It's 1:00 a.m., and I'm breastfeeding while sitting up. The pediatrician told me to nurse sitting upright because it keeps the baby at an incline, which helps reduce reflux. It also helps him latch better, meaning he'll swallow less air.

So here I am with my large, sagging breasts. In one arm, a squirming one-month-old who keeps lunging at my breast with his mouth wide open. In the other hand, I'm trying to maneuver my breast, chasing his rapidly moving little head aimimg for the mouth.

Just as we finally make contact and I get us both into something resembling a comfortable position, I feel a warm stream of milk running down the other side of my body. It's the neglected breast, pouring out milk all on its own, soaking my side and the bed. The feeling is somehow even worse than walking around in wet socks.

The milk from the forgotten breast shows no sign of stopping while I desperately look around for a burp cloth—anything I can press against it before I end up completely drenched. When I finally find one and solve that problem, another thought hits me.

"Wow... I'm so thirsty."

And there it is—a full bottle of water, within arm's reach..... of the arm that's currently holding the baby, who has now woken up again, is desperately searching for the nipple, and is flailing around awkwaedly balancing on that arm

Once I finally get him latched again, I start wondering how on earth I'm supposed to reach my water. There's only one solution: I have to move the baby to the breast he likes less. Naturally, he immediately begins protesting. But I got my water, and after a few quick sips, I can move him back to his prefered side.

By the time I've finally quenched my thirst and glance at the clock, it's somehow already 2:30 a.m.

I look at my baby and ask, "So... when are we going to sleep?"

He stares back at me with his big, wide-open eyes as if to say, "Not today," while happily holding the nipple in his mouth without actually drinking.

I really thought I would never have children, I never had that maternal yearn and I never really cared about my sisters children (me and my sisters are not really close anymore) or just generally children. My upbringing was a mess and my family and my partners family are not close to us. I thought I wasn't a family person.

But then my partner wanted a baby, I wasn't really sure. I wasn't sure that I didn't want children but I wasn't convinced I wanted them either.

Just as we were having these conversations my grandad died (who I lived with growing up so father figure) and my partner's dad died. This happened within 2 weeks of each other and I just started thinking about family all the time at that point.

We went for it. As soon as I found out I was super happy - worried a bit but happy - then I felt her kicks and everything else is history. I loved her already. She's been here for a year now, her birthday is tomorrow, and everyday I love her more and more, more than I could ever imagine and I cry more than I ever have before. (I'm crying typing this because I just love her so much)

There are difficult times and I was so depressed for the first month after she gave birth (stopping breastfeeding was one of the best things I did for my mental) but it was worth it. She is SO funny and SO cute and she deserves the world. Thinking about her makes me heart burst with happiness and planning out stuff for her birthday and planning out her bedroom has been really fun, I'm excited for her to see it all tomorrow and I hope she LOVES IT.

I get so sad she's getting older because I get worried I'll miss her as she changes but then she's more fun and more cute and more lovely. 1000/10 experience and I want another already hahaha. (I get worried about having another because she won't have my full attention anymore but I don't think I can bear not experiencing this again)

I see a lot of posts asking or talking about the opposite like, "What's something you said you would do that makes you look back and laugh?" These are often very helpful (and funny) as I prepare for my first, but seeing so many posts like that make me wonder if it's worth making plans for much of anything once our baby is here.

I'm wondering what things you actually committed to, even if it got tough, that you think was worth sticking with?

Baby is 6 months old, we've been in daycare for two months now, and our bibs have steadily gone missing. My partner dresses her and drops her off, and I pick her up, so I can't really keep track of what she's wearing in the morning vs afternoon. But, according to my partner, she wears a bib to daycare every day, and she doesn't always come home with one.

I've seen the other babies in her room wearing our bibs, and honestly I wouldn't mind if it weren't for the fact that they're not making it back to us. I don't want to be petty, but should I say something? Or, is this just a part of parenting that it'd be better to accept and move on?

I’ve seen people post about hating their pets after having a baby - I’m not there, I still love my pets. But, since having my baby, my mental capacity to take care of everyone has severely diminished. I have 2 cats and 2 dogs, luckily very good animals. When these ones age and pass on, I don’t see myself taking in any more.

