What is the blanket for? This question, when you are parents, can take a considerable amount, especially when you are at your first. And even in our own childhood, we had old t-shirts, a doll or a teddy bear who followed us wherever we went. Even so, this fetish object that we adored had an important role in our construction as a child. Zoom on the usefulness of a good soft toy in your child.
What does a child's blanket represent?
Around the age of 8 months, your child begins to attach to objects that are accessible to him on a daily basis. It is also from what you can see that he makes a fixator on a particular object: his blanket.
For some, a blanket is a representation of your child's independence. Indeed, it is at this age that the anxiety of separation arises and that it becomes more and more present.
Your child begins to notice that he is a separate person from you. In this sense, he understands that there are certain limits to your presence in his life. In some, this thought is easy to accept, but for others, separation from one's parents is a painful one.
The blanket, the best ally of your childhood
Like your child, you too have experienced this period of separation. The teddy is therefore a way to represent the permanent presence of a person in the life of a child.
Indeed, having a blanket can help the child think of his parents when they are not there. It also allows him to express a kind of expectation in relation to the absence of the latter.
The presence of a plush also allows the child to be less alone in his bed. This object will be part of his daily life, and he will start to be more autonomous and to focus a little more on his blanket than on the absence of his parents.
The blanket becomes the best ally of your child when it allows him to make a link between your presence and his autonomy. It can also be a sign of comfort, for some, in order to counter the anguish of separation and facilitate transitions.
Moreover, you can see that it is easier for your child to sleep in an unknown place when accompanied by his blanket.
Plush, a solution against anxiety?
As it is said before, the soft toy can be a companion of size against the anxieties (ex: during a divorce) that lives your child daily. In other words, feeling that an object is present for him in all the stages of his life allows him to better face the situation.
Indeed, a study done by the University of Amsterdam, published in the Dailymail confirms this statement. According to the results of this study, people who are accompanied, whether by another individual or something familiar to him, are often more comfortable talking about sensitive things.
This is also the case for your child, when he begins to experience new sensations during his life.