AIBU to ask for the PFB/newborn panics & preciousness that you look back and laugh on now?

[Dennisreynoldsduster]

As a first time mum I’ve been a bundle of neurotic anxieties, and found myself warming wipes, worrying that DS has a million things wrong with him, studying the contents of nappies with rather more attention that I’d expected..

So as I’m about to do the night shift with a rather awake baby, can I ask you to share the precious first born behaviours and anxieties that you look back on rather fondly or laugh about now?

HoppingPavlova the poster knows that, hence why they commented.

It’s lovely that you weren’t a ‘fruit loop’ like the rest of us, thus proving that hormones aren’t to blame. It must be very special being one of those superior parents who didn’t struggle.

I’m sure the new parents who are struggling found your comment very helpful, and feel fantastic now they’ve been told it most likely isn’t hormones but more that they are actually nuts.

Perhaps have a think about your audience before posting,

A test flight!!

I walked down a hill backwards so the blood wouldn't rush to his head in the pram.

@mrschatterbox

I remember being on the maternity ward 3 or 4 hours after giving birth. Dd started having spasms and her breathing was a bit disrupted. I panicked, pressed the call button but got no response for at least 5 to 10 seconds so dragged my episiotomy down to the nurses station. Nurse ran back with me, took one look and said she's got hiccups

I cried from the relief!

When DS was only three weeks old he got a cold. We took him to the doctors just to be checked. We just needed to keep an eye on him. We kept a VERY close eye on him - taking his temperature every 15 minutes

I can still picture the HV’s face as she swallowed the big grin which had started on her face when we told her

I thought I was super chilled and laid back when dd was a newborn. It’s only now I look back I realise how bonkers I was.

My city center is cobbled, and I used to walk an extra 30mins walking on the outskirts to avoid them because I was convinced dd would get shaken baby syndrome from walking over them

I actually cried when my mum gave her a biscuit (rich tea, not one made from crack!) because she’d never had anything with added sugar at that point. She was 10 months ffs 😂 I’m much more relaxed now. Mainly because she’s a fussy, tiny thing so anything eaten is a win.

We took my pfb on her first family outing to Durham - which is cobbled.
I refused to take the pram and insisted on putting her in a sling Incase she got shaken on the cobbles.
Dp asked what I was going to do with her when we were sitting down eating our picnic. I may have screamed like a banshee that I would hold her because I loved her and why was the babies brain not more important then his sandwiches.
We lasted an hour before heading home as I was convinced dd was overheating in the sling.

I was very PFB with ds right up until his sister was born three years later!

PFB things I did:

Warmed yogurts by holding them in my hands for 5/10 minutes before him having them because he didn't like them being too cold.

Wiped down ALL his toys and the floor every night.

Sat in the back with him if the three of us went out anywhere. Like even to the shops.

And god knows what else. I was RIDICULOUS.

The first time I (gently) bonked her head on the car ceiling whilst putting her into the car seat, I was convinced that a crack team of social workers was going to abseil down from the trees and take her into care :)

I love this thread - partly because it's funny and has made me think thank god I'm not the only one who was ridiculous, but also because of the LOVE in it. All of these ridiculous things we've done or felt are solely driven by love and care for our kids, it's beautiful to see :)

I still lick the high chair surface/lunchbox for my eldest if I spray them with a chemical when cleaning to check they don’t taste of it 🙈 I wipe it down again after with hot water and washing up liquid 😂

I am pregnant and no offence to all of you, but I am genuinely worried that I will turn out like this and do any of these things. You all sound bonkers. Obviously, it was motivated by love and protection and from a wonderful place, but bonkers none-the-less. It appears to have worn off, which is encouraging.

I’m pretty sure our parents didn’t give so many shits. So why do we?!

@Winterwoollies honestly you’ll look back on your newborn days and realise you did similar things. It just seems so logical and necessary at the time! Hormones and lack of sleep do weird things to your brain.

I almost bit my exH’s head off for forgetting to put DS’ mittens on. DS had a long scratch on his forehead when I noticed. I though he had been scarred for life.

As it happens with newborns, any sign of the scratch had disappeared from his skin within 2 days.

I remember taking 8w old DD for 1st jabs and demanding that I park in the GPs car park as i couldn't possibly park 10 mins away and walk with my PFB

The shame of it... they did let me though bless them. I was super anxious!

