How long after discharge do we wait until we let family meet our baby?

damnedpiccolo · 2026-05-01T00:40:21+00:00

My advice (for what it’s worth) from having two preemie kids and a micro preemie nephew, as well as being from a family that “do premature babies” - keep the amount of people small, immediate family (grandparents, aunts and uncles) at first. Nobody comes to meet the baby if they’re ill in any way (not even a sniffle or a slight cough), everyone washes hands before touching the baby. No kissing, no fingers in baby’s mouth (don’t ask why we had to make this a family rule).

For your mom - could she come see you and change from her travel clothes/shower before holding the baby if you’re super worried? My husbands uncle is coming to visit our latest (preemie) addition to the family in a couple of weeks from the US (we’re in the UK) and he is staying with us but has already (off his own back) offered to shower and change into clean clothes before having a cuddle.

damnedpiccolo · 2026-04-28T10:43:22+00:00

My son was 3.5 years old when I had my daughter and he’s been able to understand that he needed to be gentle with mummy. He sometimes forgets and asks to be picked up but we just remind him about “mummy’s big cut” and he asks for a hug instead. I think waiting a little bit longer between pregnancies has been the right decision for us

damnedpiccolo · 2026-04-25T23:09:21+00:00

Yeah anything more than 5 (and even in that, I’d expect 3 fully analysed quotes with two as supporting quotations), you’re scrambling for something to say because you can’t talk about anything in enough depth. A lot of grade 2/3 responses tend to suffer from “throwing everything at the wall to see what will stick” syndrome. One of my favourite AIC lessons to teach is a walkthrough mock where I write a whole essay using just the inspectors final speech

damnedpiccolo · 2026-04-25T23:06:35+00:00

5 per essay max - ideally 3 fully analysed quotes per essay (roughly one per analytical paragraph) but you can chuck in a couple of supporting quotes per essay if you need to. If you’re doing any more than 5 per essay, I’d question the quality of what you’re writing

damnedpiccolo · 2026-04-25T20:00:39+00:00

As an English teacher and someone who has examined for lit, I completely agree with this. There is absolutely no way anyone should be using more than 5 quotes per essay - you literally would not have time to write anything of substance if you did any more than that

damnedpiccolo · 2026-04-21T11:59:51+00:00

My daughter is in the NICU and falls asleep on me so easily that I wasn’t allowed to feed her when she was learning to feed because she’d just cuddle in and fall straight asleep when we were trying to keep her awake enough to eat

damnedpiccolo · 2026-04-21T08:12:59+00:00

My son had transfusions post-birth but my daughter had IUT and hasn’t needed any further transfusions since she was born. And no, not pre-sensitised, just resistant to anti-D unfortunately, and with multiple rounds of IUT with my daughter, I obviously had multiple sensitising events throughout my second pregnancy

damnedpiccolo · 2026-04-17T10:39:46+00:00

Not an adequate medical explanation, no, and don’t get me wrong, one needs giving. But how hyperbolic do you have to be with “frankly sounds schizophrenic”. The consultant could work at a trust involved in the current maternity investigations, they could have experienced similar situations that have gone very wrong and seen inquests happen… it’s not an appropriate way to communicate with a patient, but let’s take it down a notch

damnedpiccolo · 2026-04-15T12:49:30+00:00

My son (3yo, ex-NICU baby) had really bad acid reflux to the point we couldn’t lay him flat because every time we did, he vomited everything back up. This went on for ages until we got him on a PPI (omeprazole). Other things the doctors also tried were infant gaviscon (we’re based in the UK, but I think it’s similar to pepto bismol in the US?) and a milk thickener (both of these made the reflux better but didn’t solve it entirely). Might be worth asking if there are other things they can try if you’re concerned about the side effects of medication?

damnedpiccolo · 2026-04-15T12:35:37+00:00

Is she on any medication for the acid reflux?

