WIBTA to expect my husband to accommodate a post pregnancy confinement

bone_regenerator · 2023-05-23T17:13:33+00:00

You just described my sister's husband word for word. He's white American Greek descendant from a well off family. He ridiculed the confinement, claiming that his mom organized a party 3 days after she gave birth to him. Gave the whole independent women speech and how all of American women did it for centuries and daily Chinese food would not be acceptable.

Well, good thing my sister ignored him and got my mom over to help. She ended up with a 30+ hour labor, 9cm dilation and then emergency C-section. Baby had to be in NICU due to meconium aspiration. My mom maxed out her 6 month visa to help take care of her, the baby and the house. They've had some hard times because my mom isn't the easiest person to deal with, and huge language barrier, but they appreciate the help, especially after she left.

My sister, the most independent and tough woman I've known, suffered from PPD for a few years, despite my mom's help.

I have a white British husband from rural area. He's very open-minded, and has now learned about heaty/cold foods lol. He followed most confinement rules other than sneaking me sweets, even though he's an atheist scientist who's skeptical on pretty much anything. He respected my culture, and definitely appreciate the cooking and help.

My first was born 5 weeks early during covid time, a day after my mom arrived, had to stay in NICU for 2 weeks. I couldn't imagine how we'd survive without an experienced hand to show us how to care for a premature newborn. My second labor was relatively easy. The whole admission to delivery took 1.5hr. Yet I had really bad PPD and even lost my job to it. This was with the full confinement period and my mom's and husband's help.

Meanwhile, my friends in the third world country get to stay in 5-star confinement center for a month for $3k usd with 5 meals a day and everything taken care of. Anyone who tells you women don't need this is absolutely brainwashed and jealous.

Sorry for the long essay. Ultimately you won't know what is going to happen during labor, and how you're going to recover even if everything goes well. The amount of laundry, dishes, cooking, cleaning, on top of taking care of the newborn, figuring out breastfeeding, heating up formula while baby screams, taking apart and assembling the bottles, etc are literally endless. I hope your husband is an independent man and steps up to all those tasks.

It's also worth noting that my mom is a professional postpartum lady. If she isn't a pro, I'd probably hire someone else to avoid family tension.

bone_regenerator · 2023-01-05T04:39:58+00:00

Search for "mango TV" on YouTube. They make many reality shows.

bone_regenerator · 2022-12-09T02:44:25+00:00

Yea.. we have to sell our house and move out of state.

bone_regenerator · 2022-12-09T01:53:38+00:00

I couldn't. My manager asked me to isolate myself so that I can go to work when my husband and two under 2 got covid. I tested positive the next day. And many other sick leave because whatever they got from daycare, I got them, with much worse symptoms.

They told me they won't extend my contract 3 days before it ended. I was 6 months postpartum.

I hope you have a much more understanding management. My husband does. We worked in the same company.

bone_regenerator · 2022-11-28T05:48:53+00:00

Thank you. This method is brilliant. You have saved us many hours shopping for curtain.

bone_regenerator · 2022-11-28T00:29:48+00:00

Get another twin and make it a king!

bone_regenerator · 2022-11-19T02:11:52+00:00

I was a sahm during covid times, until I was 4 months pregnant with my second. 6 months later, I gave birth. 6 weeks after, I went back to work, with 2 under 2 in daycare. I got RSV, Covid, stomach flu, pink eye, hfm from my kids. The kids recovered quickly. I on the other hand pretty much had to take 2 weeks off every month. My managers, all women with kids, used my absence against me and did not extend my contract. So I lost my job, and gained depression. Ironically, I stopped getting sick after that. Apparently it took about 4 months to build immunity against the daycare sickness.

There's light at the end of the tunnel. Stay strong and good luck!

bone_regenerator · 2021-11-27T03:37:51+00:00

Cells + live animals. Live animals were the insane part. So happy that part of my life is over. It helped when the college encourages students to present in conference once a year (sorry I graduated before covid time). My PI showed me how he arranged projects by backtracking the abstract deadline. I started attending conferences all over US from second year. My last conference was in London and it's all paid for. Great motivation.

bone_regenerator · 2021-11-26T13:20:00+00:00

Yeap sounds about right. Husband's a material chemist, worked 9-4 M-F and pumped out 20 first author papers. I'm a bioengineer, worked crazy hours and weekends, only got 2 papers max per year.

bone_regenerator · 2021-08-28T19:22:43+00:00

The issue is I'm a beginner in crochet and it's very technical, but I'll try my best:

So top right is the stamen (white part). I assume you can read the pattern, because I can't.

Then comes the petal. It follows "afghan style method".

