What should I expect immediately after giving birth?
The information on this page covers what you can expect immediately after you’ve given birth. Your midwife or maternity support worker will then help you wash and freshen up and make you some well-deserved tea and toast before you go to the postnatal ward.
Skin-to-skin
After you give birth, you’ll be encouraged to do skin-to-skin.
This is when you or your partner hold your baby – naked or dressed only in a nappy – against your skin, usually under your top or a blanket.
Skin-to-skin has lots of benefits:
- It helps to regulate your baby’s body temperature.
- It helps to stabilise your baby’s heart rate and breathing.
- It helps to calm your baby.
- It helps to support your baby’s immune system by the passage of your own beneficial skin bacteria.
- It helps to initiate breastfeeding.
Having skin-to-skin contact with your baby straight after you have given birth will help to keep them warm, calm, steady their breathing and allow them to adjust to the outside world. This should last at least until after the first feed but for at least an hour. If skin-to-skin for at least an hour isn’t possible immediately at birth or is interrupted, then start and maintain skin-to-skin as soon as possible.
If your baby is delivered by caesarean, you should still be able to have skin-to-skin contact with your baby straight after delivery.
Skin-to-skin contact is good at any time. It can be a bonding experience for you and your baby.
The way you parent your baby can have a long-term impact on them. When babies are brought up in loving, nurturing environments, they are more likely to become confident and secure adults. It’s important to think about your babies needs for closeness, comfort, and love. Skin-to-skin will not make your baby spoilt or clingy – it will have positive impact that will last their lifetime.
Feeding your baby
Your baby may be ready to feed soon after you give birth to them, particularly if you are skin-to-skin.
Your new-born baby will require a very small amount of colostrum (first milk from your breast) or formula milk.
It’s important to be responsive to your baby. Feed them as soon as they show signs of being hungry – sometimes called feeding cues – and allow them to feed for as long as they want.
There is lots of support available for you.
Stitches or other treatments
If you need stitches or other treatments, this will be done while you are still on the labour ward, and you should be able to carry on cuddling your baby while this is being done.
If you have had a large tear or an episiotomy (a cut made in the area between the vagina and back passage/anus during childbirth to help the baby to come through more easily), you’ll need stitches, using local anaesthetic to numb the area. Small tears and grazes are often left without stitches because they can usually heal without treatment.
Your breasts undergo a lot of changes during pregnancy and those changes continue after you’ve given birth. Your body naturally prepares to feed your baby by producing small amounts of a thick, yellow-coloured fluid called colostrum. It’s a very concentrated food, so your baby will only need a small amount. Your baby’s stomach is the size of a marble at first and so a teaspoonful of colostrum will be enough to fill your baby up.
After the first 2-5 days you will start producing a much larger volume of milk. This is known as your milk ‘coming in’ and it happens to all new mothers, irrespective of your chosen feeding method. However you are feeding baby, breast or bottle feeding, be sure to watch out for redness, lumps or hot areas of your breasts which may be painful and could be accompanied by a fever and flu like symptoms;
this could be a sign of infection in your milk ducts called mastitis, and you should see your midwife or GP if you experience these symptoms.
If you are breastfeeding, investigate getting a feeding bra which fits you well, as these are supportive, aid good milk production and flow, and allow easy access so you don’t have to get totally undressed to feed baby. If you’re having problems with feeding, experiencing soreness, or struggling with engorged (overly full) breasts, check out the information about early feeding and common challenges on our website or speak to your midwife.
If you’ve decided that breastfeeding isn’t for you, wearing a well-fitting bra and avoiding all nipple and breast stimulation will help your body to stop producing milk as quickly and painlessly as possible. Nevertheless, this can still be a little painful sometimes, so try a cold compress or ice pack, alongside some pain relief if you’re struggling. Avoid the temptation to touch your breasts or run them under a warm shower to release your milk – your body will just produce more milk to compensate, prolonging the process. So just keep the shower head and your hands well away and let your bra do its work.
It’s also useful for you to know about the milk ‘let-down reflex’. This is where milk leaks from the breast, stimulated by a hormone called Oxytocin. This hormone is also known as ‘the love hormone’, because it can be released when you see and think of your lovely baby. This can create some awkward moments, for example when waiting for the bus or on hearing another baby cry, as your thoughts and your body’s response might be enough to stimulate the hormone and cause milk to leak from your breasts. Breast pads slipped inside your bra can prevent you getting two damp circles appearing on your shirt with little warning. Reusable or disposable breast pads work just fine, but make sure you change them regularly, and avoid any that are plastic lined, as these keep moisture in and can cause nipple soreness.
