The Hospital

Klinikum Weiden. That's where I gave birth. I could've given birth in a hut, and as long as I came out of it with Lyla, it still would've been some of the best days of my life. Luckily, it was better than a hut. But I can definitely say I enjoyed the hospital in America more than this one.

 

I'm feeling bullet points for this one.

- No sprechen de english. Ok, they are a heck of a lot better at english than I am at German so I've got to give them some credit. But there was a difficult language barrier for sure. Like when I say things like "My baby is purple!" or "Is it normal for her vomit to be yellow?" or "Can I have some pain medicine"; I was likely to be met with a well meaning, kind, but severely confused smile. 

- ROOMIE. Yeah. No privacy for me. You have no choice but to share a room with another woman and her baby. And no, there is no curtain. And no, the room isn't large. Your beds are facing each other so there's none of that maybe if  i pretend i can't see them, i can ignore them. Nope. You are basically forced to stare at a stranger the entire time. I'm sure she had a blast watching me breastfeed, while I thoroughly enjoyed the fact that she was just wearing a long shirt with underwear. I actually lucked out though because she was a nice girl who spoke english. It could've been a lot worse. 

- BYOR. Bring your own robe. I wasn't provided with one of those hospital robes you get in America. Good thing I went and bought this hideous granny robe beforehand or else I would've been forced to wear the outfit I came in (not comfortable at all) or be naked. At least with the latter, I would've matched my roomie?

- No AC. It was hotter in our room than it was outside. It was almost amusing.

- Our beds were like 4 feet long. I'm not a tall person, but not once was I granted the pleasure of stretching out my legs during my stay.

- Because of the no AC issue, we had our windows open. Guess what was just outside of our window? Not an apricot tree. A crazy construction area. Like, I promise you would laugh out loud at how incredulously loud and obnoxious it was. Jack hammers, industrial table saws, really loud clings, really loud clangs. All the REALLY LOUD THINGS that construction people use? They were all being used. And they were about 100 feet away from our window.

- Meals: I couldn't tell you how delicious they are because I was only concerned with the fact that they were food. Since I was experiencing the transformation between low-appetite pregnant woman and bottomless pit nursing mom, I'd say I was pleased with the meals. My only complaint would be that I would've been fine if they had brought 10 more each day. Thank goodness I had snacks that jeff brought me! I was eating at all hours of the day. Vigorously.

 

- Visiting hours. Not that Jeff could've stayed the whole time anyways, because whoa we have another kid to worry about, but visiting hours ended at 8 pm. Husbands are considered visitors. Not ideal, but as long as my baby didn't count as a 'visitor', I was fine :)

- Nonchalant. The nurses and doctors are a lot more nonchalant than my experience in the states. This was good and bad. But overall, I liked that they weren't on me like flies about how I should be taking care of my baby. It made the experience much more authentic and special. They only took my baby from me twice, for a total of about two hours. Those two hours were the only two hours out of my entire stay that I wasn't holding/staring/kissing her. :)

- The nurses were all SO kind. I really cannot complain about their sincerity and desire to help. That was one aspect that I really appreciated.

- They are much more condoning of natural birth; it almost gives you more confidence in yourself that you can give birth naturally because THEY have all the confidence in the world that you can do it. The nurse who helped deliver me was also spectacular. She really knew how to make the birthing experience as smooth as possible. I give her most of the credit that I didn't tear- so I'm quite grateful for that lady! My doctor was also good.

- One of the highlights of the stay was obviously when Jane got to meet her sister for the first time. I was SO anxious for her to see Lyla and I started smiling so big when I heard her little voice coming down the hallway to my room :) She walked in, saw Lyla, and her eyes were as big as saucers as she gasped out of pure delight. "baby sistuh! wanna hold her!" It was just as sweet as I had been envisioning, Jane then went on to give us a lecture about how Lyla only drinks milk and jane only eats goldfish. We've been trying to teach her that she is to never feed babies food because they only drink milk. I think it's safe to say its drilled into her head :) I was so elated to be with both of my girls! And jane seemed like a total giant to me- it was seriously trippy.

So many sweet moments happened in that hospital room that I will treasure forever. But part of me was VERY anxious to get out of there, for reasons that should be obvious by now.

The other part of me was not ready because those two days, despite the circumstances, felt like a little heavenly oasis. I got to bond with Lyla in a way I didn't get to with Jane in the hospital. Nobody was bugging me, or coming into my room at all hours. Last time, my mom, sister, and jeff were all there most of the time and I had about 20 visitors. Although there were times I was sad I didn't have people to share this with, I loved it. It was a sacred experience and I don't think ever in my life have I entirely and sincerely savored every single second in the way that I did for those two days. I'm especially grateful for the alone time I got, because when you have two kids instead of just one, the alone time is a bit harder to come by. 

Somehow I forgot how incredible it is to have a newborn. But it was fun to be so pleasantly surprised. I forgot that it is SO not a burden. I forgot that as much as I want to set her down and take a nap, I actually feel like crying if I'm not holding her. I forgot that my babies want to be near me just as much as I want to be near them. It's a beautiful reciprocation. 

 

Little Lyla. What a complete angel. She has been so good. She nurses so well, although has a hard time staying awake to get enough milk. ;) She really prefers to be cuddling with me. She has a hard time falling asleep if she isn't. She also loves wrapping her little hands around my fingers. That's another way she will fall asleep. We've both fallen asleep many, many times with my finger grasped in her little hand. It's pretty sweet. She loves her binky and I'm grateful for that! I know some people say it's bad because of nipple confusion or whatever, but if there is something I can give my baby to take her from hysterical crying to happiness and calm in about .2 seconds, I'm going to use it. SO not going to apologize for that, ever. 

I want to go off on a little tangent about her name. We picked Lyla just because we liked it. I was originally going to spell it Lila, but when I spelled it out for people they never were quite sure how to pronounce it. (Lee-la, Lill-a, etc) So we went with Lyla. I'm sure some human out there will still find a way to mispronounce it, but I suspect most will say it right. (please prove me right, humanity.) Kimberly is one of Jeff's sisters. Jeff has always had a very special relationship with her. And we kind of want Lyla to be just like her. She is a strong, confident, spiritual, kind, patient, and incredibly selfless woman. She also happens to be an amazing athlete, scholar, and musician. When you think about how you want your child to be one day when they grow up, you'd probably use most of those words I used to describe Kim. So we figured it would be a great service to Lyla to give her a little push in that direction ;)

That Jeffrey boy. Can't not talk about him here. I think, like me, he was caught off guard at how much he loved this little girl. It was tender to watch. It was also so sweet to watch him be the stay at home daddy with Jane while I was gone. He took good care of her and made her feel special, which she really needed and was unable to get from me for a few days. On top of taking care of Jane while I was gone; he mopped the floors, did the dishes, stalked the food with groceries, etc. He even perused the women underwear aisle for me, taking pictures of all the different kinds to make sure he got the right ones...that's love. He has taken such good care of his girls. I love him forever for it. 

We work well together, we really do make a good team. It's times like these that I'm really glad I didn't marry a total loser. And super grateful that I married a total champion.

Anyways, the moral of this whole story (post) is that Lyla is one loved little girl. I didn't know my heart had enough room to grow so enormously, considering how much love I already have for my family. Thanks little girl for gracing us with your sweet, sweet presence.

(PSA: HAVE A BABY. IT ROCKS.)