Advice from a New Mom (long)

kates1976

A girlfriend of mine who just had her baby girl a few weeks ago sent me this advice in an e-mail and I thought it was really good advice and wanted to pass it along here.  Enjoy!

*Be sure to pack comfy clothes for your husband!  My poor husband only had a pair of sweat pants, jeans and two tee shirts...needless to say he felt pretty dirty at the end of our stay.

*Take yummy soap and shampoo with you. I just took like some travel stuff. The first shower feels so good that I can only imagine it gets better if you have yummy smelly stuff to take with it. Plus, your husband will want to shower too, and mine said it was also the best shower of his life.

*Take a pair of comfy PJs, a robe, and a pair of comfy granny panties. As soon as you can pee by yourself change out of that stupid robe and the horrible panties they give you. I changed the second day and felt like a new person. I wish I had changed sooner to be more comfy.

*Send your baby to the nursery the first night in recovery. It was so hard to let her go, but the sleep was totally worth it. Plus, when they brought her back to me was when I felt like I really bonded with her. It was the middle of the night and no one was there. My husband was fast asleep and the nurse wheeled her in to me to eat. It was the first time it was just to two of us and I realized how much I missed her, and we just stared at each other in the middle of the night. It was amazing and I don't think I would have gotten that if she hadn't of gone to the nursery and I hadn't gotten some uninterrupted sleep. Plus, it is the last uninterrupted sleep you will get. I almost want to go back to the hospital for one night just to get that again.

*Don't be scared to kick people out. We had tons and tons of visitors the first day, and while we were so grateful...we didn't get any sleep for two days since she came in the middle of the night. We finally just started telling people we were leaving the hospital soon and we would love to see them after we got home. Gave us a little more rest in the hospital, but didn't feel like we were mean to people. Rest while you are there cause after you are home, you long to go back to the hospital to rest.

*Take everything from the room. Blankets, shirts, diapers, wipes, pads, everything!!! You pay for it anyway.

*Have everything you need for your recovery at home already before you have the baby. Pads (lots), food (if you breastfeed you will be ravenous!), the breast feeding pads if you are going to. I wished I had done all this before cause poor husband had to go to the drug store right when we got home to get my prescription and pads. He was so embarrassed, but did it. I didn't realize how much care I would have to take of myself, and how much care my husband would have to take of me afterwards. I figured when you left the hospital you were almost back to normal. But you do have to take care of yourself to. 

lennonlover

Sounds like good advice...thanks for sharing!

HotDish!

The first shower is amazing, especially if you have to wait 3 days to have one like I did.

My hospital will not take babies to the nursery so I don't have the choice, I don't think I would though. I actually slept fairlt well the first night with DD in the room.

Mr and Mrs King

That's great advice.  Thanks for sharing.  My sister said that same thing about taking everything from the room.  Her exact words were "take everything that isn't nailed down". 

MidwestTexan

Thanks for sharing!

shipian

Good info! Thanks!

JacqiD03-14-2008

I just copied that. Thanks.

lwilkinson

Thank you for this advice!

iloveclayton

That sounds like good advice, Im gonna save this post.

FirefightersBride

Thats great stuff! Thanks for sharing!

theduck808

this is awesome! ?

blessed_wife

Thank you for sharing!

The New Mrs.

Great advice. Thanks for sharing!

chels0120

Thanks so much! Every piece of advice is sooo nice!

ck715

I second all the things she said. I waited until I got home to shower. I did pack pj set to wear in the hospital plus comfy slipper socks( it was winter when DS was born). We asked for extra pacifers and they gave them to us!?

I tried to get them to take DS to the nursery during the first night so I could get some rest but they kept bring him back after 2 hrs for a feeding, so I just ended up sleeping with him in the room. My hospital believed in co-room sleeping.

I stocked up for home on pads, bought some throw-away/cheap granny panties for the first couple days after, tucks pads, a small sport squirt bottle (warm water helps clean and sooth) and breast pads (I went through a lot after my milk came in).?