Pregnant/New Parent Doper Check-in!

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Hal’s “Delivery Day” thread got me thinking – we’ve been having a bit of a baby boom around here lately, and I want to know how everyone else is doing!

Jonah will be 5 months old tomorrow, and he’s so much fun – very interactive, loves to play and be tickled! He’s also got quite a temper, and is in a bit of a mommy phase, which is kind of annoying. As long as I’m holding him, though, he’ll flirt and be charming to almost anyone! He just figured out how to roll from his tummy to his back, but he hasn’t mastered it yet – he usually does it in his sleep, which means he and I are both a little surprised when he wakes up on his back! He looooves to blow raspberries, and will do so quite saucily for minutes at a time. :stuck_out_tongue: He also likes hanging out upside-down, and thinks the cats are fascinating – especially their tails.

So, new parents (and I leave it to you to determine if you’re a “new” parent), show off your babies! And soon-to-be parents, tell us how your pregnancy is going!

2

[QUOTE=stargazer]
– he usually does it in his sleep, which means he and I are both a little surprised when he wakes up on his back!
[/QUOTE]

Does this mean you put him to sleep on his stomach?

Our first is coming up on 7 months in a few days, and he’s about as easy as they come. Almost no crying (though its obvious when he’s unhappy), slept through the night after 5 or 6 weeks, no problems breast feeding, etc. etc. I’ve been making his baby food for him for a bit more than a month now, and he has wolfed down everything that’s been put in front of him so far. Peas, carrots, sweet potatoes, green beans… poof. Gone.

I’m sure the next one will arrive with horns.

3

My little Boots (that’s what his sister calls him) is 9 months old now, and as cute in personality as any baby I’ve ever known. He smiles and laughs all the time, and has pretty much since his very first smile. He is really good about amusing himself, and only gets cranky when he’s hungry. We had trouble getting him to sleep through the night…still woke up at least once until he was over 7 months old…but that problem has fixed itself, and now everything’s great.

He’s crawling like a champ, and can even stand on his own, so we are bracing ourselves for walking/running/climbing/jumping!

4

stargazer, I’m certain you’ve heard this before, but I almost died from the cuteness. Died, I tell you.

My approximate reaction:
"Eeeeeeee! :smiley: "

(Be quiet biological clock! You must wait a few years for babies!)

5

[QUOTE=Labrador Deceiver]
Does this mean you put him to sleep on his stomach?
[/QUOTE]

Yep. He never, ever slept well on his back, so for a few months I was sleeping on the couch, with him on my chest. That got really uncomfortable after a while – bad on my back and neck – so I talked to our doctor about it at his 4-month checkup. She said that if it were her kid, she’d put him down on his tummy, especially since he was almost rolling over and he has no other SIDS risk factors. So we tried it – tentatively, worriedly, at first – and it’s been going pretty well. He still sleeps in our room and wakes up a few times to eat, but we are all getting good sleep and I’m not tired of holding him when I wake up in the morning.

It wasn’t an easy decision, but it seems to be working out for us.

beanpod - Thanks! We think he’s pretty darn cute, but we’re biased. :smiley:

6

[QUOTE=stargazer]
Yep. He never, ever slept well on his back, so for a few months I was sleeping on the couch, with him on my chest. That got really uncomfortable after a while – bad on my back and neck – so I talked to our doctor about it at his 4-month checkup. She said that if it were her kid, she’d put him down on his tummy, especially since he was almost rolling over and he has no other SIDS risk factors. So we tried it – tentatively, worriedly, at first – and it’s been going pretty well. He still sleeps in our room and wakes up a few times to eat, but we are all getting good sleep and I’m not tired of holding him when I wake up in the morning.

It wasn’t an easy decision, but it seems to be working out for us.

beanpod - Thanks! We think he’s pretty darn cute, but we’re biased. :smiley:
[/QUOTE]

I hope I didn’t come across as judgmental. Lord knows, I’ve only got a little more than 6 months of experience at this stuff. Ours is just starting to roll over a lot now, and my wife still isn’t 100% comfortable about finding him on his stomach. Of course, some of that stems from the fact that he starts to fuss a bit when he finds himself face down on the mattress.

Everyone has been telling us that 6-9 months is the “fun phase”, and I couldn’t agree more.

7

[QUOTE=Labrador Deceiver]
I hope I didn’t come across as judgmental.
[/QUOTE]

You didn’t, at all! I hope I didn’t come across as too defensive – I just tend to anticipate flak on that topic, since a lot of people seem to think we’re either too stupid to know better or that we’re almost criminally bad parents for putting him to sleep on his tummy.

8

[QUOTE=stargazer]
You didn’t, at all! I hope I didn’t come across as too defensive – I just tend to anticipate flak on that topic, since a lot of people seem to think we’re either too stupid to know better or that we’re almost criminally bad parents for putting him to sleep on his tummy.
[/QUOTE]
I think by 4 months, you are more than fine, especially if the baby can roll over. The minute my babies learned back-to-front rolling, they never slept on their backs again, and there’s pretty much nothing you can do about it (both of them tend to be on-their-fronts-butts-in-the-air sleepers…my daughter still does that sometimes, at age 3 1/2!) And the fact that they can lift their heads a little and roll mitigates the danger of putting them on their stomachs, anyway.

