For context, hubby and I have a 7 month old baby girl. She is the cutest thing and gets a lot of attention out in public. We appreciate the attention for her. She deserves it! But also as first time parents and introverts, it can be slightly overwhelming. Yesterday I went to Michael’s with baby girl to grab some supplies for a project, and I had her sitting in the cart. I looked away for a minute to grab some buttons, and an older woman walking down the aisle gravitated right to her. She started talking about how baby girl could be a Gerber baby and asked if I even knew what Gerber was (I’m 38, I know what Gerber babies are). She then reached out and touched my baby’s foot. I was slightly in shock and didn’t say anything, but baby girl started crying because she’s 7 months and was getting irritated with sitting up in the cart. The woman got defensive for some reason and was apologizing, saying she had upset baby. She then started talking about her grandbabies and saying that I needed to cherish every moment because it goes so fast. I smiled and said I would, and then quickly walked off with my baby. How do I avoid these interactions? I don’t mind people smiling and talking to her, but I don’t want people touching her. She’s not crawling yet and she’s constantly putting her feet in her mouth.

I can’t tell if it’s just my algorithm but it seems like nearly everyone has sleep trained? I’m still deciding if we want to do it, but I’m feeling social media pressure and trying to figure out if it’s really as common as it seems.

Not really looking to be convinced one way or the other, mostly just curious regarding prevalence.

Is it actually even cheaper if I have to out of fear of being covered in pee automatically change it every 5 min? Shes literally getting more diaper rash changing these every 2 hours (probably a pee and a half) then huggies when I just waited for the blue line. This is ridiculous. She peed all over me and i had to change her jammies and diaper and wipe her back down. She refused to go back to sleep, giving me -2 hours of sleep. Im pretty broke, but it almost seems like im breaking even cist wise with a bigger headace.

Help. Need your survival tips. I'm barely functioning, everything hurts. Baby wants cuddles and being held and lifted to stand. And wants me to sing all day but my throat says nope, not today.

I want to buy a Snoo secondhand. With how tired I am right now at almost 4 weeks pp, I’m willing to try anything. My husband is confused as to what exactly it does (tbh I don’t even know 😅). Can someone explain why they love theirs?

My baby girl is 6 months old and she (knock on wood) is a great sleeper. She goes down around 8pm and usually wakes up between 5 and 6. A lot of mornings she will feed at this time and then actually fall back asleep, sometimes I’ll put her back in her crib and others I’ll let her co-sleep with me since my husband has already left for work.
Is this normal for her to be getting this much sleep? Call it a 8.5-10 hour stretch, eat and then another 1-2 hours?
She’s perfectly healthy and meeting all of her milestones I just don’t know I should switch and let that time she wakes up between her morning time or let her sleep if it’s her body telling me that’s what she needs

Help I need my baby to leave me alone and play by himself. What toys or otherwise did you use for this. We watch Ms Rachel etc and he has all these toys already but he just wants my attention. I’m already jaded and exhausted and I don’t care about being the best mom anymore. I can’t handle being needed like this constantly from morning until night.

I need this baby to leave me alone for long stretches of time. No haters please give me your suggestions.

We never officially did any sleep training, but had a combination of practicing putting him down awake, never feeding to sleep, and getting him on a set schedule and at 5 months he started sleeping through the night and consistently did for over a month. Since then, there have been a few regressions that were resolved by ramping up solids and putting him in his own room.

Lately, however, we've been travelling and he's been teething. He still goes down no issue, but he'll wake 1-3 times/night. Sometimes he seems to be half asleep crying and we'll leave him and he'll go back to sleep on his own. Other times I'll go and feed him—I know he's not hungry, but it's what he wants and it calms him down instantly, and then he falls asleep in the crib. We feel bad knowing that his wakes could be caused by travel/teething/schedule and haven't wanted to leave him to cry when he seems distressed.

But what are you all doing in this situation and what should we be doing? I don't want to set him up with habits that'll be hard to break but I also want to make sure he's not unnecessarily suffering.

I’m 38 and we recently decided we want to have a child.

Is raising a child without outside family support doable?

My parents are deceased and my husband’s parents are moving to another country soon.

