Is having a baby really as hard as people make out? What's the hardest bit/what uses your time?

[Jellybabie3]

So im 33 weeks and over the moon to be preg. But now its getting closer to the end i am wondering why it so difficult to have a newborn? In a totally naive way i know....but what makes it so difficult?? What fills up the time to mean you cant do anything for yourself anymore?

I'm not trying to sound thick/patronising or whatever i am literally trying to prepare

As a rough example:

My first baby breastfed evey two hours as a newborn. Each feed took 40 mins. So I'd start feeding 6am, finish at 6.40am. Then wind him for 15 mins until 6.55am. Sometimes he'd be sick so change of clothes needed. Then around 7.10 he'd fill his nappy, sometimes this would require a full change of clothes, so that takes till maybe 7.20. Then he'd maybe sleep for 40 mins and I could get something done. Maybe he would wake up crying after 10 mins and need holding to settle him so no free hands to get anything done. It makes you reluctant to jump in the shower in case the baby starts crying as soon as you get the shampoo on so everything feels rushed. No such things as a relaxing soak in the bath in those first few days (that was may experience anyway).

Then 8am....start again as above. Sometimes he slept for 2-3 hour stretches and I got a bit of rest but you can never fully switch off because you don't know if it's going to be a 2-3 hour sleep or a 15 minute cat nap!

According to my friends, this is a pretty normal experience and happens round the clock, day and night. It starts straight after labour when you are extremely tired and in pain so you start all this pretty exhausted and struggling to walk unaided. After a day or two the lack of sleep, the sudden change to your lifestyle and the crazy hormones from the milk hit you and you are an emotional and exhausted wreck. But you still have to carry on because you have a baby now!

There can be other challenges on top of this such as birth injuries/infections to you or feeding difficulties to get on top of, some of these can be physically painful for you as the mother. Also, working out how to feed and care for the baby takes up all your headspace, you just can't think about anything else, you're trying to learn all these new skills and no-one else can really take over to give you a break (although obviously other people can come and cook and clean for you - recommended!).

It all gets a bit easier after a few weeks. The hormones also help you to just get on with it and many mums are just so delighted to have their baby here that they do feel happy. But it's a huge shock to the system and happy as it is, it's overwhelming and a big, big adjustment. You will cope easier if you are mentally prepared for this as you seem to realised so that's great.

Congratulations on your pregnancy and I hope that all goes well!

Also - newborns are just SO gorgeous, they smell amazing and also, they are gorgeous. As they get older and you get to know them, they become your little mates and as hard and exhausting as it is, it's also very much a fun and rewarding experience - so don't panic!! I've done it 3 times and no regrets so can't be that bad!

It’s bloody fabulous having a newborn OP. They are so funny and utterly fascinating. And the time is gone in a blink.

Lots of time breastfeeding yes but I had both a bf pillow and a sling so I could sit and feed with only a bit of a wiggle here and there, and could easily feed and move around, so there was no massive restriction on activities whilst the baby was feeding, I could eat, make food or drinks, go for walks, play with other kids etc in feeding times. Used the sling for all the times the babies wanted to be held so I could move around and do school runs or go to baby groups or do the housework.

I never spent any time winding or burping babies and I also never spent any time trying to get them to go to sleep which I think helped very much with my stress levels and just accepting that what would be would be.

I went back to work with them at just a few weeks each time and wish I’d had longer to spend just doing baby things instead of doing baby things and working too but it was just lovely to have them with me, they are and were fun little people.

This made me laugh, but in all seriousness, it's a good question.

Personally I don't think it's a particularly rational choice. There are lots of sensible reasons not to have children. But I wanted them anyway. I think the urge to reproduce is natural (not that there's anything wrong with people who choose not to, perfectly understandable.) The pros are kind of unquantifiable and difficult to describe without sounding smug or gushing. The love is indescribable. There's a lot of joy in rediscovering the world through a child's eyes. I feel content and "complete". Also utterly exhausted and all the rest!

I've just realised that you resurrected a zombie thread that hadn't been posted on for 5 years! Why?!

@lydiangel83 resurrected the thread to post an update.

No she didn't, Lehill resurrected it with the post I quoted. lydiangel83 then posted an update.

It's all clear from the posts as they have the date and time on them.

Apologies.

Constantly thinking about someone other than yourself. All. The. Time.

Which gets harder and harder as they grow up.

Congratulations though; it really is rewarding as well as hard work!

What I found hardest was the overwhelming feeling that I was doing it all wrong, and that I wasn't feeling the right things.
The practical stuff- no sleep, feeding, burping was relentless. but on top of that I had no sense that my baby was mine, that I was a mother, or that I loved him and it was just unbearable. I had PND, and that, mixed with the relentlessness of newborn care was really something else

There is a lot of dramatic language on this thread. No baby needs to be woken every 2 hours through the night once they’ve regained birth weight, not all babies need to be winded for an hour etc.

It may be true for some babies but others are perfectly easy and it’s possible to drink hot drinks and have a shower

Hello! What a lovely suprise to see my old thread come back up...I've NC abit but am still here.

Anywho, it seems I have made myself laugh with this one as, lo and behold, I am now 37 weeks pregnant with number THREE 😂😂😂😂 so I guess I answered my own question...it's not THAT bad.

