I felt like it would be helpful to have a place to recommend and review apps that are helpful at this stage in our pregnancies and also those that are good for when our LOs are here. I’m sure not everyone uses them all the time but there has to be other app junkies like me! I had a few go tos when I had DD but that was almost 6 years ago, so I’d love to hear what everyone else likes.
Me (33). DH (37). DD (2.2012). MCs x4. After 4 years & 7 months, due 4.2018!
Right now I’m having to do two daily kick counts so I’m using Kick Count by BabyMed to record and track my sessions. I can show the trends and reports to my MFM at my appts and it’s very straight forward. No annoying ad pop ups
The one app I used a lot when DD was a newborn and asleep on my chest was Candy Crush. Just something to pass the time when I didn’t want to disturb her!
Me (33). DH (37). DD (2.2012). MCs x4. After 4 years & 7 months, due 4.2018!
Full Term is a GREAT app to time contractions. It saves your data and displays it in a number of formats so you can easily see if/when you're progressing, and it's super easy to use. Highly recommend!
Full Term is a GREAT app to time contractions. It saves your data and displays it in a number of formats so you can easily see if/when you're pressing, and it's super easy to use. Highly recommend!
I second Full Term! Obviously I haven’t been able to use it for contractions yet but it also has a kick counter feature which I’ve been using since I hit 30 weeks. It’s super simple to use, free (yay) and was recommended at our childbirth class by the instructor.
I was using Expectful for meditation. They have a lot of topics including pre and postnatal, spousal, etc; the guides are about 10 mins. The bedtime one is legit magic snooze medicine. It’s paid though
I liked to track DS' feedings and sleep when he was a newborn. The app I used is called Sprout Baby. I also track his height, weight, and head circumference. There are baby tracker apps that will track a lot more things, which I also tried, but I kept going back to Sprout baby. It was just easier for me to use and I love their charts.
Man my favorite app is my patient portal through my doc! I honestly don’t know how I did it with dd before sites like this existed! I got my gtt results within an hour of the lab draw and can message my provider whenever I need to without leaving a message to get lost in translation between reception and nurses!
An extremely good app for post-birth is Baby Connect. It lets you track feedings, diapers, milestones, medical records, and more. It also has the great feature of allowing you to let other caretakers to sync with your app, so everyone can add data. I feel like if my baby had feeding problems, this feature would be vital for my sanity.
I used it heavily in my DD1s first year to keep track of vaccinations, weight, height, and various milestones. Especially while she was in developmental therapy (nothing wrong with her, turned out she just extremely careful and takes her time with everything).
@kmalls I second full term!!! I went to download and realized it was the same one I used with DD. It was great and I felt like I was able to time going to the hospital because I could accurately go in and see how I was progressing with contraction frequency and length.
Yup, super helpful when going to the hospital! And it actually came in handy when the first nurse I saw tried to tell me I wasn’t in labor, just dehydrated I was all UM NOPE and showed her the hours and hours I had been tracking my contractions as they got closer together.
Wonder Weeks!!! It's actually a book too, but the app sums up everything really nicely and concisely. You put in your due date and then the app will tell you when baby should hit major cognitive milestones called "leaps." It's helpful because these leaps are generally categorized by weird behavior such as increased fussiness, hunger, clinginess, etc, so it will explain, "Baby is going through this cognitive stuff right now and will soon be showing the ability to perform xyz skill. Signs of this cognitive leap include [insert weird baby behavior here]." I used it with DD, as did a lot of my BMB, and it's crazy how accurate it is, usually. I found it super helpful and interesting!
@kbamomma33 I was just going to post about wonder weeks! I never read the books but I loved the app. Pretty much every time I was like, hmm, what's up with DD lately, she's extra fussy/clingy etc., I'd check the app and she would be in a new leap! It was surprisingly accurate and helpful.
@kbamomma33 I was just going to post about wonder weeks! I never read the books but I loved the app. Pretty much every time I was like, hmm, what's up with DD lately, she's extra fussy/clingy etc., I'd check the app and she would be in a new leap! It was surprisingly accurate and helpful.
Lol soooo wonder weeks was a total fail for me. I didn’t use it for DS and I think it would have been great. He hit every sleep regression hard and exactly when they were forecasted, so I think the app would have done a lot to ease my frustration. I paid for the app with DD and it literally told me nothing. She cried for 3 months straight, then skipped every sleep milestone after that. It was interesting to read the information, it just didn’t apply to our situation very much. I’d still recommend it, just with the caution that it may not be as spectacular for you as it is for so many others!
I use Ovia Pregnancy app with my first son and now this one. I like it because of the daily blogs and the symptom check and medication safety lookup aspects. I also started using Pregnancy+ because they have great lifelike pictures and good blogs. However, this was a paid app somewhere around the $4 range.