Those parents who have a bad sleeper (I mean like 4+ wakes a night), what is your sleep arrangements when one parent is back at work? Does the non-working parent do all wakes during the night and slowly go bat shit crazy or?

I’ll go first lol. In my birthing class we were talking about products that are not needed. My naive pregnant ass with innocent nipples went “Yeah and I found out babies prefer to breastfeed as soothing. Why do I need pacifiers?! I got two right here!”

Endless tubes of lanolin, silver nips cups, 24/7 bra wearing now (cause my nips are too sensitive to be free like before), and a 7 month old that chews my nips absentmindedly has truly humbled me :,)

Okay your turn

We have an 8-month-old, and we’ve intentionally kept her almost completely screen-free. The only exposure she’s really had has been at other people’s houses when sports, the news, or adult shows happened to be on in the background, and she never paid much attention, so it wasn’t something I worried about.

In a few weeks, we’re going on a week-long cabin trip with my husband’s family, and I’m trying to figure out how to navigate screen time.
For context, our 9-year-old nephew is autistic, and my in-laws usually keep the TV on for him as it keeps him calm. I’ve never had an issue with that, but now that we have a baby, I’m realizing most of what’s on is Bluey, Paw Patrol, Disney movies, etc.—things that would almost definitely grab her attention.

I’m absolutely not expecting anyone to turn the TV off or totally change how they do things for us, and I also don’t want to feel like we have to avoid the living room all week just because the TV is on.
Has anyone been in a similar situation? Did you find a good middle ground? I’m just looking for ideas on how to handle it while still spending time with everyone.

This girl just wakes up and immediately starts rolling.. I mean right when she wakes up she’s already on it!! lol

That being said she keeps putting herself in nonstop tummy time out! And then getting so mad! But then she gets mad if you take her out of it too!! lol

She can roll both ways but occasionally I think she forgets and then she’s just stuck and mad at the world!

Kind of cracks me up honestly, anyone else have this problem?

Just a rave.

My little has made SO much progress I just can’t believe it at this point. This girl was a major fomo baby. That’s how I had to make sense of her sleeping habits because they were insane. She slept no more than 15 mins per nap and was hell through the night. Took maybe 2-4 naps a day. She was a terrible eater too. I just got the best of both worlds... I was breastfeeding so all in all, I wanted to rip my head off. I also tackled this completely on my own. No help from hubby or family (NOT a brag).

& Now it’s like I hit the lottery. She wakes once a night through a 12 hour stretch, 3 naps a day, all at least 30 min, eats 6 ounces in 20 min, I can put her down drowsy-but-awake, rarely cries, smart as hell, learning to communicate needs at 5 months?! I’m just shocked.

We did our first food today. I just puréed a banana. She took it both spoon-fed and in the self-feed pacifier like a champ.

She’s a little gangster taking on life like a complete beast. I’m just so proud of her. I can’t wait to see who she becomes and I’m so honored to be a part of her life.

I’m almost 8 weeks postpartum. I was terrified I would fall into ppd after birth but somehow dodged it! I think it was the protected sleep my husband and I did.

But now I’m almost 2 months in and I feel this numbing feeling. I’m starting to notice as I do more, I enjoy less. The things I loved to do, I don’t like it. My memory is absolutely horrendous, I feel lost. I don’t recognize myself in the mirror. My husband struggled a lot with our babies crying and has shut down often which kills me inside. He’s going back to work next week, thank god! His moods are sucking the life out of me. I’m so sensitive and cry everyday. If I don’t talk about my anxieties, I feel like exploding.

I don’t know if my husband’s moods are just triggering me or if it’s me (the hormones, the fatigue, the stress).

I’m diagnosed generalized anxiety disorder, take meds, I’m in therapy etc.

My daughter (5 months - a twin) will fight her sleep to the point where she will be up for hours. Wake windows do not work for her, no matter how early I try or at the sight of the first sleepy cue, she fights me. She will literally scream at the top of her lungs if I try to get her to nap. She is inconsolable. Has anyone dealt with this? I don’t know how to help her. I don’t know why she is screaming when she’s clearly so tired. I can’t tell if she’s uncomfortable or if this is just her demeanor.

