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ParentGaf OT: Birth, Bib and Beyond

U

User 100115

Banned
We can agree as parents that kids are amazing. They are adorable, and make our lives more joyful just by being there, and you get to watch as they make their first steps into this big bad world. We can all agree that being a parent is also tough. Those cute balls of poop and vomit eventually start walking and talking and learning how to manipulate us and....It helps to have support!

Welcome to ParentGaf, where you can rant, ask for advice, brag, tell those funny, cute stories your friends don't get, whatever. Or those oddly terrifying stories that only other parents will get that are funny in retrospect.

People have talked about creating a central parenting thread on Gaf for awhile, so I decided to bite the bullet and do it myself. The OT will evolve as we do.

Book Recommendations:

The Happiest Baby on the Block

Healthy Sleep Habits, Healthy Child

The Sh!t No One Tells You: A Guide to Surviving Your Baby's First Year

The Sh!t No One Tells You About Toddlers : A Guide to Surviving the Toddler Years
 
C

Chopper

Member
As of seven months ago, I can proudly join ParentGaf. This is my son, Axel. He is the fucking best. Just working on weening and crawling at the moment. He is turning into a fine little human.

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I don't really have any recommendations re: books or websites. We're kind of blagging this. But the Wonder Weeks app is pretty cool.
 
Rest

Rest

All these years later I still chuckle at what a fucking moron that guy is.
One of my friend's kids has started eating on his own recently. Toddlers are so happy when they eat, it's kind of amazing.
 
JetBlackPanda

JetBlackPanda

Member
I have a 3 year old daughter at home and she is the magic that makes my world run. Sure I was happy before. Gaming,hobbies, my wife etc. but nothing can compare the pure JOY my daughter brings me.

amazing stuff.
 
C

captive

Joe Six-Pack: posting for the common man
My son turned 1 on August 31st.

Book recommendation, courtesy of Ronito a while back actually, The Happiest Baby on the Block.
 
D

Deleted member 125677

Unconfirmed Member
We've got two boys, 6 and 3 years old. They're the best when they're not busy trying to kill each other! :)
 
X

XiaNaphryz

LATIN, MATRIPEDICABUS, DO YOU SPEAK IT
Have a 9 and a 6 year old, I know the teen years will arrive before I realize that much time has passed.
 
Rest

Rest

All these years later I still chuckle at what a fucking moron that guy is.
Fiction said:
[...]and I already had to take his cheapy tablet away for getting busted surfing porn. Whhhhhhy.
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Fiction, come on. Let the boy have his porn.
 
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superdeluxe

Member
Have a 5 year old and 1 month old, the little one is sleeping in 5 hour stretches so we are loving that. Problem is the 5 year old wakes up during the night and needs comforting :/
 
DJ_Lae

DJ_Lae

Member
We have three girls (5, 3, 4 months)...which is a lot of girls. I'm not looking forward to their teenage years.

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They're great, but I'm at the point now where I'm so far behind on sleep (among other things) I feel like a perpetual zombie.

Youngest has congenital hypothyroidism too, which is new to us. I've had health issues myself the past couple of years but it's something else to put your kid through a barrage of tests when they're barely out of the womb (she started taking synthetic thyroid at 6 days). Having said that, it's about as mild a condition you could expect and there are no real dangers with it...just having to remember to take the stuff every single day for the rest of her life and periodic bloodwork to ensure it's on track.
 
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PanicFreak

Member
My baby girl was born 7 months ago. She is crawling and teething and learning to eat on her own. This has been the messiest, sleepiest and most hectic time of my life. Just this morning, I put her on the floor in the middle of her room to put on my shirt. Shirted up, I walk back into her room and find her missing. I look in the bathroom and she is sitting on the floor, playing with the cord of my wife's hot curling iron.

We have a lot to learn but I've never been so fulfilled.
 
X

XiaNaphryz

LATIN, MATRIPEDICABUS, DO YOU SPEAK IT
DJ_Lae said:
We have three girls (5, 3, 4 months)...which is a lot of girls. I'm not looking forward to their teenage years.
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My wife is also one of three girls in her family, her sisters are just a couple years apart from her. I first met them all in high school.

