Signs you are not bonding with your Baby Why aren’t I bonding with my baby?

Being a parent is never easy, especially if you are a first-time mother or a father. Everything will seem new and will take time to get used to. Searching for signs you are not bonding with your baby will be really tough.

Bonding is a slow process, it would not happen at the speed that you expect. Sometimes parents can rush in and fall in love with their child instantly, sometimes it might take a few weeks even months to form that close relationship that would last a lifetime.

There are various reasons that would delay the bonding between you and your baby and those reasons are specific to each parent. It has been estimated that over 22% of the new parents do not bond with their child immediately and do not show any attachment for a long period of time.

If you are scared that you are not bonding with your baby or if you are searching for signs you are not bonding with your baby, first of all, relax. Bonding is a slow process and everything about parenthood is new to every person and unique to every parent. You are not lagging behind nor are you jumping ahead.

First, we will take a look at all the reasons parents bond with their Baby

Why do parents bond with their Baby?

Before we go and look into signs you are not bonding with your baby, we will see why parents bond with their babies. Parents are the primary caregivers of the baby and it is quite natural for them to bond with the baby. Parents love to connect to their babies because of their natural instinct. Baby’s bond with their parents due to feeling of securement and their need to feel loved. Baby is the newest addition to the family so it is natural that every parent feels the need to bond with their baby at first sight.

But sometimes all these reasons why the parents should bond with their baby can be overridden by other factors.

How the Baby-Parent bond is created?

You would have seen how the parents just scoop up their bundle of joy and instantly fall in love. Those scenarios are not limited to movies but happen in real life also. Yes, parents do fall in love immediately and the baby will also bond with them instantly.

If not seeing your baby for the first time, touching the baby, caressing the baby will develop your bond. Most mothers feel that nursing and breastfeeding the baby creates a strong bond between them. Taking care of them, putting them to sleep, playing with the baby, and even burping your small one will create a warm bonding between the parent and the baby.

Sometimes the mothers bond really well and instantly while the fathers take some time to bond with their baby. This can happen as the mothers are the primary caregivers and the fathers usually take a backseat when it comes to newborn babies. But changing their diaper, making eye contact with them, and trying to soothe them from a bad fright or a bad experience can pave the path for the fathers to bond with the baby.

Reasons for not bonding with the baby

Now we have come to a major part of our main topic. There should be reasons why you are unable to bond with your baby. Of course, some people can have several of these reasons while others have none but are still unable to bond with their baby.

• Alienated from the baby – You as a new mother or father can feel like the baby is a foreign interference that was not there earlier. This feeling can be sharpened if the baby had been in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) for some period of time due to premature birth. The parents may feel like they are not really connected to the baby.

• Shock and Exhaustion – Child birth is no easy task whether it is a natural birth or c-section. The shock and exhaustion that comes after a child birth can take the toll on you and can cause the bonding to form later.

• Postpartum Depression – Most mothers go through postpartum depression even if they are not aware of it. In this case the mother will feel distanced from the baby, angry with the baby and sometimes feel jealous of the baby.

• The bond between two parents is very important to the bond between the baby and the parents. If you have a strained relationship with your partner then that will definitely affect your bonding with the baby.

• Body changes that occur after the birth and the hormonal changes that occur after the birth can make the mother feel angry towards the baby which will harm their bond

• Previous loss of a child – If the parents have gone through miscarriage, still birth or loss of a child, that would cause the bonding between the parent and the child to rupture or it will take time to build up the bond with the baby.

• Parent’s childhood memory – Some parents have bad experience with their parents and that can affect negatively on their bond with the baby.

• No support system – Having zero support from anyone and having to manage everything alone can make the parent exhausted and overwhelmed and will harm the development of the bond between the parent and the baby.

• Depression/Mental illness – Depression or Mental illness of the parent can definitely affect their perspective of the baby. The baby can be seen as a burden or a threat if they have been suffering from mental illnesses for a long period of time.

• Lot of care-givers – some households have a lot of people to take care of the baby and this will make the baby confused as the baby won’t be able to identify the primary caregivers and will not be able to bond with them properly.

All these reasons and more will pave the path for our main topic; signs you are not bonding with your baby. Let’s look into all the signs pointing to why you are not bonding with your baby.

