Breaking the 'new baby' news

[fleacircus]

Actually, it occurs to me that the phrase 'new baby' is probably a no no. But, how and when did you tell your first child that you were expecting another?

For context, I'm almost 24wks pregnant, DD is 16mths so will be 20mths when DD2 is born. We haven't told her, although we are doing a lot of 'look, there's a baby' and 'oh look, a big sister with a little baby' and 'babies need lots of looking after'. I'm getting increasingly anxious about how she'll cope, so would really welcome hearing about others' experiences.

[pollywollywoowah]

DS was 19mths when DD was born. We didn't do any "breaking the news" really. Just got a couple of "New Baby" books and pointed out babies like you are doing. I suppose you could tell your DD what is going to happen but she won't really understand.

Closer to my due date we got the baby things out (moses basket, clothes, car seat etc) and told DS they were for the new baby but he was more interested in trying to get in them himself. Lots of photo opportunites!

The day we brought DD home from hospital, DS took one look at her in the moses basket and made his "oh look a small animal" noise (he wasn't talking at that point) which was a kind of squeaky mieow and that was it. Carried on as if nothing was different. She was a quiet sleepy baby (at first ) so by the time she was making more of an impact on his life, he was used to her being there.

We did make a huge effort to keep his routine the same as before, DH taking over a lot of "duties" while he was on paternity leave. I think that made a big difference to his acceptance of her. He still went to childminder, bath and bedtimes were the same etc.

Now DD is 7mths and DS is 2.2 and they are the cutest pair ever. Always got a big smile for each other, pleased to see each other in the mornings (even at 5am ), DS always giving DD cuddles, patting her back to wind her after her feeds, running over with the muslin if she brings a bit of milk back up etc.. Favourite at the moment is using the kitchen as a racetrack with DD in her babywalker and DS on his ride on!

Your DD will be fine and you'll have two lovely, close girls before long

[thisisyesterday]

we haven't said anything to ds2. he'll be 19 months when db3 arrives.
at that age they're too young to really understand it

[fleacircus]

That's interesting - getting the baby things out is a good idea as a way of introducing the topic; I hadn't thought of that but as we're going to collect them all from my parents' loft next month, that will give us an obvious opportunity. We're doing our best to keep our routine the same and DP is taking three weeks off; we can't afford to send her to the CM for the full three days a week but at the moment she's on term times only and she's going to go down to one day a week from the end of the summer term and keep that up through my leave - I'm hoping that because it's a couple of months before the baby's due she'll have time to get used to that as the new routine without associating the baby with too much change.

Your DS sounds lovely; thank you for the reassurance. I think helping them to have a good relationship is my biggest parenting anxiety - 'two lovely close girls' is exactly what I'm hoping for!

[pollywollywoowah]

You will all be fine!

I think at 19mo they're too young to fully comprehend what's happening really which can only be a good thing IMO. I look at DS now and I know it'd be different if DD had come along now as he is much more "aware" and knows how to play up! At 19mo he was still a baby really.

Regarding the baby things, I also wanted there to be no novelty factor to the moses basket etc so by the time DD was in it, he'd got over the excitement of a new item and it was just part of the house. He nearly popped with excitement when it all came out of the loft though and I was so glad we weren't doing it when DD was nearly due!

And a couple of months is plenty of time to get used to a new childminder routine for your DD. Our childminder is fab and DS went a few extra times in the weeks following DD's birth which was invaluable to us all. He loves going so it was a treat for him and it gave me some time alone with DD. My mum funded this as we couldn't afford extra sessions and she wanted to help but didn't want DS to look after lol.

And yes my DS is lovely

[Laugs]

Any suggestions what to do when they are older?? My DD will be 3 when the baby is born. I am only 13 weeks pregnant, but unfortunately we had to take her to the scan last week. When I showed my mum the scan picture subtly (I thought), DD said 'It's only a baby' Do we have to explain everything now? She hasn't mentioned it since. It's so early. And how should we do it?