How Infant Massage Supports Bonding, Development, and Connection
Why Connection Matters
Babies don’t use words, but they are always communicating with us through their bodies, their breath, their movements, their cries, their stillness. Touch becomes one of the first ways we listen to, and respond to our babies!
Infant (often referred to as baby) massage is about slowing down long enough to notice your baby, and letting your baby feel noticed by you.
Connection and attachment don’t happen in one big moment. They’re built in small, repeated interactions of holding, responding to and soothing your baby.
When babies experience consistent, loving care, it helps their nervous system feel safe. Over time, that sense of safety supports their emotional regulation, development, and the ability to trust relationships later in life. Touch plays a powerful role in this. And just as importantly, it helps parents learn their baby.
Supporting Development
When babies feel safe and soothed, their bodies can focus on growing and developing.
Infant massage has been shown to support:
Sleep and relaxation
Digestion and comfort
Circulation and body awareness
Nervous system regulation
When Bonding Feels Delayed for NICU Families
For NICU families, connection can feel interrupted or delayed. Medical equipment, limited touch, separation, and fear can make it harder to experience the closeness parents hope for and imagine.
Infant massage can become a gentle way to reconnect with your baby when the time is right. It offers a way to rebuild physical closeness after separation, creates opportunities for skin-to-skin and moments of calm, invites respectful touch, and supports sensory and nervous system development.
When Postpartum Feels Heavy
Sometimes, connection can show up through action before it shows through emotion.
Infant massage isn’t only about babies. For parents experiencing postpartum depression, anxiety, or emotional numbness, bonding can feel complicated. Massaging your baby can offer a structured and gentle way to connect, create calm moments when feeling overwhelmed, increase confidence in responding to your baby, and reduce stress through shared physical and emotional regulation.
Why it Matters to Us
Infant massage is one of our core practices because it reflects our intention: to centre care, connection, and bonding for parents and babies. We believe healing and bonding happen in small, intentional moments. Infant massage invites us to notice. To listen. To connect.
* This practice is informed by attachment theory, infant development research, and cross-cultural traditions of touch:
Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University. (2011). Serve & return interaction shapes brain circuitry [Video].
Field, T. (2010). Touch for socioemotional and physical well-being: A review. Developmental Review, 30(4), 367–383.
McClure, V. (2021). Infant massage: A handbook for loving parents (4th ed.). Profile Books.