To think some modern parents make unnecessary work for themselves

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My aunt, who reared ten children and at one time had five children under four years of age (including 2 yr old twins) has just spent a day minding her first grandchild and said it was harder work than anything she had experienced before. The baby came with a list of instructions as long as your arm, a huge bag full of lotion for this and ointment for that, a rigid timetable of naps and snacks and drinks, rules about sterilising anything the child looked at, and complicated sleeping bags and play suits to be zipped in and out of.
I have seen this with a few friends as well - they can't meet you for lunch until 2.30 because the baby has to be fed at 1.28 on the dot, no one can visit between 3.00 and 4.30 because that's nap time and the baby will wake up at the slightest noise, are constantly pulling things out of their baby's hands because of 'germs' etc etc etc.

AIBU to think some mums just go over the top, obsess about every detail of rearing a child. and are turning it into an overly complicated science when previous generations managed perfectly well without half of the nonsense some modern parents go on with?

i think that some people have selective memories about how much hard work it was ;-)

I don't think it's necessarily a modern parent thing, but a first-time parent thing.

I was like this with my first, now in my third I realise the world still turns if she misses a nap or gets lunch late (that's why god invented breadsticks!)

I agree that some (and I emphasise the 'some') do seem to need everything to be all singing and all dancing. Although I suppose whatever gets you through the day.

I saw the antithesis to this today, as I sipped coffee. A young mum, baby in sling, bag on shoulder.

I suppose it is their choice, other people's regimes always seem daft, but as long as it doesn't effect you why worry.

I always laugh when people get themselves into the restaurant style catering, where they make totally different meals for each member of the family. Madness.

I agree. I haven't done that I've been much more relaxed about it and it's worked well for me and I have a very happy baby.

My Mum's best friend had her first grandchild at the same time my baby was born. She didn't enjoy looking after her grandchild at all because it was, as you described, a day timetabled down to the nth minute and the millimetre of milk and the precise weight of organic carrot puree. And it was absolutely rigid.

She found it unpleasant and couldn't really understand how you would really enjoy your baby parenting like that because she found it very difficult to enjoy.

I do think, FFS, it's a BABY, you've not joined the army.

Agree about selective memory plus your aunt is now older.

Maybe if you have lots of kids you just get on with it and the kids have to fall into line? I only have one so can't comment on raising numerous children. If I am lucky enough to have family look after DD I don't leave long "to-do" lists but unfortunately that means common sense sometimes goes out the window, and DD ends up being allowed to nap until 5pm. I would never be so ungracious as to complain about free childcare though, even if it means DD will go to bed at 11pm. However on weekends, yes I have to be quite rigid on structure because if I let a meal time slide for convenience of friends or family, DD becomes an absolute nightmare and lunchtime is ruined for everyone.

Also less technology was available so pre baby monitors, it's likely babies would have woken and cried but not been heard, etc, maybe people didn't know the benefits of sterilisation etc.

I can't get my head around 'little Harold must have his nap at X time'.

It never accounts for the fact that babies change the bloody goalposts so many times and whilst 'little Harold' might have previously enjoyed his nap at whatever time, he might then decide not to.

Mine never napped. Swines.

YANBU. I have a 13 week old, my first baby, and I'm at how rigid some mums lead their lives. Quite frankly I could never be that organised and my life is chaos and surely you'd go mad with the boredom and insanity of it all?

Exhausts me just thinking about it.

I don't think its a modern thing. I think its a person type thing.

Some people just enjoy over complicating things you can usually tell who does by the size of a changing bag and the amount of items required when leaving house with child.

However I couldn't do the whole regimented baby thing....boring.

Thisisyesterday I don't find it hard work at all, never have done and he's only 17 months so I can't have forgotten too much! But I don't think I have made it hard work for myself. My baby is always fed, clean, rarely sick and he is happy apart from when he's tired. I don't think you need to have these military style plans for babies.

If it works for some people and they actually enjoy it then fair enough. But a lot of people seem to do it even though it makes them miserable just because they think they should. As the OP says, people make it hard work when it doesn't necessarily need to be.