My husband works 2 days remote, 3 days in office (he’s an accountant). I’m currently finishing up nursing school. I don’t know what my work situation will be as a nurse, I’m hoping to get it an outpatient M-F position without nights/call.

I truly wish I could help every single momma in these threads. It makes me so sad to read about women with no support or no help. I was in the same boat last year.

Reading these posts pushes me harder to complete a PP doula training. 😔

Hi guys, as it says in the tittle, we're trying to potty train our 21 months old.

He is going to the kindergarten and they are already potty training them, they told us we should try as well.

He did pee and poop a few times with them and he wants to sit on the potty with other children but when I try to do it with him he barely sits for a few seconds. He didn't pee nor poop at home, not once.

Is there any way I could keep him on the potty ( without toys or cartoons ) a bit longer ? Or is there any way I can show him how to pee or poop in the potty ?

I could really use some advice, he's my first child and it's a bit hard for me since we have a baby as well.

Thank you so much in advance. 🫶🏻

So whenever I put my baby down to sleep, she keeps reaching her hands out to the side and looks like she’s grabbing onto something. I tried giving her those caterpillar stuffed toy but she didn’t seem so interested. I’m just so curious why she does it. She keeps on moving and aggressively grabs on to the air. Any experience like this with other mothers?

Hey guys! My PFL is almost up and I’m getting nervous about working from home with a newborn. I’m hoping some of you have advice or suggestions. I’ve got a couple of major upsides in my favor.

* Before baby, I was usually able to complete my assigned 8 hours of work in 5 solid hours of effort if I was on my game.

* Both grandmothers want to help, they just have limited availability that needs to be scheduled in advance if possible.

* My work doesn’t have a lot of meetings, and the meetings I do have are mostly either internally facing or scheduled out weeks in advance where I can set up a visit from grandma for coverage.

* My manager and team lead are both huge baby people and so will do their best to work with me.

My plan is to focus the majority of my work on times when baby is sleeping (3-5 hours depending on the day during work hours), and then split focus between working and watching baby the rest of the time. My little guy is only gonna be about 2 months old when I start back up again though, so I’m nervous I’m gonna be neglecting his development if I’m spending a big chunk of the day only half paying attention to him. My wife works similar hours to me and she isn’t able to do WFH and for a few reasons, daycare isn’t really an option, so taking care of the little dude is basically on me.

Any advice or reassurances y’all can offer would be appreciated.

To my pre baby night owls, when did you get YOURSELF on a schedule? I used to sleep in till 11am sometimes even longer before having a baby. She had her nights and days confused so we’ve slowly been able to get her on a more normal schedule. She is officially a 6/6:30am riser naturally. It’s wonderful for her but also… hell for me. I’m getting more and more used to it and getting up with her. But as for now, she is my alarm clock which means I get no private time in the mornings. This isn’t really me looking for advice, more just seeing how long it took other parents to adjust. I know what I need to do (get used to it, and start setting an alarm for earlier if I want that time by myself). How long did it take you to start waking up before them and when did they stop being your alarm clock??

Ok so my 4 month old sleeps great in his crib. However the last several nights as he is becoming more mobile (he's rolling all the directions and trying to crawl) he ends up with his legs through the crib slats and his chunky thighs are getting stuck. So at about 3am/4am I am waking up to a baby screaming bloody murder. Does anyone have any suggestions to prevent this? I am trying to follow safe sleep guidelines but everything we look at is technically unsafe that would help prevent the problem. I am half tempted to have my husband build a back wall on his crib at this point as it is only happening against the back of his crib that touches the wall. I wanted to ask y'all about any suggestions for things that have worked for you?

When we started weaning our girls, I found the actual NHS guidance pretty sparse on the practical day-to-day stuff - and a few friends going through it both around the same time and more recently, said the same. The main alternatives we found were either not really UK-focused (a lot of the well-known apps/sites are American) or just took a lot of effort to actually use day to day.

