When a few random people once told me that a gym ball can be used to soothe a really fussy baby a couple of years ago, I thought that sounded awfully weird.  It went right over my head as I (silently) went, “Yeah. Right.

In my mind, I was certain they were just doing a sales pitch and was trying to impose their holistic nonsense bullshit on me –I was, after all, in some yoga class when that conversation happened. I really thought they had gone over the cuckoo’s nest!

I mean, what do you do with a gym ball? Or a birthing ball, or an exercise ball, a balance ball, or whatever it is that is being called, except using it as a prop when you exercise?  You know that big, round of a ball which is about 10x the size of your head and you can use it to bounce your butt around?  Yeah, this:

 

 

Turned out I was probably the weird, closed-minded one and those people knew what they were talking about. (Duh! I know…I know….)

Why am I even blogging about this? Apart from the fact that I have put myself in shame by exposing my ignorance about the uses of the ball, I also discovered the magic of the ball last week in my “Mommy and Me” Yoga class session with Spud.

Ahh! Now it is making sense, right!

I have always enjoyed the “Mommy and Me” Yoga sessions for moms with new babies (min. 1 month till about crawling stage).  I figured, since I did a number of sessionswith Spud when I was on maternity leave, I thought going with Squirt now would be a good way to spend one-on-one time with him before I go back to work; which was what exactly I did last week.

Except that due to his reflux, that poor boy could not stop crying and was inconsolable. Nothing I tried worked, and looking at how helpless I was, the instructor offered to get me a gym ball. While I went “what”, “why” and almost rolling my eyeballs IN MY HEAD when I heard that, I accepted the offer graciously.

When she came back with the ball and suggested that I bounce on the ball while cradling Squirt, I did wonder if it will work. I even felt certain that it was a futile effort, and somewhat ridiculous. But I was too focused on trying to calm Squirt down, and at that time, I was game to try ANYTHING.

What do you know – the moment I sat on it and started bouncing up and down like a clown, Squirt calmed down immediately. I kid you not. He stopped crying in an instant!  I even tried it several times during that session for every single time he got inconsolably fussy.  I was so amazed that I immediately bought us a 65 cm ball home.

I am now endorsing that it indeed is a fabulous tool for soothing a fussy Squirt. Each time he gets into one of his crying fits, I get on the ball. And it worked every damn time; even putting Silver Bullet in amazement at how Squirt just shuts up!