lifting weight after being torn

hi, i had a tear which required a lot of stitches during
delivery.apart from the first week after, they are not painful &
appear to be healing well. a month has passed now and my midwifes
recomendations are still that i avoid lifting heavy things.

i can understand she would want to be cautious lest i overexhert
myself & make things worse, but i really would like to get on with my
life and am ready to take a calculated risk. this would primarily
involve lifting the stroller in and out of the car.

how long did you wait till you got to the stage you could carry a
stroller again?

thx

hi, i had a tear which required a lot of stitches during
delivery.apart from the first week after, they are not painful &
appear to be healing well. a month has passed now and my midwifes
recomendations are still that i avoid lifting heavy things.

i can understand she would want to be cautious lest i overexhert
myself & make things worse, but i really would like to get on with my
life and am ready to take a calculated risk. this would primarily
involve lifting the stroller in and out of the car.

how long did you wait till you got to the stage you could carry a
stroller again?

how about using a baby carrier of some sort? Babies at this age are lighter
than most strollers. It depends on your car how easy or difficult it is to
lift a stroller in and out, despite severe injuries I carried much more than
using a stroller, there was both the lifting in and out of the car, and the
fact it was more difficult to control a toddler whilst pushing a stroller
than it is whilst carrying hands free!

Anne

wrote in message
oups.com...
hi, i had a tear which required a lot of stitches during
delivery.apart from the first week after, they are not painful &
appear to be healing well. a month has passed now and my midwifes
recomendations are still that i avoid lifting heavy things.

i can understand she would want to be cautious lest i overexhert
myself & make things worse, but i really would like to get on with my
life and am ready to take a calculated risk. this would primarily
involve lifting the stroller in and out of the car.

how long did you wait till you got to the stage you could carry a
stroller again?

thx

I don't think it's *just* a stitches issue. If you're only a month past
delivery, you can definitely go on with a normal life, just don't over do
it.
I waited until the next day before I was lifting and carrying around a 14
month old DD1. It was fine, even though I was generally exhausted.
DD2 was born towards the end of October, and I remember that around the very
beginning of January (DD2 was about 10 weeks old) I had shoveled some fairly
major amounts of snow for my aunt and uncle from their driveway. Not long
after I did this snow shoveling, I started to bleed again, and it stopped
about a day or so later. I think I just simply over did it.
I was carrying a double stroller in and out of my trunk within about 2
weeks, as that's when I finally found the stroller I wanted. Before that, I
was carrying a newborn and a 14 month old on a regular basis, and yes, I
was lifting a single stroller in and out. Just be careful and don't over do
it.
I didn't start doing more and more, though, until about 3 months after. At
that point, I was back in full swing of life. Before about 3 months, I was
doing normal activities, I was just taking it a bit easier as to not hurt
myself in any way.
Also, as mentioned by Anne, is a type of carrier at all possible? When mine
were a month, it was so easy to use a carrier. With DSs, it was a Snugli
carrier. DD1 was a sling and DD2 I have moved to a wrap and a mei tai.
Even if they fell asleep in the car seat, I was able to put them in a
carrier without them really even waking up, and if they did wake up, they
were almost instantly back to sleep.

I had a pretty bad tear and episiotomy before DD was delivered by forceps,
and I don't remember being cautioned about lifting at all due to this. The
way I remember it was more like "Don't overexert yourself, just listen to
your body and do just what you feel like." I lifted things like a stroller
for sure. I guess if you lift and still feel ok, it would be fine. I
remember in general after delivery, for maybe the first month, I didn't feel
like doing a huge amount of lifting by choice, but general day to day living
was not a problem. So carrying some groceries or shopping bags or moving a
stroller or lifting the baby was fine but I would not have moved heavy
furniture or anything. I hate to be graphic, but lifting was NOT the problem
with the stitches, the real problem that made my stitches horrific was, um,
using the toilet. That "discomfort" did last for a month.

"beyond the pale" wrote in message
...
I had a pretty bad tear and episiotomy before DD was delivered by forceps,
and I don't remember being cautioned about lifting at all due to this. The
way I remember it was more like "Don't overexert yourself, just listen to
your body and do just what you feel like." I lifted things like a stroller
for sure. I guess if you lift and still feel ok, it would be fine. I
remember in general after delivery, for maybe the first month, I didn't
feel like doing a huge amount of lifting by choice, but general day to day
living was not a problem. So carrying some groceries or shopping bags or
moving a stroller or lifting the baby was fine but I would not have moved
heavy furniture or anything. I hate to be graphic, but lifting was NOT the
problem with the stitches, the real problem that made my stitches horrific
was, um, using the toilet. That "discomfort" did last for a month.

I did have stitches, but those heal, generally, fairly quick.
I do agree that the general daily activities is no problem, but the
no-brainers like moving furniture... Yes, that's an obvious one!
When DD1 was 3 weeks old, we moved to where we are now. I really didn't do
much at all as far as moving goes. I packed up boxes of stuff - like all
the kitchen stuff, the clothes, whatever. I really didn't lift a finger. I
didn't *want* to, and even if I did, I had my mother, MIL, DH, SIL, BIL, dad
and brothers there to tell me what I should and shouldn't be doing. There
really wasn't a reason to, as we had lots of strong guys to do that part.
Even around 10 weeks after DD2 was born, I felt fine. I did those sidewalks
but I really felt it after - and the bleeding started again, which I am sure
is just because I did more than I probably should have.
A stroller or groceries isn't a problem. Neither is carrying around the
baby or other children, even laundry, although I did have N carry baskets up
and down the stairs as the stairs were enough just walking up and down empty
handed.
I definitely agree that you shouldn't do more than you feel you should. We
all know our bodies best!

