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The newborn’s skin color changes as the days go by . At birth, many parents end up being surprised, because the baby’s skin tone is usually different from what it will be when it is bigger.
This is because the newborn’s skin is very sensitive and changes with each situation, such as when crying, when sleeping or due to the temperature of the environment. But, as the days go by, it stabilizes and begins to adopt its definitive color .
Why Does the Skin Color of the Newborn Change?
At birth, most babies, regardless of race, are to some extent purple and red . Babies born with vaginal delivery 1 are usually born more purple because of the effort they make when passing through the birth canal . But the trend is that it will normalize a few hours later. Babies born by cesarean section have a more reddish color, as they have not undergone this effort.
After a day or two, the purple color becomes more pink, due to blood vessels visible through the very thin skin of the newborn baby. At this time, the newborn’s skin color changes, some receive a yellowish color due to physiological jaundice ; quite common in young babies. The newborn baby’s feet may be purple for a time, due to the still unripe blood circulation . But in the end, the newborn’s skin color changes because it is controlled by genes, and it is something we cannot control.
But what does it mean?
Over the next six months, the newborn’s skin color changes and the baby’s true skin color will develop . Regardless of what she looked like at birth. It is quite common to hear reports of parents of black descent telling that their babies were born light or pink and darkened one to three tones over the months reaching the same color or close to yours.
What happens is that as the baby grows, the amount of melanin (pigment responsible for skin color, which appears according to hereditary characteristics, without the interference of the sun’s rays) increases. This melanin comes from the mixture of the paternal genes and also from the offspring , that is, the skin color is an example of polygenic inheritance , which means that multiple genes collectively influence the phenotypic characteristics.
In fact, there are several different genes that regulate a variety of melanin production processes, so no matter what color is born, the newborn’s skin color changes, or will change over time.
How does this change occur?
If the above does not yet make sense, try to think differently. As a strange analogy, imagine a room with several light switches that control different sets and numbers of lights. When all switches are off, the room is dark . When all the switches are on, the room is bright . When some switches are on and others are off, the room is partially lit, and you can change the way it is light or dark, depending on the switch you choose to leave on or off.
Different skin colors are shown similarly, because several genes are shown in different ways. It is an imperfect example, but it illustrates more simply that skin color inheritance is more complex than it looks.
And the baby’s eye color, does it change?
Just as the newborn’s skin color changes, so does the eye color. When they are born, especially those with fair skin, they have blue, green or gray eyes, because there is little melanin in them. The amount of melanin in the iris, the colored part of the eye, is what determines the color of a person’s eyes. Genetics controls the amount of melanin (or pigment) that a person will have in his body.
The DNA the baby receives from the mother and her partner determines whether her eyes will be blue, brown, green or another color. He may be born with blue eyes (because while the baby is in the womb, the eyes do not produce , or sometimes produce a very small amount of melanin), but after birth, the light stimulates the production of melanin, which is why that eye color can darken or change over time.
It is important to understand that it is not the color of the pigment that causes the change. There is no blue, gray, green or hazel pigment in the eyes. The only pigment we have in the eye is brown, and it is the amount of that pigment that determines whether a person’s eyes will be light or dark. Typically, the biggest change occurs in the first 6 to 9 months of life. For several weeks or months, it is possible to notice that the baby’s eyes become darker.
The change is so gradual that parents often do not realize it until, one day, the baby wakes up and surprises them with a different eye color. In 12 months , most babies will have their permanent eye color. So don’t worry about your baby’s skin, know that the newborn’s skin color changes, but your love for him doesn’t. So enjoy this moment!
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My name is Dr. Alexis Hart I am 38 years old, I am the mother of 3 beautiful children! Different ages, different phases 16 years, 12 years and 7 years. In love with motherhood since always, I found it difficult to make my dreams come true, and also some more after I was already a mother.
Since I imagined myself as a mother, in my thoughts everything seemed to be much easier and simpler than it really was, I expected to get pregnant as soon as I wished, but it wasn’t that simple. The first pregnancy was smooth, but my daughter’s birth was very troubled. Joana was born in 2002 with a weight of 2930kg and 45cm, from a very peaceful cesarean delivery but she had already been born with congenital pneumonia due to a broken bag not treated with antibiotics even before delivery.
