Breathing the Dead ~ H.S

Chapter Forty-Three

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE: LILIES

Laura

"What's the verdict, Liam?" Harry was asking, "Is she OK?"

"More or less," Liam rose to his feet with a single nod, "only a couple small tears in the skin of her perineum and the skin of her vaginal tissue. None of it requires any stitching, though. They should heal up pretty quickly on their own," he then looked at me and smiled, "you're pretty tough, Laura. Almost nine hours of labour and you escape with the most minor lacerations I've ever seen on a first-time mum. Congratulations."

I chuckled. "Thanks, doc. Now I really do feel accomplished with life."

I then ended up looking down at the beautiful baby girl lying on my chest (now freshly cleaned and wrapped up in a brand new blanket) - nuzzling into me and her tiny mouth wrapped around one of my nipples as it had been for the past hour - satisfying her hunger and looking completely content doing so.

"To think that used to be my job," Harry said with a chuckle as he crouched down next to me & our precious child.

"Oh, shut up," I swatted at him and laughed, "do you really think that's an appropriate way to speak around your daughter?"

"She doesn't know what I'm saying," Harry chuckled again, "she's just lying there - looking cute. She couldn't care less about what I'm saying."

"While we're waiting for her to finish up," Liam nodded towards our sweet baby, "I think it's about time we go over your recovery from childbirth. You both need to listen carefully - because this is going to be a whole shitload of information and I'm not too keen on repeating it."

Harry & I looked at each other before nodding at him slowly.

"OK," Liam cleared his throat, "Laura, it's going to take approximately six weeks before your body recovers from your childbirth. It could take longer, but six weeks is usually the norm. During this time, your uterus will slowly start returning to its normal size - and your cervix will also tighten up within about a week, but it will take the full recovery time for it to fully heal from the delivery."

"Alright..." I began to nibble on my lip slowly, "go on."

"Well, your pregnancy has caused a lot of extra blood and tissue and stuff to build up inside your body so that your little girl could be properly taken care of in there. Now that it's all not needed anymore, it's gotta come out somehow,"

"Oh no," I grimaced, "you mean through my vag, don't you?"

"Yes," Liam nodded, "your discharge after pregnancy is commonly called 'lochia'. It's usually a bit heavier than your standard menstruation - and it'll often contain blood clots at first. Over several weeks, the colour of your discharge will eventually fade to yellow or white, and then stop completely. You may also experience incontinence: urinary, fecal, or both, but urinary is usually more common - and usually happens whenever you cough, laugh or sneeze."

"Fecal incontinence?" I made a face, "Nasty!"

"Oh, and your milk's gonna come flooding in pretty fast," said Liam - ignoring my distaste somewhat deliberately, "so, you're definitely gonna have sore breasts for a little while."

"OK..." I gulped quietly, "what else?"

"Well, as I'm sure you've already guessed, your daughter's birth has already chopped off a huge load of weight from your body, but it doesn't mean that it's all gone. A lot of water is built up in the extra kilos, and so you'll be having to urinate a lot more frequently during your recovery period. The weight of your breasts should also decrease once your feeding schedule becomes set in stone. If you want to go back to your pre-pregnancy weight completely, you'll have to do quite a bit of exercise to achieve that. That's more or less the significant physical changes you'll notice. Other possible changes could be constipation or hemorrhoids."