Parenting Tip: Body autonomy

It's really important for us to respect our baby's body autonomy. What that means is that we're not moving them around and not telling them what's going on. We don't just sweep them up and put them on the changing table and change their diaper.

If there's a runny nose, you don’t just grab a tissue and wipe their face without asking permission or giving them a little heads up of what's happening. What we really want to make sure we do is let our babies know what we're doing to them. So when it's time to change a diaper, you say to them, even a tiny infant, “it's time to change your diaper”, and make eye contact with them. “I'm gonna put you up on the changing table. Now I'm gonna undo your diaper. Oh, it's clean you up.” And you narrate what you're doing while you're doing it.

So your baby starts to, A, attach language to these things that are happening to them. And B, the bigger issue is that your but your baby feels like they have some control over what's happening to their body, even if you're not actually asking permission. But you’re giving them a heads up on what's happening because it's their body, no one else’s. They’re not an inanimate object. They’re a person.

And the idea is as they grow older, they will continue to really know that they have say what happens to their bodies. That they get to be in control of their own bodies. And that's what we want for them as adults.