My mom lives locally and is a SAHW - I am incredibly blessed to have her so close and have her help. She is happy to babysit whenever I need her to so I often ask her to watch one of the boys while I take the other to a doctor's appt. But I'm looking at the dates I just emailed and it's 1-2 appointments each week in August (between doctors for all 3 of us plus my own stuff - hair, dentist, etc.).
I know she doesn't mind, but sometimes I feel like I rely too much on her. I don't know how people do appointments when they don't have the help I do. She's actually going on vacation next month and I'm trying to decide if I should reschedule my appointments or suck it up and handle both.
What do you do for:
1. well-baby appointments
2. your own doctor's appts, hair appts, dentist appts, etc.
TIA!
Re: how do you handle appointments?
For well baby appts we just go. When the toddler was younger I tried to get him to stay in the single stroller and entertain him with books, etc and I wore the baby in (Bjorn or Moby) to keep my hands free to chase the toddler.
For my hair - a neighbor and I trade baby sitting.
For my doctor - I've taken them or scheduled first or last appt and DH either goes in late to work or comes home a bit early to watch the kids.
For my dentist - I've been lucky that he'll see me on weekends.
I recommend looking for someone for back up - either another SAHM you can swap time with or someone on Craigslist that does occasional sitting.
GL!
Total score: 6 pregnancies, 5 losses, 2 amazing blessings that I'm thankful for every single day.
1. Well-baby appts: I work FT so the kids are in daycare (well, DS will be in a while), so I just schedule them during the weekday and thus far have left one at daycare (or in DS's case, at home with a grandma) while DH and I took the other in. That's likely how it will work in the future unless both are sick. Then if DH is home and not traveling, one will stay at home with him and one goes to the dr with me. If DH is traveling, I'd probably drag both along unless I prevailed upon a neighbor to help me out.
2. I usually leave the kids with DH or in daycare. The only exception will be my 6wk pp visit with my OB where I will bring DS with me so they can see him.
DD -- 5YO
DS -- 3YO
We don't have family around unfortunately, so ...
1. For well-baby visits, I take them both with me. I use the double stroller.
2. If I have a quick check-up, I will take them with me in the double stroller. For hair, dentist, etc I find one that has evening and/or weekend hours so DH is around to watch the boys.
I would definitely consider you blessed to have her help as well, and if I were in your shoes, I would probably choose to reschedule the appointments next month while she is on vacation, unless of course you just want to see what it is like )