Hospital Stay

 Aimy is now two weeks old and is doing well. On Monday we had a visit from the midwife, who weighed and examined her, and it seems she has regained all the weight she lost after birth plus a little more! Now that she's sleeping and I have napped a bit myself, I'm going to try to catch up on the entries I've wanted to write since we got home.

As I said in my last post, I was hospitalized 2 days before Aimy was born. We stayed there 3 days after her birth, making for a nearly 6-day stay. And though it was not easy being away from home and my own bed, it was better than I thought it would be.

The room, complete with bed for baby.

Because our health insurance allowed us to have a private room at 1 euro per night, we jumped on the occasion and ended up being put in a nice room almost at the end of the hallway, which was great in terms of noise. There was enough space for a folding cot for Carlos, and he stayed overnight every night (Definitely an advantage of having a baby during the holiday season!)

All hooked up to the monitoring equipment

The birthing pool. The hospital was one of the few in France that have one.

The food was really good as well! On New Year's Day we even had foie gras and cake for lunch (though to make up for the calories, dinner that night was quite light. They make a point in the admitting brochure of detailing how a nutritionist plans out each meal, and I really got the sense of that on the 1st). Carlos' meals were also quite good, often a bit more complete than mine, but there wasn't a huge difference between what he got and what I ate.

Red meat, foie gras, cake... not a bad meal for a hospital!

I was really impressed with the staff in the maternity ward as well. The midwife and the auxiliaire de puériculture  (infancy and child care assistant) who were with me for Aimy's birth were fantastic, and the rest of the staff were very helpful, always reminding us that they were there if we needed anything. I did appreciate their advice and counsel, and it was nice to have those few days of help and encouragement after Aimy was born. The hospital has been awarded a "Friends of Babies" label, only one of 5 in all of France, and I definitely felt after my stay there that they deserved that designation.

Flowers from Carlos, orchids from the hospital, a baby book from the city and chocolates from a local business. We sure were spoiled!

All in all, it was a much better hospital stay than I though it would be.