Was your baby cleaned after giving birth?

[MumtoBen]

My baby was not cleaned after I gave birth. It was about 14 hours later (gave birth at midnight, got to wash him at about 2pm next day) before I was able to give him a bath. His hair and face especially were caked in blood. I thought he had black hair until I washed it and found it was in fact blonde. Is this normal?

Wiped but not much and definitely not cleaned ... both mine were pretty clean when they came out - no vernix or anything ... just some blood in their hair.
DS was bathed when he was a day old and DD was about a week old before she had her first bath.

actually, i do remember getting a hug from mum, she didnt care she got covered in blood too, and she had put on her best cardi

Mine were both cleaned, and both were sections (one emergency, one planned).

three of mine were cleaned, all becuase they needed checkign over first. ds1 wasn't cleaned as he was straightforward and so given straight to me. I think I can remember mears posting on here saying that babies shouldn't have the vernix washed off.

None of my 3 were cleaned. DS1 and dd were placed onto my stomach straight away, had to wait a minute for ds2 as he'd swallowed some fluid. If I remember rightly, none of mine had a bath until they were about 12 hours old. Didn't mind the blood in their hair, and like you mumtoben, found I had a blondie underneath it all!!

Neither of mine were cleaned.

DD was bathed on the 2nd day by midwife as a demonstration. We were shocked to discover she was blonde as well, lol.

DS wasn't bathed until we did it - can't remember when though.

Kind of. She was a water birth :) Didn't have a proper hairwas for at least a week and, er, not sure when her first bath was. A while after that though!

DS placed on me straight away and I was allowed discover for myself we'd had a little boy -which I thought was lovely!! Hosp didn't tell us at THAT time at scans the sex of baby, but it does now so am hoping to find out this time round. Was wiped clean and brought over to us had a wash next day to get rid of gunky stuff in hair and had PROPER bath at 3 days old. It was only at that point we realised he was blonde!

My ds was placed on my chest immediately after birth, he was then given a quick wipe over and we were given a demonstration in the hospital how to bath him the next day.

my ds1 wasnt washed properly for weeks ( not in the intensive care anyway) and i did ds2 at home the morning after he was born, but i definatly remember the midwives saying they werent going to do it for anyone, cs or not.!!

DS was placed onto my chest straight after birth, he was then wiped over and wrapped in a towel and given back.

The next day the nursery nurse gave the ward a demonstration on how to bathe your babies and used our ds! So we got a free bath out of the NHS :o

This is making me not be able to wait! I have been wondering about how I will feel when they flop this sticky baby on me but you have all made it sound so amazing! And I am intrigued about the 'smell', haven;t heard anyone talk about this before.

Hi fenny my 2 were'nt cleaned either and its such a nice fealing when your babys born and they put the baby on you. It made me feel really close to them. My first born had lots of the white stuff on his body when he was born It kinda turns to powder after a while which moisturises thier skin.xx

mine were just given to me straight away.both were absolutely coated in vernix-you'd have thought they were prem.then later we just dried them off a bit.
i bathed them the next day with water just to get the blood out of their hair.

My ds was bathed pretty much straight away, he was covered in poo! (his poo, not mine)

mine was born in birth pool so was quite clean. no blood obviously. he was a little greasy but no white left as he was so big he had rubbed it all off inside.
if i was to have had him on dry land, i would have had him as he came, not cleaned first.
i would be too excited to wait.

They're SO nice and warm when they're first born and put on you. Oh, you just want to cuddle their tiny bodies.

DS was placed on me first though to have a feed. I think he had cuddles from his daddy too, so it must have been about an hour after birth he got cleaned up

ds stunk to high heaven when he was born so I asked if he could be given a bath, he was also covered in a lot of blood.

With dd (1st baby) the offer was there, so I said yes. i watched her whilst I was being stitched up

agree with expat they are very nice and warm. VERY warm actually - like little hot water bottles!

and i had one that found my nipple immediately after rooting around like a little mole

dd1 just went to sleep on me.

dd2 snuggled, but she was all looky looky. she didn't want to suckle, just be cuddled. after a couple of hours she finally dropped off and i put her in her little cot so i could have a sleep and not worry about squashing her.

ds1 cried a little and then stared and stared at me.it was blissful.
ds2 cried and cried and cried, and then fed straight away and then did the staring thing!
that feeling when you are first holding them...mmmmm you just can't describe how fab it is can you?

Ds never got washed in hospital. I wasn't physically able to after a massive pph and blood transfusion.

He finally got washed when we got home 3 days later.

SIL made a comment that if your baby is born on the night shift then less staff so less chance of them being washed?