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Ask HN: How does having a baby change your life?

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Re: Ask HN: How does having a baby change your life?

#201

Post by petervandijck »

ghurlman wrote: post #142
petervandijck wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Meh. Also: everyone will have advice: you will learn to ignore most of it. Particularly advice by your parents. They had babies in a time when there were different priorities. So you'll have to learn to find your own way, trust your instincts, talk to other parents you like/admire. You can safely ignore most advice by most people :) (ps: my tip: you can't spoil a baby, not until they're, say, 1 year old (then discipl…

If you knew somebody who killed their baby by rolling over in their sleep on her, somehow I doubt "meh" would be your response.

Of course. But that doesn't add strength to the argument that you shouldn't sleep with your baby.

Re: Ask HN: How does having a baby change your life?

#202

Post by petervandijck »

oconnor0 wrote: post #145
pyre wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are other cultures where sleeping with your baby is the norm, and they don't have issues babies dying left and right due to parents rolling over on them, so I think we need more than anecdotes to say that it's dangerous.

I think in this case anecdotes is a fine data point. While there may not be a statistically significant increase in deaths for babies sleeping in bed with their parents, accidentally killing your kid by rolling over on them would be horrible.

Having your baby die in the next room because you couldn't hear them struggle would be horrible too. Just don't sleep next to them dead-drunk, and put a pregnancy pillow around them. It's fine.

Re: Ask HN: How does having a baby change your life?

#203

Post by petervandijck »

wacheena wrote: post #185

My wife had a baby 5mo ago. The biggest change for us initially was lack of sleep. Now that we're past that hurdle (he sleeps for roughly 12hrs at night) the biggest change I'm seeing is STUFF. There's huge marketing pressure to buy things for your baby. Some are a necessity (at least in Western society) like diapers, clothes and whatnot. But there are many, many things you'll see at Target/BabiesRUs/where ever you s…

Here's a vote for cloth diapers, especially if you're considering more than 1 kid.

Re: Ask HN: How does having a baby change your life?

#204

Post by cincinnatus »

drblast wrote: post #15

Living with one child is like living with a demanding, but mostly reasonable, roommate who really likes spending time with you until she goes to bed early. Having two or more children is like living in a circus where all the performers are deaf.

Our observation was that when any two of our kids are in the house it is noisy, but an order of magnitude less than when all three are.

Re: Ask HN: How does having a baby change your life?

#205

Post by recoil »

tyweir wrote: post #122
davetufts wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is it a "critical advantage" to measure how much the baby eats? Babies need to eat when they're hungry and they stop when their stomach is full.

I was going to ask the same question. Not once have a thought "my daughter is eating too much." Politics, nutrition and parenting are all conversations I attempt to avoid, and this combines 2 of 3 topics. :/

With breast-feeding my wife wasn't worried about "too much", rather "not enough": it wasn't clear to her exactly how much our daughter was getting.

That said, it was pretty obvious that she was getting enough, it was just mildly uncomfortable not knowing how much.

Re: Ask HN: How does having a baby change your life?

#206

Post by projectileboy »

You're no longer the center of your own universe. It's really fun 85% of the time. You will have your patience tried in ways you can't possibly imagine (for example, you haven't yet experienced 18 months of sleep deprivation, and no, college and/or your startup isn't the same thing). If you're doing it with a significant other, it will seriously test the strength of that relationship.

Re: Ask HN: How does having a baby change your life?

#207

Post by pyre »

lazyant wrote: post #152
pyre wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also true that babies that sleep with their parents hasn't been a cultural thing in the US. I'd say that in the last 20 years, the number of people doing it has increased, which likely accounts for the increase in the numbers of deaths due to it. Using this same logic, we should have abandoned the adoption of the automobile because as it became more and more commonplace, automobile-related deaths rose as well.

It's a simple trade-off or risk management. In the case of cars we accept the risk in exchange for our lifestyle (going to work, go to buy food etc) so this is an acceptable trade-off for most people (I like to reduce the driving risk by grouping errands, walking when I can etc). In the case of sleeping with a baby you are taking a risk but for what reward? "cultural thing"? not having to sit up in bed and reach to t…

* You can just as easily say that having your baby sleep in a crib runs the risk of you having purchased a 'defective' crib that will kill your baby and spawn a recall.

* You can easily say that putting your baby in another room runs the risk of something happening to your baby in the other room that you either can't hear, or can't get there fast enough to do anything about.

* Your baby can just as easily die from SIDS in a crib as they can in your bed, and SIDS is probably a larger risk than you rolling over on your baby (as long as your don't go to bed after drugs and/or alcohol).

  > this risk/reward ratio is horrible
Please tell me what the risk/reward ratio is.

  > In the case of cars we accept the risk in exchange for our lifestyle
  > (going to work, go to buy food etc) so this is an acceptable
  > trade-off for most people
Most people don't do risk/reward ratios. What is the risk/reward ratio of the majority of the populous zooming around in personal automobiles as opposed to pooling resources for effective (and well-maintained) public transit? In many of the places where public transit languished while automobile usage took off it had far more to do with the prestige of owning a car. Using public transit meant you were poor, but having a car (or multiple cars!) was a status symbol. Why do you think that you can find extremely 'pimped out' cars in the drive-ways of houses that are falling apart in places like Detroit? Why do I get teenagers/20-somethings (infrequently) yelling things like, "I got wheels baby! WHoooo!" (or similar) when I'm walking along a busy street? The car is a status symbol a hell of a lot more than it is a utility device (do you really need to drive 5 blocks to the store to pick up beer and drive back home?)

Re: Ask HN: How does having a baby change your life?

#208

Post by julietteculver »

dgabriel wrote: post #161
julietteculver wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm 38 weeks pregnant so can't comment on having a child yet, but the physical impact of pregnancy took me rather by surprise. In particular, I just haven't been able to sit at a computer for that many hours of a day for the last two or three months. Getting an iPad has certainly helped somewhat with that, but haven't found any way to actually do programming comfortably for long stretches. I feel like my brain is sti…

When I was pregnant with my twins, I worked full time, mostly from home. The key was a sweet recliner, good laptop, and laptop stand. I got plenty done. After they were born, I spent so much time nursing them for the first 2 months, that I had plenty of hack-y time (alternating with episodes of Buffy). You need a good nursing pillow and a comfortable seat, but you need those even if you're just watching Buffy. My bel…

lol, since I started on maternity leave I have in fact alternating hacky type stuff with watching Buffy! (which I'd somehow managed to never watch, and should keep me going for a while) Thanks for the tips too!

Re: Ask HN: How does having a baby change your life?

#209

Post by gbog »

mikegreenberg wrote: post #192
Vivtek wrote: post #91

Oh, where to start? Having a baby entirely eliminates your life and replaces it with a different one. And you can't undo it. You cannot spend all your time on a project now - you have to change your priorities. This is not an option, and unfortunately it's not something that happens magically by itself, either. Like maintaining a marriage, it's something you choose to do because not to do so is unthinkable. The payof…

Your essay made me consider a very interesting aspect to parenting: Starting a family is the ultimate entrepreneurial endeavor. It's arguably the only business where the potential gains and risks are unmeasurable.

I have a one year old kid, he is learning to walk, so funny. With a baby you learn what the meaning of "responsibility", and you see a human being (the only really interesting topic) evolving, building it's self. You also get nightmares in the first days. Do one get nightmares when founding a start-up?
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