Raising a child is full of surprises. No matter how many books, parenting forums, and Dr. Sears articles you read, nothing can completely prepare you for becoming a parent. If I could go back to before my daughter was born and tell myself what I didn’t know I would experience, this is what I would say.
1. Making a Baby Isn’t as Easy as It Sounds
Some people are able to reproduce as easily as bunnies, but for others, that’s not always the case. Before I got pregnant, I naively thought that whenever I would want to have a child, my husband and I would just have sex every day for a month and bam, that would be it. The human body doesn’t really work that way.
So if you’re thinking of having a child someday and want to plan the pregnancy for
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You Can Work from Home with a Child (But Only Up to a Point)
There are two periods of your children’s lives when working from home with them is a breeze: Before they’re walking (e.g., when they can entertain themselves by discovering their toes) and after they’re old enough to understand that when you’re working from home, you’re really not available. If your kid is good at entertaining him/herself, working from home is easy, but it might still give you pangs of guilt when your attention is divided. It’s hard for parents to say “No, I’m busy now” several times a day.
So even if you’re lucky enough to get to work from home, you should plan on getting childcare help once your child is old enough to demand your complete and undivided attention.
7. Don’t Worry If Your Child Isn’t Reaching Development Milestones
My daughter didn’t start walking until she was thirteen months old—about the time all the baby books said I would need to consult a doctor if she wasn’t walking by then. So of course I stressed about it. She was also in pull-up diapers longer than other kids in her daycare (a stranger even once remarked to me in a public bathroom that she was too old for diapers. Yeah, rude parenting advice from random strangers is also a thing you’ll have to get used to). So of course I stressed about