u/Free_Impact_2326

I'm doing my best to change my mindset and stop spending money on unitaskers. At work we have a lactation room where other pumping moms leave their pumps/bags on a shelf and leave their milk and milk-contact parts in a special fridge dedicated just to breastmilk. There are lot of cute pump-purses in the fridge tempting me. But I know for a fact that I don't need one.

I'm rocking a spectra in a backpack packed with snacks, baby wipes, and a book. In the fridge I'm the one with a mason jar for breastmilk in a gallon ziploc bag of spectra parts.

What do you do, only with what you already have, to make pumping as nice/as comfortable as possible?

Hey all, peace be with you.

I've not had much luck finding beautiful Anglican rosaries. I want to collect some that are a joy to use, both to enrich my faith practice, and to pass on to my children someday as well-seasoned and well-loved prayer items to encourage them when life gets hard. But when I look online I'm very disappointed. Most of them look cheap, and at that rate I could easily make my own. As an alternative, if you have a source of quality jewelry making items, i would take that too and use it to make my own. Regular craft supplies would result in what I'm seeing on Amazon, and Amazon is probably cheaper 😅

All said, thank you in advance.

I'm really overwhelmed by how thankful I am that schools like this exist, and I just wanted to express that around other people who certainly understand it.

My oldest is transitioning into children's house next month. Her toddler teachers helped her with the transition into daycare, through getting a little sister, through potty training hiccups, and they supported us as first time parents more than I can tell you. I'm so excited to meet her teachers in Children's house, and I'm so glad we have 3 years to get to know them.

This was triggered by the welcome letter from the school that landed in my inbox this afternoon. I'm so grateful that my almost 3-year old is going into an environment that fosters independence and practical learning. She's very advanced verbally, and as a former gifted kid who struggled mightily against public school, I really hope this gives her the chance to explore her curiosity more. I have faith that she'll be a better adjusted young person for it.

In the end, I know we're lucky that such a school exists and we're in a position financially to send her.

I know I'm not alone in this. I'd love to hear about your schools and teachers. All said, thanks for listening to me gush, I just needed to express this to others who'd understand.

Hey everyone. Please bear with me, I'm not sure I'm using the right terms as I'm just getting started.

We're not able or terribly equipped to homeschool right now, and our kids are still very young, not quite ready for formal education yet. But I got the idea to supplement what my oldest (almost 3 years old) gets at Montessori daycare/school and that brought me here.

Someday I hope to homeschool while still working full-time. I was hoping to get some insight from parents who've done that. Working on reading and phonics with my oldest has been just the best, and if I get to be a sort of tutor and not her main teacher, I'll still be excited to be part of the ride.

What would you recommend to an eager beginner? What would you work on with a 3 year old?

Hey everyone!

My daughter is leaving the toddler classroom and going to the 3-6 classroom. Ms. Meeka (yes, like the kids tv character) has been an angel during potty relapses, getting a whole baby sister, and many a tantrum. We know this much about her. She loves what she does. She is capital T tired. And when asked how she does it all, she famously says, "Coffee and Jesus, baby."

We love her and are indebted to her. Teachers, what would you value? What would you use in a gift? Childcare givers are such special people.

Basically, we want to give her an impactful gift from the little girl who loves her, and certainly gave her more gray hairs. TIA 🤍

Hey all. In a couple weeks my little family of 4 is going to take a trip a day's drive away. I'm here asking for all the advice.

- how did you maintain sanity in the car?

- what sleeping arrangements worked best in some less than ideal travel situations?

- what kid crap did you bring that was a lifesaver?

- any common glitches you experienced and what you did about them?

We know this much. About halfway through we're planning to stop at Chick-Fil-A and let her eat her favorite nuggets and burn some energy on the indoor playground. And we have a car potty locked and loaded for emergencies. My second is an infant still very much in the potato phase, and that's a whole lot easier, especially considering she sleeps great in the car.

Hey everyone. I'm on day 3 of mastitis treatment. I'm on antibiotics. I'm piggybacking tylenol & ibuprofen every 6ish hours and that's staving off chills and body aches. I'm definitely fevering at night still, as my tempdrop recorded a low last night of 100.1F! My intake has been rather poor the last few days related to feeling so badly. There's no way my calories or fluid intake are sufficient.

So the reason for this post: tonight my evening pump is down 75%. I do one a day to build up a stash for my return to work. Logically I know better than to be surprised but emotionally I'm taking this hard. I'm trying not to overthink this. Can I still recover my supply? Can I work back towards adequate fluids and calories and hopefully my supply will return?

