Any tips to get me through the next few years

[anyadvicefor]

I'm 18 weeks pregnant and have a nearly 1 year old. Baby was 8 months when I conceived so it'll be a 17 month age gap. I'm shitting jt I'm not Gona lie. Any advice ?

Bumping

One more hopeful bump 😆

I have a 16mo gap and it is hard! You have to be really organised and there really isn't much down time. Top tips:

Always pack a bag and prep the toddlers lunch the night before.

If DC1 doesn't sleep through yet then throw all your resources at helping that happen.

Then try and get then to sleep or at least be happy in their cot until 7am.

Morning: Wake up super early, like 5:45am. Coffee, do any tidying, and prep breakfast and an activity for DC1. Then feed the baby in peace (it's the only peaceful once they'll get all day). Once that's done get DC1 up and fed. You've then got time to get yourself ready while they're in the highchair.

Get DC1 dressed and set them off doing an activity, playing or watching TV. That buys you some time to get the baby napping and to do whatever else you need.

After that everyone is ready for the day and you can go out or whatever is on the agenda.

Find a playgroup with tea and biscuits or a soft play where toddler needs absolute minimal supervision.

Take all the help you can get!!

It is actually lovely to have them so close together. They are obsessed with each other!! Good luck!

Happy to answer any questions.

Also, everyone eats dinner together early - before bed and bath time. Otherwise the evening gets away from you.

Will be tricky to start with but lots of benefits.. always at the same stage, shared toys, permanent play mate .

The age gap between my eldest two is slightly more than that but only by a couple of months.

It genuinely is hard work... but after a couple of years I started to notice ways in which the small age gap made life much easier.

Mine are best friends now. Days out, toys, activities etc are all so much easier because they can manage the same kind of thing.

Things that have helped include babywearing, bulk cooking, lots of time out of the house in the countryside, low standards of housework, turning chores into a game by finding ways in which they can join in with everything, eating all our meals together for calm family time, having their baths and bedtimes together, and trying to truly enjoy all the many lovely moments.

Routine routine routine and get DC1 into a good bed/sleeping routine now.

Get a rock solid bedtime routine going now for your dc. Decent double buggy. With a bit of practice you can get naps aligned! Stock up on nappies etc so you never run short.. Running to a shop with 2 dc won't be fun. I have dd's 15 months apart. Ds's 13 months and ds's 20 months apart... Quite enjoyed doing it a few times tbh!

I bought DC 1 some special toys that only came out when I was feeding the baby. That way each feed turned into a really happy time for us.

16 month age gap here with two boys, yes it was hard at first but. But they were best pals. The trick I found was getting them to nap at the same time. I spent loads of time pushing the youngest up and down the hallway at the oldest nap time. Paid off tho as they both fell into same routine and I had a couple hours too have lunch and set up trains etc . Nothing to dread. They are now 13 and 12

I'm going to try this!

My question is how do you get the older one down if the baby is still awake? She always starts crying 😱 I have resorted to car naps on the days I'm on my own!

I went for the opposite approach and used to enjoy having the naps separate so I had more one to one time with each DC.

Don't stress too much when baby is born. Rely on tv if you can, get as much help as you can.

When recovered, this is what helped me -

Don't go downstairs til everyone is dressed and ready (dentists recommend brushing teeth before breakfast)

Always have your bag packed with nappies, wipes, snacks, couple of toys

Prepare lunch and prep things for dinner in the morning

Get out after breakfast - find all your local groups and library activities, go to parks, get plenty of fresh air

Have some easy recipes on hand. Things like chicken and veg one pot or tray bake recipes.

Do a laundry load every day.

Clean the kitchen and living room every night otherwise things get overwhelming thenext morning if you're trying to play 'catch-up'

I think you may have commented on my previous post about me finding two really hard. I hope I didn't scare you too much.

If not, I have the same gap as you and yes it's tough but it's good to be prepared - I was very naive. Here's some things that have really helped me once dc2 was a bit older (I didn't actually find the newborn stage hard with two as they don't do much!)....

If they aren't already, focus now on making your first a good sleeper. For me, my second followed suit and they both sleep through and nap at the same time which is amazing. We also get our evenings child free from 7pm.

I potty trained my second quickly as two sets of nappies was killing me slowly.

Babyled weaning - both are good eaters, feed themselves, eat pretty much anything I put in front of them and meal times are easy.

The out and about is a great double pushchair.

Do housework and get prepared for the following day the night before. Mornings are a shit show in this household so it makes things easier.

Don't feel bad for putting the eldest infront of the tv whilst you sort out youngest! Or get them to help (mine loved getting nappies, wipes, muslins).

