Before the haze of the first week escapes me, I wanted to record some of my few memories and thoughts gathered from the sleep deprived, hormonal and bruised mess I was on my first week of motherhood.
The birth process was long and filled with a lot of waiting for the next stage to happen whilst everyone monitored my progress with an anxiety that they didn’t share with me. We thought though that it was all worth it when the pushing stage came around and I hadn’t gone animalistic at that point and then, just like in the movies, the baby was born within twenty minutes of pushing. This next part was odd, we were given dry toast ( neither of us had had much to eat all day and they forgot our butter) and cups of tea to revitalise.
Then it was just me and S our newborn left in a bay together, she kept crying in her cot. The midwife came and put her into bed with me, explaining that she wanted to be near to someone more familiar. I was so overwhelmed realising then that I was her whole world at that point in time.
The next few days I entrusted myself into the care of others whilst I myself tried to get to learn how to care for my new girl. It all proceeded fine as I planned for our new life and home together and focused on learning how to get my milk in on Day3 so that I didn’t starve S. The peace of new motherhood ended when I was into my third night with her and just couldn’t settle her. Wouldn’t feed, wouldn’t sleep. The midwife kept asking me what was wrong and whether I could feed her somemore since she was crying so much and keeping the other babies up. I took her pacing up and down the corridor until we found the reason for her anxiety, S did her first big diaper. From then on I was enslaved to her yelps which crescendoes into shrieks everytime you took too long because my S is a lady and wouldn’t abide a soiled bottom. I learnt how to change a nappy in record time.
The day my milk kicked in, I was a proud mother researching apps for how to schedule her feeds, not realising that that would be the least of my worries. S still hadn’t really learnt to sleep alone in her cot and I was still trying to be super mum sending Mr HEA home each night and braving the hospital alone. Humble pie was served to me when one night I was told by one of the midwives that she couldn’t wake me up when she had come in to give S her drip so she took my baby from our bed and gave her her antibiotics and safely returned her to my side, neither S nor me any wiser as to what had transpired. That made it terribly hard to sleep anymore when I realise how irresponsible I was sleeping in a place filled with strangers around me and my baby.
The last straw came when on the morning of when I thought we’d be discharged from the hospital they told me that they recommend my S went through a Jaundice test, that it would take 12 hours. They explained everything to me but I wouldn’t listen to the risks. The thought of another sleepless paranoid night with S waking up the other babies in the ward was pure torture. I pleaded out.
Then when that didn’t work, I hatched a plan with S to pass the test. I told her if she’d work to a regular schedule of feeding and relieving then we’d be able to fight the Jaundice from taking over.
It didn’t work. S was borderline and as a precaution we were to now stay on and put S under that awful blue light until she was in the safe zone and goodness knows how long it would be. At this point, I needed a better plan. In a very Desperate Housewives manner I hatched my negotiations with the midwifery to ensure my child and I got the ultimate luxuries we could get away with if we were to stay on, otherwise I threatened I would not cooperate with the treatment ( I did apologise the next day saying I never knew what came over me) and it worked. I was left to administer the phototherapy in the most peace they could afford us and I broke visitation rules by having both my mum and Mr.HEA there with me. I even had a ham sandwich delivered in the middle of the night which puzzled me because I had asked if there was a vending machine to buy a bag of chips from. Turns out it was a lost in translation moment where they thought I wanted hot chips and that breastfeeding had me ravenous and delusional.
I never thought I would put my child’s health at risk. I thought the hospital was bad for her. But this is where lucid Mr HEA stepped in to call the shots ( but also S’s condition worsened making it now imperative that we undergo treatment) and together as a family, the three of us became this effective team of established regiment. We tirelessly kept to routine and S’s bilirubin came back under control. She was such a trooper though. Being yellow never stopped her from getting up for every feed. That’s how I know she is a trooper.
It wasn’t that horrific an experience for me otherwise. I learnt to dress, feed, settle and let go of my worst fear that I would kill her. I also learnt that I wasn’t alone and that all the other new parents had equal ( in some cases worse) struggles and fears.
The day we were told we were allowed home, I still had a bit of paranoia that they would find something else to keep me back with. So nervous that my blood pressure spiked right back up and the midwife started reaching for the doctor. Thankfully the benevolent doctor didn’t come. S and I were discharged in time to celebrate Mother’s Day evening at home. MrHEA cracked open a new bottle of Scotch and proceeded to wet the baby’s head with his cousin’s husband who’d come to pick us up from the hospital.
There there, we were finally home. S still misses the babies in the hospital who would wake up with each of her feeds. But she is so well loved and there are so many who love her that we really feel blessed and can’t wait to share her with the rest of our world.
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