Being a new mum can be challenging. All of a sudden you have this extra person in your life that you need to completely cater and care for. While this is a wonderful and beautiful time it can certainly be a demanding and stressful due to the round the clock nature of caring for a baby. Certainly for new mums without the experience of 'been there and done that', they can be left feeling overwhelmed by the sense of change and the unknown ahead.
The real key is having ways to cope with the new demands of parenting. There are many ways that you can streamline your life in order to still be able to stay motivated and productive in tasks on a day to day basis:
Get Friends and Family to help
They’re your family and friends for a reason ! They will be well aware of this huge change that will have happened in your life, and there’s no doubt that as your family and friends they will be more than willing to give you an extra hand every now and again. Whether it’s looking after the baby for a couple of hours while you do something, helping to get food from the shops, or just generally being there to offer that extra bit of support, it could make everything that bit easier. The time to ask for a little bit of support is when you first think of it and most people are only too willing to be asked.
Organise your days beforehand leaving time for the unexpected
To help streamline your time and make your day as stress free as possible, it might be useful to plan our days, or even your week beforehand. It’s very easy to get caught up in the whirlwind of being so focused on your baby that you might forget other important things that need doing, be it laundry, exercises, maybe a meet up with friends etc. By having organised times to do complete tasks and attend social meet ups can really help you stay on top on your own life as well as the baby’s, giving you the feeling that there is a sense of control of your world.
Bath time with the baby
Even finding the time to do something like showering or bathing might see almost insurmountable when you’ve got your hands full with this whole new parenting role. But a good two birds, one stone technique is to incorporate your bath times with the baby. Not only is this a great time saver its also a good bonding experience between baby and parent.
Decluttering the house
Having a messy home at any time can be frustrating and make it feel like there’s more on your plate and more to do than what there really is. When a baby joins the family, homes are far more prone to getting cluttered as the attention shifts from maintaining your home to giving your time and attention to your little one. A way to deal with this is by organising items that you think you won’t need in the meantime and get them out of the way. While this may seem pointless, it’s very easy to get into the habit of holding on to items that you don’t need. It’s not until they are gone that you realise they were just taking up needless space, not just in your living space, but also in the back of your mind as well. By decluttering and minimalizing your living space it will create a sense of space and calm for both you and the baby by having more space and less distraction. A case of less is more. By having less things taking up space in the home, meaning less cleaning and less dusting, less stuff to trip over, and less chance of discovering your baby trying to eat your ornaments.
Meet friends for breakfast or lunch, not dinner
Whilst it is great to have friends around for support and companionship in the evening, for some people, and at certain times for all of us, it can be rather challenging to maintain a consistent and close relationship especially through those first few months of raising a baby.
A good way of coping with this is meeting with friends earlier in the day for social occasions such as breakfast and lunch. These are relatively smaller meals than dinner, meaning that they won’t take up as much time during the day or be so full on as an evening get together. This leaves the evening period of the day where your likely to be feeling a bit more tired and perhaps in a less social mood, free to properly focus on what needs doing without worrying about getting ready to go out or more likely, to be having people around. A local Café is a great place to meet with other mums for a light breakfast or lunch, be social, have a catch up, children as well, with the icing on the cake that no one mum is left to do the washing up or tidy up afterwards.
(Could include link to article that is about how snugglebundl is minimalist (blanket/carry baby in it) and time efficient?)