I’ve been trying very hard to remember the details of my recovery and our time in the post-partum room after Rowan’s birth, and I have to be honest… the details are incredibly hazy. I have distinct memories and remember how I felt, but the when and in what order is all jumbled.
It felt like we were in there for a week, but it was really just Monday-Wednesday. Days really blur together when you’re getting no sleep and solely focused on keeping a tiny human alive.
Nick and I got settled into the post-partum room on Monday afternoon, and we went home on Wednesday. I would love to paint you a narrative like I normally would, but, as I mentioned above, the best I have are some random memories/feelings:
- The room was very small–probably about half the size of our delivery room, if not smaller.
- The first two nights were really tough. It took Nick a while to figure out the couch that unfolded into a bed, so he was uncomfortable for the first night two, and he was also the one up every two hours taking care of Rowan since I was still bedbound from being on magnesium and also recovering from the C-section.
- Though I never fully understood why, we fed Rowan, at first, with a syringe vs. a bottle–at least for the first day or two.
- I tried to breastfeed and pump, but nothing was coming out. I’d get a little bit of colostrum with pumping, but that was it. Internally, I’d promised I would give myself grace and accept it if I couldn’t breastfeed, and yet I was still really hard on myself. (And I did know it takes a while for milk to come in–especially if you have a C-section.)
- My blood pressure continued to be high throughout the hospital stay. I was given a cuff so I could take it at home, and it was connected to my Kaiser app so my doctors/nurses knew when my readings were high.
- On Tuesday, I was able to get up and start moving around, and on Tuesday night or Wednesday morning, I was finally able to take a shower. That was legitimately the best. damn. shower. ever. I was still very much yeti-like, and I was over it…
- On Tuesday, Nick and I started taking Rowan for walks (him in his mobile bassinet) around our floor. It felt so good to be moving again.
- The first day and a half, we were calling the nurse every couple of hours to bring us donor breast milk to feed Rowan. We’d have to wait for the nurse to get everything and bring it to us, and it would then have to get warmed up, which took a few minutes. So poor little man had to wait for his feedings (which he didn’t appreciate).
- One nurse finally suggested… why don’t we leave a warmer, bottles, and jars of donor milk in your room so you can have it as soon as he’s ready? (Novel idea!)
- I remember just wanting someone to tell me what to do. The nurses were helpful, don’t get me wrong, but every baby is different. I was constantly asking for clear guidance, and it was all very “you can do this, or you can do that…” I get it, but I still wanted an instruction manual. (Still do, sometimes!)
- I had a lactation nurse tell me I had “tubular” boobs, and my milk production probably wouldn’t be great (thanks for giving me that complex, unnamed nurse…).
- Nick and I walked down to the hospital cafeteria for lunch one day (my parents were in the room with Rowan), and on the way, he was like, “So, you want to go ahead and do the transfer for baby girl?” I told him to shut his mouth…
- The hospital we delivered at advertised it sent new families home with a lasagna–something I was very excited about. But no one ever told us I had to call and order it first. I tried on the day we left, but we were ready to go home and would’ve had to wait an hour or so to get it. We just decided to go home.
- Nick was a swaddling master, and I struggled with it. Rowan always managed to scrunch out of my swaddles.
- Though everything was difficult for me, at one point, something finally clicked. I was trying to do everything the nurses said, exactly how they said it. I was trying to pump, trying to breastfeed, all the things. I finally had a turning point where I said to myself, “The only thing that matters is feeding this baby.” I stopped pumping and trying to breastfeed, and I only focused on getting him his donor milk when he needed it. That was a HUGE help for my mental health. My milk didn’t come in until after we were home, and trying to breastfeed a baby when you have no milk just sucks (no pun intended). I know the logic–pumping and breastfeeding help bring your milk in, but it was all too overwhelming for me. It wasn’t all perfect from that point on, but it was definitely better.
- Before we left, one of the lactation nurses came to see us and gave us all kinds of guidance on how to properly prepare formula – “boil it to 100 degrees” (which, if we’re being technical, isn’t actually boiling), and then mix it with the formula. She brought up the formula shortage of 2020, which was due to contaminated formula, and how boiling the water first and mixing it with the formula while hot would kill the bad bacteria. (Side note: Do you know how long it takes to get water to boiling and then allow it to cool naturally to 100 degrees? For. ev. er. That doesn’t work when you have a tiny human screaming for a bottle.)
- While the guidance from this nurse was helpful, boiling water to exactly 100 degrees proved challenging (until I remembered I had a Bluetooth electric tea kettle that showed me the water temp). And God bless my mom, because she bought all sorts of beakers and cups to help me measure everything appropriately, as well as a thermometer for the water.
- This guidance also proved complicated when, a month or so later, we learned Rowan had a milk sensitivity. He had to be on a very special formula that couldn’t be mixed with water warmer than 104 degrees, or it risked killing the probiotics. (My brain nearly imploded with trying to figure this out.)
- At one point, I was using distilled water for his formula, because at least it was sterile…
- And then God bless my sister who was like, “I just used tap water for the boys’ formula.” I finally stopped worrying so much about bringing the water to temp before mixing the formula. (To this day, though, Em still gives me grief for making Rowan a “sterile” baby–sterile water for formula, sterilizing nearly everything he touched–despite the fact that I don’t do any of that anymore.)
Again, sorry this was all a jumble… I’ll talk more about our first few days at home in an upcoming blog. The next blog is going to be a special announcement! (And no, I’m not pregnant…) 🙂
IVF That 