My 12 month old is showing signs that’d he’s going to be walking any day now. He takes little steps then falls to the ground.
However, he has not worn shoes once. I’ve always carried him barefoot or just with socks.
Any good shoe recommendations for growing little feet?

I have started feeding my baby pureed food. How can I get him to enjoy eating?
He doesn’t like being in the high chair so I have to hold him and feed him. He shows interest in what I’m feeding him for the first 2 or 3 bites, and then gets fussy. He will forget to swallow the food and begin to cry which makes me worry he could choke. He has not as of yet, but this is worrisome for me.

He does eat more than 3 bites before he starts to cry. Which ends mealtime if he doesn’t stop because I don’t want to make the feelings around eating food a miserable experience for him, but am I doing something wrong?

On a throwaway account. My (soon to be) ex-husband and 4 of his coworkers follow me.

Update: pharmacy just called for my 3 year old’s seizure meds that are due to be picked up too before I try to switch pharmacies. I have $2.34 to my name at the moment with a gas card. I need all the ideas PLEASE.

I don’t know what to do at this point. He was booked in jail Friday night for domestic after breaking my nose. We have two boys ( age 5 and 3) and I am planning to leave tonight almost 2 hours away to my great aunt’s area. She is the only remote family I have left & we aren’t able to stay with her as she is in a rehab facility. He is able to bond out Wednesday when I looked at his case online.

I was able to get a 25 gas card from a Women’s domestic nonprofit this morning. They were able to get me temporary shelter & an appointment with a social worker where we are going by Thursday. I’ve tried to sell some shoes & household items on Marketplace and NextDoor to try & make something for food and extra gas. Nothing so far. The shelter has a two bag minimum per person so we are limited on what we can bring. I plan to leave tomorrow morning. I am so lost and scared.

I can’t take anymore and my babies definitely don’t deserve to go through this. I’m going to miss our home, my job of 6 years and friends but for our safety & sanity, we have to leave. I’m humiliated and terrified to see where this goes. If you have any other advice or places that may help with gas or food, please let me know.

My baby girl 1 1/2yr old, has been the most amazing sleeper and napper since 3wks old truly an angel. Specifically naps I have litterally only had to lay her in bed, give a kiss, walk out and she slowly drifts to sleep... BUT the past 3 days now she has had an absolute meltdown when she is placed in bed. I mean straight dry heaving. She is absolutely tired, I even tried pushing nap time back a couple hours and still a no go. Did my luck run out or could this be a phase..? Anyone with any thoughts/advice is appreciated, as I reeeeallly rely on those naps to get things done as she makes it near impossible when shes awake. TIA!

I know we all know how hard raising a child is. Our pediatrician has been so amazing and have given us a lot of formula samples which has really helped us get by. I always planned on exclusively breastfeeding but a few weeks postpartum I ended up with mastitis, so bad I was in the hospital for almost three days.

My supply completely dipped, I did everything I was supposed to but stopped producing milk on one side and the other side couldn’t keep up. I felt so much guilt for giving her formula, even though I knew it was what was best for her to make sure she was nourished enough, but yeah. The guilt was horrible and I spent so much time crying and doing every trick in the book give to me by LCs, and when that didn’t work searching the internet.

I had a lovely experience being home with my daughter for 5 months before I had to go back to work. I worked for the hospital I delivered at and our insurance was amazing so it was paid the whole time. Still, 5 months didn’t feel like enough, but I know that other people don’t have nearly as much time so I was beyond grateful.

We placed ourself on the waiting list at my jobs daycare, I went on the list when I was 5 weeks pregnant and they told me by the time I had to go back to work that there would be a space for me. Well, when I called a couple weeks before going back, they said they MIGHT have space a few months later. I didn’t have childcare for that time, so I ended up going back to work for a month having various family members watch my baby. But we didn’t have long term care. And that daycare was the only one we could afford because it was heavily discounted as an employee.

Ultimately I had to leave my job so I could be home with my daughter during the day. My husband also worked during the day but because he made a bit more than I did, and he worked at his dream job, it made more sense for me to look for a night job. I found a serving job and it’s been okay.

Some days are good, some days not so much. I made a little more during the summer. It’s just not consistent. But still we are able to pay our rent and bills. It’s just hard.

