Athéna's first month

Is nice to be finally home after such a long stay in the hospital, I was definitely bored being stuck there. Yet, out of hospital means no help from nurses if we face problems with bb There was a night when bb woke up like every hour crying (maybe colic?) That we tried all ways to calm her down and the sleepy husband told me to ask for the nurse! Haha, since when we had nurse at home?? We did had free home visits from a midwife to check on me and bb. So, we also bomb her with many questions that Google can't help us. I can't imagine how life will be without Google.

Main problem was i had zero milk supply and bb weight was decreasing. It's really frustrating that each meal time, bb had to suck both breast 10min each (no milk) then husband feed her with bottle. Normally she was already crying very badly by the time for bottle and I feel like a lousy mum with no milk. Since it has been close to a week after delivery and i had zero milk, midwife asked whether i still want breastfeed, if yes, she suggests that we loan the hospital breast pump (we just need pay a 200€ deposit at the pharmacy for the pump and no deadline to return) and I must work hard to pump every 2h day and night. Well, I really want to breastfeed to save milk powder money..so I agreed. Luckily, my milk supply kicked in after 2 days of the pump and bb can finally be comforted when she nurse. With my low supply and her low weight, we still need to let her nurse on both breasts then husband to bottle feed. By 3rd week, my supply increased and she started to finally exceed her birth weight and we can stop bottle feed. I think husband must be super happy to stop bottle feed because he is supposed to burp her and hold her in upright position for at least 30m after each feed and is not fun to do so in middle of the night. Or even in the day every 2 hourly. But finally, we can worry less of her weight.

Thankfully, husband had 10days of paternity leave, I will prefer more leave but his boss wasn't allowing more to be taken. So, it starts the countdown to the days where I'll be going solo with bb. Being the perfectionist me, I didn't really allowed myself to rest in bed and enjoy husband's help. Instead, I was up and about trying my best to care for bb and cleaning up our hospital stuff and home. I was constantly in pain for my wound and I thought is normal, since I just delivered. Google told me that I should have less pain after a week but I didn't. It became worse and felt like fire was burning there and so much pain when I stayed in a position for too long(10min?). The midwife saw a slight infection and prescribed an antiseptic lotion for me. But things didn't improve after 2 days and husband was going back to work in less than a week. So we took an urgent appt with my gynae and hope I can be given antibiotics to help with the healing. Sadly, it was really bad news. My wound had a bad infection and stitch came loose. I was given antibiotics and to return in 2 days for a restitch (because gynae gg holiday there after).

I had to admit that delivery was painful but stitching there was really painful too. I was really not looking forward for the restitch especially only with local anthesia. Anyway, I didn't had choice, I blame my lack of bedrest and constant big movements for this torture. The infection cleared a little and gynae did the restitch... ouch! Gynae warned me that it will be more painful after the anthesia wears off and I was already in alot of pain.  Since we didn't want bb to be in hospital, I went alone and had to take tiny steps to walk out of the hosp. I took a uber home and glad that the ride was only 5min. I was in so much pain that I finally didn't moved from the bed for the day. Well, I can't imagine how it will be if I didn't return to my gynae. At least by the time husband returned to work, I felt better.

Confinement was not happening because we didn't had time to buy ingredients and to cook. We relied on microwave fast food. My sister in law came for 2 days to help us with bb and husband made me sesame chicken that I cried while eating because it's like finally real comfort food. I had to stop bathing the the confinement med bath that my mum bought because of the infection and I bath everyday too. Well, when I'm old with body aches, my mum will remind me is because I bath everyday. But no choice.. Confinement vs infection, I choose to be clean and infection free. Family also came to visit and bought us home cooked food which was very welcomed by us.

Finally, it was time for husband to return to work and start of my solo care for bb. It was hard to be alone, at times I desp wish to pass bb to someone else to hold while I can rest. The nights I tried to also care more for bb since I was breast feeding her and husband had to work. I was exhausted... the most tiring part of the day was after 1600, bb is fussy and I tried to entertained her with dance, songs, books etcs and I'm always so glad when husband came home to take over. We will try our best to make her nap around 1900 so to have dinner together but rarely happens. And bed time was supposed to be 2100 but usually only happens after that. I have a bb who don't sleep.

Things seems to improve when we decided to swaddle bb. All along I wanted to swaddle bb but it wasn't welcomed by the hospital or Midwife, it's seen as sort of abuse. It took awhile for bb to be used to swaddle since we didn't used it when she was bored. But swaddle helped her to be less awake by her limb movements and seems to make her feel more secure during sleep. Anything that helps bb sleep I'm doing it! I finally took time to read the baby whisperer book (gift from a friend who had a baby early and swears by the book) and we decided to try to train her on the e.a.s.y schedule (eat, activity, sleep, your time) instead of the current feed to sleep way.

As bb started to get used to the new schedule, our direct above neighbour started renovation works for their home and is to last min a month... so hello to daily 0800 to 1700 of renovation works...sigh.