by Michelle Stein posted in Parenting

When I think of a freshly-delivered baby, I envision a wrinkly, floppy ball of sweetness cradled in someone's arms. Not, you know, a determined little person strolling across the room.
That's probably why a video of a newborn "walking" across a counter top just minutes after birth is pretty much breaking the internet right now. This baby girl from Brazil shocked nurses and midwives with her strength when she was in the middle of her first bath.
Click play and prepare to be amazed.

Okay, now that you've picked up your jaw from the floor, let's figure out what's really going on here. It's not quite as amazing as you'd think. According to the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP,) this "walking" is one of the many reflexes all babies are born with. "She can?t support her own weight, of course, but if you hold her under the arms (being careful to support her head, as well) and let her soles touch a flat surface, she?ll place one foot in front of the other and 'walk,'" says the AAP. "This reflex will disappear after two months, then recur as the learned voluntary behavior of walking toward the end of the first year."

Who knew" I've given birth to three children, so I know a thing or two about newborn reflexes, like rooting, sucking, grasping objects placed in their palms, flexing of the toes when stroked on the sole of the foot. But this whole stepping reflex is news to me.
Apparently, I'...