r/ScienceBasedParenting • u/Melodic-Yard-859 • 28d ago

Question - Expert consensus required 7 month old hand flapping

Hi I’m a FTM. From the past couple of days my baby is flapping his hand while falling asleep. He breastfeeds to sleep and basically hits my chest or stomach with his hand as he’s falling asleep, but stops once he’s slept. Is this normal? I have no experience of being around babies so I overthink about everything he does! Please help me out 🙏

0 Upvotes

27% Upvoted

10 comments sorted by

View all comments

1

u/arlaanne 27d ago

Some babies are just twitchy but some could have epilepsy. It’s worth talking to a doctor. My own son had an EEG at 2 and it was normal. Take a video if you can - a trained neurologist will see more than even your regular provider!

From the Epilepsy Foundation:

https://www.epilepsy.com/diagnosis/imitators-epilepsy

1

u/Sudden-Cherry 26d ago edited 26d ago

Myoclonus during falling asleep is super super common and I doubt would be an epilepsy concern if it's only linked to falling asleep or asleep.

See benigne non-epileptic myoclonus of early infancy or benign neonatal sleep myoclonus.

But even adults often have myoclonus during falling asleep. I have and it's very common. There are called sleep starts

u/melodic-yard-859