Sunday, December 28, 2008

What is this?

Nic's new scary trick is to hold his breath when crying. He has held it so long that he has passed out; four times now! This is so freaking scary, I can't even explain. We've looked up things on line about this and it sounds like something that many people have experienced with their children, but I'm not sure that gives me much comfort. We see Nic's doctor on Friday, so we'll see what she says.

Anyone ever experienced this before?

4 comments:

Pat and Peggy said...

My brother Tom did that when he was a baby (he's 54), scared my parents to death. After a couple of emergency room visits, a doctor recommended to my parents that they toss cold water in Tom's face when he started holding his breath. It cured him of that behavior. Hope Nic's problem is as simple as this.

FDR said...

None of our kids exhibited this but there are plenty of people have made comments on the subject on parent-oriented sites found through Google Groups. Some found success with blowing onto the face or the cold water splash; others say the best strategy is to keep cool, ignore the behavior and make sure the infant won't hurt himself if he passes out. Most agree that once the baby faints, normal breathing resumes. In any case, it must be a scary experience to see Nic do this, We hope he grows out of it ASAP.

Jessica said...

holy crap that IS scary!

Anonymous said...

One of my children did this, usually without warning when he was angry..... he was about 12 months old at the time. Our doctor recommended that we ignore him and walk out of the room. Very difficult for a caring Mom to do, but it worked! He wanted an audience to witness his temper. Good luck with discovering what is setting off your little guy...... it's tough to be a parent.