1stInfant.com website deals with infants, their needs, general information, services and products to enhance an infant life and their family.

Technically speaking, an infant is a word from the Latin word “infans” which means unable to speak. Legally an infant is any child under the age of legal adulthood.

The difference between a newborn and an infant is when referring to a child less than one month old they are called newborn. A newborn includes all prematures, postmatures, and full term pregnancy delivers.

After the first month from birth, the infant will continue to be categorized as an infant until between the ages of 12-24 months an infant moves into the toddler stage.

During the first year of life an infant may succumb to infant mortality by many causes, the most frequent are congenital malformation, dehydration, infection and SIDS.

Throughout the first year of life an infant uses crying as a form of basic instinctive communication. A crying infant can be expressing many different feels such as boredom, discomfort, hunger, loneliness and over stimulation.

Usually during infancy the recommended method of feeding is breast feeding. If breast feeding is not option, then an infant formula is substituted.

The ability of an infant to obtain a sucking reflex is something they are born with and thus allows them to extract milk from either the nipples of the breasts or the nipple of the baby bottle. This also includes the natural born ability of rooting to find a nipple. Historically, a wet nurse was used to feed the infant, however, this is becoming more rare in developed countries.

As the infant gets older, food supplements are also introduced into the daily feeding. The selection of what type of supplements, fresh, canned, prepackaged, or at what age vary drastically around the world.

During their growing period, infants are seen wearing diapers until they become toilet trained. Some infants become toilet trained early, within the first year, however the average is around 18 months. The 18 is also the magical number a newborn needs of sleep per day on the average.