In the weeks and months following the birth of your little bundle of joy, you will likely find yourself sitting around just holding (and possibly nursing) your baby a lot (by the way, check out my post on the After-Birth Experiences No One Talks About for insight into how your body can behave during this time).
This is a beautiful time of bonding for mama and the newest member of the family, but it will also create a huge disruption to the normal daily life you are used to. Gone are the days when you could use the bathroom whenever the need arose!
The most important thing you can do during this fleeting period of your child’s life is soak up the snuggles as much as baby wants and needs them.
However, for the times in between those cuddly moments of joy when you are simply waiting for your baby to wake up so you can set him down to get food and drink, here are ideas to pass the time and stay (somewhat) productive.
1. Write Your Birth Story
You will be so glad you did this! I typed up a very rough draft of my birth story about 7 months post partum and I wish I had done it sooner. By that point, I already had a hard time remembering some things.
But I am also grateful I did not wait any longer to do it because just a few short months later, I read my birth story and was surprised at some of the things that happened during labor that I no longer remembered.
Don’t worry about grammar and punctuation at this point; just get your memories of labor and delivery down before you forget all those little things you might want to know about for the next time around – or simply for the sake of reliving the memories at a later date.
Using a tablet rather than a computer makes this task much easier if you’re juggling a baby in your arms.
2. Write Thank You Notes for Baby Shower Gifts
You know how you were too busy preparing for a baby to get those thank you cards written and sent before your baby was born? Now that you have a newborn pinning you to the couch, you have time to put some thought into expressing your appreciation to everyone who helped celebrate the life of your child.
Hopefully you thought to put the list of who got you what in a safe place after the shower, because you most definitely are not going to remember who gave you the cute bunny outfit two months ago.
3. Take an Online Course
As exhausting as being a new mom can be (both from lack of sleep and from nursing if you are breastfeeding), sometimes you just crave mental stimulation because you’re stuck in the house all day every day, unable to do much.
I used some of this down time to take some cheap courses (about $10 for a four hour online course) on investing in the stock market – something I had been wanting to do for a while but didn’t have time for when I was working full time before my daughter was born.
This is a great time to start learning or increase your knowledge about something you’re interested in.
I watched my investing courses in the browser app on our TV while my baby snoozed in my arms. The only problem I had was that I couldn’t take notes very well, so you might want to choose something you can grasp without having to take notes.
4. Read Books on Kindle
I have read so many books on my Amazon Kindle Fire since my daughter was born. It has been so nice to be able to read again since this is another thing I didn’t have time for before my daughter’s birth.
I highly recommend buying a Kindle or some other similar device that allows you to read electronic books, particularly if you have a baby that wants to be held all the time. It is so much easier to hold a tablet than it is to try to keep a book open while you’ve got a baby in your arms.
5. Binge Watch Your Favorite Shows
When everything else seems like too much work in your sleep-deprived state, TV can be a beautiful thing. Take advantage of the time you have to watch what you want to watch in peace because once your newborn is a toddler, you probably won’t be watching your own shows anymore.
As your little one gets older, you will either start watching programming directed at your child or you will decrease or eliminate TV time altogether (see my post on Screen Viewing Effects on Children).
So go ahead and binge your way through every season of your favorite shows. Don’t feel too guilty because you won’t be able to do this again for a very long time.
6. Research All Your Newborn Questions
New parents always have lots of questions because bringing a baby home is basically starting a new job. You haven’t done this before, so there are going to be things you don’t know how to do. There are going to be strange things that happen with your newborn that you’re not sure if they are normal occurrences or not.
Spend some time reading online about various situations you find yourself in with your new baby. For example, things as simple as bathing, erratic breathing, and frequent nursing sessions with a tiny baby can cause a lot of anxiety for a new mama.
Fortunately, a lot of the uncertainties you have will become clearer the more you research and the more you get to know your little one. You can also post questions you have on a moms forum or group online. Sometimes just getting a variety of experiences from other moms is the best kind of research.
7. Get a Buckling Nursing Pillow and Bake
I spent about the first two and a half months of my daughter’s life on our living room couch, so by the time my husband started hinting that I should try to do at least a little bit of work in the kitchen each day, I was more than ready to get off my butt.
Since I could hardly ever put my daughter down without her crying constantly, I had to get creative. I quickly learned how to hold my nursing (and often sleeping) baby in one arm while I dumped ingredients in a bowl with the other. Viola! We suddenly had banana bread again (one of our main breakfast foods).
There is one tool that made this possible: My Brest Friend Nursing Pillow. This thing was my second lap for the entire first year of my daughter’s life. It is a nursing pillow that buckles around you so that it stays on when you stand up.
Just to be clear, this is not something that holds your baby like a wrap or carrier. You still do the holding, but the pillow gives you support and makes it so much easier on your arm.
This worked best for me because my daughter was not happy in a wrap since I couldn’t get her into it in a way that she could comfortably nurse. This way, she could nurse away (which she did constantly) and I could be more mobile.
8. Create an Expenses Spreadsheet
Many of us probably don’t keep track of our spending as well as we should (I am the first to admit failure in this department). But in our electronic age, most transactions are viewable online, so all you need in order to create a spreadsheet detailing your expenses is a computer, tablet, or even your phone (if you have really good eyes).
I have always struggled to stay on top of recording our expenses, but when there isn’t much else you’re capable of accomplishing for several weeks or months, it’s easy to get started.
9. Do Squats
If you have a clingy baby like I do and feel like she is literally an extension of your body, it’s going to be difficult or downright impossible to exercise for a while.
This can be frustrating when you’re trying to lose pregnancy weight and you’re feeling restless from sitting all day. There is one, and only one, exercise that worked for me to do while holding a nursing, sleeping baby: Squats.
I walked around the house a lot too, but stroller rides were out of the question with my reflux baby, so doing anything that really worked any muscles was not realistic beyond squats. So I clung to my squats.
10. Create a Meal Plan
This is something I did not do but wish I had done during those quiet moments on the couch. You may not be able to do much cooking with an infant attached to you, but at least you can work on something your future cooking self will thank you for.
Create a month long meal plan that you can cycle through a few times once you’re up and around more. Think through meals you know how to make and search Pinterest for new recipes. Put together a combination of easy and more elaborate meals to make each week.
This will take the stress out of meal planning as well as grocery shopping. I’ve heard so many people say they also spend a lot less on groceries (and waste a lot less) when they plan out meals for the week ahead of time.
This is still an unchecked item in my to-do list. Take advantage of your limited couch days (I assure you, they will come to an end eventually) and make life easier for yourself in advance.
What ways have you found to be productive while taking care of a newborn, Mama? Share your ideas in the comments!
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