What tips would you give a brand new mom?

The responses we saw most often were:

• Trust Your Instincts
• Breastfeed
• Cherish Every Moment
• Join a Parenting Community
• Sleep when your baby sleeps
• Have pre-made meals handy
• Try to rest and relax

And here is how it broke down …

From our Forums

LaurenOlalde: Advice that many gave me but I didn’t believe, “Time goes by so fast.” The first year has come and gone and my once newborn is now a toddler, I cant even begin to explain where the time has gone.

KimPossible:  Write everything down because you will forget a few months/years later.

Editor’s Note – or add them to your Babies Online Milestones Tracker!

BreezyChas: NEVER wake a sleeping baby….and NEVER hold a sleeping baby (well for long) … In my experience with mine….with our first we held her all the time when she was sleeping because she was new and she would never sleep without someone holding her. With my second we didn’t hold her as much when sleeping and she slept a lot better…by my third…he’d sleep all night in his crib because we didn’t hold him while sleeping…

oceangirl: Trust your instincts.

KimPossible: Don’t be afraid to question your child’s pediatrician or to disagree with him, you are the parent and have the final say.  Do your research, ask other parents for advise you might be surprised what you learn.  Join a parenting message board!! The knowledge and info you learn/receive is priceless!!  Do reviews on products before making a purchase. You might find that something you think is cool but have gotten horrible reviews by other parents.

2CuteBoys: Always trust your instincts, IMO you can never spoil a baby enjoy her/him cause time does go by fast,cherish every moment,be open and honest with your kids,be paient with them…

Frances: My advice would be to take other people’s criticism with a grain of salt. Not everyone will agree with the way you parent YOUR baby… if you choose to breastfeed you may get negativity from people that formula feed or vice versa. As long as your baby is fed, clothed, loved, healthy, safe and happy there is no right or wrong way to parent. You have to do what is best and works for your family regardless of what others have to say. Don’t ever let anyone make you feel you are inferior because you don’t do things the way they did.

From our Twitter Friends

• inklesstales Don’t let your mother or mother-in-law make you afraid. YOU’RE the mommy now.  (2)  Breastfeeding HURTS, but it doesn’t last, and then it’s very cool, and FREE, and healthier – & go ahead & do it in public. (3)  Trust your instincts. You may not know medicine, you may not know much, but YOU KNOW UR BABY.

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  canadiancollect:  Never brag when baby is sleeping well. You’ll jinx it!
  
  
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  rapidreasoning: Advice from someone who just gave birth…treasure every single moment with your new baby!!
  
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• BreastfedBabies: Join LLL so you can have breastfeeding friends and join MOMS Club so you can have Mom friends close by!
  
  
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  backwoodbarbie1: Sleep when they sleep.and you can never take to many pictures!!!

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  cindyambrose: If it’s someone close, pre-made meals. if not, maybe vouchers for a pizza place?

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  mommymichelle6:  seek out experienced mom’s to act as mentors. Raising a child REALLY does take a village.

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  kaboogie: There’s ’nuff advice, not enough support. Do what makes sense, leave the rest behind.
  
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  Juicytots:  stock your freezer with quick easy food

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  Soph4Soph: rest as much as you can & see a movie!!

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  CynSieWil: Stock your freezer with three weeks’ worth of dinners–you will NOT have energy to cook or shop
  
  
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  kaboogie: RELAX and use your natural instincts.
  
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  dancingsisters:  Sleep when your baby sleeps. You don’t know when your next chance may be!
  
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  windwardskies:  trust your instincts! All the books/advice in the world can’t compare to what you feel is right.

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  Bncngoffthwlls: The key to good parenting is to always know what your next best distraction will be! U always need 2 know what UR going 2 distract UR kids w/ BEFORE U do something that U know will cause meltdown!

From our Facebook Friends

I was surprised that our Facebook Fans were so quiet on this one, but we did get a few responses …

Renee H

My advice: Take time out for yourself! You don’t have to be “super-mom” like you think. The better you take care of yourself, the better you’ll take care of your little one!

Donna H

Nap when the little one sleeps

Jenni B

Go with your gut instinct. People will off you plenty of advice, but there is something to be said about a mother’s instinct – it’s usually right on.

Lori W

What I would tell a new parent: Read….read….read….oh, and relax and enjoy your child! Even though babies don’t come with “directions”, don’t worry that you’ll do something wrong. Your own “mother’s instinct” will kick in automatically without even thinking about it! Did I say read?…………..

From our Myspace Friends

Heather W

Rayne’s Mommy

Always remember when you feel you are having a bad day….Look at your baby and everything becomes better!

Karen

(Haha…sorry that was some advice I heard when I was prego with my first and I’ve always remembered it.)

