Parents Share Their Experiences Preparing Older Siblings For The New Baby
A number of people have asked us for advice on preparing the family and specifically older siblings for the baby to come, so we turned to parents of the MiLOWE village to share their personal experiences on leveling up with a second baby:
1) Once you found out you were pregnant, how did you prep your older child for the birth of their new sibling?
2) Did you and your partner make any arrangements in advance for postpartum plans like splitting duties for each kid, cooking/cleaning etc.?
3) How did you introduce your new baby to their older sibling(s)? Did they get them a special gift? Did you say anything particular to prep them for the big day?
4) Would you do anything differently?
Brittany Howell, mama to two and founder of Colorama LA.
Kale said:
We tried to talk about babies a lot and point to my belly saying “baby”. I don’t know if any of it registered because then she just started calling all bellies ‘baby’ and really made for some uncomfortable situations.
Covid was really a blessing for postpartum. In the regular world my partner would have been back to work as soon as we left the hospital give or take a few days so having him home and unable to travel as been phenomenal. C-section pretty much determined the work load being on him as well and we were lucky enough to have family step in and take the older sibling during the day the first couple of weeks while I recovered. Preschool has been amazing at just giving her some independence outside the house and me some free time a few times a week. Though the transition was really hard for about a week. A lot of tears and a lot of change (for both of us).
Introduction was pretty much - here is baby! It’s amazing how quick they get it (maybe because of stories we read and shows we watch, but she was just like “okay he’s with us now”.)
Buy less clothes, I am pretty minimal in general (we didn’t find out sex for that reason too) but when he came early I panicked I had no preemie clothes. The only things babies ever need are those night gowns you can easily change diapers in the first couple months. Tiny preemie pants for August were a really silly buy haha.
Brittany said:
My MIL had the shirt my husband wore when he met his baby brother 32 years ago. And she gave it to us. So special! We had big bro get a toy for the baby and had the baby get a toy for big brother. This really helped smooth the transition and big bro held on to that toy (a car) for months saying, “Levi got this for me!” Before COVID times, they were able to meet in the hospital. Someone gave me advice to greet Ryker first when he comes in the room because in reality he hadn’t seen his Mommy in three days - really love on him first and then introduce baby. I would highly suggest someone snapping pictures because it’s one of the most special memorable times ever! Also, have the new baby in the bassinet next to you versus holding it so they don’t just associate you and baby.
Erica said:
Before she was born, I would sit in the nursery room with my toddler explaining to him that he was going to be a big brother. Little did I know he would ignore her for an entire year 🤷🏻♀️
Hindsight is 2020, should have [done postpartum prep with my partner]! We settled into a role where I took the nights and he took the morning for both kids. We still do it today and it feels right for us.
My toddler wore his big brother t-shirt to the hospital. He was also supposed to give the baby a balloon, but he kept it for himself 😃
What would I do differently? I would have worked harder on the toddler sleep habits. I was so focused on making sure the baby slept though the night, I let things slide with my 2 year old.
Amanda said:
We prepped our first child for the birth of their sibling by ordering him a new toy each week (from Amazon) and telling him the baby sent it to him and was so excited to meet him! We did this for 8 weeks and used it as a countdown to let our son know how many weeks were left until the baby arrived. We tried reading him books about being a big brother but he wasn’t interested in them in the slightest.
Our older son had “daddy days” where he spent the whole day with dad while I got to bond with the baby. Dad had been cooking dinner for the fam since halfway through the second trimester so that continued. Soon after the birth, I started taking my older guy on “mama dates” where just the two of us did an activity or outing.
We did a home birth. Our older son came into our bedroom in the morning to meet the baby. It was a little shocking for him since we all thought we were having a girl. When our son was introduced to his baby brother, he asked where his sister was! Later that day, we had our older son help us sing ‘Happy Birthday’ to the baby.
