To wonder how people manage AP when they have a toddler and a newborn? and not much help?

[titferbrains]

Have spent most of last 4 weeks with baby in my arms, feeding, sleeping, passing baby to another person's arms, or with him in a sling. He has periods of being content and awake, lying in pram or on mat etc, but when tired he needs to be held and preferably fed a bit then cuddled for a bit before we can put him down.

AP principles are lovely for your PFB when you have lots of time and energy to give, but how do people manage when you have a 2nd or more? My DH is not around to help in the evenings, my DD is unwell and needs medicine, extra stories and cuddles atm, and puts up a fight before she goes to sleep. I have been feeding ds while I do story but it's pretty uncomfortable holding a book and trying to stop dd from "patting" Ds.

Am not about to go cold turkey and let DS CIO, but would love to know how people manage toddler and tinies in a kind way. I tried to swaddle DS and put him in his cot (he normally sleeps with us) this eve and I made sure to (safely) make him feel cosy with a rolled up towel and my nightshirt next to him, but after a quick feed, low lighting and music, I put him down and he went from calm to rage in about 10 seconds or less!

Do you have a clever routine/solution?

Bats

DS2 is 6 weeks ATM, and I've just had to accept that sometimes he'll have to cry for a moment while I deal with DS1. I've a sling, but it's not practical to wear all the time (when I'm cooking, for instance)

I do spend a lot of time cuddling him though. He won't stay asleep in his basket for long.

I think that this time is hard whatever techniques you try to use. When the baby was tiny I did try to feed and read the story but my DS is 4 so it was much easier to get him to hold the book, turn the pages etc etc.

DD is now 10MO and bedtime is still hard, but I had a realisation at about 3MO that sometimes I needed to do stuff like climb ladders or get DS dried, and she'd have to be left alone. She self settled quicker than I could do it, so my trying to comfort her made her cry for longer.

Then she went down by herself with minimal 'whinging' (not crying) and things are much easier.

Whatever you do, it is not easy and you muddle through your own way. like we all do, and it won't always be like this. I don't think it is a good idea to attach a label to your parenting style, as then you will think 'is this the AP way' or 'am I failing at AP' when what you are doing is finding a way that works for you and your family.

CIO - Cry It Out

Leave baby to cry until they stop of own accord

So what would happen to a parent with twins who wanted to do this AP thing?

One on the front and one on the back or one on the front and one clinging to her hip?

Oh got ya BabyBelly thanks!

CIO= Crying it out.

Putting baby down in cot and leaving them
To cry/scream until they fall asleep with no checking on them what so ever.

Unlike CC where you do at least check on the baby at short intervals.

Your poor thing, what on earth are you doing to yourself? You need to nip this in the bud now, before you go thoroughly round the bend. We all cuddle and hold our babies, but they don't need it every moment of the day - they don't even want it every moment of the day. Put him down on a changing mat with something interesting to gaze at and leave him be for a little while.

And this is from someone who ebf and co-slept and is still bfing a toddler. I'm all for closeness and attachment, but give yourself a break fgs.

OP, I think you need to relax a bit and follow your instinct, and most certainly follow your children's cues. AP is a principle that you either agree with, or disagree with, but certainly not one that you need to follow with a guide-book in your hand, and two fractious children in the other.

Sounds cliched, but go with the flow! Slings are great - I loved mine around the house when DD was tiny and it meant that I had hands free for older toddler. They were also worth their weight out and about too for the same reasons. I also used a vibrating bouncy chair which meant that new baby was strapped in safe, and older toddler was able to have cuddles and stories too.

If your baby is a crying a lot, then get back to basics. Examine why he's crying so much and instead of worrying about parenting approaches, have a think as to what you can do to eliminate his discomfort. Wind? Colic? Pain? Silent reflux?

Hope that helps

To be clear, I've fallen into AP rather than planned to do it. I love love love cosleeping, I love my sling, my baby is not a screamer so cuddling him is lovely, I had always planned to make a really good go of EBF this time round so I arranged to have as much help as possible so I could focus on baby and allow time for feeding.... and here I am, something of an AP type parent.

at unclench, I am learning to do this day by day but keep coming to MN for help....

Worse worra - what about parents of two sets of twins? What about people with larger families? They'd have to have one clamped on every appendage and God forbid they ever needed to take a large stinky dump!

Sling.

Mine are 2.7 apart. I think you do what you have to with a baby and a toddler, because you are constantly responding to competing demands. I'd be wary of doing things to disrupt the routine of the first, and i think many babies can cope without being held/carried all the time.

And I dislike the idea that there's nothing between CIO and AP. I actually think the term CIO is an unnecessarily emotive term. What many many parents (except on MN) do, is to allow their DCs to fall asleep on their own, sometimes with a little crying for a few minutes as they wind down.

There are times when it's tough, I was alone through my whole pregnancy and the couple of years of my DDs life, and I chose to follow many of the AP principles simply because they benefited my life more than the alternative.

Settling in and finding a routine are probably the hardest part, but co-sleeping and breastfeeding took away the hassle of night waking and my toddler pretty much settled with a book and cuddle... can you breast feed lying down? If I was having trouble doing the bedtime routine in her room, I would bring her onto your bed and feed while you read to her, then put her to bed and deal with the baby if needs be (although hopefully they just fed to sleep and are lying on the bed, allowing you a bit of time to do what you need to). Carrying my baby in a sling about the house meant I didn't have to worry about the toddler alone with her in a three storey house, and just made my life easier on the whole. And I was able to just switch of and focus on my two intensively, I sat and fed in the day time, went to bed at the same time as the toddler in the early evening, did the night feeds without ever leaving my bed, and just focused on low stress, child focused time doing whatever made life easiest.

Actually, the little I do know of AP - it's a fancy term for parents that more or less says 'listen to your babies'. It doesn't actually mean that you have to be velcroe'd together all the time. Sometimes, nappy off time on a mat is quite entertaining for a little baby. Give it a go...and relax.

I also think it's really really hard on toddlers when babies come along, and when they aren't at a very adaptable or reasonable age. Babies, on the other hand, are often adaptable, especially DC2s, who are happy to have a big sibling to stare at

Thanks Tatty, I am definately not an AP parent then :(

I've got 12 wk old twins, a 2 year old and a 4 year old, so I know all about trying to spread yourself between too many children!

My strategy, given that I can't possibly attend to them all at once, is to use all the tricks I can to help the twins settle on their own.

This includes a vibrating bouncy chair, a baby swing, dummies, swaddles etc.

I figure that if they're happy and settled, that's good enough for me, much as I would love to sling them all the time. We have our crazy moments when they're all yelling, but on the whole, the strategy seems to be working

Blimey Jojay. I think you win .......

As moth says, AP is just a fancy term for listening to your kid and trying to meet their needs.

Sounds like you are doing this just fine, op.
And it's very, very true that there is huge room between AP and CIO type parenting.

Arf at the rod for your own back folks - the baby is 4wks ffs.

Oh good lord - just do what common sense tells you works and throw the books and the acronyms out the window!

wipes brow for jojay

nethun - are you agreeing with me? I don't think I expressed myself very well. I meant that there's this idea that either you are one or the other, when most of us are in-between

I have to admit to a totally irrational hatred of the term Attachment Parenting. Like the rest of us Don't Bloody Care. I know it's not what it's about, but I still don't like the term.