List of what to prepare for the hospital bag...any good massagers out there??

[deep]

I shouldn't have even packed for my last visit - my wife had a whole 7 minutes of active labour. Then she hopped in the shower and wanted to go home, but there was no doctor on hand to clear our bouncing baby Devan, so we had to stay the night.

Bring two sizes of clothes and diapers (unless you know exactly how big your baby is going to be!). Depending on the time of year, have suitable transport clothes/blankets for the temps.

Bring whatever it takes to make your wife happy and comfortable, from clothes to books to music to food/drink to whatever.

Personally, I don't bother with a lot of clothes/luxuries/time killers for myself...I've never had the urge to do anything but hold wife and babe for the entire stay at the hospital...I can shower and change when we all get home.

[kaimui22]

you can bring all you want but most likely won't be able to use much of it..

i packed my bags a month ahead of my due date and when it happened, i hardly opened up my bag in the hospital..

there's no "standard birth" so there's nothing to expect...just when you think you will be mobile and ride through each contraction, you might be strapped to a fetal monitor w/ an epidural and bed-ridden....or u might expect an extra long labour but end up having a fast and easy birth

just bring some necessities...like underwear (even though they provided some disposal ones at the hospital..i opted to use there since i would be too tired to wash mine once i got home), a pillow, nightgown, and oh yeah, slippers!! socks are nice too because after delivery you will get chills and your feet will feel really cold if you had an IV or epidural

but as for the items for labour..i'd say bring minimal items as you prob. won't be using them and/or you won't have the energy/time to root through you bag looking for the things you thought would help you.

just my 2 cents...(my baby is now 2 weeks old and i suffered 34hrs of labour..ended up c-section..so you get my point of no use in preparing..i was locked to the bed with an IV, catheter, epidural and fetal monitor)

[gemstone]

Bring a gameboy or a DS. The wait might be long. And DON'T make the mistake of going to the hospital too early. It's not like the baby will pop out in 2 minutes. Wait till they are pretty close apart. When we showed up, my wife has contractions a few times in the hospital hallway so they knew we were serious and gave us a room right away.

Careful with this advice. Everyone is different. I didn't have a single contraction when my second was born. My water broke, 35 minutes later he was born. We only went to the hospital because the weather was bad and didn't want to risk bad roads slowing us down. All my others (4) were at least 6 hours labour. One thing that was common with all of mine was they would be born within a half hour after throwing up. Yah, we had to stop for me to throw up on way to the hospital with the second one.

[mart242]

Careful with this advice. Everyone is different. I didn't have a single contraction when my second was born. My water broke, 35 minutes later he was born. We only went to the hospital because the weather was bad and didn't want to risk bad roads slowing us down. All my others (4) were at least 6 hours labour. One thing that was common with all of mine was they would be born within a half hour after throwing up. Yah, we had to stop for me to throw up on way to the hospital with the second one.

It's his first kid. The second is apparently much faster. He also lives 5 minutes from the hospital.

[skanji]

It's his first kid. The second is apparently much faster. He also lives 5 minutes from the hospital.

were going to the civic...by choice...

[gemstone]

It's his first kid. The second is apparently much faster. He also lives 5 minutes from the hospital.

Doesn't matter if it is the first or 10th. My 3rd, 4th and 5th were 11, 6 and 8 hours.

[GunnerX]

As I noted in my post, our first kid came out 3 hours later after we got to the hospital. We got there after 5am. My wife was put on the machine to check her contractions for an hour! She was 2cm dilated when we got there. The nurse came back after 6am and my wife was 7cm dilated already. We got a room and by 7:30am, she was 9cm. So it really is a random thing with the labour times. The doctor told us not to bother calling whenever we have our 2nd baby. They said that once my wife's water breaks, go straight to the hospital!