Strangers to the baby

definition

The word "strangers" describes the behavior of small children towards strangers. In this context, grandma, grandpa or your own dad can also be defined as a stranger. Small children can begin to strangle from one day to the next and then approach all other people, including the close and familiar environment, with distrust and dismissive behavior. Most of the time, the only trusted caregiver remains the mother. However, this strangeness is totally normal and shouldn't be a cause for concern. It speaks for the fact that the child's social behavior develops so that the child recognizes familiar faces and can differentiate strangers from them.

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Causes of alienation

The only defined reason for alienation so far is the normal development process of the child's social behavior. From the 6th month onwards, the children are able to recognize faces and react accordingly to familiar or strangers. The child's sensory perception matures so that it no longer blindly trusts each person as before, smiles at them and gives them undivided attention. The child can now recognize certain features in the face of different people or assign individual gestures and facial expressions.

In a certain way, by being strangers, a child shows the first traits of a healthy distrust of strangers in a possibly unfamiliar environment. At the same time, being strangers is a sign that the child is able to build trust. As a parent, you don't have to worry or reproach yourself for the time being that the strangers are based on poor upbringing or that the child was spoiled too much. Of course, bad experiences with strangers in the past can have a negative influence on 8-month strangers. However, this is more of an exception. Incidentally, the strangeness of children can be very dependent on how their current well-being looks. On bad-tempered days, strange behavior is possibly more pronounced than usual.

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It is also assumed that it depends on the maternal character how long and intensely the Fremdel phase lasts. Mothers who enjoy communicating and who are quick to talk to new people and who are open to strangers can, in the presence of their child, convey to them that there is no danger from the stranger. If a child grows up in such an environment, it can have a positive influence on the child's strangeness.

How is stranger diagnosed

The diagnosis of “strangers” is only possible through careful observation and analysis of the child's behavior. If children suddenly react anxiously to a person who enters the room or comes into close proximity to the child, and hides behind mum's legs for protection or wants to be hugged, it is almost certainly a stranger child. The triggering person does not necessarily have to be a stranger, it can also be the grandparents or friends.

From an appropriate age children show that sudden change in behavior towards certain people. As soon as strangling occurs from the appropriate age, around the 8th month of life, affected parents can be fairly certain that their child is strangling. In order to diagnose the foreign phase in children, a visit to the doctor with diagnostic equipment is not necessary. It often helps to ask mothers who are friends or your own parents for advice on assessing the child's new strange behavior.

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Concomitant symptoms

How exactly the alienation looks in a child varies from person to person. Most of the time, strangers are scared, cry or even scream. Because of their fear, the children seek contact with a person they trust, in most cases with their mother, and want to be picked up by her or hide behind her. They seek protection from the supposedly stranger, so to speak, and find it with their parents. It is also typical that the children turn their heads away from the stranger. Overall, they behave in a very dismissive and distant manner. Often they scrutinize the stranger very carefully and face them with great suspicion.

It is generally known that alienation is much more likely to be triggered by adults than by other children or adolescents. In addition, men trigger the strange behavior more often than women.In general, strangers want to escape from the confrontational situation with the stranger in whatever way and therefore seek contact with a trusted person chosen for this moment.

Treatment / therapy of strangeness

First of all, it should be said that foreigning is completely normal and is part of the development of social behavior. In most cases it is not necessary to treat the alienation of children, as this behavior pattern is abandoned by itself after a certain age of the children. Nevertheless, one can counteract the alienation in a supportive way and help to relieve the children of fears. First of all, it is therefore important that the child's confidant who is present recognizes the strangeness as such in order to react appropriately. So the child and his strangers should be taken seriously. This means that as a person of trust you should offer the protection that the child expects from you at this moment. It is counterproductive to try to force the child to grapple with the situation and seek confrontation with the stranger.

Conveying understanding and patient behavior as well as security are essential. Nonetheless, the person you trust must not provoke avoidance behavior.

If the child begins to struggle, that is his right. However, the person they trust can establish communicative contact with the supposed stranger at a distance. In this way, she conveys to the child, without actively involving them, that the stranger does not pose any danger. Babysitters to whom a child reacts with strange behavior should not be sent home straight away. No, it is advisable to simply leave the new babysitter in the child's environment for a longer period of time. Talk to him in front of the child and actively involve him in tasks such as feeding, changing diapers and playing with him and the child. In this way, the child learns to abandon its initial, completely normal strange behavior more quickly.

