This isn’t to say you should ignore the advice of others. Sure, there is some wonderful wisdom that can be handed down from generation to generation, your friends may have made some excellent discoveries that could work wonders for you, and specialists have fantastic knowledge that they can impart. But it’s impossible to take every person’s advice.
Listening to your intuition allows you to decide which pieces of advice to act upon, and which to pass by.
WATCH your baby closely and learn their signals. They’re communicating with you long before they can talk, or even sign (I strongly recommend using sign language with your baby as it can make communicating and responding so much easier!). Even if something feels right for you, your baby may have other ideas. And babies are whole human beings with such enormous emotions and such incredible innate understanding of their own needs.
It’s so important to honour their communications and show them they matter, they are heard.
Whatever route you choose, it needs to work for YOU and YOUR BABY, not for those giving you advice. And if you can master the motherly art of listening to your baby and your intuition first, then you’ll soon find the strength and confidence to decline or ignore advice that doesn’t suit you, with grace.
Hayley Bukhamsin is founder of The Gentle Mama (www.thegentlemama.com, Instagram, Facebook). She is a certified Infant Sleep Educator, specialising in supporting parents to achieve healthier and happier sleep, balance for the whole family, and confidence in their instincts. Her primary motivation is to empower parents to cut through the clutter of confusing advice in order to listen to their own intuition and their babies’ communications.
Whilst Hayley’s clients come from all over the world, she currently lives with her husband and two daughters in Dubai, UAE. She earned a BA Hons degree from The University of Nottingham, UK, before starting a career in advertising. It wasn’t until the birth of her first daughter that she discovered her true passions: Attachment Parenting, Gentle Parenting and, above all, healthy infant sleep.
For the last 5 years, Hayley has pursued this passion actively, building an Attachment Parenting community within the UAE, blogging about her parenting experiences, founding The Gentle Mama and writing for national and international titles including The Natural Parent Magazine.
