Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
Hi everyone, on today’s podcast, we’re going to talk with maternal child health advocate, Whitney Dula, about the benefits and practicalities of baby wearing. Welcome to the Evidence Based Birth® Podcast. My name is Rebecca Dekker and I’m a nurse with my PhD and the founder of Evidence Based Birth®. Join me each week as we work together to get evidence based information into the hands of families and professionals around the world. As a reminder, this information is not medical advice. See ebbirth.com/disclaimer for more details.Â
Hi everyone. Welcome to today’s episode of the Evidence Based Birth® Podcast. I have a quick question for you before we get started. Have you ever dreamed of becoming an Evidence Based Birth® instructor? Or, have you ever wished you could teach the EBB childbirth class to parents? Well, we only open applications to the EBB instructor program once per year and the application period for 2024 opens tomorrow, May 30, and closes on June 28. Our team will be hosting a live Q&A tomorrow if you want to learn more and this is going to be my final reminder on the podcast that if you want to apply to become an EBB instructor this year, then visit ebbirth.com/instructor today to get more info. Applications will not open again until the summer of 2025. So if this is something you’re interested in, take action. And with that, let’s get to today’s episode.Â
Today, I’m so excited to welcome Whitney Dula, spelled D-U-L-A, to the Evidence Based Birth® Podcast, where we’re gonna dive into baby wearing, which is a topic we have not really covered yet. So I’m so excited to introduce you to Whitney. Whitney is a native of Prince George’s County, Maryland, with a deep affinity for Old Bay and go-go music. Whitney currently owns the Mama’s Dula, spelled D-U-L-A, a lactation-focused postpartum care service based in Prince George’s County, Maryland. Whitney is also a public health-based international board-certified lactation consultant and health educator for the Babies Born Healthy program, which is part of Montgomery County’s Department of Health and Human Services. When Whitney is not working, you can find her serving her community with her various organizations, traveling with her family, or planning her next do-it-yourself adventure. Whitney, welcome to the Evidence Based Birth® Podcast.
Whitney Dula:
Hi, Dr. Dekker I’m excited to be here.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
And we are so excited to pick your brain about all things baby wearing, which is a topic near and dear to a lot of parents and birth workers’ hearts. But before we dive into all the details on baby wearing, can you just share a little bit about your personal journey and how you became passionate about this topic?
Whitney Dula:
Oh my goodness. So I actually got into baby wearing very loosely with my oldest. I have two daughters. And when I was pregnant with my oldest, you know, you sign up for all the registries and everyone’s telling you all of the things you need to have. And most people assumably think that you need a stroller and like a the carrier car seat. When we think of infant carriers, we think of the car seats. But I had gotten like an email about something with like a baby wrap. And so I was like, okay, whatever. So I signed up for it. I got the this cheap ring sling. And I think I had also signed up for like Zulily or something. And they had the ergo baby carriers on sale, which that’s a very popular carrier brand in most, uh, mid to higher end retailers. So I had got one of those, had no idea how to use either of them. But I did wear both my babies starting pretty early on. Matter of fact, I remember, I distinctly remember one of the first times I wore my baby, we flew to Texas. I didn’t feel like dealing with the stroller through the airport and then, you know, all of the carrying car seats and all the other stuff that comes with that. So I wore my newborn through the airport. And when you are typically wearing your babies, you don’t have to, like, you know, disrobe going through TSA, which is great. So we wore her through the airport and she slept through the whole flight and it was fine. And she got to meet all of her family out of state. And it was great. But with my oldest, we didn’t I didn’t do a lot of wraps. It was very intimidating to me. So we did a lot of the structured carriers, the ergo baby carriers. I had racked up like three or four by the time she was a toddler, but she loved it. So it was something that, you know, I think helped foster our bond as a mother and daughter. But when my youngest was born, I wanted to get a little bit more involved with the wrapping, I had been gifted a couple of them from some other moms I had met through mom groups and things like that. And so I was like, I got these things I need to learn how to use this. And then the pandemic hit. So my youngest was born in February of 2020. And she was six weeks old when we went into seclusion. So I had nothing to do but time to kill and practice. And that was how I really got into. I started looking into taking a class just to learn how to use the wraps I had. Stumbled upon a class to become an educator. And I was like, well, why not kill two birds with one stone with all this newfound free time I have? I was on maternity leave. And then when maternity leave was up, I had no job really to go back to at the time. Even with the health department, we were not seeing clients in person. So I was home with my kids. And that’s when I became an adjoined certified baby wearing educator.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
Interesting. Describe for me then what, were your baby’s reactions when you would put them in a wrap or a carrier? Like, did they not like it at first? Did they get used to it? Or did they instantly relax? Can you just talk a little bit about the baby’s reaction to it?
