u/PumpkinPie_1993

I hope this is the right place for this. I’m not using the fence sitting flair because my husband and I are 100% OAD, even though I wanted two children and he only wants one. But we talked about it and I ultimately agreed, and he got the Big Snip, so it’s done.

But there is a part of me that is sad. I feel sometimes like I’ve lost something, which isn’t fair because I haven’t lost anything at all. In fact, I’ve gained a beautiful, bright, healthy baby girl whom I love more than life itself.

So I’m just here in my feelings I guess.

To be clear, there is a part of me that feels real, genuine relief that I don’t have to do this again. I had a rough pregnancy. My baby was an emergency c section and I lost a critical amount of blood. We both almost didn’t make it. And that was before all the parenting hardships even started.

I think about how I never have to do the newborn sleep deprivation again and I feel relieved. I think about how, once she’s out of diapers, I’ll never have to change a diaper again. I feel good when I donate the clothes she’s grown out of, like “phew, we’re out of that stage now too!”. All of these experiences bring be a sense of relief.

I passionately believe that every child deserves to be wanted, and I never wanted to be in a position where I’m like, talking a partner into having a baby. I believe children should be a 2-enthusiastic-yes decision. My husband was a firm “no”, and well you can’t compromise and have half a kid. So when I agreed to OAD, I fully meant it. No regrets.

But still these feelings linger. How do I let go of this? How did you make peace with being OAD when you pictured something else?

My beautiful girl is almost 9 months old, and in just over 3 weeks, I will be returning to work.

For the first 8 months, it was just her and I. I lived in a different state far from family and had no support. We have been together virtually every waking and sleeping moment since she was born. She’s also EBF and we rarely ever used a bottle.

I moved in with my mom 3 weeks ago. My mom, who is retired, will be full time caring for my baby once I return to work. My job is a 1 hour commute (one way), so I’ll be gone 11 hours day/five days per week.

Obviously this is a big adjustment for us both. My girl has been a trooper though.

The first week was spent with my baby getting used to her new environment, the 5 hour time difference, and warming up to mom.

The second week, I started leaving my baby with my mom for short 1-2 hour periods. We also started having my mom be the one to get my baby when she wakes from her naps. This all went well (no tears, etc).

Our goals for this week were for me to do at least two 4 hour stretches of me being gone, plus start offering a bottle.

The week started off ok (I offered a bottle while going down for a nap and she took it and went to sleep), but then on Tuesday my dog got sick. The vet could get us in Wednesday morning during my kiddos nap time.

I thought, well, maybe my mom can get her down for a nap. We weren’t going to attempt that until later, but the circumstances kind of forced a change in our timeline, so I figured we would just lean into it.

It was a disaster. DISASTER. Apparently my baby cried hysterically, wouldn’t take the bottle, and eventually passed out from exhaustion. My mom held her, sang to her, and rocked her the entire time… she just wasn’t me.

Since then my baby cries if I’m so much as out of her sight. Thursday was especially intense, and was basically a wash. Today we tried my mom putting her down for a nap again, and it was just as terrible. What we ended up doing for both naps today was, my mom sitting next to me on my bed as I nurse baby down (she no longer accepts the bottle from me).

My goal was to slowly give my baby the space to develop an attachment with my mom. I figured we had enough time to move at a pace that wouldn’t exceed my baby’s comfort level. I knew we wouldn’t get through this without some tears, but I had hoped that by being deliberate and responsive, my baby would form a strong enough attachment to my mom that my first day of work wouldn’t be a total shock to her.

Now I feel like I’ve completely torpedoed these efforts. My date of returning to work looms over me like a deadline, after which I fear my baby will think i abandoned her if I don’t get this figured out.

I know my baby needs to learn to be comforted by my mom. I know that responding to her cries is a form of negative reinforcement and that she will never be okay with someone else if I’m always there to “rescue” her. I was really trying to strike a balance between “giving her and my mom space” and “giving her support and reassurance”. I just feel like I’ve completely fucked it all up.

Where do I go from here? What are my next steps when baby barely lets me out of her sight and no longer takes the bottle? I’m feeling so defeated.

Hey all. I’m honestly just posting because I’m completely devastated and want to talk to other people who will understand.

I’ve been lucky enough to have 9 months with my baby girl before returning to work (due back in 3 weeks). I’ve EBF with her and would pump occasionally here or there, but I ended up tossing all of my frozen milk a few weeks ago (before using any) because we moved across the country and I couldn’t take it with me.

