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Pregnancy

Talk about every stage of pregnancy, from early symptoms to preparing for birth.

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Original poster

How did you feel when you bought your baby home?

109 replies

Baggyjumper0121 · 20/10/2023 13:43

When you came home with your newborn, did you feel excited? Nervous? Lost?

My colleague recently had a baby and she talked about having an anti-climax feeling after the first day and she said it was like an empty feeling even though she had her baby with her but as soon as family/friends would leave after visiting she would feel very down. I hadn't thought about this

I am due in 5 weeks and I know nothing can prepare me for the emotional side of things but interested in reading your experience of the first few days with a newborn - emotions wise

OP posts:

Are your children’s vaccines up to date?

Set a reminder

Mummyof287 · 09/11/2023 21:37

My main thought I can remember on the drive home from hospital was....'I've got to now be responsible for her and keep her safe for 18 years!' It felt so scary at the time to think that!

Kats43 · 09/11/2023 21:47

I think did feel a strong need to be cared for and be able to concentrate on just recovering and my baby. Unfortunately didn't tend to quite work out like that as we don’t live in a culture that tends to do that. Think postnatal hotels like they have in some counties sound amazing.
Not nervous as such as was young and fearless with 1st but a feeling of overwhelming love but also worry that anything could ever hurt them, I remember thinking how awful must be for mums with babies in the NICU

jellybe · 09/11/2023 21:58

I spent a lot of time just staring at her and through the blur of sleep deprivation thinking 'I can't believe she's mine and that I get to keep her'. Whilst at the same time having the 'oh my word how do we do this' feeling.

Freetodowhatiwant · 09/11/2023 21:58

Terrified, full of anxiety that something would happen to the baby. Overwhelmed by this for weeks maybe even months. I remember being in a shopping centre when the baby was 3 weeks old and having a shell shocked conversation with someone with a 5 week old and desperately wishing my baby was 5 weeks old too so I would be more used to it! the baby would feed for hours and never be satisfied. I wrote a feeding diary for the first three days before giving up in the diary in despair.

Also I was confused by suddenly seeing a world I hadn’t seen before operating before my very eyes! There were people with babies and prams everywhere. And they all would come and speak to me! You gas fever really noticed them before.

Saffrom · 09/11/2023 22:03

I really fell for the myth that mum and dad are equal partners in modern times. I remember crying about how little DH seemed to feel (or do) for the baby. Then I met a mum from another culture who thought it was hilarious I’d expected the dad to be useful and that cheered me up.

It is very much you and the baby, alone. Eventually I came to love that.

InTheFutilityRoomEatingBiscuits · 09/11/2023 22:17

I gave birth at home, so I didn’t have the transition feeling of going from being surrounded by other people to on my own. I just had one midwife for the birth who left shortly after. Although I’d never held a baby before, never been to an antenatal class and didn’t know anyone with a baby I wasn’t worried about how to care for a baby. Feed, change, bath etc didn’t feel worrying to me. Having the baby there felt normal, natural and right. I felt like I had my life back.

Didn’t mean it was easy, my relationship was unstable and I became a single parent just a few weeks later but honestly that just increased the feeling of it being me and my little baby against the world.

One thing I did feel really weird doing is saying we’re in tescos, instead of saying I’m in tescos. Or, we are going out, instead of I. I didn’t feel more like a duo when the baby was out. Weirdly I felt more like two of us when the baby was IN! Like I was always aware of this baby and every single movement they made and then suddenly we were separated and I felt more like a singular person afterward (saying I) than before birth (when it would be weird to say we…)

it’s best described as surreal!

Mummy08m · 09/11/2023 22:18

My dh never deletes any WhatsApp messages going back years. I got him to scroll back to my days on the postnatal ward after dd was born.

It was really heartwarming actually. The postnatal ward is a hell on earth but dd was my solace. I texted dh every ten minutes all night long, about everything she did - for example, at one point I crunched into an apple and dd, in my arms, flinched at the noise and glared at me - I texted dh that she was only a day old and she had my misophonia already!

At another point, she sneezed the cutest little sneeze and I had to Google "is it normal for newborns to sneeze" (I'll save you checking - it is).

I can't wait till this second pregnancy is over and I've got my baby, real life baby not just a painful kicking bump. It's such a great wonderful moment.

Ponderingwindow · 09/11/2023 22:26

More tired than I had ever been in my life. I had not slept for a moment in 60 hours and was recovering from surgery. All I could think about was getting into bed.

then I woke up and realized DH and I had both fallen asleep and it was far too cold in our room and it had been too long since the baby ate and thus the blind panic of those first few days.

i think things would have gone much more smoothly if I had been able to sleep, but hospitals and sleep are just not compatible.

SwordToFlamethrower · 09/11/2023 22:46

Overjoyed! It was one of the greatest moment of my life and I'll always remember coming home with DH and DD.

6 rounds of IVF will do that

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