Things you don't/might want to know about giving birth

out to lunch with Aunt Mal

My baby is almost 7 weeks old already!!!  I can't believe how fast the time has gone and I can't believe how much my silly little girl is growing!!!  She is smiling so much and talking, too!  She has the sweetest voice I've ever heard and I can't wait to hear what it sounds like when she actually starts saying words.

Today I had my 6 week check-up.  Everything checks out ok.  I did ask about my tail bone which is still hurting me unless I'm on my comfy, smooshy couch.  My doctor said that if it still hurts by the end of the third month I need to touch base with them because it may mean that Lucy shifted my tail bone out of place and I may need to see a physical therapist!?  What!?  So hope for my full recovery :)


Remember: Guys you may want to steer away from this post!!!  May be TMI for you!!! :)

So, as promised I wanted to share with you some down and dirty delivery room details.  I know I shared Lucy's birth story but I left out the details you should know/be terrified of.  This blog post is a terrifying warning and/or an informative post because I know some of you are about to have babies and some of you want to one day.  Now, keep in mind everyone is different and your experience could be TOTALLY different from mine, but just so you know.....

I'm not that modest.  I mean, I'm not ridiculously slutty but I am no nun either.  I told everyone after Lucy was born that if you are modest that ALLLLL modesty goes out the window when you have 5 people not including your husband/significant other looking all up at your junk.  And then as they sew you up you're laying with your shiz all open for, like, forever.  Just FYI.

Now, I only allowed Mark in the delivery room with me.  I was not about giving my in-laws nor my family a front row seat to my own personal vagina monologue.  I even told Mark to stay up by my head (which he didn't!) and I turned down the mirror.  To each his own but I'd rather not...

Also, I recommend an episiotomy rather than tearing.  I healed pretty quickly and I did both but I was told by a reliable source (thanks, Mom) that a cut is easier to heal than a tear.

I am a wuss.  I thought I'd be ok without the epidural for a while - I wasn't.  BUT I have been told that the pain is worse with pitocin, so if you go into labor naturally maybe you'll be ok for longer - or maybe you could be ok for the whole birth!  Not I.  I must say, though, drugs are gooooooood. :) At the point when the anesthesiologist finally showed up I was near death.  Maybe I'm being dramatic, but that's what it felt like to me!  I was so thankful for him to be there that I didn't care about anything around me.  I didn't care what was hanging out where...  For about two hours before he got there I was blacked out with pain anyway so I don't remember anything.  No clue I got a catheter, don't remember having it taken out, I don't remember what Mark was doing during that time - was he by my side the whole time?  Did I yell at him?  Who else was there?  I don't know.  Oh the pain...

I was a little afraid of the epidural needle... but I was at the point where they could have taken out my insides and I would have felt better than I was feeling through those 1 minute 30 second and 30 seconds apart contractions...

I was also afraid of the IV.  It wasn't that bad.  Yes, the actual puncture (is that what it's called?), where the needle entered the skin, was a little tender but all-in-all I didn't even notice it.  By the 3rd day, that's right it was in for THREE days!!! it started to get a little irritated but by then they were ready to take it out.

It is extremely uncomfortable asking to go to the bathroom  (IF you get pitocin, so if you go into natural labor disregard this)... the nurse has to come in and bring over the port-o-potty thingy and then you have to get help getting out of the bed and you have 293472837 things attached to you that you have to navigate around and a backless gown so your ass is just flopping around and you're exhausted and when you FINALLY get on the pot, you can't pee.  No one knows if you even had to pee in the first place or if it was the drugs giving you the pee sensation or maybe you just don't have to pee anymore because it took you an hour to get on the toilet.  It's glorious because then about twenty minutes later you get to do it again and who knows, you might not pee that time either...

My epidural wore off a little before Lucy came out.  Ouch.  So they gave me more.  Then when we were ready to move to the mommy/family wing I was still numb hahah I can only imagine what I looked like.  Jesus.  After it finally wore off, I really wasn't in too much pain.  Every time a nurse came in to ask my pain level I don't think I exceeded a 6!  But, moving was a problem.  Up and down into and out of the bed was the worst part.  I purposely didn't go to the bathroom because it was such a hassle.  

Not only was it painful getting up and down, but going to the bathroom was a 15 minute ordeal!!  It was a pain in the ass.  First you have to get up.  Ouch.  Then you have to delicately walk to the bathroom.  Then you have to take off your diaper and by diaper I mean the very complimentary mesh granny-panties with a pad bigger than my husband's forearm.  That pad, though, is your best friend because not only is it a pad, but an ice pack.  Ohmygosh.  And the pad is sooo necessary (don't bother bringing more than two of your own.  you won't need them, only to go home) because you are bleeding more than you thought possible unless you were dying.  Then you have to spray yourself with a little water bottle spritzer because you can't wipe because of the stitches.  Then you have to put a new diaper into the granny-panties.  Then you have to delicately walk back to your bed.  Then you have to get in it with the help of your husband.  Like I said - 15 minute ordeal.

When you get home?  The pain-in-the-ass stuff continues.  You can't climb the stairs but once a day (you wouldn't believe how many times you run up and down the stairs in one day!), you can't drive and you have to remember your handy water bottle all the time.

Then, then your milk comes in.  I didn't breast feed so those of you who plan to, you can disregard this but those of you who will bottle feed, when your milk comes in, o.u.c.h.  Your boobs swell to melon size, they are rock hard and extremely tender :( I do not miss that week.  OUCHHH!!!   AND you can't take hot showers which is a travesty in my life.

But in the end you get this:

and it's allllllll worth it :)