Whitney Dula:
So my baby’s loved it. The youngest one is upstairs now. And I’m pretty sure if I told her we would do uppies right now, she’d be like, okay. And my kids absolutely loved being worn. I have met babies that… can’t stand it. And there’s usually some underlying causes for that. But babies as a species, humans are a carrier species. Babies aren’t really born with functional legs. You know, they have to grow and develop to use them. They’re meant to be carried. So the more biological response is that babies will want to be held, that they want to be carried. That is the biological expectation to their brains. So my kids were totally fine. And a lot of times, you know, as they get older, they’ll be in this what we call like an up and down phase. Like they want to be up and then they see something that they want to do or they see something they want to chase. It’s kind of a little puppy and they want to get down. That’s where you have to kind of determine at what point, you know, what’s going to be the most useful for your life. Maybe wearing a wrap where you have to do a lot of tying and twisting, that’s not going to be the most ideal if you’ve got a toddler that wants to be up and down every 10 seconds. But my kids loved it.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
I think, you know, I was wondering if you could dive a little bit more into the benefits, because other than the babies loving it and wanting and it being kind of an instinctual thing and also a way to free up your arms as the caregiver while you’re carrying, what are some of the other benefits of baby wearing?
Whitney Dula:
I mean, you actually hit a couple of the biggest ones. Parents love getting their hands back, right? We, you know, especially as mothers, and I’m saying mothers as a general term, but as parents, as the primary parents specifically, you have a million and one things that you need to be doing during the day. And as much as we would love to hold our kids all day long, that’s just not realistic in the 21st century if you are a parent of multiple children. So like I said, I had a toddler and a newborn at the beginning of the pandemic. So I’m running behind a two and a half year old and I have a newborn that can’t fend for herself. So she was baby worn from the beginning, from the very beginning, because I had another kid to change. As far as a developmental and benefits aspect, though, one thing that we know about babies is that they tend to respond really well to what we call ventral surface pressure. So having that pressure on their chest, on that breastbone, on their stomach and upper abdomen, it can help with their digestion and ability to feed. When we talk about tummy time and strengthening their arm and neck and head muscles. Even being on your chest, a lot of times parents were like, oh, tummy time. I don’t do tummy time. My baby, they’re too small. And I’m like, well, no, you can start tummy time from birth. And then two, I was like, well, what are you doing? Because a lot of parents don’t think of baby wearing or holding their baby skin to skin as a form of tummy time. But the babies are still using those same muscles because if they’re trying to look at you and you’re talking to your child, they’re trying to look at you. They’re using those same muscles on their arms. They’re using the same muscles in their neck. They’re using the same muscles in their chest, developing that core. To be able to eventually hold their heads up, to be eventually be able to, you know, stack their spine, to be able to sit independently. So there’s skills that build on themselves. So baby wearing is a huge proponent of just overall infant development.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
Yeah. With the pressure you mentioned, it reminds me of one of my amazing sisters-in-law. She’s a special ed teacher and specializes in sensory tools for, you know, calming and therapeutic use. And she was the one who taught me that the weighted blankets that I guess you can now get at Target and places like that, but she always hand sewed them herself, that the weighted blankets have been shown by research to be calming. And again, it’s because of the pressure sensation. And so it made me think when she was explaining that about baby wearing and just that concept of being held snugly and closely is calming for people of all ages.
Whitney Dula:
Of all ages, right? Like, you know, I always remind parents, you know, everyone likes to be the little spoon in their partner, you know, when you’re with your partner, you want to be the little spoon. You like being held closely and hugged tight and all that type of stuff. So it’s the same for babies. Babies have the same needs that we do. So they have the same needs that we do as an adult. That doesn’t really change. We don’t grow out of those things. So the ventral surface pressure is really good. I’ve actually even recommended it, you know, as a lactation consultant, I recommended baby wearing, especially for children who are suffering from, say, GERD or some kind of reflux, because again, that pressure just kind of helps stabilize things. And it allows the parents to hold the babies upright without having to physically sit and have to hold the baby for an extended period of time. And there have been studies, I’d have to look them up again, but I have seen some loose studies on the positive impacts of baby wearing on children with GERD. So there is some loose research on that as well.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
And then thinking of it from the fourth trimester perspective, like when you’re freshly postpartum and the baby was used to being inside of you, carried around, there’s something instinctively comforting about being able to hear your heartbeat and feel your breathing and the movement of your body as you walk. So did your baby sleep really well? When, if you were baby wearing or not?
Whitney Dula:
They did. I joke and say that I had slightly unicorn kids. So sleep is a spectrum and it’s developmental. So it’s like, take this with a grain of salt, because what your kids do and what my kids do to be totally, and it’s not linear because they were great sleepers as babies. And now they like wake me up at five o’clock in the morning to like, tell me about some random dream they had. And I’m like, please go back to sleep. But they would, they would. I won’t say instantly fall asleep. But a lot of times that they were already kind of overtired, it was just a very simple transition for me. If like, say, if I was wearing one of the structured type carriers, I would often like when we would go to family events, I would snap it around my waist and just kind of leave it dangling there. And then if they started getting sleepy or started getting fussy, it’s just like, we’re just going to slip you in there. And I’ll pull the little hood up and then they could rest. And, you know, I wouldn’t have to worry about them, you know, lying somewhere where they woke up and they’re like, oh my gosh, you know, where am I? I am a firm believer of not doing what I call quiet daytime sleeping. So allowing children to get used to various environments.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
So they can sleep even when there’s noises?
