Hello to all the pregnant readers, this one’s for you! I finally recalled all the things I’d like to share with you on what to expect after you deliver your baby. While still inside the hospital.
Arrival in your Private Room
These are all based on my personal experience 🙂 I am sure most moms were hungry as hell after they delivered their babies, if you’ve had a normal delivery then you can eat to your heart’s content once you are inside your private room. In my hospital, the food was ready when I came in. I am sure my husband was tempted to eat my tray!
You will be lifted from the stretcher to your bed, actually, the nurse may ask you to just scoot to one side until most of your body is in place. It is normal to have lots of blood on the stretcher and, you will be given a mattress pad so as not to spoil your beddings.
During this time, morphine and other drugs given to you are still working. I didn’t actually felt tired and even watched lots of TV. Although, I know that the nursery would be calling anytime for feeding sessions with the baby.
You will not feel you need to urinate, but try to. Urinating never felt so hard because you won’t feel that tingling sensation because of anesthesia. The earlier you urinate by yourself after delivery, the better. Because that would be one item off your list 🙂
Utilize the bed pan to urinate, be sure your husband is prepared for this or simply ask assistance from the nurse. It is a good idea to have an aunt or sister with you inside the hospital.
The First Call from NICU
Just before I was in deep sleep, the phone rang loudly beside my ear. It was the nursery indeed. This would be your first opportunity to stand up and walk, most of all, to hold your baby for as long as you like! 🙂 You will feel dizzy, so please do this slowly.
This is also where your maternity napkin or pad comes in. Needless to say, you can now wear your undies lined with this.
Ask your husband to grab a wheelchair. Don’t worry how you look, other moms look as sleepless as you. This time, I wasn’t feeling as energetic because I wanted some sleep. Yet, this is already the beginning of sleepless nights. Now that you know this, please get as much sleep while the baby is still inside the tummy 🙂
Read about the first weeks of breastfeeding here.
The morning after
Me and my mom during my second day at the hospital. That’s Ashton by the window! 🙂
Get ready to rumble! Warn your husband and other people with you that you may be very unfriendly during this time. The morphine has faded and so did other medications. Personally, I couldn’t explain how I felt, I just felt irritated and dead tired. First, I felt very greasy because you sure would not want to take a bath yet within the first 24 hours of delivering your baby. Just following what the old folks say. I took my first shower on my second morning at the hospital after the OB visited me and gave me a go signal.
Anyway, you may call the nurse for your pain killers to soothe your episiotomy. It would be uncomfortable and painful to sit down and stand up. Next thing you need to remind your nurse is your dose of stool softeners.
Doctors and nurses would come in every now and then to ask you if you have urinated (if you followed my tip above then you would have done this already) and if you have moved your stool. This can add stress to your already irritated self. They say walking would be good to solve constipation.
I never really succeeded doing no. 2 in the hospital, so no need to worry if you can’t have that success in the toilet. Maybe if I had relaxed a bit and stop worrying about stools then I could be successful.
I also remember how cold my feet felt and I badly needed my legs to be massaged. Not sure about this it could just be me, yet the feeling of my legs were really irritating and I loved it when pressure was put on them. Ask your husband to be ready to give lots of massages. If not then call a postnatal masseuse.
Take as much sleep as you can during this time, drink lots of fluid and eat lots of fiber like papaya fruit.
Also, do not forget to finally use your maternity belt or binder to get that shape back 🙂
I can write more but I will leave you with that for now. It might sound very hard and uncomfortable but if you ask me, it is the most memorable days of my life and I would go through it again. It’s a wonderful miracle and it would even be more appreciated if you come in prepared.
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Mommy Lace is a blogger from the Philippines. She started this blog to share information on pregnancy, breastfeeding, childcare, family, and health.
