Note: Sorry for the long break, but being parents feels like running a never-ending marathon at a sprint-speed, and it took me quite a while to put this post together… Also, all the pics are from the 13th, the 14th, the 15th and the 16th of January from those amazing days spent in the hospital.
This was the day that everything changed for us! I woke up that day more scared and anxious than I have ever been in my entire life! This was the day we were going to meet the little princess. There were loads of questions all popping up in my head at once: will we like her? Will she like us? Will it all go smoothly in the operating room? Will she be ok? Mainly the one question that kept popping up was whether she will be ok during the operation. That morning a switch popped inside me and all of a sudden I did not care much if I was going to be ok, if the scar will be big or even if the recuperating period will be long…no, all I cared about was her, the little human being that kept growing inside me for the past nine months. This was one of the most awkward feelings I have ever felt considering the fact that I am one of the most selfish people I know, but on that day, it was all about her!
This little bundle of joy along with D were waiting for me when I got out of the operation.
Going back to that morning… I woke up a bit confused and constantly feeling that the storks should get their business back on track as I was extremely scared of the c-section I was about to undergo. I mean, really, why can’t babies be delivered by storks (or dhl)? I am mentioning again that we opted for a c-section because the bundle of joy managed o get the cord around her neck and, as we found out a few days before the operation, my hips weren’t wide enough for her to be able to pass through. Once we got to the hospital, some of my fears were eased thanks to the wonderful team of doctors. I was very lucky to have a calm, collected and experienced doctor throughout my pregnancy that on top of his amazing skills had a good sense of humour. Another important and very easing person was my anaesthesiologist which is a good friend so I was blessed with not only one, but two familiar and friendly faces during the op. As it turns out, that was very important going in as it eased my nerves a bit (just a tiny bit, but it helped). After all the medical procedures were done it was time for the biggest challenge of my life, the actual operation. I admit that once the anaesthesia settled in, I did experience a minor anxiety attack, but the skilled anaesthesiologist managed to get me out of it. What I clearly remember from the whole thing is that I waited to hear and see the little princess before I thought to myself ‘well, my job here is done’ and immediately dozed off into a quick snooze. Before I knew it, it was all over and I was moved to the post-op room where the amazing nurses took such good care of me that I actually felt spoiled and not as if I had just went through the biggest test of my life. About 20 minutes later D and the little princess were there to see me and the moment I held her tears of joy invaded both my eyes as well as D‘s. That was the highest form of joy I had experienced in my life and I knew right there that life will only get better from that moment onward. And it did!
We spent three blissful nights in the hospital where we were cared for impeccably. The second day after the operation I was able to get on my own two feet and move a bit and from that point on, there was nothing stopping me. We spent amazing moments with our girl in the hospital with nurses coming every few hours to teach us how to take care of our baby and making sure that when we left the hospital we felt confident enough to be the best version of new parents we could be. We got the special-food-treatment, well at least D got it while I was still on a post-op diet. That was a bit hard as I was hungry, but for the first two days I mostly ate toast, cottage cheese and soup while he ate prawn soup, grilled beef, fruit salads and other seafood and meat specialities with gourmet desserts, but, all in all everything was ok. The best part about the whole special post-op care that I received was the fact that I was never in any pain at all and by the time I left the hospital, my uterus was back to its initial pre-pregnancy size thanks to some great massages I received from the nurses. To top the experience, right before we left the hospital I received a full body medical massage that left me feeling like I was on cloud number nine.
Of course D got her tiny Tous diamond earrings…
A bit about the princess… she was born on the 13th of January at 11:03 a.m. and we decided to name her Leia. Yup, as in the Rebel Princess Leia from Star Wars. We chose that name for a numerous number of reasons, for one, we are both huge Star Wars fans – that is the first movie I ever remember seeing as a child, another reason being that even when she was still in my tummy she was a rebel child moving all the time and making sure we both felt her presence while not really making me feel any discomfort or sickness and another reason for choosing this name was the fact that we both decided early on that if we have a girl her name will start with the letter L while if we had a boy, his name will start with the letter T. Apart from that, medically speaking she received a grade 9 out of 10 on the APGAR scale because she was born via a c-section as opposed to a natural birth. She weighted 3120 gr and had quite a full head of hair at birth (I suspect from all the heartburn I got in the last month). While she obviously looked like a potato at birth, in the next few days she actually started looking like the most beautiful baby either of us has ever seen, but I guess that is what all parents say. We bonded immensely with her while in the hospital and I am so glad that D got to stay with us all the time as he spent a lot of quality time with her during those very important first days.
Going home…
I feel very emotional writing this (in the best way possible) and I confess that it took me three days to write this post as I have to say, parenting in the hospital versus parenting at home is totally different. Just to give you a small hint of posts to come, when we got home with Leia we were under the impression that the trial-version we got in the hospital was of a different kid as for the past three weeks we have both been struggling with sleep deprivation (now we kinda found a solution to that, but this is something that happened in the last few days), colic and at the same time we have never had a more satisfying time ever in our lives. That said, we still can’t wait for these first few weeks to be over, for her to be a bit stronger and to be able to actually go out with her and play and take pics. A few more posts will slowly come based on our experience as first-time parents and how we managed to survive, but right now the rebel princess is waking up and we need to go on diaper and feeding duty.
L.
P.S. : Three weeks post delivery I managed to fit into my pre-pregnancy size 23 jeans. True, they are Hyperflex from Replay (quite elastic, see them here), but hey, that was a major morale boost. More on what waist trainers I used post pregnancy in an upcoming post!
evenlymatched.eu 
Published by