Since arriving at our new house, I’ve been pumping every day. However the pump doesn’t usually trigger my let down (even with all the tricks), so I only get 2 maybe 3 ounces per day, and my baby is jealous of the pump so I have to do it when she’s napping. But I’ve been trying to build up a stash so that my mom (who will be caring for her) will have enough to feed her every day while I’m at work. I’ll be working 11 hours/day, 5 days a week, so I need a lot of milk ready.

Anyways, I went to make a bottle today from my frozen stash (to help get baby used to taking a bottle) and on a whim I tried it and…

It’s not good. It’s got this funky, earthy taste that reminds me of like moss but in a bad way. I tried the milk I had just finished pumping and sure enough, it tasted fine.

I feel devastated. I tried mixing the frozen milk in with my baby’s lunch (purée) and she wouldn’t take it. Yesterday my mom offered her a bottle with the frozen milk and she wouldn’t take that, but we figured it was because she was fussy. But I offered a bottle with the fresh pumped milk today and my baby took it happily.

I feel defeated. Like all this work was for nothing. And it looks like I’m going to have to use formula after all. I know milk can be good in the fridge for 4 days or so, so I can try to pump a lot in the days leading up to my return to work, but i don’t know if I’ll be able to have enough on hand to keep my baby satisfied.

I’m just sad.

Before I had my baby, I walked my dogs every day. In my old neighborhood (on a military base), I had unleashed dogs charge us on 4 separate occasions in one year. It was always super stressful and I’m super fortunate that none of my dogs were ever harmed.

Since having my baby, I’ve had this huge fear that an unleashed dog will charge us again. The dog doesn’t even have to be aggressive; my baby could get harmed by having the stroller tip over in the ensuing chaos (she’s strapped in of course).

We moved to a new state 3 weeks ago and I’ve been enjoying walking with my dog and baby again. Until last night, when we came across an unleashed dog.

I didn’t see him until we were almost to him. He was a big GSD and was sort of crouched in some bushes on the edge of his property, watching us. Maybe preparing to defend his space, idk. I diverted us in time and thank GOD he decided not to charge.

What has rattled me, is that I always kind of assumed that if an unleashed dog did approach us, that I’d have time to get between the dog and my baby.

Now I know for a fact that I wouldn’t.
If that dog had decided to charge us, I would not have been able to do anything about it in time. Even though I was keeping a look out, I completely missed this dog until it was almost too late.

I love walking with my dog and baby, and I don’t want to become a helicopter mom. But knowing now that even in our new neighborhood there are dogs off leash, I am genuinely terrified to take her out again.

Is there any way to make it safer? Is there like some stroller attachment out there that could act as a guard or something? I know I sound ridiculous but it doesn’t really seem like any place is safe from this (what I consider to be a very real) threat….

Any ideas are appreciated!!

My baby girl is 8.5 months old. I just nursed her to sleep (I haven’t always), while rocking her on our bed and singing softly. She drifted off peacefully without a single tear or fuss. Once she was asleep, I laid her down next to me. In 30 minutes, at the end of her first sleep cycle, her little hands will try to find me, but her eyes won’t open once. Once she feels me, she will sleep solidly for the next 6 hours or so, until she goes searching for milk. She will help herself to what she needs (I’ll wake up enough to feel her and shift us around if necessary) before settling again for the next 4 hours. I’ll sleep 8 hours tonight, and so will my husband. We will all wake up in the morning feeling happy and refreshed.

I know this because this has been our routine for the past 2 months. Not every night looks like this of course (baby girl had her first teeth come in a few weeks ago, etc) but this is our new normal.

My darling girl has not been an easy sleeper. For months every single nap was a battle. Every single night was full of wake ups and soothing and there was never any respite. Once, I woke up my husband to ask him why our digital clock was in Chinese… turns out, I was so tired that my brain stopped recognizing numbers.

But slowly things got better for us. I learned a lot and so did my baby. There was a lot of trial and error, and I made many… many… mistakes.

But I never once sleep trained. My husband and I were always there for her, we always responded to her needs no matter what. We didn’t always cosleep (some medical concerns forced our hand when she was 5.5 months old) and we don’t have to anymore, but we all enjoy it.

I’m sharing because I want other people who are currently in the trenches to know that this day will come. I don’t have all the answers and I know that we aren’t fully off this roller coaster yet, but holy hell has it gotten so much easier.

It makes me sad to think about how much I would have missed- how much I would never have learned, about myself or my baby- if I had sleep trained. I know, better than most honestly, how hard it is and how much it sucks. But achieving quality sleep for both you and your baby while also being responsive to them is possible.

Good luck ❤️

This morning I was thinking about how my 8 month old baby girl is the prettiest, smartest, bravest baby that ever existed…

And I thought it could be fun for other new parents for brag about your baby for a minute!

