Your newborn seems to cry more each week. You’re doing everything right. Your pediatrician explains this is colic, a normal phenomenon that affects babies…. Now what?
Dr. Harry Pellman is a pediatrician at Edinger Pediatrics, the Fountain Valley pediatric practice that is part of Rady Children’s Health Primary Care Network, and a clinical professor of pediatrics at University of California, Irvine. He has spent decades reassuring worried parents about one of the most misunderstood phases of early infancy: colic.
Who gets colic?
All babies are at equal risk of developing colic, no matter their temperament, sex, or background. It typically begins around 2 to 3 weeks of age, when crying starts ramping up week by week. It peaks somewhere around 8 or 9 weeks, then slowly eases. By 3 or 4 months, it is usually gone for good.
What is colic?
When this intense, excessive crying is labeled “colic,” it means there is no underlying medical condition, disease, or injury causing it. What we call colic is best explained by the fact that different areas of the brain develop at different times. The areas that stimulate a baby develop before the areas that calm one down.
Dr. Pellman points to landmark studies from the 1970s by Dr. Arthur H. Parmelee, Jr., a developmental pediatrician at UCLA, as part of this theory.
Dr. Parmelee spent enormous amounts of time watching babies in their first four months, observing how they behaved awake and asleep and how their sleep changed as they grew. He also examined the brains of babies who have died from trauma. He found that starting around 2 to 3 weeks of age, babies develop a powerful new ability to feel, see, and hear. Increasing brain sensory input and increased stimulation comes pouring in every day.
The problem is the part of the nervous system that quiets all that input does not begin developing until around 2 months.
“Colic is a mismatch between the ever increasing information stimulating the brain and body and the development of areas of the brain that quiet that stimulation,” Dr. Pellman explains.
Think of how, as an adult, you can let people walk past you, ignore a light switching on, or tune out sounds outside. Those things register as minor nuisances at most. A newborn cannot do that yet. Everything lands at full volume with no way to turn it down.
Dr. Pellman explains that one of the clearest ways to picture this comes from the renowned developmental pediatrician T. Berry Brazelton, who compared colic to a volcano. In the first weeks of life, all that incoming stimulation builds like pressure under the surface, with no way to release it.
Eventually it erupts into a hard crying spell. It gets loud, the baby is clearly uncomfortable, and sometimes they cry so hard they wear themselves out and fall asleep, which lets off a little pressure for a while. Until around 2 months, though, the buildup just keeps coming. Once the inhibitory nervous system, the part that allows the calming part of the brain to develop, kicks in, the pressure buildup in the volcano slowly lessens and those eruptions finally start to settle.
Why does nature do this to babies and parents?
Historically, it has helped keep babies safe. Colic is not unique to humans. Every mammal infant goes through a version of it, which suggests it serves a purpose.
One leading theory is that in a far more dangerous past, a newborn who could not quiet down and cried insistently was harder for a busy parent to ignore and overlook when they were the most vulnerable, thus protecting against predators and making sure they were fed and taken care of. Other theories include it increases lung capacity and motor activity, generates heat and improves temperature regulation, and triggers more contact to increase social attachment.
Why does my baby cry more than my friend’s baby?
At least two things shape how intensely some babies become fussy and cry. The first is temperament.
“All babies are born with a certain temperament, and that temperament stays with them the rest of their life,” Dr. Pellman says.
A baby with a more intense temperament will cry harder and louder at the very same level of discomfort that a mellow baby might shrug off. The second factor is your baby’s environment. Loud music, bright lights, a busy household, or lots of movement all give a baby’s brain more stimulation, with no way yet to filter it out.
When will my baby’s colic phase end?
Relief arrives on its own timeline. Dr. Pellman explains that around 2 months, the calming part of the brain, the inhibitory nervous system, starts to develop, and by 4 months it has typically caught up with the stimulating part. For most babies, colic resolves by 3 or 4 months, though it can take until 6 months in some cases.
When to check with your pediatrician
Trust your instincts if something changes fast. A sudden, dramatic shift from your baby’s normal personality is your signal to call the pediatrician, because that can point to a medical cause rather than normal developmental colic.
Dr. Pellman lists a couple of common culprits. Babies have sharp little nails and rub their eyes, and they can scratch their cornea, which hurts and often comes with a watery, closed-up eye. A groin hernia that gets stuck is another source of sudden, serious pain.
When the crying is new and out of character, let your pediatrician take a look.
What can I do in the meantime?
Dr. Pellman suggests that in order to soothe your colicky baby, start with your mindset. Knowing this is a normal, temporary phase that nature built on purpose makes the hard evenings easier to weather. From there, the goal is to turn down input: keep lighting soft, play gentle music, and rock your baby slowly.
White noise helps by masking other sounds so they do not stimulate the brain as much. Motion works too, which is why a car ride often settles a screaming baby, combining soft sound with gentle movement.
Don’t forget the basics. Make sure your baby has a full belly, a clean diaper, and skin free of irritation, then keep stimulation as low as you can.
“Try to get the stimulation down to as little as possible,” Dr. Pellman says. “Make sure they’re fed. Make sure their diapers are changed. If there are sores, try to help them heal.”
If the crying is stressing you more than expected, please ask for help or have your child seen.
Above all, keep the bigger picture in view. Colic is a normal phase your baby is built to grow out of, usually by 3 or 4 months. The hard evenings are real, and getting through them typically does not mean anything is wrong with your baby or with you.
Learn more about possible causes of colic and how to soothe it in our blog, Colic in babies: Tips for soothing your child from a pediatrician.
For after-hours question about colic, call 1-844-GET-CHOC