Latoya G

Be prepared to sacrifice all the time you have to properly raise your little one, it won’t spoil him but it will make him smarter. & Good communications and loving attention by parents during a child’s early years are sure to reap lasting rewards

Desiree Annette

The best is yet to come!

Don’t compare your baby to others. Every baby is different and will reach each milestone when they are good and ready.

Janelle

Rachel Briggs

Rå¢hêlLêê

*Do what you feel is right No matter who is saying not to.

*Don’t be afraid to lay the baby down, you do not have to hold them for the first year of life.

*Crying is ok. Some cries are needed to strengthen the lungs.( not all cries are though)

*Keep your faith in it all. When times get rough and you feel like there is no rest coming for you. Wait it will.

*Don’t feel guilty because you ask for help so you can rest.(If you can not function due to lack of sleep Who will care for your children?)

*DO listen to advice given some of it may be useful one day.You may not want to believe it but Your Mother & Mother-in-laws do give good advice sometimes.

*Just because you gave birth doesn’t mean you gave up on all the things you wanted to do or wanted to have. DO what you love if it requires no children,get a sitter. Do not feel bad about still doing things for yourself.

*Take Pride in your new life with baby. Be Brave,Strong,Courageous! They are all you have and they need you to protect them at all cost!

* When they are old enough to tell you to shut-up or tell you NO or repeat things they hear DO NOT feel bad about time outs or a tap on the buns to let them know its not ok. DO not be afraid to discipline. It helps guide them to be the people we want them to be and helps them to distinguish from right and wrong!!

*Last but not least *** LOVE *** with your heart n soul and give hugs and kisses and praise every chance you get! Your not promised today nor tomorrow so live life to the fullest and don’t be afraid to say what you mean and mean what you say!Protect and Love at all cost!

Sarah

Rachy

So there you have it!

Moms around the world giving you their most valuable tips.  What golden nuggets do you have to share with other new moms?

Congratulations on the birth of your new baby. This is a glorious time in your life. Whether this is your first baby or your fifth, you will find this a time of recovery, adjustment, sometimes confusion and frustration, but — most wonderfully — of falling in love.

Babies younger than four months old have very different sleep needs than older babies. This article will help you understand your newborn baby’s developing sleep patterns, and will help you develop reasonable expectations when it comes to your baby and sleep.

Read, Learn, and Beware of Bad Advice
Absolutely everyone has an opinion about how you should handle sleep issues with your new baby. The danger to a new parent is that these tidbits of misguided advice (no matter how well-intentioned) can truly have a negative effect on our parenting skills and, by extension, our babies’ development…if we are not aware of the facts. The more knowledge you have the less likely that other people will make you doubt your parenting decisions.

When you have your facts straight, and when you have a parenting plan, you will be able to respond with confidence to those who are well-meaning but offering contrary or incorrect advice. So, your first step is to get smart! Know what you are doing, and know why you are doing it. Read books and magazines, attend classes or support groups – it all helps.

The Biology of Newborn Sleep
During the early months of your baby’s life, he sleeps when he is tired, it’s really that simple. You can do very little to force a new baby to sleep when he doesn’t want to sleep, and conversely, you can do little to wake him up when he is sleeping soundly.

A very important point to understand about newborn babies is that they have very, very tiny tummies. New babies grow rapidly, their diet is liquid, and it digests quickly. Formula digests quickly and breast milk digests even more rapidly. Although it would be nice to lay your little bundle down at a predetermined bedtime and not hear a peep from him until morning, even the most naïve among us know that this is not a realistic goal for a tiny baby. Newborns need to be fed every two to four hours — and sometimes more.

During those early months, your baby will have tremendous growth spurts that affect not only daytime, but also nighttime feeding as well, sometimes pushing that two- to four-hour schedule to a one- to two-hour schedule around the clock.

Sleeping “through the night”
You have probably heard that babies should start “sleeping through the night” at about two to four months of age. What you must understand is that, for a new baby, a five-hour stretch is a full night. Many (but nowhere near all) babies at this age can sleep uninterrupted from midnight to 5 a.m. (Not that they always do.) A far cry from what you may have thought “sleeping through the night” meant!

What’s more, while the scientific definition of “sleeping through the night” is five hours, most of us wouldn’t consider that anywhere near a full night’s sleep for ourselves. Also, some of these sleep-through-the-nighters will suddenly begin waking more frequently, and it’s often a full year or even two until your little one will settle into a mature, all-night, every night sleep pattern.

