Recovery from a c-section

Day of surgery

Once the surgery was over I was wheeled up to the recovery room. The spinal started wearing off and I started to feel my incision. I had tons of shivering (even though I wasn't cold) and teeth chattering. That seems to be my m.o. when I come out of surgery. After about two hours I was moved up to my room in the maternity ward. I didn't have a ton of pain, but I also wasn't moving around. The nurses put compression boots on my legs that filled up every couple of minutes with air- that was to make sure I didn't get a blood clot. I also had different machines hooked up to me checking my blood pressure, oxygen level, etc. so there was a lot of beeping and hissing going on in our room.  I also had an IV for hydration and pain meds and a huge pad between my legs for bleeding.

CP and Izzy slept in the room with me. Izzy was up crying most of the night and needed to be held by one of us at all times so CP and I got about an hour and a half of sleep that night. I couldn't leave the bed so I wasn't a tremendous help and I was trying to breastfeed every three hours. We knew Iz was at least getting something as she had some wet diapers.

Day 2

The next day a nurse helped me stand up fairly early on which was to help with my recovery. The pain of getting from a laying down position to sitting and then to standing was nothing like the pain after my fibroid surgery. I'm guessing it has to do with where the doctors made the incision- even though it is much longer than any of my other 5 scars, it isn't used as much for that movement. I was surprised and happy that I wasn't going to feel like my insides were ripping apart again because that was not fun.

I also had both the catheter and the compression boots taken out/off this day. Nurses had to help me to the bathroom where I got the oh-so-glamorous mesh underwear and huge pad. Iz got checked by the pediatrician (she looks great!) and I got checked by a doctor (your incision is perfect!).

This day was a bit rough as I did my best to recover from major surgery and battle no sleep. My pain levels weren't too bad though. I was allowed to shower but chose to wait until the next day.  When my parents came to visit, they offered to hold Izzy while we took naps. This was super helpful and even my 30 minutes of sleep during the day felt great. 

I was still trying to breast feed every three hours and it really was hit or miss. One nurse gave me nipple shells which helped to bring out my nipples prior to feeding.  The nice thing about a different nurse every 8 hours or so is that they all have different tips and tricks, but at times consistency would have been nice. We only had two nurses that were not super helpful the entire stay which was good.

That night CP and I did a better job of sleeping while the other person held Izzy, but it was still a rough night.

Day 3

This morning we got to meet with a lactation consultant.  She warned us that starting on this day, babies tend to get very frustrated because they are hungry and your milk hasn't come in yet.  She advised me to start pumping until I saw milk, then to get Izzy to latch.  This definitely helped because Izzy was almost inconsolable when she was hungry and getting her to latch when she was that angry was difficult.

I felt better and could move around the room, but was warned not to overdo it.  I also got to take a shower which felt down right luxurious. 

Randomly, my legs filled with fluid during the day which the nurses told me was normal.  You get a lot of fluid pumped into you during surgery and when that is mixed with starting to walk around, most people blow up.  My feet were more swollen at this time than they were during pregnancy- it was really gross.

The hospital food was pretty disgusting and CP was getting bored with eating in the cafeteria, so that night we ordered sushi.  It was awesome and totally worth it.

That night Izzy's weight dropped down to 7 lb, 4 oz (down from her birth weight of 8 lb, 3oz), or about 10.4%.  While up to 10% of weight loss is normal, the extra .4% didn't make the nurses happy.  No one tried to push formula on me though and they could tell that my milk was about to come in and her weight would start to increase.

Day 4

We were doing well as a group and had the option of going home this day, but we chose to stay another day and I'm glad we did.  Although the constant (every 2-3 hour) check-ins by nurses and aides were annoying, the extra breastfeeding tips were really helpful.  That day my milk came in and I was very excited about my ridiculous fun bags.

The best news of the day was that Harry and Biff have deflated and will hopefully be retreating in the coming days or weeks.

Day 5

We were warned that discharge would take a while and that we would be waiting and the nurse was right.  We had our pediatrician visit and an OB visit to check up on me and Izzy and got some more helpful tips from a different lactation consultant.  She advised me to start wearing a nipple shield while breastfeeding to keep Izzy awake.  The shield would hit the roof of Izzy's mouth, thus keeping her awake for longer periods of time while feeding.

After getting home, I weighed myself.  I weighed 10 lbs less than my last weigh in at OB's office at 38 weeks 1 day (not sure how close OB's office and home scale are though). The fluid build up in my legs is not helping, I have to admit that i was hoping for a bigger drop off.

Today I also had my first little poop which wasn't too bad.

I do have some pain in my uterus when peeing, which my doctor attributed to them moving around my organs during surgery.  This is normal and should go away in a few days.

Day 7 

Down another 6 lbs!  I had a slightly more satisfying poop, but I am still constipated.

Day 8 

Amazingly enough, I seem to have stopped bleeding!  I'm only taking Motrin at this point as the Norco results in constipation.  My only pain is when I pee which is odd because the pain is mainly close to my butt.

Day 9

Another day of no bleeding and I'm down another 6 pounds!  At this point I'm only 3 pounds away from my first OB appointment weight/pre-BFP weight.  Not sure what my weight was before I started on the fertility meds and I really need to lose a lot more. Let's hope healthy eating and breastfeeding can keep the scale dropping even though I can't exercise just yet.  I'm still having pain when I pee which can't be normal.  I'm looking forward to my OB appointment.  The fluid in my feet and ankles is finally much better. Shoes that were tight on discharge day are now okay to wear.  I still have nice sock lines though.

Day 13

Today I'm back to my pre-BFP weight but boy is my stomach still soft. Stomach skin seems to be pulling back up so that I have less of a pouch, but stretch marks are still angry and red (albeit less red). Gas is not as much of a problem today.  Bleeding has started back up again.

Today I met with my OB and asked her about the peeing pain.  She seems to think that I might have an internal hemorrhoid so she gave me a steroid that I get to stick where the sun don't shine.  (My OB called on Monday and let me know that I actually have a UTI, so I am now working on getting rid of that with antibiotics while not getting thrush at the same time).

Day 14
It has now been two weeks so I am officially cleared to drive, walk up and down the stairs as much as I want, and to start walking for exercise (too bad it's FREEZING out!).  I am still not allowed to carry anything heavy (basically just Izzy), but it will be nice to start to do more around the house again.