OS childrearing

Cookie_monster_7

I was up and down the stairs for nearly 2 hours this evening trying to settle my 3 month old baby to sleep, eventually gave up and let her sleep in my arms while I watched a bit of tv! But I was just wondering what people did before baby monitors. In our house if the monitor wasn't on I would not hear the baby so I am glad we have it, I don't like her to cry for long. What did people do though? Keep the baby in the same room as them or just pop in every few minutes to check on them or...dare I say....leave them to cry?

What did you do before sterilisers and baby swings and all the other gadgets I rely on?

Also I have a baby with reflux who is on infant gaviscon poor wee love but how on earth did the mother of a refluxy baby survive before baby medicines like that???

(This is a money related thread:money: because it would save people a lot of money on gadgets to find out the answers to these questions ;))

rachbc

My kids are fairly os - cloth nappies, boob milk (which cuts down hugely on expense and kit needed), eating the same food as us, not huge nos of toys, lots of playing out and crafty stuff.

My son co slept with us, dd was in a bedside cot then fairly quickly into her own room at 3 months. I did have a monitor as its a big house and wouldn't have heard her without it. I had a bouncy chair and a door bouncer but not electronic baby minding things like swings, activity centres etc. I had dd in a sling a lot so she was entertianed by what I was doing and happy just to be close. But if you want to go really old school there is always sticking the baby in a pram at the end of the garden option lol!

I suspect reflux just wasn't diagnosed years ago -probably just considered 'fussy' babies and stressed mums left to deal with it!

Chipps

When our DD was a baby, if she wouldn't sleep we put her carry cot in the back of the car & went for a drive! Of course, we had to think of another method for the boys when they were born! I suppose I don't really like the idea of leaving a baby in the remote "care" of a baby swing or something like that. I have spent hours pushing/bouncing a pram to get baby off to sleep - even from bed.

Didn't have a baby monitor either - was that because baby was in the same room, or because we had a small house!??? TBH I can't remember!

Spendless

Do you live in an OS house tho cookie-monster (eg one that was built 70s or before)? With my eldest we were in a 1910 2 bed MTH, stairs ran thru middle of house no need for a baby monitor -tho I'd got one (before discovering I didn't need it). With youngest we were in a 1930s 3 bed semi and couldn't here. When I say couldn't that is cos we made no effort to, we had a baby monitor that wired into our tv and we just used to put the baby channel on. IIRC it kicked in when you were watching a channel and then you could see if she was in a tiswas cos she was hungry or was just gurgling about. Without it we'd have more likely kept bedroom door and living room door open so could hear her.

If you are in a more modern house with a more modern layout-such as the 3 storey houses, or are more often in a conservatory at the back of the house whereas baby sleeps at the front-then it'll be more dfficult today to hear than it used to be.

ginnyknit

I had my two just as things were beginning to improve for Mums but my premature son's early life was shrouded in mystery. i just wish I had the internet then so I could have known what they were talking about. We had a bottle warmer and just made up a days bottles an stuck them in the fridge then we would take a few up to bed with us and leave then on the shelf all night- midwives now would be shocked:eek:

I had cloth nappies but for a tiny baby they weren't much use, so my cousin worked at Palmolive and got me premmie disposables somehow. Tiny clothes werent around either and his best babygro came from Italy - it had tomatoes on it:rotfl:He still keeps that to show people how small he was.

When dd arrived she was lactose intolerant and I had to fight for soya milk basically by shaming the doctor into giving it me. Luckily my friend had 3 kids who were allergic to dairy so we learned together.

One of my least favorite memories was the scruffy kids round the corner who walked round with a sauce bottle full of tea with a rubber teat on it. I don't think their parents had much idea but at least in those days you saw what was going on it wasn't hidden behind closed doors. By the way I am only 50 its not war time Im talking about!

meritaten

back in the fifties - babies were left to cry - it was thought that you would 'spoil' them if you picked them up and cuddled them! baby monitors were unheard of - the bedroom door would be left open and so would the living room door. someone or other would check periodicaly - or baby would wail that loudly it could be heard over the radio or tv. babies WERE checked on if they cried...........dont get me wrong, but they werent picked up and nursed unless the parent thought something was wrong (colic, teething etc) just fussing was ignored. if baby couldnt settle or was unwell then odds were that it would spend the night cuddled up in mum and dads bed. a big NO NO now! I am not commenting on whether these practices were good or bad, just letting you all know how it was when i was a child in the fifties.

xxvickixx

Co sleeping is promoted now as being safe.
I didn't even know that formula was around in the 50's - thought it was a more modern fad!

maman

xxvickixx wrote: »

Co sleeping is promoted now as being safe.
I didn't even know that formula was around in the 50's - thought it was a more modern fad!

There must have been something like formula around because I remember MIL budgeting by keeping money for different bills in National Dried Milk tins.

I didn't have a monitor. DD slept in carry cot/Moses basket in sitting room (then carried upstairs) when she was really tiny and nursed her to sleep before putting her down when she was older. Terry nappies but I seem to remember some sort of liner too which saved work. I didn't have a bottle warmer, jug of boiling water worked fine.

A big saving will come later if you don't use any jars of baby food but puree/mash your own HM things.

Thanks for the laugh over the sauce bottles full of tea:rotfl:

Hardup_Hester

Some types of formula were around in 1919, people also used to used watered down evaporated or condensed milk.

Cheapskate

My children are 23, 21, 18, 3 & 10 months. Although not that long ago for the eldest, we had little money then either, so remember having terries for my eldest 2, didn't BF but on low income so got vouchers for fresh or formula milk. Never had monitors - we lived in a back-to-back & was cold, so we all lived in one room & went to bed together - we shared a bedroom until just before our 3rd child was born! :eek: Our kids have never had a room by themselves until we moved where we are now & DD had her own room, she was nearly 8.
Gave our older ones cambric tea in bottles when they were nearly 1, hardly any ready-made baby food, partly cos no money & partly preferring to make my own - even then I didn't like the thought of lots of convenience foods, although I was only 18 when our eldest was born!
Even though we've a little more money with our youngest two, I still do things the same way more or less - make up bottles in advance, put in fridge & reheat, don't buy loads of toys, esp electronic things, always cuddled kids whenever they cried. BF these two longer, DD (10 months) for 5-6 months. I still walk around the room with crying babies - I think that when a baby cries it wants something, even if it's just being close to someone. Lots of so-called primitive societies have babies physically next to someone (sling or similar) 24/7, & those children are much calmer & very rarely cry.
This is a bit of a waffle - sorry! - but think people are losing touch with babies sometimes, all they need (most of the time!) is feeding, cleaning, cuddles & playing with - as long as you're near them, they're fine!
Feel free to disagree!
A x

xxvickixx

Mmm, love condensed milk and evap, I used to drink glasses of evap as a child lol! Thanks for filling me in - it's really interesting actually.