You are already dead.
 
E

excowboy

Member
Parent of a 2 1/2 girl (who mainly enjoys dinosaurs, but today built a rocket) and a 2 day overdue baby who I cannot flipping wait to meet!
Any protips welcome :)
 
D

DaveTheSnake

Member
Proud parent of a soon-to-be 2 year old girl. She loves airplanes, dogs, Elmo, and taking selfies. She is the light of my world.

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#2 is due in late October, a boy!
 
M

MonkeyKing

Member
Three girls, ages 9, 7 and 5.

So the other day, the 7yo tells me what her schoolmates told her: that babies come out of mommies privates. Is that true, daddy?

*sigh* yes, except for c-section babies, most babies come from mommies privates.

"daddy how did the baby get in there"?

.....y'all wanna play some Minecraft? YEAH!! Go play before I change my mind.
 
G

Goodlife

Member
Another dad of 3 girls here, seem to be a few of us about!

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4, 3 and 1.
They are all pretty bonkers, in their own way.

And as above, the teenage years fill me with dread already
 
H

H.Protagonist

[-_-]/
Yay! Nice work, Fiction. <3

Impressed with you 2+ kids families. Seems such a rarity today. I'm not a member of Parent GAF just yet, but I'm 4+ months in now and the dough is rising nicely. It's an absolutely bizarre experience, this pregnancy thing. *_*

Any other expecting moms (I imagine the number is very small on this forum):)P) or soon-to-be-first-time dads...?
 
choodi

choodi

Banned
Father of two here (girl and boy).

My oldest (girl) is turning 3 on Monday and the little guy is almost 18 months.

I've had loads of fun buying geeky outfits for them both. There's some awesome Star Wars clothes available at the moment and I've had to resist buying all of it for them.
 
H

Hanmik

Member
Fiction said:
Do I have the oldest kids so far?

I want advice too sometimes! Lol

Mine are 12, 10, and 8.
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I have three girls with my lovely wife.. they are 11,10 and 5. But I have a daughter from a previous relationship that is 17 (but she wants nothing to do with me, she would rather see me dead)
 
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neorej

ERMYGERD!
Proud father of a 3 (4 in november) year old girl here. It's amazing how much energy she can give back to you. Just her smile and bright blue eyes waking you up in the morning gives you more juice to start the day than any cup of coffee ever could.
 
choodi

choodi

Banned
Hanmik said:
I have three girls with my lovely wife.. they are 11,10 and 5. But I have a daughter from a previous relationship that is 17 (but she wants nothing to do with me, she would rather see me dead)
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That's pretty rough dude. Is there anything you can do to build some sort of bridge?
 
M

mrklaw

MrArseFace
Fiction said:
Yeah >.<

So! Long lessons on internet safety are in order before he (or his little brother, because apparently he thought it was a bright idea to share his discovery of naked ladies online with his 10 year old brother) gets free access to the internets again.

BTW, parents of older kids, pro tip: THEY LEARN TO DELETE THEIR INTERNET HISTORY FROM OTHER KIDS AT SCHOOL. You're welcome.
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I need to figure something out here too. Daughter aged 12 and son aged 14. Daughter is locked in her room half the time instagramming her friends. Son not too bad, mostly in the living room with us.

I have microsoft family safety set on their computer but I don't know how well that reports where they have bee surfing, also I'm not that comfortable with snooping on them. And of course on their iPads it is entirely useless.

I have some restrictions set on the iPad for my daughter, just to avoid accidental exposure to pron. but I don't know how easy it might be to get around that, especially if they are actively looking. My ISP has blockers I can turn on too. Obviously they can and will still find it, but I think it makes sense for it to not be quite so easy to get hold of.
 
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Hanmik

Member
choodi said:
That's pretty rough dude. Is there anything you can do to build some sort of bridge?
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nope.. I have tried for many years. Nothing to do..

I know she told a new class some years ago (when she introduced herself), that she did not have a father, he was dead many years ago. Shit like that hits hard..

But life must go on.. And I have a lovely family now that means the world to me.
 
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anarckitty

Member
H.Protagonist said:
Any other expecting moms (I imagine the number is very small on this forum):)P) or soon-to-be-first-time dads...?
Click to expand...

