Your Baby’s Progress at Five Months Old

Parents always wonder about the progress of their children and this is no different at five months old than it is at any other age.
The most important thing to keep in mind, however, is that all babies progress differently.  The subjects covered in this article are just a relative outline of the standard developmental stages of most babies at five months old.  Your baby’s personal development is bound to differ somewhat from those of others.  It is part of what makes your child an individual.

At five months of age, your baby has been developing hand-eye coordination.  This all started a few months ago when your child first realized that he or she had hands to use to grasp and hold things.  It actually takes well into month three for babies to understand that they have control over their hands.  At month five, your baby will have gained better manipulation of his or her hands and will be reaching for and grasping different items.

Now, baby will not only wish to explore things with those hands, but to use their mouth as well.  It becomes important to your child to get everything they can reach into their mouth as a way of finding out more about it.  It is important, at this stage, that you keep everything your baby might stick into their mouth clean.  You must also take authoritative action to keep anything dangerous and anything that can make your baby choke away from them.

At five months old, your baby’s weight gain may slow.  Babies typically gain six to eight ounces per week during their first three to five months.  Thereafter, it is not unusual for your baby’s weight gain to reduce to five to six ounces per week.  Again, babies are all different and while it is important that your baby continues to grow, it is more important that he or she grows regularly rather than how much.

At this age, babies will begin to develop personality traits that will stick with them into childhood.  There are three basic personality types that begin to show themselves around five months old.  The first is the easy baby.  This baby sleeps well, eats well, and can entertain himself for long durations.  The second personality type is the shy baby.  Shy babies are hesitant to try new things and can easily end up in tears when pressed into change.  The third baby personality is the high-needs baby.  A high-needs baby demands a lot of attention, is sensitive, and requires a lot of patience from his or her parents.  These personality traits are not resultant from any effect of parenting.  You do not wind up with an easy baby just because you are a good parent or a high-needs baby because you are somehow lacking.  This is simply how personality characteristics come to be.

Again, it is important to realize that all babies are different and that your baby will develop at his or her own rate as they reach five months old and more.