Husband, Family, Nanny. Who Will Give a Hand First?
Sometimes, the entire burden of infant care falls squarely on the shoulders of new parents, but often, their relatives, who are willing to take responsibility for some problems, that might arise after a baby is born, give a hand.
Sharing Responsibilities and Asking for Help
Everyone knows that after giving birth, a woman needs a help, but not everyone knows what to do to be helpful. After a vaginal delivery, if the postpartum recovery is fast enough, and the baby is correctly attached to the breast and has no health problems, a new mother can gradually adapt herself to find time for her regular family routines, for example, housecleaning and cooking. But in the first days and even weeks after birth a woman definitely needs some help to solve everyday problems. After cesarean section or obstructed labor help is needed over a longer period of time.
Some women, first of all, ask their own mothers to give a hand, but if it is not possible, they can hire a nanny, and “free” time between feedings can be used for sleeping and housework.
Finding out, whether a family member is available and willing to help and to what extend he is willing to become involved, or hiring a nanny should be discussed before the baby is born, in order to avoid any problem, when a new mother returns home from the hospital. It may be also desirable to prepare a new farther for his some new responsibilities.
As a rule, the best helping hands for a woman in the first few months after giving birth are her mother and her husband. Some women give priority to their husbands, followed by their mothers, baby`s grandmothers. The third place goes to a nanny. It sometimes happens that a grandfather can be successfully involved in the process…
What Family Members and Paid Helpers Can Do
They can make a new mother completely “free”, giving her some time for herself (she needs to pamper herself with manicure, pedicure, massage and hair treatment), giving an opportunity to keep abreast of professional affairs (for example, if her professional activity is related to the constant changes in legislation that she has to track making her returning to work after maternity leave easy); giving some time for hobbies, making handmade baby toys; sleeping or going shopping and buying something new as soon as she starts to return to her pre-pregnant fitness level and shape.
The helping hands can “pickup” cleaning, cooking, walking with pets, purchasing food and other necessities, can help with payments, paperwork at her company office and other problems that may arise after the baby is born; walking with the baby in the park, when he falls asleep in the stroller, play with him, if he does not sleep.... and may help with everything that is not directly related to breastfeeding. If a few helping hands are available, and responsibilities are distributed uniformly, then none of them will feel "overextended", and a new mother will never remember her first months after birth, as "horrible" ones.
A new mother should talk with her family and paid personnel about what kind of help she needs, and what she can (want) do herself to do everything as good as possible, to avoid conflicts, and to prevent her family`s sleep deprivation.
Usually six or eight weeks after the baby's birth the family adapted to the new routine and new responsibilities. A lot of changes will happen in the future, but it is easy to manage them, if new parents used to talk about any problem and share hardship and joy together.
