Infant Colic - Stop the Crying
Your baby may be one of the estimated 25% of infants that face excessive crying bouts known as colic. The constant crying leaves caring parents feeling dismissed when well-meaning friends or the pediatrician will comment, “She’ll grow out of it.” Yet new insights into colic’s causes are emerging, along with effective solutions to help your baby and whole family regain peace.
This article dives into the latest perspectives on what’s behind colic, its impact, and most importantly, how new approaches address the root issues through gentle chiropractic care. Read on for hope and answers to end the exhaustion and distress colic creates.
What is Colic in Babies?
Colic is defined as intense, repeated crying in babies that:
Lasts over 3 hours per day
Occurs more than 3 days per week
Continues for over 3 weeks
Resists soothing techniques
These prolonged crying bouts exceed what’s considered normal fussiness. And they’re distinct from tears due to immediate needs like hunger or a soiled diaper.
Babies often arch their backs, clench their fists, and bear down during colic episodes. This suggests acute discomfort, and the tension in their neck and arching of their back is a clear indicator of where the root cause of the stress and dysfunction often lies. The main area of dysfunction is not just in their digestion but in their neck, spine, and nervous system. The crying usually peaks in the evening, disrupting the baby’s sleep and pushing parents to their wits end.
Colic Baby Symptoms
Crying in a high-pitched and inconsolable manner
Tensing the back, legs, and belly
Clenching fists and facial flushing
Having trouble sleeping and feeding
Finding temporary relief from crying after passing gas or pooping
Being fussy during the late afternoon or evening
Refusing to calm down even after trying everything.
You may also notice your baby showing colic symptoms and struggles with other parasympathetic nervous system and vagus nerve functions like digestion, sleep quality, skin appearance and immunity. So, issues like reflux, constipation, eczema, and frequent illnesses often accompany the intense crying. Put simply, most often a colicky baby does not “grow out of” their challenges but “grows into” other challenges as the stress of colic morphs into something new.
The nonstop crying impacts child development and family life. Yet despite affecting up to 72% of babies at some point, conventional medicine claims the causes “remain unknown” and suggests just waiting it out.
If your baby shows these colic patterns, don’t brush them off. Promptly identifying these colic baby symptoms based on the specifics above allows corrective care to relieve the discomfort quickly.
The Real Impact of Colic
Did you know that the constant crying of colicky babies can have serious consequences? It can cause disruptions that can hinder the baby’s development and make life tough for the whole family. It’s important to understand the impact of colic so we can find solutions that work.
For babies, the constant distress and lack of sleep can lead to challenges that might impact their overall growth, brain development, and bonding with their caregivers. This can cause issues down the line, like poor self-soothing, developmental delays or learning delays.
Colic can also make feeding difficult, impacting the baby’s nutrition and immune system. And it’s not just the baby who suffers—everyone in the family, from the parents to the siblings, can feel the effects of constant crying and stress of a colicky baby. Coping with the lack of sleep and financial burdens from endless crying can make everyone feel stressed out.
In some cases, colic can even lead to more serious issues like shaken baby syndrome or postpartum mood disorders. Therefore, it’s crucial to find solutions that can help ease the suffering of both baby and parents.
Even if it’s just a mild case of colic, finding ways to help make life a little easier for everyone involved is worth it.
Why Colic Is Not “Normal” Crying
Conventional medicine normalizes colic as just temporary crying babies outgrow. However, emerging insights dispute this notion. New evidence reveals colic is not normal but instead signifies:
Digestive dysfunction from an early neurological imbalance
An urgent cue signaling a baby’s overwhelmed, stressed system
Risk of future issues if the underlying dysfunction remains
Simply waiting it out neglects underlying causes. There is a reason for your baby’s excessive crying. Early correction of neurological dysfunction and dysregulation restores comfort and development. Prioritizing colic education and solutions prevents much distress for your baby and everyone involved.
Common Misconceptions About Colic
The traditional medical model blames colic on issues like gas pains or food sensitivities. These explanations fall short and lead to limited solutions:
Myth: It’s just normal crying that resolves on its own.
Truth: It indicates neurophysiological dysfunction that can progress to chronic problems.
Myth: Colic is caused solely by gas or food intolerances.
Truth: These result from more primary neurological imbalances.
Myth: Formula changes and probiotics cure colic.
Truth: They offer only a partial remedy but don’t address root dysfunction.
Myth: Eliminating milk products always helps.
Truth: True dairy or lactose intolerance is rare, and even when present, there is a root cause to the intolerance itself.
Myth: Colicky babies just need to pass gas.
Truth: They don’t produce more gas than typical infants.
Myth: Only time will improve colic.
Truth: Gentle restoration of nervous system balance often brings lasting relief.
While intestinal issues play a secondary role, they stem from deeper neurological causes. To end the distress, we must address the roots.
The Colic “Perfect Storm” Sequence
Recent research has uncovered a series of events that are responsible for colic’s excessive crying and digestive issues. These events are called the “Perfect Storm”, and they occur in the following sequence:
Phase 1 – Maternal and Fetal Stress: Emotional, inflammatory, or traumatic stress faced by the mother passes to the developing brain and nerves of the baby, which can alter neurological development and function.
Phase 2 – Birth Trauma: Interventions like c-sections, vacuum/forceps delivery, or difficult labor create neurological interference in baby’s head & neck, which leads to sympathetic (stress) dominance and vagus nerve dysfunction.
Phase 3 – Nervous System Imbalance: Excessive stress overwhelms the nervous system and triggers a fight-or-flight reaction instead of rest and digest activation, causing the baby to struggle with reflexive functions like feeding, sleeping, and soothing.
Phase 4 – Colic Symptoms Emerge: The baby develops intense cries as an attempt to calm nervous system as well as signal that something is going wrong underneath the surface.
The Perfect Storm model explains how this cascade of events leads to signs of colic. To reverse the dysfunction, it’s important to restore proper nervous system function.
How Neurological Interference Disrupts Your Baby’s Nervous System
Connecting colic’s neurological dysfunction requires examining neurological interference. Neurospinal tension, misalignments, and dysfunction like these disrupt vital communication.
Diving deeper into the connections between birth interventions or injuries and neurospinal function, we must discuss the role the vagus nerve plays in colic baby symptoms. The vagus nerve is perhaps the most important nerve in the entire body, and it’s actually a cranial nerve, meaning it originates and branches from the delicate brainstem and upper neck area.
The location of the vagus nerve makes it especially susceptible to birth intervention and injury via things like forceps or vacuum extraction, c-section, induction, long labor, etc. The vagus nerve is quite sensitive to inflammation and other forms of irritation.
Since the vagus nerve is known as the “rest, regulation, and digestion” nerve – when it’s disrupted and dysfunctional, the symptoms of colic set in, with things like sleep, digestion, and self-soothing immediately affected.
The All Natural Approach for Colic: Neurologically-Focused Chiropractic Care
Neurologically-Focused Chiropractic Care is a specific type of care that can help babies who suffer from colic. The real key to lasting relief is addressing the root cause or neurological dysfunction, not just looking to cover up symptoms (traditional medical approach) or just change the diet and add supplements (natural or nutritional approach).
At Pure Light, we have helped countless babies transition from excessive amounts of colicky crying back into calm, happy, and able to sooth babies. With consistent chiropractic care, the colic disappears, and these babies and their families find balance that they so desperately need.