With my son I used the Babysparks app for after he was born. It has daily activites for you and baby to participate in together to help development and bonding. There is a free version and an upgradeable version. I always used the free version and it worked great.
Best breastfeeding trackers I have found are 1: set out 6 diapers in the morning, and when they are gone you by the end of they day you know you are feeding often enough! As for tracking side in the early days I have been lucky enough to never need anything. I can always tell which side needs relief next! But a hair tie on your wrist to switch while baby is nursing to show you which side works great. My fear with apps is uneducated docs will often tell you baby is nursing too often or some bs like that. Im definitely a “watch the baby, not the clock” type of advocate on that front. (Babies can’t tell time lol) and I can see trying to track timing and feeds as causing anxiety in new moms of baby’s don’t fit a mold.
@riversdoctor I did the hair tie thing with my daughter. She nursed so often when she was a newborn, and I was so exhausted, there was no way I could keep track of which side she had nursed last.
I've been liking the ovia app for pregnancy, and I loved the wonder weeks app with my first. My partner and I use the Cozi app, and I have a feeling that's going to help us keep on top of everything when the baby is born. It has a shared calendar, sends everyone who's hooked up to it a daily agenda email, and you can create lists that sync to the app and allow everyone to add to. It's great for shopping lists! I just use the free version, and that's been sufficient for us.
We used Total Baby for DD1. It’s a paid app but can by synced with my husband for feedings and I tracked all my pumping/stats and emailed myself that information to keep track of my stash, etc.
LactMed is great if you plan to BF and are unsure if a medication will affect it.
Glad this thread was started! Im downloading the Full Term, Wonder weeks, and Sprout apps now! @riversdoctor love the hair tie suggestion. I would never have thought of that but it sounds simple and easy and free
I did use a breastfeeding app (sorry, can’t for the life of me remember what it’s called and it’s long ago deleted) that helped in the very beginning when DS was struggling with weigh gain. He was constantly falling asleep while nursing so the app helped me get a sense of how long he was actually actively drinking and not just latched and snoozing. The lactation consultant at my pediatrician would always ask, so it helped my peace of mind to have it tracked and not ballpark. That said, by two weeks old we had things under control and I ditched the app.
@kbamomma33 I was just going to post about wonder weeks! I never read the books but I loved the app. Pretty much every time I was like, hmm, what's up with DD lately, she's extra fussy/clingy etc., I'd check the app and she would be in a new leap! It was surprisingly accurate and helpful.
Yes! Exactly this!
Also echoing that Wonder Weeks was totally worth the app purchase with DS. It was so accurate. It didn’t necessarily help with tips to deal with leaps but knowing it was a leap and normal was definitely reassuring.
Re: Helpful Apps
The one app I used a lot when DD was a newborn and asleep on my chest was Candy Crush. Just something to pass the time when I didn’t want to disturb her!
Me (33). DH (37). DD (2.2012). MCs x4. After 4 years & 7 months, due 4.2018!
Married: 10/3/15
TTC: May 2017
BFP: 7/20/17
EDD: 3/29/18
I used it heavily in my DD1s first year to keep track of vaccinations, weight, height, and various milestones. Especially while she was in developmental therapy (nothing wrong with her, turned out she just extremely careful and takes her time with everything).
With my son I used the Babysparks app for after he was born. It has daily activites for you and baby to participate in together to help development and bonding. There is a free version and an upgradeable version. I always used the free version and it worked great.
https://mymomsense.com/
I've been liking the ovia app for pregnancy, and I loved the wonder weeks app with my first. My partner and I use the Cozi app, and I have a feeling that's going to help us keep on top of everything when the baby is born. It has a shared calendar, sends everyone who's hooked up to it a daily agenda email, and you can create lists that sync to the app and allow everyone to add to. It's great for shopping lists! I just use the free version, and that's been sufficient for us.
LactMed is great if you plan to BF and are unsure if a medication will affect it.
@riversdoctor love the hair tie suggestion. I would never have thought of that but it sounds simple and easy and free
I did use a breastfeeding app (sorry, can’t for the life of me remember what it’s called and it’s long ago deleted) that helped in the very beginning when DS was struggling with weigh gain. He was constantly falling asleep while nursing so the app helped me get a sense of how long he was actually actively drinking and not just latched and snoozing. The lactation consultant at my pediatrician would always ask, so it helped my peace of mind to have it tracked and not ballpark. That said, by two weeks old we had things under control and I ditched the app.
https://breastfeeding.teachable.com/p/ready-to-breastfeed/?affcode=59772_vtvaq3db