I am a little sad today, as tomorrow I return to work. The past three weeks I’ve been at home, as my wife and I welcomed our son into the world and set about starting our life together as a family unit.
It’s been an amazing time, a lot of ups and some small downs, but – and here’s the thing – we have a baby boy now! He is here, he is ours to raise and love, and we are excited. Tired, but excited.
Our boy spent 5 days in hospital before coming home. Being a caesarean baby, 4 days is standard. We needed a fifth though… apparently most babies tend to lose up to 10% of their body weight after birth, it’s standard. Our boy though, lost a bit more than that; he was a little too underweight. When we were told this, my wife and I got a bit upset.
We felt like the first test of being parents was one we failed, that he was malnourished and it was our fault. The midwife assured us it was a common thing and not to be hard on ourselves, the wife especially.
I went off to get us both a coffee and headed to a quiet corner to have a bit of a cry. Was a bit of a release of emotion following the whole childbirth adventure and this just triggered it. Had a good cry, got us coffee and cake and went back to the room, giving my wife a big hug and kiss. We’d be fine, I knew, just had an extra night before home is all. It would also mean we’d need to use a bottle as a top-up for the lad but that was something we were OK with.
The next day was homecoming day! I stayed up most of the previous night and got the house nice and tidy for the big event. My wife is a bit of a ‘Captain Clean’ so even though the place looked great, I was worried I’d miss something…
I drove to the hospital and helped the wifey pack her things and we headed out to the car.
I felt like such a man right there – walking out of a hospital with my wife and our baby son, it was such a clear and tangible moment of achievement. Might sound silly but right at that moment I felt so alive and so very, very happy. Nothing much of my life till then mattered so much, it was less important now that my wife and I had a young person to raise and love.
The rest of that first day home was pretty special. We just held him and walked him around the house, showing him his home. While we are only renting for now and will one day have our own place, for the next year or two, this will be home. It’ll be where a whole bunch of his ‘firsts’ take place! We had that day to ourselves, no visitors dropped in (as requested) so we were really able to sit back and try settling in.
I’ve been pretty terrified of harming the baby – not in a ‘psychotic episode’ kind of way, but in an ‘accidental’ one. I hold him so carefully and am so awkward when I do anything, even if it’s just change a nappy. It’s gradually subsiding but when I carry him around, I’m so worried that I’ll slip on something and hurt us both. Others tell me this is pretty normal for first-time parents and that it fades away completely – I hope so!
We learned the lad has a tongue-tie, which is a small flap of skin between the bottom of the tongue and the base of the mouth.
The ramifications of this are that he can’t extend his tongue all that far out, which means he hasn’t been able to feed as easily as is usual and explains why he lost a bit much weight in the days after birth. We were told it’s as simple as snipping this thin flap and over a few days, his tongue will adjust and he’ll suffer no long-term effects.
So we made an appointment with the recommended doctor and headed off for the procedure (as his Nan kept referring to it). It was pretty quick and easy, no crying and only a small drop of blood. He did gain full movement of his tongue in the 48 hours following the snip and now loves flicking his tongue in and out of his mouth.
What the tongue-tie did have an effect on however was the amount of milk his mother was able to supply him with. Those first few days where he couldn’t get as much as he needed (due to a limited ability to suckle properly) meant that a full feed’s worth wasn’t created and this reduced amount was biologically programmed as being “all that is required”. To combat this, we’ve been topping him up with formula, in bottles. To be honest it’s probably worked out quite well. My wife will return to work after 3 months and breastfeeding during the day simply won’t be possible. Having the lad used to a bottle form the start will make things a lot easier in that respect.
The places for things and routines and all that, have roughly established themselves now. The lad’s feeding cycle is every 3 hours or so, even through the night at this stage. The wife is such a trouper, she hasn’t had more than a couple of hours of unbroken sleep in a while and she’s soldiering on; what a woman.
I also am quite tired. What I knew as my normal schedule has been ripped up and thrown away, so it’s taking me a bit to adjust. I’ve long been a big sleeper, able to sleep until midday on weekends and take it pretty easy. That simply isn’t possible anymore, so I feel as though I’ve been hanging out for a ‘catch-up sleep’ for a couple of weeks and just can’t actually get it.
Tomorrow I return to work. I’m thankful I work for a progressive company, who give fathers two weeks paid paternity leave. I took an extra week’s leave and have enjoyed being home for these weeks, especially as the wife had a caesarean and was a little less mobile than would be usual.
So back to work I go, to earn money so we can buy a house and build a home for our family.
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