Whitney Dula:
When they’re out, you know, not being able to process ambient noise. So, yeah, we would go to family functions and they’d be in the carrier and they’re asleep. And, you know, you always had that one auntie or grandma trying to peek. And I’m like, please, leave my baby alone. And I would say that could be considered a benefit as well. Holding boundaries with family. I think we’ve all been in situations where we’ve gone to functions, family functions, public events. People, they see babies and we get excited and we want to look at the baby and fawn over them. We’re still in a slightly post-pandemic society. I don’t really want you breathing on my children. I didn’t want people breathing on my children before COVID. You know, babies are not, you know, it’s not a Thanksgiving turkey. We’re not going to be passing them around just willy nilly. And so that was one of the ways I was also able to hold a boundary as a new parent and not kind of be steamrolled by other folks to let me see the baby. Let me hold the baby. No, the baby’s asleep. They’re calm, they’re content in the carrier. Even though for me, it wasn’t a hassle to get them in and out. I would be like, oh, it’s just, you know, I got all these buckles and, you know, make up excuses to be like, no.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
It kind of creates like a protective bubble.
Whitney Dula:
It’s a protective mechanism as well.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
Yeah. Because they’re kind of hidden from the public.
Whitney Dula:
I don’t want to overstimulate my child in this way. And they’re content and they’re comfortable and we’re going to leave them there. And so whenever folks are concerned about traveling or going out, I’m like, do you have a carrier? Because put that baby in a carrier, they can’t.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
And we don’t mean a car seat carrier. We mean a baby wearing carrier.
Whitney Dula:
An infant wrapped structured carrier.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
Yeah. I mean, the infant car seats are really convenient, but at the same time, you know, struggling with the flat spot on the back of the baby’s head.
Whitney Dula:
Oh my goodness.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
Yeah. So I hadn’t even thought of that until we were just having this conversation that baby wearing is another way to just limit the time they’re in a car seat.
Whitney Dula:
In a container. In a container. And as a Certified Passenger Safety Technician, that’s a whole. Other discussion that we probably don’t have time to get into. But as a car seat tech, I’m going to throw out there, guys, like babies should only be in car seats when they’re in the car. If you’re at home. Take them out, please. And so, yeah, it is a way, like I said, for the babies, you know, they’re sleeping, they’re resting. If they wake up, they jostle a little bit, but you put them in the carrier, typically they’ll go back to sleep. I know that’s a lot of concern for parents is transitioning from one place to another. So one of the things I always did as a parent is… I’ve never used my stroller. Like, I feel like I never used it from becoming such a pro, you know, not professional in that sense, but becoming such a proficient carrier user. I would have like three or four carriers in the car. Never had the stroller. But, you know, keeping something in the car, keeping a carrier in a car, keeping a wrap in the car. That way, if you are concerned about transitions, like I said, you can, you know, an Ergo carrier, you can, like I said, flip that around your waist. Keep going. So put the carrier on at the car. And if the baby wakes up, you can transition them into the carrier. You can put the baby in the carrier immediately or just have it available. They even make some now that are so small, you can actually pack them and roll them up and they’ll fit in the baby bag. They’re not the super big bulky ones, but they’re kind of thinner. They are that like packable nylon, like the little packable jackets. You have packable baby carriers now. So there’s lots of different options to meet family’s needs. Depending on what, you know, they might have going on from their day to day.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
And I was thinking, you know, it sounds…like a big commitment, especially if maybe as a new mom or new parent, you’re touched out from being touched all the time. So I wanted to bring up the fact that other caregivers can use, you know, learn how to use the baby wearing. And I know for me, my husband, Dan, he wore all of our kids and our babysitter for our first and second child, she was intrigued by me. And so she watched all the YouTube videos, learned how to use the baby carrier. And when I wasn’t home and she was the primary caregiver at the time, she wore the baby everywhere and she loved it as the babysitter. Like she said, it made it so easy going to the park with the toddler and the baby and the, you know, baby wearing carrier. So I, I think it also gives other caregivers the opportunity to have that really close physical bond.
Whitney Dula:
It does. It definitely does. And it’s not, it’s not a thing that you, it’s like you said, it’s not something that one person can do. It’s not something that, by nature as the primary parent that you’re an expert in. Like I said, I only learned how to become good at it from taking a class because I wanted to teach other people how to do it. So, you know, for me learning, it was then, yes, teaching my partner. It was teaching the grandparents or the godparents.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
I was going to say the grandparents can do it.
Whitney Dula:
The aunties. You know. My sister was a big fan of wearing my babies and wanting to learn. Their godparents wanting to learn. And it becomes a trickle down effect because then when, you know, especially like when it’s the aunts and the friends and stuff like that, then that’s now a skill that they have if they choose to have children. So like now my godson was carried as a baby because I taught them, you know, with his cousins. So like now they have transferable skills. So it is a, it’s also a very big community aspect. And historically, it was a community practice. Many, many cultures have histories, very rich histories. I’m Black. So African traditions, but there’s traditions all over the world, Indigenous, Native American traditions. There’s Asian traditions. So many, many cultures have different ways, means, types of carriers that are specific to their own culture. So it’s something we have literally done for generations. And it has always been a community practice. It was not done in a vacuum. This isn’t like something that’s just the moms did.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
Right.
