Reply to If you wanted a third, but dreaded newborn phase again

Forum Index » General Parenting Discussion

Reply to "If you wanted a third, but dreaded newborn phase again"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]The opposite. I LOVE newborns but babies turn into toddlers. If I could skip those years I'd have six babies.

Fwiw I have three and the baby phase with the third was the easiest. You are more confident and spend a lot less mental energy worrying about small stuff.

What do you dislike about newborns? The lack of sleep? The crying? For me I just tell myself the sleep thing is four months long. I can do anything for four months. [/quote]

Op here. For me it’s the lack of sleep for sure. And also the stress over germs. And the crying really does stress me out. Pumping and breastfeeding. Difficulty traveling. Bottle sterilizing and washing. Baby led weaning. Making purées. Wake windows. Being on a nap schedule. Not being able to take your eyes off off the hazardous toddler for one second without fearing for their life. Once my second child hit 20 months it all felt so much more manageable to me. [/quote]

I'm currently pregnant with my third, and I also HATE the newborn phase. I decided to make some practical decisions to lesson this (lots of the same concerns as you).

#1 priority is sleep for me. So - I'm going to combo feed from jump (I at least started out exclusively breastfeeding my other two, one it went well, the other not so much). I'm sleeping through at least one feeding absolutely every single day starting day one. Dad can give baby a bottle of formula. If that works, great. If my supply never establishes well, then we'll move to all formula immediately. Benefits of nursing are WAY overblown, and benefits of sleep for me personally are enormous. We're getting a night nanny. Probably not every night - maybe 3 days a week for a while? That'll be the biggest change. We will also (as we did the first two times) sleep train right at 4 months. The Sleep Easy Solution.

No pumping. I'll haakaa for a few ounces in the morning, but that's it. I've literally already gotten rid of my pump. I will completely wean to formula by the time I go back to work at 12 weeks, I'm not dealing with pumping at work.

The baby and I are spending every single night at our own home for the first six months. Full stop. There will be zero traveling. My husband may take the older kids to visit relatives for the weekend occasionally.

Making purees and baby led weaning? Waste of time and energy. Give your kid pre-made baby food, then introduce finger food in a slower fashion. Way less mess, way less fuss. There's a ton of baby food out there that's literally just pureed food and water.

Bottle sterilizing? That shiz goes in the dishwasher. We'll use ready-to-feed when baby is super tiny.

Wake windows and nap schedules - yup. That means our older kids are going to do less for a year. No soccer, no swimming lessons. Mine will be 4.5 and almost 3 when baby arrives, they'll be fine with a slower year.

But the flip side of it is that I SO want a third. My family feels so incomplete, I feel called to do this. So all this other stuff? It's four months. As that other poster said, you can do anything for four months. I look at my kids now and it's so, so worth it. [/quote]

Op here. Sounds like you have a good attitude about things!

I wouldn’t say my family feels incomplete. I think about a third but if you told me i couldn’t have more children, I’d be very thankful and happy with the family I have. But I also don’t feel done. I know if I had a third I would definitively feel done.[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics