Intparent, I am in awe.
My son arrived from Korea at the age of 7 months (with 7 teeth 
)
It was a cold January night in 1999, and everyone in the terminal at JFK was in tears. Strangers, people who worked there, everyone.
My son was passed from person to person-- my husband to me to my mom and and dad to my inlaws to my sister to my other sister to my nephew-- all without a whimper.
But when we tried to put a winter coat on him, he put up quite a fuss. When we got home, we realized he was already wearing about layers and simply had enough on.
Also, it never occurred to us to loosen the straps on his car seat… he was no newborn!! After playing with them for half an hour in the cold, we put him into the seat as best we could and drove to my inlaws (about 10 minutes from JFK), took the seat out of the car and adjusted the straps.
One of my husband’s friends, who works part time at a photo studio, had his camera-- he came specifically to get pictures. Thank God he did… not one other camera worked that night. Thanks to Doug, we have some great photos of that night.
We celebrate “Gotcha Day” every year; my son gets to choose the restaurant. He normally chooses Japanese, as he loves it and his sister hates it, so it’s kind of a “two-fer.”
H & I walked 2 blocks from our apartment to the maternity hospital for our 1st child. He took several hours to be born anyway, even tho we arrived at the hospital when the contractions were 4 or fewer minutes apart as directed.
For our 2nd kid, the power went out just as my mom arrived to watch S and we had been heading for the elevator. We ended up walking down 6 flights of stairs to get to the car and drive to the hospital. D was born in the next hour or two, while my OBGYN was there with several of his other patients. The power was stlill out when H got back home to watch S after D was delivered, cleaned up & taken to the nursery at the hospital. I count my blessings that D was NOT born in the elevator, since we would have caught it and possibly been stuck in it if mom had just arrived a few moments earlier!
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I remember my mother in law telling me a story about a coworker who drove herself to the hospital while in labor. She seemed to think that this was exemplary behavior, and one I should consider for the future.
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I know a woman whose H planned a fishing trip during the time of her due date. He thought it would be perfectly fine for her to drive herself to the hospital …and they also had a 2 year old! Oh my.
No! We (her friends) told her that one of us would take the 2 year old and another would drive her to the hospital. (You can guess where we wanted to drive her H to.) 
getting back to the topic…altho I wasn’t afraid of taking care of a newborn, I did have certain fears about childbirth. As crazy as it seems, I’m actually glad that I had C-sections rather than natural births…which do scare the heck out of me.
I’m the oldest of five and did a lot of babysitting in junior high (we lived on a military base – lots of business there!). I had no worries about the logistics. Nursing was the biggest challenge. They were both easy babies and even though they were only 15 months apart, things went well. Would put them both in the recliner with me, one in each arm, and we would all nap together. Delicious. Was lucky to be home at that time. We won’t talk about the state of the townhouse, though. 
Both kids were three weeks early, induced because I was turning pre-eclamptic. With S1, I was at a regular appt and they threw me in the hospital. DH had to pack my bag. I was 4 cm and 90% effaced without having a contraction (weak cervix). Once they induced me, things went really fast. I really could have done without the epidural headache. After the fourth unsuccessful spinal patch, DH checked me out AMA and took us home.
With S2, we started induction at 7 am, figured I’d labor through the US Olympic hockey medal game (1992) and be in my room recovering in time for the women’s figure skating finals that night. S2 was born during Kristi Yamaguchi’s free skate. Our occasional babysitter took care of S1 for the day – no family nearby.
Eight hours later, the nurses threw S2 out of the nursery for being “disruptive.” Brought him in to me and left him. I pulled him out of the bassinet, put him on my chest and we both went right to sleep. S2 had to go back in the hospital for jaundice a few days after being released, so he was on the peds ward. The nurse put him under the lights and I asked how to latch the door so he wouldn’t fall out. She sarcastically replied, “Newborns can’t roll.” At that moment, S2 rolled over, fell out of the isolette and the nurse caught him. There was a large sign on the isolette after that: “Latch the door!”
We have friends who had a baby 4 years ago at home, with no outside assistance - he had 2 kids from a previous marriage, born in hospitals. His wife is a bit of a free spirit, and she wanted a truly natural birth. They live in the country, miles from a hospital or even EMS. Thank goodness all went well …
Re post 78 from momcollege: If you had a second C-section the lesser pain was not in your imagination. My OB told me upfront the second C would be a breeze comparatively and that recovery time would be a week versus 6 weeks. The muscles have already been cut and the second time around it’s basically scar tissue being cut. Of course I didn’t believe that at all until his prediction came true. My long six weeks first time around was about 5 days recovery the second time. BTW-- I wouldn’t hesitate to this day to throw that nurse out the window.
*I strangled a couple nurses on the regular floor. *
My oldest was born at 10:50 pm, and by the next evening she was so ill that the pediatrician was helping me track down my husband so he could see her.( he was at his parents house, who- no surprise- were irked that I expected him to be at my side.) Her platelets had dropped so low, that she was hemmoraging everywhere.
She had exploratory surgery, and I was upset with the night nurse because she was obviously in pain.
( she also was intubated, so you couldn’t hear her cry) Of course the night nurse was pretty young, I think she was even younger than me ( I was 24 at the time). She handled me pretty well though.
