Key Takeaways
1. Nurture is a Preventive Medicine Built in Infancy
When babies receive nurturing care in the first three years of life, it builds strong, resilient brains—brains that are less susceptible to poor mental health for life.
Early Experiences Matter. Mental health struggles are prevalent and growing, but the foundation for lifelong mental wellness is built in infancy. Nurturing care during the first three years of life has a dramatic impact on genetics and the development of an infant’s stress system, leading to a cascade of changes in the brain and body that boost lifelong health. This period of rapid brain development offers a unique opportunity to shape resilient brains less susceptible to mental health issues.
Nurture vs. Pills. While pharmaceutical treatments can help, they haven't improved collective mental health. Nurture, in contrast, is a preventive experiential approach that builds strong, resilient brains. This involves responsive relationships that regulate the stress system, mitigate genetic risks, and promote lifelong health.
The Mental Health Revolution. By nurturing our babies' brains, we can revolutionize mental health and impact larger systems in our world. Mental health doesn’t impact individuals in isolation. Our families, communities, and nations at large are impacted by the mental health of their members. We are in a mental health crisis with wide-ranging effects on humanity and our planet. We are also in possession of knowledge to dramatically shift this crisis and create new cycles of intergenerational mental wellness.
2. Babies Need to Borrow Your Brain for Regulation
Babies need reliable access to you, a parent or caregiver, for what I call an external emotional brain; they need a caregiver who can reliably regulate their stress, support their emotions, and meet their needs.
Immature Brain Circuits. Infants' brains are still developing, particularly the emotional and thinking brain circuits. They cannot manage stress and emotions on their own, requiring caregivers to act as an "external emotional brain." This means providing a supportive, reliable, and safe presence to regulate their stress, support their emotions, and meet their needs.
Three Stages of Brain Development. The infant brain develops from the bottom up:
- Survival brain circuits (brain stem) develop first, sustaining life and inviting relationships.
- Emotional brain circuits (limbic system) develop extensively in infancy, shaped by nurture.
- Thinking brain circuits (prefrontal cortex) develop later, influenced by the emotional brain.
Co-regulation is Key. Babies need reliable access to you, a parent or caregiver, for what I call an external emotional brain; they need a caregiver who can reliably regulate their stress, support their emotions, and meet their needs. In order to build the healthiest brain, your baby needs to borrow your mature brain functions during the important early years of their life. The infant brain develops in the relationship with the adult brain. It borrows the adult brain to develop regulation, sociability, cognition, and health.
3. Nurture Interacts with Inherited Genes for Mental Health
Nurture makes an impact on inherited DNA and epigenetics to reduce or silence mental health effects.
Nature and Nurture. The brain is built by a complex interplay between genetics (nature) and experiences (nurture). While DNA provides the building instructions, experiences shape and strengthen important genes, proteins, cells, and circuits in the brain. Nurture can reduce or silence the power of genes that increase vulnerability to psychiatric symptoms.
Orchid vs. Dandelion Genes. Some infants inherit "orchid" genes, making them highly sensitive to both nurturing and stressful experiences. Others inherit "dandelion" genes, making them more resilient regardless of their environment. Since we don't know which genes our children have, it's crucial to provide every child with nurturing experiences to maximize their chances at good mental health.
Epigenetic Markers. Experiences in early development lead to epigenetic changes in our babies. Nurturing experiences create epigenetic markers on DNA that foster resilience and mental wellness. Stressful experiences may leave epigenetic markers that increase susceptibility to mental unwellness. By nurturing in pregnancy and infancy, we can create new epigenetic markers that foster resilience and mental wellness.
4. Parent Brains are Wired for Nurturing Superpowers
Having a baby changes your brain to give you nurturing superpowers.
Brain Transformation. Becoming a parent leads to massive brain changes, a period of neuroplasticity as significant as adolescence. This transformation, called matrescence (for mothers) and patrescence (for fathers), involves the emergence of new and specialized parenting brain circuits that nonparents do not have.
Parenting Superpowers. These new brain circuits give parents enhanced abilities for:
- Sensitivity to baby's communication
- Enhanced empathy
- Threat detection
- Feelings of motivation, reward, and calm when interacting with their baby
Nurture is Key. The extent of these brain changes and the strength of parenting superpowers depend on the amount of time parents spend nurturing their baby in the early months. This underscores the importance of parental leave for all parents.
5. Nurturing Presence: Being in a Physical and Emotional Relationship
Being with my baby is vital brain-building, circuit-sculpting, cycle-starting activism for my baby’s future.
Shifting Mindsets. Nurturing presence is a shift in mindset from thinking of babies as objects to be managed to thinking of them as human beings who exist in relationships. It involves unconditional acceptance, respect, and trust in their cues and communication.
