The vital functions of any person’s body are ensured by the implementation of a set of reflexes. As for newborn children, they also have a certain set of natural reflexes, which are a unique manifestation of their body’s response to external and internal stimuli. All movements are laid down long before the birth of a newborn, during intrauterine development.
One of the first to appear is the sucking reflex, but many do not know until what age it is present and when it should fade away. Often, parents are able to see in ultrasound images how, while still inside the mother’s womb, the baby can suck his own finger. After birth, this reflex begins to be honed and improved, as soon as the nipple or mother’s breast touches the newborn’s lips. Thanks to this action, the baby eats.
5 nerve pairs located in the child’s skull are responsible for movement. A newborn baby is able to suck everything that falls into his mouth, be it his mother’s breast or a pacifier. artificial feeding. The ability to suck is not a habit, as it is formed during the period intrauterine development. This reflex begins long before the newborn is born, after about 15 weeks of development, and has a significant impact on early formation child's psyche. Also, thanks to the possession of this reflex, the newborn has the opportunity to satisfy his own hunger, which, without exaggeration, ensures his survival.
Research shows that children who had the opportunity long time stay on breastfeeding or they are not old enough, in later life they are less susceptible to various bad habits, they are more calm and balanced.
Every mother can be sure that as soon as the pacifier or its nipple touches the palate in the baby’s mouth, he immediately begins to suck. Already in the first hours of his life, the baby is ready to take his mother's breast. The reflex is implemented in practice by rhythmic sucking movements that calm an irritated child. In the process of sucking a pacifier, about 4 muscles are involved, and when sucking on a mother's breast - about 40. While sucking, the baby can even fall asleep, as he feels protected, comfortable and calm.
After satisfying the feeling of hunger, the reflex begins to weaken and, conversely, intensifies as soon as the feeling of satiety disappears. Thus, periodically repeating, the sucking reflex in newborns makes itself felt.
The signal for the implementation of this phenomenon will be a simple touch to the child’s cheek or lips. As soon as the mother touches the nipple or pacifier on her cheek, the baby will immediately turn his head in her direction and open his mouth slightly. This signal indicates that the baby is ready to suckle and the mother should provide him with this opportunity.
How long does this phenomenon last?
As already noted, a newborn baby begins to suck after a couple of hours of his life, and the formation and appearance of this reflex generally occurs long before birth. A few hours after birth, the baby begins to actively seek the mother’s breast in order to support and realize its natural instinct.
The duration at which the sucking instinct is most pronounced in infants- This is the first year of life. Gradually, closer to the age of one, it begins to weaken. By about 3-4 years it completely fades away.
In this regard, many experts point to the need to breastfeed the child until complete decline. sucking reflex in accordance with the norms laid down by nature.
Weakened or absent sucking reflex
In practice, there are cases when the sucking reflex manifests itself to a lesser extent, it is weakened or absent altogether. The following symptoms will indicate an underdeveloped skill:
- the baby rarely swallows during feeding;
- the baby will be lethargic by itself;
- during feeding, the baby may suck very weakly and even fall asleep;
- In rare cases, the baby cannot take the mother's breast at all.
The main causes of weak sucking are considered to be paresis of the facial nerves, severe somatic conditions, mental retardation and other deviations in the development of the central nervous system. Such conditions can be observed in newborns as a result of hypoxia during childbirth or during pregnancy. Others, more rare cases, causing deviations can be colds and viral diseases or.
At the first suspicion that parents have a weak sucking instinct or its absence, the child should be shown to specialists.
To establish violations or deviations in this complex physiological process A thorough diagnosis will be required, after which treatment is possible.
From the parents' side any self-medication in this case is unacceptable. The only thing they can provide to the child is food from a spoon. For these purposes, you can use either mixtures. It is necessary to feed your baby with a spoon more often, as he may not be full in one sitting.
If the child is all right, then parents can be calm about the state of health and nervous system of their child. In this case, the formation and development of his body occurs harmoniously.
Reflexes are spontaneous reactions to any external irritating factor. They are characteristic of all multicellular organisms, including animals and humans. Reflexes are unconditioned and conditioned.
The first group is always with a person, contributing to his existence in external environment- This innate reflexes. The second group represents neurological signs that appear and disappear during a person's life. Each child is born with a certain number of unconditioned reflexes, among them the sucking reflex and other automatisms that provide the new person with the conditions for survival.
What is the sucking reflex?