If you are pregnant or breastfeeding, milk expression by hand is a useful technique to learn. It’s a handy way to relieve engorged breasts. You can also use it to stimulate milk production and provide milk for a baby who is not breastfeeding well or needs more milk.
The NHS Start for Life has information about hand expressing your milk.
- Breast milk is a ‘bioactive fluid’. This means it contains lots of nutrients such as proteins, fats, vitamins and minerals, plus vital antibodies that fight germs and can reduce the risk of your baby getting infections and diseases.
- It contains hormones that help your baby’s development. Breast fed babies also have a lower risk of ear, respiratory and gastro-intestinal infections, and diarrhoea.
- Breastfeeding is free, can be done anywhere at any time and with no plastic or packaging has less of an impact on the environment. Breastmilk is also beneficial for women and birthing people. It reduces your risk of obesity and of Type 2 diabetes. Your own risk of breast and ovarian cancer also reduces if you breastfeed. In addition, breastfeeding can reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease and osteoporosis, so they are major benefits to your health.
- Breastfeeding promotes a growing attachment between you and your baby, with an emotional closeness forming that will help your baby’s development.
You may come across challenges in the early days of your breastfeeding journey.
Some babies can be slow to start feeding for several reasons, and it can be normal for some babies to feed infrequently in the first few days. This can also be a sign that a baby is unwell, and it is important to seek advice from your midwife or health visitor if this is the case.
It is important to encourage your baby to nuzzle at your breast in the early days, to increase your milk supply and to establish breastfeeding. Help your baby to nuzzle and suckle at your breast whilst in skin-to-skin, as that will ‘switch on’ those milk producing cells and baby will become familiar in being at your breast.
Hand expression of colostrum can help to entice your baby to your breast if it’s dripped into their mouth.
How well your baby feeds can depend on the type of birth and pain relief used during your labour. Often all it takes is some gentle handling and patience and you can overcome any early challenges.
Sore nipples can hugely impact on your breastfeeding journey. This usually happens if your baby isn’t positioned or attached well at the breast. If a baby only sucks the nipple rather than the whole areola, then their tongue or roof of the mouth may rub on the nipple. This causes the nipple to become sore very quickly and can cause the nipple to crack. Breastfeeding shouldn’t be painful, so it’s important to get breastfeeding support right from the start. It’s also important to remember sore nipples won’t get better if the positioning and latching of your baby is not improved.
A baby that refuses the breast can be distressing for you. This behaviour doesn’t mean your baby dislikes your milk but can often be due to your baby struggling to latch effectively and becoming frustrated. It is important to seek support and to check positioning and attachment; a change of position and lots of skin-to-skin may help – and remember to relax! When you are relaxed, your baby is relaxed.
Frequent feeding can also become a challenge for you. Babies often ‘cluster feed’, meaning the frequency of breastfeeds increases. This can be a very tiring and demanding time but be reassured it is a completely normal process. Babies cluster feed to increase milk production, so it’s important to be flexible and adaptable to your baby’s demands.
Be responsive to your baby’s needs, which includes more than just food. It is also about love, protection, comfort, rest and relationship building.
If you’re planning to bottle feed with expressed breast milk or infant formula, these tips will help you feed your baby and keep them safe and healthy.
If you decide to use infant formula, first infant formula (first milk) should always be the first formula you give your baby. You can use it throughout the first year.
Visit the NHS website for more guidance on bottle feeding.
Neonatal Units are a part of hospitals which provide care for babies who are born prematurely (before 37 weeks), with a medical condition which needs treatment, become sick during or after birth or are born at a low birthweight.
The word ‘neonatal’ means newborn, or the first 28 days of life. Approximately one in 7 babies require neonatal care at birth.
Northwest Neonatal Operational Delivery Network
All neonatal units in Greater Manchester are part of the Northwest Neonatal Operational Delivery Network. They have a website that has lots of information about neonatal services and support available to you.
Spoons
Spoons is a charity which supports families who experience neonatal care in Greater Manchester. Their aim is to alleviate the stress and isolation families can feel.
Spoons focus on supporting the whole family, practically and emotionally from admission to the neonatal unit and beyond. They offer a range of support services for families to access on the neonatal units and within the community, including:
- Peer to peer support led by parents who have had a baby in neonatal care. This service is available at the cot side on the neonatal unit and at community groups.
- Outreach sessions with health care professionals, including the provision of EMDR and counselling.
- Sibling support so the wider family feel fully supported.
- Provision of activities, this includes baby massage, yoga, and weaning sessions specifically for families who have a baby recently discharged from neonatal care.
- Financial help with travel costs for families facing hardship.
Visit the Spoons website.
Email them at care@spoons.org.uk or call them on 0300 365 0363.
