Survival Tips for Mums-To-Be

Molly Whitehead-Jones - 9 Nov 15

So you’ve done a stand-up job of growing an actual person inside you and soon they’ll be in your arms rather than your giant belly.

With the great unknown of labour looming before you and, beyond that – even more intimidatingly – a lifetime of mothering, I’ll bet you’re feeling pants-wettingly excited and pants-shittingly scared in equal measure right about now (I know I was).

As I’m sure you’re acutely aware, you’re about to embark on a VERY steep learning curve for which little can prepare you. And I’m not going to sugar-coat it for you: your first few weeks as a mum especially are going to be mega tough.

Here’s a few tips, garnered from the stuff I’ve come to discover myself, to help you negotiate the mayhem.

PRE-BABY

Join an NCT group

Ignore the unfair ‘breastfeeding mafia’ label that’s somehow become attached to the NCT: this is my number one, must-do.

The course might feel expensive at a time when you’re probably counting every penny, finding the motivation to drag yourself out for an evening in a drafty church hall is challenging when you’re all pregnant, and you won’t really learn much that you couldn’t from a book. But it’s 100% worth the investment as it’ll allow you to regularly meet up with a bunch of women in the exact same boat as you – and this can prove invaluable later on.

Because being pregnant together is incredibly bonding, and these ladies will most likely become your closest allies in mumdom. The fact is that it’s much harder to seek out mum buddies once you’ve given birth as a) you’ll be housebound a lot of the time and b) when you do get out amongst the adults, you’ll struggle to focus on conversations for more than a few minutes at a time. And no matter how supportive they are, your old, pre-baby friends won’t want to WhatsApp with you at 2am about your little one’s questionable rash.

My NCT mates have talked me through the toughest times, encouraged me to get out way more than I ever thought I’d be able to with a tiny baby in tow, and helped me to laugh away my over-anxious mum worries.

If you do sign up for a course yourself, I hope you’re lucky enough to find yourself amongst such awesomeness.

Build up your bookmarks

When you’re heavily pregnant, you won’t be moving much; once the baby’s arrived, you’ll be pinned to a chair feeding for many, many hours of the day.

Instead of driving yourself insane by watching endless hours of hollow daytime telly while you will your baby to GET OUT OF YOU ALREADY (so much fun…), I’d suggest spending the start of your mat leave working that iPhone.

There are lots of brilliant motherhood-related websites and inspiring mum bloggers out there; do the groundwork now and you’ll have a ton of useful resources to provide solace and/or hilarity that’ll make getting through the 4am feed much more bearable.

You’ve already found Selfish Mother, so you’re off to a good start.

(Try not to Google stuff, though, especially anything related to newborn illnesses; this will only lead to you falling into a black hole of panic. Baby books/real-world, actually-know-what-they’re-talking-about experts like health visitors and doctors are always a better option here.)

POST-BABY

Get over the fact there’s little praise coming your way

Once dad returns to work and the initial flurry of visitors disappears, it’s going to be just you and your baby for the majority of the time. This means that, more often than not, you’ll have no witnesses to you totally bossing the day-to-day mum stuff: there’ll be no round of applause for that nappy change where you didn’t get poo on you; no high-fives for managing to get dressed before 1pm.

Every day, you’ll perform a thousand little (yet essential) tasks and tricks that’ll go unseen and unrecognised by the wider world, and you won’t have anything to show for all your hard work but a baby that’s still alive come evening. This can be particularly hard to come to terms with if you’re used to working in a teamwork-led environment and, like me, are the kind of person/saddo who thrives on receiving recognition for a job well done.

Keep going, know deep down that you’re doing amazing things, and you’ll soon realise that the best reward for your hard work is a happy baby (and then when you do get little nuggets of compliments on your mumming skills, they’ll feel especially precious).

Get out of the house as soon as you can

After endless days trapped indoors with the tiny new human who’s taken over their lives, all new parents are gripped by ‘the fear’; that, if they step outside, their vulnerable baby will spontaneously burst in to tears/roll under a passing car/shatter into a million pieces.

Engage the reasonable part of your brain (this will be tricky given the upheaval you’re enduring, but try) and realise that you can’t stay in your house forever more, that your baby is probably so asleep it won’t even notice what’s going on and that, if they do start crying, you can just turn around and try again another day. No big deal.

I vividly remember when we finally made it to the end of the road for a coffee on day  6: the total euphoria of caffeine and fresh air was overwhelming and totally worth the hour it took us to get out of the door in the first place.

Remember: ‘This too shall pass’

The first few weeks with a baby are incredibly disorientating. And in your sleep-deprived, totally overwhelmed state, you will surely start worrying that it will always be this way – that you’ll never be able to eat a meal in peace, or concentrate on a magazine for more than 10 seconds at a time, or watch a 30-minute TV programme without falling asleep.

Being a parent is always difficult, but it WILL get better. True, things will never be as they were before, but your baby will learn to sleep longer at night, you’ll learn how to juggle the many new skills you’ve acquired as a mum, and, slowly but surely, you’ll find snatches of sanity-saving peace and semi-normality returning to your life.

Always be grateful

This one is hard to remember when you’re yanking yourself out of bed for the fifth time that night or they just won’t stop crying – but you are very, very lucky.

Your body was able to make a baby, and you both made it through labour. That alone is something to be grateful for – and I imagine you have plenty more blessings besides.

Each day, take a look at the miracle you made, let your heart fill up with love and remind yourself how fortunate you are and it’ll make all the hard stuff much easier to bear.

Molly Whitehead-Jones

Molly Whitehead-Jones is a first-time mum living in Manchester and founder of Mamas Collective, a mums group that offers meetups, workshops & events for savvy, super-cool mamas who love their kids but won’t let motherhood hold them back.

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