Ask HN: How did you prepare for being a first-time parent?

Set 7 alarms on your phone, one to wake you up each hour.

Go to work the next day and try to do your best work.

Do this two months before the baby comes and you'll already be adjusted to your new mental norm.

I'm only half-kidding. The eradic sleep is tough - babies through toddlers wake up for all sorts of reasons. Depending on the child, it could be years before you sleep consistently through an entire night.

That being said, the first time your baby smiles at you, or when they offer a drink of their juice because they are being thoughtful, when they say "love you" the first time, when they are genuinely excited to see you after a long day.. No other feeling like it.

I liked this book, which was given to me by my older brother (who became a father before I did): https://www.amazon.com/Be-Prepared-Gary-Greenberg/dp/0743251...

An expectation for a complete lack of control.

You can plan, prepare, and do what you feel is best, but at the end of the day you have to be flexible and know that you will learn. I wish I could say there was a method or a book or something, but just knowing that some parts would be hard and confusing helped set my expectations. I wasn't surprised I was cleaning poop off the floor of my in-law's because I knew I would experience failure, but I was surprised babies pooped that far.

Yes! A schedule was imperative for me to feel like I had some expectations and control. Waking up with absolutely no structure was just a little too overwhelming for me, so having "naptime is ___, lunch is ___" really put me at ease. I didn't read many books on parenting, but one that was immediately helpful was on sleep schedules of children and how they evolve as the kids age. This helped us figure out a schedule that worked for us.

Another thing we did that really helped was artificially limiting inputs regarding advice. In those first weeks, we had a handful of books and dozens of blogs and websites that all had contradictory advice; it was really overwhelming. We decided we would only subscribe to three primary sources of info where possible: Mayo Clinic online, some book we had on sleep schedules, and our pediatrician. Only having three places to consult when we had questions (as opposed to the entire Internet) was an enormous help.

I thought the child-birth classes we did were amazingly helpful for a number of reasons:

* You become familiar with the terms (procedures, drugs, etc) so that during delivery they don't sound scary and unknown.

* We met other people in our relative neighborhood at the same stage. We're still friends with many and it was a HUGE support network before and after our children were born. I think this is especially helpful with a first kid.

That aside, I recommend 'The Expectant Father' for dads as a decent book that I found helpful.

Final preparation tip: Lie about the 'due date' to everyone. Add an extra 2 weeks. It helps getting those annoying calls so close to delivery date. (Like if you don't return someones call in 5 minutes they assume you're in labor...) It gets annoying and fast.

And for after the baby is born: Just remember that you will get your 'sleep' back one day. It will be worth it. I have such a HUGE appreciate for un-interrupted stretches of sleep now. Hang in there :)