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Ask HN: Tips for Hackers having Kids?

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Re: Ask HN: Tips for Hackers having Kids?

#61
post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was keen to respond to this thread until I read the above response. Ezmobius has absolutely nailed it. I'm an incredible proud Dad to a fifteen week old baby boy and his advice echoes every single thing I was going to say. Then once you go back to work expect to only work on the computer when you are at work. I'd like to elaborate on this point. Leaving Mum & baby at home will be difficult for a while, I still stru…

Routine. Routine, routine, routine, routine. This. It took us 8 months to get it sorted but now our little boy just about begs to be put to bed and he sleeps 10 hours a night without a sound.

My experience 1 year into Fatherhood agrees with this. We put baby on a cyclic routine of Eat, Play, Sleep since about day 7. She was sleeping through the night at 8wks. Check out "On Becoming Babywise", Gary Ezzo.

Like all the other papas here say, BE SENSITIVE TO YOUR WIFE. Be aware that as your wife breast feeds (if she does) her hormones are still rocking to a different beat every hour. Let complaints roll off your back. Sometimes things won't make sense to you, but go with the flow. Afford her tons of generosity and selflessness. Clean the house for her, offer to take the baby so she can sleep, draw her a bath to soak in with candles and bubbles. Take her on a romantic date if she's up for it so she feels like she's still got it even though she may complain about her body often. Make her life easy and sweet and yours will be good.

Also, for a bit of relief... listen to Garrison Keilor's Fatherhood tale: http://www.publicradio.org/tools/media_player/popup.php?name...

Enjoy being daddy! It's absolutely wonderful. You will forget about working overtime. You'll want to spend any and all free time with your little one. Cheers!

Re: Ask HN: Tips for Hackers having Kids?

#63
post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's absolute bliss! We are incredibly lucky, since 10 weeks old, baby Cameron has been sleeping a minimum of 8 hours a night. Sometimes it takes 10 weeks, sometimes it takes 8 months, either way, it's worth the effort. Kids thrive on routine.

We kind of took the other route, our daughter slept whenever there was time really. We took her backpacking across Europe for 2 months when she was 8 months old, she just slept whenever she was tired. At home she would go to bed if we were at home, but we didn't hesitate to go out for dinner or to a friends house or whatever and she'd just sleep whereever we ended up. In contrast some of our friends have kids who wil…

I find kids adopt to their parents way of doing things. My wife and I are rather calm, and so are our children. They fall asleep easily enough, are happy children, and calm and relaxed.

The problem some parents have with their children is they try to change the way the children behave to something other than what they learned from their parents.

If they are the type to go out, party, invite friends over and stay up late, etc, then they should expect their children to emulate that. It's when the parents want their children to behave differently that you have a problem. This is all purely my own experience.

Re: Ask HN: Tips for Hackers having Kids?

#64
Congratulations!

The late Tracy “Baby Whisperer” Hogg pointed out that swaddling is a neurological hack to help babies sleep. OK, she didn’t phrase it that way, but... Until they reach about 4–5 months, babies don’t really have voluntary control of their arms and legs. So imagine you’re kind of tired, lying in your crib, drifting off, when OMG THIS ARM IS FLAPPING AROUND NEXT TO MY HEAD ISN’T THAT COOL.

I didn’t read about this idea until I had my third child; when I noticing that indeed, he could sleep even in a room where his brothers were playing until his arm came out of the swaddling blanket, I got one of those special swaddling blankets with Velcro (I call them “baby straitjackets”), and that aspect of baby care, at least, became significantly easier.

Re: Ask HN: Tips for Hackers having Kids?

#65
post #45

If you're the type that needs your sleep, YMMV, but I am now the father of four and still a co-founder, so here goes ... NOTE: This is scattershot advice mixed with personal reflection. Salt liberally, expect typos. I started working on Stormpulse in 2004 as a hobby project a few months after we had our first child. She slept horribly for the first two years of her life--very difficult to get to sleep and woke up a l…

I just want to take a moment to second the book Happiest Baby on the Block (I got the book, apparently there is a DVD). It truly is a "baby hacks" book. I read it cover to cover months before my first baby was born, and while I don't remember all of it, I retained enough that I am the goto person for baby burps and swaddling my children. My first born (now 20-months) slept well, was easy going, and is a well-behaved child. My second son (1.5 weeks old) is going the same route as his older brother. Well-behaved, good eater, good sleeper. Takes to swaddling a bit more than his older brother, but is also more active without it.

