How do you take baby home from hospital?

[jellybean13419]

This probably seems a daft question. But friends have told me you must take baby home from the hospital in a car seat and they don't let you leave with baby in your arms. We are planning on getting a birth to 4 years car seat that stays in the car permanently. So what's the process here? It must be fairly common as there are loads of this type of car seat on the market. Do you take your pram with you to the hospital and take baby out to the car park in that? Or do you have to have another car seat handy that you can take out the car? 🤔

[quote SmidgenofaPigeon]@PerspicaciousGreen thank you. You’re probably right- we will look into car seat/Uber.[/quote]
If you'd be buying a car seat just for the trip home, you might well be able to borrow one. Lots of people will have had one for their infant and then upgraded when they grew out of it. Don't listen to people who insist you'll need one if you don't drive. You can always get one later if you want to.

We bought a travel system for other reasons and it came with a bucket car seat. I'm sure DC1 has been in it once or twice as I can picture him in it but I can't for the life of me remember why. DC2 has had exactly one car trip in her 15m of life - home from the hospital in my mother's car seat!

I suppose in theory if you're very committed to not buying a car seat, DH could bring the baby home in an ordinary pram on the tube and you could get an Uber with your bag! But it does seem like more trouble than it's worth

Of course they let you leave. I have a midwifery degree and there's absolutely no training for midwives to assess car seat suitability. We like babies to be safe, obviously, so the best course of action is to put baby in a pram if your seat is fixed in the car, but we can't say no to baby going in dad's arms (mums can sometimes be a little unsteady due to blood loss etc. so I prefer that as a last resort). It's not a prison.

@PerspicaciousGreen thank you- definitely we are reluctant to buy one a the flat has bugger all storage space and we just won’t be using it! I have been offered a loan of a secondhand one but my friend seemed faintly horrified and said they have to be new or they’re not safe

@sundowners

I'm really surprised at how many on here are saying they had the 1 carseat rigidly fixed in car they'd never remove! So you'd just risk waking baby every-time you stopped driving/had to carry into house? Carry baby in arms in rain etc? Presumably- never travel in any other car ever- as doing so with baby in lap would obviously be highly dangerous? For the sake of not spending £50 - £100 on a safe but affordable portable carseat specifically designed for babies I dont know why you'd make your own life so much more stressful.

Really, I get why you would think this if you have never done it, but it's not a big deal. I had both, and we never used the travel system, baby too scrunched up, you can't leave them in there any period of time, you have to take them out anyway, as soon as you have a heavy baby it gets back breaking lifting them out, so no, I didn't use to one that came as part of the travel system even though I had it. That's how good the other one was. But I guess if I'd had a baby who slept badly I might have had a rethink.

[quote SmidgenofaPigeon]@PerspicaciousGreen thank you- definitely we are reluctant to buy one a the flat has bugger all storage space and we just won’t be using it! I have been offered a loan of a secondhand one but my friend seemed faintly horrified and said they have to be new or they’re not safe [/quote]
Aha, that old chestnut. They don't have to be new , they have to not be expired (they have expiry dates written on them somewhere) and not have been damaged (in a crash or by dropping etc). If they had to be actually new to be safe, how would anyone take their baby on a second car trip?!

So you want to get it from a trustworthy and responsible source, but number of owners is not actually a scientific factor in whether or not a car seat is safe. Otherwise I could buy a new car seat, drive once round the block with it, hand it to someone else - and that would definitely and magically be safer than a car seat one family has owned for fifteen years and played drop football with.

Sorry, the once round the block car seat would sarcastically NOT be safer than the football one!

I'm really surprised at how many on here are saying they had the 1 carseat rigidly fixed in car they'd never remove!
So you'd just risk waking baby every-time you stopped driving/had to carry into house? Carry baby in arms in rain etc?

