Part Four: The Hospital Stay.
The first night was awful. I was so hungry. I was all alone. I WAS ITCHY.
The nurse came in around 2AM after my IV bag alarm had been dinging for over ten minutes. When she finally came in, I was in tears begging the nurse for something to satisfy my painfully hungry stomach. At 2:30 AM I got one stale cracker and a ginger ale and was told I had to wait until 6 AM (to make sure I didn’t get sick). I devoured the cracker and the tiny can of soda. My stomach roared on.
I starred the clock down…willing the hands to move faster…timing my breaths with the puffing of the air circulator- things strapped to my legs. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Beep. Puff. Puff. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Beep. Puff. Puff.
Finally…5:59AM. My heart was racing. I needed FOOD! As soon as the digital clock hit 6, I dialed the kitchen. I ordered an omelet, potatoes, yogurt, fruit, Water, Tea. Then I waited. When the food came, I couldn’t even tell you if it was good. I inhaled it. All of it.
Finally, after a non-existent night nurse, the morning shift nurse was in. She asked if I had tried eating yet… (HA!) I laughed out loud, it actually scared her. Yes, I have eaten already, are you joking? I would’ve eaten three meals by now. (Note: I did not have to wait nearly as long as I did after my son’s csection. I had my son at almost two and had a full dinner at 5 as soon as I passed the ice chip test.) I was finally allowed to walk and shower. I had walked the floor four times, showered, dressed in my clothes, and waited for my husband and mom to come visit….it was 730 AM.
My husband came with more food and my mom. The nurses brought my sweet girl in from the nursery, all swaddled up and beautiful. The morning nurse helped me get to the chair, and I snuggled my still unnamed baby. The hospital photographer came to do pictures and we still hadn’t settled on a name. The photographer was nice enough to come back in a few hours so we could think about it.
I hardly cared. I had people. I wasn’t alone. This was nice. I could feel myself calming. My spinal block started to wear off, and I had to call for some pain meds. The nurse wrote it on the chart and on the board in my room, in 6 hours I would get more. (AKA if the nurses remembered)
An additional super glamorous thing about having a baby (At least one via csection) is that they track and log your urine output in a little hat like thing that attaches to the toilet. you had surgery, they pumped you full of fluids and make you to drink a lot….obviously, hopefully, you’ll pee a lot.
I had to call the nurses over and over and over about emptying the stupid hat. They also notoriously forgot to log it. So I started logging for them on the board in my room.
Turns out, I also had to call when I needed my pain medicine…only for nurses to try and tell me I was calling too early. Trust me lady, I am not early. It says I get another dose at 4pm it is 415pm and I am in freaking pain. I never had to do that when I had my son…and that was in the same hospital not even 2 years ago.
The photographer came back in, but we still hadn’t settled on a name. We were at a cross roads. Until, my husband mentioned that name I plucked off the website I read a gazillion times and text to him. Kalina.
It was hard to accept the name at first. I loved it, still do. But I had been calling this baby Stella and my husband had called her Peyton for months. It was strange naming her something else entirely. But Kali, it just fit.
The second night, I actually slept. I was too exhausted not to sleep. Once again, the nurses didn’t check on me or ask if I needed pain meds when they were due at 4am. So at 7am, I woke up, alone, in EXCRUCIATING pain…and very UNhappy. I rang the nurses, who apparently just got on shift, and FINALLY got a dose of meds. I slowly started to feel better.
At 745, when I was just about feeling relief from the medicine and dozing off, a nurse brought my daughter in and left the cart next to my bed. I politely asked her what she was doing? She told me she was leaving the baby, that the nursery was full.
I was alone, couldn’t quite get out of bed on my own yet to retrieve said baby from the cart, was still in a ton of pain from going too long without the meds… so I did what every normal person does, I laughed. I laughed until I cried like a total psychopath and told her, no, you go give a baby back to a mom who didn’t have her abdomen sliced open 18 hours ago and wait until I have someone who can actually help me get out of bed.”
The nurse complied. (and no, she didn’t order a psych eval either, I think she just knew I was right).
Once the meds fully kicked in, I felt 1000 times better. I showered. My mom came, so did my husband, an hour later my OB came in. She asked if I wanted to go home… DESPITE My husband urging me to stay another day since our son wasn’t feeling well, I was begging her to send me home. There was no way I was staying in this place one more second than I had to if the doctor gave the all clear.
So she signed my papers. I was discharged. Now we had to wait for baby to be discharged. Three hours ticked by…it was getting VERY close to when I needed another dose of meds. I rang a nurse. Well, surprise, I am discharged, no medicine for me. It was the cherry on top of the worst hospital stay of my life.
We finally busted out of there at around 2pm, just in time to fill my prescription and get home, officially a family of four!
Life of A Mama: Unfiltered 