Any pearls of veteran parenting wisdom?

[RuthChan]

We all had a good chuckle at the recent thread about neurotic first time mothers, and I for one am happy to know that I've managed to avoid most of those pit falls during my first 3 months in the job, despite having the most beautiful baby in the world!!!
However, what we FTMs really want to hear from all you veterans is not what you wished you hadn't done, but what you wish you HAD done, or heard or been told etc the first time round. What pearls of wisdom can you pass on to the rest of us????

I wish I hadn't wasted time trying to a perfect mum, wife, hostess and employee. I should have not cared more IYKWIM!

I was much more relaxed second time around!

if you turn your back on an 18 month old in the garden because he's quiet and happy, chances are when you turn back he'll be prodding a snail and eating the froth

likewise if you take your children to the local woods to dig up worms (yes we were that mad threesome ) and bring them home, your 2.8 year old daughter will be devestated at having to let them go and will spend 20 minutes kneeling on wet grass stroking her worms and calling them 'nakes

write your child a big card / letter on their birthday, tell them what kind of person you think they are and what they have acheived that year and what makes you proud. Any milestones, who their friends are, what they like doing

keep them safe every year (can do it at christmas too) .. much better than a baby book .. you get to see the child developing

Good advice!!!

No problem with the photos though. Everyone takes far too many of their first child anyway and now that we've entered the age of the digital camera... Never seem to get around to erasing all the bad ones either!

The letter writing idea if a great one. Will definitely have to remember that one.

Any more...?

i've got some grown up children as well as little ones, ruth. the only thing i really regret is when i've been mean to them, and people think i'm soft anyway, but when i look back, being cross and very strict sometimes only made me and them upset. i wish i'd known that a lot of their behaviour was not under my control and that i should have accepted them more as they were.

less seriously, i would not leave my first babies to cry for a moment, so sometimes i couldn't even get lunch. i should have just put them in their cot for a few minutes, got on with what i was doing and then picked them up as soon as i could and given them a big cuddle

Ah yes, GCs, I know that not getting angry and just accepting them for who they are will be one of the tough ones. For example, I never rebelled as a teenager so if my children do I'll find it hard to understand why they need to.

As for leaving the baby to cry while I get lunch etc. Yup, I'm already pretty practised at that one. It makes me feel quite heartless at times, but otherwise I'd never get anything done.

my pearl of wisdom would be to use a baby "grobag" for bedtime instead of having the baby move around the cot getting cold...I could even take dd away to a hotel/caravan etc and she would be happy to sleep because she had the same bedding in effect. Love grobags!

Yes, I have to agree that grobags are great!
Our house is really cold at night so I feel far better knowing that DD can't escape from her bedding.

If anyone offers to take the baby for a walk or watch them while you grab 40 winks snatch their hand off so to speak.
I was so bloody independant with my DD1 I had to do it all myself, no-one else could do it better
I learned the hard way.

oh yes flower...I never dared ask anyone to help with the baby when I desperately needed a break. Now I know that friends and family are usually happy to have a baby for a short time...it's when the baby becomes a toddler that people are suddenly too busy to help!

So Ruth, one more pearl of wisdom, ask someone to mind the baby and put your feet up!

I would LOVE to have help minding the baby, but unfortunately there's nobody around who would. Of course the baby's kind of tied to me due to breast feeding, which doesn't help!
I thought my parents in law would help as they live close by, but they seem to think the 30 min drive to our house is a trip to the end of the world.
I seem to be doing ok so far though, so I can't complain.
Not looking forward to if/when we have number 2 though...

Things I wish I'd known earlier (after 24 years I think I might finally be getting the hang of it):

1. Children learn by modelling the behaviour around them - they'll do what you do and not what you say. Especially true of 'pre-language' phase, and these early patterns are laid deep.

1. Take a long term view - think about what you really want for your child when s/he is 20, 30, 40

1. Don't let the world contextualise (label) your child or your parenting. Hold fast to what you know to be right and pay attention to your child - you know them best.

1. Kids need their parents to be parents, not friends.

1. Children do being children perfectly.

1. Be consistent.

1. Don't take things personally - learn what's about you and what's not.

1. Kids are amazingly resilient.

One tip which I think would be useful, if like me you absolutely hate bathing a new baby in case you break something or are just terribly unsure of yourself! [bluxh]
I got a foam kind of bath thing from mothercare, it was about 7 quid, its basically like a big sponge you can lie baby on.
Made bathtimes a thousand times easier. Think I seen them in Tesco's once as well.

When you are going through a particularly challenging time ie disrupted sleep with a newborn try and remember that it doesn't last forever. Most challenging behaviours seem to happen in phases and I am far more tolerant of my third child than the first as I know things constantly change. I sometimes feel I was (and still am) too hard on ds 1.