When you become a parent, you might love it immediately. It’s like some people have an inherent factor in their nature that kicks in when they have an infant in their arms. Others might struggle with the parenting instinct. Either way, though, you need to watch over your child as best you can.
That means keeping them safe as they grow. You must watch out for vicious dogs in the neighborhood. If you don’t, then it becomes a matter of understanding landowner liability for dog bites on their property, and that’s a nightmare scenario no parent wants to face.
You must keep your child safe from traffic, from kidnappers, and from kids at school who might bully them. It might seem like a lot, but hopefully, you will respond and put your best foot forward as your young one grows.
You should also know about some of the most crucial resources that parents can access if you ever need them. Let us talk about some of those right now.
Free Clinics
You will probably understand as a parent that when you bring your child home from the hospital, you must immediately begin a regimen where you take care of them. Maybe you took some child-rearing classes beforehand to get ready for this moment. Perhaps you childproofed your home and you have a crib, jars of formula, and toys for the child all ready to go.
You should also have a primary care doctor lined up for the child. Ideally, you will already know them from before you gave birth, or before your partner gave birth. However, if you do not have a primary doctor for the child, you might need to look into some of the free clinics in your area.
If you live in a larger city, that is often helpful in this regard. More densely-populated regions will usually have more free clinics and financial resources to help families who do not have very much money or a conventional healthcare plan. However, larger cities might also have more families in need, so getting an appointment and seeing someone might present difficulties.
You need to figure out the nearest clinic and a time when you can get a doctor to see the baby, though. They need their inoculations, and you may also need advice sometimes, especially if you are a first-time parent who has many questions.
Public Education
You will need to find a school for the child as well. Ideally, you would want to start them in a preschool program before you ever put them in kindergarten.
Usually, you can find such programs either for free or partially subsidized. The local government should fund such entities.
If you don’t mind putting your child in whatever nearest one you have, then you can do that. However, maybe there’s one on the other side of town that has better reviews.
The preschool program in which you put your child matters. So does the grade school that you put them in when they should start kindergarten.
If you have to drive your child a little further afield to put them in a more reputable program, then you can do that. If you must take public transportation to get them into a better program because you don’t own a car, then do that instead.
In almost all instances, you will pay nothing to get your child into these programs. If the only ones you have nearby don’t have the best reputations, or you only have private ones that cost a fortune, you can at least read to your child every day. Fostering a love of reading and limiting their screen time almost always helps with a young one’s development.
Food Assistance Programs
You should know about SNAP and similar family-oriented financial assistance programs as well. Maybe you don’t need such a program because you are making enough money and your family doesn’t have food insecurity. If so, that’s great. However, as we progress further into this century, more families have food insecurity situations.
If you can get SNAP assistance, then do that. If that’s not an option where you’re living, look into food banks instead.
Such programs will give you priority if you let them know you have a young child. Don’t feel badly about accepting charitable contributions. You have a youngster to raise, and you need to think of them before your pride.
Developmental Screening Tools
You can often access developmental screening tools through a doctor’s office or your local department of education. Again, what you can access varies. If you live in a larger city rather than in a small or rural community, you will likely have more options in this area.
Developmental screening tools take many forms. You can use them to test your child to see if they have any learning disabilities or impairments. At a time when more doctors give kids an ADHD diagnosis than ever before, you should try to find out if that’s happening with your child sooner rather than later.
If your doctor does give your child an ADHD diagnosis or says they have a learning impairment, don’t worry. Your youngster can still probably learn at a normal rate if they have attentive teachers and a respectful faculty at their school.
Mental Health Support Hotlines
Finally, you should know about mental health support hotlines. That’s not so much for your child, but for yourself.
Raising kids might seem like a breeze for some, but not for others. Maybe you’re someone who feels lost while trying to do everything for your child that books and online sources say you should. Perhaps you’re a single parent, in which case you may feel even more alone while on this journey.
If you ever feel like you can’t cope, call one of these hotlines. The individual on the other end of the phone will likely have some suggestions, or maybe they can just give you a much-needed sympathetic ear.