I always thought some of the things people say to expecting or new parents are pretty hilarious. “Your life is about to change!” (No shit.) “You’ll never love anyone as much as you’ll love your baby!” (Well, duh.) And one of my favorites: “Oh man, you have NO idea.” (Um, obviously, since I haven’t done this before.) And is that even advice, really? Or is that just your passive-aggressive way of making me feel even more clueless and inferior?

But really, I get that *most* of what people say comes from a good, well-meaning place from parents who have been there, done that. And I did seek and receive some very valuable advice, mostly from friends with babies and younger kids who actually remember what it’s like to bring home a brand new person. If your kid is older than 5, then you might want to skip out on giving advice to people about pregnancy, childbirth and the early days of child rearing. Instead, take some notes on how to cope with the toddler years (3 is the new 2!) and how exciting/awful the first day of kindergarten is, and send it to your friends along with a bottle of wine once their kid approaches those stages.

Some of the advice I’ve gotten from wise parents should include a disclaimer, or at least a little clarification. I feel compelled to share some of those nuggets, mostly so that when my childless friends become pregnant, I can just refer them here, and I won’t have to remember something that happened a lifetime ago in baby-raising years. Not that I can remember anything these days anyway…

Establish a routine as soon as possible: And by “as soon as possible,” I mean not until you get through at least the first two months. When a mother of two told me this, I took it quite literally. In that first week home, I was feeling the guilt and stress of not having a routine. Why couldn’t I establish a routine? What was wrong with me? What was wrong with my baby? NOTHING. There is NO routine that is possible in those early weeks. At about six weeks or so, I implemented a “routine” of going upstairs to bed with the baby no later than 8 p.m. each night (instead of hanging out on the couch til 11 or so while he alternated between snoozing and nursing and I watched Netflix – whoops). It wasn’t until I went back to work (at about 10 weeks) that anything resembling a “regular routine” was possible.

Read to your newborn! See this post.

Don’t search the internet for symptoms: Yeah, right. I consult Dr. Google on the reg. More crying than usual? Giant, projectile spit-up? Stuffy nose? Mild fever? Eye gunk? Mild rash that just doesn’t seem to go away? Google it. Sure, be sensible and discerning. Know what sites are reputable and don’t just take any random biased website or mom blog as hard evidence. We were also given an awesome book by my mom’s physician friend: the American Academy of Pediatrics: Caring for Your Baby and Young Child, Birth to Age 5. If that’s not a baby handbook, I don’t know what is. We used that thing a lot in the first few weeks. Now I just mostly ask Doc G.

Sleep when the baby sleeps: Or you could use that precious time to shower or feed yourself. If you are ambitious enough to try to get some sleep when the baby naps, he’ll likely wake up as soon as you start dozing off, which might be more exhausting than just not sleeping. Sure, every now and then you might get a good half hour, or maybe even an hour, of uninterrupted sleep in the early weeks; but for your own sake, just assume that you won’t be sleeping much for a long time. When your little one finally gets to the point where he’s taking regular naps of up to 2.5 hours long, you might not know what to do with yourself. THAT is when you sleep (of course, that’s only on the weekends if you’re working – but take what you can get!).

See, I already forgot some stuff… I’m certain I had at least three other things but these will have to do… What’s the best/worst advice you were given about the newborn weeks?