The Four Questions. A nurturing presence is characterized by answering "yes" to these questions:
- Do you see me?
- Do you care that I'm here?
- Am I enough for you, or do you need me to be better in some way?
- Can I tell that I’m special to you by the way that you look at me?
Being vs. Doing. Nurturing presence prioritizes being with your baby over doing tasks. It recognizes that the most powerful tool we have for building healthy brains is not perfection or any product, but simply our loving presence.
6. Nurtured Empathy: Connecting to Your Baby's Internal World
All of your baby’s stress and emotions need to feel welcome and safe.
Understanding the Internal World. Babies have an internal world made up of physical sensations, stress, emotions, needs, and thoughts. All behavior and communication comes from this internal world. Nurtured empathy involves bringing our attention to the baby’s internal world with the goal of teaching them how to navigate emotions, needs, thoughts, and behaviors.
Beyond Behavior-Based Parenting. Nurtured empathy is an alternative to behavior-based parenting, which focuses on modifying behaviors through rewards and punishments. Instead, nurtured empathy seeks to understand the underlying emotions and needs driving the behavior.
Building Self-Awareness. By linking behavior to feelings and needs, we help babies develop self-awareness, self-regulation, and empathy for others. This involves naming what is happening internally, connecting the thinking brain with the emotional brain, and meeting the underlying need.
7. Nurturing Stress: Responding to Cries and Big Emotions
Responding reliably strengthens a baby’s emotional brain circuits, helps them grow confidently independent, and gives them the gift of stress regulation for life.
Stress as Communication. All infant stress is communication, signaling that their stress systems are overwhelmed and they feel unsafe and dysregulated. Babies need us to provide oxytocin to help them feel calm and safe.
The Stress Curve. Babies have a functioning amygdala alarm and hypothalamus gas pedal, but lack a hippocampus brake pedal. They need nurture to recover their stress system and get into safety states.
The Importance of Presence. Nurture, through thousands of experiences with a calm, regulated, and loving external brain in infancy, sets the conditions and builds the efficiency of the stress system that babies will rely on for life.
8. Nurturing Sleep: Creating a Safe and Connected Sleep Environment
There is a huge range of sleep needs for babies, and in a safe, comfortable sleep environment my baby will sleep the amount that their brain needs.
Normal Infant Sleep. Infant sleep is governed by circadian rhythm and homeostatic sleep drive, both of which are immature in babies. Night waking is a normal feature of infant sleep, and babies need our help to fall back asleep.
Beyond Sleep Training. Sleep training, which involves letting infants cry until they fall asleep alone, is not neuroscience-supported or evidence-based. It may lead to a freeze-dissociation-sleep response and put the infant brain at risk of toxic stress.
Nurtured Sleep Practices. Nurtured sleep involves:
- A regulated caregiver
- Supporting circadian rhythms with sunlight and darkness
- Following the baby's tired cues
- Nurturing the baby to sleep with co-regulation, feeding, cuddling, rocking, or carrying
- Sleeping close to the baby
- Prioritizing your own sleep
9. Filling Your Nurture Reservoir: Prioritizing Your Well-being
Becoming a parent is a unique opportunity to learn about your stress system and do inner work within the relationship with your baby.
The Nurture Reservoir. Think of yourself as having a nurture reservoir inside. When it's full, you feel comfortable, safe, and able to deal with stressors. When it's empty, you're more likely to switch into a stress state.
I CARE Practices. Use these practices to build your nurture reservoir over time:
- Intuition or Interoception: Observe signals from your body.
- Curious about your physical needs: Meet your basic needs for water, food, nature, movement, sleep, touch, and safety.
- Aware of your emotions and emotional needs: Learn to recognize and process your emotions.
- Regular breathing: Practice slow, deep belly breathing.
- Evoke compassion and awe: Cultivate positive emotions.
Growing SPACE Practices. Use these in-the-moment strategies to guide you from stress states to safety states:
- Self-awareness: Notice when you're getting stressed.
- Pause your immediate reaction: Interrupt the immediate response.
- Aware of the sensations: Feel the emotion and notice sensations in your body.
- Create movement: Release the stress through physical movement.
- Emotion processing: Name your feelings and needs.
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Review Summary
The Nurture Revolution receives mostly positive reviews, with readers praising its science-based approach to attachment parenting and emphasis on nurturing babies. Many find it validating and life-changing, appreciating the focus on responding to infants' needs. Some criticize the repetitive nature and lack of detail in certain areas. A few readers express discomfort with inclusive language choices. Overall, the book is widely recommended for new parents, though some suggest it may not be suitable for all audiences or parenting philosophies.