If my rigid routine meant DC slept for a 12 hr overnight stretch then I was damn well going to stick to it.
So I did.

Well they did but fewer children die now than in previous generations.
We are usually all doing the best we can with new understanding of child development and how to give them the best start we can. Having access to more disposable income, better medical care and knowledge and more female freedom (well...) will mean things are even more different than just the shift to being more child centric would be alone.

Also with expectations and contraception more women are in charge of their fertility so their dc are planned and can be afforded (though not all obviously). I know fecund members of my family past did not want the 8 or so dc as a planned choice, babies happened and they had to fit in because mum had the house to keep and maybe little money. My gm on both sides were in this situation, one with awful pnd. So not a dim and distant past thing.

So I kind of think yabu although ofc some parents may feel pressure to be something they aren't because they 'should', many of us find our own path and are doing what we feel is giving our dc what we believe is best for them. It's going to be different to before and things will move on again.

Katie, that's not making it harder though. If sleep is very important to you (and it does vary from person to person) then making sure you got a good stretch in was worth doing and would make things easier for you in the long run.

I think some make it far harder than it has to be. Those that are inflexible with routines make it much harder for themselves and its a little off to hand somebody offering to care for your child a list!

That said i just went with the flow, if he napped he napped. He fed when he needed too and went along everywhere with me as normal.

Socks you are so right regarding the changing bag, i recall seeing some huge ones on prams and wondering if they had packed everything the baby owned.

We did/do quite a lot of routine with DC1 and likely will with DC2. But I'm really laid back when it comes to germs and letting my child climb things. I met someone recently who followed their baby around with arms outstretched behind them every time they started cruising. I always figured that if DS could get himself into a standing position that he'd have to learn to get down himself too.

Hopefully DC2 will be happier napping in a buggy than DS was though. That would make life easier for naps.

Bit of a tangent, but I used to lie unashamedly about not having people pop in during day time naps. Pretending it was in case they woke up but really it was so that I could noooothing for that 1.5 hours.

As I remember it, in big families, the older children helped to bring up the younger ones, and children were sent outside to play in virtually all weathers.

during your descriptions of "zipped in and out of various garments" etc

Oh, and we had a huge changing bag. DS still has toddler diarrhoea so needs a change of clothes to be carried wherever we go and when I was BF I had huge oversupply and so much leakage that I needed to take a change for me too.

Nothing regimented here. Dd and Ds are in the care of my parents today as I am at work, I've never given them a list, or nursery.

They will nap when they are tired (well, DS will, DD is 6), eat what is put in front of them. I think today they are visiting the dreaded McDonalds, and whilst I know my mum will not give the baby a burger and will take a pouch and snacks for him, I know he'll get some chips, and I won't worry about the salt as it's not like he gets them every day!

Kids (well mine anyway) behave differently depending on who is caring for them. There was no point in telling nursery that he has 2 naps a day at such and such a time, because it all depends on what time he woke up in the morning, what he's doing etc. plus I bf him still for naps and as they cant do that, they have to find their own way!!

Maybe, but this struck a nerve. For years I had people making the face when I said DC and I had to be home for a certain time to not upset their sleeping patterns.
As DH and I had to get to work every day to pay the mortgage, a full nights sleep was essential. And the people concerned weren't going to be around at 3am to amuse and entertain the baby and the toddler.

OP - do you have kids?!

My DTs had a RIGID nap routine. A nap, at the right time, for the right amount of time ensured they went to bed at the right time and slept all night. I needed that for my sanity!

I do think that with more money and smaller families has come a rise in precious parenting. I grew up in Ireland at a time when 5 or 6 children in a family was quite normal and I know my mum and her friends are often a mix of amused and exasperated when their grandchildren are subjected to these rigid regimes and smothered in hats and blankets every time the slightest breeze blows and mothers are cooking 3 or 4 different dinners every evening because Sophie won't eat pasta and James doesn't like cheese and Molly will only eat pasta and so on.

Yes, I agree some parents do over analyse and over complicate things.

Helping babies to have a good sleeping routine can save so much hassle though.

Ours wasn't set in stone but I had an upper limit of when mine should be in bed by. It was mainly to save my sanity more than anything.