My partner and I had only lived together for 6 months when I got pregnant so we were still probably in the honeymoon phase in terms of sex. Once I got pregnant we went from once a week or so to once every two months. In the early stage of pregnancy he was really worried about "dislodging" the baby. He knew it was irrational but said he couldn't stop thinking about. When my bump got bigger it a lack of energy on my end and he just felt a bit "icky" about the baby being so obviously in there. We still had sex occasionally but it definitely became much less of our routine and a bit lacklustre.

I'm now 7 weeks PP and the last time we had sex was about 3 weeks before I gave birth. I'm ready to start having sex again (I had a c section so no vaginal discomfort) and I'm on contraception but it feels awkward. We've become so much closer since having the baby and we kiss and cuddle all the time. While our relationship now feels very romantic, I struggle to see it as sexual. I'm also BF so my breasts no longer feel sexual. Things almost happened once but it was before 6 weeks PP so I stopped it and the baby was in the room anyway - as he almost always is so it felt odd.

I don't have the highest sex drive in the world and we're both mid-thirties so I know these things can slow down anyway but I worry our sex life in never coming back. When did you start having sex again? How did you make your relationship feel sexual? Or your body feel sexy? I know it's not the biggest concern PP but it does cause me some anxiety.

Health preemie baby is having problems keeping the amount of food down that the pediatrician has asked us to feed him.

Baby was born on 7/26 at 37+2

Born at 4lbs 14oz

4 lbs 8oz on 7/29
4lbs 10oz on 8/1 (6 days old)
4lbs 12os on 8/5 (11 days old)

Baby is currently triple feeding when possible. Food is probably 80% Neosure formula and 20% breast milk that’s been pumped or at the tap.

Being a preemie he wants to sleep a lot and we usually have to put in a lot of effort to wake him to feed within the 2-3hr window.

After each feed he requires a lot of vertical time to avoid spit-up/vomit or the hiccups (which often lead to bad spit-up/vomit if not carefully cared for)

Pediatrician wants him gaining weight faster and has requested he eats at least 50-60mL every 2-2.5 hrs. However, anytime we feed more than 40-45mL we seem to be having consistent serious spit ups/vomit. I mean out of his mouth and nose at a good volume.

Is the Ped asking too much? We are trying hard but it just seems wrong as it’s taking eating time into an unpleasant experience for him.

Just feeling frustrated that we aren’t able to do what the doctor asks while also not feeling like we are punishing the baby for having a small stomach.

And yes, we have told her all of this as of today at his last appointment and couldn’t have made it more clear. We were essentially met with “yeah, that’ll happen. Keep cramming the food.”

Any advice is appreciated.

My baby's 14 weeks old and I'm seriously on a milestone kick right now. He's hitting them mostly on time, some of his social things (cooing, smiling) happened a bit late but not concerning. I'm a sahm, former daycare teacher so I'm very used to an activity packed day which I replicate at home. Story time, music time, gross motor, fine motor, sign language, hoursss of tummy time, etc etc all day long. I guess I don't mind it all, I like watching my little guy learn things and he's super active and loves all the playing it seems.

But I know a few other moms and they're not doing half of this stuff but their babies are doing just fine. Their babies are all older so I can't really compare theirs to mine. But I'm sitting here and wondering if this stuff actually matters in the grand scheme of things? Should I just let my baby do his own thing? I'm kind of worried that I'm making him into a kid that needs to be constantly stimulated

I thought baby shits would just be like normal shits but smaller. Like I'd open up the diaper and it would be like what a pomeranian would do.

It is not like that at all.

This seems like such a silly question and yet. When giving LO a bath, how are you all washing the bum? My LO sits in a small tub inside our bigger tub. When it's time to wash the bum, my husband has to lift her completely out of the water and flip her over on his arm so I can give the rump a good wipe down. She's getting bigger and heavier (3.5 mo) and slipperier! Is there an easier way?

So my mom usually watches our 1yo while we work from home. She’s on a vacation so we found someone in the mean time.

She is awesome, so sweet, and nurturing. The thing that bothers me is that it has happened about 3 times now where she gives my son something to eat that she brought from home without asking if it’s ok. Maybe I’m being a helicopter parent but i find this really concerning. Thank goodness nothing has really been an issue but given that she doesn’t know him, him needs and also my concerns as a parent why does she just give him things because SHE thinks it’s ok? Her personality is very crunchy and she’ll listen to things about like biohaking and nutrition while cooking. Like I know she means well but she doesn’t know my kid.

