Places to go, people to see
As a new parent, the idea of leaving home, baby in tow,
can be incredibly intimidating. What do you really need to pack in
your nappy bag to survive an outing? What if they
scream/vomit/overfow their nappy in public? And how do you time it
so they're well-rested, happy, and sociable? The stroller, the
supplies, the stress! If you're thinking it may just be easier to
stay home and take a nap, Katherine Granich has a great strategy
for getting out and about with your baby with minimal
drama.
Ten days after my daughter was born, my friend, an
early-childhood development expert and educator, came to visit. She
always waited until the 10-day mark to visit new mothers, she
explained to me, because that was when the fowers were wilting, the
other visitors had dried up, the pre-made meals had been eaten, the
laundry had proliferated... and the new mum was feeling vulnerable
and a bit overwhelmed, all on her own with her baby. As she pushed
me gently into an armchair and brought me a glass of water and a
sandwich while I breastfed, she casually asked when I'd last left
the house. I was embarrassed to admit that since coming home from
hospital I hadn't even been out to the letterbox. I mumbled
something about not wanting the neighbours to see my unbrushed
hair, but my friend was wise. "You need to work on
getting out," she declared. "It's good for you and good for your
baby. Today, you will walk to the letterbox."
Every few days after that, Rebecca would
call and ask how far I'd gotten with my baby that day. It took two
or three weeks before I made it around the block with the pram - a
mission that took me over an hour to plan and execute the frst
time, and despite my forward-thinking, I forgot baby wipes and had
to jog the stroller home after a particularly explosive nappy. It
was three months before I felt confident enough to set out for the
local supermarket, a 20-minute round-trip. Unfortunately, I'd timed
that outing badly - it was pension day, and I fled, groceryless,
after the fourth stickybeaked stranger had poked her head
into my daughter's pram and enquired whether she was a boy or
a girl (she's been dressed almost exclusively in pink since birth,
for goodness' sake).
When my daughter was four-and-a-half months
old, we travelled overseas to visit family. "They're so easy to
travel with at that age!" is what people kept telling me, but 24
hours of long-haul fying probably wasn't on their agenda when their
children were newborns. Fortunately, it wasn't as bad as I thought
it would be, but the six-week visit was a blur of exhaustion. My
daughter was perplexed by the new climate (we'd gone from winter to
summer), her eating and sleeping schedule were a mess, and the
constant stream of visitors was overwhelming. When we finally flew
back to New Zealand at six months, I was ready to hole up in my
home and never leave again. All of the confidence I'd built up over
the first couple of months had been somewhat damaged by my "too
much, too soon" approach.
It took some coaxing from my
friend and another week or so of venturing only to the
letterbox, but I got back out of the house. We moved to a new
neighbourhood with a more family-friendly community, heaps of parks
and reserves, and a mall right down the road. I started taking
my daughter to baby gym one morning a week - mind you, we usually
only made it there every other week, but when we did manage to get
there in one piece, I felt so proud. I even started to think about
getting out on my own, and joined an evening women's group
that met once a week, trusting my very capable husband to handle
our daughter himself for a couple of hours. And eventually, I felt
comfortable saying to friends, "Where do you want to meet?" instead
of, "Do you just want to come to my house?"
Two-and-a-half years later, it's still
something of a mission getting out of the house on some days
(just ask my daughter's caregiver - we're chronically late to
childcare). But I've learned some simple rules that make getting
out and about more enjoyable for both of us, rather than a dreaded
event. I like to call them "the four P's": plan, pace, prioritise,
and process.
Plan
When you're a busy professional used to a
career, a schedule, meetings, conference calls, deadlines, and
"key deliverables", it can come as something of a shock to realise
that your newborn not only doesn't care that you have a Blackberry,
he or she staunchly refuses to conform to anything remotely
resembling the carefully organised schedule you're used to
programming in there.
Newborns don't come with the precisely
calibrated body clocks we adults have developed over our lifetimes,
with scheduled breaks for meals and sleep. They may spend the first
few days of their lives snoozing serenely, but unfortunately, it
doesn't last. Once you're up six times between midnight and 8am
feeding and changing a newborn, you start to know what tiredness
really is. During the day, it's sometimes all you can do to get
dressed and comb your hair. I discovered online grocery shopping
late in my pregnancy - the ultimate excuse for staying in all the
time. My newborn daughter would go in her cot for a nap, and
I'd sit down at my computer and hurriedly order up a week's
worth of food, then hide while the deliveryperson left it all on my
doorstep (so he wouldn't see me in my pyjamas).
