Top Things No One Tells You About Birth and Recovery

So we’ve talked about what no one tells you about pregnancy and the list was extensive. Now, let’s dive into the forbidden area of birth and recovery: where no one wants to go.

I didn’t know very much about birth and recovery. Oh, I read the books, heard different people’s stories and had my own idea about what it would be like. I figured I’d breeze through until I got my epidural, spend a few nights enjoying the room service of the hospital, go home and be the perfect hostess to the folks who drop by to see the baby, and fit into all my pre-pregnancy clothes within a month or so. Are you laughing yet?

*Top Things You Don’t Know About Birth and Recovery*

1. Labor hurts. A LOT. You have no idea until you go through it. Just be prepared for the most intense, physical and mental pain you’ll ever go through and be alive to tell about it. At one point, I wished I would just die.

2. Labor pains (or contractions...although there’s nothing “contracting” about it. They should call it “crushing of all your internal organs” or “having a truck drive over you” or “twisting and destroying of every nerve cell in your body”) can last a really, really long time. Really. Mine started on Tuesday night and I didn’t deliver Maelin until Friday morning.

3. It can take a long, long, long, long time for the epidural man to come in. In that time, you will do all sorts of degrading, humiliating things as you wait for him.

4. The doctors will expect you to lie down and hold still while they are examining you. They will expect this even before the epidural man comes. Be prepared to try to hold still while they are doing whatever it is they do down there whilst in the middle of the being crushed by a truck. See how still you can be…

5. The epidurals are worth every single cent. My advice is to get one as soon as possible. Have the epidural man on your cell phone if you can and call him on your way to the hospital. Better yet, contact him before you deliver and promise him a nice fat bonus if he meets you at your car!

6. You will lose every last bit of your personal dignity. At one point during the pushing stage, I looked up and there were about 15 people in the room watching me with my legs up. None of these people I knew: it was like a football game. They were all cheering and yelling and very excited. Did I care? Nope…

7. The epidural wears off. Then it hurts. It really hurts. It really, really hurts for about a week.

8. You will bleed for weeks. Yes, I said weeks.

9. Bathroom business is not fun for said weeks. Just realize it’s not going to be fun and do your best.

10. Your old clothes will NOT fit you right away. I’m at almost 3 months and most of them still don’t fit. Unless you’re one of those mutant size zero people who lose weight just by thinking about it, expect to have to buy another wardrobe for after you give birth. This is in addition to the maternity wardrobe that you already bought. You will need nursing bras, new underwear (that you don’t mind ruining…see number 8 above), new jeans, shorts, shirts that you can use for nursing that are somewhat private, and a few nice outfits.

11. Breast milk stains clothes. Didn’t know this until I realized 4 of my favorite t-shirts have permanent dots the size of quarters in very specific places. Hmmmm…I wonder if I can still wear them?

12. You can function on amazingly little sleep. I realized the other day that it had been over 80 days of not sleeping more than 3 hours at a time. Wow…if you had told me that before I got pregnant…

13. Showers are sacred. You will kill for an uninterrupted one. You will act as if you can’t live without them because they are so hard to get. You will write them into your day planner…

14. You will become increasingly resentful of other people’s freedom. You might count the days since you were last able to go linger at the store or out to dinner or for a walk. Be prepared to race through Target grabbing things off the shelves like that “Supermarket Race Game” so you can finish before baby wakes up.

15. You and your husband will play the “Who Has It Worse” game. This is a fun game. The rules are: *Keep track of the amount of sleep you get so you can compare, *Keep track of the amount of soothing baby while crying time you each put in, *Yell and scream at each other about the amount of helping the other person does, *Play the biggest martyr you can when he gets up and goes right into the shower and you have breast milk dripping from you and you haven’t showered in 3 days. He’ll feel guilty and offer to bring you a pastry from Starbucks, *Listen to each other’s feelings about adjusting and try to one-up each other, *Do a little extra housework so you can yell about how he doesn’t ever help you around the house…it’s great fun! There is never a winner to this game, however so there are no prizes.

16. You will love that baby more than you ever imagined. People will try to tell you that and you believe them, but when you actually bond with the baby, you turn ferocious. You watch the way other people hold the baby; you are on the lookout for mosquitoes, spiders, dogs, cars, flowers, and cat fur: anything that could possibly harm your little one.

17. You will wake from a sound 21/2 hour sleep (darn it….) and race to the crib to make sure the baby is still breathing. You will do this every night…sometimes, multiple times during the night. You become an expert at dodging obstacles in your house on the way to the baby’s room. I can jump about 3 feet now…Gizmo is the only thing in the house that still trips me up every time.

18. You will be more exhausted and cranky and resentful of your life changes than you ever thought possible and then the baby will smile at you and you realize that it’s all worth it.