The site Kelly linked initially seems to suggest that dyslexia, ADHD and other problems are exacerbated by limitations of movement for the most part (“infant cooped up for too many hours in a restrictive area such as a playpen,”). But it does tout the crawling action itself as “crucial for the formation of the nerve bundles for the transition from unilateral to bilateral functionality and harmonization.”
Somehow I’m still not buying it. But if you can find medical research that says so, I’ll consider it. Dr. Greene says crawling isn’t even in his textbook.
Not only does breast-feeding burn calories, it causes the uterus to contract & gets you back into shape faster.
Milestones: my first 3 walked between 9 and 11 months. #4 didn’t even try until he was 15 mos. old and it was great!!
#1 slept about 3 hrs. at a stretch until she was 6. The others were pretty average, except for #3, who slept thru the night from his first night on earth.
All-in-all, raising 5 has been the best experience of my life. Including the time Neil Armstrong took me for a walk on the moon (kidding), but it still would be the best.
hillbilly queen, I am sorry, but IMHO you hijacked the thread by unknowingly spreading misinformation that others felt had to be addressed. If formula just fine? Yes. Is it as good as breastmilk? No. End of story. It has nothing to do with the quality of anyone’s parenting. There are shitty parents who breastfeed, and wonderful parents who use formula.
I found the “parenting class” useful because in our case they told us a lot of the stuff we didn’t know we didn’t know. Not how to fasten a diaper, but what sorts of freakish things are actually normal (those newborn snuffles! that gross acne! that “stork bite” on the back of the neck!).
Surprise #1: I was unprepared for how dang much time everything took. I mean, the schedule is brutal. Feeding, burping, soothing, changing, doing laundry, receiving guests, developing pictures, writing thank-yous for all the gifts… some of this stuff sounds like no big deal but good god, it’s endless. Accept any help offered.
Surprise #2: Noisy restaurants are your friend. When you take the baby out, the louder the better. They’ll learn to sleep through noise, and you won’t be panicked at the slightest whimper interrupting anyone.
Surprise #3: Getting out of the house can feel like heaven sometimes when you’ve got a tiny baby.
P.S. My son never crawled. My doctor never worried. I asked about dyslexia; he laughed.
Babies automatically filter out bright light and noise when they are very young, so don’t worry about noise.
I got great advice when I was pregnant with my first- your baby is not a book! The books are great, and can really help, but in the end, your baby is a unique person with his/her own personality and needs.
That has been so true for us! Number One Son didn’t sleep more than 2-3 hours at a time until he was almost 18 months old! He had (and has) no desire to eat what we’re eating! If it wasn’t for Cheerios and oatmeal, the kid would have starved to death.
Number Two Son is my sleeper and eater, with nothing different from his parents. They are just two different people.
I breastfed #1 for 9 months, but wasn’t producing enough milk for #2, so around 4 months we had to go to formula. No reason for the milk production problem per se- my OB says every pregnancy is different, the next one will be too!
I will second the “take help when offered” idea! My mom came over every day for the first week, just to do whatever needed doing! I used to joke that if I had my hair brushed, teeth brushed and face washed by NOON, it was a productive day! Try to nap while the kids sleep, and not to run around doing laundry or dishes. You need rest too.
My nugget of wisdom about kid nutrition- look at it over the course of a week, rather than a day. Trust me. Some days, you will hope no-one ever finds out what that kid ate all day!
Look, pregnancy is a joy and parenthood an adventure. Enjoy it and don’t take yourself too seriously!
A resource I use quite a bit, and he’s in my area-
Not only is he a pediatrician, he has 8 kids! 4 of whom became pediatricians!
Please don’t quote me anymore. I think everyone reading this thread is fully aware of what I’ve said. Please excuse my poor phrasing. In my original post, I was just trying to make the point that solid food would not be an issue for the first few months. Just because I failed to mention breastfeeding, y’all jumped down my throat. I didn’t THINK of breastfeeding because I never dealt with it.
I don’t have any kids but I have gleaned two very important tips:
Don’t ever shake a child. Even if you’re just playing, this movement moves the large, heavy head back and forth on a little neck that can’t take the movement. There have been several well publicized trials in this area about babies and toddlers who have been severly handicapped or even killed when shaken.
Make sure your baby sleeps on his/her back. I’ve read a theory that sometimes babies die of SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome) when they sleep on their stomachs because they create a pocket of CO² and that’s what they breathe in. If they sleep on their backs, they don’t have this problem. HTH
On the ‘no protein’ issue- I think what was meant is no non-human or synthesized human proteins. The proteins in human breast milk and infant formula are perfectly fine for a baby. It’s other proteins you should avoid, such as cow/goat/sheep milk, nuts, eggs, or any meat product (chicken/beef/fish/pork), until your pediatrician gives your the go ahead!