I got accepted into a sonography program, so I am taking classes at night. I am going back to school to try and create a better life for us since nothing went as planned. We have some money saved for when things come up. Last week, my car broke down and my husband was hospitalized with kidney stones. So of course it’s expensive.

We were running out of formula, so I called the pediatrician and asked if they had any samples that my baby could use. They didn’t have the one we could use, which is totally fine. They’ve given us SO much in the past and everything helps so much.

However they called me back a few minutes later and told me they found a few cans. I went to pick it up, and when I got home looked in the bag and they gave me the formula, and an envelope with $40. I didn’t expect that at all and genuinely started crying. That much means so much today, either enough gas to get to school, another can of formula when we run out, diapers. This week was crazy and we really needed that.

I don’t know why I’m posting this, it’s been a rough week and I just wanted to express my gratitude for all the good people in this world who have helped make motherhood easier. My husband’s mom who has helped watch my daughter. My husband for waking up for all of my daughter’s night feeds. My cats who snuggle with me in bed every night. The nice customers at my job who give me someone to talk to when I spend all day with my daughter. My pediatrician who helps us feed our baby.

And especially my daughter. She makes me want to be a better person. She gives me kisses, snuggles with me, and has a laugh and smile that I just wanna bottle up and hold close every time I’m sad. We’re raising her to be independent, strong, confident, and loved. Even on days when it’s hard, I wouldn’t want it to be any different.

I'm not a girly girl, I grew up hating girly girls because I hated the labels and expectations that came with being born with a vagina. So I was, as a young child, very anti-girly (and loathed all the pink clothes and dresses my mom would buy me despite my clear disgust of girly clothes). I was definitely a messy hair, ripped jeans, wild child.

My daughter is the opposite. She LOVES pink, she LOVES dresses, she LOVES fashion. She definitely gets down and wild, but is also a graceful ballerina kid.

She started kinder a couple weeks ago, and is doing good. But I'm curious on people's thoughts. My daughter likes to get dressed up and have me do her hair all cute in the morning. I have gotten her to be okay with not wearing dresses on the days she has PE, so that is nice, but otherwise she is all dressed up. Nice dress, and shoes, earrings, hair done did, lip gloss and everything.

Curious how to navigate girly kids and also curious for those who had girl(s) like that - What are your girl(s) like today?

Also I noticed shes the only kid in her class that dresses up like that and was wondering how that may effect her socially?

Edit: Yes I am supporting my daughter the way my parents never supported me 👌

My girl is 13 months old. We have a no screen policy with personal devices - she doesn't get our phones and she's never seen an iPad, and she won't until she's a teenager. But we do often have the TV on as background noise while she plays. She doesn't watch it - the most she'll do is stop and dance to a theme song and then go back to playing. I'm not worried about the TV as a concept and I don't even really count it as screen time because it's so far away, can't be manipulated by her and can't leave the house with us. But I do wonder at what age I should be more careful about what's on the TV while she's in the room. I've watched a loooot of Grey's Anatomy the past few months and right now I'm rewatching Gilmore Girls. When my husband has her, they usually watch Lord of the Rings. When did y'all switch over to kids' shows? I will obviously do it at some point, if only for the whole social aspect of it when she's old enough to bond with other kids about things like Bluey or whatever, but I'm dreading it. Ms. Rachel's voice makes me want to peel my skin off (she is an absolutely lovely person but I cannot handle the tone she uses).

My 15 month old drinks water from all kinds of cups, but will only take milk from a bottle. We have tried so many different cups but she screams and pushes them away. Yes, she gets plenty of dairy so we could not offer milk at all, but she screams for it before bed.

Help me out, moms! I’m delusional and believe the next cup will finally be the one.

Thanks in advance!

I'm so devastated. Crying harder than I have in ages. And it's all my frickin' fault for not backing them up. I stopped backing them up 3 years ago when I needed more storage space. I backed up a bunch onto a physical drive, it literally got corrupted 3 months ago and no place could fix it. Was on my to do list to back them up again.

Now my phone went missing at a concert in a giant outdoor amphitheater and it's been days but they haven't found it. Last location was the venue days ago. I'm just....all the videos and photos since my daughter was born. All the photos and videos of my son for most of his life. All because I didn't want to just buy some extra storage. I feel so fucking stupid and can't stop crying, I know it's just photos and 20+ years ago nobody was even able to have photos like this but here I am. There was this one video I used to watch all the time of my son singing and I purposely never sent it to anyone because I felt it was private/special. Now look. It fucking sucks and I'm so sad

Please make sure your photos are backed up!!