It is formed in a child in the first minutes of life, and its inclinations appear in the womb; on an ultrasound, it is often visible how the fetus holds its finger in its mouth. If the baby was born healthy and full-term, he is immediately applied to the mother's breast, and he calms down, receiving a few drops of colostrum. This is how maternity hospitals support the innate instinct and promote the correct establishment of the sucking reflex.
Any kind of touching the baby's lips causes responses in the form of committing sucking movements. Doctors know until what age the sucking reflex is normal, performing a protective function - this is the first 12 months of life.
The sucking reflex is realized with the participation of the nuclei of certain nerves located in the stem part of the medulla oblongata. These are the trigeminal nerve, facial, vestibular, glossopharyngeal, vagus and hypoglossal.
The interconnection of these pairs of nerves ensures strict coordination of the sucking process. After finishing feeding, the reflex first weakens, and after an hour or an hour and a half it comes to life again. If the central nervous system or any of the above nerves is damaged, it decreases or disappears completely.
Babies weaned early from mother's milk and fed with formula have the problem of an incompletely realized sucking reflex, which can lead to the development of obsessive movement neurosis varying degrees. This is expressed in particular in the following:
- the habit of sucking various objects (finger, pen, pencil, blanket, dolls, etc.);
- habit of biting your nails;
- Adults have a desire to smoke, hold a cigarette in their mouth for a long time, and try to light up quickly under any stress.
Thus, the child must correctly go through the oral stage of development so that there is no formation of neurotic reactions in the future. People deprived of early stage development mother's milk, must be brought up with the use of a pacifier as an object of sucking, otherwise an adult during his life may show oral aggression in an active form (biting, snapping verbally, being sarcastic) and passive ( poor appetite, all sorts of painful conditions).
A baby is given a pacifier between feedings; it must be weaned off gradually, during play, with talking and affection, without punishment or screaming. When the sucking reflex fades, nature has determined that a child older than one or one and a half years old does not need it, although the baby will continue to have sucking movements for a long time in his sleep and in subsequent years, until about 3 or 4 years old.
Why might he be missing?
If this action is weak, the baby sucks very sluggishly at the breast or bottle, quickly falling asleep during feeding, or even refusing to eat altogether. This happens in weakened, injured during childbirth or premature babies. They are discharged from the inpatient department when the baby gets used to sucking milk well. A decrease in the sucking reflex can be observed for the following reasons:
- hypoxic-traumatic damage to the central nervous system of the child in the womb or during childbirth;
- severe somatic diseases (due to general weakness and malaise);
- paresis and paralysis of the cranial nerves, in particular the facial one;
- mentally retarded children;
- severe stomatitis, respiratory viral infections, rhinitis;
- flat-shaped mother's nipples.
With a reduced sucking reflex, the child is constantly malnourished, so he must be fed with a spoon or expressed milk from a bottle every 2 or 2.5 hours.
Any deviation in the baby’s condition is a reason to consult a doctor, because this may be a signal of the development of a serious pathology that requires immediate treatment. A decrease in the sucking reflex requires dynamic monitoring with the involvement of a neurologist.
The absence of a sucking reflex is the first symptom of damage to the central nervous system, or rather the stem part of the medulla oblongata, and an unfavorable prognostic sign. Such babies have very little chance of survival; they have to be fed only through a tube.
Reasons for the complete absence of sucking in children:
- trauma to the medulla oblongata during childbirth;
- weakness of the masticatory muscles, orbicularis oris muscle, tongue;
- deep prematurity.
Features of the sucking reflex in premature babies
In children born ahead of schedule with little weight, a lot different problems with health, their own characteristics of development and nursing. In particular, the sucking reflex in premature babies, as well as swallowing, are often absent, especially with a body weight of less than one and a half kilograms, when there is underdevelopment of many organs, their small volume, impaired thermoregulation, difficulty breathing, etc.
Inferiority of reflexes is associated with insufficient development of nervous regulation mechanisms and incomplete formation of sucking muscles. Such children cannot be immediately put to the breast, but a long delay is also scary because of the possible large loss of body weight. 
A long delay is given in case of severe injury or suspected cerebral hemorrhage. If the child has not been fed for more than 12 hours, he is transferred to parenteral nutrition with a glucose solution. Tube feeding of premature babies is practiced with a significant reduction in sucking and swallowing, while the volume of each feeding is dosed with a special syringe. They switch to bottle feeding after the baby develops good reflexes.
