As you know by now, we’ve extended our family.
A new baby boy is now a part of our lives. This is the greatest blessing, and I can’t describe how much love I feel for this little guy.
We got off to a tough start though; he decided to arrive exactly one month earlier than expected, and we did not see that one coming!
The birth story will be saved for another blog post, but today I wanted to share my experiences and reflections on staying at the hospital.
Since our baby boy came one month early, he needed support with breathing and feeding. He was on CPAP (a breathing aid), and because of his early arrival, he also had some difficulties eating, so he had a feeding tube as well.
The Hospital Experience
First of all, the hospital staff was amazing. They were incredibly kind, understanding, and supportive, both practically and emotionally. I will be forever grateful to them all for those intense first weeks.
I know there are parents who stay at the hospital with their baby for months, and I deeply admire their strength. For us, even these three weeks were really tough. Our baby got better and stronger every day, and seeing that daily progress is what gave us hope and helped us stay patient. Still, it was tough and emotionally draining.
In the first few days, I wore hospital clothes and felt so sick; partly from just having given birth, but the hospital outfit somehow made it worse. Around day three, I finally changed into my own clothes. My husband had to bring all our things because, well… we hadn’t packed our hospital bags yet. We had actually planned to do that the week he arrived, so yeah xD
Life on a Strict Schedule
Life at the hospital was intense. They had a strict routine for us to follow around the clock. Every three hours, we had to wake the little one (even if he was sleeping), change his diaper, and feed him. During the first week, I had to pump before feeding, and later I had to pump afterward, since we switched to breastfeeding. I’ll talk more about the breastfeeding journey in a separate post.
So our days looked like this, on repeat:
Sleep (if baby slept), wake up, change diaper, feed baby, pump, eat, sleep again — and repeat.
We had to track everything at the hospital as well: how much he ate, what was in his diaper, and how much milk I pumped from each side, including the exact date and time. Living in one hospital room and doing the same routine over and over again was exhausting. At home, you’re in your own space and have more flexibility, but here everything followed the hospital’s plan.
The good thing was though that the nurses were incredibly supportive. They acknowledged how strict the program was and told us it was okay to feel overwhelmed. That open and honest dialogue helped us get through the hardest days.
We Weren’t Ready (And That Was Okay)
A lot of practical things hadn’t been handled yet when baby arrived. We had postponed them to the week our baby was choose to arrive. We were both sick the week before birth, and my husband waited until the baby shower was over (which was just about a little over a week before I gave birth!) so we’d know what we still needed to buy. As you can imagine, we were pretty far behind on everything.
Surprisingly though, we didn’t stress too much about it. Sure, we had moments of stress, but I honestly thought we’d feel more panicked. I think we were just so focused on our baby’s health that everything else felt like background noise and stuff we’d take care of when we could. We also just tried to take it one day at a time since a lot was going on.
A Test of Our Relationship
This experience also challenged our relationship in a good way. We were sleep-deprived, sharing a tiny room, and both mentally and physically exhausted. Also you are probably never really fully prepared for birth, but that it happened one month earlier didn’t make us feel more prepared, so that also took a lot of our energy. At home, it’s easier to take breaks or do your own thing for a moment, but here, everything was shared and intense.
Looking back, I think we handled it really well, and it actually brought us closer. That means the world to me. (More on that in a future post…)
Mentally Exhausting but a Shift Happened
Staying at the hospital was mentally exhausting for me. I had several breakdowns from the pain after birth, the wild postpartum hormones, and the constant worry about whether our baby was okay. I knew we would get way less sleep… that’s part of having a newborn. But I wasn’t fully aware or prepared for the emotional overload and physical side effects of giving birth.
And the hormones? Oh ma gaaad… I felt like I didn’t even recognize myself at times.
What helped me through was talking to family, friends, nurses, and especially my husband. Everyone was so patient and supportive. Eventually, something shifted. I had to take a deep breath and tell myself: This is temporary. This is normal. It’s okay. You just have to be in this right now.
And that helped. Like fully surrendering to the situation and accepting the circumstances.
Once I did that, I started to find little routines again: reading, social media, blogging, going for short walks, and enjoying chocolate again now that I no longer have GDM. These small things helped me feel like me again at the hospital as well.
Let me share some moments from those three weeks:
