Your Child Now Will Often Cling To You In Unfamiliar Situations

Your baby most likely experiencing separation and stranger anxiety, a normal phase that most babies go through toward the end of their first year.

At this stage, as much as he was enjoying his newfound ability to move around without your help, mentally and emotionally he was still very independent on you and his dad. Raising a strong, confident and self-sufficient child won’t happen in a day, of course, or even in a few months. But forming a strong bond of trust with your baby makes you the perfect coach to ease him through his natural fear of separation. It may seem a bit hard at first, but soon you will find opportunities every day to help your little one becomes his own person.

 

Some babies are more sensitive to separation than others, it is a matter of temperament. Laid-back babies seem to play alone more easily and warm up strangers more quickly, while babies with more intense personalities seem to cling longer and separate more slowly. All you can do is pay attention to how your baby react to new situations and respond appropriately.

 

You must be holding him because he is slow to warm up to strangers, he is not slow to warm up because you hold him. A strong attachment figure, can give baby the confidence to explore further. As soon as he becomes comfortable on one level, he moves to the next. Step by step he will climb each rung toward independence, checking to be sure, that you are right there holding the ladder.