When I was pregnant with my second child, I noticed that my eldest son Jack was asking questions about what would happen when the baby came along; Things like: ‘Where will the baby sleep?’ ‘Will the baby cry all the time?’ ‘Will the baby love me too?’ . I realised that my son was probably worrying about how things might change when baby arrived, and I decided to channel his thought process into a writing project which became How Will it Be with Baby & Me?, a picture book to give voice to the niggles in Jack’s mind which he probably couldn’t name.
Anna Friend, How Will It Be With Baby And Me?
For me, helping Jack to understand and look forward to this new phase for our family was really important because not only did I want him to feel positive and settled when the new baby arrived, I wanted the first few weeks to be as stress free as possible – because there’s enough going all already with a new person in the house!
I must admit that the book helped; it meant that we all had a starting point for a conversation about the new baby and what this would mean. I think the most important thing for me, was to keep talking about all the things that a new baby would add to Jack’s life – more fun, more cuddles and more love!! The love thing was the biggest, I think, because it’s a difficult concept for children to gather and when we spoke about it, it was as if Jack saw love as a tangible thing that we gave each other. So one of the big parts of the book is when we talk about baby growing its own love and bringing that with them when they arrive. This seemed to settle Jack, it helped him understand that the love we had for him would remain the same and not be shared. Plus, a big bonus to being a big brother: the new baby would also be bringing him love.
Other things that helped was involving Jack in small decisions about the baby, like where the cot might go or what colour the bedding might be. We also helped Jack to create a little picture that we framed and placed in the baby’s room and asked him to pick out the outfit that baby would wear to come home in. Although Jack was only two at the time, we felt it helped him to really step into the older sibling role and become excited about what this meant.
The main focus for any family welcoming a new child into the world has to be all the positives that the baby will bring to the older sibling mixed with some managed expectations. Talk about the things that baby will love about their new brother or sister, tell them that the baby will already know their voice because they hear them every day and do it all whilst giving them a big cuddle, because cuddles always help!
So when Billy finally arrived in 2013 Jack was over the moon and super excited to become a big brother! All the worries that he had disappeared the minute they met and now, aged 9 and 11, they remain really good friends and Jack still enjoys his role as the older (and wiser) sibling
How Will It Be With Baby & Me?, Anna Friend’s picture book written for her growing family, will now be published by Scholastic UK with illustrations by Jake Biggin