Why I Heart Dr. Karp

I realized I never wrote the post I promised on why I heart Dr. Karp. Don't worry, my husband knows all about it. He hearts him, too.

Dr. Karp is the author of The Happiest Baby on the Block and The Happiest Toddler on the Block. The number of people (all of whom we trusted) who recommended these books to us before we had Eme made us very curious. Now that we've read and been using the information in them, we know what everyone was on about.

His theory is that the first three months are time when the baby is still developing as if it were in the womb, and what we think of as "colic" in babies who have no medical reason for it is just their shock at being out of the womb. He gives the 5 S solution. We discovered through trial and error that it worked very well when we followed the instructions. So well that we didn't wait until she was a toddler to run out and get the second book.

Dr. Karp's theory about toddlers is that they are like little cave people. When we try to talk to them like they are adults while they cry and scream, we can't possibly expect to get through to them. Rather, he says we should mirror our toddler's emotion, looking directly into her eyes, showing her that we understand that she is upset. Only once she sees we understand what she wants can we redirect her.

So far, this is also working very well with Eme. It's funny to see other people's reactions when we're out in public and we crouch down to Eme's eye level and say "Eme mad! Eme want to walk!" but she stops yelling. Then we can say "let's ride in the backpack!" or "here's a bunny cracker!" and she becomes much happier.

She's only a few months into toddlerhood, but we're excited about these tactics so far. We'll see how it goes as we continue to learn along with Eme while we help her learn how life works.

For all of these reasons, we heart Dr. Karp.