Whitney Dula:
This was something that the community did because child rearing in of itself used to be a community event. Like the village took care of the children. And that was one of the ways we were able to do it.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
That’s so important. I think of… it’s sad that some of that information was trying to be erased or forgotten. I know when I started baby wearing my first, this was like 15 years ago, one of my sisters called me and she’s like, I guess she had seen some pictures of me baby wearing. And she’s like, I finally Googled what you were doing. And I guess you’re doing something called attachment parenting. I guess that’s a good thing. So she was kind of like, she didn’t have children of her own. And it was just kind of an interesting…
Whitney Dula:
You’re being the crunchy mom.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
Kind of..but I think it’s sad that that’s the perspective, that it’s some like, you know, white capitalistic, let’s, you know, buy all the baby carrier gear when it’s actually a very ancient, you know, indigenous, deep rooted practice to carry our babies. And it doesn’t necessarily require an expensive baby carrying device.
Whitney Dula:
It’s not.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
I was. Talk a little bit about that because I, I use the Moby Wrap®. And even at the time, 15 years ago, I think it was like $80, which was a huge amount of money for a new parent. Yeah, very expensive. And what I found by my second child is that the fabric had started to lose its… Like-
Whitney Dula:
The elasticity.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
Yeah. And it had become stretched out. And so actually made the baby wearing less safe because it was sagging. And I figured out how to go to a fabric store and make my own fabric, and not spend that kind of money. So instead, I just paid a little bit, bought some fabric that I thought would work and it did end up working. So can you talk a little bit about like, you know, the effect of capitalism on baby wearing and ways to do it that are less expensive?
Whitney Dula:
Oh my gosh. Yes. So. This applies to everything in parenting. And my clients always laugh at me. I always joke and say, I’m like the slightly goofy lactation consultant, but I’m going to tell you what’s honest and true. Parenting in this time is just ridiculously inflated. If we needed all of the stuff that is marketed to parents to raise children, we would have stopped having children a long time ago. And people always joke and ask me, am I having any more children? No, because it’s too expensive.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
It has-
Whitney Dula:
And that’s like a reason why society has made it too expensive to have children because you need this and you need a crib and you need a carrier and you need a stroller and you need a hiking thing and you need these kinds of bottles, the bottles that look like a breast, which. You need, you know, you need 47, you know, one device, you know, you need a monitor, you need a monitoring sock and you need. You don’t you just-
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
Literally just need yourself.
Whitney Dula:
You need yourself and somewhere safe for the baby to lay down. And like you said, maybe a 24 by 36 piece of fabric. And that’s probably how I’ve done it. I have done all of the things. I have all of the things. When I say I have all, when it comes to baby wearing, I have all, I have rings that I’ve bought. I have wraps that I have bought, you know, that are beautiful and artist, artisanally woven and, you know, spent probably way too much money. My husband would kill me if he knew how much I spent on something. I have, which you said, I’ve gone to Joann’s and I found like some really cute leopard print jersey material and I made a wrap. You know, I’ve gotten carriers that were handed down to me that I bought from swap groups that I’ve had. You know, I custom made one for myself just because in a former life, I was a fashion design major. And I was like, I just want to see if I can make one. And I custom made this like beautiful. It’s what we call a may die carrier, but I made it out of fabric that a friend from Africa brought back. So it was like a nice blending of the cultures. Actually, ironically, on my Instagram, I have a video and it’s on my TikTok as well. I have a video of like eight different carriers that are not actually carriers. You know, if you have a scarf, like a really long, wide pashmina scarf. If you have one of my favorite carriers, and I used to keep one in my car for this reason, is airplane blankets. Airplane blankets, I steal them out of Delta First Class. They’re the best ones because they’re woven. But an airplane blanket is the perfect size to make what we would call a traditional katang kind of wrap. Like just a torso carry tied across your chest. Like I can still wrap my three-year-old with that or my four-year-old. Great carrier. Didn’t spend any money on it. Like I paid hundreds of dollars for this airplane ticket. I’m taking the blanket and now I have a free baby carrier. You can, like you said, you can go to the fabric store, get the clearance $5 jersey and cut a four foot piece of fabric and have a baby carrier. I’ve seen parents wrap with towels. I have wrapped with beach blankets and beach towels. So you don’t need a $200 woven wrap. You don’t need a $90, you know, structured carrier if that’s, you know, not within the budget. And if it is within the budget, then great.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
Or there’s, like you said, the free and swap groups.
Whitney Dula:
Oh my God, there’s so many groups. There’s so many groups on Facebook. There’s people on TikTok that if you follow them, they can point you in a different directions of where some of those swaps are. Here in Maryland, we have a really great resource called Patuxent Babywearing, and they have a library. Which is great.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
Where you like check out different baby carriers?