"Anne Rogers" wrote in message
...
hi, i had a tear which required a lot of stitches during
delivery.apart from the first week after, they are not painful &
appear to be healing well. a month has passed now and my midwifes
recomendations are still that i avoid lifting heavy things.

i can understand she would want to be cautious lest i overexhert
myself & make things worse, but i really would like to get on with my
life and am ready to take a calculated risk. this would primarily
involve lifting the stroller in and out of the car.

how long did you wait till you got to the stage you could carry a
stroller again?

how about using a baby carrier of some sort? Babies at this age are
lighter than most strollers. It depends on your car how easy or difficult
it is to lift a stroller in and out, despite severe injuries I carried
much more than using a stroller, there was both the lifting in and out of
the car, and the fact it was more difficult to control a toddler whilst
pushing a stroller than it is whilst carrying hands free!

Anne

Oooh... The toddler and baby thing... IIRC, mine are around the same age as
yours, right? (My DDs are 14 months apart in age)
I know how much of a PITA this situation can be...

Oooh... The toddler and baby thing... IIRC, mine are around the same age
as
yours, right? (My DDs are 14 months apart in age)
I know how much of a PITA this situation can be...

mine are a full 2 yrs, so not having a double or tandem was how we started
out, I'd not used a buggy regularly with DS anyway even when pregnant, just
a mix of carrying and him walking, so he was more than averagely capable of
walking a significant amount. The problem I found when I first tried the
stroller, which wasn't until DD was 2-3mths old anyway, that DS was very
aware of what I was doing, and wanted to help, which was sweet, but it's
jolly hard to push a stroller that is being pushed by a toddler,
particularly as he got adament about doing it himself, it didn't help at the
time that the stroller that fitted in the car wasn't that easy to push. We
ended up getting a second hand tandem which we used for trips from home, it
did fit in the car, but was so heavy, we only did that once or twice and
other times, I would carry DD and hold DS's hand, or sometimes get the
stroller out for him, on odd occasions I even carried him and pushed DD.
Because I was so badly injured in the birth, everything was an awful lot
harder than normal, but even normal I don't think would have been easy, I
suspect I injured myself further by the carrying, though it didn't hurt any
more than walking, I just don't think the long term effect on the softened
muscles can have been good and I did definitely have some worse patches
later on. Even now it's not always easy with two, DD was two yesterday and
she's a right little madam about holding hands, she won't do it, today when
she couldn't wriggle free, she yanked her hand down and bit me! We have a
bigger car now and our better stroller fits and that side of things is a
whole lot easier, so I use it quite a bit, she's almost never carried these
days, even DH has stopped that, we went on holiday without a stroller 4mths
ago, but I doubt we would now! Frustratingly this stroller got damaged on a
plane in October, we didn't notice in time to make a claim (they said a 7
day limit, though I guess had we pushed it they might have had to do
something, but we were so busy we didn't), but as we didn't use it much
until the last couple of months, it wasn't worth buying a new one either!

Anne

xkatx wrote:
"Anne Rogers" wrote in message
...
how about using a baby carrier of some sort? Babies at this age are
lighter than most strollers. It depends on your car how easy or
difficult it is to lift a stroller in and out, despite severe
injuries I carried much more than using a stroller, there was both
the lifting in and out of the car, and the fact it was more
difficult to control a toddler whilst pushing a stroller than it is
whilst carrying hands free! Anne

Oooh... The toddler and baby thing... IIRC, mine are around the same
age as yours, right? (My DDs are 14 months apart in age)
I know how much of a PITA this situation can be...

It's actually me that's got the kids same age as yours DS and DD are 15
months apart, DS born June 2005, DD October 2006. And DS didn't walk until
late so I was doing the double pram and carrying a non-walking toddler thing
for quite a while. What a PITA...

At the beginning I just used a light single umbrella fold stroller for DS
and had DD in a pouch on the front. Once I got past the 2 or 3 month mark I
started using a double pram. I have both a three wheeler with a toddler
attachment on the front and a side-by-side umbrella fold. Neither of which
is particularly light. And DS tends to run off if I don't have him strapped
in (he'll be 2 next week!) so I still have to put up with dealing with
double prams in some shape or form. DD is really long and if I have her in a
pouch on the front her head keeps hitting my chin

To the OP: the important thing is to watch what your body is telling you.
Even if you have apparetnly stopped bleeding you may get a bleed if you
overdo things as Kat pointed out. It takes a while for your body to get more
or less back to where it was at before and you need to help it to do so by
not overdoing it. Lifting a stroller in and out of the car should probably
be alright.

Engram

beyond the pale wrote:
I had a pretty bad tear and episiotomy before DD was delivered by forceps,
and I don't remember being cautioned about lifting at all due to this. The
way I remember it was more like "Don't overexert yourself, just listen to
your body and do just what you feel like."

Same here. I didn't have any lifting restrictions.

--
Nikki
mama to 4 boys