We've never had an issue with jealousy. I'm not sure if dd was too young to notice but we included her in everything to do with ds and showed her a lot of attention. They've bonded amazingly.

If all else fails, chuck them outside with a bowl of warm water and some plastic utensils and you'll get a good 30mins peace.

Good luck!!

Thanks so much everyone this is all great !
One thing is dd sleeps through the night but only in our bed... she will not go in her cot anymore. Since she learnt to pull herself up she's a nightmare, she fights sleep so much and once she finally falls asleep, we will put her in her cot but she wakes up and screams and screams until we put her in our bed, then she will soundly sleep!!

Don't know what to do

Honestly I’d work on getting your little one to sleep through in her own bed.

We've tried believe me! It's so hard she just will not do it. She gets in such a state I just can't leave her like that

Similar gap and while it was hard, it was also great. The gap was small enough for them to be very interested in each other and playmates.

A great tip I picked up on here was to talk about the eldest child to the baby so the eldest is still getting your attention. Stuff like “your big sister is building a tower of blocks. I wonder how high it will go? One-two-three…” and other such blather.

Can you get your dc to sleep beside you on a bed or mattress in your room. It’s quite a big ask to go from being with mum or a caregiver all day, to all alone at night. You might need to do it in stages.

Sorry should have said dd is still in our room anyways as she doesn't have her own room yet (will be moving to a bigger place in a couple of years fingers crossed)
So it's not like it's that, she just wants our bed lol
She used to sleep so well, go down awake in the cot, would fall asleep and sleep through. When she started crawling it all went out the window and since then it's been chaos. I've given up even putting her down in the cot, I wait for her to fall asleep and then transfer her.
Which isn't ideal I know but it's relentless otherwise.

Try again and don’t give up, you’ll get less sleep for the first few days but it’s worth it.

I just want to add that I found the pregnancy much harder than after the birth when I could just get on with it.

And I was definitely less hard on myself as a mum too which was better for everyone. There are times, everyday when you need to prioritise one of them over the other, and someone might cry for a minute or two while you sort the other one out. When I only had one, I felt like a bad parent if they cried.

If you have a supportive and involved dh, a great sanity saver is to hand off the dc for bath time/playtime, pop in your headphones and do a bit of housework in a part of the house they’re not in. Even 30 mins of not being interrupted and getting to catch up on the chaos can be a huge help.

We’re now 4.5 months into the same age gap and honestly, it’s nowhere near as bad as I was expecting (yet, anyway!) We’ve just been on holiday and met so many people who told us it’s a lovely gap which comes into its own the older they get. Already it’s gorgeous to see the way the younger one smiles at the older, and the mutual fascination that’s building…

Plus, it’s an amazing feeling knowing that each day truly does get us closer to being out of the brutal newborn years!

My tips:

• Do everything you can to sort the older one’s sleep. Research different approaches to sleep training and see if you can find something that vibes. Makes a huge difference.
• Annoyingly, both a double buggy and a sling + single are useful at different times (see if you can find a secondhand Donkey which can be both). Wearing the baby is super useful when following the toddler around playground, soft play etc.
• Take masses of snacks with you to help corral the toddler where you need them to go/ strap them into the buggy. Things like pots of raisins or frozen peas take a while to eat and are nice and distracting while you’re feeding the baby.
• I made a ‘sanity list’ (lol) of all the local kid friendly attractions and events I could think of, for each day of the week. So there is always a choice of options for me to pick from if one (or all of us!) is crying. Your mileage may vary but I’ve personally found I’d rather deal with the physical fatigue of being out and about morning and afternoon, then the mental fatigue of trying to manage everyone at home (this may change in the winter, I guess).

Yes I agree the priority here atm is getting dd back in her cot. Please tell me how to do this ?!
I try and put her in, she is clearly shattered, lay her down the usual routine, leave the room, within ten seconds she is standing up crying her eyes out. I go back in, don't talk, don't make eye contact, lye her back down, leave the room and then she cries. This goes on for ages until we give in because she is hysterical

Some ideas….does she have any kind of comforter? Could you introduce one? Our oldest has a soft toy thing which is a key part of bedtime now.

Does she nap in the cot in the daytime? I’ve heard from others that starting with naps (the whole drowsy but awake thing aggghh) is recommended - we did this.

We did intervals in and out - 1 min, 2 mins etc and it worked like a charm - but I do appreciate that different babies seem to react differently to it and I’m sure I would have found it much harder had it made our eldest really hysterical (we also did it before they were standing).

On the other hand, a different approach could be to totally lean into the co-sleeping, if your eldest sleeps soundly in your bed and you don’t think they will be too disturbed by the newborn? Maybe get a bigger bed or even a floor bed, and plan to have toddler in the bed with you, and newborn in a next to me or similar?