So far, from digging around in a bunch of these same conversations elsewhere, I've seen people recommend the following a lot - hopefully summarising it here with some of the actual reasons people gave saves someone else a bit of digging:

How to Wean Your Baby (Charlotte Stirling-Reed) and The Weaning GP - these two books keep coming up more than anything else. The Stirling-Reed one gets recommended for its 30-day structure, and more than one person said they'd recommended it to literally all their friends, which is about as strong an endorsement as it gets. The Weaning GP is newer, has a big Instagram following, and people like that it's half practical how-to and half recipes the whole family can actually eat together, not separate "baby food." Worth knowing though - a couple of people who bought it also ended up saying they wished they'd ditched a similarly-structured book earlier and just cooked whatever the family was already eating, adapted down. This was in fact the approach we ended up taking eventually (3 girls!) - essentially whatever we ate but with no salt, mushed up with a bit of water. Took a while to figure out though.

Solid Starts - the single most-mentioned resource by far, mostly for the age-by-age serving size and food safety lookup (how to cut a grape, when a food becomes a choking risk, that kind of thing). The catch that comes up constantly: it's American, and the pricing has clearly annoyed people - one person mentioned it used to be under a fiver a year and now the subscription price feels "ludicrous" to them. A few who paid for the guided content specifically also said they found it disorganised compared to the free lookup tool, which people still rate highly.

Nara Baby - the app that gets recommended most often as a free alternative for actually tracking what's been tried, when, and any reactions. People like that both parents/carers can have their own login on the same child's log, and that it's held up across more than one kid rather than being a one-and-done novelty. A close second mentioned in the same vein is Nanny Louena, which people rate for letting you filter by diet type and for giving you a printable allergen chart, which a couple of parents said they still have stuck to the fridge.

Free, official routes - a genuinely large chunk of people didn't pay for anything and instead pieced it together from the NHS Start4Life pages, the free "Eating Well in the First Year" PDF from First Steps Nutrition (several said their health visitor pointed them to this one specifically), and Ella's Kitchen's free weaning chart and digital guide, which stacks with a free recipe book if you're signed up to the Boots Parenting Club. A number of people also mentioned their local health visitor team running a free in-person "intro to solids" session, and more than one said it was more useful than anything they'd read online.

The low-tech stuff that keeps coming up alongside all of this - steaming a single vegetable and remixing it across several different meals with whatever's in the cupboard (a spice, a carb, a cheese), rather than following a recipe book meal-by-meal, was mentioned as a way to make the whole thing feel less like a second job. Freezing portions in ice cube trays got mentioned constantly as the actual thing that saved people's evenings, regardless of which app or book they were nominally following. And practically everyone, regardless of which resource camp they were in, agreed on one non-negotiable: the right bib (Bibado's smock-style ones came up again and again) matters more than almost anything else on this list.

If people are happy to add to this and it's allowed (I haven't used Reddit much until I decided to look into all of this) I can update the post to include any suggestions people consider worth adding.

I’m freaking out over this brown speck I seen in baby’s white of his eye. He’s 4 months old. It disappeared in his lower eyelid somewhere and I couldn’t find it. Popped up again a few hours later. I tried to flush his eye started getting red from that. Again can’t find it, held his eyelid down up whatever used a flash light unfortunately disappeared again. He acts like it isn’t even there. It’s giving me anxiety. What do I do

Delta Children is terrible!

We have had so much trouble with the Delta Children brand. It is surprising because they had decent reviews... but first it takes them WAY longer to deliver than we were told, then it comes missing key bolts, takes over a week to get anyone to answer us through email, because they have no phone number or anything to contact them at, and now they are saying it will take 3 to 4 weeks to get a few bolts that they never sent! We ordered this crib 2 months before our kid was due and he is now 2 weeks. If they stick inside the 3 week time frame, which i doubt, it will have taken them 3 months to properly deliver a subpar, super expensive crib.

It is a terrible quality crib on top of all of this. Every little touch scuffs it, its flimsy, colors dont match... i could not say a SINGLE good thing about them.

Anyone else used them lately?

My son is 6 and obsessed with animals. He'd gotten into the habit of asking for my phone to "talk to ChatGPT" — asking it questions, having it tell him little stories, that kind of thing. I honestly thought it was harmless, even kind of sweet.

Last week he had my phone in the other room and I suddenly heard him crying. I ran in and he was staring at the screen, really upset. He'd asked it to "draw a lion having its dinner" — something totally innocent — and what came back was a photorealistic, bloody, genuinely horrifying scene. Not a cartoon. A nightmare image, handed straight to a 6-year-old with nothing in between.

