What are normal newborn reflexes?
Your child is born with many newborn reflexes. And these are reflexes that you're born with, but that disappear. And most newborn reflexes disappear by about four to six months of age. There are two newborn reflexes that persist to a year, the sucking reflex, which makes sense because your baby needs to be sucking--taking the milk up to a year at least. And the Babinsky reflex, which is when you rub the bottom of the foot, and the toes curl up. If I did that to you, and rubbed the bottom of your foot, your toes would curl down. And that makes sense that you start curling down after a year, because that's when you start walking, and you're sort of grabbing to the ground. Now the Moro newborn reflex is a startle reflex that it can be out of the blue--it could be after a loud noise; it could just be after holding the baby's hands, that they shake and hug the air like this. Or their leg quivers; or their lower lip or chin quivers. All these little quivers are normal newborn reflexes. But the Moro reflex is the shaking of the arms in a hugging position up in the air. And that newborn reflex usually goes away about four to six months of age. It wouldn't make much sense if we were all walking down the street doing that. Some other newborn reflexes are the Moro reflex, where again, the toes curl up. There's the Rooting reflex where you rub the cheek of the baby, and their mouth will go toward it. And that makes sense that the babies need that so that when they feel the breast or the nipple near their mouth, they go to take the nipple. And these are all absolutely necessary reflexes for a newborn.