The issue of breastfeeding is decided separately for each child, taking into account his condition and the stability of reflex signs. Usually they start with once or twice a day, if the child gets tired, then they feed him from a bottle; in total, such children are fed up to 10 times a day. The main thing in the process of nursing premature babies is not to force things.
The process can be lengthy, but success is ensured with the competent approach of doctors and the baby’s mother; such children catch up with their peers by the end of the first or maximum third year of life.
Thus, the sucking reflex is one of the most important innate reflexes that human nature has endowed to ensure the most comfortable conditions survival and further development. His complete absence- an irreparable problem that is incompatible with life, and a decrease is an ominous signal about a serious neurological problem that must be immediately looked for and eliminated by everyone possible ways with the involvement of neurologists and other specialists.
The sucking reflex is one of the fundamental ones, directly responsible for the baby’s life, because this is the only way food enters the child’s body. The sucking reflex begins to form with prenatal period life of the baby, and by birth it is already fully functioning. A healthy newborn baby, whose umbilical cord has not yet been cut, already willingly takes mother's breast.
You can check the presence of this reflex by putting a finger in the child’s mouth - if he starts sucking it, this is a signal that everything is normal.
Weak sucking reflex
This is observed mainly in children who suffered some complications during childbirth. Such babies can very often suckle at the breast for an hour and a half, or, conversely, do it sluggishly, without desire, or refuse altogether. Abnormal sucking reflex can also be caused by:
- colds, acute respiratory infections;
- fetus during childbirth;
- mental retardation of the child;
- paresis of the facial nerves;
- severe somatic condition.
The sucking reflex in premature babies can also often be weakened, but this is a temporary phenomenon. The mother should know that in this case the child needs to be breastfed, but at the same time try to feed the baby with a spoon, bottle or syringe if he eats very little.
Doctors in the maternity ward closely monitor how the baby sucks at the breast (or bottle) after birth, and try to discharge the newborn only when the sucking reflex is normalized.
The complete absence of the sucking reflex is considered an anomaly caused by global damage to the central nervous system or severe birth trauma. Unfortunately, in the complete absence of this reflex, children extremely rarely survive. Since there is also no swallowing reflex, at first they are given food through a special probe, however, as practice shows, such children have practically no real chance of recovery.
Unsatisfied sucking reflex
The main idea of all existing theories is that until a child is one and a half to three years old, sucking is active process, which is responsible for calm and comfort. Nowhere has it been scientifically proven that sucking a pacifier or fingers will lead to smoking and neuroses, but the opposite process 
those. an unsatisfied sucking reflex (if the mother suddenly decides to stop breastfeeding or scolds her for licking her fingers) threatens with mental complications.
When does the sucking reflex disappear?
By the age of 3-4 years this unconditioned reflex completely fades away, but after a year you can notice that the child’s desire to suck out food for himself weakens significantly. He becomes more interested in eating in a different way.
During intrauterine development in nervous system The baby develops reactions to external as well as internal stimuli, which are called innate reflexes. Without some of them, the baby would not be able to survive outside the mother's womb. One of them is sucking.
The sucking reflex is an innate reflex.
What is this?
The sucking reflex is unconditioned and is extremely important for the baby’s survival after childbirth. Its formation begins during the gestation period. Thanks to him, the baby receives food from the mother's breast or bottle. It manifests itself to its maximum in hungry healthy toddlers, and immediately after feeding it weakens for a short time.
It is quite pronounced at the age of up to one year and normally begins to fade away by the age of 3-4 years. If a baby under one year old has it to an increased degree, the baby will often and for a long time suck on the breast, pacifier and even his fists.
Grade
To trigger the reflex, an index finger is inserted into the child's mouth to a depth of about 3 cm. Normally, the baby should begin to suck on it rhythmically. If the reflex is strong, you just need to touch the baby’s lips or stroke the toddler’s cheek, and the baby will open its mouth and begin to move its tongue, as if sucking.
Also, in its assessment, you can use trial feeding - the baby is given a breast or a bottle of food, after which they observe how vigorously the baby sucks. If it is weakly expressed, the baby will suck sluggishly. In this situation, the baby may frequently refuse the breast or bottle, rarely swallow food, and fall asleep during feeding.
To test the sucking reflex, you need to bring your finger to the baby’s mouth and insert it shallowly
Many mothers do its assessment immediately after birth. See the next video for more details.
Reasons for absence or weakening
The sucking reflex may be absent when:
- Paresis of the facial nerves.
