Helping Your Partner Recover From a Caesarean

Start from what it actually is

A caesarean is abdominal surgery. The NHS describes a cut of around 10 to 20cm through the tummy and womb, usually horizontal just below the bikini line, closed with dissolvable stitches or with stitches or staples that are removed after a few days. Tommy's is blunt with partners: it is major surgery, recovery can take at least six weeks, and discomfort may last considerably longer.

Everything else on this page follows from that. If a friend had the same operation for any other reason, nobody would expect them to be carrying things up stairs at day three.

The first day or two, in hospital

The NHS explains that a catheter usually stays in the bladder for around 12 to 18 hours after the operation, until your partner is able to walk around, and that the wound is covered with a dressing for at least 24 hours. Tommy's adds that they will need help lifting the baby for at least the first 24 to 36 hours.

That is your job description for day one. Lift the baby in and out of the cot. Pass the baby for feeds and take them back to be winded. Fetch water. Adjust the bed. Press the call bell if your partner cannot reach it.

Staff will encourage your partner to get out of bed and move around as soon as possible, and they can eat and drink as soon as they feel hungry or thirsty. Moving early is not being brave, it is clinical: the NHS advises staying mobile with gentle activity such as a daily walk to reduce the risk of blood clots.

Getting home

Tommy's is specific: when your partner is well enough to go home, you will need to drive them or arrange a lift, because they will not be able to drive for weeks after the birth. Fit the car seat in advance and practise with it, because a car park is a bad place to learn.

Think about the route home. Speed bumps are genuinely painful after abdominal surgery. So is a sudden brake. Drive as though there is an open wound in the passenger seat, because there is.

The six-week list

The NHS says your partner should be able to hold and carry the baby once home, but may not be able to drive, exercise, carry anything heavier than the baby, or have sex straight away, and that this may not be for six weeks or so. The instruction is to start again only when it feels comfortable, and to ask a midwife or the GP at the six-week postnatal check if unsure.

Translate that into your week. You are doing the shopping, the stairs, the older child, the pram in and out of the boot, the washing basket and the car seat. Tommy's lists twelve practical jobs partners can take on, including helping your partner in and out of bed, making sure they do not lift anything heavy, feeding the baby with expressed milk or formula, changing nappies, taking the baby out in the pram so your partner can sleep, doing the shopping and cooking or organising a meal rota, and cleaning the house.

Pain relief on time, not on demand

Tommy's names reminding your partner to take pain relief on time as a specific job for partners, and the NHS advises having regular painkillers to take at home for as long as they are needed, such as paracetamol or ibuprofen. It notes that aspirin, and codeine in co-codamol, are not usually recommended while breastfeeding, and that the doctor can advise on what is suitable.

Doses and choices are a matter for your partner's own clinician, not for you or for a website. What you can usefully do is keep the timings on a phone alarm, because pain that is allowed to break through takes longer to settle and makes moving, feeding and sleeping harder.

The wound, and what to watch for

The NHS advises gently cleaning and drying the wound every day, wearing loose comfortable clothes and cotton underwear, and watching for signs of infection. It says non-dissolvable stitches or staples are usually removed by the midwife after five to seven days.

Contact the midwife or a GP straight away if there is severe pain, leaking urine, pain when peeing, heavy vaginal bleeding, a wound that becomes more red, painful or swollen, discharge of pus or foul-smelling fluid from the wound, a cough or shortness of breath, or swelling or pain in the lower leg. The NHS states these may be signs of infection or a blood clot and should be treated as soon as possible.

You are often the person who notices the leg swelling or the change in the wound, because you are the one seeing it. Say something. Do not talk your partner out of ringing.

The part that is not about the wound

An unplanned caesarean can land as a loss of something as well as the arrival of a baby, particularly where the birth plan looked very different. NICE's postnatal guideline asks clinicians to discuss the challenging aspects of the postnatal period that may affect bonding and emotional attachment, naming the woman's physical and emotional recovery from birth, the experience of a traumatic birth or birth complications, fatigue and sleep deprivation, feeding concerns and the demands of parenthood.

The unhelpful response is optimism. "At least you're both healthy" closes a conversation that needed to stay open. Ask what they remember, listen to the version they tell, and do not correct it.

Feeding and skin-to-skin

NICE recommends offering women who have had a caesarean and who wish to breastfeed support to start as soon as possible after the birth. Positioning is harder with an abdominal wound, so pillows, and someone to pass and take back the baby, do more good than advice does.

Tommy's notes partners can have skin-to-skin contact too, and that the midwifery team can make sure you have privacy for it. If your partner cannot comfortably hold the baby for long stretches in the first days, this is practically useful as well as good for you.

Sex, and the conversation about it

Tommy's puts it carefully: physical recovery takes up to six weeks but everyone recovers differently, and when you start having sex again depends on how your partner feels physically and emotionally. It suggests talking about it to reduce anxiety on both sides, and finding other ways to be close in the meantime. There is no deadline at the six-week check, whatever anybody implies.