I didn't ever consider it taking a risk but yes I just lifted them if they were asleep. If they were very tired they usually snuggled in and would go back to sleep in the house. If not then they stayed awake. Rain? Yes I didn't have an issue with a bit of rain between the car and the house. They don't melt!!

@sundowners

I'm really surprised at how many on here are saying they had the 1 carseat rigidly fixed in car they'd never remove! So you'd just risk waking baby every-time you stopped driving/had to carry into house? Carry baby in arms in rain etc? Presumably- never travel in any other car ever- as doing so with baby in lap would obviously be highly dangerous? For the sake of not spending £50 - £100 on a safe but affordable portable carseat specifically designed for babies I dont know why you'd make your own life so much more stressful.

Ours actually was removable but we never ever did - our parking was 5 minutes from our house and I found the car seat way too heavy to lug back and forth, I don't understand how so many people carry them around. When he was tiny I put him in the sling to/from the house, after that I just carried him. Anywhere else I put him in either the pram or the sling. He woke up as soon as the car stopped anyway. I don't understand the point about rain - car seats are open at the top? No, we didn't ever travel in anyone else's car, I can't really imagine why we would. If I wanted to car share, e.g. go somewhere with my mum, I was the one who drove. I'm now on baby no. 2 and he's 12 weeks and again has never been in the car seat not in the car (though we now barely use the car anyway) - we've yet to be in a situation where it seemed necessary/practical to do so.

@PerspicaciousGreen you’re totally right! I’m sure the maxi cosi we’ve been offered would be fine- it’s owner could probably count on one hand the times it’s been used as they’re carless too. Thanks for all your advice xx

@Hallyup6

Of course they let you leave. I have a midwifery degree and there's absolutely no training for midwives to assess car seat suitability. We like babies to be safe, obviously, so the best course of action is to put baby in a pram if your seat is fixed in the car, but we can't say no to baby going in dad's arms (mums can sometimes be a little unsteady due to blood loss etc. so I prefer that as a last resort). It's not a prison.

Thank you

@SmidgenofaPigeon you could always get a taxi and let OH push baby home if you won't need a car seat any other time. Silly to buy one for one trip but I certainly couldn't have walked home.

@SmidgenofaPigeon

No no I wouldn’t be walking three miles at all. It IS three miles but a short hop to and from the tube either end. Two stops. I wouldn’t think I’d walk three miles having just given birth.

I could have done this after both my births - though I'm not sure I'd have massively wanted to - but I know lots and lots of women who couldn't have.

It's not a prison.

Oh yes, there was never any question that we weren't going to be allowed to leave because we didn't have a car seat with us on the ward. But the midwife seemed totally flummoxed by it as if it had never happened to her before, and we didn't want to get her in trouble, so we were all stood there like lemons for a few minutes while we tried to understand what the problem was and she tried to work out what was best for her to do given her kind concern to make sure the baby wasn't transported in a manner which was deemed unsafe by the hospital policy. We all found it rather funny, but it was a bother I'm not keen to repeat when I just want to get home and get to bed.

SmidgenofaPigeon I definitely couldn’t have done that after my first. I wouldn’t have been able to walk further than the car, and I also would have worried about wetting myself! I sat on a big absorbent pad for the drive home.

After my second I was in better shape and could walk and control my bladder, but I hadn’t really slept for 3 days and I was a bit of a zombie!

@IEat

Baby in arms in the back of a taxi

Really hoping this was back before in car safety was a thing!!

@DollyParton2

Ha GreenSpace00 I love your “remove her quietly” and your baby never once woke up doing so? Either you have the deepest sleeping baby ever or this simply isn’t true. I also don’t believe that those saying they also had this system never travelled in another car. So you either had baby on lap which is so dangerous or in the case of hire cars used a hire car baby seat which are notoriously in such bad condition/ upkeep/ used by so many other babies they’re dangerous. As others have said the 0-4 years car seats are also generally just not as safe so truly- why do it?

