When we moved to a different county and I quit my job to be a stay-at-home mom, I knew that I was going to have to deliver my second child at a different hospital. My previous OBGYN didn’t accept my new insurance and there was no way I was going to be able to drive an hour each way for my appointments with a toddler. I wasn’t too worried about switching to a new OBGYN or delivering somewhere unfamiliar, what worried me were the stories I had been told about this new hospital. I had heard that it was old and rundown compared to the other facility and lacked all of the amenities that we had enjoyed when I gave birth to Ethan. We were told the doctors weren’t as knowledgeable, the nurses weren’t as nice…you name it, we heard it.
Thankfully, they were wrong. Every single thing about this new hospital and my new team of providers was fantastic.
The first big difference between my delivery of Ethan and my delivery of Amelia didn’t have anything to do with the hospital or the OB office, so let’s start there: COVID.
- Masks: I had to wear a mask to all of my OB appointments and both my husband and myself had to wear them during my delivery and the duration of our hospital stay. When we were alone in the room however, we were allowed to take them off.
- Visitors: No one was allowed to visit us while we were in the hospital and my husband was not allowed to come and go from the hospital as he did with Ethan. Once we were in our recovery room, we were not allowed to leave that room for any reason until we were discharged. To be honest, we loved not being allowed any visitors. Of course, I would have loved to have had Ethan there but it was so nice just being able to bond with Amelia uninterrupted and to breastfeed freely.
- Staff: When we had Ethan, it seemed like someone was in our room every 2 minutes and we were SUPER annoyed the entire stay. Our sleep was constantly interrupted, I was always paranoid about someone walking in while I was breastfeeding…it was no fun. This time around, the nurses and aides kept their distance as much as possible. Amelia & I still had our vitals taken every few hours and all of that fun stuff, but the room visits were kept to a minimum.
As for how this hospital and staff compared to the previous hospital and staff:
- Atmosphere: Everyone was so much more laid back and accommodating at the new hospital. We felt so comfortable asking for things we needed, like extra pads or wipes, and the nurses in the O.R. were so patient and sweet with me – as my husband wasn’t allowed back until my spinal had been placed and I was super nervous.
- NO JUDGEMENT: Ya’ll – not a single dang person tried to pressure me into breastfeeding. The nurses of course said they recommended it, but then that was it. They just told me to let them know if I needed any help or wanted to speak with a lactation consultant. At the hospital where I delivered Ethan, I had 2-3 lactation consultants come into my room and ask to watch me feed EVERY single day. I never even asked for them! I felt so shamed when I started having an issue with Ethan latching and they beat the “breast is best” agenda into my head so hard that breastfeeding became something I dreaded and tried to make work long past when I should have. At the new hospital, I started having latching issues again and my supply dropped and I knew I needed to supplement with formula. I was a ball of nerves when I asked the nurse if she could grab some formula and the syringe to tube feed and all she said was, “sure, no problem”. No speech about how terrible formula is, no recommendation to speak to a consultant – just trust in me to know what my baby needed.
- Medication: As soon as we checked in I asked the nurse to make a note to stop my pain meds and pull my IV as soon as possible following delivery. I have a pretty high pain tolerance and I absolutely hate being tethered to an IV line so I knew I wanted to stop the meds at my own discretion, but I fully expected the nurses to put up a fight. Once again, they proved me wrong. As soon as I had had the required fluids, my line was pulled and I went straight to taking the pain medication orally. I was allowed to take the pain medication when I felt I needed it, as opposed to around the clock and I felt so much more comfortable being in control of my own care and treatment.
- Length of stay: The standard hospital stay following a c-section is 3 days but we were told we could leave after 2 if we felt ready or stay as long as 4 if we wanted the extra time to recover. We chose to leave after 2 so we could get home to Ethan and once again not a single person tried to influence our decision.
Now for the fun part, the actual delivery & the subsequent recovery:
- Spinal: This was the part I was dreading the most. I don’t mind a little pain and have no issues with needles but I do have a multitude of spinal issues, which cause daily pain and stiffness. Having to stay hunched over while heavily pregnant so a large needle can be ever so carefully inserted into my spinal column..yeah, that’s tough for me. It took the anesthesiologist 8 attempts to get my spinal placed with Ethan. After the 7th attempt we were told they had one attempt left and then I would have to go under general anesthesia. Thankfully, it didn’t come to that. Understandably, I was nervous about going through that again and we were convinced it would be unsuccessful and I’d have to go under. This anesthesiologist managed to get it placed on her first attempt & you have no idea how much lighter I felt when all of that stress and anxiety melted away.
- Pain: After Amelia, I had very little gas pain and my general pain score was around a 2/3 out of 10 at it’s absolute worst. I felt like I was more sore than in pain and I was ready to get up and get moving much sooner than I was the first time around. I took hardly any pain medication once we got home and I was moving around like normal almost immediately.
- Mental state: I’ll never forget our 2nd night in the hospital with Ethan. He was cluster feeding and I was so tired and in so much pain that I broke down in tears around 2 a.m. The nurse came in and asked if she could take Ethan for a couple of hours to let me sleep and I lost it. I was terrified of him being out of sight, convinced he’d just be left out in the hallway hungry and crying. She finally convinced me to let her take him and I cried the entire 2 hours he was gone. With Amelia, one of our nurses made the same offer and I agreed without hesitation. I had so much trust in the staff this time around and felt so much stronger both physically & mentally that I happily accepted. I didn’t cry every night as the sun went down, dreading those long nights like I did with Ethan. I was able to actually sleep and that makes ALL the difference. I was more confident in my ability to navigate nighttime feeds and I knew what sounds were normal during newborn sleep so I wasn’t laying awake checking to see if she was breathing every 5 minutes.
Overall, my pregnancy was definitely harder with Amelia and we’ve had our fair share of tough times in her first 2 months but her delivery and my recovery were exponentially easier than with Ethan. I am so incredibly grateful for this because it allowed me to truly enjoy and soak in those first few weeks. With Ethan, I had a bad case of the “baby blues” and it made everything seem so much harder and more stressful than it really was. Now, as we enter our 3rd month with our sweet girl, I’m looking forward to seeing how she develops compared to her big brother and see what her little personality is like. Something tells me she’s going to have all the sass.
If you’ve had more than one birth, what were the biggest differences you found in your deliveries and recoveries?
