SO MUCH happens after Bub is born. A friend of mine told me that labour is nothing compared to afterwards. I did not believe her, but guess what, she was right.

Right after birth

• Bub is placed on your chest and the labour pain disappears as if nothing had happened
• They try to breastfeed bub – you don’t get milk straight away, instead it’s colostrum which lines Bub’s stomach for immunity
• BYO diapers because the hospital doesn’t supply them (not in my experience at least)
• They don’t bathe Bub for the first night to keep the mother’s stuff on them and boost their immunity (they will show you how to bathe Bub the next night)
• I was snipped a bit to help Bub’s head come out – so I had to wait for a doctor to get stitched up – couldn’t really feel anything apart from one area which didn’t have anaesthetic, but it just felt like a sting. This is when those stirrups come into play and your vagina is out on show
• All my family came to hold him and watch the midwife measure/test him
• You get up and you feel a bit dizzy and your tummy feels so weird like it’s ‘empty’. You walk cautiously and slowly to the toilet and you have to pee a certain amount within a certain time frame – it’s hard to pee and only a bit comes out with blood
• You have your first shower – weirdest experience ever
• We went through the public system and were lucky to secure a partner room so my husband could stay with me – Bub was sleeping soundly throughout the night and I thought: this is easy
• Had Maccas and breastfed bub only a couple times (TIP: if you choose to breastfeed, practice latching Bub as much as possible while you’re in hospital and midwives/nurses are around – get it right now to avoid PAIN later)
• Bub’s poo is black like tar and hard to clean – it will eventually transition to yellow/mustard seeds
• TIP: keep asking for these small ice blocks which you put into your pad to help help your vagina
• You & Bub get checked on every couple of hours by the midwife (amazing support)
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Week 1

• You walk out of the hospital and it’s like you’re on another planet
• Now the fun begins once you get home: it’s time to now learn how to actually parent
• I didn’t learn to breastfeed properly and Bub didn’t latch well. My nipples got cracked and sore and it stung like a mothaf* to feed. Everytime Bub cried in hunger, fear ran through me as I knew pain was coming. One night, I broke down crying (even though I had called the Australian Breastfeeding Association). I felt guilt that I couldn’t feed him and didn’t want to give him formula as that felt like I had failed.

So I was forced to compromise: I rested my nipples for a whole day and pumped and gave formula as a top up. The midwife comes to visit you at home twice and on my second visit, she told me: DO WHAT YOU NEED TO DO TO SURVIVE, THERE IS NO RIGHT WAY

• My milk came in after approx. 3 days and at night I got a fever. Thought I was ill and called the hospital helpline – was told this is normal once your milk comes in. Fever broke overnight and then I was fine
• Feelings: longing for the times prior to Bub, feeling alone as only I could feed him, blardy tired, no f*ing clue what is going on (and I was living with my parents so had so much more support than usual)
• Sleeping: Bub woke up every 2 hours or so and fed for about an hour – felt like shit. Bub will naturally sleep longer overnight and you will also get used to not getting a whole night’s sleep. At around 4 weeks, he should only need to feed 10-15 minutes per boob before falling asleep
• If Bub gets acne on his face, just leave it, it will clear after a couple days
• Bathing: we decided to bathe everyday – at around week 3-4, you can start doing some massaging post bath to help with digestion
• At first, Bub will cry whenever you change or bath him – don’t worry he’ll get used to it
• Your appetite will increase SO MUCH as your milk is coming in- don’t worry, it’ll quieten down after awhile and ‘go back to normal’ – try to eat healthily
• Lesson: as long as Bub is fed, clean and secure it’s pretty much all you need to learn how to do initially. Bub will be quite sleepy overall and won’t open his eyes much 
• TIP: rotate Bub’s head from sleeping on one side to the other to avoid flattening one side of his skull
• Gross fact: I had quite a bit of bleeding, felt quite weak and had a massive blood clot come out. In terms of exercise: give yourself at least a month to recover (for those fitness freaks: I know it’s hard, but you need to give your body time to recover).

Weeks 2-7

• Breastfeeding still difficult to master. Bub wouldn’t latch properly to my right boob compared to my left and it felt quite uncomfortable. I used cold cabbage leaves and various breast gels to help soothe my nipples. Eventually you will get used to having your nipples pulled and tugged at – but it takes a good couple of weeks
• You will get the hang of breastfeeding – I did by around week 6. It gets to a point where your milk could squirt out like a fountain (use breastpads!)
• I developed mastitis: blocked milk duct usually from Bub not latching properly. The milk goes into other areas of your breast and it gets inflamed. You get fevers on and off and you have to take care of your baby still (no rest for the wicked)

Cure: feed from the mastitis breast first and drain it as much as possible (start on that breast and pump out if you still feel ‘full’ after feeding). You may need to change Bub’s feeding position – get his bottom lip to be above the sore area as the bottom lip will draw the most milk out. Also went to doctor and got antibiotics

This was a blessing in disguise because I learned to feed Bub in a different way and realised that I had probably developed mastitis earlier on which was why it was uncomfortable to feed from the left boob

• Sleep (I will do an updated post on this): there are SO many opinions on this. My way was a more gentle/natural way:
  • I let Bub guide me – they know how much sleep they need and you just go along for the ride
  • I try to teach him day versus night. During the day, expose them to sound, light, talking, singing etc. At night, I turn the light off (just have a night light so you can still see) and keep it relatively quiet
  • My routine: Bathe bub, feed then sing and put him to sleep. When he gets up overnight, I feed him one side, burp him, change his diaper, feed the other side, burp him, then put him to sleep
  • He naturally started sleeping longer week by week. There are some nights where they have a growth spurt and they wake up more frequently, but again, trust that they know what they’re doing

Week 8

• Bub starting to be more aware and smile. He is fascinated by bright colours and loves singing and talking. He enjoys bath time and tummy time is improving. He’s started eating his hands when he’s hungry and can maintain eye contact.
• We tried to have sex: it felt quite unfamiliar as I felt like a milk machine rather than a sexy bunny. Also I was scared I would maybe tear again and I didn’t want to wake Bub (sleep is also sacrified). So it didn’t really work out, but we talked about it after and agreed to just keep trying (Rome wasn’t built in a day) and we need to actually schedule time in for intimacy. You don’t have to have sex everyday to be truly intimate. For me and my partner, our love goes beyond sex and our spirits/souls are already forever together

I stopped documenting each week after the 8th week – Bub is now 11 months and doing well. I will post more based on milestone events like solids, sleep etc so more to come! 🙂