What is something your baby does that makes you proud??

My husband and I have been together for almost 15 years, and he is a wonderful person. He’s smart, funny, and would literally do anything to help a friend. He’s very social and loves getting together with friends. A quintessential extrovert.

But over the years, his friend circle has gotten smaller and smaller. Now, the only people he calls friends are really husbands of *my* friends.

It makes him sad, and I know he’s lonely.

But the thing is, is that he talks about himself way way too much. The only way he knows to relate to people is by doing that thing where, when someone is sharing a story he will follow up with a story of his own. Which is fine every now and then, but in 15 years I’ve never once heard him ask even a simple follow up question to someone. He will even interrupt to start talking about himself. Sometimes the thing he starts talking about isn’t even tangentially related to what the other person was talking about, so it’s like you know he just wasn’t listening or was just waiting for his turn to talk.

It’s incredibly rude.

It wasn’t as big of a deal when we were in our 20’s, because everyone is pretty self absorbed in their 20’s, but now it’s like we’ve all matured and he hasn’t. I watch people get visibly frustrated and annoyed with him, but after they go home he thinks it was a hugely successful get together.

I do my best to mitigate it. I’ll turn the conversation back to what the original person was talking about, I’ll gently say “Honey I don’t think so-and-so was done with their story” if he interrupts, and so on. When I call him out he looks surprised and will apologize, but he never seems to learn.

I just want to tell him that he’s the problem. That if he were just a little less self centered and made an effort to be interested in those around him, he would have more friends.

But no matter how I try to approach it, or how I think about phrasing it, it will always come off as hurtful and could even lead to a fight.

So I guess I’m looking for ideas on how to talk to him about this in a way that won’t be, you know, super hurtful or inflammatory.

Edit:
I want to thank everyone who has taken the time to comment so far, and perhaps answer some questions or clarify some things.

1. Why is he like this?

He is not neurodivergent and does not have ASD/ADHD. He is like this because his mother is 1000% worse than he is. His whole family, in fact, communicate exclusively by talking solely about themselves and never listening to anyone else. I have personally witnessed, multiple times, my husband and his mother talking to each other at the exact same time, neither one seemingly aware that the other one is talking. It’s… strange.

2. Is he like this with me?

Yes and no. Early on I would call out him interrupting me with a “oh I wasn’t finished talking yet”. He no longer interrupts me. He does not ask me follow up questions about things, but he will say things like “I’m listening” or add commentary when I talk about my day to show he is engaged. So I know he’s capable of growth.

3. how do I know he’s a good friend if he doesn’t listen to others?

Good question. He has several excellent qualities that make him a good friend. He’s reliable, he’s thoughtful (like he once purchased a rare whiskey he found for a friend who likes whiskey), he’s selfless in other ways (like he’ll spend his whole weekend replacing his friends brakes for free), he celebrates his friends successes, he’s not judgmental (he celebrated with a friend who came out as trans), and he would do almost anything to help a friend in need (he once helped raise almost $15K for friends family member who was in a car accident).

He’s a good guy. He just sort of makes everything about himself all of the time, and it wears on people until they eventually stop coming around. At one point, anytime someone interrupted someone else my friend group called it “pulling a David” (goes without saying but that’s my husbands name). So I know it’s not something that only I notice, and my more subtle attempts at getting him to reflect and make a change have not been successful.

Hey everyone! My beautiful baby girl is 8 months old, and she happily slept in a bedside bassinet for the first 5.5 months of life. Then some medical issues forced us to cosleep (full on bed sharing) and honestly I’ve loved it. I wish I had done it sooner to be honest! We both have gotten such better sleep.

But for the past 2 weeks, my baby has been very restless, even discontent, next to me. She has always been active in her sleep, but this has been something else. I have to sit up and rock her to sleep multiple times, which is unusual for us now. She helps herself to her food when she is hungry or wants comfort, and I can tell when she’s trying to settle herself and gets frustrated that she can’t.

I honestly think she wants more space. I thinks she’s getting frustrated at being boxed in with the c-curl etc. She’s never liked being limited in motion, even as a newborn she hated being swaddled and things like car seats and high chairs are the bane of her existence. My husband and I say “she yearns for freedom” lol. But I’m wondering if this has now extended to sleeping.

If you used to bed share and no longer do, how did you know it was time to switch? Were there signs? And how easy was it to switch?

Lately my girl has been pretty restless next to me (we bed share) and I’m starting to wonder if she wants her own space.

How did you know it was time to transition to a crib? What were the signs? And how did you know you had made the right choice?