When I had our second, even though she was term, we were back at the same hospital, in the NICU, because she had aspirated meconium. ( actually we were also there because our neighborhood hospital said I was too high risk even though having a baby who ties her cord into three knots isn’t likely to be repeated) My heart stopped when her bed was in the same place her sisters had been, with the SAME primary nurse, even though it was eight years later.
They have wonderful, wonderful staff though, from the attendings to the cleaning crew. It was very reassuring.
( although it would have been nice to have known the Dr doing the delivery)
You know how smells evoke memory?
To this day, if I smell Hibiclens or Betadine, it takes me back to when they were born. Especially the first, since we had to scrub up every time we went in to see her.
We lived in a rural area for 7 years–about an hour from a small hospital. Home births were/are common, especially among certain religious communities. There are midwives, (mostly uncertified), but they often missed the deliveries because they had to travel, too. One of my friends had all of her older kids watching the birth of their sibling. (No thanks–that’s icky, imo). I had one home birth with a midwife, which went well (this was in a city near a hospital–I’m not that daring. It was my 3rd child and my 2nd was pretty easy). I planned another home birth, but ended up going to the hospital/inducing labor when I was weeks overdue. The doctor (who insisted on inducing) missed the delivery anyway, and the nurse left for shift change. . .H was the only one there. H actually “caught” 3 of our kids… . all planned,induced labors in the hospital, but the docs just cut it too close and didn’t make it. (3 different docs/different hospitals). Another one was almost missed–H had major assist on that one. Irks me that these docs got paid, regardless. (I should mention that H is a doc, but not an OB).
Interesting goof…my second C-section was tough, but my third was a walk in the park. I was out walking at our local boardwalk a week later and didn’t look like I just had a baby…in fact, some people asked whose baby it was
^^
although I had complications with both C sections, the second one wasn’t nearly as painful and on the way home from the hospital, we stopped at Toys R Us to get our older son a promised toy. (my mom freaked out that we did that.)
We called our first The Amazing Baby Who Never Sleeps. And she didn’t, for 2 1/2 years. And then she did. It took us a long time to get brave enough to do it again. When I got pregnant with our son, seven years later, I knew I would end up having a C-section. I was right, he was breech and wouldn’t turn. He didn’t sleep either but unlike his sister, he seemed to want to go back to sleep. Somehow that made it easier, or maybe I just knew that it wouldn’t last forever.
Our first NEVER slept during the day except for ONE 20 minute nap each day…even as a newborn. Ugh. At night, he only slept for 2 hour intervals for the longest time…he was always hungry…and he HATED his crib.
Our second would CRY FOR HIS CRIB…seriously. He would start to cry, I would lay him down in his crib, and he’d immediately stop crying and go to sleep. He slept 12 hours at night very soon…down at 6pm…up at 6pm. yay! But when he turned 2, he became a monster for at least 2 more years. 
^ I wish I had known (almost) 19 years ago that I was not alone in having an “insomniac newborn”.
One day DH came home to me lying on the bed, DS breastfeeding. I was silently crying. When asked what was wrong, I wailed, “He won’t stop eating on me!” It got better after that day, but DS still has the picture of me crying.
There are some babies that seem to be “born hungry”. S1 was attached to me constantly. I still remember the nurse bringing me S1 to nurse after 36 hours of labor and then an emergency C-section (all I wanted to do is sleep) and the nurse kept saying, “but m2ck, you have to wake up; your baby wants to eat.” I became very good at latching and dozing.
S2 didn’t eat anything for his first 6 days…nothing…he slept the entire 6 days. I was in the hospital during that time, so they brought out the pumps so that I could save. Thankfully he was a good size, but he was 2 weeks early (a scheduled C), so likely he just wasn’t ready to face the world.
Thank goodness he was #2 because if #1 hadn’t eaten for the first 6 days, I probably would have freaked out a bit.
About the second C section and looking good afterward–my OB said he would use the same incision site and basically could give me a mini-tummy tuck at the same time. Which he did–unfortunately I need another one now!
i remember going shopping with D1 when she was just over a month old. She was in a snow-white winter baby bag, for want of a better description, and was sacked out (literally) over my shoulder. This older woman came up to me in the store and with the most wistful, longing look exclaimed, “Oh! That’s the BEST age!” I thought, what? They eat, sleep, poop, and cry, and this is the best there is?
I now have a much better idea of what she meant, although my kids are both college age now and I have yet to find an age I would call the “best” - I pretty much liked them all.
i had been on bed rest for about 16 weeks with first. They did an amino & an ultrasound before I had her & guesstimated she weighed 1&1/2 lbs. ( She actually weighed just under 2 & 1/2 lbs.) it took me a long time before I could fit into my old jeans after the C section.
With my second, I had also been on bed rest, but the last month was actually allowed up. she was also a VBAC, although I ended up being in hard labor for three days. That didn’t do her ( or me) any favors, but I burned a lot of calories apparently because I looked great! ( it wasn’t until she was a few weeks old that she stopped sleeping)
It is nice to hear someone else say this. We felt the same way (our gap was only 5 years, though). And looking back, #1 was the easier one!