I was worried about baby today because I suspected my supply was suffering, so I thawed out a bottle of milk and offered her a few ounces. She takes the occasional bottle very well and takes thawed milk well too. She didn't seem to be overly hungry or interested; I felt reassured that at least she's getting enough for now. I do have a significant freezer stash if I should need to supplement.

Seeking encouragement and advice- and trying very hard to stay positive.

I'm a few hours into realizing that I probably have/had a clog on one side. I've tried dangle feeding, football hold, cross-cradle, side-lying, pumping. I know about sunflower lecithin but I don't have it around. This came on fast and I know from experience that I go from clogged to mastitis scary fast. This BF journey has been going really well so far so I don't have some of the oh crap supplies I did last time around.

I think I got the clog but I'm not sure, using my pump. But I'm not sure and anxious about it. Secondary anxiety about getting only 1oz on the clogged side and 5oz on the regular side. Idk if my supply can really tank this fast? I'm repeat pumping and massaging the clogged side just in case.

Advice/help needed. Thank you all. (Yes, will call OB if things don't improve quickly.)

EDIT: omw to urgent care for symptoms of mastitis 9-10 hours later. Not thrilled but thankful I have the option

I'm open to trying cloth wipes and I have at least one set of bedsheets that I was planning to cut up anyway. Is there any reason I can't use those? I have a serger. One set is cotton, one set is flannel, and they're old and saggy but super soft. Also, what size do you cut them down to?

I'm so stinkin excited. I'm gonna go lift some light weights, stretch, and go for a swim. It's going to be very easy but man I have missed my gym! Idk if I'm going to have to cut my lock off because I don't have a clue where I last had the key 😅 and I do feel really self conscious rn in my PP body.

But anyway I guess I just wanted to celebrate this! Have a good one!

Hey everyone. My oldest turns 3 in a few months. I'm looking for places in the 757 that are loved by kids this age that 1) don't cost an arm and a leg 2) don't have strict limits on the number of kids in attendance. We originally wanted to use the norfolk zoo but their party size is pretty small and we want to be able to include siblings and open attendance from our church. We'd rather not have it at our house if we have the option. We're also a little too big for baby indoor play places and a little too small for the big kid ones. My daughter loves dinosaurs, firetrucks, animals, and Little Bear.

Apologies in advance for this being so long. I'm just so frustrated. I'm a tricare patient and I have to go to the MTF, so I can't exactly pick and choose a provider that believes what I believe.

So I went to my PP appt yesterday for baby #2. My convictions have changed a lot in the last several years and the appt really struck a chord with me. Maybe after #1 it was the same time and I was different, I'm not sure.

A couple things to know about me. I'm a seasoned critical care RN. And I've been practicing FAM (fertility awareness method) for 5 years now. I've avoided when I wanted to avoid pregnancy and I've conceived when I hoped I would conceive.

The appt is rushed from the beginning. I have a seasoned midwife and a junior midwife seeing me; the Junior midwife is being supervised while she finishes her orientation it seems. They ask me a series of Y/N questions about complications, ask about how feeding baby is going. Everything seems routine until we get to birth control.

They ask if I've given any thought to starting BC. I say yes, you'll see on my form that I've marked down condoms and FAM. There was no option for FAM/NFP, I wrote it in over condoms. The Junior midwife furrows her brow. The senior midwife asks if my cycles are normally very regular. I explain that they usually are, once they resume. Mind you, I think she was confusing what I do with the defunct Rhythm method. The Junior midwife tells me that cycle tracking is unreliable in postpartum and breastfeeding; I know this, which is why I also circled condoms.

The senior midwife smiles patiently. She tells me it all just depends on how big a deal it would be if I got pregnant again. It's very clear to me that they've both decided that either I'm incompetent or I've been seriously mislead.

The Junior midwife, trying to be helpful, tells me that if I dislike hormonal contraception, there's always the copper IUD. I sigh. I know they are just doing their job but I really don't want to go into the spiel because they already think I'm a nut. I explain as gently as I can that my husband and I believe that life begins at fertilization and we would not accept something that blocks implantation.

The junior midwife is so done with me but is clearly trying to be professional. She doesn't know what to say, so the senior midwife tells me that if I change my mind, I can just call them and they will help me.

