The First Days at Home with Baby

Mel and Maximus checked out of the hospital Tuesday after lunch, and we all headed home. Overall, I was very pleased with the hospital where Max was delivered, Saint John's Hospital in Maplewood. Every one of the nurses that worked with Mel and Max was excellent, and the facilities were very nice. The only real problem we had was that Mel's dinner was very late Sunday night, but that was resolved. There were a couple of other details that did not rise to the level of being problems, but could have improved our stay. It would have been nice if there had been a channel listing for the cable TV provided. It was sometimes difficult to determine what channel was what. And I thought that the food in the hospital cafeteria was a bit pricey, although it was good. One thing I liked about where Emma was born, Saint Luke's Hospital in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, was that the maternity section had a room where the baby's mother and father could serve up their own food at no additional charge. Once again, these were not real problems, and neither of these would deter me from recommending Saint John's Hospital to others.

When I brought Emma home from preschool on Tuesday, she was very excited to see mommy and "her baby." Her excitement waned however when it was time to give Maximus a bath. He did not appreciate being stripped down and being bathed. Max was sure to let us know this by screaming as loudly as he could. Emma, who has never really liked loud noises, was very upset by this. I was going to wait to give Emma her bath until Max's bath was done, but I decided to do it right away.

As the week has gone on, Maximus has become less and less agitated while having his diapers changed, and even, to some extent, while being bathed. Just to be considerate to Emma though, we gave Max his bath today while Emma was still at preschool.

With Emma, I remembered being up multiple times throughout the night to feed her once she came home from the hospital, but I do not remember the frequency at which she required to be fed. With Max, we ended up feeding him approximately every two hours the first couple of nights. And after being fed, he did not want to go back to sleep right away. He appeared to have his nights and days cattywampus. Last night though, Max managed to go at least three hours, up to three and a half hours, between feedings overnight, and he went back to sleep much more quickly. Consequently, I got a much better night's sleep last night. His sleeping this long between feedings did concern us somewhat as we were already used to him waking more frequently. However every time we checked on him, he was just fine. I do wonder how long it will take for Max to sleep through the night. Emma was doing so at six weeks. Of course, every child is different.

The home visitation nurse stopped by the house today to see how Mel and Maximus are doing. While she was here she weighed Max. He is already exceeding his birth weight by 2.5 ounces. Mel had thought it looked like he had filled out a bit. We take Max into the doctor for his first appointment next Wednesday.

Everyone in the house is transitioning well to the new resident of our home. Even the cat, Ike, is doing well with it. We'll see how things go next week when I return to work. As I work from home now, things will be different from when I went back to work after Emma was born, but I am sure things will work out fine.