The Wonder Weeks

Understand why your baby cries

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Every parent has been there. Yesterday your baby was giggling and happy. Today she’s a monster. She won’t sleep, she won’t eat; she’s been crying all day. You can't see a tooth coming and she doesn't seem unwell. So, what has happened?

“Aha!”, a friend will say. “She must be going through a developmental ‘leap’.” What you need to decode this new stage and your baby’s fractious behaviour (and learn how to deal with it) is The Wonder Weeks – an app that helps you understand the mental development of babies over the first 20 months.

Simply enter your child’s due date (the app says this is a more accurate marker for brain development than birth date) and the app will create a personalised calendar for you, telling you what to expect at key milestones.

After reading what to expect for the upcoming week, hit the Notes button and jot down your own experience.
The Wonder Weeks helps you know what to look for as your baby grows and develops.

If your daughter is 22 weeks past her due date, for example, you’ll see a thundercloud icon on the app's calendar to indicate that she’s a few days from her entering the Relationships leap. This is when she’ll start to understand the distance between objects and, in turn, notice when you walk away. It’s a long leap (four weeks!), so get ready for that cranky behaviour and deal with it by warning your baby when you’re going to leave the room, and continuing to talk to her while you’re away.

Thanks to the popularity of The Wonder Weeks app and the partnering book on which it is based (available as an in-app purchase), the term ‘leap’ has become as commonplace as a lack of sleep among new parents.

The app makes all the brilliant content of the book easy to navigate and ensures you can take the information everywhere with you – ready for whenever the next ‘leap’ strikes.

Along the way, The Wonder Weeks tells you about the emotional and physical changes your baby may be encountering. If your daughter is 26 weeks old, for example, you’ll learn she’s approaching Leap 5, “The World of Relationships,” when babies begin to perceive the distance between two objects—which is a radical shift in their world.