How to support new parents
Photo by Paolo Bendandi on Unsplash
In today’s episode Dave and Jim discuss ways to support new parents
During this episode we’ll discuss:
What our family situations were like for our first-born
What kind of help we got and from whom
Areas we felt we could have used more help
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TRANSCRIPT
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Dave: In today's episode, we're discussing what are the best ways to support new parents.
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Everyone, welcome to the Papa est Fatigué Podcast, the podcast for dads by dads. A couple of years before my wife and I had our first child, a close friend of ours had their first. We wanted to support them, but we really didn't know what to do. Since it was their first child, it was basically the blind leading the blind. No one knew how to support each other
but eight years later and two kids down, Jim and I both, I think, have a lot of ideas about things that would have helped us our first time around. Before we get into it, here's my deal. I'm Dave. As I said, I've got two kids. I have a seven-year-old girl and a four-year-old boy.
Jim: I'm Jim. I've got a seven-year-old girl and a five-year-old girl.
Dave: Jim, let's just get into it. With your firstborn, what was the family situation like? Were your relatives around to help? Were you on your own or was it somewhere in between?
Jim: My wife and I, both of our families are fairly close, and so our parents were pretty involved. My mother and then my in-laws at that time, both my father-in-law and my mother-in-law. We lived in a small place in the city, small apartment. We didn't have a guest room, for example, or a guest house or anything like that where someone could come and stay.
In some cases, the mother-in-law would come and get a hotel room nearby and could be with us for the day and kind of take turns rocking the baby or holding the baby, just freeing up our hands so that we could do other things around the house.
My mom would come over, I don't think she ever took the hotel room, but she'd come over for the day and probably stay late into the night, do a lot of the support stuff like cleaning and laundry and cooking and just to free up our time, both my and my wife's time to be with the baby and for me to support my wife. I know that there are other situations where the relatives may move in for a while. I'm sure that's got both its pros and its cons. I think you've got some comments about that, but at least having that intermittent support for a day or two here or there or a couple of days at a time was really helpful.
At that time, I don't want to say I was overwhelmed, but it was definitely, we were in uncharted territory. This was all brand new to us, and figuring out how to be parents, that was a full-time job, so to have that support was really helpful.
Dave: You sort of alluded to it. As I mentioned in a previous podcast, my wife's family is in Asia. In this instance, her mom did fly out. For our firstborn, I think she probably came out for maybe two months, and she stayed with us. Then, my parents live really close by, so we could kind of see them whenever we wanted to. We had that sort of in-between somebody with us.
Then certainly when my wife's mom went home, my parents were nearby, which was nice to have that. Yes, I think that for us, my parents, because my mother-in-law was here, my parents weren't super involved in those first couple of months. Like I said, because we had my mother-in-law here, and she did a lot. I will say that in terms of the support that we got from her, a lot of it was I think emotional support for my wife.
As we talk about support, I think it's important to sort of draw a distinction between support for the husband, sort of all the generic stuff, and then support for your wife who has gone through very different experience than you have. I mean, we haven't had this thing come out of our bodies and all the stuff that goes along with that. I think it was important to have her mother-in-law here for that or her mom here for that, but in terms of the actual help that was provided, most of this with the cleaning and the cooking and all that stuff fell to me, but again, the support that was provided was really to help my wife out. That was invaluable.
I mean, if you have the ability to do that and if your wife wants that, embrace that wholeheartedly because that's certainly something that is-- They just might feel a little bit more comfortable. I think my wife certainly felt a little bit more comfortable having her mom around all that time.
Jim: Yes, that's a big part of the support. Not only is it the cooking and the cleaning but you're absolutely right, there's the emotional support for both parents, but I agree certainly for the mother, maybe more in a vulnerable position than the dad is.
Dave: Yes. We actually have a lot of friends I guess also because a lot of my wife's friends' families are not in the country, but that seems to be fairly typical where people will try and come out for a while. It's nice also because that grandparent is going to have just less time with the child, certainly as they go back.
