How to do a relieving massage for constipation in a child

Hello, dear readers!

Massage is a miraculous technique for influencing the body, helping to solve many health problems. It works equally well in both adults and children. Current and future parents should be aware of the possibilities of physical therapy for various disorders in their child. The most common problem for infants and their parents is digestion and natural recovery. Intestinal colic, combined with high mobility of the baby's colon, is the cause of sleepless nights for the whole family in the first few months. Constipation causes no less trouble for parents.

How important is massage for health?

Both problems can be solved with the correct technique of massaging the tummy. Pediatricians agree with this and advise mothers to regularly massage the baby’s body. Massage in infancy is extremely beneficial. This is gentle stimulation that helps the baby develop correctly and harmoniously. By influencing the skin and muscles, we also influence the baby’s brain, stimulating the centers responsible for motor activity, immunity, and intelligence.

By the way, when we talk about abdominal massage for constipation in children, we usually mean performing various techniques on a newborn. But in fact, this type of influence is also effective in older children - up to 3-5 years. There are even types of massage for constipation for adults, which we will talk about in the following articles.

A little about other physiological methods of eliminating constipation

To enhance the therapeutic effect of massage, depending on the age of the baby, use the following techniques:

Placing the baby on the stomach.
Passive leg movements. Bring your legs together and bend your knees, pulling your hips toward your stomach, lifting your limbs up. Be careful not to lift the legs up in infants under 6 months - this will cause spastic constipation.
Gymnastic exercises. With children over one and a half years old, do play gymnastics, which involves bending the torso in a standing or lying position, lifting the legs, and “bicycle.” Come up with interesting adventures, then the child will be happy to join the game.

It is difficult to explain to young children the need for gymnastics. Massage your tummy and then play with your baby - a session of stroking and playing will bring pleasure to the baby.

We invite you to watch a training video about the rules of baby massage:

Massaging your baby’s belly is not difficult, but before you start treating your baby’s constipation with massage procedures, consult your pediatrician. You will not be able to determine on your own: stool retention is caused by physiological reasons, the appearance of an obstacle in the path of feces or diseases of the digestive tract, and in case of diseases, intestinal stimulation is harmful.

Why does constipation occur?

If this has become a constant cause of concern for your baby, do not be upset: many children have difficulties with bowel movements. Pediatricians name different causes of constipation in children and associate them with physiological and psychological factors, depending on the age of the child. In fact, it is impossible to say exactly what caused the baby’s constipation.

Most often, doctors name the following factors:

If a nursing mother ate something unusual.
When a baby is transferred from breast milk to artificial nutritional formulas.
If a child is given first complementary foods, this is one of the most common causes of digestive problems in children.
If the baby was given a medicine that has astringent and fastening properties.
When there is little liquid in the child’s diet (this applies to those children who are bottle-fed or switch from breast milk to complementary foods and “adult” food).

In older children, constipation may be associated with psychological factors. Most often, parents encounter this problem during potty training. If before this baby easily relieved himself in diapers, then when switching to a new regime, difficulties may arise. Especially if parents behave incorrectly - they are nervous, scolding them because the child “forgot” to ask to go to the potty - this can lead to psychological problems, which are physically expressed in constipation.

If your child's constipation becomes chronic, this should be a reason to contact your pediatrician.

It is important! Supporters of Sigmund Freud's psychosexual teachings are confident that issues related to natural relationships should be resolved as delicately as possible. In childhood, bowel movements, according to Freudians, are associated with creativity (“my body produced something”). Therefore, you should not force your baby to go to the toilet when he doesn’t want to, or scold him for asking to go to the potty at the wrong time. This can cause various psychological complexes in adolescence and adulthood.

Therefore, the first thing to do for constipation is:

eat in moderation and at the appropriate time, according to the table of activity of internal organs.
Maintain water regime
eat your daily dose of fruits and vegetables, and of course
moderate physical activity, and
daily abdominal massage.

After all, constipation is a real problem for any person, when it is difficult to go to the toilet, the stomach becomes like stone, anxiety disturbs and sleep is disturbed, bags appear under the eyes. Food that has stopped in the intestines begins to cause great harm to the body, poisoning it with poisons and toxins.

Therefore, constipation must be dealt with immediately, or better, of course, with the causes of its occurrence. But all the same, if there is already constipation, then the intestines, especially its thick section, need to be awakened.

And for this, I offer you a very effective exercise for constipation , from the health gymnastics Lam Press. The exercise or form is called "Dough".

So, as usual, before performing any exercise or massage, you need to warm up your hands very well, especially your fingertips. Then remember and think about the meaning and importance of the abdominal cavity to you. Send all your Gratitude and Love to this area by listing each organ in this area. This is a very important point when performing massage for constipation.

