Tips/advice for a new baby

[Loucuth]

Good evening.

I'm 37 weeks pregnant and have an almost 3yo boy. My son is very active and I always describe him as loving attention not affection! He is quite cuddly at times when he is watching tv etc but on the whole he'd rather play games than have a cuddle - which is fine we love his cheeky and lively personality.

My worry is that we are due a baby very soon and I'm starting to feel very guilty about how that's going to affect him for example i think he will be jealous about the baby sleeping in our bedroom. I predict that he's going to be quite jealous (understandably) and become clingy/cuddle which will be a shock for us to see that side to him.
We have got him a present off the baby for when he/she is born which he is really excited about. He has shown some interest but we haven't forced the baby onto him and have just went at his pace. For example when he wants to rub my tummy he will say he wants to touch 'your' baby, i reply that it is 'our' baby.

I wondered if anyone had any tips with how to handle the guilt I'm going to feel even more when the baby's here, any tips for how to successfully ensure that my son doesn't feel left out etc

Many thanks

A simple tip I was given was to be with the elder child when they meet the new baby (so leave the baby in their Moses basket or whatever and hold the elder child's hand).

A broader one was to try not to 'blame' the baby when you can't meet the older child's demands. So rather than saying "I can't get you a biscuit right now because baby needs his milk", simply say "I'll get you one when this TV programme ends". This tip seemed to particularly make sense to me.

Oh, and on the guilt front, I realised I'm time that my elder child was great whether or not I spent loads of time setting up activities and giving her loads of attention. I think a lot of what I was doing when they were an only was a bit pointless and they have learned loads all by themselves since the baby arrived!

Thank you! I especially like the tip of not blaming the baby. I've already had to stop doing that now I'm heavily pregnant and not as quickly mobile to play games. I've resorted to saying 'mammy's poorly' a lot lately