Paul and Lisa were excited that I choose them to do my observations on their son. Paul and Lisa have been married for 3 years. Douglas is their first child. Mom and dad both work full time so Douglas is at a sitters house during the day. Evenings and weekend time with baby are very important to both of them. Alias’s pregnancy was difficult. She worked all through her pregnancy. Since she was under a lot of stress from her job, this caused stress on her pregnancy. She had to go into the doctors a few time for stress test to make sure that the baby was doing well.
Douglas was born on August 19, 2013, although her due date was August 9. She was 10 days late. Alias’s did not have a normal delivery either. Since she was 10 days late, the doctor requested that they induce labor on her. They went in at 12:01 on August 19 and immediately prepped her for the inducing processing. After injecting the medication in her, it wasn’t long before she felt her first hard contraction. After about 3 hours, Lisa had only dilated 1 CM. The doctor decided to break her water to help speed up the delivery.
That didn’t help. Lisa had plans on delivering her baby without the use of medication, but since being induced and having the contractions being hard and strong, she decided that she needed some release from the pain so that she could rest legalizing that this was going to be a long process. The Specialist doctor came in and gave her an Epidural. When Lisa was finally at stage two, she began the pushing process. As she came close to the final stages of pushing out the baby, the doctor give her an episiotomy because the baby was very large.
Since Lisa had been pushing for three hours, she was very tired and weak from the pushing that the doctor had to use forceps to help get the baby out. Finally at 1 1 p. M. , she gave birth to a baby boy on August 1 9, 2013. Douglas weight in at bib and 13 in. , a big boy, Lisa is a very small person sighting about 115 lbs. She said that she was all baby. Lisa said that the delivery was long and tiring. She had not eaten since 5:00 p. M. The night before, August 18 and after the delivery Lisa was very hungry, thirsty, drained of all energy, and exhausted.
Paul was in the delivery room and said that when the baby was handed to her, she was so weak that she could not hold the baby. She had no strength in her arms so Paul laid the baby on her chest close to her heart so she could at least see the baby and feel him to make that first connection. The nurse wanted to get started with breast-feeding, UT since Lisa couldn’t hold her baby, that bond had to wait until the morning. Alias’s labor was not your typical textbook labor, however, she did recover fairly quickly. After a few weeks of being home, mom and baby had began developing their bond.
Even though this was their first child, it didn’t take long for mom and dad to develop the routine and roles as parents. Both mom and dad are now comforTABLE with being parents. Fast forwarding to six months, all developmental milestones have been reached. The only issue that mom and baby had was with breastfeeding and colic. Douglas had a arid time lacking onto mom’s breast and because Douglas was a big baby, he required a lot of food. Mom tried to pump her breast but could not keep up on the demands of her son. She had to put Douglas on formula and with her breast milk she would put some of it into the bottle with the formula.
Douglas was also a colicky baby. After trying out several formulas, per the doctor’s suggestion, she finally had to put him on soy formula. Mom started to put infant rice cereal in his bottle to help fill him up so he could be full and happy. Other than that, Douglas is a happy and healthy baby. Douglas is a DOD sleeper. He sleeps through the night now that mom puts rice cereal in his bottle at nighttime. Douglas usually goes to sleep around 7:30 p. M. And will wake up about 6:00 a. M. The nighttime routine is that Douglas likes to be rocked and held while falling sleeping. Mom or dad will take turns doing this.
This gives each parent an opportunity to spend quality time with his or her son. According to both parents, Douglas doesn’t have a preference as to who puts him to asleep. The parents will dim the lights and will put on some lullaby music from their Pod and will rock Douglas until he is sound asleep. This process can take up to 30 minutes but both mom and dad don’t mind because it’s just quality time that they each share with Douglas. In talking to mom and dad, the process is similar. While Douglas is drinking his bottle, mom / dad are looking at Douglas and he is usually looking at them.
Douglas will try to hold his bottle with his parents; sometimes he’ll be reaching up as if to touch his parents face. Mom has long hair so when her hair is out in front, Douglas will reach out and grab it to play with it. The interaction between parent and child is a strong attachment. Douglas is pretty good about going o sleep. He knows the routine and likes this time of night. Douglas feels very secure in his surroundings and has that trust in his parents. Douglas and his mom have a tight bond. When Douglas woke up from his morning nap, he woke up happy.
Since mom knew of his sleeping patterns, usually 2 hours, she knew that it was about that time for him to be waking up. We walked into the bedroom and he was staring up that the mobile smiling and cooing. Mom said, “Hello big boy” to him in a pleasant tone. Douglas began moving his arms and legs in excitement. She went to pick him up and he held up his arms waiting for the embracement from his mom. They hugged for a moment and then she placed Douglas on the changing TABLE to change his diaper. He was fully alert and happy and focusing on his mothers face.
He looked at me only for a moment and then looked back at his mom. This strong focus on his mom demonstrated that there is a strong emotional bond between them. This interaction plays into the Erosion’s theory of psychosocial development of trust versus mistrust. While mom was changing his diaper, she was singing the “Its, Bitsy Spider” song and using the hand gestures on him while tickling him. Douglas responded with laughter still focusing in on mom and watching the hand gestures as she would raise them up in the air to come down on his stomach to crawl up his stomach and tickle him again.