With 2 children, and with 1.5 weeks left on paternity, I've been hacking away at DuctMail in short spurts. Full time job waiting for me to return, and Mommy is on her 1-year maternity leave (I love Quebec).

I'd add more, but frankly, this post (the parent) is dead-on-balls accurate. Sadly, I have but one vote to give.

Re: Ask HN: Tips for Hackers having Kids?

#66

I have a 5 1/2 month old boy named Ryland and he is just now finally sleeping all night long(9pm to 7:30am) The first 2-3 months were zombie time. I couldn't get any work done because of the sleep dep. My one biggest piece of advice. SLEEP WHEN THE BABY SLEEPS. or you will get NO sleep ever. It will be the roughest thing you have ever gone through but one smile from your childs face up at yours makes it all better an…

As the father of a 1 year old girl who owns a gym and has a start-up, I agree with everything in this post.

ezmobius, I wish I had more votes to give you, as this is one of the best comments I've read on HN.

And an emphasis on sleeping when your baby sleeps, you may need to encourage your wife to sleep, as she'll probably want to do other things.

A friend of mine with 3 kids often says, "Mom takes care of the baby, Dad takes care of Mom." I think that's apt in the first 4 months, just do whatever you can to allow your wife to be the best mother she can be.

Re: Ask HN: Tips for Hackers having Kids?

#67
post #2

1. Your priorities will change. You're not the same person after you have had a kid. But, you will find that the pressure on your available hours will help you figure out how to work smarter and triage your worklist better. You will have to work fewer hours, but your productivity will adjust to compensate to a large degree. 2. Hack when they sleep. Pray to any gods you may have that the one you get does that plentifu…

For the first two months, ignore point the second and sleep when they sleep.

Re: Ask HN: Tips for Hackers having Kids?

#68
Actually, you have some experience from your start-up. Babies and a start-ups have so much in common.

They both leave you sleepless, make you think about them all day, make you feel like they are the meaning of life, grow fast in front of your eyes, and interact with you more and more every single day. Well, congratulations!

I'm a hacker's wife and a non-technical co-founder. I and my husband are the two partners of our start-up.

You may start working on these issues:

* Read about baby care (birth to 6-8 weeks), and start chatting with your wife, so that you can start building your parenting style. Baby care is not difficult, but there are lots of different paths to follow. If you learn in advance, you will fell more confident and need less trial-and-error.

* It's best to limit your working plans for the 0-3 months, best scenario with a nice sleeping angel baby will still be quite hectic.

* Getting help from relatives, friends and even neighbours can do a lot of difference. You can take care baby, but it would be nice if someone can care for you in the meantime.

* If you have not yet, read about sleep depreviation. Motivate your wife to rest as much as she can during pregnancy and following birth.

* About the routine, it seemed not so important to me when I was pregnant, we were not the routine type of couple. It turned out to be very important. When you set a routine, baby knows what's next, so she relaxes and be much more cooperative. And when you know what's next, you can plan your day (no, not boring, believe me).

* Take your family outdoors frequently. It will help your wife to recover.

* You'd better spend some time evaluating baby products to be familiar with market. I'm not telling you to buy things in advance, but in some cases a small stupid-looking gadget can save you lots of time.

* Add some parenting blogs to your reader, especially some of those informative/experience sharing ones.

Good luck on your geek fatherhood journey!

Re: Ask HN: Tips for Hackers having Kids?

#69
There's lots of great advice here. I've got a 10-week old girl who I'm certain is the cutest, most wonderful little thing in the world. I'm assuming you're the dad (if you're the mom, I can't offer much).

Stuff to think about right now:

-Sleep deprivation starts early. Your wife is going to be uncomfortable as anything the last several months. She may toss and turn a lot at night. Plan accordingly.

-If there is anything you've been wanting to get done, do it now. I had been putting off copying my old Amiga hard drive to preserve my childhood computer for 10 years. I narrowly got that done before the baby arrived.