Then, it's primarily on FaceTime or whatever, and they're sort of missing the small milestones that you see along the path. They might miss the first crawl just because we all forget to video it, and those kinds of things. It's nice to have them there for that as well.
Jim: You reminded me about my sister's experience, and I hadn't really thought about this with respect to my mom. My sister had some complications early on with the pregnancy and afterwards. It lingered on for a couple of years as the kid kind of found his feet, so to speak. I forgot about that. My mom moved to another city to be with my sister and her grandchild, my sister's son. You talk about that emotional support. Thinking about it now, credit to my mom for really just picking up that slack, and to this point, to this day, she has got a really tight relationship with her grandkid, and in a way, that kid has got like two moms, which is really sweet.
It was both picking up the kid from school, preparing lunches, changing diapers, all that regular stuff, and also just being a support for my sister in the way that you described. Now that I'm reflecting on that and thinking of it from a third-hand experience, that's hugely valuable and that's mental sanity, mental health, self-care, all those things that you could describe as new parents.
Dave: I think that brings up a good question. For your firstborn, did you ever feel overwhelmed and that you maybe needed more support than you actually had? What was your mental state? Because, yes, I think there really is, there's this level of support for just kind of, we're all sleep-deprived and the dishes need to get done and the laundry needs to get done, but then there's also, as we talked about the emotional support also for the dad who might just feel like things are spinning out of control, like, "I thought I knew what was going to happen," but it's like, "This is not anything like what I expected." What was your experience in those first few weeks or months?
Jim: I would describe it as overwhelmed, but not in a "panicked, I can't handle it kind of way," just in a, "It gets just too much." What it was for me, it was a very humbling experience in that, "I'm not going to be going to the gym. I might not be staying late at work." All the things that I thought that I could control about my life, just kind of slowly had to accommodate what was now the biggest thing and biggest and most important thing in my life.
That adjustment of thinking that I was in control to realizing that I was not in control, and then just figuring out how to deal with that overwhelmed feeling. I liken it to whitewater rafting. It's like you're going down the river, everything is going to be fine. It's just not going to go the way you think it is, and it's kind of out of control, but everything is going to be fine. It's just, you're along for the ride. That point was driven home to me when my second was born, because that's when I just gave up.
That was like, I was still holding onto this idea like, "I can get to the gym now and then whatever." When the second came, I was like, "That's it, I'm no longer in charge of this. I'm now just a participant in something that's much bigger."
Dave: With your firstborn, were you kind of thinking, like, "All right, well, this thing will take over a little bit of my life, but I can still sort of keep my pre-parenting identity and I'll maybe just have a little bit less time to do the things that I normally do," was that kind of what you were thinking?
Jim: Yes, naively so, in some ways that it was a time management problem, scheduling problem. "How can we work this all in and get all that stuff done?" It's just not. As so many parents know, it's a transformative experience in so many ways. I don't want to sound-- I feel like I sound narcissistic or self-centered like, I'm still going to do things my way, but it really wasn't. It was just, I'm in a certain rhythm, a certain sort of lifestyle. It felt like an addition, not a transformation. I mean, I felt like it should be an addition, not a transformation, and it was a transformation.
Dave: I very vividly remember, I don't know, maybe a month before our daughter was born, thinking, and I've mentioned this in other podcast, like, "The kid will sleep X number of hours a day. That still feels like I should have enough time to get the laundry done and cook and clean. I'm not clear why all these parents are like, 'I never have enough time to do.'" If you just add up the hours, it seems like there's got to be time in the day to get something done.
I also felt like there would still be some level of, I don't know if normalcy is the right word, but the pre-child life that would still be there. It was certainly a rude awakening when you realize that that's not at all the case. I think that's where sort of going back to this level of support, that's where in hindsight, I probably needed some more help. It's just those things that you're like, "Well, of course, I can get laundry done," but not only is it hard to get laundry done, but after just a few weeks of sleep deprivation, you honestly don't care if you've been wearing the same shirt, like five days in a row, it doesn't matter, right?