Signs you are not bonding with your baby

Now let’s go to our main topic, what are the signs that you are not bonding with your baby or your baby not bonding with you. Well, there are quite a lot of signs, some not as prominent as the others. We have tried to cover up most of the common signs of the baby not bonding with you but of course, there can be some unique signs as well.

1. You don’t feel like breast-feeding

Bonding with the baby is most important to the mothers. If you feel like not feeding or nursing your child then that is a major sign of lack of bonding. There can be reasons such as depression, shock, or postpartum depression behind your reluctance to feed the baby and you should seek professional help in this type of situation. This is one of the first signs you are not bonding with your baby.

2. Difficult to maintain eye contact while breastfeeding – Mothers love to gaze into their baby’s eyes while they are breastfeeding and that plus the skin-to-skin contact will make your bond with the baby stronger. But if you feel like avoiding the baby’s eyes or looking away or your baby is avoiding your eyes then that bond will be affected.

3. Getting angry with the baby – Now don’t think others don’t get angry with their baby. We all arrive at that point eventually but if you feel like harming the baby or getting angry with the baby every time the baby cries or ask for you, then your bond is not formed properly

4. Doing baby’s chores will annoy you – Baby is a huge responsibility, there will be an endless number of tasks you have to struggle with every single minute of the day. Most mothers find it extremely exhausting but they comply anyway due to their love towards the baby. But if you feel constantly annoyed and feel like the baby is a burden then bond with your baby is weak.

5. Being afraid to pick the baby/touch the baby – Babies are small and fragile and it is completely fine for you to get scared to pick the baby up for the first time. But as time goes by you will be more confident with your baby and you will love to pick him or her up. If you still feel nervous after a few weeks’ time then bond with your baby is still at progress level.

6. Not affected by the baby’s crying – Most of the parental instincts kick in when you hear the baby cry. But if you are indifferent to the baby’s cries and show a deaf ear towards that then that would imply you have not bonded with your baby well. This is one of the major signs you are not bonding with your baby.

7. Oral aversion – This is more on your baby than you as some babies due to various reasons will reject breastfeeding. There can be various medical reasons such as mother’s milk not being enough, being in the neonatal care unit for a long time, being used to the formulas, etc. There can be psychological reasons also such as prenatal depression of the mother, the baby feeling distant from the mother and the bonding between the mother and the baby being broken or halted.

These are the signs you are not bonding with your baby. There might be loads of other signs that can be taken as signs you are not bonding with your baby. But the main thing now is not to worry about the signs you are not bonding with your baby. The best thing is to find how to bond with your baby and how to build that relationship with your baby.

How do I bond with the Baby?

The reason that you are searching for the signs that you are not bonding with your baby itself suggests that you want to bond with your baby and you are concerned that you are not bonding with your baby. You have to understand bonding with your baby is a natural but slow process. Most fathers find it difficult to bond with the baby than the mothers. You can think of the time you were pregnant and how you felt at the time and you can try to continue the bond you had at that time even after the baby is born.

Now if you are seeing familiar signs in the earlier topic and feeling helpless, you have to remember it is completely natural to show signs you are not bonding with your baby even though the bond is slowly developing. If you are feeling distant from the baby then you can talk openly to your partner, maybe they might be feeling the same way. Then both of you can discuss and come to a solution as to what you should bond with your baby.

Overworked parents will feel they are not bonding with the baby simply because they don’t have enough time to bond., So it is important to seek help from the grandparents or friends to ease the workload and relax a little with your baby.

Try to touch, caress, play or build eye contact with your baby. These activities will strengthen the baby’s trust in you and your affection towards the baby.

Conclusion

Every parenthood is different and every parent’s story is different.

Some will bond immediately with their baby while others will take time. The important thing is that you and your baby are physically and emotionally stable and healthy. A healthy parent will form a strong bond with the baby, so it is important to take care of yourself amidst everything that is going on in your life. Don’t worry about the signs you are not bonding with your baby. It can be for perfectly natural reasons.

Love yourself and you will be able to love your baby also. Bonding with your baby can take time sometimes and no amount of rushing or panicking will solve the problem.

So you can relax and try to work on the bond between you and your baby taking your own time.

Good Luck!!