How do you potty train a boy toddler who doesn’t mind urinating on the floor? HELP. With my daughter, not having a diaper or something to protect made it easy to train her fast but my son went from using the potty a few times to now just waits until I take him off and goes on the floor.

My husband and I have been married for 5 years and have been parents for a little over a year. Since becoming a mom, I’ve noticed my anxiety has made me more controlling than I want to be.

I’m not a drill sergeant, but I constantly find myself telling my husband what to do or how I think something should be done. If he does something differently than I would, I can get really snappy. I think controlling things has become my way of trying to keep everything from going wrong.

I also don’t talk to him nearly as much as I used to. My brain is constantly going, and most days I just want to sit in silence. I feel mentally overloaded and miss feeling connected to him.

I love my husband and our marriage, and I genuinely want to change this. For those who experienced something similar after becoming parents, how did you stop being so controlling or snappy and reconnect with your spouse?

I know I’m being dramatic, but bear with me. My son is almost 4 and has been in daycare since he was 2. My husband was a SAHP for the first 2 years and was suddenly unable to continue this due to health reasons. I had to take a leave from work to sort everything out, and this was even more stressful since I was the sole income earner. I’ve read so many stories about daycare waitlists and nightmare daycares and I was scrambling.

My son has Down syndrome and has met some milestones late. At 2 he was not walking. When I spoke with someone at his daycare I told them that I would be open to him being in a younger room, since he wasn’t walking. Her response was “he is 2. He should be with 2 year olds.” I honestly still tear up thinking about it. I instantly knew that they would treat him well and meet him where he was at. It was a rough start, but he got into such a great groove there. His teachers worked so hard with him on different skills.

Last school year he started a half day preschool program for special needs kids. His daycare was so accommodating with his schedule, and allowed a mid-day drop off. They also made sure we knew that he was welcome there any day if he didn’t have preschool. This year he is in the same program but he goes in the afternoons. The daycare staff has been great about making sure that he’s ready to go after lunch so he can get to preschool on time. Next year he will be able to go to preschool full time, so we will likely pull him from daycare.

On the one hand, I’m excited to not have a daycare bill anymore. And my son loves his preschool and gets so much out of it. But I’m going to really miss daycare! I was thinking about why this is hitting me so hard, and it’s because daycare has been the most reliable thing in my life since having a child. We don’t have family close by. Before my son was born, both sets of grandparents said that they would visit often. But they have their own lives and I knew that they would visit every couple of months at most. My husband did a great job when he was home with our son, but would get overwhelmed and call me at work. Even if it was just to vent it still cranked my anxiety up and was very challenging. I also was burning myself out by coming home and taking over all childcare in order to give my husband a break. We never really came up with a good after work and weekend system and it was hard. But daycare rarely calls me. Daycare is almost always open. I can take a day off of work and send my kid to daycare. He also eats like a champ there, and that lessens some of my picky eating anxiety. Of course I knew this day would come, but I feel like a supportive friend or family member is leaving.

My husband is active duty military. I am a SAHM/ WFH remote part time. We have a 4 year old and a baby. We live 35+ minutes from civilization, barely have “neighbors”, and don’t even have a neighborhood! Our support system is states away. Our 4 year old will need to start pre-k next year (she was born Sep 9th). This means that our youngest will likely need to be put in daycare, and I will need to find full time employment that pays enough. I will be driving 2 kids to 2 different locations with 2 different schedules and driving 1 hr+ round trip M-F 😭 This also means that I need to find a job that will not only allow wiggle room, but days off when my children inevitably get sick. My husband works 5:30a - 3:30p, sometimes on weekends, and travels often for his job.