Jim: Yes.
Dave: You're just like, "Well, it's not ripped. That's good enough. There are no stains on it. Like, that's probably okay."
Jim: [laughs] You're not leaving the house anyway.
Dave: Right. Your expectations and what you're looking to show the outside world, this has completely changed, like, "I just don't care."
Jim: [crosstalk] standards and expectations.
Dave: Yes. I guess with that sort of thinking in mind, if you look back on those first few weeks or actually even months, what would you say that you wish you might've maybe gotten help with that you maybe either didn't think about at that time or you just for whatever reason didn't ask because you felt like maybe you were asking something that was too much, how would you have done that differently?
Jim: Alluding to the title of the podcast, the most important thing for me to get a handle on and I didn't was sleep. I think that to your point, the kid sleeps 12 hours a day, 14 hours a day, whatever the number is, that sounds great except it's never more than an hour and a half at a time. Two things would happen. One, I'd put her down, and usually, I'd lie down with her, which means that I fall asleep. Second, if I didn't fall asleep, I was terrified of moving because you're going to wake her up.
Dave: [laughs] You're right.
Jim: Just like, "Just sleep." It was either my sleeping time where I felt like I was being held hostage, I wasn't going to get anything done anyway. It was after my second was born when somebody explained to me the concept of the night nanny, which was just brilliant in hindsight, it's just exactly what it sounds like. It's somebody who takes over the kid so that the parents can get a good night's sleep. It's not something we were in a position to do, but to have that sort of help at night would have been really helpful.
We've talked before about splitting schedules. I explained, my wife and I split the night. For the first half of the night, changing diapers, getting the bottles, things like that. Then we'd switch up for the second part. We just got at least four hours of sleep, but to have both of us, and that's got its own consequences. To have both of us get six, seven, eight hours of sleep at a time, I think would have made a big difference.
The few times that we had somebody stay over or we stayed over at my in-law's house, we still didn't-- That was a boundary that the in-laws didn't step into, and probably my wife and I [unintelligible 00:12:43]. In hindsight, I think I would have been more open to that experience.
Dave: When you were talking about being held hostage, another early memory I have of my daughter was, you get them to sleep in your arms. At the beginning, you're able to put them in the crib and walk away. Then there's a shift, where like the minute you put them down, you're good for maybe a minute, and you turn your back, and boom, it all falls apart. That was among the most frustrating transitions. I remember, I'm like, "Ah, she's asleep." Then you start to realize that, "Okay, she's asleep, but now what?" Because you know you put her down, she's going to wake up. Now you're literally, you just have to walk around with this kid. You can't do anything.
I also never felt like I could sleep with her like that, because I always felt like a dropper in my sleep or just roll over, just one of those things where I was just super concerned about that. That was another thing that I remember, that one was, it was just brutal when you had that recognition that she's asleep, but there's nothing you-- You can't get to sleep at that point.
Jim: Did you do the drives?
Dave: We didn't do too many of those. I do remember a few parents saying if you do that, then you open the flood gates and to every night having to do that. Here's another one I remember. One of the first times we went out when we felt good, we went out to Dim Sum, and I had the baby there, and I can't remember exactly what I was doing, but I think I was babying her like a new parent.
I guess one of the people at the restaurant said something to my wife in Chinese, because I don't speak Chinese, it was something like, "If you keep doing that to your kid, your kid will always expect you to do that." Like it's a slippery slope. At that time, I was like, "I don't care, like, she's fine." There are some slippery slopes. I do have some friends that their tactic was to put the kid in the car seat and then stick that on the dryer, turn the dryer on.
Jim: Interesting.
Dave: Because it replicates the movement, and they're like, "It was great," that we didn't have to go anywhere. That was their masterstroke. Everybody kind of had their way around it.