-Make some meals you can easily freeze so you don't have to cook if you don't want to. You'll need this in the first few days as well as much later when you and/or mom go back to work. Cooking is a royal pain with a really little baby.

Stuff to think about after the baby arrives:

-Plan on not getting any sleep and being entirely unproductive while awake (you are taking several weeks off work right?) the first few months.

-Expect that while awake, you will have zero time to yourself. Use the time you do have wisely, frittering it away on Facebook is probably a bad idea.

-Expect the first night home to be unreal. My wife is a pediatrician and I thought that would prepare us. Boy was I wrong. We were still two bumbling clueless parents. Best thing we learned that night is division of labor: one sleeps while the other is awake with the baby. Otherwise, you are both going to be completely exhausted instead of a manageable "really tired".

-A smartphone is a huge help with a little one. I read HN at night a lot when my daughter is drifting off to sleep in my arms but not fully asleep. I do it primarily to keep myself from falling asleep while holding her. It's easy to hold in one hand (vs. a laptop or iPad).

-Babies love white noise. They find it incredibly soothing. Get a white noise generator of some kind. We have a 99-cent iPhone app on our phones that we use daily. My daughter loves "air conditioner" mode. She often fights sleep and squirms around a lot. White noise and a pacifier put her into a deep, restful slumber.

-Babies get cranky for a variety of reasons you will never know. Your inner geek is going to want to find reasons for things and understand "the system". Resist this, it's futile 50% of the time. Instead, try random things: change the diaper, change position, walk around, sit them upright, lay them down, etc... It's good to have a bunch of stuff to run through. Sometimes, a screaming baby just needs his or her mom though, don't forget that.

-Babies like to be with you. Get a bouncer chair so you don't have to hold them all the time and they can watch you as you steal 5 minutes to post photos online. Get one with a vibration mode. They find it soothing and can nap for quite a while there.

-Plan on doing lots of laundry. Babies mess up their clothes and yours all the time. Make sure you have a basin or utility sink where you can soak clothing with detergent to get poop out of it before washing in the machine. We discovered Oxi Free (doesn't have any perfumes as opposed to regular Oxi) takes poop out really well and doesn't damage colors.

-Take tons of photos, they change a lot very quickly.

-Efficiency is key. Look for places to reduce labor. Are you always carrying pacifiers around the house? Leave one in each room. Spending lots of time washing bottles? Get a dishwasher rack that holds them. No time to clean your house? Get a cleaning person to come in and give it a once-over. Just as with a startup, sometimes it's better to trade money for time.

-Mom needs you more than you realize. Help her out. The biggest thing you can do is to suck it up, tell her to get some sleep and take the baby for a while. Yeah, you're exhausted, but babies need moms who aren't basket-cases. You'll survive.

-Talk to your pediatrician about any concerns you have, no matter how silly. They hear the same things a lot. A good one will give you excellent advice, even about things that aren't strictly "medical".

Best of luck to you. It's a life-changing experience and one of the happiest times in your entire life.

Re: Ask HN: Tips for Hackers having Kids?

#70

It is not a kid, it is relationship bomb. Focus on the relationship. (I heard it in some random YouTube video once, which just goes to show that good advice can be found in strange places)

As a parent of two (3yrs and 10mo) there is serious truth to this. I can only assume that the down votes are because of the flippant way it was phrased, but let me offer this to the new and prospective pappas out there: you will be tired, busy, and frustrated. If you don't step back and take care of momma you can quickly find your relationship spiraling out of control because you no longer prioritize yourself or your wife.

A few thoughts:

(a) Schedule is key. Put the little buggers on a schedule and keep to it.

(b) The parent's bed is sacred, no child shall pass. We were very strict with this rule. Our kids have never been in our bed to sleep.

(c) Free time is key, one of the best things we did was get a nanny/house keeper on Saturday. That way we can leave the kids at home and go have a nice lunch together and maybe see a movie without the hassle of babysitters and late nights.

(d) Start waking up early, way early. Nearly 4 years into fatherhood I am still searching for the ways to attain my lost productivity. One of the biggest has been to simply wake up earlier. Kids bring about a new world order. Accept and move on and embrace the 4:30 wakeup.

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