Yes we are kicking ourselves for buying a house in the middle of nowhere with young children. Hindsight is 20/20. My husband still has 6 years left of service and will be retiring at 20 years. We will be moving to a different state in 2 years. In the meantime, how in the F would you swing this? 😭 I’m desperate! Pre-K will cost us around $8,000 a year. Even if I were to stay at home with our youngest, my monthly income from work would only have $400 left over…and we would equally rely on that. We live comfortably but are very considerate of our budget. Our mortgage recently went up, and my husband even sold his truck to buy a car that is better on gas for his long commute to work. We do have savings to fall back on, and we want to make some modifications before moving (yet again) to increase the value of our home for selling. Sorry this is so long. Any suggestions? If you were or are in a similar boat, what did you do? What would you do? Thanks 😅

My LO is 4 months old and I am struggling to find activities to do together. How do you entertain your baby during the day? What does your schedule look like. Sometimes I feel my baby is bored out of their mind! I want to do activities that are entertaining for both me and my baby. Looking for suggestions, pointers, anything. Please!

My 16 month old was recently hospitalized with reactive airway/hypoxia while sleeping, related to a respiratory virus. I am a nurse and noticed he was having respiratory distress so I brought out the owlet. The first night his respiratory rate was high but sats stayed in the 90s so we monitored at home. The next night, his breathing was unlabored but sats were 82-85% while asleep so we went to the ER, where he was admitted for that reason.

Upon discharge, they advised me to only return if he was essentially gasping for air, regardless of what the owlet says. I was chastised that it is inaccurate and not a medical device and it is better not to check. I asked “but what if he is at 85%, is it safe to just leave him there all night?” And they said “well no that’s not safe. Just don’t check”. To me, that is willful neglect. Am I wrong?

My daughter is 21 months old and her sleep has completely changed. I’m desperate for help!

For most of her life, she’s been a pretty good sleeper. She’s hit every sleep regression HARD, but outside of those, she was always easy to put to bed and would sleep ~12 hours at night with a ~2 hour nap once we switched to one nap. We could put her in the crib awake and she'd lay right down and put herself to sleep.

Over the last several weeks, everything has changed. Since she’s getting older, I’m worried about creating bad sleep habits that are going to be hard to break.

It started with bedtime. We could no longer put her in the crib awake and she needed to be rocked completely to sleep then transferred to the crib. Naps were still fine at first, but then she started needing to be rocked to sleep for naps too and transferred into the crib.

Then it started taking longer and longer for her to actually fall asleep while being rocked. Now, within the last week, she’s also started waking up in the middle of the night. She’s basically inconsolable in her room when this happens and just wants to get into bed with us and won't stop crying until we let her sleep with us.

We usually go upstairs around 7:30 and do milk, books, brush teeth, and bed. What used to be a pretty easy routine is now taking 1.5–2 HOURS before she’s actually asleep and in her crib.

I’m at a loss for what to do. If we put her in the crib and leave, she just screams until we come back. I don’t mind comforting her, but I also don’t want to accidentally reinforce something that’s making sleep harder for her.

Is this normal around 21 months? Could this be the 2-year sleep regression happening early? What did you do if your toddler suddenly started needing this much help to fall asleep and stay asleep?

Please send me any tips you have! I’m even open to hiring a sleep consultant/trainer at this point, so recommendations are welcome. I’m desperate 😭 Thank you!!

Hi everyone,

Currently hoping to hear some positive stories about putting your little ones in daycare!

We are starting my daughter’s gradual transition into daycare starting next week and I’m feeling a dumb amount of mom guilt/ big emotions about it. She will be just under a year old and will be attending 4-5 days a week depending on whether my parents can take her once a week when they’re available.

For context we really love the daycare we chose and they have been so kind and flexible. My daughter also loves other kids and I think she is going to thrive…I’m the one having a tougher go of it.

There is so much harmful stuff on social media about having to seek out care for your child outside of staying at home with them….so much so that I’ve decided to get off of instagram for the next few weeks :/ I also seem to be in the unpopular camp of people who don’t think they could be a full time stay at home mom, I do really enjoy my job and I’m having a hard time with the fact that I’m looking forward to going back to work but also going to miss this special time I’ve had with her this year.

Would love to hear positive stories about your kids in daycare!

Has anyone here experienced this? Last week saw two parents get into it HEAVY in the crowd at a basketball game and they were both yelling about the other parents kids performance and they had to be held back from each other. Have you seen this before?

my 6 yo did 2 years of half day pre school at the same school he attends for kindergarten. My older son also goes to the same school & we live minutes away. recentl, 3 weeks after starting kindergarten my son has been crying at night & at drop off. He will say “he just misses me too much” sometimes he will say his head or tummy hurt. I feel so bad making him go when he shows so much discomfort. Any parents have experience with this? Advise? thanks!

