Nightmare car rides: Five parents share their baby’s first experience
From near misses to midnight breakdowns, parents share their baby’s first car ridesCar rides en route to the hospital have often made for some memorable labour or surprise birth stories but generally, your ride home does not make the headlines.
For some parents though, it probably should, with everything from near misses on the road, projectile vomiting, to middle-of-the-night breakdowns turning the first car ride with their newborn into an experience they may want to (but can't) forget.
Five Aussie parents share their experiences with carsales.
Never assume
When my third child was born, I thought I had everything under control because my first two had been so easy in the car, just very relaxed and peaceful.
As they say though – assumptions are made and most assumptions are wrong – and boy was mine wrong.
The whole ride home, my son bawled his eyes out; it was like he was in pain, except as far as we could tell, he wasn’t, he just hated the car.
My husband and I ultimately pulled over and got him out about seven times in the twenty-minute drive home. As soon as we held him, he stopped crying instantly. As soon as we put him back in the capsule and started the car, he also started again.
It was the longest car ride of my life.
Strangely though, he never did it again. Although I was apprehensive about taking him in the car, the next time he was absolutely fine. - Lou, 42, Brisbane
When it rains, it pours
The day we took our first baby home from the hospital it started raining heavily as soon as we pulled out of the car park.
At first, it was manageable, but five minutes down the freeway, it was pouring so much that I could barely make out the road in front. Worst of all, I was in one of the middle lanes, so I couldn’t pull over right away.
Because it was our firstborn, my wife was terrified that something would happen and naturally, I was also concerned, a feeling that I did try to hide this at the time.
After a few close calls changing lanes and slips in the water pooling on the road, we managed to get off at an exit and find a side road to wait it out. - Ryan, 45, Melbourne
The crazy driver
I will always recall the first car ride I had with my newborn alone. It was a few weeks after my c-section when I was given the all-clear to drive and my partner had returned to work. Deciding to get out of the house, I put my son into the car and headed toward a friend’s house.
I made it to the end of my road before a crazy driver, turned the corner, speeding and nearly took us out, only missing us by centimetres. After he sped off, I heard a crash soon after and saw him plough into a parked car up the road.
Needless to say, the police came, he was arrested, and I was rattled. My son though, slept through the entire thing. - Georgia, 32, Canberra
The long way home
We had quite a long drive home from the hospital once my wife and son were discharged and some of the roads were quite bumpy.
I’m not sure if this was why, or if it was just a baby being a baby but halfway home, I heard my wife shriek and when I pulled over I realised why… he had vomited. And, not just a little but projectile vomit all over himself, the car seat in front, his baby car seat and my wife who had been sitting in the back next to him.
After the initial shock, it was a little bit funny, although I’m sure my wife wouldn't agree. - Mohammed, 42, Melbourne
The breakdown
We were able to head home quite quickly after the birth of our third baby. The labour and delivery went smoothly, I’d done it before, and it was a public hospital so at about 11:00pm the day I gave birth they said it was fine to leave.
Unfortunately, the smooth experience didn’t last for our drive home, with our car breaking down on a back road.
We called roadside assistance and we waited for half an hour for them to arrive only to be informed they couldn’t fix it. So, after that we had to wait another hour for a tow truck and my parents to come and collect us.
We got home at about 1.30am, and after being awake for over 32 hours at this point, to say I was exhausted, well, that would have been an understatement. - Ash, 35, Geelong
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