6 Effective Ways To Build Your Baby's Muscles

Mommies love to see their babies all rolly-polly. If you want to have your baby grow muscles and bear that healthy look, and wonder how you can help your little one with it, here’s the way to go.

In This Article

Exercises

Your goal is not to make your baby do heavy-duty exercise to turn him into a wrestling champ, but gentle exercises meant for babies will do the job.

What you need to bear in mind is that a lot of babies don’t get as much strength training as they should because of concerns around sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). Since babies are made to sleep on their back, they don’t get enough chance to challenge their muscles. Instead, if you can lay your baby on its tummy for a few moments in a day right from when they are four weeks old, it can help them build muscles.

Eventually, your baby can lie on its tummy for a longer time and support its head. These muscles help him in all essential movements from lifting his neck to rolling over, or crawling and walking. One way to encourage your baby to use his muscles is by placing a toy in front of him. It will make him try to reach for the toys and roll away.

You just need to be careful that while your baby gets its exercises, you make it gentle and don’t put pressure on the little one.

1. Sitting up:

It’s natural for parents to let their babies lie down for long so that they don’t have to worry about their babies falling each time they sit. Instead, allow your child to sit up on his own as many times as possible.

2. Oil-massage:

Oil massage helps make your baby’s bones and muscles stronger. Babies can have oil massage fairly soon after they are born but make it very gentle for the first two months. You can gradually increase the pressure depending on how your baby starts reacting to it. Slowly, your baby learns to enjoy the pressure and gets stronger.

3. Outdoor games:

Outdoor games are suitable for toddlers but under adult supervision. Some of the most common games you can make him play are ball games involving catching, tossing or kicking the ball; hide and seek; ring-a-ring-a-roses; jumping games, sea-saw, and swings.

4. Indoor games:

Get your child a toy horse to ride. Make him dance to some music. Roll him on a mat. Else get a pushing and pulling cart. The idea is to make your baby as much physically active as possible. The more active he is, the better is his appetite and sleep.

Foods

Mere physical activity would not help your child grow. He needs to complement it with proper intake of nutritious food:

5. Milk:

For the first six months of its life, keep your baby on exclusive breastfeed. Mother’s milk has just about every nutrient that your baby needs for healthy development. You would have noticed that babies who are well fed on mother’s milk are fairly round. Also, breast milk helps in the development of immunity, aids in the development of bones and dental formation and builds muscles, including the oral muscles.

Formula milk too is beneficial, but it should be taken as an alternative to mother’s milk.

When it comes to cow milk, you might want to introduce it in the second year of your baby. Dairy products such as cheese, whole-milk yogurt, butter and ghee help in muscle development. This apart dairy products are rich in vitamins A and D, calcium and proteins.

6. Cereals and grains:

Offer your baby cereals and grains, which are rich in iron, have a good supply of vitamins, minerals, carbs, and fiber. You can give teething biscuits or foods like pasta and bread.

7. Vegetables:

Mashed vegetables and vegetables soups are ideal. Include plenty of green vegetables, peas, and tomatoes for better results. Vegetables help build muscles through vitamins A, B, and C, proteins and fiber. Vitamin B helps in cell growth while vitamin C helps in absorbing iron. Fiber supports digestion.

8. Fruits:

Bananas, mashed almonds, apple, dried fig, dates, etc. contain vital nutrients such as copper, calcium, magnesium, potassium and riboflavin, which help in building muscles, nerves, bones and help in energy production.

9. Proteins:

Egg yolk, pureed fish and chicken, cheese or tofu are good sources of proteins. They are also rich in omega-3 fatty acids, vitamin B, zinc, and iron, which are crucial for the development of muscles.

You can begin focusing on your child’s growth even when he is only a few months old. Do not wait for him to reach a certain age to start muscle building activities.

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