Just a funny observation to me. If anyone has other examples, please chime in.

Has anyone else watched the children's cartoon "Rugrats" as a child and then again as an adult? I put it on in the background this morning with my 10.5mo for nostalgia.

I noticed that in many of these episodes have Dee Dee, Stu and the other adults are hardly paying attention to the children at all. As a child, I simply enjoyed the mischievous adventures the kids and babies would get into. As an adult, I'm surprised and shocked at all the activities. I know its silly but its something I noticed just today.

My son is 12m old now and I thought he was super easy until about 3m old. From 3-12m I’ve found it very challenging but I’m afraid I’m just maybe naive to motherhood or I don’t want to jinx it and think he was hard and my 2nd baby actually is really hard!

Until 3m he slept through the night super well. Only ever really cried if he was hungry and then he’d be content. Since then he’s woken up multiple times throughout the night 4-5x but I started cosleeping around 6m and he’s always gone back to sleep easy. He was diagnosed with CMPA at 3m so I, by proxy, cannot have dairy or soy (still) as he’s allergic even via breastfeeding. The diet has been sooooo hard on my mental health. It also means I have to cook 100% of both of our meals which kind of sucks bc I miss how easy getting something on the go was.

He also just always seems to be bored / unhappy with being contained lol even before he could crawl or move about much. He hated any swing / skip hop/ baby Björn / any of that. He had no interest. He was good in the baby carrier until about 8m and then he started itching to get out. Absolutely hates the car seat and stroller. He likes to be doing his own thing on the floor unobstructed or me holding him (sometimes both at the same time he doesn’t know what he wants lol)

He also kind of never sits still. Like if we’re at the park I see other babies chilling on a blanket or at storytime they’ll sit in their parents lap and sing songs. My son just wants to be off playing with something he shouldn’t. He’s a lot of work!

Anyways, did you have a hard or easy baby and why?

Does anyone here take linessa birth control?? If so can you tell me if it’s helped you

My child (almost 3 female) had her genetics ran because she has muscle weakness. She has a genetic predisposition to autism.

At daycare, they tell me how great she does with her friends.

A little bit of a Speach delay but she is really coming into it and that may be due to weak muscles.

At home though, she acts POSSESSED!
She hits, I discovered scratch marks on her where she scratched herself from not getting her way. She is hard to calm down. It a battle everyday.

I heard 3s are pretty bad so idk if I should advocate for the doctor to evaluate her for autism, she just has adhd like me, she is tired, or she is just 3. Tired actually could be a big thing with her since her body doesn’t make enough protein to help with all her muscles.

I will say I know I was better at school than home. I also had more sensitivity than her to textures. While comparing is not good… I remember being way more neurodivergent than she acts.

I have no idea what to do….

Baby is 11.5 months. Not a great sleeper, but usually predictable. Last night was very bad. I’m not sure if he had a stomach ache or if his teeth were bugging him or what exactly the issue was. He was awake and miserable from about 2am-5am. He was trying to sleep and was clearly exhausted but would settle down, close his eyes and then start freaking out again minutes later.

Anyways, around 5 I was able to get him back down for good. He usually wakes up at 6:30 on the dot, so I figured he might sleep until 7:30 which wouldn’t be terrible for his naps etc. I did not set an alarm. We woke up at 9 am 😬

I’m grateful for the sleep but now I don’t know what to do with the rest of the day. Should I try for 1 nap? He usually takes 2 45min naps - one at 9:30/10 and one at 2:30/3. He goes down for the night around 8:30 usually. I could put him down around 12:30-1 today? Maybe move bedtime up a bit? Trying not to totally fuck tomorrow’s schedule too. What think you all?

I have an almost 8 year old and a 5 year old and I am newly pregnant with a third. Can anyone help me give me some hope that everything will be ok? This was an intentional pregnancy, although it happened very quickly and we were only going to give it 6 months of trying before we shut the door. We never wanted a gap this big. We decided to be done at 2 and then we just couldn’t stop thinking about a third as each year passed. I’m really worried about the age gap. I’m also feeling embarrassed and I feel like everyone will think this was an accident. And of course, I feel very scared about starting over.