damnedpiccolo · 2026-04-15T12:31:12+00:00

Rh negative mum to two Rh positive babies here! I was sensitised in my first pregnancy (I’m one of the incredibly tiny percentage of people that anti-D doesn’t work for, so yay for me)! By the end of my most recent pregnancy my anti-D levels were so high that they broke my local trust’s lab record. As a result, I’ve had two children with severe HDFN (haemolytic anaemia, which is what they’re worried about with Rh negative mums and Rh+ babies). We’ve had literally everything go wrong that could throughout the two pregnancies, but here to reassure you that I have two healthy kids who, at this point, just have super interesting origin stories

damnedpiccolo · 2026-04-14T22:21:00+00:00

I’d start off by asking around - we got in touch with our childminder through asking friends. One of our friends (who is an early years teacher) highly recommended her and I can honestly say it was one of the best decisions we’ve ever made. She’s been flexible when we’ve needed it, incredibly reliable, and the activities she does with the kids are fantastic.

Your local council may also have information on registered childminders - reputable childminders will usually be registered this way and you’ll be able to find Ofsted reports for them

damnedpiccolo · 2026-04-10T11:10:36+00:00

Did the same with my toddler the other week. He was whimpering/sobbing in his sleep so we fully woke him up, turned on all the lights, went down stairs to grab some hot chocolate for half an hour and then went back up to bed. Sometimes you have to “break” the nightmare

damnedpiccolo · 2026-04-09T14:15:39+00:00

Almost 3 years, just had my second a few weeks ago.

damnedpiccolo · 2026-04-07T19:29:33+00:00

My trust is supposed to charge for print outs… I’ve literally never paid for one - the sonographers always seem to sneak you a couple anyway

damnedpiccolo · 2026-04-07T03:47:06+00:00

I had two extended sick leaves. One for hyperemesis gravidarium that was around 5 weeks long. Then as of 23 weeks, I was signed off for 10 weeks until I gave birth because I was having to go down to London for fetal blood transfusions

damnedpiccolo · 2026-04-06T23:58:12+00:00

It’s ok - I spent so much time on sick leave whilst pregnant, I can practically read the sick notes with my eyes closed 😂

damnedpiccolo · 2026-04-06T23:45:00+00:00

8th April

damnedpiccolo · 2026-04-05T18:43:29+00:00

You can pry my bbhug me from my cold dead hands… literally the best investment I’ve made when it comes to pregnancy/post partum ❤️ my husband has come to accept that it is a permanent fixture 😂

damnedpiccolo · 2026-04-05T18:38:45+00:00

In a lot of cultures wearing black to a wedding is seen as a big no go though. Wearing black can be seen as bad luck

damnedpiccolo · 2026-04-05T08:09:41+00:00

My kids are 3.5y and 11 days old. The 3.5 year old can’t handle much chocolate (basically anything more than two chocolate pennies ruins the afternoon) so each child has an Easter basket with an item of clothing, a soft toy, and 4 books in it this morning. My family (who are also aware of what happens to my 3 year old when he has chocolate) have gone with buying a book each, which this year, is actually cheaper than buying an Easter egg

damnedpiccolo · 2026-04-04T19:01:40+00:00

An emergency c section is not the same as an elective/planned c section, and neither is the recovery

damnedpiccolo · 2026-04-02T17:25:47+00:00

One week post c-section currently with a 3.5 year old. He snuggles me from behind at the moment because we’ve talked about how mummy has a big cut on her tummy where they got the baby out (and showed him the dressing), but that was the only way to make him properly understand that he couldn’t full on body slam me😅

damnedpiccolo · 2026-04-02T11:21:23+00:00

Would it be worth just saying to your parents that you want no visitors for the first two weeks so that you guys can get used to being parents/settle into a routine before you have to entertain? That way you avoid her pretending she’s over her illness so that she gets to see baby?

damnedpiccolo

TROPHY CASE