Sister getting married about a month after baby due

[NanooCov]

I think I'm probably being unreasonable but given it's my first baby am not sure if I'm being very precious or just a wee bit.

My only sister met a chap in February of this year. Haven't met him yet. We live SE England and she lives NE Scotland - have seen her at a family wedding abroad since they met but he wasn't there (was all arranged before they met). Have invited them down but they haven't yet taken up the offer. By all accounts they are madly in love. He moved in within weeks and they are now engaged to be married. Mum and Dad had reservations given the speed of it all and the fact he kind of just appeared (no surviving family, no friends to speak of, from South Africa and only moved to UK just before he and my sister met - though he has a UK passport as his parents were British) but are generally supportive.

They have set the date for their wedding for 7th February 2015 - nothing booked yet but it's the one year anniversary of them meeting which they think would be romantic. Wedding will be in NE Scotland somewhere.
I'm due my first DC on 22nd December. Clearly no idea if he will be on time, early or late but if law could potentially be just a month old on date of wedding.
I'm perturbed at the idea of a 500+ mile drive with a one month old to scotland when I'll be still oozing bodily fluids from every orifice, trying my best to BF and generally adjust to trying to keep a small person alive.
Am I worrying over nothing? I kind of want to prepare my sister for the fact that, as much as we'd like to attend, it might not work out for us. If I'm feeling fine and baby is thriving then marvellous, but it's the uncertainty that worries me. I don't want to suggest they push back the wedding (although nothing is booked yet) and to be honest I don't know what would be a more comforting gap between birth and wedding. Maybe I'm overthinking?

No matter now portable babies are, they should not be in a car seat for any longer than 2 hours at a time. We took dd to a wedding at 8 weeks old and it was fine, but it was 40 minutes away. I had an elcs with dd1 and felt amazing. A 500 mile journey would still have been hard that early on. The sleep deprivation is horrendous.

Of course see how you feel but I think it's a shame to drag a newborn baby that distance to be honest. They are so tiny and so vulnerable. 10+ hours in a car seat is not good for them.

What I don't get is that when someone comes on here to moan about people visiting after the birth, everyone replies that there should be no pressure to have visitors in the early days/weeks yet here everyone is saying it's fine to travel 500 miles 4 weeks post birth

I went to a wedding with ds1, aged 20 months, whilst I was pregnant with ds2, and 8 weeks later went to a wedding in Scotland (we lived in Essex) with ds1, and ds2 aged 5 weeks.

Nanoo - have you considered going up by train - there are good fares you can get if you book in advance, and in my experience, it is a much more comfortable and easier way to travel with a little baby than by car.

It might almost be cheaper to go by train, and use taxis than to pay for petrol to drive that far.

Thanks for the link Shergar. I wasn't aware it was a breathing thing re the 2 hour car seat limit - thought it was just so their lovely little bodies didn't get all squinched up. Will bear that in mind. Current preferred travel option is probably flight (though there is the pain of losing £££ if we then cancel) but if we do travel by car we will probably stop overnight half way and certainly have loads of breaks for baby, me and DH (who'll be doing all the driving like a trooper). I generally dislike the train but can see the benefits in this case of being able to feed on demand and potentially soothing rocking motion so will look into that too. If we do go train I'll insist on first class and annoy all the business travellers with crying baby and all manner of fluids leaking out everywhere that they will probably tut at over their papers.

Go by train.
Much easier. You can feed change etc as you travel. Advance book for good price
Car and stoping every hour to feed change etc will extend the journey into three days ...

See how you feel after the birth, tell sister that you intend to be there but don't know how you will be feeling. For example, If you end up having a C-section I'm sure it's a while to recover from and driving is not advised. I though I would be out celebrating my 30th one month after DS was born. 16 months later I gave finally managed a good night out! That's just me though it's difficult to plan post pregnancy. X

I would baulk at driving 10 hours there and 10 hours back even without a baby. With a baby it sounds like hell (mine fed for at least half an hour every 1-2 hours).