That's fine for the first few weeks, but
eventually you do need to get out. Your baby needs fresh air and
sunshine, and you need to learn how to cope in the real world once
more. Enter The Plan.
Yes, I know it's overwhelming, the amount
of stuff your baby seems to require throughout the day, just to
keep him or her fed, clothed, and warm enough. And you probably
can't imagine carting even half of that stuff in the basket of your
pram or in your nappy bag when you go out. But here's the thing -
you don't actually NEED all that stuff when you're out. If you have
a plan, and you stick to it, you can actually be okay when out in
public with your newborn. And here's what you need in your nappy
bag:
• 2 nappies
• Travel wipes
• 2 plastic bags (one for nappies, one for wet
clothing)
• Light blanket (doubles as a changing mat or a sunshade for
the pram)
• Light jumper
• Small rattle or soothing toy
That's about it - honestly. If your child
has a dummy, toss that in there too. Many new parents overpack
their child's nappy bag with everything they can think of,
including three changes of clothing, six toys, and a week's worth
of nappies. Remember, you're not a Sherpa, and you're not scaling
Everest with Ed Hillary. Stick to the basics. Realistically, you're
not going to be away from your house long enough for your newborn
to do too much damage to your supplies. And if you do, by some
fluke, run out of nappies or other necessities, you can always run
into the supermarket on your way home and restock - or just run
home.
When going out with a toddler, the
list is much shorter. When I take my two-and-a-half-year-old
out, all we pack is a couple of nappies and wipes. It all fits
into my handbag and because I know my daughter's habits,
likes, and dislikes pretty well, I know what she can handle
and how long she'll last in a given situation before we both
have to go home and have a nap.
Timing is everything - plan your outing for
a good time of day. If you have a newborn who hasn't yet
established a sleeping or feeding schedule, it's probably best if
you limit your outings to very short durations while you work this
out. Go to the letterbox. Sit in the sun on your verandah or in the
backyard. Take a walk around the block with the pram. 
Once you have a better idea of when your
infant eats and sleeps, you can venture further afield. Go to the
postshop, the dairy, or a mother's group. Have a manageable goal in
mind - mailing a letter, buying bread and milk, or simply meeting
other new mums for a brief time.
The purpose of getting out of your house is
to reconnect with the wider
world, so make it a goal to have at least one outside interaction
per week to start. Gradually increase this to one outing a day - a
small outing, that is, like a walk or a short trip to the
local playground. Don't make the mistake I made and think you're
ready to leap from going to the supermarket to visiting relatives
overseas! This brings me to the second part of my strategy -
pace.
Pace
Olympic athletes will tell you that pace is extremely important
when you're trying to go the distance. If you do too much, too
soon, you'll burn out - and end up wanting to hide when you
actually do need to leave the house for something important, like
well-child appointments. Start small and build up your outings
gradually, both in frequency and duration.
As the parent of a newborn, you need to
make a plan to go out when you feel ready. If your baby is a week
old and you're accepting invitations to family dinners and booking
tickets for an overseas holiday, you're either really brave or
feeling really pressured. Slow down, rest, and take it slowly -
especially in those early weeks when your baby's schedule is a bit
of a mess. You need rest so that you can feed and care for your
baby.
As your baby gets older and shows more
interest in the world around him or her, going out can be quite
fun. Take a walk around your neighbourhood in the pram, or, if it's
a rainy day, head to the mall on a weekday (when it's less crowded)
and do a couple of laps while window-shopping. Grab a chai at your
local coffee shop - takeaway if your baby is starting to fret - and
just get your legs moving. Go to a friend's house or visit your
parents - they'll love to see you and the baby, and you'll be in a
comfortable environment where it won't matter if your bundle of joy
screams, spews, or poops. You'll feel better for getting out, and
the stimulation of a new environment will awaken your baby's senses
and help them to sleep better when it's naptime. But don't overdo
it. An outing like this once or twice a week is plenty, unless
you're the type who gets bored at being close to home.
When your little one is a few months old, you may feel ready to
head out to longer activities once or twice a week. Catch up with
friends at a coffee group, visit your local parents' resource and
meet other new mums, or head to the mall and do some shopping. But
as you increase your time away from home, pay attention to your own
wellbeing and your child's routine. Too much disruption to their
normal, everyday schedule can make for unsettled nighttimes and
fretful feeding.