9

I am 17.5 weeks, and just found out today that I am having a boy. We called our daughter at daycare to tell her. She dropped the phone to go running around the classroom shrieking “Baby brother! Baby brother!” (she is almost 4).

Everything is going fine. I’ve had almost no morning sickness, but constant heartburn. I’m on low molecular weight heparin shots for a clotting disorder, which means my belly is pretty bruised, but otherwise I’m fine. I haven’t felt the baby move yet. My placenta is anterior, so he would have to kick all the way through it for me to feel anything. He was very active in the ultrasound, though, and the tech said I wouldn’t have any trouble feeling him in a few weeks.

10

I don’t want to put a damper on the thread, but I’m six months pregnant, very planned, and I just feel so meh about the whole thing. I’m mildly depressed, but I had hoped some kind of hormonally induced maternal love had kicked in by now. It hasn’t, yet.
Medically, I’m doing all the right things, Not taking any health risks, eating well, and all the other stuff like making sure I have the baby room in order and the paperwork filed. Money isn’t a problem either. It’s just…I still don’t find human baby’s cute, and I feel …detached from the whole pregnancy. I’m even doggedly going through the pregnancy complaints I have, tiredly thinking “Oh, here’s another hurt, or inconvenience. Ouch. Oh well.”
I feel the baby moving around in my belly, and I feel nothing much beyond: “Oh, there you are. You’re a person, just like everyone else I’m meh about.”

The thought of having another human around who is totally selfish, totally depends on me, and calls that “love” reminds me too much about my mother, and frankly, I have been trying to get away from her.

My husband looks forward to having the baby, and he loves me.
But I’m even meh about him. I like him a lot, but he’s not relly dependable in the little things that do still matter to me, like making sure there isn’t so much clutter in the house. Clutter and bad smells are the two things I still can get really upset about, and I don’t have the energy to tackle either of them myself.

Sorry if this sounds depressing. It’s just another side of pregnancy, I suppose.

11

Maastricht, while a certain amount of meh-ness is pretty normal during pregnancy, and while it’s extremely hard to tell from a single message board post what’s going on in someone’s life/head, I’ll say that you do sound kinda depressed. I sympathize, because I spent the first two trimesters of my pregnancy with Whatsit the Youngest in a horrific funk of depression. It was probably about the worst mental state I’ve ever been in.

Promise us that you’ll take care of yourself and be vigilant about getting in to see a doctor if you get worse, okay? This is especially true for after the baby comes. Feeling a little blue, a little blah, a little weepy: totally 100% normal. Feeling like the walls are closing in on you, like you have no friends, like everything is pointless and sucks and you hate the baby: not normal. Get help. I am speaking from personal experience here.

As for us, Whatsit the Youngest is sunny and happy most of the time and is thinking about learning to walk, which scares the crap out of me. The other two didn’t walk until 16 and 14 months, respectively. WtY is barely even 8 months old! I guess he’s just got l33t advanced baby skillz.

Here’s Whatsit the Youngest chilling out with his older brother and here he is in his most excellent Halloween costume.

12

My wife is 30 weeks along. Birthing class is this weekend, oh joy. A tour of the maternity wing follows next weekend. She has just entered the “Oh my God I’m so uncomfortable” phase. She’s lucky if she gets more than 3 hours of sleep at a stretch. At this rate I’m thinking nursing a newborn will allow her more rest. Luckily she runs her own communication consulting business from home so she can nap bid day if she wants. Prenatal yoga really seems to help her with the discomfort, joint and back pain. I’m trying to encourage her to get it in 3 times a week.

13

Well, I’m no longer a “new” parent to Spencer - he’ll be 2 at the end of April. But #2 is almost ready to debut. I’m 37 weeks as of tomorrow, so I’m really in the home stretch! I just found out yesterday that I tested positive for group B strep, so that means 4 hours hooked up to an IV while in labor. :frowning: I hated the heplock so bad last time that I was going to refuse it this time around, but I don’t have that option any more. Just don’t want to risk neonatal sepsis, ya know?

And I totally understand pregnancy depression - I’m clinically depressed as it is, and the hormones and mood swings and stress of pregnancy can really slam me around. The past week has been really bad, because I was off work for two weeks for the holidays and then had to go back. I’m not particularly fond of my job situation, and I know I only have a few more weeks to go, but it’s still hard. Add to that the list of things we need for this baby (new carseat is #1) and things I need to do before the arrival (pre-register and pack are #1 and #2) and the fact that I have a hard time functioning in a messy house … and you get some really bad crying jags and any time of the day or night, lasting anywhere from ten minutes to an hour. (Yes I’m on medication, but I haven’t seen my therapist since before the holidays. Methinks I need to change that!)

