Top Ten Worries of New Parents

You already know that worrying is part of the parenting turf. (You'll find it listed in the job description right after guilt.) What you may not realize until after your baby arrives, however, is just how many things there are to worry about-and how normal it is to drive yourself crazy by panicking about every little thing.

Believe it or not, you will probably find yourself obsessing about the very same things that your parents worried about when they were raising you-and that their parents fussed about a generation earlier. 

While child rearing philosophies and infant feeding practices have changed dramatically over the years, worrying about your new baby never quite goes out of fashion.

Here is a list of the top ten worries of new parents. 

 

1. Will my baby die?

There's no doubt about it: if there's one thing that tops the new parent worry list, it's the possibility that your baby could die. The first time he sleeps through the night on his own, you awake in a panic, wondering if he's alright.

The fear of losing a child to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome can be particularly strong for new parents, notes Dr. Tiffany McKee-Garrett, an assistant professor of pediatrics at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas. The good news on the SIDS front is the fact that SIDS deaths are relatively rare, occuring in just one or two of every thousand live births.

2. Will I be able to protect my baby from harm?

The world can suddenly feel like a very scary place when you're entrusted with the task of caring for a newborn. Fortunately, newborn babies aren't nearly as fragile as they look, and common sense and parental instinct enable most parents to keep their babies safe from harm.

3. Is my baby "normal"?

Something else that most new parents worry about is whether or not their baby is developing normally. McGee-Garrett spends a lot of time reassuring worried parents that their babies are well within the normal range in terms of their development. "I try to remind these parents that there is a large variability in the timing of when babies do things," she explained. "In the vast majority of cases, despite the parents' concerns, the baby is developing just fine."

4. Is my baby getting enough to eat?

While parents of formula-fed infants may also fret about whether their babies are getting enough to eat, feeding-related worries tend to be more of a concern for parents who are breastfeeding. Part of the problem, of course, is that it's impossible to measure the amount of liquid that a breastfeeding baby is consuming--other than counting the number of wet and soiled diapers that the baby produces over the course of a day. Fortunately, most new mothers grow more confident in their bodies' ability to provide for the needs of their breastfeeding babies once they and their nursing babies gain a little more experience.

5. Is my baby crying too much?

Many new parents are shocked to discover how long and how often newborns cry, and may worry that the crying could be a sign of a more serious problem. McKee-Garrett tries to reassure the parents that she works with that crying is perfectly normal infant behavior, and that as long as the baby looks well, the crying is unlikely to do him any real harm. And to parents of colicky babies, she offers these reassuring words: "This too will end. Your baby will grow out of the colic by age three months-age four months if you're really unlucky."

6. Is my baby sleeping too much-or too little?

If your baby sleeps through the night right away, you may worry that he's not eating often enough. If he's not sleeping through the night by the time he's six months, you may worry that you're setting him up for a lifetime of bad sleeping habits by failing to teach him to sleep through the night. Fortunately, most newborns settle into more adult-friendly sleep patterns by the time they reach three to six months-good news for parents who can't imagine anything more satisfying than a good night's sleep!

7. Will my other children learn to love the baby?

Parents who are expecting their second or subsequent child frequently worry about how their firstborn will adjust to the arrival or a new baby or sister. While there can be some rough spots on the road to sibling acceptance, most older children do learn to welcome-or at least accept-the new baby.

8. Will life ever be the same for my partner and I?

Another worry at the top of the list for many new parents is how they will manage to stay connected with their partner when baby makes three-or four-or more! While it's hard to find much "couple time" when you have a newborn around, most couples take solace in the fact that the exhausting newborn phase only lasts for a short time. Once the baby is sleeping through the night-or at least for a couple of hours at a time-most couples are able to find the time and energy for romance again. 9. Will I be able to provide for this child financially? Another big worry-especially for first-time fathers-is money. It's a concern that Harriet Lerner, Ph.D., bestselling author of The Mother Dance, has heard time and time again from men: "New fathers feel tremendous pressure to earn, earn, earn."

Despite what many panicked first-time fathers fear, babies don't have to cost the earth. Borrowing as much as possible from family members and friends and shopping secondhand are two excellent ways of reducing your baby's bottom line.

10. Will I be a good parent?

One of the most common worries of new parents-particularly of new mothers-is about whether they are up to the challenges of parenting.

Given society's extraordinarily high standards of mothers, new mothers have good reason to be scared, says Lerner. "Society has expectations for mothers that even a saint couldn't meet."

While this particular worry never disappears entirely, most new mothers resolve their Madonna complex by learning how to accept their imperfections on the parenting front.

While there are plenty of things for new parents to worry about during their baby's first few months of life, most parents discover that their anxiety level begins to decrease a little as time goes on.

That was the case for Laura Augustine, 31, whose son, Sam, recently turned one. "I was pretty paranoid when we first brought Sam home from the hospital," she recalled. "I can't believe how much easier it is now."

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