Parenting Catch-all

Yeah we have already made a hand and foot print clay mold thing for mother’s day and also some hand print art for her birthday.

Last year when mine was that age we went to the mall and picked out a fuzzy warm hat. She mostly remembers it because the saleswoman got her a balloon when we were done.

I think we have just navigated out of a difficult period with our 2.5 year old. Her new baby brother has been home for three weeks, and although she loves him and is excited to see him and interact with him as much as she can, the big change clearly unsettled her, as she has been an absolute nightmare at bedtime and at daycare dropoff/pickup ever since his birth. For the last 3 weeks she's been good for at least one 20-30 minute screaming/kicking/yelling tantrum a day, often more than one, with the worst of them coming at bedtime. We spoke to our pediatrician and re-consulted all the various parenting discipline manuals we've ever read, and tried every strategy under the sun. All of them failed miserably. Our sticker chart was nowhere near as enticing as we'd hoped. But I think we've just waited her our of it, as she got through the last two days without incident and was dramatically more cooperative and pleasant. Perhaps it is too soon to declare victory, but I will accept the improvement!

Ugh! Our hospital sent us a letter asking us to confirm with our insurance company that our newborn son has coverage. I called the insurance company and spoke to a woman who was very helpful and said yeah, in fact, they had paid in full the cost of his delivery the same day the hospital's letter went out, so we're all set. I said "oh, you paid it in full? That's great, my wife had thought we had a $250 copay for delivery, glad to know we were wrong." She then said "can I put you on hold for a second," and when she came back, said "so we did pay it in full, but it looks like you actually were supposed to pay a $250 copay, so I'll just update that claim for you right away and you'll get a bill for $250 soon!" Gee, thanks, customer service lady!

(probably better they corrected it now than them catching their error 6 months from now leading them to foreclose on our house or whatever other insane thing might happen with medical debts in our dumb country, but still, sucks)

Oops.

$250 sounds great. We're still waiting for a delivery bill and then the NICU bill. Could be very painful.

Stele wrote:

Oops.

$250 sounds great. We're still waiting for a delivery bill and then the NICU bill. Could be very painful.

Seriously, I think we paid the full deductible (~$5k) and we were in VT too.
mrlogical, were you in Burlington? The birthing rooms were super nice. Which made it funnier as the postpartum rooms seemed like a dungeon at the time, new building to old building.

Yeah, my insurance is through the State of Vermont employee plan which is pretty great, no deductible, so I am certainly not complaining about paying $250 in comparison to what many others in the US have to pay. But it is unfortunate that I accidentally volunteered myself to pay that when maybe I wasn't going to have to otherwise.

And yes we were in Burlington. The hospital is great, and infinitely better than where we had our first when we lived in D.C. (although much of my comparison is based on the insanely uncomfortable extendable couch they had for fathers in postpartum rooms in D.C., as compared to the reasonably comfy murphy beds they have in Burlington). I believe the postpartum rooms in Burlington are all new, built 2-3 years ago, just before my second daughter was born, so perhaps not the dungeon you experienced.

Another fun detail when our daughter was born in D.C. was the hospital erroneously sent us the bill for the labor and delivery as if it were not covered by insurance. $31,000! It was actually less scary because it was just so thoroughly unaffordable. The same hospital also tried billing us $8,000 for the surgery my wife unexpectedly needed when their anesthesiologist somehow got the epidural catheter stuck in my wife's back and a surgeon had to cut it out, though when we called and said "hi we are both lawyers and we are definitely not paying this" they apologized profusely and said they just wanted to see if our insurance would cover it (??) but we didn't have to pay. What a weird and bad system.

Wow. I'm from a 'poor' country and we paid the equivalent of $15 to find out our child's sex. The rest was free, including paediatric clinic visits.

MrDeVil909 wrote:

Wow. I'm from a 'poor' country and we paid the equivalent of $15 to find out our child's sex. The rest was free, including paediatric clinic visits.

But we have more Freedum!!(TM) so there's that.

lunchbox12682 wrote:
MrDeVil909 wrote:

Wow. I'm from a 'poor' country and we paid the equivalent of $15 to find out our child's sex. The rest was free, including paediatric clinic visits.

But we have more Freedum!!(TM) so there's that.

You spelled “we live in a dystopia ruled by corporate interests and also corporations are people” wrong.

Apart from the delivery being free here, the city covers the cost of ~5 days accomodation in the maternity ward (more like a 4 star hotel) which includes a private room, and training classes to get you up to speed. Pretty nice.

MrDeVil909 wrote:

Wow. I'm from a 'poor' country and we paid the equivalent of $15 to find out our child's sex. The rest was free, including paediatric clinic visits.

Yeah, I don't want to be that guy, but reading parenting threads always makes me grateful to be in Australia.