All this to say, I left feeling frustrated, unheard, and frankly a bit condescended to. I know they mean well, and they have to provide options, and that the women's health clinic in particular is incredibly overburdened and understaffed. But man... I really miss my civilian midwife back home.

I have 12 non-deployable months from my daughter's birth, and the day after her first birthday I can be deployed. My goal is to combo BF/pump when I return to work until she's 9-10 months old, at which point I want to move towards exclusive bottle/cup feeding with solids. If I've saved up enough milk, I could stop nursing and pumping entirely. I'd like to have dried up before her birthday so that in the unlikely event I have a low notice deployment I'm not also worried about mastitis.

The math for an individual week at work while I'm away is pretty straightforward, but I'm not sure how to calculate the ounces needed to carry her through the last several weeks. Is there (math) formula people use to estimate?

PS- I'm not sure I'm in the right subreddit but a lot of them are exclusively one or the other and our journey is kind of a big mess of both.

No matter how developmentally normal it may be, I'm pulling my hair out over how many times my almost 3YO asks the same questions. The day starts off with us being calm and put together. We try to be silly and lighthearted. We deflect a lot of the same old "why" and "what's that" with mirror questions like, "why do you think?" But by noon pretty much every day we are questioned out.

Is there any way to stop the endless questions? I explain the same few things many times over every single day and it is my least favorite part of parenting at this age. I would rather deal with tantrums, that's how much I have come to despise the questions that she certainly knows the answers to but insists on asking over and over.

Failing that, what do you do when your toddler asks "why" for the 100th time and it's only 9am? What do you do when you're exhausted, touched out, and totally overstimulated?

Hey everybody. I'm approaching the point where my freezer stash is more than I would use in an emergency, and I've looked into the nearest medical center that accepts milk donations. I'm really excited to be able to do this, as my journey w my first was really hard and I struggled with undersupply. This time around has been really redemptive.

So my question is, what do I need to know that I may not know from the hospital's donation page? What is a normal timeline like?

Hello everyone! I was gifted the Periodic tea and the packaging includes a warning on the label that says I should check with my doctor before consuming while breastfeeding. But then everything else I read tells me that it is designed to be safe for breastfeeding in postpartum. Can I safely take the periodic without impacting my supply?

I'm also curious about the milkmaid and people's experiences. Right now, I'm not having any supply issues, and I've just hit six weeks postpartum. Baby is gaining beautifully and I'm able to put away a 4 oz bag almost every day for the freezer stash. I've stored up about a 100 oz so far. Is it that helpful for increasing supply without doing extra pumping or feeding?

Our family recently went from 3 to 4 and things have been a little chaotic as we adjust. But the newborn phase is coming to a close and I'm having a lot of fun with some of my toddler's new play abilities. In my nerdy brain a good toddler activity is [time spent playing] > 2[(time to set up) + (time to clean up)]. So my absolute favorite lately has been pretend play. My toddler loves all forms of it: dress up, all the Montessori work-play, and her dinosaurs 🦕

But her absolute favorite lately, given the birth of her sibling, has been her own baby doll. Now our kids are named on a theme, and baby doll perpetuates that theme, so she's really part of the family! Just now I was setting up a little toy pack & play next to baby sister's, and dressed baby doll in a new outfit for her to discover. It made me happy on a level I can't fully express. I had that little child satisfaction of "my very own" version of adult thing.

And it made me want to ask... in the midst of all the hard, the gross, the whining, the sleeplessness, what makes you feel like a kid again?

My oldest will be 3 soon. Her baby sister came home a little over a month ago. I realize that defiance and big feelings are developmentally and situationally very normal. I don't like tantrums anymore than anyone else, but I can snuff them out pretty quickly but ignoring them. I keep my toddler safe, help her calm her body down, and we move on.

My husband gets really revved up over these tantrums. He has his own tantrum in response, basically. I've told him directly that I dislike the way he he handles it; he gets exasperated with her quickly and he talks to her in a way that just feels... mean. It's a little bit of what he says but more how he says it. Plus, his negative attention means the two of them really spiral out of control.

I've spoken to him directly about how he's the grown up and she's the child. He doesn't believe me that this is normal- he really thinks she's being defiant and that she "needs discipline". I'm at a loss. She loves her dad so much and she deserves to have a healthy relationship with her dad. And my other half is in no way a mean or reactive person anywhere else, which has me wondering why the tantrums get to him so hard.

How do I help my husband be less reactive to tantrums?