How to do a tummy massage?

The massage technique is quite simple and does not require the mother to have a certificate of completion of a massage course. Most movements involve gentle, slow strokes and minimal pressure. It is important to remember that the abdomen is a very sensitive area, so you should not apply too much pressure or make too intense or fast movements. Proceed slowly and carefully.

It is important! During the session, look the baby in the eyes, talk to him, smile, sing songs - i.e. communicate with the child so that he feels comfortable and calm: his mother is nearby.

Do not massage your tummy with cold palms. Your hands should be warm and gentle; this is very important both for the effectiveness of execution and for psychological comfort.

The massage technique is as follows:

Place your right palm in the center of your tummy and begin clockwise circular movements. Move slowly, increasing the radius of the circles from the navel to the hypochondrium.
Wrap both hands around the baby's lower back and move your palms away from the obliques and navel.
Stroke your tummy with your hand from the navel to the pubic bone.
Perform acupressure with your fingertips around the navel.
Then massage your oblique abdominal muscles with your fingertips.
Gently massage the area of the sigmoid colon with two fingers (it is located in the lower left part of the tummy and can be easily felt with your fingers like a small elastic cushion).

Stimulation of the sigmoid colon is a very effective technique that usually helps the baby to quickly relieve itself, because. exposure to this part of the intestine causes a strong urge to defecate. Finish the session with light and smooth strokes, letting the baby feel the warmth of your hands.

Doctors advise giving your baby a couple of tablespoons of water before the session to soften the stool and make it easier for them to pass down the intestines.

Better remember this! Circular movements on the tummy for constipation should be done clockwise. If your baby has the opposite problem - diarrhea - then you can massage the stomach using circular movements counterclockwise. Surprisingly, it works.

Massage for flatulence: indications

Bloating is a big problem for the person who experiences it. It can be accompanied by pain of a different nature: cramping, cutting, stabbing, etc. Sometimes the pain is so strong that a person cannot straighten up and is forced to remain in one position so as not to provoke new spasms in the intestines. A special abdominal massage will help relieve symptoms of flatulence. It is indicated in the case of:

Acute attacks of pain caused by spasm and hypertonicity of the muscles of the abdominal region;
To eliminate symptoms of flatulence due to nervousness.

Massage should not be done if there is a suspicion of appendicitis, peritonitis and other inflammatory processes of internal organs. Also a contraindication is the presence of elevated temperature.

The main purpose of anti-bloating massage is to enhance intestinal motility and peristaltic functions. It is performed on an empty stomach or a few hours after eating. Each age group has its own characteristics of massage.

Precautionary measures

If the reason for stool retention lies in the physiology of digestion, then you can easily cope with them yourself. But the situation is completely different with intestinal obstruction, which often occurs in infants and children under 6 months. In pediatrics, there is the concept of “intussusception,” in which the movable loops of the colon seem to enter one another, creating an obstruction. In this case, medical attention is needed, and massaging the tummy is prohibited.

Symptoms and signs of intestinal obstruction are:

the baby did not walk “at large” for 1-2 days;
the baby's gas does not pass;
the child from time to time presses his legs to his stomach and cries;
vomiting begins;
body temperature is increased.

Sometimes a baby may have stool that looks like raspberry jam due to blood. In this case, the child should be urgently shown to the pediatrician. Self-medication is unacceptable!

It is important to remember these symptoms in order to identify diseases in time. But don’t let anything scare you, because medicine today helps solve almost any problem.

Abdominal massage for bloating in infants

In infants, the digestive process continues to adjust in the first months of life. Because of this, colic and bloating in babies occur very often. Massage can relieve the condition. There are several exercises designed specifically for newborns.

You need to start with something simple. Place your palms on your child's stomach and hold them in this position for a couple of minutes. Heat has a beneficial effect on internal organs, activating their work;
Gently pick up your baby and place him on your arm, forearm, stomach and face down. Rock it slightly. This way the abdominal area will receive a light massage;
After warming up, you can move on to more intense manipulations. Turn the baby over, holding him close to you; knees should be bent. Rub his lower back with your palm. The legs in this position press on the stomach, resulting in a massage of the internal organs, in particular the intestines;
For older children (from three months), a more complex massage is suitable. The child is placed on his back and his legs are bent. The knees turn to the left, but they should not touch the surface of the bed completely. Massage your stomach at waist level with upward movements. Then the baby is switched to the other side, and the procedure is repeated;
To weaken the tone of the peritoneum, make “crawling movements” with your fingertips in the direction from the lower abdomen upward. Babies really enjoy this gentle tickling;
The “bicycle” exercise is an excellent massage for the gastrointestinal tract. Also, while the baby is lying on his back, bend his legs into a ball and rock the baby from side to side.

