When I went to the hospital, I understood that I’d be sent home with a vulnerable being who would require constant care, but it was impossible to pr

Comic: how to watch a baby

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2024-11-28 01:30:02

When I went to the hospital, I understood that I’d be sent home with a vulnerable being who would require constant care, but it was impossible to prepare for what that actually felt like.

I’d loved being in the maternity ward, a leisurely four nights thanks to a C-section and a few complications, where I was surrounded by perky and competent nurses who took care of me and my baby, checking my bandages and bringing me ice and answering my questions.

When we were discharged, my husband and I secured our newborn into a car seat on the checkered linoleum floor. The strap tightening system was confusing, and there were warning labels explaining the baby might become airborne or get strangled.

We arrived home to an apartment that had rendered itself strange and irrelevant in its structure: it had belonged to different, childless people. We spent hundreds of dollars over the next two days overnighting bottles and breast pumps and swaddles: we needed diaper cream, and we needed it right now.

Somewhere within those bleary first days, I downloaded an app on my phone that promised to help me keep track of everything.