I’m not familiar with these. I had Pregnancy for Dummies which was reassuring, considering I was at very high risk for a wonky labor and delivery.
Yeah, the What to Expect series assumes that pregnancy is going to be your full-time job. Their diet is overly rigid and the book makes it clear that if you don’t follow their diet to the letter, all sorts of Very Bad Things are going to happen. Not “can happen”. “Going to happen”. And they spell out every complication and problem that can happen, even those, such as genetic problems, that have infinitesimal odds of happening in the general population. And, of course, if you don’t follow their program to the letter, THOSE PROBLEMS WILL HAPPEN!!!11!!! (I’m not a fan, can you tell?) That’s why I liked Pregnancy for Dummies. It focuses more on the normal parts of pregnancy and less on the scary stuff.
I’ve got The Panic-Free Pregnancy, Pregnancy for Dummies, and NurtureShock. Love them all.
I am looking forward to grabbing the wee feetses. I love baby feet. If she gets my high arches, she might even enjoy having her feet massaged when she’s older and walking.
Oh, we’re obsessing about names (or at least I am). I don’t plan to post her real name here, though. I don’t use my real name or Mr. Neville’s here, and I plan to do the same with our baby.
We are considering doing this with a bassinet. I don’t think a co-sleeper next to my side of the bed would work, because I think I hit Mr. Neville when I was turning from one side to the other while asleep. I could see hitting a baby in a co-sleeper next to my side of the bed with my arms or legs, when I do that.
Well, my lifetime record for following a really strict diet is 2 days. I really don’t think 40 weeks is a realistic goal, given that. And I don’t bother doing things that I’m pretty sure I can’t do. I’m either too realistic, too cynical, too lazy, or some combination of all three to do that.
I do, however, know that What To Expect was published in 1984. I also know from personal experience that people were having babies before that (I was born before that), and at least some of them turned out OK. I know that humans have been having babies for at least 50,000 years, and most of them did not follow that diet, What to Expect not having been published yet.
I think I freaked Mr. Neville out a bit when I first talked to him after I got the positive pregnancy test (he was in California for his work at the time). I had had some time to Google about embryonic development by then, and I said, “And it’s got a TAIL!,” like that is the cool thing that it is. He just doesn’t seem to realize how cool it is that early human embryos have tails. (But it is, isn’t it?)
I’m overweight, and I wear pretty loose clothes. I can tell things are different when I take off my clothes, but it’s not at all obvious yet when I’m dressed. I’m really not looking forward to people trying to touch my belly. I don’t even like Mr. Neville touching my belly (I’m self-conscious about my belly fat).
Hey, where’s my doctorate in parenting from Harvard? My sister had a baby almost six years ago now!
I’m not entirely sure what we’d have done if the chromosomes hadn’t been normal. Fortunately for us, we got to exit before we had to cross that particular bridge. Pittsburghers know that getting to exit before you have to cross a bridge is almost always a good thing.
Maybe try to project a crankier image? During my entire pregnancy, only one person pawed at my belly (and this person is the budget officer at my job, and I needed my budget approved, so while it was grim I felt I ultimately got something out of it). I attribute this success to my general curmudgeonly attitude.
Oh, here’s a thing. I’m not wild about having my picture taken in general. I continued to feel like this while I was pregnant. Now, I regret a little bit that I only have a few photos of me while I was visibly pregnant. As much as I felt like a cow, I’m not likely to be pregnant again, and it’s something my daughter might like to have someday in the future when I’m long dead (or senile and shoved in a nursing home).
Related: if you are the one who usually takes photos in your family, try to make sure that someone else takes some too. We have about eleventy million “Baby and Daddy” photos, and like … two … of “Baby and Mommy.”
I’m 33 weeks and I have no interest in shopping or fixing up the nursery. At all. My co-worker is 35 weeks and spends all day on Amazon and is getting a $600 stroller and oh boy, girl stuff is so much fun to buy! I have bought one onesie at a thrift store because my friend was so excited and it was worth a dollar to make her feel good for finding it. I’ve been driving around with a hand-me-down crib in the back of my car for 2 weeks because I just don’t feel like dealing with it. I suck at nesting I guess.
I forgot to say congrats! I really am liking being pregnant, I hope you enjoy it too!