Whitney Dula:
Yeah, you can check out different. You pay like a small fee per month, which kind of helps with the cleaning and the care of them. But you get to pick like two carriers. And it’s actually a really great way to where if you don’t have an educator or a shop nearby where there’s lots of different types of carriers to try, you kind of get to rent one. You get to test drive it for a little while. So there are lending libraries. You’d have to look them up. They’re scattered. So I know we have that in Maryland as a resource. I know there’s other states where some places have the lending libraries, sometimes partnering with the La Leche League or something like that. You’re bound to find someone who’s a wearer and they might have some staff. I think Seattle has a big baby wearing community. So they have a lot of those types of things as well. Seattle and stuff. I know that’s where I’ve met a lot of folks from. Those exist where you can try out different carriers, figure out what works for you. Sometimes certain carriers are better for certain body types or others. So like my husband hated wraps because he’s kind of a stockier guy. He has muscular arms that kind of limit his range of motion. So where I can do like monkey bending and do all that, he couldn’t do all of that. So he liked something that he could put on like a book bag. It was simple. And then he’d spin the kids and when they got older, they can kind of help themselves, which is great. But, you know, you might find that you might like one thing and your partner or your family might like something else. So that’s a good way to be able to get multiple carriers for less money.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
Yeah. And to try out and figure out the ones that work best for your family. I was wondering, Whitney, could we pick your brain about safety tips? Because that was something that I learned later on is that there are less safe ways to wear your baby that could be risky. So can you talk about like those basic safety aspects?
Whitney Dula:
Definitely. You had mentioned like with the Moby Wrap that was your first baby. It was great. And by the time the second one rolled around, it was stretched out.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
And that made her kind of like sag further down.
Whitney Dula:
Yeah. It makes wearing uncomfortable for the parent. And then you’re like, okay, I don’t actually like this anymore. You know, so one of the things we the first thing I would say, and this is a part of the official checklist, but it is part of the official checklist, is check the integrity of your carrier, especially if you did get it secondhand or from a library or even if you if it’s new you know it was new when you bought it but maybe now it’s been through a couple kids, it’s been through the wash a couple of times, might have been spit up on a couple of times. Check the integrity of that carrier. Make sure that if it’s one of the structured carriers, that there’s not like rips or holes in any area that would be integral to the safety and stability of it. So like, you know, the seams aren’t shredding on the straps, like we don’t need straps popping. Make sure that it has a webbing on it, that the webbing is not fraying. You know, that you don’t have any busted seams like where what we call the seats or where the baby’s bottom would sit. You know, like any of the stress points, basically. Think about how you wear your clothes. Think about even, like I said, think about it like a backpack. If you have a hole on like one of those, like the book bag is going to fall apart. Your books are going to fall off the bottom if you have a hole or the seam is coming apart on the bottom of that book bag. So you don’t want anything like that happening with your carriers. If it’s a wrap, you want to make sure it’s not unraveling or creating, you have snags, sometimes they can snag. You want to make sure that the snags are not, again, to a point where it’s going to compromise the integrity of your wrap or your carrier. So that would be number one. Outside of that, a lot of baby-wearing educators follow something called check your ticks or make sure you have all your tick boxes. So that’s a… So T is for tight. You want to make sure that the fit of your carrier is snug. Not so tight that the baby can’t breathe or that you feel smushed, but tight enough that the baby is supported. That nothing, like straps aren’t falling off, especially with stretchy wraps. You actually do want it tighter than what you think because of the nature of the fabric. It’s going to stretch out.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
It gives a little bit?
Whitney Dula:
It gives. So you want it to be very snug so that the baby is supported. The second thing you want to do is that the baby needs to be in your view of all times. And when we say in view at all times, especially with newborns, we need to make sure that you can see their face. This lets us know that their airway is clear. We don’t want them, and this is the second one, that they should be close enough to kiss. So the next three kind of tie in. So they should be in view at all times. You should be able to see their whole face. They should be close enough to kiss. So if you just tilt your head down, you should be able to kiss the top of their forehead. That means they’re up high enough. Not sinking down into your body or sinking down into the carrier. Because we want to prevent the third thing, which is that they are keeping their chin off their chest. As a public health worker, this is something we teach in a lot of different things. We don’t want babies chin to chest in car seats. We don’t want them chin to chest in strollers. We don’t want them chin to chest in a baby carrier because it closes off their airway and that can cause positional asphyxiation. So when we hear about, some of these SIDS cases or when we hear about babies having, you know, unfortunately, you know, you know, premature demise is because their chin has tucked, it’s cut off their airway. They’re not able to breathe and get air. And with newborns, this is especially important because they don’t have the neck strength to like pick their heads back up. A little bit less of a concern with an older baby, not a concern generally with toddlers because of, you know, an older baby or a toddler feels themselves not being able to breathe. They’ll wake themselves up. They’ll sit up and readjust. But with newborns, they can’t do that. So we as the parent, as the wearer, have to be checking to make sure if they start sinking down, because that’s a normal thing for babies to do. They kind of start curling in and tucking in totally fine. They get cozy and snuggly, but we want to make sure that we kind of tilt that head if we need to, tilt that chin up if we need to. If we’re wearing a carrier and we’ve been moving a lot, that we check the fit again really quick, making sure that the baby’s up high enough that we can kiss their forehead without having to lift them up or bend down too far and hurting our necks, making sure that we feel comfortable in the carrier in our body. Because sometimes the weight of the baby will start creating pressure points as well. So we want to make sure that… You know, you’ve been wearing for a long time. That we just do a periodic fit check, make sure everything’s still where we want it to be. One, to ensure the baby’s safety. And two, to ensure both the parent and the baby’s comfort. And then the last thing is the S, you want to support their back. We want to make sure that the baby’s back is supported at all times. In the baby-wearing world, there are like two different types of kids that we talk about. Tends more as older babies and toddlers. But supporting the back is important all the way through the baby-wearing spectrum. As younger babies, we want them to be supported, again, to protect all the things we already mentioned. When they get older, we just want to keep them alive. And toddlers are unpredictable.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
You don’t want them to flip out.