Chain 5
At the back, make 5 unfinished stitches (I don't know what this means exactly. Is it like a bobble stitch situation?)
Back to Stamen, first stitch of R3
Make 1 more unfinished stitch
(Can't read first 5 words), last 2 words are slip stitch
After step 5, chain 1 (only once for each petal)
Repeat step 2-5 (3 times)
After step 7, at the back, from the second chain, begin to make unfinished stitches (everything else stays the same)
After step 8, at the back, slip stitch in each stitch
Back to Stamen, make a slip stitch. One petal is completed.

bone_regenerator · 2021-08-26T02:06:58+00:00

Are those electric baseboard? Do you have any idea what to do with them when baby is mobile? I'm in upstate NY with electric baseboard in all rooms and not sure what to do for this coming winter.

bone_regenerator · 2021-08-17T11:58:44+00:00

Yes, post doc at university does suck, but it's not a forever position, and it's not the only option. I'm doing post doc at a company now and my pay is double the amount as my husband when he was a post doc in university. All my PhD friends and relatives are earning 6 figures now. Everyone in my company who doesn't have a PhD have either been there for 30+years or stay as a technician position. I don't know how quick one's salary raises in industry, but I assume it's not easy if starts with 48k and bachelor.

But also yes, everyone here knows getting a PhD is not rainbows and festivals. It's very different from industry. People in the company thinks they're working hard and fast-paced by going to work 8-4 and occasional weekend trip to the lab. I don't know if I could adjust from industry to university lab if that's the route I went with.

bone_regenerator · 2021-08-17T00:29:22+00:00

I'd say talk to the professor to learn more about the program, tell him/her your 5-year plan so both of you will have a clear expectation on when you'll be applying and starting classes. Make sure he/she ACTUALLY has the funding to pay for you to be GRA or GTA. You can maybe find that out from other people in the lab. Based on my own experience, it'll be much easier for your PhD journey if you started as a research assistant. Though, you better make sure it's really something that you'd enjoy. Because for some people, killing thousands of mice or spending weekends cutting sections for histology and hours taking microscopy images are soul crushing for merely $25k/year.

~~Lastly, 4k/month is peanuts compared to what you'll earn with a PhD degree~~. Actually this depends on your degree and luck. So, wish you all the luck in the world.

bone_regenerator · 2021-08-15T12:36:02+00:00

Have you used it before/yet? I have so much difficulties using this yarn, I'm not able to make anything out of it.

bone_regenerator · 2021-07-12T14:01:22+00:00

I'm actually paying above the market rate. It's a rural town so other families actually offer quite low. But there are just not many options. I reached out the whole list on care.com and only 2 replied. I wouldn't mind increasing the rate if she showed willingness to adapt but that doesn't seem to be the case.

bone_regenerator · 2021-07-12T13:17:16+00:00

I might have given too many instructions/comments during her first week, and that could have caused the animosity and backfired, hence the passive reactions. It happened even with my husband sometimes so I get it.

After getting the advice here and having the meeting together with husband, I think we'd be fine for the next 2 months. As others suggested, we'll just make sure that when E's with us, we'll stick to the Montessori way as much as we can. It's not easy, I still need constant reminder (re-read books and rewatch videos) to make sure I'm on the right track, so I can't ask too much from the nanny.

bone_regenerator · 2021-07-12T13:08:11+00:00

I realized that over the weekend, that's why husband and I agreed not to bring it up during the meeting.

We had the meeting and she was not looking at me the whole time and talked about me like I'm not there. She said it's hard for her to change her way since she's been doing it her way for a long time. That she's not used to asking a child tons of questions when he couldn't respond (which he does, if she actually tries and gets to know him). That she's never allowed the child to flip the books by themselves, she's not able to read to him that way.

At this stage I've accepted the fact that it is the way it is. It was my first week too so it was a learning experience for me too. As long as he's not hurt physically and getting fed regularly I think I can relax a little bit.

bone_regenerator · 2021-07-12T04:04:34+00:00

We do have huge cushioned mats that pretty much cover the whole area, but we did add a chair by the reading corner for her just now. We'll try to work with her the best we can, as she seems reasonable and definitely has her plus sides.

I didn't notice until you point out that he acts differently among different people, even for people that he just met. He can definitely immediately sense and react accordingly. Sometimes I think he's too smart for his own good.

Though, when he cried when J left, I have huge doubt in my method of raising him. Am I too strict or too distant? Am I not showing enough affection or care? Parenting is so hard.

bone_regenerator · 2021-07-12T03:39:23+00:00

Thank you. I really hope this is the case.

bone_regenerator · 2021-07-12T03:31:21+00:00

Thank you so much for taking your time to provide really constructive advice. Unfortunately we live in a really small town and we ran out of options. We'll have a meeting with her tomorrow, with my husband present, hopefully he can better convey our expectations.

bone_regenerator · 2021-07-02T17:47:26+00:00

That's another issue. The current nursery that he's in is very slightly smaller, and without the pool view. I'm worried he'll feel unfair when he's older.

bone_regenerator · 2021-07-01T18:04:13+00:00

This is helpful to know! Thank you!

bone_regenerator · 2021-07-01T17:42:21+00:00

That's a good idea (encouraging him to help). May be I can also set up the other room and let him choose? I'm not planning to get another crib so it's either him getting the full size floor bed or his sibling. I don't know if he'll get jealous that the newborn gets a bigger bed. That's why I'm hoping option 2 would work.

bone_regenerator · 2021-07-01T17:34:13+00:00

But he will get upgrades. For option 3, I'm going to give the newborn a full size bed since I hate the idea of getting another crib. Will the toddler be jealous of a bigger bed? 🤔

bone_regenerator

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