It’s hard to explain to a toddler all the changes a new baby brings. Until they are living with the reality of a new sibling and feeling all the big feels, they can’t fully understand. I think we could have done a better job of checking in with our older son about these feelings on a daily basis rather than having the conversation after we witnessed him being emotionally reactive to sharing his bath for the first time or having to wait for us to change the baby before we all left the house.
Cheryl said:
I want to say that as soon as we found out, we started talking to her about becoming a big sister. At the time, she was only 18 months and didn’t really have a clue what that meant. It just so happens that she received a baby doll as a Christmas gift and that helped explain how there was a baby growing in mommy’s tummy. And as the months passed and I started to show more, it out of nowhere clicked by the time I finished the first trimester. We would always talk to “baby sis” and she started to routinely kiss, hug, talk to and sing to my belly. Also, a lot of rubbing!
Yes, and what we arranged didn’t go as planned because of Covid! Our first child was attending daycare before covid and we ended up pulling her out beginning of March before any shut downs started happening. And she was enrolled to start Preschool in August, and that did not happen either. The original plan was that I was going to go back into the workforce (decided to stay home after going through PPD and anxiety after first baby) a month after having second baby, but it’s a difficult situation for us at the moment since we are making it a personal choice that having outside of family childcare help is still not safe for us especially with a newborn. The way we are making it work is that I have the kids full time from wake up time and for most of the day. We are lucky that Mike works from home (even before Covid) and that he can step in when he can and when I need him to. But usually, he takes the evening duties like bath time and bed time routines for our first child. I am usually on duty with our newborn since I am exclusively breastfeeding.
We already had a cleaning routine along with household tasks that we still follow and it makes our days flow better with both kids. I do most of the cooking and cleaning, but Mike will help with after meal clean up and loading dishes. He also takes care of the garbage and making sure it is taken to the curb for collection days. I try to meal plan n prep before the week starts to keep things easy as well as making sure we are all eating pretty healthy. We have nights we have take out or pre-prepped meals for easy and quick meals. Now that baby #2 is here, we try to simplify everything we do. I try to remind myself that it’s ok if the laundry isn’t done or if the house is a mess.
Some might find it extreme, but we actually do have a schedule or “shifts” on whose turn it is to be with the kids “full time” especially during the week. It works for us and our family, because it gives us each our time to focus on ourselves, our individual goals and simply just having a break. On weekends, we also have weekends that are “get shit done” weekends. We make those a stay home weekends. We alternate those weekends to going out and do family outings or have a planned activity as a family at home every other weekend.Our situation was a little different because baby sister arrived 4 weeks early. So it all happened unexpectedly before we could prep Big sister about mommy going to the hospital and we didn’t expect to stay as long as we did. We also didn’t get to prepare her about her Lola (Grandma) watching her while we were in the hospital. She had a tough time while were gone and we didn’t want to Facetime in fear that it would make it harder for her to see us on the phone versus being physically at home with her. Also, baby sister stayed in the NICU for a week, so when I came home after 3 days in the hospital, she still talked to my postpartum belly as if baby sister was still in there. Even if we showed her pictures, the fact that she didn’t see baby sister at home physically made her think she was still in my belly.
The day sister was finally going home, was also unexpected because the Doctors told us, it may be a couple more days just the day before. My mom took Halen to my brother’s house that day to see her cousin (who my mom usually take care of on her days off from work) to play with. So when we found out and when we got home, Big Sister was not home. Which to me, worked out perfectly, because we had time alone with baby sister to settle at home and set her up comfortably before Big Sister came home.
When Big Sister came home, Mike got her out of the car and told her we had a surprise waiting for her in the house. Baby sister was laying in the lounger on the couch waiting for her. It was a magical and sweet moment. I can still see her smile and hear her squeal. We had the book Big Sister for big sister and a small sloth stuffed animal for baby sister.I think the only thing I would do differently is to remember not to sweat the small stuff and that I can’t do everything especially things that are out of my control, like Covid. But everything all came together perfectly and now, I can’t even remember how life was without my two girls.
xoxo to all the parents out there.
-Christianne aka MiLOWE Mom