Whitney Dula:
Yeah, we don’t want them. So we call those leaners. Like the kids that you wrap them or you put them in a carrier and they go, oh.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
They arch their back.
Whitney Dula:
And you’re like, oh, my God, what are you doing? So we have leaners and you have what we call seat poppers. So those are the kids that, like, go straight as a board and you can’t get wrapped up under their butt because what can then happen is that they bottom out. They’re like that book bag that has the pop seam at the bottom. And they just. So one of the running jokes. But it is a good point is we always say top rails, which is the, usually the top of the carrier on a structured carry is that where the baby’s head kind of comes out of. On toddlers, a lot of times toddlers like to have their arms out. So it’s up under their armpits like this. So we’ll say the top rail saves lives because sometimes if that bottom goes, that’s what’s going to keep them on you until you can at least get to a point to take them out and adjust. So always make sure that top rail is nice and tight.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
The top rail means under their arms they’re resting on.
Whitney Dula:
Under their arms or whatever’s going across their neck and shoulders. So whatever’s going to be touching here, that’s the top. So if you’re wrapping, we call it a rail. And so the top rail, you want that to be nice and snug on a structured carrier. So like the Ergobaby, a Tula. You want to make sure that that top edge is nice and secure. It’s not gappy on the sides where they can. Kind of slip out on the sides as well. So you want to make sure it’s tight. Baby’s in view at all times. They’re close enough to kiss, keep their chin off their chest and that they are supported in their back. So TICS, check your TICS.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
Awesome. Thank you for sharing that really important information. Any special considerations for parents with like health conditions or physical limitations?
Whitney Dula:
There, again, like I said, there’s different carriers that may work for different families’ needs. I can’t say there’s a specific carrier that is… existing for specific disabilities, but you might find that one carrier works best with your needs or not. So like I said, my husband’s disabled, but to use him as an example, like I said, if people have range of motion issues, so maybe a parent does have limited mobility in their upper body or has limited range of motion for whatever reason, maybe a wrap is not going to be the best situation for them unless they have someone to assist them with…
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
I was going to say, sometimes in the beginning, it’s like a two-person.
Whitney Dula:
And as a learning curve, it may be, but if there’s going to be a chance where you’re going to be by yourself, then that’s obviously not going to be maybe something like a ring sling where they can one-handed kind of put it over them, get the baby scooped in or put the baby in their lap and kind of scoop it under the baby. I’ve seen folks do some very interesting things. You kind of have, you’ll figure out what works for you. So ring slings, I tend to find work really, really well for parents that have limited mobility. Parents who may be like wheelchair bound because they’re sitting. And a lot of times when you’re sitting, you don’t want anything that’s going to be pressing or wrapped around your waist. And so those structured carriers may not be the best situation for you in that case, because it’s going to be very uncomfortable. It’s going to be too bulky. They a lot of times don’t have a lot of give. And that front panel is very, very firm. So if you’re sitting, it’s not the most comfortable. So a ring sling or a woven wrap, a short woven wrap, might be more, you know, amenable to that particular person’s needs. But like I said, someone with a lesser range of motion, but is, you know, can’t do all the wrapping, they might prefer the structured carrier. Or maybe they need that back support. So some parents like wrapping, like having the long wraps because they can create a custom support, like parents with back injuries, or they like having the structured carrier because some of the structured carriers come with lumbar rolls, or they might have a support brace. There’s actually one particular company, I’ve never used her carriers, but there’s a company called Babuebaby®, and it was developed by an occupational therapist. And those were designed actually for parents of children with disabilities or who have lower tone and they go up to a higher weight. And it comes with an extra support that goes around the parent’s chest to support the heavier weight of an older child and keep them, again, like I said, from if you have a baby with low tone, you really need to make sure that that back and that neck is supported so that they’re not falling back or falling to the side and that they feel fully supported, but also that you as the parent are not compromising your health and comfort for the sake of your child. So there’s lots of different options out there and working with an educator or working with a group might be a good option so they can figure out what will work best for them.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
Yeah, I was going to say, if you’re looking for help, you know, we were talking earlier about how a lot of this knowledge seemed to have been lost. And then there’s like, you know, renaissance and baby wearing over the past couple of decades. What’s the, like, who do you look for to help if you don’t have any family or friends that know how to baby wear aside from watching YouTube videos or TikTok videos? I know that there’s only so much you can learn from a video without having somebody in person show you how to do something. So what should people search for how do they find someone who can help?