Congratulations and God Bless You Both! I am also in Pittsburgh and pregnant, but I am not due until September. Also this will be number 6 for me, so that’s a little different. With my first, the placenta was also in the front. I believe that it shifted there during the pregnancy, I distinctly remember being in bed one night around 7 months and watching my belly bouncing around when there was one really big side to side kind of flip flop. I did not feel my son move after that at all and panicked (naturally) until I saw him after delivery. I don’t say that to scare you, I just want to say that it really really makes movement less noticeable. So don’t panic if you don’t feel movement by the time you “should”.
On breastfeeding, what I usually suggest to people is that you try to do it at the earliest opportunity, like in the delivery room, if possible. It is instinctive, but after they get a pacifier or a bottle I believe it does cause some confusion. I had that problem with my first, and after 6 weeks of trying, lots of crying from both of us, and a ridiculous amount of disappointment in myself, I gave up and gave in to bottles. Ya know what, it was totally ok, he is 15, about 5’10" healthy, smart, everything I could want, so, its not the be-all end-all some make it out to be.
And, for the record, I nursed 2-5 for between 16 and 26 months, so, I feel well qualified to speak on both sides.
I like Magee. If I want fish, I go to Wholey’s, if I want cheese, I go to Penn-Mac. Its what they do.
And as mentioned by Sarabellum above, a wet soapy baby is slippery as anything you can imagine. I still get a little frantic sometimes with that. And most every item you bring in the house for a newborn ends up in the trash or given away within two years. I did not want any hand me downs for number one. When he was six months old I found myself begging pregnant friends to take stuff that I paid for that were really never used. It is wasteful and silly, whatever you can get from a friend, take it. It doesn’t matter if you can afford it or not as even if you buy it brand new it will be useless in a matter of months. Kind of like maternity clothes, its nice to get a few nice things for yourself but, you’ll never get your use out of them.
Not a drop-side, I hope? I heard that I shouldn’t get a secondhand crib, because a lot of the old ones are drop-sides, and those are bad. I heard that secondhand car seats are another no-no.
That’s where I’m going for my prenatal care now, and where I’m planning on delivering. I’m glad we live only a short drive from Magee (as long as the traffic on Fifth isn’t too bad), so I’m unlikely to have to give birth in the car or anything like that.
Best advice I can give: be a stay-at-home mother for as long as you possibly can. If you can manage to be home until your baby is grown enough for kindergarten, I urge you to do it.
Do whatever it takes to raise your child yourself; don’t leave it up to a daycare ‘professional’ (stranger).
No, it’s a smaller collapsible crib. It’s fairly new- the child it was used for is like 4 now I think. I haven’t really looked at it much, but I have a bassinet for our bedroom and it could be a while before we actually even need the nursery. I’m feeling comfortable with my laziness.
Me and my two sibling managed to survive a drop-side somehow, but I probably wouldn’t use one now. I’m totally with you on secondhand car seats.
Don’t be afraid to make (reasonable, or at least only quasi-unreasonable) requests, when you’re in the hospital. They might say no, but they have probably heard it before.
When my daughter was born (I had a C-section) and they finished wrapping her up and did the clean & weigh, etc., while I was still on the operating table, getting sewn back together. She made one of those unmistakable newborn “hungry” whimpers, and I said to the nearby nurse, “Oh, I think she’s already hungry. I wish I could nurse her.” And the sweet old nurse said no problem, and scooted the baby into the crook of my arm and helped hold her in place while she got latched on.
On the operating table. LOL. At least it gave me something else to think about, other than the fact that I was getting sewn up.
Now, I don’t know that every surgeon would be chill enough to be alright with nursing moms on the operating table, but it can’t have been the first time (or the last time) that anyone asked about it. They’re probably pretty hard to shock.
The hospital staff might seem kind of combative at times, but they really do want you and your baby to figure out the nursing thing, and they want you to be happy and comfortable, if it’s possible to do so.
Congratulations! I will also echo what Oldncrinkly posted, don’t be alarmed if you don’t feel much movement. I had an anterior placenta with my daughter, and, rarely, if ever, felt movement during my pregnancy. I had to totally discount all of the standard kick count advice.
Congratulations!! (And I’m so glad that you don’t have an image of the “perfect birth”; easiest way to drive yourself completely insane.)