Expecting mom reporting in. I have a 3 year old daughter who is turning 4 on December 26th. My son is due December 23rd, so we're celebrating my daughter's birthday in early December instead.

Have you found out if you're having a boy or girl yet?
 
V

Vincent Grayson

Member
http://imgur.com/mfL6ioC

My girls, 11 and 9 (from left to right).

I live a life surrounded by women nearly 100% of the time now. I don't mind it, but it has its...quirks. The girls still haven't hit puberty, so I don't know the full extent of the nightmarish hell I'll be entering sometime in the next few years.

That said, my oldest is an absolute amazing human being, and bizarrely astute and logical for her age. She's got some crippling social anxiety though, and that's been tough for her for a while. My wife and I have been a lot more on top of this kind of stuff than our parents were though, since both of us had some serious issues with depression growing up, and she's definitely improving. I think starting martial arts has helped a lot.

My youngest seems to be taking after my stubbornness to an upsetting degree, and she's absolutely nailed the tearing up and puppy dog eye bullshit that ends up getting us every time. I suspect she is going to be a nightmarish combination of myself and my younger sister in her teen years.

But for now, life with them is pretty great. They're good students, sweet kids, wicked smart (though luckily not enough to be unwilling to work when things don't come easy), and really growing into people I can be proud to call my children and who I suspect will go on to do some interesting things.

My oldest currently wants to be a baker/forensic person (likes Bones, she says). I guess the baking will happen in her off hours. Kids are weird.
 
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aett

Member
We've got a 4-year-old son (who's closer to 5), and we've got a daughter due next month.

We made the decision to have the second kid because the first one seemed to be doing a good job sleeping through the night, so of course he has recently been proving us wrong. He woke me up several times last night, with the final one being a little before my alarm clock, when he somehow kicked me in the throat.
 
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Number45

Member
anarckitty said:
Expecting mom reporting in. I have a 3 year old daughter who is turning 4 on December 26th. My son is due December 23rd, so we're celebrating my daughter's birthday in early December instead.

Have you found out if you're having a boy or girl yet?
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Yikes, that's an expensive Christmas! D:
 
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GPsych

Member
I am a proud father of a 5 week old daughter. She's basically the best thing in the world, although I literally got zero sleep last night. I'm at work right now surfing GAF (and effectively stealing from taxpayers as I work at a school district), but I lack the energy to do anything productive at the moment. I assume the sleep thing will get better eventually.
 
A

anarckitty

Member
Number45 said:
Yikes, that's an expensive Christmas! D:
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Tell me about it!

Last year we ended up celebrating my daughter's birthday in mid January. I think we'll do that again for both children next year. I want to make sure they get their own special day and it doesn't get lumped in with Christmas.

GPsych said:
I am a proud father of a 5 week old daughter. She's basically the best thing in the world, although I literally got zero sleep last night. I'm at work right now surfing GAF (and effectively stealing from taxpayers as I work at a school district), but I lack the energy to do anything productive at the moment. I assume the sleep thing will get better eventually.
Click to expand...

Every baby is different, but more than likely it will get better eventually. Some kids do great with sleep training, and I've heard some are absolute nightmares and don't sleep through the night. In fact, one of my friends has a 7 month old son and she told me he's slept through the night a total of 2 times. =/

Good luck, and I hope you can eventually get caught up on some sleep.
 
Icefire1424

Icefire1424

Member
To those out there severely lacking sleep, yes, it does get better. Little bit at a time, but soon they only start waking up twice a night, then once, then you get that one morning you wake up and realize it's actually morning, and you didn't wake up at that night. At which point you will immediately run into the nursery to make sure everything is okay, to find your little one sound asleep. I still do that.
 
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Hanmik

Member
My 11 year old daughter had colic when she was 1 month old untill she was 3 months old..
And my 5 year old also had colic when she was 2 months old untill she was 4 months old.

You feel like nothing helps, it´s a fucking nightmare..
 
S

Skiptastic

Member
My son just turned one month old yesterday. He's gained three pounds in that time!

He's pretty much average in length and weight, so the wife and I are happy. As he continues to get longer periods of sleep, we are even happier!
 
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