Whitney Dula:
I will say a good place to usually start, because with this renaissance of… returning to like communal support, and I’m using that term loosely, you know, if you have like a postpartum or perinatal care center, a lot of times that there’s somebody there who, even if they’re not certified, because some things we just don’t need to be certified in, right? Like you don’t need a title behind your name to be an experienced baby wearing expert. Like we said, some of these things are just cultural and it’s ingrained and, you know, you can know everything there is to know and not need to. That’s a lot of stuff in maternal health, right? But there’s usually somebody there who can teach you how to baby wear. I know where we or I live at, there is a breastfeeding center. And that’s actually where I got some of my early help from because some of the other moms that were just there, one of the shop assistants was someone because they sold the carriers there. So they had someone who kind of knew, you know, the basic mechanisms on how to help you get it on, how to get it off, how to do a basic carry. You know, so anything, anyone where they have postpartum care, that’s usually a good place to start. You can search, like I said, baby wearing swap or baby wearing library or baby carrier library. Like I said that’s how I found out about the Patuxent Baby Wearing Group here in Maryland. You can probably Google baby wearing educators if, you know, people have really good social media or online presence, they might pop up. Like, I know I’ve had clients book me, just for that. Like, not even lactation related. Like they found me because I teach baby wearing and they’re like, oh, okay. You know, and then there might be a conversation back and forth. And then I’ve even had lactation clients come back and then have me teach them how to wear their babies or how to breastfeed their babies in the carrier, because we’ve got over one hurdle. So like now let’s tackle the next thing.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
And how are lactation and baby wearing related then? Because, you know, you’re mentioning all these places, it’s all breastfeeding or lactation, you know, equipment or assistance. Is there something, do the two practices like help each other?
Whitney Dula:
I would say that they can help each other. And I would say that it’s more of like a correlation than a causation kind of thing. I think as we’re seeing an increase with people returning to breastfeeding, we’re also seeing a return to people using attachment parenting, to use that term. We’re seeing a return to parents using carriers. We’re seeing a return to parents utilizing doula and midwifery support. So a lot of, again, just the more traditional and family-focused, family-centered practices are just coming back into play. And so, like I said, that’s why I feel like we’re seeing all of those things kind of happen in clusters. But people are cross-certified in the same things. You know, you’re seeing, we see a lot of that in the birth world. However, yes, breastfeeding and baby wearing, I think, are very intrinsically linked because a lot of the things that I would teach a parent about baby wearing, I would tell them to do a lot of the same techniques. When you’re trying to… Nurse your baby or establish-
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
Increased milk production?
Whitney Dula:
Production with the baby like um, one of the things I say I see a lot. As a… birth worker or an allied health provider is parents seem to be afraid to hold their kids nowadays. It’s a lot of this, I think, generations of detached parenting. So now that you want to be an attached parent, you’re not really sure how to do it. And I mean, just even holding, like physically holding the baby, like they’re very like. Scared that this baby is like a little China doll. And I’m like, babies aren’t quite that fragile guys. You know, a lot of times I get calls about. Oh, you know, my baby doesn’t latch, my baby doesn’t latch well, or, you know, it’s painful or it’s uncomfortable. And so when I’m assisting parents with latching difficulties, I want to see what they’re doing first before I come in and start trying to be the expert and fix everything. So a lot of times I just like to sit back and watch and see what’s happening. Like a lot of times they’re like the baby’s being very held kind of far away or on their back and it’s not at the most optimal positioning. And so again, like what I would say is I’m like, let’s start skin to skin first. Baby’s screaming, you can’t focus when you’re upset and screaming and hungry. Like babies can’t focus when they’re upset and screaming and hungry. So let’s do some skin to skin. Let’s recenter. Everyone take a deep breath. Let’s calm down, literally center ourselves. And then the same things where I was saying, we want the baby to be close. We want the baby to be like belly to belly. We want them to have, like I said, that ventral contact. We need them to have your tummy touching their tummy.. I say, imagine you’re still pregnant and attached by that umbilical cord. But on the outside, you know, you need that level of closeness. We want to make sure that the baby’s head and airway is clear. So a lot of times I see babies, they’re trying to latch and they’re doing chin to chest. We want them to have their head back and elevated so that they can fully open that jaw and make sure their airway is clear. Because if they can’t breathe, they can’t eat. So there are a lot of connections in the mechanics of baby wearing that also cross over into the mechanics of breastfeeding. So usually if we can get one thing going well, the other will usually follow. And if a baby is struggling with one. Traditionally I see them struggling with the other. So I have had the babies that… Won’t nurse and can’t get comfortable at the breast. And then they also will scream bloody murder when you put them into a baby carrier. So I have seen that. And that’s like, okay, maybe we need to do some release. We need to do some massage. We need to do something.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
I was going to say, is there some gastrointestinal distress?