Best advice I can give: do whatever it takes to have someone else, ideally someone experienced in childcare, help you raise your child, whether that be a daycare “professional,” a nanny, or another family member. You will get another invaluable perspective on childrearing, and that other person will often have suggestions you wouldn’t have thought of or insights about your child that you didn’t realize. Plus which the daycare route provides great exposure to socialization and independence opportunities.
(Okay, to be perfectly honest I don’t 100% subscribe to that advice, as I know plenty of awesome stay-at-home moms – although I honestly think the Little One is doing quite well with this method. Just this week we were able to correct some nascent whining tendencies because her teacher noticed that she whined a LOT more when she was with me than with her, and we realized I was being too lenient. Were I a stay-at-home mom I would never have noticed it myself, or would have assumed she just had a tendency to whine.
And we actually put her in two mornings of daycare a week not because we needed to – it’s actually both more expensive and more inconvenient than it would be were I to stay home with her those mornings – but because she surely did need that socialization opportunity.)
Same advice I give all other newly-pregnant parents-to-be: Pick a spot somewhere that you can take the tykette about the same time each year and take her picture there.
The spot I took the Rykid to was where the Minnehaha Creek meets the Mississippi River. There’s a big rock there, and it’s cool to see as he goes from a little fella much shorter than the rock to a big, tall guy much taller than the boulder.
My best piece of advice is: don’t worry if you don’t end up sticking to the Scientifically Proven Best Practices.
I have a friend who was dead set on following The Very Best Method all along. This worked fine during pregnancy, but once the kid came along, not so much. For the first year or so, when something that was ‘right’ in the abstract turned out not to be right for her and/or her kid and/or her husband, she got really upset and anxious. I don’t know if you’re anywhere near as set on ‘doing it right’ as she was, but the fact is, your kid may not have read the scientific studies. The method that’s been proven to work best overall may not be the one that works for you guys. Don’t let it stress you out.
Most of the things that are not on the list of absolute non-negotiables are up for revision as needed. I know there’s no one best way to raise a kid. If there were, we as a species would probably have figured it out by now, and this whole thing would be easier.
I know my parents didn’t do everything right, neither did Mr. Neville’s. We’re planning to do some things differently than they did. But, if the kid turned out like me or like him, I’d be OK with that.
I think this might be an especially good idea for me, since I haven’t had a lot of contact with infants thus far in my life, and I freely acknowledge that I don’t know what I’m doing when it comes to them. I don’t really have much in the way of instincts (for anything), either, so relying on those is out.
This picture where there’s Grandma and Auntie Nava and Aunt Littlebro and Daddy and Mommy and me and Littlesis TOO! (inside 5-months-along Mommy) is probably my nephew’s favorite. He never misses a chance to show it to people.
ETA: throws peanut shells at JohnT
It would be really great if you could do some babysitting between now and the birth. It’s not going to be as hard as it seems, but learning how babies communicate is really useful.
There’s one particularly funny episode, where a Mother is very, very down about breast feeding, and the Father is snidely unsympathetic. Tracy just grabs him by the nipple and twists, saying “I’ll just do this for half an hour or so then, shall I?” * **
*This is accurate in spirit, but probably not verbatim.
** If this isn’t funny to you now, please re-read it this time next year. You’re gonna Laaaaauuuuuughghgh!
First of all, Congratulations. (That would be an exclamation point on there, but husband’s laptop doesn’t like that key.) Yay, for babies. (see previous.)
Now, for advice. Babies do not need daily baths. You’re already cleaning the messiest part of them often, and sometimes they need a face wipe for drool or leaked milk. Other than that, every so often is fine. What they might need more often, though, is a hair wash, to prevent oil buildup and cradle cap. We basically swaddled the kid in a baby towel and used a football hold to hold him over the sink, so water could be scooped onto the top of his head without getting into his face, a drop of baby shampoo (or baby bath stuff), lather, scoop more water, pull the corner of the towel up over his head, and done. No muss, no fuss. We used the baby towel because it had a hood on one corner. Made it very easy to cover his wet head and make sure he didn’t get chilled.
Other than that, babies are portable and you don’t have to know it all on day one. It’s okay to do what works for you and the baby.
During my entire pregnancy, only one person pawed at my belly (and this person is the budget officer at my job, and I needed my budget approved, so while it was grim I felt I ultimately got something out of it). I attribute this success to my general curmudgeonly attitude.
**