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How long does strangling take with the baby?

Children usually start cheating around 6 to 9 months of age. A frequency peak is described in the 8th month, on which the synonym "8-month anxiety" is based. From the 2nd to 3rd year of life, the strangling usually subsides again on its own. Of course, the beginning and the end of the strange behavior vary individually. Some children do not start to stranger until late and put it down after a few months. Others classically strangle from the 8th month and only stop at the age of 2 or even later. Mostly, strangling recedes as part of the development of social behavior as soon as verbal communication improves.

There are also several factors that can influence the duration of the alienation. On the one hand, this includes the child's characteristics, such as the general character of the child and his current feelings. On bad-tempered days, children tend to stray more than on other days. In addition, it went from the ground up to very shy children, in whom the stranger phase simply lasts longer than in sociable and curious children.

The mother can also influence the duration of the alienation. An open and sociable manner has a positive influence on a shorter stranger phase. If the parents receive frequent visitors, it is also more likely that the child will spend less time with strangers, as it is used to contact with strangers at first. A counterproductive factor is the intrusive and penetrative behavior of supposedly strangers. It is important to accept the child's strange behavior and to give him time and space.

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Which foreign phases are there?

The foreign phase typically begins in the 8th month of life. This is why one speaks of the so-called 8-month stranger. At this point, unfamiliar children express themselves with crying and screaming.

In the further course, the reactions shift depending on the child's level of development. An older child who can already walk will start crying less. Rather, it will run away from the stranger and hide behind the confidant's legs or signal the desire to be kidnapped. It will also watch the stranger closely with suspicious looks or shyly avert their gaze.

The older the child is, the more clearly it can show or communicate that it is afraid of the stranger and does not want to be around. However, one cannot generalize the whole thing completely and assign a certain behavior to an age of the foreign phase. Every child tends to be strangers to different intensities and in different ways.

At the age of 2-3 years the strangling generally subsides again.

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Parentheses and separation anxiety in the child

Clinging and the associated fear of separation is a component or a typical characteristic in the stranger phase of a child. If the mother takes it to daycare or kindergarten, for example, it is difficult for the children to separate from their mother. They cling to their arms, cry and resist being forced to leave their mother behind.

The fear of separation is particularly pronounced in the stranger phase and is based on the fact that the children suddenly see the kindergarten teachers as strangers whom they distrust. Therefore, they cling to their trusted person, as only with her will they feel safe and secure. During this phase, children are afraid that the mother will not come back and leave them behind. Therefore, some children may respond to the breakup with very violent crying and screaming.

Strangers with papa

A stranger child can be very moody and volatile when it comes to defining a stranger. It often happens that one's own father is treated as a stranger. This manifests itself in a defensive reaction to the father and an increased search for contact with the mother. The children show all possible typical behaviors of a stranger phase such as crying, screaming, fear and aversion towards the father and focus on the mother. This Fremdel reaction tends to affect fathers who work all day and only come home in the evening.

If the child has then spent the whole day with the mother, the father, when he comes home, is understandably initially as a stranger. The father then has to painfully accept the stranger and should not force the child to make contact - i.e. not poke him or her despite crying and defensive behavior. Rather, it makes sense to be near the child with the mother, to talk to him while maintaining a certain distance and to wait for the child to approach the father again by itself. It can also be helpful for the mother to show the child photos of dad during the day or to have him talk to him on the phone so that the child can remember the voice in the evening.

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Strangers with grandma and grandpa

It is not uncommon to observe that the grandparents were warmly welcomed and illuminated yesterday and the next day the child perceived them as strangers who were greeted with suspicion and fear. This situation, which is painful for the grandparents, is typical in the child's stranger phase. This is not because the grandparents were not nice on the last visit or did something to the child, no, an unfamiliar child spontaneously defines who is seen as a stranger from one day to the next. Unfortunately, this can also affect grandma and grandpa.

The reason for this is the development of social behavior. The mother or the father who spent the day with the child, they the so to speak chosen confidante. Anyone who joins them, whether they are relatives or friends, is perceived as a stranger. However, this phase can pass quickly if the grandparents are patient and show understanding for the unfamiliar child. It is important that they accept the behavior and not try to harass the child. The child needs to get used to grandma and grandpa again, so to speak, which can be easily achieved with regular meetings. Often the foreign phase goes just as quickly as it came. Grandma and grandpa shouldn't take it personally and worry about it.

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