Contraindications to massage

There are quite a few contraindications to medical massage. Absolute contraindications include the following diseases:

malignant formations;
dermatological diseases: herpes, lichen, pyoderma, etc.;
acute cerebrovascular accidents;
myocardial infarction;
epilepsy;
purulent inflammation;
bleeding disorders;
thrombophlebitis;
recent bleeding;
phlebeurysm;
aneurysms;
atherosclerosis.

Relative or temporary contraindications include fever, increased body temperature, respiratory diseases, and pregnancy. In case of peptic ulcer disease, it is important to achieve scarring; you can resort to massage only during exacerbations. After undergoing surgical interventions, it is important to wait a certain time; the doctor will tell you when you can go for a massage course.

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Gj-4 (he-gu) - point of life. Why in the East is this point on the hand called the point of life? When exposed to it using a microammeter, you can determine the energy in the channel of the large intestine. And accordingly, find out whether a patient with an unstable psyche has diarrhea or constipation. If the energy at point Gj-4 is low, then the intestines are clogged with fecal stones and the person experiences constipation. Which means my head hurts. The energy channel, together with the sap flow channel of the large intestine, “enters” the brain, and then joins the stomach channel, and through the tonsils, the juices enter the gastrointestinal tract and are then excreted from the body. It’s good that if you have diarrhea, then both the brain and the body are quickly cleansed of toxins. Well, if there is constipation, then the head “splits”, and we take handfuls of tablets for headaches, although it is enough to cause relaxation or cleanse the large intestine, establishing normal sap flow in the body. B vitamins are absorbed in the large intestine and through the sap flow channel these vitamins enter the brain, and from them the cells of neurons of the nervous system, skin and mucous membranes are built. Therefore, the head hurts, the nervous system suffers, and the mucous membranes of the gastrointestinal tract become inflamed and again carry poisons into the brain in a circle.

A pill for headaches aggravates the lack of nutrition to the brain, because it sharply reduces the energy in the large intestine channel and leads to chronic constipation. That is why point Gj-4 is called the point of life. To be healthy, you must first monitor the functioning of the large intestine and empty it in a timely manner, avoiding constipation. Emptying the colon should be a cult of a healthy lifestyle. The first condition that everyone must comply with is to immediately after waking up fill your brain with a thought aimed at emptying the intestines in order to get rid of everything that has accumulated in it during the previous day. The second condition is to do nothing until you empty your colon. Do not go outside, do not touch food. You can drink water to start your stomach and speed up emptying. The third condition is to begin bowel movements. To do this, use your index finger to press the deep meridian point, which is located on the left side. Place two fingers from the navel down the middle of the abdomen and two fingers from the navel to the left. The intersection of these lines will give you this point, which you need to press deeply and hold for two minutes. Then rest and repeat again. If pressing this point does not help, then turn on two more points, which are located on the chest at the level of the nipple, where the breast ends. These points are also only on the left side, and both of them are pressed at once. Hold for two minutes. We rest and press again. As soon as we feel a slight relaxation, we firmly press the point located at the very bottom of the tailbone and hold it until the rectum is completely emptied. After completing this procedure, we proceed to the normal rhythm of life and start a new day. At first, bowel cleansing is very difficult to master, but when the release reflex kicks in, it will become a necessity. And you won’t be able to live any other way. You can take honey or 30-50 g of sunflower oil in the evening to turn on the reflex if it doesn’t turn on. If everything works out for you, then the headaches will go away, you will get up “on the wrong foot”, and start your day in a good mood. Turn this procedure into a cult of a healthy lifestyle. Teach this to your children, and they will get sick less and become kind, cheerful, obedient and smart. Well, point Gj-4 is located in the dimple between the index and thumb on the outside of the palm. And if you don’t have a dimple, then massage this area more often on both hands. Well, if you learn to empty your bowels every morning, you will definitely have a dimple at this point.

The state of your psyche, your health and happiness are in your hands. Go for it!

Series of messages “gastrointestinal system”:
Part 1 - Recipes for colon cleansing Part 2 - Nikitin S.A. Let's restore the intestines... Part 3 - "SCRUB" FOR THE INTESTINES Part 4 - Point of life or how to get rid of constipation Part 5 - All about the work of the stomach (according to Avicenna) Part 6 - Apples against gastritis and dyskinesia... Part 23 - A miraculous recipe from a Siberian healer - Oil for stomach pain Part 24 - POMEGRANATE - cures everything! Part 25 - Simple ways to get rid of mucus in the body