Parenting Contents Archive

Wife Says No More…

My wife and I have a beautiful 1/mo old baby boy and it’s been quite the adjustment since bringing him home. After pregnancy, delivery and this first month at home, my wife swears she doesn’t want any more kids. My questions is, has anyone else ever felt this but later changed their mind? Is this normal? Should I start mentally preparing for this to be our one and only child? Baby boy isn’t particularly difficult and I’ve even taken night shift for the first full month while the wife heals. Kinda hoping it’s just a phase new moms go thru. Any advice/experience would be appreciated.

At what point do I just give up ever fitting into my pre baby clothes?

My baby is 8 months old. I’ve been working out consistently since he was 8 weeks old, and worked out all through my pregnancy and ate healthy but still gained more than the recommended weight. I’m still like one size too big for all my clothing. My weight has been exactly the same since about 3 months postpartum. So I have one gym outfit that fits, I wear it every time I go to the gym. I have one pair of pants that fit. I wear them whenever I leave the house. When I’m at home I wear pajamas basically. If I could get back to my former size I obviously have a whole wardrobe of clothing I’d be able to wear. My question is when do I just accept it’s never going to happen, get rid of my old clothes and buy new clothes? Obviously this is a huge expense as well as a huge chore of figuring out how/when to go clothes shopping when you have a baby. Thinking about it makes me want to cry. But I’m also tired of having basically two outfits to wear.

My very slow to talk son graduated from his hearing impaired group today and I'm so proud

My 4.5 year old didn't speak a word until he was 3.5. After we discovered he was hard of hearing. He had surgery and 1 year later at his one year comprehension test they graduated him today. He blew all the tests out of the water. He allowed them to poke at his ears (his biggest fear), he answered all the questions WITH WORDS and he passed at a normal level for his age. After being completely non verbal 1 year ago. This is only a brag really. I am so incredibly proud of him. For conquering his fear (don't worry I paid him in a toy store visit immediately) and for being so receptive to all the therapy and all the stuff he had to do to help catch up. Proud mama. Kids are amazing ❤️

That cavalier attitude toward subbing, unfortunately, isn’t new; for years, many schools have treated substitute teachers like babysitters rather than educators. @TheAtlantic @cray_kate https://t.co/kg9h4bWAyF

Did any Americans with due dates around New Years induce a little early to get a big tax refund?

With a $5k child tax credit on the line for parents who were able to give birth before Jan 1, I’ve often wondered if anyone tweaked or attempted to tweak their birth plans to be able to claim it. No judgement here, my baby was due September 5 and when I was recommended for induction I intentionally selected a date before Sept 1 so my baby would make the kindergarten cut off in my state and save me a year’s worth of childcare payments.

Struggling with getting back the romance

Hey everyone. My wife and I had kind of a hard conversation today, not like devastating but we talked about how we both feel like the romance has gone missing from our marriage after our baby. For context, our LO is 8 months old and we have a very (kind of unintentionally) strict routine in place for our days. Basically the only time we have together without the baby is the couple of hours after she goes to sleep. We both use this time to unwind and just play our video games and then go to bed, most of the time she’s asleep before me. The conversation today brought up some feelings of ours that we both feel like the romantic spark we had is gone or has been lacking. For some reason, be it dad brain or something else entirely, I just can’t think of anything to do to try and reignite our romantic life, so I wanted to ask other new parents if they’ve run into this issue and things they’ve tried to help resolve it. Any advice is welcome here, please let me hear it!

Maternity Leave Hell

I’m so sick with the incompetence of companies and trying to figure out maternity leave. I’d been contacting HR since I was 5 months pregnant to try to get some outline of wth I needed to fill out / do to be paid for my leave. Got zero help just saying they’ll know more after the new year. Now I’m here with a month old baby contacting 3 different agencies and my HR team (who can’t give me a straight answer) trying to scramble to make sure I get paid for being off 12 weeks cause my baby isn’t ready for me to go back to work next week and we can’t afford to not get paid for me being off the second half. It is so ridiculous women have been a consistent force in the workplace for over 40years get it freaking together and having some standardization for maternity leave.

Thought the terrible-two's were stressful - just wait until you start to teach your teenager to drive. Buckle up parents and be prepared to buy new floor matts! #parentingtips #DriveSafe @CherylMaguire05 https://t.co/dYyJ3FLiKE

Not giving “alternative dinner options” to picky kids/toddlers?

I see divided opinions on this a lot, and I’m just wondering what people who legitimately can’t afford to have multiple dinner options are supposed to do (for the people who think this is wrong or damaging)? Like if you’re barely scraping by and have just enough food for everyone to eat enough of what’s being offered- if you make chicken casserole for dinner and your child refuses to eat it or try it, but giving them a PB+J instead means someone doesn’t get lunch tomorrow. Or maybe you just legitimately ONLY had the ingredients for that casserole. What is a parent in that situation supposed to do? Are kids who suffer from food insecurity generally less picky than kids who know their parents will let them have a meal they really like if they simply refuse to eat what’s served?

Black History Month Always Worth Celebrating with Your Child https://t.co/IGX6k8brGY by @TeamPersley of @NYCDadsGroup #BlackHistoryMonth #citydads #dadlife #parenting #BLM

Did anyone vaccinate their baby early for measles?

I was looking at the vaccination schedule, and it looks like the first dose for measles is at 12 months, however, i can also see that 6 months is an option. Are there any drawbacks to vaccinating early or any reasons you *should* vaccinate at 6 months as opposed to 12?

Husband is getting a vasectomy in a week

And I really don't want him to. We have two girls already, 4 and 18 months and I would really like to try for a third in about a year or two, but he is sure he does NOT want any more babies. And I'm not gonna tell him what to do with his body, if he's sure he doesn't want more and he wants to make it permanent, that's his right. But God damn am I frustrated by it. Not looking for advice, I'm not going to break up my family for a hypothetical third kid, just sad and grieving the loss of said hypothetical third child and wanted to share it in a safe place.

Click here to watch Parents latest installment of Kidsplaining where teens "try to" explain TikTok to their parents.👉 https://t.co/BGkVest5H8 https://t.co/Tggk9pE3SC

Make #outdoorplay a year round activity! Bundle up when it gets cold! #parentingtips https://t.co/EhjLAIPd74

Toddler wakes up early, we let him mumble in crib

Is it bad that when our toddler wakes up early we just let him do his thing in the crib while we continue to (try) to sleep? As it is I'm up at 5:45 everyday to get up with him. If he cries then I'll get him but if he is just mumbling around I leave him until 5:45.