first parenting dilemma

[fox]

I have the opportunity to go to China for two weeks in March.

Himself can't really come with—he wouldn't be able to work—and in any event Blanziflor won't be fully vaccinated by then, at the age of not quite four months.

Part of me really wants to go. Another part doesn't know if I'll be okay being away from my four-month-old for two weeks. Your thoughts welcome.

Comments

[abka]

There's no wrong answer here, it's really what is best for you. With the first baby I didn't leave her alone overnight until she was a year. With the second I just went away for a larp "weekend" when she was 4.5 months old. Meaning I left her for 18 hours, then visited for an hour or two, then left her for 24 hours. I'm exclusively breastfeeding and pumping. If you choose to do that, it would be very difficult, not only finding places to pump in China, but you wouldn't be able to transport the milk back so you would have to build up a 2-week supply of pumped milk in advance which sounds daunting if not impossible. However, if the baby's on formula it's totally doable, and if you're nursing and supplementing you could pump and dump to maintain supply and the baby could just be on formula for the trip's duration. At four months it would be likely that baby would resume nursing when you returned. Emotionally I'm not ready to be away from the baby for more than a day max, and even that gets hard after 6-8 hours, and now she's just about 7 months. Nursing or not two weeks is a long time when the baby is four months. But I totally wouldn't judge a mom who chose to take that trip, international travel paid for by someone else is a hard thing to say no to.