Back at the start (part 4 - don't rush!)

I was going back through my diary/notes from when baby no 1 was born and it reminded me of a couple of other sparks of wisdom (or just annoying advice) to mention.

It's so easy (esp with baby no 1) to rush things when baby is crying.  You feel terrible that something you're doing is making baby upset so you rush putting them down to sleep, or rush getting out to the house to try and settle them, or rush the nappy change without remembering all your stop checks for why baby may be crying.  Well, I know I did anyway.  We used to have a nappy-changing-station set up.  Okay, might sound a little control-freaky but this was seriously the only way to remember everything and get baby cleaned up in the shortest possible time.  Hubby and I would have many an argument which started with 'you didn't set up the change station you ****' or somesuch, I can't quite remember (!) ... But unless the wipes were open, the nappy laid out and a change of babygrow on standby, I found the whole thing quite stressful. 

But one night in particular stands out at 1 week old when said-child was being put down, I totally rushed it all, forgot to change his nappy and totally forgot to even feed him from my other boob - so all in all he went down for a sleep wet and hungry - a wonderul success in parenting I think.  Or not.  Needless to say he was awake half an hour later crying again with me in tears wondering what on earth I'd done wrong!  Okay, maybe that was a little emotive, but for crying out loud, I was knackered (not literally I might add - it'd only been a week!), stressed and was searching for some much needed control!  So just remember the check list when baby is crying - hungry? Wet? Temperature? Tired?  I wish there was some wonderful acronym I could come up with for that to make it more memorable ... Ummmm, am missing a vowel to help myself out here - any suggestions?!

Also, if you're anything like me, I try to just feed at night and not change nappies constantly (that will wake baby up more).  So even though I'm a regular nappy-changer in the daytime, baby can go up to 11-12 hours with no nappy change (if no poo) through the night.  Well, sometimes you may find baby is sopping wet come morning.  So one of two things could help with this - either choose a feedtime in the night to change nappy before you feed (may result in some prolonged crying at the start, but means it'll be easier to put baby down afterwards) or try the next size up nappy just for nights - e.g. if using newborn, try no 2 for a couple of nights to see if that helps.

And finally for today, I thought I'd share a diary note from day 15 - I have simply written 'need to be calmer when out away from home' - hahaha - I was in the pub (don't judge - it was a trendy gastro pub and I was drinking de caf tea - I promise!) and had no idea what to do with baby when he woke up from his sleep 20 minutes earlier than expected.  Honestly, these are the big stresses with baby no 1 when trying out routines - I think it was after this that I vowed to leave Gina behind and start my own schedule!