Newborn Paperwork and Other Boring (but Important) To Do’s

You just had a baby…now what?

In case bonding, nursing, sleeping, cleaning, and taking care of yourself aren’t enough to keep you busy that first week home, there is a little bit of new parent housework to take care of that’s actually pretty important.

Once I came home from the hospital, I kept thinking – am I forgetting anything?? Did I complete all of my maternity leave paperwork correctly? Did I tell all of my cousins that she had arrived before posting it on instagram?

Make a plan and delegate tasks between you and your partner to tie up those last little loose ends from the birth.

Things to do the first week:

• Pediatrician Visit– During our hospital stay, they asked for our Pediatrician’s name and office. Our office called us to schedule our baby’s first visit, after the baby arrived. (We go to Heritage Medical Clinic Green Hills in Nashville, TN and love it!)
• Birth Certificate– For the state of Tennessee, the hospital gives you a “mother’s copy” to take home with you, and then you have to go online to order official copies to be sent to your home. They give you a handout with instructions on how to do this. You might want to bring a folder to the hospital to store important docs like this!
• Day Care Notification– We called all of our day cares and told them that our baby had arrived! We gave them her name and birth date. We are on several waiting lists, so this was also an opportunity to follow up and check the status of our wait!
• Health Insurance– We called our health insurance and asked where we needed to mail the birth certificate to, and we asked how to get our baby added to our insurance plan. (Thankfully my husband took this one off of my list!)
• Maternity Leave– I let my company know that my baby had arrived, and I got my FMLA/Short-Term Disability payments squared away. Note that maternity leave laws vary by state. For instance, the state of Tennessee lets new moms take up to 16 weeks of unpaid maternity leave. Some companies will offer to pay some or all of the full state leave- so be sure to touch base with HR during that third trimester!