At ii weeks sometime, your infant will probably hit the beginning of many growth spurts, so become ready for a more demanding, hungrier, withal still adorable newborn.

If yous're having any trouble feeding baby or keeping up with his seemingly clamorous appetite, check in with your pediatrician. And if infant doesn't seem to be getting enough milk, talk to the doctor nearly what to do and then likewise.

Infant's sleep is even so bound to be pretty erratic at this early stage, then try to pace yourself, rest when you can and ask for assist where yous can get information technology. Only call up to have care of yourself besides, as you're however in recovery and adjustment fashion.

Here's what else to expect from your 2-week-one-time babe.

Your 2-calendar week-old baby'southward development

At a Glance

Sleeping basics

Newborns upwardly to three or 4 months quondam demand 14 to 17 hours of sleep in a 24-hour period, usually waking every ii to 4 hours to eat.

Feeding nuts

Breastfed babies should eat as much every bit they desire at this age, but a general rule of thumb is roughly 16 to 24 ounces of breast milk or formula in 24 hours.

Did you know?

About lighter-skinned babies are born with nighttime bluish or slate-colored eyes, and most darker-skinned babies go far with nighttime brown eyes.

It may non seem similar your baby is doing much of anything these days — besides eating, sleeping and pooping.

Simply he'southward actually using his infant brain plenty, cycling betwixt intently watching his surround, moving around and spending time in a drowsy phase, when infant's either well-nigh to autumn asleep or just waking up.

Watch carefully, and over fourth dimension you'll be able to respond to your baby's unlike states of mind.

Though your baby seems like a helpless newborn, he's making lots of developmental strides this week, including beingness able to focus on a face with his sweetness little eyes.

And speaking of those eyes, information technology's too early to know for sure what colour they'll terminate up being. A baby's true eye colour doesn't usually make itself fully known until somewhere between six and 9 months, and can keep changing until as late every bit his third birthday.

Your 2-week-quondam baby'south growth

You tin start posting those weight-gain bulletins first this week.

Most babies will take regained or surpassed their nativity weight by 10 to 14 days of life, thanks to all the feeding they're doing — whether that nutrition comes from the breast or the bottle.

Some babies who become off to a slow start in the breastfeeding department may accept a footling longer to put on the pounds, just every bit long as your baby'due south doctor isn't worried, y'all shouldn't be either.

Just make sure you're feeding your little i every two to three hours, counting from the outset of one feed to the outset of the next.

Your 2-calendar week-onetime babe's wellness

At that place are no well-baby visits or shots this week (hurray!), but there'due south yet plenty to know about your little one'south health.

Average newborn weight

There'southward a wide range of salubrious weights when it comes to newborns, only in general, babies born full-term tend to counterbalance between 5 pounds 11.5 oz, and viii pounds, 5.75 oz. Read More

Circumcision care

If your infant boy has been circumcised, it commonly takes almost seven to x days to heal. Gently clean the area during each diaper change using warm water. Read More

Cantankerous-eyed baby

Newborns' eyes often look every bit if they're crossed, in part because they're born with extra peel folds in the inner corners and in part because they don't have full muscle command yet. Read More

Umbilical cord infections

While rare, an infection of the umbilical cord known as omphalitis needs medical attention. It normally appears after the umbilical string is cut or a few days later nascency. Read More

Postpartum & new baby tips

Low milk supply?

If you're breastfeeding, you may feel poor milk supply. Since adequate supply is fueled past adequate need, anything that hinders the latter can atomic number 82 to a problem.

Common culprits include:

  1. Supplementing. If y'all've added formula to the menu, your baby will take less milk from your breasts, which in plough will crusade your breasts to produce less milk.
  2. Exceptional feedings. Stretching out the time betwixt meals (to four hours, for instance) may be easier on a new mom, only it can hateful your breasts won't be stimulated often enough to produce an acceptable amount of milk.
  3. Short feedings. If yous cut nursing sessions brusk (five minutes on each chest, for instance), non merely won't your baby go the fattier (and virtually nutritious) hind milk, but your breasts won't exist sufficiently tuckered. And without sufficient emptying, they won't be stimulated to produce more than.
  4. Pacifiers. For some babies, time spent sucking on a pacifier means less time on or inclination for suckling on the breast, which ways less milk production.