It really shook me. These tools are everywhere now, my kid treats them like magic, and there's basically nothing standing between an innocent question and whatever the model decides to generate. There's no concept of "a child is the one asking."

I went down a bit of a rabbit hole and ended up finding a safe ai for kids app for him. that lets him keep doing the thing he loves — talking to an AI, asking it endless questions, having it tell him stories — but with a version that actually knows it's talking to a child. It speaks back in a warm, playful, kid-friendly voice, keeps everything age-appropriate, and when he asks it to draw something the style stays soft and cartoonish. A "lion eating" comes back as a friendly lion with its food, not something out of a horror film.

I couldn't attach the two images so you can see the difference

Has anyone else had a moment like this, where you handed your kid a device and an AI showed them something you weren't ready for? Curious how you're all handling it.

Parents considering today's economy, what's one practical step you'd recommend to help set your baby up for financial stability?

If you can, share how to do it, too. One example might be freezing your child's credit with the three major credit bureaus until they're old enough to use it—though I honestly don't know if that's a good recommendation or if I'm just being an overly cautious parent.

I think once dad and I learn that first step we might figure out maintenance.

Much appreciation in advance!

When did your LO stop contact napping? Mine is 10 weeks and basically refuses to nap anywhere but on me. We attempt a crib nap for practice once a day but that has been pretty much completely unsuccessful. I enjoy the quiet time and am soaking up the snuggles but I’m starting to feel a bit trapped.

You’ve fed them, changed them, soothed them etc and they’re finally asleep. You gently transfer them to the crib and … bam! Eyes wide open. Do you…

a) pick them up immediately and try again
b) if they’re not crying, leave them to settle themselves to sleep
c) if they are crying, set a timer and see if they’ll settle themselves within that time and then pick them up
d) if they’re crying pick them up immediately and soothe and try again.
e) let them cry it out, they’ll eventually fall asleep.
f) other

I’m interested in what other households do! Let me know the age of your baby/child, and which one is your household :)

Eg.
Mine is: 4mo daughter post 4 month sleep regression; combo of both b and c. Usually she is put down pretty much asleep and may wake up but she usually settles herself down without crying. If she does cry, I give her 5 minutes before I intervene and pick her up, and she’s usually out within 2 minutes.

(Let’s keep this a judgement free space and learn from each other! We are all doing this for the first time after all)

Our baby has CONSTANT blowouts - out the legs and out the back. We have tried Huggies, Pampers, rascals and Kirkland diapers and blowouts with all. He is around 15 lbs and using size 3 diapers. He blew out with size 2, so we moved to 3 on all of the above brands. No success. We flair out the frills/elastic around his legs. We make sure the band is secure. We leave the little pouch space near his bum. They are almost always fresh diapers.

I will mention that he almost exclusively poops after we feed him and have him sit in the bouncer to keep him upright to prevent spit ups so I’m thinking it’s because his bum is compressed and there’s nowhere for the poop to go but out? Please help lol.

Sorry in advance for the rant.

Am I the only person who finds it extremely odd that so many people make celebratory posts on Linkedin about their career and company in the context of parental leave? I'm sure this is much more common in the US than it is elsewhere. But it almost feels like the companies are pressuring their employees to make a post about how great they are during the employee's leave.

I just saw a new mom say how wonderful her company is because she's got the flexibility to be home with her newborn while still being able to "stay connected to the work" through online team calls. Am I crazy in thinking this is not a flex whatsoever and kind of... sad? Like do we have to tie everything back to work? Our children?

I know a lot of people don't have the realistic ability to 100% step away from work (I probably fall into that category). But why are we praising that online? Shouldn't we be more critical of companies that make you feel pressured to "stay connected"?

Again, sorry for the rant.

Signed,

a US mom-to-be limited to 12 weeks of unpaid leave.

Hello fellow new parents!

I wanted to offer some education regarding SIDS since there was a recent post about it, and I imagine many of us (myself included) have very legitimate fears about it.

SUID vs. SIDS

SIDS is a biological anomaly that is not obvious or observable via an autopsy. SUID (Sudden Unexpected Infant Death) is a newer umbrella term that SIDS falls under, but also includes accidental suffocation and asphyxiation.