Falling Asleep at the Breast or Bottle
It is very natural for a newborn to fall asleep while sucking at the breast, a bottle, or a pacifier. When a baby always falls asleep this way, he learns to associate sucking with falling asleep; over time, he cannot fall asleep any other way. I have heard a number of sleep experts refer to this as a “negative sleep association.” I certainly disagree, and so would my baby. It is probably the most positive, natural, pleasant sleep association a baby can have. However, a large percentage of parents who are struggling with older babies who cannot fall asleep or stay asleep are fighting this natural and powerful sucking-to-sleep association.

Therefore, if you want your baby to be able to fall asleep without your help, it is essential that you sometimes let your newborn baby suck until he is sleepy, but not totally asleep. When you can, remove the breast, bottle, or pacifier from his mouth and let him finish falling asleep without something in his mouth. When you do this, your baby may resist, root, and fuss to regain the nipple. It’s perfectly okay to give him back the breast, bottle, or pacifier and start over a few minutes later. If you do this often enough, he will eventually learn how to fall asleep without sucking.

Waking for Night Feedings
Many pediatricians recommend that parents shouldn’t let a newborn sleep longer than three or four hours without feeding, and the vast majority of babies wake far more frequently than that. (There are a few exceptional babies who can go longer.) No matter what, your baby will wake up during the night. The key is to learn when you should pick her up for a night feeding and when you can let her go back to sleep on her own.

This is a time when you need to focus your instincts and intuition. This is when you should try very hard to learn how to read your baby’s signals. Here’s a tip that is critically important for you to know. Babies make many sleeping sounds, from grunts to whimpers to outright cries, and these noises don’t always signal awakening. These are what I call sleeping noises, and your baby is nearly or even totally asleep during these episodes. I remember when my first baby, Angela, was a newborn. Her cry awakened me many times, yet she was asleep in my arms before I even made it from cradle to rocking chair. She was making sleeping noises. In my desire to respond to my baby’s every cry, I actually taught her to wake up more often!

You need to listen and watch your baby carefully. Learn to differentiate between these sleeping sounds and awake and hungry sounds. If she is awake and hungry, you’ll want to feed her as quickly as possible. If you respond immediately when she is hungry, she will most likely go back to sleep quickly. But, if you let her cry escalate, she will wake herself up totally, and it will be harder and take longer for her to go back to sleep. Not to mention that you will then be wide awake, too!

Help Your Baby Distinguish Day from Night
A newborn baby sleeps about sixteen to eighteen hours per day, and this sleep is distributed evenly over six to seven brief sleep periods. You can help your baby distinguish between nighttime sleep and daytime sleep, and thus help him sleep longer periods at night.

Begin by having your baby take his daytime naps in a lit room where he can hear the noises of the day, perhaps a bassinet or cradle located in the main area of your home. Make nighttime sleep dark and quiet. You can also help your baby differentiate day naps from night sleep by using a nightly bath and a change into sleeping pajamas to signal the difference between the two.

Watch for Signs of Tiredness
One way to encourage good sleep is to get familiar with your baby’s sleepy signals and put her down to sleep as soon as she seems tired. A baby cannot put herself to sleep, nor can she understand her own sleepy signs. Yet a baby who is encouraged to stay awake when her body is craving sleep is typically an unhappy baby. Over time, this pattern develops into sleep deprivation, which further complicates your baby’s developing sleep maturity. Learn to read your baby’s sleepy signs — such as quieting down, losing interest in people and toys, and fussing — and put her to bed when that window of opportunity presents itself.

Make Yourself Comfortable
I’ve yet to hear a parent tell me that she or he loves getting up throughout the night to tend to a baby’s needs. As much as we adore our little bundles, it’s tough when you’re woken up over and over again, night after night. Since it’s a fact that your baby will be waking you up, you may as well make yourself as comfortable as possible. The first step is to learn to relax about night wakings right now. Being stressed or frustrated about having to get up won’t change a thing. The situation will improve day by day; and before you know it, your little newborn won’t be so little anymore — she’ll be walking and talking and getting into everything in sight…during the day, and sleeping peacefully all night long.

About the Author:
Elizabeth Pantley is the author of several books, including Gentle Baby Care : No-cry, No-fuss, No-worry — Essential Tips for Raising Your Baby, The No-Cry Sleep Solution: Gentle Ways to Help Your Baby Sleep Through the Night, Kid Cooperation (with an introduction by William Sears, MD), Perfect Parenting, as well as her latest The No-Cry Sleep Solution for Toddlers and Preschoolers and is also president of Better Beginnings, Inc. She is a popular speaker on family issues, and her newsletter, Parent Tips, is seen in schools nationwide. She appears as a regular radio show guest, and has been quoted in Parents, Parenting, Redbook, Good Housekeeping, American Baby, Working Mother, and Woman’s Day magazines. Visit Elizabeth’s web site http://www.pantley.com/elizabeth.