I find infant carriers so cumbersome that I would take the baby out of the seat anyway and carry them into the house, if they wake then they wake. We only have one car so don't need a car seat that goes in anyone else's car and with an isofix seat I feel happy that I know it is fitted securely. We have never needed a hire car so that has never been a problem. I can't think of a single time in two years when not having an infant carrier has been an issue.

@jellybean13419 I had my daughter last May and the midwives escorted us with the baby in the plastic bassinet from hospital to the hospital entrance where my husband was waiting. We moved my daughter to her car seat and carried her to where the car was stopped but the midwife came too, so I assume we could have just wheeled her there and popped her straight in if it was a fitted one

[quote SmidgenofaPigeon]@PerspicaciousGreen you’re totally right! I’m sure the maxi cosi we’ve been offered would be fine- it’s owner could probably count on one hand the times it’s been used as they’re carless too. Thanks for all your advice xx[/quote]
No problem! Always happy to promote car-free parenting as a feasible lifestyle choice. With every baby I've had someone comment that surely this time we'll HAVE to get a car... Nope!

@MaryBoBary I’ve suggested this to DH but he seems terrified at being let loose with the baby in a pram alone for the first time (how will I know what to do?!’ Errm, push it along?’) but if the car seat thing doesn’t work out I shall give them a cheery wave as I get into a taxi (then hang out of the widow anxiously looking up the road for them once home 😂)

[quote SmidgenofaPigeon]@MaryBoBary I’ve suggested this to DH but he seems terrified at being let loose with the baby in a pram alone for the first time (how will I know what to do?!’ Errm, push it along?’) but if the car seat thing doesn’t work out I shall give them a cheery wave as I get into a taxi (then hang out of the widow anxiously looking up the road for them once home 😂)[/quote]
Do you mean he'd walk it, or he'd do the tube journey? Because in his defence it actually is a real pain to take a pram on the tube in the vast majority of stations (since most are still woefully inaccessible), especially on your own, and I really wouldn't want to do it who had been born actually that day either. I took the pram on the tube once and it was so stressful that I used the sling every single time after that, but wearing a day-old is also quite nerve wracking.

[quote SmidgenofaPigeon]@MaryBoBary I’ve suggested this to DH but he seems terrified at being let loose with the baby in a pram alone for the first time (how will I know what to do?!’ Errm, push it along?’) but if the car seat thing doesn’t work out I shall give them a cheery wave as I get into a taxi (then hang out of the widow anxiously looking up the road for them once home 😂)[/quote]
I've just had flashbacks to the first time I took DC1 in a buggy on an escalator! He was several months old at least as we lived at a step free station and I'd not taken him out far before then. I was hovering at the top trying to work up my courage when a very very kind man noticed and asked if it was my first time and if I'd like a hand. What an angel! I'd think nothing of it now, but at the time all I could think of was what if so got the timing wrong and DC1 plunged to his doom!

Not something to attempt solo for the first time.

want to do it with a baby* who had been born actually that day

They wouldn't even let me walk around the ward holding my newborn, apparently it's too dangerous! So I would think you'd need a pushchair or sling, rather than carry baby out in your arms.

@Hardbackwriter the bus I think, takes longer but then no steps. But I can see why he’s anxious about it, definitely. We will in reality either go together or more likely, borrow the car seat and then taxi. My parents are of the opinion that if you take a newborn outside anywhere except to walk to and from a car, you’re going to give it bronchial pneumonia or something similar and you’re the worst parent ever. I’m not sure that’s true but it’s very likely public transport will be a bit of a sensory overload on a just-been-born baby.

Yep, nurse walks out the hospital with us and baby in car seat., then goes back inside. We get to car, it won't start so we are stuck in the carpark. Phone a friend up, he arrives in his van and takes me and newborn son home whilst DH is still in the carpark.
P.S It's for legal reasons. Once you are out of the building they are no longer legally looking after you and the baby.