Recovery
Since I had a second-degree tear, I expected a hard recovery but honestly it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. I was actually walking around a ballpark a week after giving birth!
While at the hospital I was able to get the hang of caring for down there. We were there for a total of three nights and four days. One of the things that I was not expecting was not being able to shower for the three days while we were in the hospital! The hospital did not have any hot water, so I had to use wipes to clean off after delivery. This was not part of the healing process but something I experienced while at the hospital.
Some things I used to help heal were of course a peri bottle, the hospital gave me one so I didn’t bother spending money to buy one. I used dermoplast spray, the hospital did NOT give me this, so I was glad I packed it. Another thing that I didn’t pack but the hospital ended up giving me plenty of was ice pads. These were just giant period pads with a breakable ice pack in them and I loved these. I asked the hospital for more of those and the underwear before leaving the hospital, so I was able to have enough for the next week of being home. I alternated taking Ibuprofen and Tylenol every three hours to cope with pain.
Being in the hospital for three nights might seem unbearable to some but I didn’t mind it. I really enjoyed just being in the hospital with my husband and newborn baby. Due to COVID-19 no visitors were allowed and honestly it was so nice. Taking that time to just become a family of three, focus on each other, and not have people showing up randomly at your door to see the baby was amazing.
While at the hospital they ran a lot of tests on Kaison (normal baby tests like hearing, glucose, and jaundice) and then they were trying to help me with breastfeeding. As a first-time mom, I had NO idea on breastfeeding other than “it just comes naturally” – or so they say. The lactation consultant was out that weekend, so I never did get to see her. Instead, all the nurses decided they would take turns helping me breastfeed and give me tips. Everyone had a different way of doing it and had different opinions on what you should and shouldn’t do. All I wanted was for my baby to eat, I didn’t care about which way was better or not at this point because Kaison had not eaten much. Kaison swallowed a lot of amniotic fluid during delivery; therefore, he was spitting up constantly the whole time we were at the hospital. He wouldn’t latch and eat because of this reason; he was just full of amniotic fluid.
I ended up never getting Kaison to latch on. The day after we were sent home from the hospital, I knew Kaison still had not got anything from me, so we gave him a bottle and he finally was able to eat. I kept trying to get him to latch for the next week, but he never would, so I just went to pumping every 2 hours and then feeding Kaison formula. My milk did not come in great at all. The most I would get during a pumping session would be 3 ounces (total from both boobs). At the two month mark I just stopped because I was barely getting anything and he was eating perfectly fine with the bottle and formula.
I think new moms have a lot of weight on them to breastfeed and do it for months on end. I was devastated and cried many times knowing that I was not able to get Kaison to latch and that my supply never fully came in. After I got over that feeling of regret for not breastfeeding my baby, I felt so much better. Remember that a fed baby is a happy baby.
