very clingy / attached 7 month old

EMLDF

So I don't normally post here.... hoping someone can help. I have a 2.5 year old daughter and 7 month old daughter. I stay home with them and nurse / cosleep with the baby. She is incredibly attached to me which I know is a healthy sign. My older daughter was attached too but not nearly so clingy. I can barely get anything done around the house bc the baby rarely will "let" me put her down. Even if she's content to crawl around the kitchen (she's been very early on all milestones), she will be at my feet the whole time, standing up on the dishwasher door if its open for example or crawling up my leg. It makes it nearly impossible to get anything done around the house and I'm so stressed by the ever lengthening list of to do's. I wear her when we are out but I honestly have no desire to start wearing her around the house for hours to get things done. Any of course, she has plenty of toys and a safe enclosed space. When I'm not around its not an issue. If she is, for example, in the living room with my husband playing by herself, and I walk in the room, she bursts into tears until I pick her up.
And yes, its not 100% of the time, but often enough to make me crazy and add a ton of stress. Anyone have tips to get her to play by herself for longer stretches? Or at least help me cope with my high maintenance baby?

delujm0

I think this is unfortunately normal...at our 6 month doctor visit, the she asked if LO was exhibiting "attachment issues" yet.   And when we said no, she said "she probably will soon then."

 

We both work and LO goes to daycare 5 days a week, which i think is helpful for this reason...there's a revolving door of about 5-6 teachers that are in the room with her at various points in the day, so she's very used to other caregivers.  But i know my friends with their kids in daycare still experienced this at some point.  SIL stays home and has had major attachment issues with her son.  He turned 2 recently and started preschool a few days a week, and it was over a month before SIL was able to leave him there in the morning without him having an absolute breakdown.  She had to stop bringing him to the child watch at the gym when he was about 8 months old because within 10 minutes they would come find her and tell her he was screaming so much he had broken out in hives and had to leave.  it was nuts.  But he's just now starting to understand the concept of people leaving and then coming back, so he's more willing to be on his own.

 

LO has basically never played independently with us around for more than 15 minutes at a time, so i can't offer you any help there.  i guess she's fine at day care but i don't know how they do it because at home she gets bored with any one activity about 10-15 minutes in and wants us to provide her with something new.

mindaa

I wear my 7 month old a lot while I'm doing chores. His favorite is vacuuming - puts him right to sleep. Also loves hanging out in the laundry room, with all the cool white noises. 
Instead of thinking you have to wear her for hours and hours, you could just include wearing in the "rotation". Like wear her for half an hour, then maybe try the bouncer for a few minutes after she's fed and rested, then let her play on the floor for a while... repeat. Takes some organizing and thinking about what chores are conducive to wearing and which are not. Maybe write down a few goals for the day, so you can quickly get restarted after interruptions.