I was sent a copy of this book for the purpose of review. All thoughts and opinions are my own. This post contains affiliate links.
Let me preface this by saying that I am not a mum of multiples although they do run in my family so there is a possibility it could happen! When I got pregnant with both Jack and Olivia, family were like ‘ooh, it could be twins!’. However it seems it has so far bypassed me and in fact it was my nephew and wife who have had them!
However that doesn’t mean that this book is simply for expectant and new mums of multiples – oh no no no! Whilst there is advice that is mostly relevant for such a situation, the author gives some great advice that any parent can take notice of!
About The Book
Being a parent for the first time is tough but the workload is doubled, or tripled, with multiple babies! This essential family guide addresses challenges such as anxiety, post-natal depression, returning to work, behavioural and emotional changes, and offers practical tips on how to get a good night’s sleep, improve communication with your partner and how to avoid shutting down and shutting up at a time when you need help!
The First Year Is Survival is the literary equivalent of a hug and a hot cup of tea after a bad day. Being a parent for the first-time is tough but the workload is doubled, or tripled, with multiple babies! Through personal reflections and interviews with parents from around the world, Leonie Huie guides parents of twins and multiples through the first year of life in the new role, openly addressing challenges such as anxiety, post-natal depression, returning to work, behavioural and emotional changes, and offers advice about how to get a good night’s sleep, keep communicating with your partner, maintain a healthy relationship with your friends and family, and how to avoid shutting down and shutting up. By the end of the book, the aim is that you’ll have more practical and realistic ideas of what to do to help you and your new family throughout that first year. You never know, you may even find that you’ve not just survived but thrived over those 12 months!
My Review
As I mentioned above, this book talks about being the essential guide to parenting twins and multiples but it is, in fact, a helpful guide for any expectant parent. The author talks about many different situations a parent might find themselves in and speaks a lot of sense. I loved the little anecdotes from the other parents of twins and triplets and I loved how the author spoke about their own experiences especially with asking for help from family, friends and godparents.
She spoke about the research she did into her own situation and how she found out she was pregnant when she didn’t believe she could be! It was a fascinating read and I really enjoyed reading about the author’s experience and about her two girls.
Overall this was a really good read and I’d love to read more from the author as she can certainly captivate an audience.
About The Author
Leonie Huie writes an informative, insightful self-help guide for new parents with multiples of how to survive the first year of parenthood. Leonie was born and raised in London growing up on the famous Abbey Rd in NW8.She is the Founder of Empower Me, an organisation providing training, coaching and support for mums including events, workshops and retreats. She is an empowerment coach supporting busy mums find their work life balance, public speaker, teacher and entrepreneur running her own fashion jewellery business. Leonie is married and is a mother to twin girls aged two years old who inspired her to write this book through experiencing a traumatic pregnancy and challenging first year off parenthood. Her daughters inspired her to write this book to help other parents of multiples survive their first year – packed with real life truths, advice and tips from Leonie, her husband and other parents of multiples she interviewed. Being told she was expecting twins came as a shock to Leonie who suffered from endometriosis and did not think she could even conceive.
You can buy the book here {affiliate link}.
I always wanted twins before having my first , I’m glad I didn’t 🙂 sounds like a great book for anyone that is having multiples 🙂
This sounds like a book I would have loved to read before I had my first child especially since having twins always intrigued me so the book would have provided some insights to it
We have a history of twins on my mum’s side of the family but doesn’t seem to be that common.