino for...I don't remember what, but we decided to place earrings on her little ears. Hehe, talk about segue!
Doktora got excited and brought out a bag of teeny tiny earrings for me to choose from. I had seen other baby girls with purple, pink, yellow or orange crystals; but I knew what I was looking for. A clear crystal, the simplest and most dynamic of them all.
Layla was crying way before Doktora even pierced her ears. Marking the earlobes with a pentel pen was actually teh toughest part. I sang to her as our temporary yaya Sonia bound her hands and feet (Oh, she hates that. She never enjoyed being swaddled as a newborn.) and she screamed and screamed and looked at me with that why-mommy-why look on her face. She cried for a whole 2 minutes and I immediately offered my breast and she was herself again, laughing in the house as if nothing happened. She was in a comfortable and safe place that provided much fun and relaxation.
Apparently it's better to wait until your baby girl is 3 months old before you have her ears pierced because her ears will be fully developed by then and the doctor will have an easier time marking and piercing them in the right places. I remember asking the nurses in St. Luke's why they recommended that I have Layla's ears pierced right away. They said because newborns couldn't move much yet, which makes sense, but Doktora's reason is better. Syempre I want her earrings to be on the right place.
Many friends and family told me that I should've had her ears pierced right away, but I had my reasons to wait and I'm so glad I did. I heard horror stories -- earrings getting stuck in in the playpen, tangled in strings, yanked off, etc. -- plus I had an earring hole infection when I was very young and having the doctor push pus out that tiny hole was no joke!
The main reason, however, was that she had just gone through the whole birth canal ordeal and to pierce her ears would've caused unnecessary pain, which is why some of the mothers I've spoken to don't agree with having their baby boys circumcized immediately after birth either. It's just too much pain too soon, and having them circumcized as infants can cause problems for breastfeeding because the baby's in so much pain, he can't learn how to latch on and nurse properly. There have also been reports that some doctors take out too much skin, so it's very painful when the boy grows up. It pays to wait, I tell you. Babies will feel the pain, but at least it's not sunud-sunod, you know what I mean? Your child will not experience pain in 2, 3 or 4 consecutive days.
So celebrate your child's birth, introduce him or her to the world, and then take it one day at a time. One vaccination shot here, earrings months after, and lots and lots of loving in between.
posted by alia at 1:51 PM
5 Comments:
wow! i love the earrings! Ü she looks sooo cute in them.
i also waited til i got maddie's ears pierced (almost 6 months). but i didn't want to wait too long cause i heard stories like the baby's ears getting infected cause they played with the new piercing too much or earrings always getting lost cause the older baby always took it off. other mothers told me that it's easier to get the piercing done when the baby's less than 6 months so the baby won't know it's there. they'll accept it like it's a part of their body.
as for the circumcision thing...i didn't have my son circumcised when he was born. he actually isn't circumcised yet and he's 7. i just thought that it was an added stress if i did it when he was born. since he was my first born, i was new to everything. the umbilical cord stump was already kinda weird looking...imagine having one more to clean. Ü we'll have him circumcised when he wants to. we've already explained to him what they do and what it's for. Ü
yeah, i was also told that once she turned 6 months, i might as well have her ears pierced when she's high school na. haha!
and wow, to be so informed at 7 years of age! what a man! :)
hi, when my baby was born, my mom was also making me kulit about having her ears pierced na (my grandmother already gave me a pair of teeny tiny gold earrings for her) because daw, the baby doesn't feel pain yet for a few days after she's born. but our hospital pediatrician said, we should wait for her to gain a bit of weight, so that you're sure about the placement of the earring won't move later on. she said 10% of babies pierced immediately after birth, after a while, the earring isn't centered on her lobe anymore.
our real pediatrician (my uncle who's a neonatologist) simple said it's safer to pierce her ears after she's had her tetanus shot. just to be on the safe side.
which is why i'm waiting for my baby to grow a bit bigger too before getting her ears pierced. :)
oh no piercing!! me worried!!! :(
ey ali, am havin a hard time readin the posts.
Any chance to reedit the background or font color?
jez a suggestion ... :)
ey, cui! that's so odd. that's the second complaint i've had about the background. the text background is supposed to be white, but it doesn't seem to load. i'll try and fix it.
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