By about the six-month mark, your child's
routine should be pretty well-established. This is the time to
start considering larger-scale adventures, like mum-baby swimming
classes, music groups, playgroups, and other organized activities.
We've put together a great list of places you can go to find out
about these activities in your area here.
I recommend checking out your local or community newspaper. Many of
them have listings of parent-child activities in your area. Another
great resource is your local Plunket or Parents' Centre, and many
local churches run playgroups and music groups. Ask your child's GP
if they know of child-friendly activities around, and check out the
messageboards on www.ohbaby.co.nz for more advice
and suggestions for places to go with your little one.
Once your baby is starting to become more
mobile, their schedule should also be fairly consistent, so you'll
be able to plan for longer outings and go to places like the zoo or
on longer car trips to visit relatives and friends. The key to
pacing yourself is to match your outings to your child's age and
ability to cope. If you've got him or her scheduled for swimming
Monday, music group Tuesday, playgroup Wednesday, baby gym
Thursday, and coffee group Friday, by just midweek, you'll both be
exhausted and prone to tantrums. Children need down-time, too.
That's why you need to learn to prioritise your
activities.
Prioritise
Once you master the whole "getting out of the house" thing, you'll
start to feel as if a whole new world has opened up. I remember
realising there were whole sections of Newmarket where I could now
legitimately shop - the toy stores and children's clothing
boutiques. It was nice for a couple of days, but I soon realised
the main reason I was frequenting these places was because I
thought I might bump into another cool mum I could make friends
with, and not because I actually wanted to buy anything. I had
my priorities mixed up, and once I abandoned the shops and found
myself some mother-baby activities, we were both happier.
What do you want to accomplish while you're
out? This isn't a loaded question, it's just a good thing to keep
in mind. If you're heading out to the supermarket, you want to get
the groceries for the week. If you're going to baby gym, you want
to socialise with other mums, bond with your child, and give your
little one some physical stimulation. Know the reasons behind what
you're doing and where you're going, and it'll help to keep you
from veering off-track.
If you find that you don't know why
you're going somewhere, or you're not enjoying it but you feel
obligated or pressured to go, you need to step back and
re-prioritise. Your time is precious when you have a child,
especially a newborn who needs so much of your attention. Do the
activities that make the two of you happy, and if you're finding
yourself getting over-scheduled, you need to decide what's
important and what's just "filler", and prune away the unnecessary
activities.
Process
When I say "process", I'm using it as a verb - you
need to process what's happened while you were out, review the
situation and its high points and low points, and figure out
whether you want to do something different the next time. Maybe you
do need to pack six toys to keep your baby occupied while you wait
in the queue at the postshop. Or maybe you should make a mental
note that Thursday is pension day, so the supermarket is best
avoided unless you want to add an extra hour to your visit and
practice fending off nosy questions from strangers in between
choosing apples and deciding what meat to have for
dinner.
There might be things you can do to
streamline your routine for getting out of the house - perhaps it
was time to go and you realised you hadn't packed the nappy bag, or
you forgot the rain cover for the pram, or you couldn't remember
how to fit the capsule into the backseat. The first time I went out
for a long walk with my daughter, I realised I'd forgotten a water
bottle for myself, so when we got home, the first thing I did was
to fill up a water bottle and pop it into the basket of the pram
for next time. The stuff you need to do to plan your outings will
change according to where you're going and how long you'll be away,
but even a miserable, grumpy outing is a learning experience.
You'll soon figure out which cafes are child-friendly, where the
best parents' rooms are located, and how many nappies you need to
get you through a visit to Grandma's. And if you're conscious of
what worked and what didn't, every time you go out will be that
little bit easier, until you'll find that it's not so intimidating,
after all. (And you can even go ahead and book that overseas
trip.)
Take care of these things when you're safe
at home and planning for your next outing, and it'll be heaps
easier next time you venture out into the great-wide world. After
all, you and your baby are mobile - you have places to go and
people to see!
Katherine Granich is OHbaby! Magazine's former editor. As we
went to press, she had calmly, capably planned an outing with her
daughter to the zoo, but couldn't find her car keys.
As seen in OHbaby!
magazine Issue 3: 2008
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