Let’s be honest, one of the biggest challenges of being a brand-new mom to a newborn or young baby between the age of 0 to 3 months is the LACK OF SLEEP (the next close contender is breastfeeding but that’s another post for another day).
When you become a mom, you often hear this advice, “make sure you sleep when the baby sleeps.” Hahaha. That’s great in theory but unless you have an AI mommy robot who produces breast milk or has mommy-like arms to cuddle a baby; have a selfless family member who lives close by to help out with chores; or you have the resources to cough up dough to hire a 24/7 nanny, that’s not going to happen.
Most of the time, what happens in reality is that when baby is asleep, you are pumping milk, sanitizing bottles and pacifiers, and gulping down mouthfuls of food. Woe betide you if you don’t have anyone to cook for you, no frozen food or other easy accessible food like cereal and bread around. And if you are breastfeeding, you are normally as hungry as a bear (we are mama bears anyway, right?).
Imagine trying to do all of this without waking your precious one who is asleep (most of the time) next to you or in your arms. I still remember the desperation that swept over me when I accidentally dropped something and woke my sleeping newborn! It takes so much work to get them to sleep and the last thing you want to do is to accidentally wake them.
Now if your newborn is awake and you don’t have to worry about waking him or her, do you think you will get more done? Heck, NO! You will be spending almost all your time holding your newborn. Why? Because your newborn still wants to return to the pre-delivery days when she was lovingly snuggled in your tummy 24/7.
For me, I struggled to find time to even brush my teeth, shower, eat, go to the bathroom- basically LIVE LIKE A HUMAN. Instead, any free time I had was spent on doing these 6 things, OVER and OVER AGAIN.
i. Feeding
ii. Burping
iii. Diaper-changing
iv. Holding my newborn
v. Pumping milk
vi. Washing bottles.
Almost 24/7 in this continual cycle. So should we be surprised when new moms get depressed or a little ‘crazy’ in the initial stages of being a mom?
I knew that I couldn’t live like this for long though and things needed to change. So in my foggy brain, I tried to think up ways to create time for myself while keeping my newborn baby happy, even if just for a few minutes to buy me some time.
Below are some tips that I developed and refined till I managed to find time not only to brush my teeth (woohoo!) and get a shower everyday (double woohoo!), but also to go back to my freelancing writing work. Caveat- when my baby was 3 months old, I still struggled with finding time to go to the bathroom as my baby seemed to ALWAYS know when I was there and would wail for me to come get her as soon as I sat down.
I hope these tips help all you new moms out there!
You won’t believe the number of times I have thanked my mom in my heart for buying a mobile toy for our newborn. I didn’t bother and I had no idea that it would become so important in not only my newborn’s but my life! With the mobile toy, I could leave her in her bassinet for 15 minutes while I got all this done- brush my teeth, shower and get dressed. Yeah, you learn to move fast when you have a newborn. Forget about styling your hair.
There are many great mobile toys out there on the market but if you can, look for one that is black and white or has striking color contrasts. At this stage, your newborn’s eyes are only starting to develop and he or she can only notice big contrasts in colors.
Here are two of my recommendations, the SHILOH mobile in simple black and white; and the Tiny Love Classic Developmental Mobile with strong contrasting colors and patterns.
I like the SHILOH mobile because it is made of environmentally non-toxic and durable ABS material which makes it safe for your baby to bite on. In fact, the manufacturer states that the mobile “meets or exceeds the ASTM standards of toys”. When Baby LeBrick started teething, nothing was safe from her. NOTHING. If anything could be put in her mouth, into her mouth it went. So it makes sense to invest in something that you know is safe when your baby enters the “put things in mouth” phase. The only downside about the SHILOH mobile is that you have to buy the arm bracket to attach to the crib separately (unless you already have one). You can also purchase a battery-operated music player that goes with this mobile separately.
My second recommendation is for time- poor moms (as 99.99999% of new parents are and probably why you are reading this) and don’t have time to muck around, get the Tiny Love Mobile. This mobile is truly the Ferrari of newborn crib mobiles. it’s got music, it moves and also converts into a night light! Yup, all-in-one purchase. If you want to go all the way, I’d say get this one.
If you speak to any mom of a newborn baby who doesn’t have an extra pair of arms or extra help around, they will tell you to get a baby carrier that your baby likes. The keywords here are that your baby likes. Because the fact of the matter is that this strategy only works if your baby is willing to be in the baby carrier which means that you have to either have:
• Trained your baby to sleep in your chosen baby carrier or
• You have found one that your baby will agree to remain in.
Baby carriers are an absolute MUST. For newborns, the recommended baby carriers that can provide better support for newborn necks include the Moby Wrap, Boba Wrap, k’Tan, ring sling, Solly Baby wrap and mei tai. These are not the only baby carriers available but these are some of the more suitable ones for newborns. For a FREE personal face-to-face consultation with baby carrier experts who can check on you and your newborn in your chosen carrier, see if there is a Babywearing International meeting near you. These groups normally meet monthly and are amazing!
It’s amazing how little I knew about the importance of a double electric pump before I became a mom. I simply had no idea. I guess it’s not a popular topic of conversation among singles.
If you are lucky and medically qualify, your insurance will pay for you to have one right after your delivery. But if not, you should get one for yourself as you will save so much time.
Why?
Firstly, if you intend to breastfeed your baby, a breast pump will be essential. For most brand new moms, their breasts are not going to be gushing full of milk for the first few days. But your newborn baby still needs to eat in the meantime, right? Using a breast pump (on top of latching from your newborn) to encourage your milk supply to “come in” (which basically means to start your milk flow) is the most common recommendation that you will get from a lactation consultant.
Secondly, if you intend to let other people help you look after your newborn (which we highly recommend so that you can take a break), you will need a breast pump to collect milk so that the other caregivers can feed your newborn. Of course, formula is an alternative but it depends on whether you are okay with your newborn taking formula instead of breast milk. (The experts will all tell you that breast milk is much, much better for your newborn but at the end of the day, you need to do what is best for both baby and you).
Thirdly, if you intend to go back to work in the next few months, you will need the breast pump to start an enormous collection of frozen breast milk so that your day care, nanny or other type of caregiver can feed your baby while you are at work.
To save you time, DO NOT use a manual or single breast pump. It is too slow, time-consuming and when you are already suffering from sleep deprivation, anything that feels too hard is just a bad idea.
Do yourself a favor and invest in a good electric double breast pump. You will be using it a lot. The top pick for many moms are either the Spectra breast pump, Medela Pump in Style or if you are completely loaded, get the Medela Symphony for hospital grade results.
I have many more useful tips but since most brand new moms are so exhausted all of the time, I will keep this article short.
However, if you are one of those moms who need to know more, please check out the rest of this blog!
