Preparing for a New Sibling

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The second pregnancy flew by and here we are at the end preparing my son to welcome his little sister in a few weeks. This will be a BIG change for him; frankly, parts of it make me nervous. A lot also makes me excited: he loves babies and I think he will be a wonderful big brother. Here is what we are doing to prepare him for this huge change.

Updating The Space

We live in a 2 bedroom apartment. This means that my son and the new baby will be sharing a room. They will not initially be sleeping in the same room (she will stay in our room until at least a year), but she will nap in there and he will have to share the space for toys.

While this pregnancy has felt really fast and there are certain prep things I absolutely haven’t been on top of and have left to the last minute, redoing the room was one I felt was very important to do early. My son is used to his space being a certain way. Being in the first plane of development (0-6 years) he is in the sensitive period for order. I knew the disruption of changing his room and the baby being born immediately after would not be the best for him. So instead of updating the room in the final month of pregnancy, we did that in the early third trimester.

We got my daughter a floor bed for the room, brought out his old play gym, and rearranged to make that work. He now points to the bed and says “baby.” We had planned to do more like change the stroller configuration earlier but that did not end up happening. I think his room though will be the most important space for him to have some stability.

We also involved my son in these changes as much as possible. He helped us build the new floor bed and was around for all the rearranging. We have found when he is included he struggles a lot less with changes in his environment versus when we make a change while he is out of the apartment.

Personalized Stories

I have created two social stories to guide him through the transition. One of them discusses the birth itself when he goes to Grandma and Grandpa’s and the other discusses what it will be like having a new baby. These stories are meant to prep him for the changes ahead. While we talk about babies and the birth this is all very abstract for him. The hope is the repetition of these stories helps him understand a bit more.

In particular, I am a bit nervous about the birth itself. There are so many unknowns about how long labor will take, etc. I want him to feel comfortable with the idea of going to Grandma and Grandpa’s house. In that book, I focus on the things he loves doing there (he really loves it). This is his first time away from me for any length of time so it is a big change.

I designed the stories on Canva, printed them on sticky paper, and pasted them into a blank board book. I found the actual pasting the most difficult part. You have to be really careful and go slowly. I started by lining up one side and then slowly peeling the paper away. Not every page is perfect, but I am not usually a DIYer! You could laminate and use rings to put together or put in sheet protectors in a binder or binding as well, all of which would probably be a bit easier than this. I liked the idea of it being a board book since that is more like the other books he has and he can really interact with it.

I have been impressed by how quickly he took to the book. Since introducing it it has been his favorite book. He seems more excited to see other people he knows in the book than to see himself, but he has really liked the book. When he first saw the photo of him playing with my tummy he went “baby baby” and then pointed to my tummy in real life. He loves pointing out Grandma and Grandpa, the cats, and the fire (he LOVES building fires at Grandma and Grandpa’s house. I am hoping it is warm enough to build one outside but if not he can inside).

The second social story about having a new sibling.

Doll Play

We bought him a doll a while ago and he has been loving it recently. We also purchased him a doll carrier that looks just like the carrier we have for the baby and a doll bed that looks similar to the baby’s bed. He is still on the young side for a lot of pretend play, however, we have guided him in some of this play with the doll in hopes of it helping him understand a bit about a baby. This will also give him something to care for while I care for the baby if he wants.

We use the doll to talk about how babies cry sometimes and about how we can give “gentle hands” to the baby on her legs.

Many recommend using realistic dolls. I planned on getting one but ended up not. We have limited space and I don’t like buying extra things that take up space. This is one of the dolls we have. I also introduced him to my old Bitty Baby from childhood!

Discussing and Listening to Babies

My son started getting interested in babies near the beginning of my third trimester. We have taken this as an opportunity to help him learn a bit about babies, including the fact that they can be loud. He loves to squeal along with them which I know could be a bit overwhelming when the baby cries. We talk about and label emotions in general so we have been talking about how when babies cry it means they are sad or need something. Instead of squealing we can speak softly to them or give “gentle hands.” My son picked up on gentle hands really quickly and if someone is sad or has an “owie” he gives gentle hands.

Reading Books About New Siblings

Books about getting a new baby are another great way to familiarize your child with the concept and also normalize a variety of emotions around the new baby. Ideally, I would have started reading these to my son a bit earlier, but as we were traveling it didn’t happen until the final month. Here are some new sibling books we got: Lola Reads to Leo, My New Baby, I’m a Big Brother Now (sister version here), It’s Big Brother Time (sister version here).

Establishing His Routine

This might not seem directly related to preparing for the baby but one of our goals in these last weeks pre-baby is to help him have as stable as a routine as possible. This doesn’t mean a schedule (in fact I think that could likely backfire when the baby throws it off!) but it does mean a sustainable rhythm that we can continue after the baby is born. We were traveling from when I was 30-34 weeks so when we got home we came straight back into reestablishing our daily rhythm.

I made him a visual daily routine chart that we can change based on the day to help him understand what is happening that day.

That’s a bit about how we are preparing my son for the new baby. I will share more about the transition from one to two after it happens. I am sure there will be ups and downs but we are very excited about the transition for our family.