Hi flopsy, i'm just copying my post from a similar thread:
I've just had an ELCS along with lots of others on this thread and quite a few of us have posted our birth stories if you want to have a read of them here
Briefly, my experience was: pre-op a week before where they did bloods, weight, talked about fasting etc.
On the day we turned up at 8AM having fasted the night before, went in about 11.30. They did the spinal first, then the catheter once the spinal was in.
Baby delivered after about 10 mins, stitching took about 25 mins but went quickly as was looking at the baby.
I went up to high dependency straight after where they helped me do skin to skin and b/f the baby. Left high dependency after 5 hours (is usually 6-8 hours but I felt fine and didn't want to miss visiting hours)
I stood and got into a wheelchair then was taken up to the ward that way, although have heard of people being wheeled to the ward on a bed.
DD had been born at midday and the earliest they could take the catheter out was midnight, which they did. I was home 48 hours after the section.
My ELCS was an absolute dream compared to my traumatic VB. Please do come over to the ELCS after traumatic birth thread if you'd like to talk it over with others in a similar position