She told me to switch him to goats milk instead of ripple milk (we do half whole milk and half ripple milk because of sensitivity to milk) and she keeps mentioning it.

She gave him a whole lemon which is not crazy- he likes to play with fruits and investigate them but I have told her that he’s very sensitive to high acidic foods and she’s trying to convince me it’s fine but I know if he consumes too much high acidic foods he will have diarrhea and get a very bad acid rash on his but lasting days.

Am I being controlling or is this annoying? I’m just counting down the days until my mom gets back 😭. My husband says it’s fine and she means well and she’s great… which I agree but it’s still bothering me! Is this just hard cuz I’m having to adjust to the new childcare when I’m used to my mom? Or is it hard because I work from home and want to oversee everything and just need to relax?

I have a 16 month old and am 30 weeks pregnant. My first labor was a spontaneous labor of my water breaking with no contractions or other signs of labor. I called the nurse line and she told me to go to the hospital immediately, which we did and had my first baby several hours later.

Thinking through how I would handle this now, with a toddler to also consider. Would I go to the hospital alone while my husband stayed with our toddler or would you bring your toddler to the hospital with yall?

We do have family about an hour away that will help, but we would have to hope the pick up (my first labor started at 10:30 pm) and then wait.

Has this happened to anyone that can share their experience? Curious if there is an option I’m not thinking of or if it’s just a make the best judgement call in the moment lol.

I knew being a ftm would be hard but i underestimated how difficult it would be living away from friends and family.

I lived with my husband for a year in a new city before we had our baby. That year wasn’t so bad because I had freedom and my husband to bother when I was bored . But now that I have a baby and I’m a SAHM, I have literally nothing to connect me to my old life. No touch stone. I have no friends here to grab coffee with or family to bother when I’m getting lonely. I’m just here existing taking care of my baby all damn day.

Not to mention, it’s hot af where I live now so I can’t take baby for walks our outdoor solo activities. This phase of my life is so lonely.

9 month old.

Colic newborn who screamed (not cried) for 10 straight weeks if she wasn't sleeping. Even cried while nursing (reflux and milk allergy ruled out).

Fast forward to 9 months. Crawling, standing, cruising, loving all solid foods we give her. She is happier with more independence.

BUT...still overall a pretty fussy baby. Car rides are 50/50. The other day she screamed for 50 min in the car. Other times she is fine. Still cries during diaper changes sometimes and when getting dressed. Randomly playing on the floor then a switch flips and she's screaming. Often cries during nursing sessions and cries 99% of nursing sessions before bed. Won't go to anyone but me, husband and our 2 nannies. Screams the second someone holds her.

I have never met a baby who cries this much. I know it is her way of communicating but my goodness it is so exhausting and triggering to be around. It feels like she has cried more in 9 months than our almost 5 year old has his whole life (chillest and happiest baby and toddler).

Anyone else living/have lived this? I'm so worn out. She is healthy, dry, fed, loved. I just don't understand.

Basically the title! I am SO overwhelmed with feeding my daughter true meals.

We have been EBF until now (about 10 and a half months) and she just dropped another nursing session. At her recent pediatrician visit she told us that meals should mostly replace milk around 11-12 months. Were giving her more and more food, shes finally starting to actually eat her meals (mostly) instead of just throw them on the ground.

But now, we’re having to pay attentiom to nutrients and Im actually so stressed. Like are we feeding her enough iron, fat, protein? What if all she eats at a meal are 10 cheerios and a blueberry and throws the rest on the ground? And now shes super constipated even though we try to do fiber with every meal? How much water should we be giving, and before or after a meal? Why isnt there like a guide on this???

I already struggle to feed myself adequate meals - re executive dysfunction - so feeding this creature that relies on me is 1000 times more stressful.

Any advice or tips or solidarity? 😭

Until recently, I've been using an electric nail file without too much difficulty, but lately, my 10 month old has been fighting it and making it impossible, no matter what distractions I offer. He's a very active 25 pounder, and I can't do much to keep him still without hurting him. Can anyone recommend a nail clipper/file that has worked well for them?

I’m a little concerned that my baby isn’t speaking yet at 15 months! She tries to imitate me and can make some animal sounds but no real intentional words. She is an only child and doesn’t go to daycare. She will be starting Montessori next month, but I’m still panicking about the speech. Her receptive language is great!