Surprising reaction at pregnancy news...

[connyrabbit]

Just found out I'm pregnant - been waiting for that all my life...but suddenly in tears at the idea of the bun coming in the way of my lovely life with my adorable hubby ...

Can anyone give me their best ideas/practices as to how to deal with the hard first months? I have friends who have almost not left their homes for 4 months. Please tell me it doesn't have to be that way? I know sleep deprivation seems to be the general problem, any good tips on that point?
I know I'll be over the moon when it arrives (I'm fascinated with everything that has to do with early childhood development/education) but I want to keep a BIG space for my hubby. I can't have him feeling left out!!!

Thanks all!!

C

Many congratulations, Connyrabbit. I hope you have a smooth pregnancy.

Congratulations!

I think it depends on what works for you. I got out and about quite a bit - coffee with women from my antenatal class, walks around the lakes near my house, shopping, visiting my family, etc. But, I was happy to let ds fall asleep on me wherever I was and wasn't that bothered if his clothes were mucky, although he wasn't a sicky baby to be fair. I took him up to London when he was 4 weeks old, we all went to Scotland on the train when he was 2 months old and drove to France when he was 3 months old.

You definitely don't have to be imprisoned for the first few months, but some people prefer to have a routine at an early stage which is more restrictive. Also, if you are unlucky and have a nocturnal baby, you might not be up to much during the day until you've got their sleeping sorted out.

Congratulations!!

What wonderful news. I am so pleased for you. X

Oh congratulations to you. This reaction I assure you is completely normal. There are couples who try for years, have fertility treatment, eventually get pregnant and still have the reaction you are experiencing. It's life-changing and now that you're actually pregnant that change has already happened. What a momentous thing and of course you're feeling a little bit panicky.

The good news is that it will pass and be replaced with such amazing excitement that you won't believe you were ever this worried. Of course things will change, especially your relationship with DH but you're going to fall in love with you DH as the father of your child. When you see him with that baby that is part of both of you, I promise you it will be worth it.

Your friends' experience will not be yours.

Congratulations to you.

Congratulations! I think you are right to be thinking about these things. Most people concentrate so much on the birth they forget to think about what life will be like afterwards. I just read Babyproofing your Marriage which I wish I had read earlier (I have 2 children 3 and 19 months) and would recommend you have a look at that - if you are a book sort of person. It will change your life and nothing can prepare you for how much - but - I would also say it is the most rewarding thing I have ever done (also the most challenging at times but definitely still the most rewarding!)

Thanks all - my outlook on things has changed already in a few days - feeling happier

Petitfilou thank you for your reading suggestion (yes I am definitely a book kind of person), I'll Amazon it right away! xx

connyrabbit - another vote here for baby-proofing your marriage, my wife and i found it really handy for preparing for impending parenthood. Its got all the "common sense" stuff i.e.

make sure the man does some housework and childcare
make sure you get time to yourself
make sure you get time as a couple

etc.

(and i particularly liked the suggestion from one couple about the first 3 months post-baby - they promised they would never bring up again the interesting things sleep deprivation made them say.

Get a sling, even two if you and your dh need different styles of sling. That way you can still hold hands when you are all out together, rather than one of you being tied to a buggy. Also, your dh will get a buzz out of being so close to the baby (the physical closeness to the LO is something that you are likely to take for granted, but he may not realise that he misses).

You may even finf that he gets distracted from you, rather than the other way around! I had to lay down the law with dh when ds1 was still new: he was to kiss me first when he came in, then he could rush at ds1.

Message withdrawn

And you DH doesn't have to feel excluded in those early weeks - DH loved that time, we didn't have any other visitors for the first couple of weeks (by choice) and we all sorted ourselves out as a new family

Good point Swizzler about the first few weeks!

If DH is able to take a few weeks off/go part-time for a while (if you can afford it) his love and support at a fairly emotional time might bind you quite tightly as a family...

And re: visitors, I dont know how close your respective families are, but you may find it easier if visitors are kept to a minimum - though this is a personal thing - and you may not have much choice!

But prob best to avoid having parents visit:

While staying at your house
For 6 weeks
A week after the birth.....

You will fall in love with your hubby all over again. You'll both look at your little one and say 'I can't believe we made that' and will be as proud as punch!! I defo feel even closer to dp since the arrival of our little boy.

Sleep deprivation tips:

If you little one has a problem with muddling up its day and night and is awake for a couple of hours in the night, stay in your bedroom with them with just a small light to make feeding easier. Don't be tempted to put on the tv, they need to learn that darktime is sleeptime!! It worked for me, as ds sorted out his day and night within a week.

For the first few weeks get dh to come home as early as he can. Once he walks in the door, pass him the baby and you go to bed for an hour or so.

Sleep whenever you can in the day. WHen the baby is asleep, you sleep. The feckin housework can wait!

If baby isn't sleeping in the day, put it in the pram and go for a walk. You may feel knackered, but it blows away the cobwebs. Sometimes staying in when you're tired makes you feel even worse.

Last but not least, the sleep deprivation doesn't last forever (even though it feels like it at the time)

hiya connie

a few months ago I posted a very similar thread - copy and paste the link below into your browser (I'm too rubbish to do blue underlined links) to read all the very helpful and interesting responses it got. I had exactly the same fears as you. Our baby hasn't arrived yet (one day overdue today!) but I do believe that giving all the implications of parenthood some serious thought has prepared us both for the changes that it will inevitably bring to our relationship.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk?topicid=49&threadid=244081#4903117

my tip to add to these is do try to keep going out

ok you will be tired etc but i think it is really important to try to get out of the house in an evening, just the two of you and don't talk about baby (you can do that the other million evenings at home)- even when baby is a few weeks old if you have fed him/her and just go for an hour

hopefully your mums or dads/sisters etc live nearby so they can baby sit - go nearby so they can call if need be (local pub for an hour or two is not that hard really). When baby gets older, start a baby sitting circle with local friends.

i think this is really important else before you know it a year down the line you have become used to staying in

Congratulations.
Your life will change, and the early months can be bloody hard, but the joy of having children is all worth it.
Read 'Life After Birth' by Kate Figes

Life after Birth can also be very useful for your DH to get a handle on the life changes and motivations for your behaviour.