As of the most recent studies, SUID impacts 0.1 percent of babies. If possible, I’d love each of you to take in a big deep breath and read this next part.

The odds are in your baby’s favor.

Years ago there was a national push for safe sleep practices, where babies are put to sleep alone (no bed sharing) on their backs, in an empty crib or bassinet. The number of deaths classified as SIDS fell dramatically. This showed researchers that many deaths once classified as SIDS were likely related to sleep environment and would now be classified differently under the broader term SUID.

And according to the CDC, up to 98.5% of SUIDS deaths (which again includes SIDS) had at least one unsafe sleep factor at the time of the tragedy.

Something else that’s important to note, because things like suffocation and rebreathing deaths cannot be observed on an autopsy, in these tragic cases, the cause of death can sometimes be listed as SIDS, which as I mentioned, true SIDS is the medical anomaly.

THE TRIPLE RISK MODEL

One of the leading scientific explanations for SIDS is the Triple Risk Model. Three risks are most likely to be present in the event of SIDS, often working as a chain, one that we can break at point #3. Breaking the chain doesn’t guarantee safety, but the science suggests it helps significantly.

(1) A biologically vulnerable baby, these are the ones who may experience the anomaly, which they believe is largely caused by an underlying brainstem abnormality that may impair the baby's ability to wake or respond appropriately to low oxygen or high carbon dioxide.

(2) The critical development period. This is when a baby’s brain and body changes functions for sleep and breathing. This is why ages 2-4 months are the most critical. Some speculate that vaccines cause SIDS but it is worth noting that vaccines and this window just happen to coincide.

(3) An environmental factor. A blocked airway, cigarette smoke, suffocation, rebreathing, overheating, etc.

Research shows that the following reduces the third risk significantly (even meeting one or two of these recommendations is good!)

(1) Safe sleep. Again, alone in their empty bassinet or crib.

(2) Room sharing. While the jury is still out on exactly why, it is speculated that subtle noises parents make in the middle of the night can help keep the baby’s brain alert and avoid falling into too deep of a sleep.

(3) Having a fan blowing GENTLY. Some studies suggest this is effective by keeping fresh air moving around baby’s face to reduce the risk of rebreathing (inhaling CO2 into their lungs, this can happen if the sleep surface is too soft (why couches, adult mattresses, baby loungers are not recommended) or if baby is on their stomach (before they’re old enough to roll).

(4) Offering a pacifier has been shown to reduce occurrences and the leading theory is that it keeps the brain engaged and keeps their airway open.

(5) Breastfeeding. Breastfed babies are generally easier to rouse. That said, formula feeding does not increase SIDS risk, it just doesn’t offer the same protection.

(6) Sobriety and maintaining a smoke-free environment for your baby.

This is more of a public recommendation — using a pulse/ox monitor. While monitors like the Owlet have not been shown to reduce or stop SIDS, they can possibly alert you to intervene if baby’s pulse or oxygen levels become poor. There currently isn’t any research that shows that if SIDS begins, parents can intervene and stop it, but this doesn’t mean it can’t either, there’s just no definitive proof and there’s no way to ethically study this. HOWEVER, occasionally the Owlet has been used as a safety net to start or continue sleeping practices that are not recommended, so please keep that in mind. Additionally, some parents report feeling more anxious with the use of these kind of monitors. I mention these because of their rise in popularity and are frequently discussed in comment sections regarding SIDS. My pediatrician said they are “complementary” to the expert recommendations.

My goal of writing all of this out is to provide both education and some comfort as many of us face the scary reality that yes, SIDS does exist, but we are not powerless in it. My prayer is that all of our precious and beloved babies grow up happy and healthy, and that their parents are able to get some sleep at night despite the very natural anxiety parenthood brings.

If desired I can make a similar post on PPA and intrusive thoughts if anyone is interested.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK513399/

https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/diseases/13646-sudden-infant-death-syndrome-sids

https://publications.aap.org/aapgrandrounds/article-pdf/51/6/69/1641689/gr+june+2024_69.pdf

https://publications.aap.org/pediatrics/article/153/3/e2023061984/196646/Characteristics-of-Sudden-Unexpected-Infant-Deaths