Whitney Dula:
It can sometimes be gastrointestinal distress. I’ve seen parents that experience birth trauma or if the baby had malpositioning during the labor, shoulder dystocia, they got stuck. Torticollis babies, especially. So babies that have any kind of structural damage or tightness or inconsistencies or asymmetry, those babies also struggle with feeding as well as struggling with the carriers. Yeah.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
Okay. Interesting. So then they would need to see a professional who specializes in…
Whitney Dula:
Usually we refer out at that point. That’s my scope as a lactation consultant and a baby wearing educator. So it’s like, we’re going to refer back to the pediatrician or to a chiropractor or a physical therapist. Let’s get this worked out and then we can come back.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
Okay. Yeah. That makes sense that if, you know, how baby wearing can calm, but if there’s something structurally wrong or they’re in pain… You know, skin to skin might help, but it’s not going to take that pain away. And I think, you know, you’re right though about the close sustained contact. And I know there are some baby carriers that are designed for skin to skin contact in particular. I think I wore one with my second and third babies, which was nice because I could just walk around the house doing skin to skin while baby wearing. So that might be helpful for people who need to do extra skin to skin, not just when they’re sitting, but when they’re walking around.
Whitney Dula:
Yeah. So there’s certain brands that, so specifically off the top of my head, I would say carriers like Tula® and Ergobaby® or having like the wrap. So Boba®, MOBY®, any of the woven wrap companies, those are all going to be positive and fostering of skin to skin and co-regulation because there’s no barrier in between the child and you. There are some other companies, which is nothing against those brands, but there’s other brands where a lot of times, because they have like these extra support panels and things like that, there might be a chest piece in between. So you’re kind of like sticking the baby, like almost. So that would not foster skin to skin because they’re going to be up against another fabric or something rather than your clothing or your bare skin. Again, might be dependent on family’s needs. Sometimes it’s dependent on, like I said, it’s dependent on budget. If you can’t find the carrier that you want within your budget, you might have to get a little creative. So doing the swaps, doing the library, making it yourself. Might be the way to foster those things. I have a hilarious picture of my now six-year-old where she like one day just climbed in her dad’s shirt. Is that an actual carrier? No. You know, it’s like, she’s like, got her arms out. And so she’s like in the head of his shirt. He’s in the head of the shirt. And she’s just like in this man’s shirt. I’m like, yeah, your dad’s shirt. She does stretch the neck all out. But she was like, I’m like, you know, she was comfortable. And he was walking around with her like that. I’m like, all right, y’all do you. Just quarter butt. I don’t have anything else to say.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
Well, Whitney, thank you so much for sharing so much knowledge and wisdom with us about baby wearing. We really appreciate it. And if our listeners want to learn more from you, where’s the best place to go?
Whitney Dula:
So they can follow me @themamasdula, T-H-E-M-A-M-A-S-D-U-L-A. Everyone jokes about like, oh, you’re a doula. And I’m like, what? That’s my real name. But @themamasdula on Instagram and TikTok. And like I said, I do have videos on both of those with quick tutorials, basic carries on, you know, and the thing with baby wearing is you don’t have, like, you can go on YouTube and they’ll have videos with all these complicated, you know, all kinds of people making dresses out of this daggone stuff. It doesn’t have to be that. So keep it simple.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
Keep it simple.
Whitney Dula:
Keep it simple. Master, if you’re using a wrap, master. If you have one good wrap, just do that.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
Just get used to it.
Whitney Dula:
Get used to it. Get one good carry. So I tried to put some simple ones up on my pages. One or two good carries and, you know, maybe get a ring sling or a structured carrier. And call it a day. It doesn’t have to be crazy. It doesn’t have to be intense. You don’t need a million and one things to do this. You don’t need a $400 velvet, in gold plated carrier to carry your baby.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
Exactly.
Whitney Dula:
You don’t. But the Mama’s Dula on most of the socials, if folks are in the Washington DC metro area, they can also look me up online, the mamasdula.com. And if they want in-person assistance or baby wearing services or try on any one of my multiple carriers, they can also book time with me to do that as well.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
That’s awesome, Whitney. And we’re coming up on Black Baby Wearing Week in June. So you can follow the Black Baby Wearing Week account on Instagram as well for lots of beautiful images and little videos and things as well. So thank you, Whitney, so much for coming on the podcast.
Whitney Dula:
Well, thank you for having me. And it’s been a pleasure.
Dr. Rebecca Dekker:
We learned a lot. All right, everyone, I’ll see you next week. Bye! Today’s podcast was brought to you by the Evidence Based Birth® Professional Membership. The free articles and podcasts we provide to the public are supported by our professional membership program at Evidence Based Birth®. Our members are professionals in the childbirth field who are committed to being change agents in their community. Professional members at EBB get access to continuing education courses with up to 23 contact hours, live monthly training sessions, an exclusive library of printer-friendly PDFs to share with your clients, and a supportive community for asking questions and sharing challenges, struggles, and success stories. We offer monthly and annual plans, as well as scholarships for students and for people of color. To learn more, visit ebbirth.com/membership.