Thumb-sucking babe

Information technology's perfectly natural for newborns to give thumb-sucking a big thumbs-upwards — for now. Hither's why:

  1. Babies are born to suck. Sucking is a normal reflex for babies. So it's definitely a skilful matter that your baby has figured it out.
  2. Sucking calms downwards your baby. Even when you've only finished feeding your infant, he might all the same clamor for more sucking action.That doesn't mean he's set up to chow down again. In add-on to suckling to fill their tummies, babies need "nonnutritive" sucking, the kind that mellows them out. It's the whole reason nosotros take pacifiers in the first place — sucking helps a infant calm down. Some babies, similar your own little thumb-sucker, love nonnutritive sucking more others.
  3. Thumbs are always at manus. There's a reason your babe's already going to town on his pollex: Like Mountain Everest, it was there. Of course, the offset few times were probably but accidental taste tests, merely when your baby figured out how comforting his thumb was, he soon found out how to become it into his mouth on purpose.

Abdominal or perineal pain?

While about of the initial intense discomfort normally passes within seven to 10 days postpartum, many women feel the lingering furnishings of childbirth for weeks after delivery.

You lot may find it uncomfortable to sit later on a vaginal birth or bend over after a C-section, for instance.

If you've had a vaginal birth, the unabridged perineal area and rectum will be swollen for a few weeks.

You can expect the site of any stitches (either from a perineal tear, episiotomy or C-section) to be sore and sensitive for about that long also. Itchiness around the stitches or scar is also mutual.

Bowel movements may be uncomfortable for a number of weeks, also, so be sure to drink lots of fluids and step upwardly the fiber in your nutrition so you won't have to strain. You might also want to inquire your practitioner about using a stool softener.

Your practitioner has probably put the brakes on intercourse until effectually six weeks postpartum. Only while you're waiting for the green calorie-free to get busy, effort to put that fourth dimension — and your pelvic muscles — to practiced utilise.

Resume Kegel exercises to stimulate apportionment, speed healing and restore good musculus tone. This manner, when you do take sexual activity once more, you'll bask information technology more — though probably non right abroad.

Most of all, relax and give yourself time to heal. Full recovery won't occur overnight, but it will happen eventually.

Infant's soft spots

At that place are actually two on your baby'southward head, and they are technically called fontanelles.

Baby's soft spots serve 2 important purposes: First, they helped your babe's skull to shift and mold and so information technology could fit through the birth canal (thank goodness), and second, they allow room for your infant'south brain to grow (very!) chop-chop during the commencement twelvemonth.

The larger and more prominent soft spot, the inductive fontanelle, is on top of your newborn's caput. It'south shaped similar a diamond and tin can be upward to 2 inches across. It'll start to shut when your baby is about vi months old and be completely closed by 24 months.

The second, or posterior, fontanelle is much smaller and harder to discover. It's on the back of the head, triangular in shape and simply about a one-half-inch in diameter.

While protecting your baby's head (no bouncing or shaking) is wise, the good news is that information technology's much less fragile than information technology seems.

Those soft spots are covered past potent membranes that do an splendid job of safeguarding the brain. Ii (rare) signs of trouble: A depressed fontanel could be a symptom of dehydration, and a constantly jutting one could signal pressure on the brain. In either case, contact your baby's doctor.

Bottle-feeding tips

If yous're formula-feeding or pumping, go along in mind that when introducing the canteen, some babies accept to it like a fish to water, while others demand a piffling more practise  —and coaxing — to get sucking downwardly to a science.