- Severe somatic illness of the child.
- High degree mental retardation.
- Hypoxia during pregnancy or childbirth, causing damage to the central nervous system.
- Weakening of the muscles responsible for chewing, the muscles of the tongue and mouth.
- Deep prematurity.
- Birth injuries of the spinal cord.
Diseases such as acute respiratory viral infections, stomatitis or a runny nose can lead to a decrease in the sucking reflex. Also, its weakened degree can be provoked by flat nipples Mom.
What to do if it is absent or weakly expressed
The absence or pronounced weakness of the sucking reflex should be responded to immediately, because this threatens the baby with malnutrition, as a result of which the baby may lag behind in development. If your mother notices such a weakening, you should immediately consult a doctor. The neurologist will check it and other innate reflexes of the baby, after which he will monitor the baby or prescribe the necessary treatment.
In a situation where he is not present immediately after birth, the baby begins to be fed either through a tube or parenterally (nutrient solutions are administered through a vein). This is especially common in babies who were born prematurely. They are not discharged home until the reflex is sufficiently restored.
How to recover
If the baby sucks very weakly, the question of how to develop it is extremely important for his health. Organizing feedings, using a pacifier and bottle feeding helps with this. The doctor will also recommend doing this before feeding. special massage faces. Of course, for successful recovery it is important to take into account the reason for its weakening, so no action should be taken without consultation and advice from a doctor.
You can learn about the benefits of a pacifier in its development by watching the following video.
A weak sucking reflex in a newborn is detected during feeding, however, sometimes mothers are not able to independently determine the presence of a problem. The sucking reflex is manifested in children by the ability to suck on the mother's breast or a pacifier placed in the mouth. There is no need to teach your baby this, since sucking is not a habit, but an important reflex. It is formed during the period of intrauterine development. Subsequently, this reflex affects the formation of the child’s psyche. Thanks to the sucking reflex, the baby satisfies the feeling of hunger.
The sucking reflex occurs in the first minutes of life; it is innate and ensures the survival of the newborn. When feeding, the palate touches, the baby begins to suck milk from their mother's breast or bottle, and sucks it in. It is the severity of this reflex that determines whether the child is full or underfed. And after eating, the reflex weakens, but an hour later it appears again. The baby is perfectly soothed by rhythmic sucking. Five pairs of cranial nerves are responsible for the sucking reflex. The baby feels pleasure when he sucks on a pacifier, but sucking milk is hard work for him. By the first year of life, this reflex weakens. The baby has absolutely no sucking reflex, who is already three or four years old.
Why do newborns have weak reflexes? Causes of a weak sucking reflex.
Weakness or complete absence of the sucking reflex can be determined during feeding. Healthy babies immediately energetically grab their mother's breast and suck it greedily. But newborns who have a reduced reflex fall asleep during feeding, they are constantly lethargic, rarely swallow and often refuse to breastfeed altogether. Premature and weakened babies are discharged from the hospital only when they can suck on their own.
When premature baby sucking reflex appears? In a baby who develops normally, the swallowing reflex appears at approximately 10-11 weeks of development inside the womb, and the sucking reflex appears at 29 weeks. The sucking reflex in premature babies develops later and is worse, and sometimes completely absent. Therefore, such children need to be fed through a catheter, using a pipette or spoon.
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You can check a weakened sucking reflex in this way: put your finger in the child’s mouth, if he has no deviations, then the baby will begin to instinctively suck his finger. The main reasons why this reflex decreases:
severe somatic conditions; hypoxia during pregnancy and during birth process; paresis of the facial nerves; mental retardation; in some cases - acute respiratory viral infections, acute respiratory infections and stomatitis.
What is dangerous about the absence of a sucking reflex in a newborn? Treatment and causes.
The absence of a swallowing reflex in a newborn indicates damage to the central nervous system (brain lining), and this is an extremely negative neurological sign. If a baby lacks these reflexes, he simply cannot survive. These children are fed through a tube. Sometimes difficulty sucking or its absence may be a consequence birth trauma. Also among the main reasons is neurological pathology, such as weakness of the tongue, orbicularis oris muscle and masticatory muscles.
Due to injuries to the neck or cervico-occipital zone, the medulla oblongata is damaged, resulting in a decrease in the sucking reflex. Due to such injuries, the overall development of the baby slows down. By the presence of natural reflexes, one can judge the baby’s health and the state of his central nervous system.