Birth to 1 month
The first month: welcome to the world
Feeding, sleeping and getting to know each other fill these first weeks.
Your newborn is adjusting to life outside the womb: eating often, sleeping in short stretches and learning your voice and smell. Most of what you do now – feeding, holding, talking – is exactly what your baby needs.
Growth
Weight
Birth 2.5–4.3 kg; about 3.4–5.1 kg by one month
Length
Birth 46–53 cm; about 51–57 cm by one month
Babies lose up to 7–10% of their birth weight in the first days and are usually back to it by day 10–14. These are typical ranges; your paediatrician tracks your baby on a growth chart.
What your baby is learning
- Newborn reflexes are strong: rooting and sucking when the cheek is touched, gripping a finger placed in the palm, and startling (the Moro reflex) at a sudden noise.
- Many babies can focus on a face about 20–30 cm away – roughly the distance to your face during a feed – and prefer faces to anything else.
- Your baby already knows your voice from pregnancy and may quieten or turn towards it.
- Movements are jerky, arms and legs stay tucked in, and the head needs full support whenever you lift your baby.
- Crying is the main way of communicating: hunger, a wet nappy, cold, too much noise or simply a wish to be held.
Feeding
- WHO recommends exclusive breastfeeding until 6 months. Feed on demand, usually 8–12 times in 24 hours including at night; frequent feeds are what build your milk supply.
- Signs your baby is getting enough: 6 or more wet nappies a day after day 5, soft yellow stools, steady weight gain and a baby who is content for a while after most feeds.
- If formula is used, prepare it exactly as the packaging says with water that has been boiled and cooled to no less than 70 °C, make a fresh bottle for each feed and throw away leftovers.
- Babies under 6 months need no water, tea, sugar water or honey – honey can cause infant botulism.
- Vitamin D drops (400 IU a day) are commonly prescribed from the first weeks of life; ask your paediatrician at the first visit. If you are breastfeeding, keep taking potassium iodide 200 µg daily, as in pregnancy.
Sleep
Newborns sleep 14–17 hours in 24, in stretches of 2–4 hours, with no sense of day and night yet. For every sleep put your baby on the back on a firm, flat surface in your room – a cot, a bassinet or a beshik – with no pillows, blankets, bumpers or soft toys, and never on a sofa or armchair with an adult. Dress your baby in one more layer than you wear and do not cover the head indoors. If you use a beshik, keep the baby on the back, avoid tight swaddling that stops the hips moving freely, and never leave a strapped-in baby unattended.
Check-ups and vaccines
- In the maternity hospital your baby receives the first hepatitis B vaccine (HepB-1) within 24 hours of birth and the BCG vaccine against tuberculosis on days 2–5. A small sore at the BCG site that appears after 4–6 weeks is normal.
- Before discharge a heel-prick blood test screens for phenylketonuria and congenital hypothyroidism, and hearing is checked. You will be contacted if a repeat test is needed.
- A patronage nurse or paediatrician from your polyclinic visits in the first days after discharge and again through the first month: weight, feeding, the umbilical stump, skin and your own recovery are checked. Register your baby at the polyclinic in these first weeks.
- Keep the umbilical stump clean and dry and fold the nappy below it; it usually falls off within 1–2 weeks. Redness spreading onto the skin, pus or a bad smell needs a doctor.
- Mild yellowing of the skin from day 2–3 is common and usually clears within two weeks; your nurse will check it. Jaundice in the first 24 hours or deepening yellow needs a same-day review.
Play and everyday tips
- Hold your baby skin-to-skin as often as you like: it steadies breathing and temperature, helps breastfeeding and comforts you both.
- Talk, sing and hum through the day – while changing a nappy, feeding, walking around the room. Your face and voice are the best toy there is.
- Start tummy time in the first week: 1–2 minutes a few times a day on your chest or a firm surface while your baby is awake and you are watching.
- Show black-and-white or high-contrast pictures at 20–30 cm; newborns see sharp contrast best.
- No screens for children under 2 years (WHO) – not even in the background during feeds.
Call the doctor or 103 if
- A temperature of 38 °C or higher, or below 36 °C, in a baby under 3 months is an emergency: call 103 or go to the hospital immediately.
- Breathing difficulty: grunting, nostrils flaring, the chest pulling in, pauses in breathing or blue lips.
- Refusing two feeds in a row, very sleepy and hard to wake, floppy or unusually stiff, or an inconsolable high-pitched cry.
- Fewer than 6 wet nappies a day after day 5, dark urine, a sunken soft spot or a dry mouth.
- Yellow skin in the first 24 hours, yellow spreading to the arms and legs or lasting beyond two weeks, or very pale, chalky stools.
- A bulging soft spot, repeated vomiting (especially green), blood in the stool, or redness and pus around the umbilical stump.
- If you see any of these, call 103 or go to the polyclinic or hospital without waiting for the next appointment.
Trust your instinct. If your baby seems unwell to you, call 103 or go to the polyclinic.
Monthly updates in Telegram
Tell the bot your baby's birth date and it will send a development digest every month, with the vaccines due next.
- ✓A short digest every new week
- ✓Countdown to your due date
- ✓Reminders about upcoming checkups
- ✓Kick counter and contraction timer