14

Noor is now 9 months old and wreaking havoc wherever she goes. She had been crawling since she was 6 months old and loves “walking” round the lounge room, holding on to various pieces of furniture, or pushing a small side table in front of her. She also has eight teeth already and would gladly chew a hole in your finger if you would only let her!

stargazer, Noor has been sleeping on her stomach since she was about a month old. She simply wouldn’t sleep any other way, but she could hold her head up from 3 weeks old and we have had a micro-movement monitor in her crib/cot since she first came home, so it wasn’t a problem.

Sarahfeena, I still remember the “two blue lines” thread and often think of you when Noor hits some new milestone, and wonder how your son is doing. I am relieved (for you) to hear that Boots is sleeping better. We have just this last week finally got Noor to eat enough dinner (followed by a bottle) to drop the 10pm feed, so she now sleeps from 7pm to 6:30am! Woo and Hoo!!!

15

[QUOTE=Dottygumdrop]
Sarahfeena, I still remember the “two blue lines” thread and often think of you when Noor hits some new milestone, and wonder how your son is doing. I am relieved (for you) to hear that Boots is sleeping better. We have just this last week finally got Noor to eat enough dinner (followed by a bottle) to drop the 10pm feed, so she now sleeps from 7pm to 6:30am! Woo and Hoo!!!
[/QUOTE]
That’s awesome! Yeah, it’s a whole different world when they let you sleep all night, isn’t it? I love the pictures of Noor…she is so sweet! I love this age, don’t you? They’re starting to do stuff on their own, and they interact so much with everyone around them. Boots is always crawling around after his sister, and wants to get in on everything she’s doing. If I’m reading her a story, he’ll crawl over and pull himself up so he can stick his head under the book and listen. So cute.

I remember that two blue lines thread, too! It’s so funny how you can feel connected to someone on an internet message board, who you have never met, isn’t it?

Maastricht, I had a lot of the feelings you are having when I was pregnant with my first one. No matter how much you want a baby, it’s a huge life change and a scary unknown. I think it’s a myth that women are deliriously happy and excited during pregnancy…it’s a tough thing to do physically, and it’s a little overwhelming mentally. So don’t be hard on yourself, but listen to what MsWhatsit said…if you feel like it’s real depression and it’s getting worse, let your doctor know!

16

Hello! Baby Small is now 6 months old! It seems like yesterday I was writing the thread that let you all know we were expecting. Just a few updates now, and I will post some pictures tomorrow when I get home.

He’s amazingly animated - loves rolling around and playing. Also, thanks Hal. The monitor was amazing and it came in handy. Not so much for the fact that it went off, but for the ticking feature. I didn’t sleep well for the first few months unless I heard that noise.

Brendon Small

17

[QUOTE=Maastricht]
I don’t want to put a damper on the thread, but I’m six months pregnant, very planned, and I just feel so meh about the whole thing. I’m mildly depressed, but I had hoped some kind of hormonally induced maternal love had kicked in by now. It hasn’t, yet.
[/QUOTE]
Hey, Maastricht, my love is paternal rather than maternal, but I sympathize. When my wife was pregnant with our kid, I spent at least 3 months being really, really depressed about it, convinced that by deciding to have a child I was making a horrible mistake. Parenting seemed wildly unappealing – all that dependency! Yuck!

On the other hand, while from your description it sounds like I was more depressed than you, there was some part of my brain that recognized that this was, if not normal, something that would pass. And it did. A couple of months before my daughter was born the cloud lifted, and while I can’t say I looked forward to the experience with unvarnished joy, I wasn’t depressed about it any further.

And that all melted in the first few weeks with my daughter. She’s cool, and has only grown cooler 2+ years later. She depends on me, but that’s only a small part of her, and it’s not even a particularly painful or difficult part.

One of the hardest parts during the pregnancy and my depression, though, was dealing with people’s enthusiasm on my behalf. No one wants to have their “you must be so excited!” cut off by Eeyore, even if you really do want to say “I’m actually dreading this with every fiber of my being.” And it was almost comical to go to birthing/parenting classes that started with the assumption that everyone there was so enthusiastic about the whole parenting thing that their job was to reinforce what a chore the whole thing could be. Yeah, got that, thanks, could we not dwell on how everything’s not sunshine and roses when I’m already expecting moonless nights and thorns? Thanks.

I just wanted to say I’ve been there, and hopefully it’ll pass for you as it did for me. Best of luck to you, and I hope you figure out how to enjoy your kid, even if pregnancy’s a drag.

18

Thought I’d post a pic of Boots. This is his usual expression…laid back and smiling!

And here is his sister in her two personas…jock and bookworm.

19

My wife is 12 weeks. My editor sent me a copy of The Expectant Father. Anyone else have some good book recos?

20

For you? Get a copy of The Birth Partner and read it cover to cover.

For her, I would suggest The Girlfriend’s Guide to Pregnancy. Don’t get the “What to Expect” books - they’ll scare the living crap out of you for no good reason.