Bringing Mum and Baby Home After an Emergency C-Section: The First Night

Bringing Mum and Baby Home

Bringing mum and baby and baby home after an emergency C-Section! Unfortunately for me and my wife, our baby came into the world via an emergency C-Section. As you can imagine, neither one of us knew what to expect or that it was even going to happen. It did happen and that meant everything we had planned for the birth went out the window. After a few days of recovering from her emergency C-Section in the hospital, which was stressful time for all of us. It was finally time to bring mum and baby home and finally start our life as a little family.

Although I know it is not possible I hope nobody has to go through that, but Alas you did and that is why you find yourself here. I know that and that is why I am going to try and help you by hopefully giving you some advice that will make things easier for you and your family.

You Need A Car Seat

First things first, you need to make sure you have a car seat to take your baby home in, otherwise you’re not going anywhere. Therefore I am telling you to make sure you know how to install the seat into your car safely so you can get mum and baby home in one piece!.

Next thing is, everything is going to be on you! By that I mean you are going to be doing pretty much everything in the house for the first 6 weeks at the very least. That is because your wife will be on bed rest for six weeks with the baby. This is to ensure that her initial recover is a success and her C-section scar heals properly. Note that I said initial recover! That’s because the full recovery can take up to 18 months.

You also have to remember the reason for the long recover is because she has gone through a major surgery. It might not feel like that because TV makes it look like a routine thing that happens, but once your of the mindset that she has had a major surgery that can help you massively.

That’s my first piece of advice I want to give you, to make sure you know she has had a massive operation and as a result needs the adequate recovery time. Once you get the mindset right for yourself that can help you manage your own stress.

Decide Where Mum and Baby Will Recover

This is an important decision because it will impact how comfortable your wife and baby will be during the recovery. If you can, avoid making her walk up the stairs to the bedroom if possible. For us it was not possible and we had to have her and the baby upstairs. If you are in the same boat have it set up the night before they come home.

If you have the space in your living room set up a bed in the room because it will save you from constantly running up and down the stair which will tire you out. It will also be more comfortable for everyone including yourself because trust me you are going to clock up your step count to a level you have probably never done before.

Also your wife will have have access to you at all times even when you are doing chores in the house and she wont have to constantly shout for you.

Set up Your baby Station

This is probably the biggest thing you can do in my opinion to make your life easier. Firstly you will have everything all in one place , meaning you wont be running around like a headless chicken trying to find a bottle, bib, baby grow etc.

I would say that all you really need for the baby station is:

• A travel kettle (If baby is on formula as mine was)
• Formula Dispenser
• Rapid Cooler (best thing ever)
• Nappy caddy
• Nappy mat
• Bottle Steriliser

Set Up Mum’s Station

Yep that’s right she also needs a little station for herself next to her so she can reach all her essentials that she needs without having to move or nag you to get. Trust me this will give her piece of mind and her own independence. Here you want to make sure she has things like:

• Phone
• Phone Charger
• Handbag
• Water Bottle
• Lady items
• Painkillers
• Snacks
• Anything else she might deem essential

You Are Going To Feel Helpless

If you are anything like me, you will want to try and do every little thing you can with your baby. Unfortunately in those early days your role as the father is unfortunately very low down on the priority list. It’s rubbish I know but your baby really needs its mum in those early months especially if it is breastfeeding and on that first night. However there are things you can do to help minimise the feeling such as:

• Do The Nappy Changes
• Make the Formula
• Sterilise the Bottles
• Play with the baby in its wake window
• Try and get sleep wherever you can
• Allow your wife to get sleep whenever she can

Your role on that first night is to make sure mum and baby are comfortable and do whatever you can to ensure that is the case.

Hopefully you now have a better idea of how the first night might go, and that it is not going to be a complete surprise. I hope that by reading this, you are better prepared to be the best dad I know you can be.

We got this!