The Not To Do List : Survival Tips for the First Year

On the night of our son's first birthday, the husband and I broke open a fancy bottle of wine (translation: more than $7.00). After all, its not just his celebration, it's ours . We made it. We became. We walked without holding on to anything.

So here's my list of survival tips for attachment parents of high needs children trying to make it through twelve months without burnout.

DO NOT:

1. Go on a diet. Chances are, if you're nursing a high need baby on demand you'll nurse more often than you expected and much longer than you planned and you'll need those calories. Plus, you'll probably need the chocolate.

2. Get ahead of yourself. Every time munchkin had some small movement towards independence my husband and I were all like, wow, that was so easy. I bet in another month he'll be sleeping by himself in his own room and we could get a babysitter and go on dates and I could start going back to that writing groups and... and... and then he would nurse eleven times the next night.

3. Compare yourself to people who are nothing like yourself--i.e. people who are sleeping eight hours in a row every night and can therefore easily string together coherent sentences and remember other peoples names.

4. Complain (or admit difficulty) to people who don't support your parenting choices. It will just give them another reason to tell you why what you are doing is really stupid.

Example:
Friend: So how's your baby sleeping? Is he sleeping through the night yet?
You: No, not yet. I'm sooo tired. This morning I actually found my toothbrush in the freezer.
Friend: Yeah, I learned that lesson with my first baby. I let him sleep with me for the first month and it was the biggest mistake. I was much smarter with my second one.

5. Spend too much time inside, alone. Even though your baby's demands are time intensive and you are too sleep deprived to get behind a wheel most days, find ways to take part in civilization even if it is only through a trip to the mailbox. Get outside. Walk. Participare in something normal and humanizing.

6. Submit poems about your birth experience to prestigious magazines.

7. Do anything you do not believe in doing. Listen to your own conscience, your own parenting intuition. Be the parent you want to be.

8. Work during nap times. As Dr. Sears points out, naps are too precious to waste on anything but rest. Watch ridiculous day time tv. Call an old friend. Take a bath with too many bubbles. Cuddle your baby some more. Do not, I repeat, do not pick up that sponge.

9. Spend time with bullies. Even if they are related to you.

10. Miss it. Even though you are tired and you haven't cut your hair in ten months (hypothetically speaking) one day you will look back on this first year as one of the sweetest, richest times of your whole life and you will want to turn to your pimply teenage son and say, "I didn't miss it, not any of it, not even while you were asleep."