Train sounds nice, but if you don't feel up to it then you shouldn't go. It could go either way.

personally i was fine and on a train trip and long walk two weeks after i had my first and i had to have a placenta removed manually (grim operation lots of bruising) but you can't guarantee it will be okay its best to plan to fly you wont need much honestly you wont! i wouldnt drive that far in the snow

Yeah the only doubt I have about the flying plan is that on two occasions when I've been due to fly up to my folks for Christmas they've closed the airport Diego snow and bad weather and I've ended up on the train anyway at last minute ticket prices, with hundreds of other people. One memorable occasion I had to stand all the way as the train was absolutely rammed. I did take turns perching on top of a big suitcase with another traveller and we passed the time by swigging out of a bottle of wine that had been destined as a Christmas present for someone. Actually quite good fun at the time and a bit of the "blitz spirit" about the whole thing but not to be repeated with a baby really. Of course it was Christmas so the chaos was heightened. I'm going to stop thinking about it and just reassess in December. Unless we see extremely bargainous train tickets in the interim, in which case may book them as a back up.

Diego? *due to (FFS)

I was bridesmaid at my cousins wedding when DS was three weeks, he was EMCS, the journey was about 5 hours by car. Obviously hard work, and the amount of stuff we took was crazy (and probably unnecessary!) but all worked out ok!

It might be worth looking into the types of train tickets that are available. If you can identify ones that can be changed, then you could always visit later in the year. First class is definitely the way forward, bigger seats and tends to be quieter.

Nanoo - only just come back to this. I'm sorry, that came across all wrong and wasn't meant to be as critical as it sounded - reading it back it is, and I can only apologise.

Thanks frosty - don't worry. The perils of online communication!

She didn't say much. Just "yes" and "I understand" and then changed the subject.

OP do check back with your sister. This response suggests to me that she's not listening and thinks everything will be all fine and you'll be there.

YANBU and are handling it very sensibly. You'll just have to wait and see - I was a bridesmaid at my sister's wedding when DS1 was six weeks old and it was hard but manageable. If you're late and have complications, have an unhappy baby (DS1 had silent reflux) or just feel overwhelmed then that long journey will feel like a massive deal.

Hopefully you'll be fine and it'll all be manageable but you are sensible to be cautious. Good luck!

I could have posted similar a few years ago. I travelled 200+ miles by car and stayed one night away to attend a close family member's wedding, the date of which (22 of the month) was decided after my due date (4th of same month) was announced. My baby was prompt so was 2.5 weeks old at the time of the wedding. To this day, I regret having gone. I had a difficult birth and difficulties breastfeeding for months. With hindsight, I certainly didn't help myself by doing this crazy trip. The baby may have been small and portable but they also wanted to
feed constantly - impossible when travelling in a car. You'll be pretty sleep deprived at that point regardless of your birth experience. My advice would be don't go and don't feel bad about that either. If they wanted you there badly enough they'd have taken your due date into account. You and your baby are the priority.

OP I can see why driving is attractive - you can easily take all your baby kit and wedding clothes with you, and stop when you feel like it/need to. Have you considered breaking your journey for a couple of nights, not just one - and staying at, say, at York and Edinburgh? And also, as other posters have suggested, arriving a whole day (or more) before the wedding, so as to have a chance for all of you to rest properly not only during your journey but also when you arrive?
In N Scotland in Feb, it's dark soon after 3pm and not properly
light again until 9.30 am. So darkness, as well as possibly ice and snow, will make driving conditions more difficult. You don't want to have to make the journey when tired or in pain or in a rush or under pressure.
Of course, taking breaks in your journey would make your stay away from home much longer, which may not be what you want. But it might perhaps make it less exhausting.
Best of luck, anyway!

Thanks to all posting and particularly those with invaluable practical advice (and frock suggestions!). Having spoken to my sister I'm now going to leave it a few days and maybe speak to her again on Sunday and maybe just in passing ask something like "I hope you're not too disappointed we might not be able to make the wedding" and see how she reacts. She doesn't have any kids either so probably didn't think about timing too much. I know they're thinking about venues too (although as far a I know haven't called any yet - bless her, she's a wee bit disorganised) and when they get down to it they may find they can't get their preferred date anyway. We shall see. But in any case, my OH and I are firm in our plan to do what feels best for us and our baby at the time. If that means missing the wedding then so be it. We can Skype - that way I can stay in my jammies