Jim: I always had mixed feelings about it because, on one hand, you're not getting in an auto accident when you're at home. You just open up that possibility. Second, I'm totally sleep-deprived. I'm half-awake driving my newborn around in the city and traffic. That just wasn't a great idea.
Dave: I do remember a 3:00 AM drive through the city, and I was like, "This is an interesting way to see the city." I took it in at that point, because I'm like, "It's been so long since I've been driving around at three in the morning in the city."
Jim: Some things you don't do anymore.
Dave: Yes. Those days are long gone. Just sort of get back onto the support side of things, what was interesting for me, my parents were very supportive of how we wanted to parent the child. I think because of that, they just sort of kept their distance at the beginning to allow us to sort of find our footing, and in hindsight, once my mother-in-law left, I think maybe I should have gone to them for a little bit more support. Like you said, actually, the biggest thing is just catching up on the sleep. With our firstborn, I never felt overwhelmed.
I certainly remember being sleep-deprived and that was kind of the biggest issue, but I never felt like, "Okay, I can't handle this." For the most part, I'm like, "I got this." There were certainly times where the baby is crying and you don't know what's going on, and there's some level of frustration there, but most of the time, I'm like, "Well, I'll just wait it out." Like I'm a pretty patient guy, even when the kid is screaming. There are times too when it's like, "Okay, well, let's just walk away for a couple of minutes and then come back. Like it's they're crying. It's not the end of the world."
The main thing I think that I should have tried to get more help with was the daytime naps. Maybe just going over to my parents' place, just be like, "Hey, I'm just here to sleep. If you can just watch the kid, and we can all just take a nap, that would be great." I would say one of the bigger things is just the standard, ins and outs of having a house.
Like laundry, dishes, chores, cleaning, this and that.
I think those were the kinds of things that you just, you get so far behind on and that still need to be done even though you don't have a lot of time. I think those were the biggest challenges, was just trying to find time to do laundry and to do the dishes, the dishes in particular, because those babies, if you're doing a little bit of bottle-feeding, the bottles back up. We had Doc Brown, it's like six pieces to those bottles. I hate like-- When we stopped the bottles, that was the greatest day of my life. I would say, for me personally, I was much happier when we got rid of the bottles.
Then when we got rid of the diapers, I was overjoyed to get rid of the diapers, but the bottles to me were just, like six pieces and like the little nipples [crosstalk]. Those kinds of things back up pretty quickly. Unlike laundry, where we joked about it, you could literally wear a shirt five days in a row. The dishes need to get done. People have to eat, bottles need to be cleaned. I think that was something that I maybe should have either asked for help for or just straight up gotten plastic or disposable and just said, "You know what? Screw it. This is weird. If it keeps our sanity for a little while, so be it." The other thing is also, I would say, just help with food.
Jim: Yes. That was going to be my point. Of all the support, if people gave food, just get it, for the same reason you're talking about.
Dave: Never say no to food. What we do, when we have friends these days for their firstborns, we always give them, like Uber Eats or DoorDash, like out of anything you ever get for your baby, because you're going to get like 20 different Onesies and you're going to get a whole bunch of Burp Cloths, like far more stuff than you need. I guarantee you the most useful thing in all of that will be the food. Especially now that there are so many more options with all of these other vendors that will drop anything off at your house.
That is, I would say, the number one way that you can support somebody or when people are asking you, like, "What can I do?" Is like, "Look, just hook me up with some food" because I don't have time to cook. I don't have time-- I barely can stay awake long enough to do all this stuff.
Jim: It doesn't have to be the homemade lasagna. It doesn't have to be the-- The gift card is a great idea.
Dave: Actually, I remember in prepping for life when we got back from the hospital, I actually had bought some frozen food. I'm like, "Look, just in case,I know there will be days when I don't have time to cook, so let's just nuke something." For my wife, there are a few services, I think it's Chinese culture particularly, where there's certain things that you're supposed to eat after you've given birth to get back your nutrients and all this stuff.
