I Wish I'd Known
We’ve had many discussions, us mums here about the things that you are always surprised to find out. The amount of times we have started a conversation “I wish I’d known” and ended with “but the gits never told me!”
Well, we have decided to let it all out! Let us embrace the fact that we can suffer from embarrassing wind during pregnancy, that our brains turn to mush and that we will cry at almost anything! Let us feel not alone in the fact that we are so tired after birth, we walk around like zombies and can even get depressed or angry.
These are some of our stories from the office. Please send us all your stories to web@babygroe.co.uk (with or without pics and anon if you like) here and save future mums from having to say the words
If you would like to discuss anything mentioned here, check out our forums by clicking here...
“I wish I’d known…………"
Pregnancy
That having a baby on New Year’s Eve would mean that the hospital felt it justified not to offer me any food for two days… snack boxes filled with cold pork pies and sausage rolls notwithstanding…
That you should not pack any of your favourite toiletries/fragrances in your hospital bag. Take a travel size pack of something you wouldn’t normally use as believe me, you won’t want to be reminded of the claustrophobic, luke warm showers you had endure with a line of annoyed new mums waiting for you to get on with it…
To request NO Flowers to the hospital. Hospitals aren’t really keen on blooms anyway and will grump about finding a vase. Your bedside will be fairly cramped anyway with a crib, presents, visitors chairs, medical staff etc. Your partner will not thank you for having to carry these home along with your dirty laundry, the baby’s laundry, the car seat, the presents, you, the baby…
That it would be best thing I ever did having my daughter and all that discomfort and pain of pregnancy and birth were worth it a thousand times over.
0-12 months
That I may be constipated after the birth... Do anything (apart from not eating of course) to avoid this!
That gift bags are the most annoying thing in the universe – especially those that say New Baby Girl on them thus rendering them fairly useless for any other occasion.
That babies get funny rashes and colds all the time and even though I’d have still gone to get it checked out, I’d have felt less anxious
How much it would change my life and the resentment both me and my partner felt at not having the freedom we used to have
That I had more than one hole in my nipples! It freaked me out so much when I used a pump to express my milk for the first time that I actually called my Mother-in-law in to have a look. Don’t get me wrong, I love her to bits but that’s something that should have been kept between me and my pump!
That sleepsuits with feet have to be the right length or your toddler will be a toppler. No feet probably better option and will last longer – Capri sleepsuits are so now!
How much time I would spend carrying my baby and I would have got a sling to make it easier
That trying to get very young babies into dresses/smart clothes was fairly pointless as you needed to change them again within a short period
That you could empty food frozen in ice cube trays into plastic bags. People had told me to make my own food and freeze it in trays but I never had enough trays free to make more, it was so annoying – until I realised (too late) that you could just empty them into bags and refill your trays as often as you needed. Doh!
That pull ups were not also pull downs and that you actually rip these at the sides to release thus preventing the poo all the way down your toddlers leg scenario. (In case you think – can’t she read the instructions, I bought these whilst holidaying in foreign land in the belief that they were ordinary nappies)
That babies clothes that button up the back are pointless. You dress tiny babies lying on their backs! Avoid.
How to protect your baby from older siblings. When I once left the room and came back Alasdair had taken Hazel out of her cot and was dragging her around the room. At that stage you feel like you have to police/oversee them all the time, but you also don’t want to overdo it in case the older sibling gets jealous. So you go to the toilet and leave the door wide open so you can oversee/hear everything. After you are used to that you really have to adjust when you have visitors in your house…thinking about closing the loo door and things.
That she’d grow so fast and I wouldn’t have bothered buying so many clothes. At least they have been used several times over now by other people but my daughter would literally be in them for a couple of weeks and that was it! In fact she’s still the same but in grown up clothes, they now have adjustable waists so I can get her age 8-9 (when she’s only 6) so they last longer and I just pull the waist right in.
That problems I had would just be a phase that my daughter was going through e.g. Sleeping poorly for a couple of nights or off her food was usually because she was cutting a tooth.
12-36 months
That even small children can have very large heads, thus rendering that very cute pink rib polo neck useless. Look for envelope necks or buttons every time.
That toddlers toddle way before they can talk usually… I mistakenly thought that these two developmental stages were simultaneous, presumably having only met three year old toddlers before having my own…
That she would want so much attention me and my partner took ages before realising all our conversations were had through her. “Does Daddy want more gravy?” rather than just ask him directly.
That when she went through a growth spurt she’d just eat anything put in front of her but when she stopped, so did her enormous appetite
That by eating so much fruit, she was damaging her teeth. She still eats as much but now I try and give it to her at mealtimes
That my daughter would take me literally. When I said “Sweetheart be careful, you could hit Daddy in the face with that” - she did. Told me because I just told her she could!