The Long Ride Home

I always imagined that I’d want to get out of the hospital and back home as quick as possible after having my baby. However, when you are dealing with hormonal imbalances, sleep deprivation, new mom anxiety and some pretty painful stitches, it’s just more convenient to be there. The people at the hospital are trained and seem to know everything about babies. Who wouldn’t want all that help?  Gone are the days of week-long hospital stays for straightforward vaginal births (or even C-sections). They pretty much want you out on the second or third day.

Just before we were getting ready to be discharged on our last day in the hospital, my husband Derek looked up at me and said, “They are going to let us take him home? What is wrong with them?” The fear in his eyes was undeniable and I have to admit, I felt the exact same way. How could they let us take home a fragile little newborn? Don’t they know we have NO IDEA what we’re doing?! Well, they did let us take him home that day and it was the longest car ride of our lives.

Dylan was born in NY Presbyterian Hospital on the Upper East Side. We live in Jersey City. What does all of that equal? A long bumpy ride down the FDR. The ride could go one of two ways: a smooth easy sail home with little traffic, a quiet baby and no potholes; or the very long and dreaded gridlock situation, made worse by a screaming baby, terrible driving conditions and any other driving-related obstacles you could think of. My mind, in its post-partum haze, was banking on the latter.

Getting Dylan into the car seat was much more challenging than we had expected. Being that we had opted for one that doesn’t detach easily from inside the car, we kicked it old-school and I held the baby while being wheeled out of the hospital by an orderly (who was shocked that we didn’t have a car seat “like everyone else”). Dylan looked so small in the car seat. I decided to sit in the back with him and off we went.

The first moment of sheer panic was when his head started bopping around. If you are familiar with newborns, you know that this looks similar to a bobble-head figurine…very scary to a first-time parent. So, I decided to hold his head up. Doing this while avoiding all the soft-spots and minding the neck is no easy task.

Then we started driving on the FDR. It suddenly felt like we were riding in a Hummer with absolutely no suspension. The potholes were epic (and cringe-worthy for someone who has stitches in a place where no one should ever have stitches). I think I held my breath for almost the entire ride home.

When we reached our exit on the FDR, we were both shocked that there was no traffic! A miracle! The Holland Tunnel was another concern, but strangely enough…no traffic! We were home in no time and Dylan actually slept for the whole ride. We did it! We transported a tiny baby home and didn’t hurt him at all. I looked up to our windows on the third floor and breathed a sigh of relief. Now…if I could just get up those three flights of stairs…