What can you actually do with a baby?

[ratbag44]

I started a thread earlier about a shit attempt at a 'fun day out' I'd tried today. It was a total fail. I have a nearly 7 month old baby and two primary age dc so a fairly big age gap. Baby is quite demanding. Wants to be held all the time, has pretty strict nap and feed times. She will sleep on the move in the buggy but not for long. Thus lots of crying and disappointed older dc today.

Anyway after a lot of stress and tears on our 'fun day out' today, dh and I have been chatting tonight and he's basically told me I need to be more realistic about what we can do with a small baby because attempting to wheel her around a busy city centre and do other family orientated activities on a bank holiday weekend did not end well.

It's made me wonder what do people actually do with babies? If it were just us I would quite happily stay home, go for the occasional walk, but try to stick to her routine and not pressure myself to be on the go. But with two other kids and particularly during the holidays I feel so bad for just staying home all the time. Dh helps where he can but he works full time.

I see people travelling the world with babies. Going on holidays. Days out. Their babies seem to slot into our plans whereas our baby dominates ours. Any advice or reassurance would be good. I know I should have foreseen these issues having such a big age gap but I guess I thought she would slot in and she hasn't.

I've only got one and we don't do anything really as his sleep is so bad that still, at 8 months old, my husband and I are still sleeping in shifts. I see other people just getting on with it and doing nice things and having days out. We've done some nice things but only really have an hour or two to do it in.
I just think we'll have to wait untill bubbas a little older. But it's very disheartening

My child is much older (5yo) but has autism and special needs so is similar behaviourally.

If we go anywhere with him, we always have a bag of toys and snacks that we can constantly put in front of him to keep him amused. At this point, Lamaze toys and baby crisps are your friends!

There's a big gap between doing nothing/ staying home and doing a 3 hour round trip to busy older child activities in the holidays.

There is a happy medium.

If I were you I'd have left DD with DP and taken the other DC's alone.

It's not fair on them to have to make concessions for a baby of a new relationship. They may later resent you for it.

Dad also needs alone time with her or he'll never be a competent parent.

I’ve got 4 girls - 10,9,3 and 2, when the now three year old was a baby I’d just take the older ones to local country parks that had large play areas, farm park type places etc etc or go to big soft play places or do things like crazy golf - used to do a morning then picnic/cafe lunch then head home early afternoon - didn’t generally go too far from home as she screamed in the car every where we went! Can’t comment on what we did when the now 2 year old was born as she was born a week into the first lockdown so no one could do anything really anyway!

We have just the one 8 month old.
We do a lot with her, but are lucky enough to have so much on our doorstep.
Our pattern tends to be playing at home in the morning and going out immediately after nap to enjoy the afternoon.
Today we went to art gallery and had snacks in the cafe first before going around.
So many of the museums and galleries have stuff on for kids of all ages and we have been utilising them.
I do think your day out, with kindness, was a bit ambitious packing a lot in!

For solidarity, when overtired my daughter is also a very loud screamer. At a food festival last weekend she refused to nap as she was so excited by the crowds and music and it ended in tears. I sit down, hold her, pat her bum and just shh and say ‘ I know you’re tired petal’ and it never lasts more than 10 minutes. It’s agonising when people stare and feels a lot longer but then she will go from screaming to sleeping with nothing in between. Then I can transfer her to buggy.

I used to have the baby in a papoose and also bring a stroller that reclined for nap time. That way the baby felt snuggled as we were walking around but had somewhere comfortable to sleep when needed.

We used to do half-day trips - steam railway or funfair, interactive museum or baby-friendly theatre or film matinee.

It sounds like the problem is with the older two at school pretty much since she's been born, your youngest is almost like the first child again. You can spend all day staying at home, attending to her every whim while your older kids are at school. Unfortunately, it sounds like she's too used to it now.

It also sounds like your DH doesn't do much to step up as a parent either. Any particular reason he wasn't on the family day out today (not sounding judgey, my DH works weekends).

I had a two year age gap so I didn't really have much choice other than to ignore one screaming or tantruming child most of the time. My eldest was one of those who cried for 8 hours straight regardless of what we did, so I was largely immune to tuts and comments about a crying baby in public by the time I had my youngest.

FWIW, my eldest who cried all the time was a velcro baby and has since been diagnosed as autistic. He hates crowds and is generally a nightmare in busy places, so we try to avoid busy places on bank holiday weekends.

@Mariokartedoff he was there today. He actually went into the museum with the older two while I fed baby in the cafe. But even with the two of us it was still hellish.

What sort of sling do you have? Might be worth trying a different style to see if your DC prefers it?

You have described my life to a T!

We have spent the last 15m with one of us doing something with DS1 while the other desperately tries to console DS2 and not go crazy in the process. DS2 has been a right little grumpy bum - hates the pram, the sling, the car, life, will only sleep in his cot, and boy does that child need his sleep - he'll wake the dead if he can't sleep when he needs to. Never been able to nap on the go etc.

It's only now he's getting older we're getting a bit of family time but even so, it's a morning activity before he needs to be back for his nap with the odd anomaly day thrown in where we push for more and suffer the consequences

I think I've just accepted it now and just think it won't last forever - while still feeling slightly out out that I didn't get one of those placid little cherubs that does slot right into family life from the get go!

I think ours were mostly afternoons out rather than full days now I think about it (with the 5/6 yo and a baby). I remember dc2 generally had his morning nap at home before we went out.

I had one that I thought would fot in with family life and it didnt work like that, our whole lives revolved around nap times. Complete opposite to my eldest who napped too / from other places or out and about.

In general we did activities for a couple of hours at most, close to home, so we could rush back for a nap. Then at the weekend it was divide and conquer so the eldest could do something a bit longer. For special occasions like the eldest birthday we would just grin and bear the disruption and sometimes it worked and sometimes it didn't. Dropping naptime was like a miracle in our house!

When my third child was born my older two children were 10 and 7. I used to take children out so older 2 could have swim lessons and baby sat with me in viewing area. We would go to library for older 2 to choose their books and they would choose one for baby. We would go to a large playground most weekends and I timed it so baby was fed and changed before we set off then he slept whilst out. We would go to an animal petting zoo and baby just had to sit in buggy and look at animals or snooze. It would not have been fair to older 2 to stop them going out and having fun. I tried not to let baby get used to being held too much and certainly not being allowed to fall asleep being held. It is a very bad habit to start and very hard to break once established. Baby would get more attention late evening when older children were in bed. He learned that was his special time when he played in bath, and DH and I made a fuss of him. Also when older children at school I got baby into a strict routine so got most of jobs done whilst older 2 at school so had time for fun once they were home from school. In mornings baby would have early Brest feed at 6.30am then I winded and changed nappy and he went back to sleep whilst I got older 2 up and breakfasted, then driven to school. When I got home baby got breakfast, changed, played then down for lunch time nap. Then up fed, changed, played then back for afternoon nap. Collected older 2 from school then baby awake till 9pm.