The books you read and the people you talk to will have their own timetable in mind regarding when you to buy new clothes, tell The World that you are pregnant, when to take a childbirth class, when to buy baby gear and so forth. There’s a lot of variability. Some things will take a while to schedule and implement. Childbirth classes can run for many weeks, for example. Outside commitments, whether paid employment or otherwise, will need to be informed of your plans at some point, whether that is to take parental leave or make other arrangements. This can be incredibly overwhelming if you try to do it all at the beginning, particularly while you are fatigued and nauseous during the first trimester. It’s very okay to put a lot of it off, to consciously put things on hold (whether related to the expected child or part of your pre-expectant life) as less important.
My mother-in-law helped us out during the 2nd week after the birth. I had a post-partum doula helping out for the first 6 weeks (other than the 2nd week). Various friends ran errands, brought over food, held the baby, went places with me and the baby when my husband couldn't and so forth. My husband had been at his job only a few months and so was not eligible for FMLA. He took some sick time before and after the birth, and all his vacation time. He's been working short hours since.
Despite all this, and despite breast feeding working quite well (other than difficulty getting sidelying to work for the first month and a half, despite getting it to work the first two days in the hospital after my c-section), I am only now starting to be able to predict what my days will be like. Mostly that's because babies take a few months to really develop any predictability, and it's damn hard to find child care for a really fresh infant, and I didn't even really want to.
I spent the first day of child care catching up on e-mail that had accumulated while we traveled for two weeks to the east coast to introduce the baby to his extended family. Along the way, I sent a message to a friend who is expecting in February. I went on a bit offering advice. This entire book is about navigating a lot of decisions, helping you to see how various decisions affect each other. But I'm now at a point where I firmly believe that some things are useful however you decide to parent.
You will be building a nest, a place where you and whoever else is caring for the baby spends a lot of hours of the day, holding, feeding, resting. Get a glider rocker and glider ottoman. Make sure you have tables on both sides (and ideally one across the front, but that can be tricky to find) where you can put books, magazines, catalogs, phones, remote controls, snacks and a beverage. Spend more time planning the nest than you spend on the nursery or any other home improvements. Someone will be in the nest all day every day. Make it a good place to be.
I did not get a wireless network and a laptop. I sure wish I had. Someone told me I should. He was right.
Make sure everyone you care about and are close to knows that newborns require about five people to take care of them adequately. Not full time, [At 10 months and change: actually, full time.] but that's how many people are needed in order to make sure everyone gets naps, showers, meals, walks, and a few minutes away from the baby to recover their equilibrium. Consider involving mothers, mother-in-laws, other relatives, post-partum doulas, friends and so forth in your support system. Be aggressive and specific in your requests for help. Expect some number of people, professionals, friends or relatives, to promise to help out and then fail you utterly.
Caring for that baby is going to be a top priority for you. Carving space in your schedule ahead of time can help you make a softer landing. When people say they were too busy in those first few days and weeks to take a shower, it isn't because they were incompetent feebs. If you don't arrange for someone fresh to take the baby for a few minutes to an hour a day, you won't be showering either. If you don't arrange for other people to go to the grocery store, buy food, bring it home and prepare it for you, you won't be eating regular meals either. If you don't arrange to trade off night time parenting, you won't be getting any sleep either. You won't get enough sleep no matter what you do.
How you carve a hole in your life big enough to fit a newborn into will depend on your circumstances. Starting to talk now to the people who can help you is the best use of your time. Don't worry too much about what kind of diapers you'll use, or where your baby will sleep, or what you will feed the baby. If you make the time, you can figure the rest of it out later. Talk to friends who have babies and have schedules that work well for them and ask them what happened along the way to that schedule. Pry out of them what the early months were like. Allow for contingencies.
Streamline your household tasks as much as possible. Simplify the meals you cook. Reduce the number of grocery store trips you have to make each week. Figure out a fast way to keep your house at a level of cleanliness and orderliness you can tolerate. Shift everyone's wardrobe towards washable clothes that hide stains. Be creative, but cut down household tasks as far as possible, then start figuring out ways to hire other people to do them, at least temporarily.
When you babysit someone else's kid, keeping that kid alive and mostly unharmed is job one, and, quite possibly, the only job you feel you've taken on by agreeing to babysit. When you have your own baby, that will be your job one, 24/7, and it is likely to be a younger baby than you've ever held before, much less been responsible for.
After keeping your baby alive and mostly unharmed will come feeding the baby and keeping him or her calm, because a screaming baby makes any rational thought basically impossible. Collect tips from friends about how to calm babies and take those tips seriously. If they all swear by a particular baby product, whether a swing, vibrating seat or whatever, at least try to borrow theirs.
Your next priority will be sleep. You might think it would be food or taking a shower, but it will be sleep. Then food, then a shower. So if you want to ever get a shower, you need to make sure you get some sleep. Arrange ahead of time for a relatively sound-proofed second sleeping area. Trade off naps with whoever is helping you care for this baby. Even if you are breastfeeding, you can still catch at least a half hour or an hour at a time if you can get your partner to cooperate.
Food prepared ahead of time, edible cold or after a quick round through the microwave, can mean the difference between being cranky and becoming psychotic. While fast food and takeout are options, if you can possibly get some food cooked ahead of time, you'll probably be happier. Friends or a postpartum doula may be able to cook meals that you like. You may also be able to stock your freezer ahead of time by adopting OAMC (once a month cooking) strategies before the birth.
If you can wrap your brain around this set of priorities, and then add to the end of the list other things you know you must maintain to stay sane, you will be better able to avoid wasting precious time when you can least afford to do so. I would suggest exercise, and time alone to the list after showers. You might think adult conversation would be important, but you won't be either capable of it immediately or, likely, even all that interested in it, other than talking about babies, and sleep deprivation.
There are some very good reasons to delay buying baby gear and making other changes (like setting up a nursery, something I personally would not advise, but which you may do) too far in advance of the birth, most of which boil down to Something Bad Might Happen, like a miscarriage or a stillbirth or a catastrophically disabled baby. In all those situations, looking at the baby gear is going to drive you further around the bend. The suggestions above won't have that effect. Quite the contrary. If something bad happens, you'll have a bunch of food made up ahead of time while you are recovering from a horrible blow and the ensuing depression, neglecting the housework will be a lot less dire, and those same people may still come through for you. And those priorities -- sleep, eat, shower -- are the same whether you have a kid or not.
Copyright 2005 by Rebecca Allen
Created May 20, 2005 Updated March 8, 2006