Douglas was aware of the motions and would be anxiously waiting for the delight of her ticking him. He seemed to really enjoy this interaction with mom. The stimulation interaction between Douglas and his mom presented to me that Douglas felt safe and secure with his mom and in his surroundings. This short interaction between mom and son demonstrated to me that mom and son seemed to be in tune with each there. They both treasured their time together and made the most of it. Douglas was familiar with the routine of having his diaper changed after waking up from his nap and mom singing the Spider song and playing.
This type of interaction is what Pigged speaks about, the “Seniority Substance 3: Secondary Circular Reaction”, in our textbook, Human Development, A Cultural Approach, Chapter 4, page 149. Douglas was excited when it was time to have his diaper changed and took delight in the song and tickle game being played over and over again. As mom picked up Douglas to take him onto the living room, dad laid out a blanket and laid him down on his back. While mom went to make lunch for Douglas, dad sat down on the blanket next to his son. Douglas looked at his dad, smiled and began to move his arms and legs with excitement.
Dad began playing with Douglas by showing him one of his favorite toys, a stuff doggy. Douglas was reaching out towards the dog while cooing but could not reach it. Dad would move the toy from one side to the other to get his son to follow the stuff dog before putting the stuff dog down. Douglas would follow the stuff dog but only for a short few seconds. Dad would bring the stuff dog back into Douglas’ view and would start the process again. Again, Douglas would follow the stuff dog for a few short second then would look back at dad at if waiting for the game to begin again.
I notice that during his short stimulation, this was something that dad and son did a lot of. It was enjoyTABLE for both of them. Douglas liked playing this game with his dad and would laugh and smile when the stuff dog was in his view. When dad went to hide the stuff dog, Douglas became very sad and began to cry a little. When dad would put the stuff dog back in Douglas view, Douglas would stop crying and would begin to smile and wait for the game to continue. This activity goes along with Piglet’s object permanence.
Pigged interrupts this as having only a moment of realizing that the object is no longer there. When dad was moving the stuff dog back and forth, Douglas only followed it for a brief moment as Pigged indicated in our textbook. Douglas was unaware that when the stuff dog was out of his sight that the stuff dog still existed. Since Douglas is a big baby, he actually has pretty good coordination of his body. For example, he can roll over, is starting the ginning stages of crawling, he can also sit up for about 10 minutes before falling overt the side.
Douglas is very strong for a baby of his age not to mention heavy. While dad continued to play with Douglas, he put the stuff dog next to him and began encouraging him to roll over and get it. With a few moves of turning right and left, Douglas quickly rolled over onto his stomach. Dad clapped his hands saying, ‘Yeah, you did it”. Douglas was now on his stomach with his head looking up to find the stuff dog. When he spotted the stuff dog that was next to him, he began to scoot on his stomach tit his hands to try to pull him up so he could put his legs underneath him.
After about 8 minutes of this and some frustrating cries, Douglas managed to prop himself up with his hands and was TABLE to get on all fours. Dad began cheering for his son again. With dad now laying down on the blanket, Douglas looked at dad and laughed as dad rubbed his back while telling him, “Good job”. Douglas kept looking at the stuff dog that was in one direction, and then looking over at dad who was in the other direction. While Douglas was on all fours he would rock back and forth as if getting ready to move award. This is all apart of the stages of learning to crawl in the large motor skills.
At this point in my observation, lunch was ready. Dad picked up Douglas and gave him a nice hug. Douglas snuggled into his dad’s arms as dad walked into the kitchen to put him into his high chair. My observation with this family was a good experience. I had spent about two hours with Paul and Lisa and was very pleased with what I saw and learned from Douglas. Paul and Lisa are very proud of their son and can’t wait for the next stages of his growth development. Paul says that Douglas keeps learning ewe things every day and he can’t believe how fast he is growing up.
They both want to provide a nice home for him and give him all of the opportunities in life that a child should have to learn, grow, and mature. In my observation, Douglas is a well-adjusted 6-month-old baby despite the hard pregnancy and the hard labor. He is happy, he laughs, he coos, he reaching, and he has good eye contact with both parents. He feels comforTABLE in his home and safe and even though I was a stranger in the house, he did not mind me being there. Douglas did not have any fear anxiety about me being there. In fact in one instant while mom was making lunch, dad had to use the restroom, was along with Douglas.
I played with Douglas and his stuff dog and he interacted with me as if he knew me. As long as I had the stuff dog, he was focused on me while making eye contact with me. In summing up my observation, felt this was a good family to observe. I learned several new things through my observation and was TABLE to see several of Pigged theories and the Erikson ‘s theories take place. Douglas seems to be growing and developing his gross motor skills at a steady rate. Paul and Lisa will have their hands full when Douglas starts railing which will begin any time now and when he starts walking.
Douglas seem eager to learn new skills, he is not a shy baby and loves interacting with his parents. Douglas is a social baby and right now does not mind strangers coming over to visit and play with him, although I’m sure in a few months that will all change. Thanked Paul and Lisa for allowing me to observe their son and for sharing their pregnancy story with me. I grabbed my things, held Douglas in my arms for a few moments to say my goodbyes to him.