I just want to thank everyone for all the tips and the encouragement. Special thanks to hedra for taking the time.
I think that I’m looking forward to it more than I was, although I’m still going to have to get over the Yeuch! factor of changing my first ever nappy! I’ve now started to worry about more practical things, like how much money will I need to pay for the car park while we’re in the hospital!
It’s also good to know how much is going on in their tiny brains. I subscribed to the ‘babies are just lumps’ school of thought and was already looking forward to the time when it can do more than just gurgle, but one thing I have realised is that all the time is precious.
I’ve already started the journal. We were trying for a baby for about nine months before it happened, and I started about six months in. I just hope that I get time to write in the thing after the big day.
Once again, thanks all for all the help and information and stories, they’re much appreciated.
Ah, something not mentioned yet… that first nappie! They told us the meconium poops were like tar. I thought, yeah, kinda like tar, okay…
Then I met my first meconium poop. Like tar? EXACTLY like tar. Sticky, black, semi-translucent, sort of petroleum smell, impossible to remove from any surface it touches.
The later ones (a week or so in) are really not bad, especially if you breastfeed. They smell a bit like sour milk, but not spoiled or, well, like adult poop (more like adult poop if you use formula). And trust me, the poop your child produces will not bother you to the degree that poop from any other source does. Nor will the vomit.
I recall knowing that I had crossed some indefinable line into motherhood when my older son threw up violently all over my shirt, and my very first (and only) immediate reaction was ‘Oh, you poor thing, do you feel better now?’ (instead of nearly retching myself, which is still my response if I hear a CAT vomitting, let along another human). I then proceeded to cover myself with towels and let him throw up on me all night (alternating with nursing). I’ve since learned that most moms get to that point fairly easily. You will, too.
Yeah hedra… I loathe anything gooey or slimy touching me but can sit calmly while my child empties her belly all over me. I knew I had won the mom triathalon when I had been pooed on, peed on and thrown up on all in the same day
Meconium… all I can say is smear vaseline on baby’s bum till the meconium passes… much easier to wipe that off than the actual meconium!!!
Looking over the thread, I noticed several people describing newborns as “lumps”. Well, my two were not lumps: they were very communicative little creatures. Unfortunately, the only thing they had to communicate was WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!
If your baby happens to be one of these, there are two very important things to remember. The first is that it is not a sign that you’re doing anything wrong. Newborns don’t have many needs: food, warmth, a dry bottom, love, and security. You can meet all those needs and still find that the baby is miserable. Some babies, unfortunately, are just like that.
The second is that This Too Shall Pass. Crabby newborns do not usually develop into crabby older babies or crabby toddlers or crabby kids. Those first few months may sometimes seem to be lasting an eternity, but you are not doomed to eighteen years of this.
Other than that… the best advice I ever got was Veien blir til mens du går. That’s Norwegian, and means something like “the road is created as you walk it”. All parenting is on-the-job training, and even the very best parents make mistakes they will regret. But kids are resilient and you can make up for a lot.
Breastfeed as long as possible. Hold the baby lots and don’t worry about “spoiling” for a good long time. Remember that even the best parenting books are guide books and not Bibles, and the authors never met your baby. In the words of good ol’ Doctor Spock: “Trust yourself. You know more than you think you do.”
Hey! Important thing: Babies are not mentally developed enough to understand cause/effect situations, nor are they mentally developed enough to devise plans or try to control you. SO, when the baby is screaming its head off in the middle of the night or won’t go to sleep to begin with, PICK IT UP! They’re scared or they hurt or ??? Don’t try and “teach them to sleep” or “don’t let them control you” or anything like that. They are not trying to ‘control’ you with their crying. They cry because something is wrong and they probably don’t even know what it is. Some people think that if you ‘spoil’ the baby you will have a spoiled child, so they ignore the screaming, force the baby to do things, etc which is stupid. Be extra nice and caring, hold the baby whenever it cries; basically try and comfort it for the first few months. Don’t treat them like a puppy that needs to be trained. They are not ‘trainable’ for many months. Heck, it takes them 6 weeks before they even learn how to smile.
Once they’re older you can be ruthless!
Breastfeeding: As mentioned, do it for yourself too. Wifecat shed the weight within 2 months and is currently wearing jeans that were tight on her before the pregnancy. There was an ad campaign in the UK that had a statistic: Breastfeeding moms burn an additional 500 calories a day on average. 500! That is close to 20% of a normal diet intake.
