My First 3 Days Home with Baby
By Cosima Wright
Still exhausted from birth I walked into my home with my brand new, one-day-old baby. The birth went well and my husband and I opted to go home after one night in the hospital. Our girl slept the whole car ride and continued to do so after we arrived. We were excited to introduce her to 3 of our closest friends, who had come by to drop off food for us, and they were amazed at how little she was.
After our friends left…
we were exhausted. The plan was to feed the baby and then catch up on some much-needed rest. Little did we know that after our daughter was fed she would refuse to be put down again, this continued for the following 72 hours of her life!
We shushed, wiggled, and hummed…
until she was sound asleep on our arms, but as soon as she touched her bassinet, she instantly started crying. We were determined to make it work and continue with our planned “safe sleeping practice,” hoping to do anything possibly known to prevent SIDS (no sleeping baby on us or in our bed while we were sleeping, and always putting the baby in her own bassinet, on her back, without any blankets, cushions or stuffed animals).
After having been awake for over 20 hours…
and still exhausted from birth we decided to take turns. My husband took the baby and I fell asleep instantly. Four hours later I woke up, still groggy. I quickly realized that I was alone in the bedroom, and wondered where my husband was with the baby. Despite the pain from my second-degree tear, I managed to get up rather quickly (jumped up) and went into the living room (flew) where I saw my husband laying on the couch tucked under a blanket, sound asleep. Where was the baby?!? I rushed over to the bassinet to realize it was empty. I quickly started panicking, thinking where is the baby? A quick gaze over the floor, did he drop her? Is she under the couch? Then it donned on me, the blanket! While yelling my husband’s name, I pulled the blanket off him, and sure enough, there was our little girl tucked away in his arms sound asleep. (That idiot! I’m going to kill him!)
There was a second or two where I was convinced that we had managed parenthood for only 48 hours and the unspeakable had happened to us! We couldn’t manage the one thing everyone warned us: don’t even sit down with the baby when you are exhausted…you will fall asleep!
In this flurry of emotions…
while I was yelling with terror, they both woke from their peaceful slumber staring at me in half asleep confusion. After realizing she was ok, I broke down in tears and couldn’t stop crying for the next two hours. I tried to calm myself down telling myself nothing had happened and we just had to make sure nothing like that would happen ever again, but everything was heightened. Which then turned into two weeks of little to no sleep. I would not leave my husband alone with the baby at night and at some point the feeling of tiredness or hunger faded. At this point, I realized that I was experiencing postpartum anxiety and luckily my family came to town to help with food, sleep, and emotional support.
Through this experience, I realized how much help it would have been to have an extra person (a trusted expert) in my home during the first 72 hours of being at home with my baby.
- A person who could help us with catching up on some much-needed rest, giving me some time to heal.
- Someone to help the baby get used to her new sleep environment, so she can learn to sleep in a safe space.
- A person who could answer questions about newborn care and ease anxiety as it arises.
- A person to celebrate and nourish a new family during their path in becoming confident parents.
Through this experience, the Bay City Doulas 3-day live-in postpartum doula package was born. We are excited to offer this support to new parents in the San Francisco Bay Area and Santa Cruz California.