These how-to-bottle-feed tips will assist you get started:

  1. Take several bottles at the ready in your refrigerator so your hungry love doesn't get his crank on waiting for supper.
  2. Sterilize nipples and bottles the first time out. New bottle-feeding gear should be boiled for five minutes in a pot of h2o (or use a store-bought sterilizer). After that, just wash bottles and nipples in hot, soapy water or in the dishwasher. You lot may demand to sterilize them more frequently if your baby was born prematurely, has an allowed organization disorder or has been sick.
  3. Savor the bonding experience. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise — you can absolutely bail while bottle-feeding, with enough of cooing and skin-to-skin contact.

Consume nuts for energy

Chances are you're often exhausted these days, so noshing on nuts will give you lot a quick burst of energy. The protein, cobweb and healthy fats packed into these niggling shells brand them fantastic fatigue-fighters.

They're a bit on the loftier-calorie side, though, and then stick to a tertiary of a cup or an ounce-and-a-half per serving. And reach for walnuts, almonds, cashews or pistachios because they take a healthier fat profile than, say, macadamias or pecans.

Swallow them out of your hand or spread two tablespoons of peanut, cashew or almond butter on a slice of whole wheat toast for an extra energy heave.

Acquisition postpartum constipation

Blocked up? Try these tips for postpartum constipation:

  1. Swallow high-cobweb grains. Opt for whole grain cereals, breads, brown rice and annihilation made with bran, oat bran or flaxseed.
  2. Make a date with raisins, figs, stale apricots and prunes. Toss your dried fruit with nuts for a practiced boost of omega-3s — and some extra constipation-fighting muscle.
  3. Nibble on crunchy fresh fruits and vegetables, and rough things up fifty-fifty more by leaving the skins on.
  4. Cook up a pot of legumes, such as lentils or blackness beans, and add them to soups, salsas or salads.
  5. Avoid refined foods such equally white rice and white bread, and get for the (whole) grain instead.
  6. Drink at least eight spectacles of water a 24-hour interval. Zero unclogs like fluids, so make sure yous're getting enough.Some women find a cup of hot h2o flavored with lemon especially moving (try information technology start thing in the morning). Vegetable and fruit juices tin assist, too — especially clip juice.
  7. Consider a fiber supplement. If none of the to a higher place tricks are working (or working well), ask your medico about taking some extra fiber. Adding straight-upward wheat bran and/or psyllium tin requite your diet the bulk it needs. Just don't overdo it, and don't take your calcium foods with them since they can block absorption of that vital bone-edifice mineral.

From the What to Expect editorial team and Heidi Murkoff, author ofWhat to Look When You're Expecting. What to Wait follows strict reporting guidelines and uses but credible sources, such equally peer-reviewed studies, academic inquiry institutions and highly respected wellness organizations. Learn how we continue our content accurate and up-to-date by reading our medical review and editorial policy.

  • What to Expect the First Year, 3rd edition, Heidi Murkoff.
  • WhatToExpect.com, Your Newborn's Weight: Normal Gains and Losses and What the Average Baby Weighs, August 2020.
  • WhatToExpect.com, Infant's Eye Color, May 2020.
  • WhatToExpect.com, Vitamin D for Babies, October 2020.
  • WhatToExpect.com, Cross-Eyed Babe, March 2020.
  • WhatToExpect.com, Newborn Circumcision Care, Dec 2018.
  • WhatToExpect.com, Safe Sleep Tips for Babies, February 2020.
  • WhatToExpect.com, How to Treat Omphalitis in Newborn Babies, November 2020.
  • WhatToExpect.com, How Much Should Babe Eat?, Apr 2020.
  • WhatToExpect.com, Here's How Much Sleep Babies Need, June 2020.
  • WhatToExpect.com, Newborn and Baby Sleep Basics, May 2020.
  • American Academy of Pediatrics, States of Consciousness in Newborns, November 2009.
  • American Academy of Pediatrics, First Month: Physical Appearance and Growth, August 2009.
  • American Academy of Pediatrics, Vitamin D and Iron Supplements for Babies, May 2016.
  • American Academy of Pediatrics, Newborn Eye Color, June 2020.

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