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When Heather Smith’s family travelled to Newfoundland for a Christmas visit, the trip was supposed to be relaxing and exciting for everyone. But for six-month-old Rosie, the experience was more upsetting than exciting.
“All the relatives were dying to meet Rosie,” Smith says. Rosie, however, was not nearly as enthusiastic about meeting them. Smith says her daughter sat on her lap and gave each aunt and uncle The Look when they came close?while clinging to her mother’s arms.
“If one of them approached us, it got worse,” Smith recalls. “She’d grip me even tighter and hide her face in my shoulder.” With all the strange faces around, Smith couldn’t even go to the bathroom without Rosie coming along. There were plenty of people willing to hold her, yet Smith knew she’d be miserable. Newborns generally don’t object too much if a stranger talks to them or holds them. They may even greet someone they’ve never met with one of those toothless, drooling grins. But all that can change somewhere around the middle of the first year?the actual timing varies from baby to baby. One day, your formerly sociable little one will start making strange, just as Rosie did.
Yet Rosie’s reaction is not only normal, it’s healthy, says Lynda Lougheed, program coordinator for Information Children at Simon Fraser University. “It means your baby knows who you are, and has developed feelings ...