The First Weeks With a Newborn
For the first weeks with a newborn, when the days have no shape. It gets feeds and diapers on one sheet, puts visitors behind a rule, splits the night into named shifts, and keeps the parent's own checkup on the calendar.
Newborn · Parenting · Self-Care · 9 items · once a day
The checklist
- Write feeds and diapers on one sheet — the pediatrician asks and nobody remembers.
- Let someone else cook one meal a day — food that arrives beats food you planned.
- Put visitors behind a clear rule — an hour, after two, and hands washed before holding.
- Split the night into shifts you name — four unbroken hours each beats eight broken ones.
- Get outside once, even to the mailbox — daylight and air do something no nap does.
- Keep your own checkup on the calendar — the parent's appointment is the first one dropped.
- Expect the evening to be the hard part — the late fussing is normal and it passes.
- Send the small question to the pediatrician — the nurse line exists for exactly these.
- Call 1-833-TLC-MAMA if the dark stays — the maternal mental health line answers day and night.
Use this checklist Free account: tick items off and keep each day's record.
How to use it
Run through it once a day, honestly and without scoring yourself. A checklist is a way of noticing, not a test: an item you cannot tick is information about the day, not a verdict on you. Over a few weeks the pattern of what gets ticked and what does not says more than any single pass.
With a free Theraglee account the checklist remembers each pass, so you can look back. Without one, you can still read it here and keep your own copy.