(though for the love of god, make him read each section though without taking quotes out of context - there are some scary ones in there!)

DW also chimed in saying she found it useful as well...

If this is possible (and i know it isn't for a lot of people) my top tip is to get the extended family involved with baby from Day 1.

When the baby first arrives you sometimes feel like you want to keep it all to yourselves but my suggestion is 'share, share, share' with inlaws, sisters/brothers/parents.

We did this from day 1 and now our daughter is 3 and she will happily go to anyone in the family, stays overnight with any of them and means that me and hubby are able to get some time to ourselves without fretting about her being unsettled and stuff.

When I got pregnant, my doctor gave me this advice, he said 'babies are meant to be shared' - and it has paid off big time when it comes to having some 'me' time.

Hope that makes sense

Hey Conny, congratulations! I think it is perfectly alright to have those feelings you are experiencing. In our case our dd started sleeping through the night (despite bf) with about two weeks, so sleep deprivation was no problem really. The bond between us (me and dh)is even stronger now that we have brought such a perfect little person into this world. Good luck to you and I am sure it will work out. XX

Sleep deprivation only lasted about 4 months for us. But we did have 3 .

Very much recommend taking ds/dd to a cranial (or otherwise) osteopath to get them checked out and corrected. Even if there's nothing obviously 'wrong'.

Took our first ds after an extended bout of colic, and at last he got to sleep like a baby and drink more than 1 oz of milk at a time.

The next 3 we took along as a precaution, and the predictions made by the osteopath were weird (resilience to colds, good eater), but have proved to be remarkably accurate! The last ds had a clenched fist before we went an after just one session that whole side of his body relaxed. Something to do with the stresses of birth and the relaxation of the muscles afterwards.

Just my 2p.

Congrats, and GL.

I will not worry you with my first few months, as I know it was unusually difficult, but as a result can say that it's def. worthwhile for DH to get a few things which just for him and DC... one poster said that their DH loved having hte baby in a Babybjorn - My DH and DS have a little trip every Saturday morning, usually at least 30 minutes (but when they're only weeks old it might only be 15 minutes!)... and love it so much that he's moved on to baby back carrier more recently. They also "always" do bathtime... it just means that they have something which is just theirs, and you have a time which you know is relatively peaceful, even if it's just 10 minutes.

If you don't have any relatives/friends to hand it is difficult. If you do, great, if you don't and can get a sensible/mature babysitter, that's great. If you can't even get your head around arranging such a thing, see if your DH will. He might have more motivation to get on with it ifswim. It only has to be an hour. At the same time, don't beat yourself up if you don't get out immediately by yourselves.
I couldn't leave the house for 6 weeks, but then took DS to Oz at 6 months, so it doesn't mean it will be like that forever!

Oh, and the lack of sleep thing just becomes normal after a while, and you stop complaining about it :-) I found brushing my teeth and a wet flannel round the face helped alot - but there was a point where I felt as if I was doing it 6 times a day....also, I did try to let it flow over me, but not always easy if you're at all anxious about them crying/sleeping/feeding etc.

Finally, it always seems to be getting so much better that we had exactly the same "I could cope if the baby arrived already 6 months old" conversation at 6, 9, 12 and 18 months!! YOu don't realise how tough it was until it gets easier. I guess that's so you don't give up!

Congratulations, and good luck.

Congratulations! Your sentiments at finding out you were pregnant rang very true with me.
In terms of looking after a baby at the same time as staying on good terms with husband/partner, a friend gave me what has turned out to be an excellent piece of advice...when you have a particularly bad night in terms of sleep deprivation, both of you need to acknowledge in the morning that it was a bad night and you are both likely to be crabby and bad tempered all day, but that you will both try to get through the day without snapping at eachother. It has worked for me for the first 4.5 months.
Good luck.

we were advised to take advantage of going away when dd was still breastfed and therefore incredibly portable, and sure enough, when we went to france when she was 7 weeks old everything was fine. also, at that stage there was no real routine to stick to, so she fitted in with what we wanted to do. go to nearby town and then spontaneously stay for dinner? no problem! thought you were going for a walk on the beach, but it turns out there's a pub? again no problem.

whereas now, we have to get back for lunch/dinner/bath/bed, it's much more annoying. but still brilliant.

I really feel for you! My DH was told aged 10 that he would never have children and so he is finding it really hard to get his head around this one (I'm 17 weeks), especially after having had 2 m/c's. I have 1DS and 1DD from my previous marriage but they will be 13 and 9 when this one is born. We've spent the last 5 years having lots of quality time together, especially when DC's go off to their dads and I'm really worried about how this baby is going to affect our close relationship. I feel like this is my first child in a way because I can't remember what it was like with my other two - it was so long ago!

We've already had a talk and agreed that the first 6 weeks or so are going to be really hard and that we are not to take any of what is said to heart. I totally empathise with your fear of DH being left out and I'm hoping that my wariness of it will mean that I make sure it doesn't happen. I'm hoping we will fall in love even more so!

I think I'm going to invest in some of the books suggested!

Congratulations and hope it all goes well!