Oh yeah, toddlers fall down. They sometimes fall down and hit their heads. It happens. They live. If you want a screaming, crying baby then do this everytime they fall “OH MY GOD WHAT HAPPENED??? ARE YOU OK??? HONEY!!! THE BABY JUST FELL DOWN!!! COMEHERENOW!!!” If you want a baby that scoffs at death, do this when they falldown “BOOM! You hit your head silly! smile” and give them a kiss and tickle them. They react based on your reactions.
Tomcat… I try so hard to explain to the grandparents that toddlers fall. daily… many times daily… and it doesn’t kill them. Toddlers are amazingly resilient little kids. When my daughter falls I hold my breath a second or two and assess her reaction. Every so often she actually hits something hard enough to hurt and she runs over to me and touches me (I feel like home base in a game of tag) and she stops fussing and runs off giggling. The ever so well meaning grandparents try and fuss over her like she needs to go to the ER. I hate this!!! Luckily so does she so she shrugs them off and goes back to playing.
Kids do so react to your reaction. I noticed it most profoundly when she was 10 months or so. Every time we’d enter a new situation she would look at me… piercingly… to see what I thought. If I smiled she embraced things so I was very conscious of that. Hell she will watch me eat and if I eat peas she will take a spoon of peas… if I switch to chicken then so will she. It is a profound responsibility and the things she fixates on surprised the hell out of me! She stands like I stand and mimics my every gesture. Talk about mini-me
Oh and sometimes they are puppies… and demand to be treated as a puppy… complete with copious woofing and eating dinner from a bowl on the floor. They are also kitties and squirrels and bears and their own made-up kritters. They are fun
Mastema, I’m sorry but that is a very bad idea. Clinical studies have proven that giving a baby cereal does not make them sleep longer. Giving solids too early can increases the risk of food allergies. Putting cereal in a bottle short-circuits the baby’s ability to self-regulate of how much they eat. Teaching young children to over-eat is a major cause of later obesity.
Since this isn’t the pit I’ll just say that your pediatrition is very wrong, and the AAP agrees with me.
Grandparents can be wonderful – I hope to be one some day but am not optimistic – but sometimes I wonder how they ever got to that stage with some of the dumbass things they do. When my daughter was just under 2 years old my Mother in Law wanted to give her a caramel. I told her no. Baby is not ready for that yet. Oh, please? No. Please? No. (This is a conversation with MIL, not the baby.) My back is turned and she gives the toddler a whole caramel, which the child sucked on for a minute til it got sticky and then tried to swallow. Fortunately my husband was able to retrieve the gooey glob out of her throat before she choked to death. Literally. She was starting to turn blue before he got it out, and she was pale as a sheet the rest of the afternoon.
On another point, the best advice I ever got regarding crying babies was from my older sister, who pointed out that after all, the little tyke might just be lonely even if she doesn’t appear to be wet or hungry. After all, she just spent 9 months being warm and enclosed all the time, and now there’s this big world out there and sometimes you just need some hugging. Totally agree that an infant cannot be manipulative, they just know what they feel.
Babies are fun. Their needs are simple though it is kind of frustrating that they have only three speeds. Crying, happy, sleeping. Trust yourself… Enjoy the munchkin… don’t over analyze! I really like the advice about finding someone who has young children whose philosophy/parenting skills you agree with to be your sounding board.
Take grandparents with a grain of salt. Or maybe a whole block of salt. I got flack from great grandma about breast feeding. “You just don’t know if the baby is getting enough!” I watched my MIL get totally flustered by a disposable diaper. You should have seen her with the baby wipes. She didn’t want to actually wipe… just pat (it might hurt her bum.) Um that doesn’t get the poo off! They were far more nervous about holding her than I expected and they had some strange advice. Great Grandma gravely told me the cats would suck out her breath. Then we had to explain 200 times that she was sleeping on her back and not her belly. Yeah I know what your kids did… Oh and my kid hates shoes and socks. My poor MIL is always trying to cover her feet. Little ones learn to walk better barefoot
MLS I sympathize about the caramel. That would have scared the hell out of me and I would not have handled that well at all! I was lucky and caught Great Grandma before she got the candy unwrapped. She was unhappy when I took it away but I wasn’t going to let Cara choke on it.
Oh and babies grow and develop and then you have a toddler. The only thing more devious than a teenager is a toddler I’ll look for that thread in about 18 months
Because of talking about all this I really cannot wait till october for my own little baby to arrive now! I miss the baby days and they really aren’t that long gone. Little one is 2 in 2 weeks.