There's like a fairly regimented list of foods that you're supposed to eat in those first few weeks. We signed up for that for the first child. Actually, my wife's food was taken care of, which was great, but it did leave me to fend for myself. Just think through that, but that is really a big thing. Then, I would say for the second child, one thing that you can ask for if you've got good friends or maybe if there are cousins around, is a play date for the older child, just so that there's less people in the house, just so you can maybe sneak in a nap here or there.
The older child still feels like they've got something going on, and like a sleepover, again, just to kind of get the kid out of the house, the older one, just for 24 hours. Even if they're self-sufficient, it's still like one more mouth to feed, one more meal to think about. Whereas, if it's just a couple of parents and you're tired, like, "All right, it's cereal for dinner, screw it," or "maybe there's no dinner or here's a piece of bread. Like we're doing prison-style tonight."
It's just, even if your oldest is older, there's still somebody that you're responsible for. If you could pawn that kid off on a friend, on a family member or something just for a night, I would say do that. I think those kinds of things just take the load off of-- Even with the second child can, be a stressful environment, especially depending on the temperament of the second one.
Jim: Yes, I agree. It's easier to give a two-and-a-half or a three-year-old to grandma, in my opinion, handing off the baby. You're right, [crosstalk] extra breathing room.
Dave: Yes. I think generally what we've found is that it's easier to hand off the older one, and also, I think people are just a little bit more open to that because they know they're not going to have to do the nighttime routine. I think that's the one thing that most of-- Most of the grandparents that come over to help out, they're like, "I am perfectly happy to help you out in the daytime, but when I go to sleep, I'm going to sleep." Like you're on your own for the nighttime routine, which I mean, "Hey, look, if we can just get help in the daytime, I will take that any day of the week."
Certainly, the nighttime routine can get pretty brutal. If you can get daytime help in any way possible so that you can get the naps in and sleep during the day and be up at night, take that any way you can.
Jim: I was thinking if I've got any closing thoughts or final thoughts about all this, it's just, all of us should just be comfortable asking for what you need, and it's hard to do in any circumstance and certainly as a new parent, but I'd just encourage people to do that. Whatever you need, ask for that help because we all need it.
Dave: Yes. Don't feel shy. What was that? It takes a village, especially when they're young. I think especially when it's your first one where it really is hard and you really don't know what you're doing. I remember the first few weeks of just going, "I'm not clear why this kid is crying." You have that checklist, "This, this, and this." You go down the checklist and you've gotten to the bottom and you've checked everything off, and the kid is still wailing, and you lose the sleep, there's the level of frustration, everybody is tired, sleep-deprived. Plus you're juggling all these other things, and even, in some cases, one parent goes back to work maybe sooner than they want.
It's possible that after just two weeks, you're trying to juggle nighttime routines and going back to work and all sorts of stuff. I think the main thing is don't be shy, hopefully that you've got a support network. Obviously, it doesn't always work that way. Sometimes people are living in new cities where they don't have a support network yet, or for whatever reason, the support network is not able to provide that much support, but I think as much as you can, reach out.
Actually, here's another thing. I think one thing that helped my wife was, I think for both of our kids, randomly, she had a friend whose child-- I think our kids are, I think the oldest are a day or two apart, and the youngest ones are a couple of weeks apart. Both moms were pregnant at the same time. When they were nursing, they could basically chat because they knew the other one was up nursing as well, so there was this sort of like comradery, esprit de corps, knowing that it sucks, "I'm up at 3:00 in the morning feeding the child, but I know my friend here is doing the same thing."
At any given time, there was always somebody awake for her to say, "Hey, how is it going" and check in with. If you're lucky, maybe that's another avenue where you can commiserate with somebody else who's going through the same thing and who you basically know will be up at weird hours that you could reach out to. If that's available to you, don't be shy, maybe organize that in advance and try and make that a thing that you think about planning for it.
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