In all seriousness to those now worried, it is hard, it's relentless, the breastfeeding is never ending (if you go down that route). My first had silent reflux so woke every hour for the first six months, then every two hours until 1. My second who is 2.5 now still gets into bed with me every single night, whoops 🤣 but I ADORE these kids, they are my whole world. Motherhood will knock your socks off, over and over again 🥰 for every day I want to scream I have a single moment with them that makes it all worth it. My eldest (who was due for this thread) is off to reception class next week 😭 I truly don't know where the time has gone, but clearly, I'd do it all (and am) again in a heartbeat.

Dive in with both feet is (my own) advice ☺️

Love this update!

I've found that you CAN do stuff, but it's never exactly when you want to do it. E.g you'll only have a 30 minute gap to say, have a shower, OR sit down with a coffee and a book. But then I'm doing a lot of breast pumping and bottle sterilising which takes up a huge chunk of my day. Everything works around a 3 hour schedule of pumping, washing up, feeding, winding, changing and sterilising. Breastfeeding on its own would have less of the faff involved although that comes with its own set of time-consuming issues 🤣

But yeah for me free time now is never free. You've always got a little countdown clock running in the corner of your mind to the next thing.

Aw just seen the update 🙏

Lovely update! Thanks OP it's so nice when people come back
I loved having little ones and also had three. Was lucky with supportive family and friends network, and we lived on a farm so was used to relentlessness and responsibility. Baby used to be in the pram while I worked with the animals. Would probably not have found it so easy if I'd been isolated at home. Also was lucky with pretty easy babies who breastfed well and didn't seem to need winding in a big way.
We co slept and I'd lay on my side to feed. I suspect i did a lot of things that would be frowned upon now, but my mum (born 1930s) did the whole feeding every 4 hours and leaving us at the end of the garden to sleep yell between feeds, and own rooms from day 5, so probably a reaction to that!

Having a baby is the easiest stage in theory, it's the sleep deprivation that's the killer but that eases at about 12 weeks.

Toddlers are savage, you'll be wishing you were back to sleep, eat and change haha

They really are the best little things though :)

I was way too lazy for any of that!

For me it was that someone is now fully reliant on you. They’re just always there and you are totally responsible for them. You have this little person and they need you for everything. Plus all your sleep is dependent on theirs-being woken up by a baby when you’ve just gotten asleep is the most disorientating feeling!!

Ah great update op, congratulations and best of luck!

Harder than I ever imagined and no one could have prepared me.

I tried for many many years for my DC then went down the assisted conception route so a very wanted child however it is the hardest thing I have ever done and won't do it again.

For me it was the lack of/broken sleep that was the killer. I still have PND and think this is where is stems from.

People tell you it's hard but you have no idea.

My DC is now a bit older and I enjoy it so much more but still have days were in like FML!

You will be fine! It is hard at times really hard but take the help offered for example if someone offers to cook or clean or hoover then let them. Likewise ask for practical help from those who care for you.

My DS was diagnosed with reflux and would cry in pain for like an hour after every feed or until he was sick. He was EBF for 5.5 months but it took its tole.

My other piece of advice is do what suits you And baby in terms of feeding and sleeping.

Love the update ❤️
In rereading the old thread Ive been trying to think what exactly was so difficult and how to explain it to someone not there yet. For me it was the real meaning of "not having a second to yourself".

I read all the same WORDS as are here- "your time's not your own", "you have to feed,change, sleep, change". I went to council birth club and they showed us a colour coded map of the day that said look, here's feeding, sleeping, walking, changing, repeat for 19 hours...

But I didn't GET it. Because there were some aspects of self care that before I had a baby, I had the privilege of completely editing out of my brain. I didn't even realise I was doing some "optional" things for myself I thought they were the basic level of being alive!! So subconsciously I assumed that the NCT map just didn't have those things that I would do for myself written down. Like when you watch a thrilling heist drama, you never see the hero stop and have a wee, you just assume they do at some point, over the 72 hours the drama is set.

The unseen luxuries for me included - being able to grab water when I needed it. Being able to sort out discomfort, if your sock is scratching you, you can change your sock or scratch your foot! Going to the toilet. Closing a curtain when the sun is in your eyes rather than the sun just still being in your eyes for an hour. Getting a jumper and putting it on if you are cold. Cleaning dirt or smelly stuff off your body, even if just like quickly wiping something. Hearing the fridge beeping and getting up to make sure the door is shut, not listening to the fridge for an hour. Fetching a tissue and blowing your dripping nose when you need to. Fetching a paracetamol for your headache.

When the baby was born I realised that doing at least some of the above things, every single day, would mean that I would dislodge or disturb a baby who needed to be on me all the time. I could get a jumper or close the window, but it would mean waking the baby, and so trigger another immediate 1-2 hours of quite hard physical work. I was trading off basic comfort against that. And nothing in my life had prepared me to do that and I was completely mentally unfit to deal with living at a reduced level of physical comfort. It sounds very fragile and snowflakey but it blindsided me as I didn't even consider it was a thing.

So I couldn't prepare myself in advance for losing those aspects of my old life. I hadn't the faintest idea that those tasks even existed, that they were real aspects of life and how I would manage without them. How surprised I was!

@EthicalNonMahogany I totally get it!!! I had a splinter in my foot for three days because I just didn’t have the time or brain space to deal with it. The shock of not being able to do the basics to make myself comfortable was so hard.

Keeping a little, vulnerable human being alive is the most exhausting long term thing I've ever done but totally worth it. It is a shock to the system with your first child I think. Nothing can totally prepare you for it.