My husband and I are moving across the country and decided I would fly with the baby while he drives the truck and dogs. I was so nervous about the flight but it honestly couldn’t have gone better!

Everyone was SO NICE. Seriously, every single interaction I had was positive. Young, old, men, women- literally everyone had a kind word to say and I never once got the feeling that anyone was dreading sitting next to me. So many people, especially other moms, asked me if I needed assistance and offered to help. It was so wonderful.

I took a red eye and pushed my LO’s naps as late as I could for the day. Even with a 1.5 hour delay, she was a total trooper. Never really got fussy and was even laughing at the people making funny faces at her in the row behind us right before take off.

I nursed her during takeoff and she immediately fell asleep (having been up 5.5 hours at this point 😭). She slept the entire flight (I had her in my lap) and woke up as we were coming in for landing. I nursed her again during this time to help with her ears equalizing. She didn’t cry a single time.

Y’all I’ve been **dreading** this and it was just… perfect. I’m sharing to celebrate and also to let anyone who is traveling with a baby soon know that while a lot can go wrong, sometimes things do go right too!

Now we just have to adjust to the 4 hour time change… hoping our luck continues!!

My beautiful baby girl is almost 8 months and has never been diagnosed with a milk protein allergy. However, I know for a fact she has what I call a sensitivity to cows milk protein.

Over the course of her first two weeks of life, she had horrible gas pain whenever I had dairy, followed by blood in her stool when we gave her cows milk formula, and another bought of blood in stool when I had a cream based pasta sauce. She also had breakouts on her face.

The pediatrician told me she definitely didn’t have any issues with cows milk because she was gaining weight fine, and that the amount of blood in her stool wasn’t enough to be concerning (I sort of feel any amount is not normal but whatever).

Anyways, I followed my gut and eliminated dairy from my diet completely. Her symptoms improved immediately.

Months passed, and at 5.5 months we started solids. I’ve been moving through allergens and we have conceded all of them except dairy.

I’m going to be honest, I initially thought the dairy ladder was for me (lol) so I started with baked goods that had dairy in it, and then worked my way up from there. When I got to cheese, my baby girl started getting breakouts on her face again. I was going to stop eating cheese again but my mom said maybe her body needed to like work it out? I don’t eat a lot of cheese anyways but I’ve been in sort of a limbo.

Anyways, I guess my question is, where do I go from here? Should I cut dairy from my diet again, wait until it’s flushed from her system and then do the dairy ladder proper with just her? When I do do the dairy ladder with her, is any reaction (like breakouts on the face) an indication that she’s not ready for that step, or are mild reactions ok?

I’ve never received any support in this and my husband thinks I’m crazy because the doctor never diagnosed her with anything, but I’m just trying to do right by my girl. Any help is appreciated!

Pretty much the title!

Just curious how long after your baby was successfully pulling themselves up to standing, did it take for them to be able to stand independently. And how long it took for them to start walking.

Last week was my first Mother’s Day and my husband didn’t do anything for it, he didn’t even give me a card.

Anyways, I decided I’m going to do something for myself. Around Christmas time I tried to do a project with my baby’s foot prints but she is a wiggle worm and it didn’t turn out well.

I’d like to try again though. What are some artsy things you’ve done that incorporate baby hand and foot prints? I thought about doing like a flower pot with her hand prints on it, but I’m not big into gardening. But I’d love ideas like that!!

After weeks of planking, piking, and army crawling, my brave little girl (7.5 months) woke up yesterday morning and started crawling like she was an old pro!

By yesterday evening, she had figured out how to climb up our stairs (with my VERY close supervision of course).

And then this morning, she pulled herself to standing.

No wonder this girl had had crappy sleep for the past month 😭

Anyways I wanted to share because I think it’s helpful to remember that sometimes development can happen slowly and then all at once, or maybe just as a reminder that just because a baby hasn’t mastered a skill doesn’t mean their little brains aren’t working hard on it! And also to low key brag on my girl 😂

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go chase after her for the 1000th time today!!

Hey all! My beautiful baby girl is 7 months old and she is ready to take on the world. I first felt her moving in pregnancy at around 20 weeks and I don’t think she has stopped once.

From the moment her eyes open in the morning, she is on the go. Rolling, climbing, army crawling (she’s almost full fledged crawling)… she rarely stops moving.

I obviously love everything about her and I’m delighted that she has such… enthusiasm… for the world. That being said, I am also exhausted trying to keep up with her- and she’s not even fully mobile yet!

If you had a super active baby, what are some things you did with them to keep them entertained? We have an activity center but I don’t like to have her in it for more than 10-15 minutes at a time (something something bad for their hips??).

Looking for tips, or even just funny stories of your active baby!!