I was getting very upset at 8m DS’ lunch time approaching while we were still walking around with friends in new city trying to find a place to eat.

At some point a friend said, oh please just give him a bit of milk! I found it very shocking that it had not occurred to me doing the same thing... he had a bottle and his lunch 20 minutes later...

I remember taking 8w old DD for 1st jabs and demanding that I park in the GPs car park as i couldn't possibly park 10 mins away and walk with my PFB

I certainly did that, and my GP surgery is next to a public car park... 4 minutes walk from my house

I'm so glad someone linked to the 'no more tears' thread which is my favourite pfb thing ever.

I did OK until it got to weaning. I was a bit nuts about weaning, would batch-cook every Sunday so that pfb would have all organic food. I used to bake my own beans, cos sugar. People knew me as baked beans mum... Also they were foul, baked beans need sugar.

I batch cooked everything organic for DS, and rotated proteins during the week. I remembered dismissing a nursery because they were serving fish fingers twice a week.

This thread is making me realise how batshit crazy I was when DS was little.

No offence to you either, @Winterwoollies but I think I also thought I was going to be super rational, calm and not over soppy when I was pregnant, but looking back that was me being a massive smug twat. No one thinks they know how to parent better than a woman pregnant with her first - it seems to be nature's little joke...

Also, you don't remember your parents being like that because you remember them when you were a much older child, or with a younger sibling.

Oh god weaning. It does bring out the absolute worst in everyone. I remember googling what exact amounts of fat, protein and carbs dd needed and then planning her blw meals around that.

She was 6 months and basically gummed a few bits and spat them out. I spent hours of my life when I should be sleeping worrying about fucking macronutrients 😂

I had (still have the wipes) a full on Milton spray n wipes for any public changing space.. no chance was some other dirty bugger infecting my tiny human, this came from dn always getting a bug after soft play (probably more from licking the equipment than having her bum wiped)

I’ve dropped my phone on my head too.. I had to know if it was heavy or not.

Washed the dogs feet if they’d been outside (3 chihuahuas stitched up to my arse with a basin shampoo and a towel several times a day)

And I weighed vomit.. but that did help work out he didn’t have anything more serious than reflux, family history of pyloric stenosis. If you ever need to weigh vomit catch it in a Muslin, weigh it in a Tupperware dish and then use a clean one in said dish adding water till you get a roughly similar weight.. your answers how much water you added. The doctor was rather impressed by my madness .

Friend wouldn’t take her baby (winter born dark by 3pm) out in the dark incase it scared her.

Friend wouldn’t take her baby (winter born dark by 3pm) out in the dark incase it scared her.

My sister insisted in her DS using mittens and hat in the middle of a 30 degrees summer. She said it was colder than where he had just came from

I don't think I did anything too out there, I was just very very anal about naps, like we couldn't ever go out at nap time, and if we went out before and DC was due a nap we HAD to come home for the nap otherwise they wouldn't be as well rested. I didn't really go out a lot. I'm still a bit precious about sleep now but that's more about me needing sleep/rest than DC 😂 thankfully they don't nap now so we're not bound to the house.

I was also quite neurotic about weaning, DC had reflux so I spoon fed puree and mushed up food for a lot longer than was necessary.

Used to change nappys after every single wee...god the amount of nappys we went through until we realised it wasn't needed quite so often.

I used to be furious when a certain family member of DH used to shove his phone on DCs face and make jokes about getting them hooked on watching YouTube. I genuinely used to think he'd sit chilling in his bouncy chair watching an ipad all day long, at like, 3 months old. As a result DC wasn't allowed to even know that the iPad existed until about 2 when they started nursery. Now, they're obviously hooked on it so that plan didn't work out very well.

Am due DC in a few months so hoping to be a bit more relaxed this time around.

The A&E doctor was very nice but lost his patience with me a bit when I revealed that DS had not cried, that he had been asleep throughout the incident and that I wasn't 100% sure that the door had hit him - 'in general', he advised, 'we'd say that if a child had the sort of head injury we'd need to see in A&E, that head injury would wake the child up'

That is disgraceful.

No wonder waiting times are so long in a&e.

There's being an anxious mum and there's being ridiculous