To be bored out of my brain whilst breast feeding

[FreightTrain]

Baby is 10 days old and I am bored stiff whilst breastfeeding her. There’s only so much scrolling on social media or the news that I can take and I’m not sure I have the headspace for a book right now.

I am desperate to do some housework, what a sad state of affairs 😂

Please share ideas for how I can keep myself occupied or at the very least tell me it gets easier.

Another vote for a thousand episode series.

Or do what I did and get into thousand reply threads on MN in the middle of the night.

Gazing at the baby doesn't take a hundred hours.

How can you be bored? There's a whole world of books, tv shows, films and podcasts out there! Being immobilised with nothing to do but read and watch stuff sounds amazing to me! I re-watched all 7 seasons of Buffy while breastfeeding dd

Ok - but after you’ve done that for a week and it’s bloody tedious, what then?

I really loved podcasts for breastfeeding. Used to listen to short ones on spotify like 'this day in history class' or 'coffee break German'. Mostly they were 5-10 minutes and about a topic I was interested in so I had something other than the baby to talk about which felt important to me at the time whilst I was adjusting to my life changing pretty drastically 😂

I read all of Austen, and watched The Killing. And developed an intense love affair with Bettany Hughes and Mary Beard programmes. I think I felt so at sea that someone intelligent, likeable and female telling me stuff I hadn’t known was lovely.

I started with this but then my phone screen did that brain stimulation thing so even after the baby was asleep I was WIDE AWAKE. Switched to kindle after that. Day feeds were much better for finding entertainment! Darn you addictive blue screens.

I’d have ended up with a permanently fucked neck if I’d spent my sons’ every feed looking lovingly into his eyes- he ate for 40 minutes at a time!

Congratulations on your new baby!
Remember that you are feeding a whole other person so be extremely kind to yourself. Make sure you have lots of drinks, snacks, the remote control, kindle, your phone and anything else you might want all stashed up at your favourite feeding spot. Feed lying down if it suits you both.
Don’t expect too much of yourself. Sniff the baby and watch easy tv or nap if you’re in a safe spot! Eat all the cake you want. It’s basically baby food 🤣

How about talking to or gently singing to your baby? I loved that beautiful and special time of gazing into my baby's eyes whilst feeding them, holding their tiny fingers or stroking their soft cheek.

Then reward yourself with a massive salad

I went through all of below decks in the first few months with my little one too! Even bought a heyu subscription

I’m glad you guys had special, magical, wonderful times - I had excruciating mastitis three times (alternating boobs) and needed some distraction from the abject agony of keeping my daughter alive.

No mobile phones or streaming when DS1 was a baby and he was a very slow feeder. I was a slave to the TV schedules. Thankfully.we had Sky TV, at the time. It couldn't be anything too exciting, though, as he was so distractible and my nipples only stretched so far. I watched a lot of ER, sometimes with the sound off and just subtitles and managed to watch Butterflies all the way through.

With DS2, it ended up being mostly CBeebies 😂

You know some books are easy going, right? I had the Kindle app on my phone. Got through loads of thriller type books.

Is there any kind of exercise you can do whilst sitting?

Thanks! I woke DH up snorting

@Tontostitis

so you did…what? Just sat and stared at your baby for hours on end? Yeah right, sure you did…. 🙄

@JumpstartMondays

binge eat?! Oh yeah I’m sure that’s gonna make op feel good about herself!!?

Thanks for all your suggestions. I’m not a big TV watcher but I’m going to give a couple of new series a go and see how I get on. I’m a big fan of podcasts and audiobooks too, but generally would listen whilst doing something - housework, walking the dogs etc. I’m not sure how I’ll get on with just sitting listening but I’ll give that a go too!

The house isn’t actually a mess, DH is doing a cracking job of keeping on top of it. My hankering to do housework is more to do with struggling to sit still than a desire to actually clean.

Part of the problem is DH and I run a business so it’s hard to fully switch off when there’s still work hanging around in the background. But ultimately I need to find a way because I’m achieving nothing in the way of work or down time as it stands!

To all the earth mothers who could while away hours staring at their baby, I’m genuinely happy for you, but please don’t be so delusional as to expect all new mothers will get the same satisfaction from doing so. Ten minutes here and there is lovely, but all day? No thanks.

I actually have a 10 min limit on Instagram on my phone so when I say social media I actually meant Mumsnet. I think I’ll ask DH remove the limits (not enforced by him before anyone asks 😂) and go on there a bit more too!

Just to reassure you, OP, it's very rare to feel like this. I love my DCs to bits but more than 2 minutes of this and I want something else to occupy me.

I read easy read books that didn't require much concentration, rom com type stuff. Mhairi McFarlane is brilliant for this.

Pelvic floor exercises!

We all have different experiences of motherhood and all are valid. If you feel judged that's your own insecurity there was no malice in any of my posts. I suffered terribly with mastitis and had so much milk the red cross came three times a week to collect my excess. My experience of breastfeeding is as valid as yours this is a discussion forum for mother's.

Please share ideas for how I can keep myself occupied or at the very least tell me it gets easier.

I think you misread the thread @LuckySantangelo35 . I suggested something to occupy OP whilst BF.

I don't know the OP so I can't possibly tell you whether she feels good about herself or not. Hopefully she does!

What about a breastfeeding friendly sling? Once I got the hang of it, I had hands free to do things while DC just fed. 10 days is too soon though imo. Just enjoy sitting around doing nothing for a while.

@Tontostitis

youre the one saying you feel “astonished” by people saying that they got bored when doing endless hours of feeding and wanted to watch tv or read. Surely you can see how that would come across as judgemental?

@JumpstartMondays

me too!

your suggestion to occupy herself being “binge eating” just seemed a bit random to me, especially for a post partum woman who is probably going to be working to get her body and fitness back at some point in the not too distant future!