'Your Baby, Week by Week' - opinions?

[FaneFeyre]

I bought this looking for a straightforward 'what to expect' kind of read, but I find I really don't care for this book much at all. The tone is weird - a bit bossy and judgemental. Has anyone else found this?

Yes, I found this book disappointing. I last put it down about 7 months ago, so my memeory is hazy, but I remember their advice wasn't that great, quite a few inaccuracies in baby behaviour; one that particularly irked me was when they say "no baby crys longer than an hour"....if only !!

And only referring to the baby as male irritated me too.

Interesting - one of the authors is a friend/colleague of my mum. I really liked the book because it didn't tell you what to do, just what biologically the baby would be doing/feeling/etc. it's very much a scientist's style of book! I loved the easy descriptions of object permanence, b&w/colour vision, bladder and hunger control, and so on. The UK version of the book is also quite different from the US, from the few sample pages of the latter that I've seen on amazon.

I think wrt the male thing, they do mention that in the foreword. You have to choose one or the other else you'll be saying he/she/they all the time. There is some interesting psychology around giving a gender to a subject of writing, which can influence how you feel towards that subject, and most baby books seem to choose 'she'. Or perhaps publishers think that mums of girls buy more books. I have no idea on that!

I thought this book was wonderful at first, then terrible. It depressed me to read about the 'milestones' for each week, which were completely unrealistic and inaccurate. It also offers advice on early weaning which is very ambitious. In one chapter it says that if you're thinking of expressing and freezing your breastmilk you may as well use formula, as the freezing process destroys any additional benefits the bm may have had -- surely that's a bit irresponsible? Anyway, the whole thing made me cross. The Rough Guide to Babies was much better.

Sorry -- didn't mean irresponsible. Just thoughtless advice.

I didn't mind the male baby thing, actually I prefer when books choose one sex and go with it rather than hopping back and forth.

Garliclover-yes those are exactly the reasons why I found it disappointing. I thought the milestones seemed quite ambitious too.

It was good in the early days for nappies output and stuff though.

Disappointing and unmemorable. Milestones made me nervous if ds wasn't doing them.

I thought it was useful as long as you take all the milestones as guidelines. DS is my first so I had no idea of how often he "should" poo and wee and how many nappies I would change in 24 hours. I didn't follow the advice on weaning though, and I threw the book away when I got to 6 months and read how it's ok to leave them to cry even if they're sick, you should just go in very calmly and clean them and then leave them to it. No way was I going to leave DS cry until he was sick, I thought this was very cruel and it made me

All in all, I found it useful as long as you don't let it override your instincts and just take it as a guide. I wouldn't use it when I have a second baby though.

I absolutely love the Week by Week book. So much so I've often called it my bible and quoted it endlessly to other Mums when discussing sleeping patterns, feeding etc etc. I tried the Baby Whisperer and flicked through Gina Ford but found them really preachy and scare-mongering. If you stuck with either of those books you'd become a really paranoid parent. I just found Week by Week to be really pragmatic, straightforward advice but advice that you could take or leave. I never found that they actually suggested the controlled crying method as the best option, just that if you were really at your wits end and decide to give it a go, advice on how to go about it.

When I got to the 24th week I though 'S**t' what am I going to do now? And was very relieved when I found the sequel 'Month by Month' which I'm now just as addicted to.

I do have a boy and one who was 3 weeks late so was really pretty spot on with the milestones so maybe that's why I wasn't effected by those issues?!

Anyway all in all I give it 10/10 but every parent and every baby is different...:)

I used it and thought it was really helpful. When picking out a baby book to buy, most of them seemed preachy or overly emotional, trying to sell a parenting technique.

Personally, I found the book very practical, which is why I chose to buy it, especially the guides on how much / how often baby should feed, dirty nappies per day, sleep per day etc. It was almost like a baby user manual, which suited me down to the ground!

The milestones are just a guideline, I always assumed, so never got too hung up on those.

I thought it was great and have handed it on to a new mum friend. Easy to read and to pick out the points/areas you might be looking for. Very practical and not at all preachy...loved it!

Oooh, I didn't realise there was a sequel, I've just ordered it thanks!
DH and myself really enjoyed it, as first-time parents; we'd have a read in bed on a Saturday morning, looking at the week ahead and what to expect. We did take some of the information with a pinch of salt though and tended to giggle at the milestones not yet reached, and the hours of 'uninterrupted sleep' baby was meant to be achieving
It did seem to become less useful in the later weeks, but early on it was great for a rough guide to numbers of wet nappies etc.
As others have said, some of the advice didn't resonate so we skipped past it, but as struggling new parents we took great solace in the early days; now we're at six months I'm quite nostalgic about it, I remember reading Week 24 when we first got DS home and not quite believing we'd ever get there.
Also liked 'What's happening to mum' - "By now, you will almost certainly have wet yourself" springs to mind...

I didn't buy the Month By Month 'sequel' (went to the 'What To Expect...' doorstops books, but I did get given the Potty Training Boys The Easy Way (same authors). Was very straightforward and logical, and I'm sure it would have been useful if one of us was a SAHP. But as mine's at FT nursery, we just got on board with the nursery's way of doing things.