Mr GT Chris wrote:

Apart from the delivery being free here, the city covers the cost of ~5 days accomodation in the maternity ward (more like a 4 star hotel) which includes a private room, and training classes to get you up to speed. Pretty nice.

We don't get long stays in maternity though (unless you pay for private health cover). You typically get discharged from hospital the next day.

Technically, long stays aren't really necessary. Many women don't even give birth at a third level center. A great deal of the worst dangers are over 24 hours after birth, and Australia is sparse enough that getting to a center in a hurry should not be a problem.

You could always hang out in a hotel or hire private carers. That way, less money goes into various medical equipment you don't really need, and more of it goes into yummy food and creature comforts. Your dime, though.

Are there any good parenting TV shows? I’ve heard of shows like Nanny 9-11 but don’t know if any at actually useful to parents or is they are all just reality tv garbage.

Mister Rogers
Sesame Street

I can't really imagine a good parenting show that isn't focused on people who should barely be allowed children.

jrralls wrote:

Are there any good parenting TV shows? I’ve heard of shows like Nanny 9-11 but don’t know if any at actually useful to parents or is they are all just reality tv garbage.

Sadly, most of the parenting shows I’ve seen are about train wreck parents. I would actually recommend podcasts like the Longest Shortest Time and Slate’s Mom and Dad are Fighting.

jrralls wrote:

Are there any good parenting TV shows? I’ve heard of shows like Nanny 9-11 but don’t know if any at actually useful to parents or is they are all just reality tv garbage.

My wife, a career nanny, used to thoroughly enjoy Supernanny, albeit that it's definitely reality TV garbage with all the concomitant editing foibles (i.e. 42 minute show with 15 minutes of content).

It was rare among the parenting shows that it got a lot of nods of professional respect and agreement from my wife though.

jdzappa wrote:
jrralls wrote:

Are there any good parenting TV shows? I’ve heard of shows like Nanny 9-11 but don’t know if any at actually useful to parents or is they are all just reality tv garbage.

Sadly, most of the parenting shows I’ve seen are about train wreck parents. I would actually recommend podcasts like the Longest Shortest Time and Slate’s Mom and Dad are Fighting.

And One Bad Mother.

Mixolyde wrote:
jdzappa wrote:
jrralls wrote:

Are there any good parenting TV shows? I’ve heard of shows like Nanny 9-11 but don’t know if any at actually useful to parents or is they are all just reality tv garbage.

Sadly, most of the parenting shows I’ve seen are about train wreck parents. I would actually recommend podcasts like the Longest Shortest Time and Slate’s Mom and Dad are Fighting.

And One Bad Mother.

Shut your mouth!

Roselyn Martha was born Dec 16th! Happy and Healthy!

IMAGE(https://c1.staticflickr.com/5/4881/45463148995_4d9476a516_c.jpg)

I had to tell my 2.5 year old to not put corn in her belly button at dinner tonight. Just one of those times you realize that is a sentence you never thought you would say.

Only two more unscheduled doctor's office visits to satisfy the paranoid daycare providers and I get a free vasectomy!

She is teething. Her eyes will get weepy. No fever. Insatiable appetite. Happy as a clam. But now Neener and I are doing the work schedule shuffle because our ability to work is held hostage by a service that costs more than our mortgage.

Rezzy wrote:

Only two more unscheduled doctor's office visits to satisfy the paranoid daycare providers and I get a free vasectomy!

She is teething. Her eyes will get weepy. No fever. Insatiable appetite. Happy as a clam. But now Neener and I are doing the work schedule shuffle because our ability to work is held hostage by a service that costs more than our mortgage.

(If I'm understanding you correctly) I hate that crap. I was picking up my son last month and was informed that he had Ring Worm, a Kidney Infection, and Impetigo... As stupid as that all sounded at the time (and I don't blame you if you think I'm exaggerating), you have to be sure, right? Turns out - surprise, surprise - he didn't have any of those things.

Also, teething is the worst. Teething can go suck on a lemon.

First diaper rash for our little one the last couple days. She is not happy. Having to change her much more frequently as that and some butt paste seems to be the only thing that soothes.

So tired.

Our son benefitted from a lot of naked time... but that’s not always possible. Our work-schedules were off-set, so we had that working for us...

My wife disagrees, but I feel like I handled more of the less desirable wardrobe changes... This is the best butt paste.

FWIW our doctor advised a non-zinc based diaper cream to address diaper rash for our infant son. We used Aquaphor, which seemed to do the trick. I can't recall why, with this baby, he suggested we not go with the zinc-based, as with our previous kids we had used Desitin or Boudreau's and it seemed to work too, but if you're looking for an alternative, it might be worth a shot.

Is Sudocrem used widely in the US? It's Irish, but I know it's available in at least some other countries. It's significantly better than anything else we ever tried.

IMAGE(https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/71jySG1yiVL._SX355_.jpg)