Adam placed the car seat gently on the table and slipped an arm around Kim's waist. "Now what do we do?" They both stood and looked at their peacefully sleeping baby. She was snuggled beneath a soft white blanket that Kim's grandmother had crocheted while she was pregnant with Kim's mother. Ellen had also bought Kim home wrapped in the same blanket so it was a bit of a tradition.
She rested her head on his shoulder. "I have no idea." And that was no lie. "It's great to be home though, eventually." Kim laughed lightly. She doubted that he had ever driven as slow as he did on the way home from the hospital. Kim had teased him about his careful driving but the icy roads and having his newborn daughter in the car made Adam as nervous as he was the first time he got behind the wheel of a car.
"You just wait until you drive with her for the first time." He nudged her lightly. "You won't be laughing then."
Kim sat down gingerly. Once the initial buzz wore off she certainly felt like she'd pushed another human being out of her body and she wasn't quite sure if she would ever recover. Adam gently lifted Polly out of her car seat and the three of them sat and relaxed together at home as a family for the first time. If he thought that the actual birth was terrifying this suddenly felt worse. Polly, so far had apparently been doing everything she was supposed to be doing which a relief but now they were on their own. "I feel like we've lost our safety net."
They stayed there cuddling, stroking and adoring their little baby until Polly eventually woke ready for a feed. Adam fussed around making sure Kim was comfortable and warm enough, had something to eat and drink and then sat and just watched his girls together. Once fed and changed they settled her into her room for the first time, watching her as she drifted off to sleep. For such a small thing she was not particularly quiet and at the hospital they had been surprised at how noisy she actually was.
"Well so far so good." Adam declared as they reluctantly left the room with the baby monitor grasped tightly in his hand, it felt strange to be leaving her by herself. Polly had only been in their lives for a little under two days and every single little thing had changed. Did she know the hold she had on her parent's already?
Adam brought the rest of the stuff in from the car including the overflowing bags of gifts that everyone had bought for Polly and they sat down and sorted through the explosion of pink. "Hmmm I feel like I'm in a Disney princess movie." Kim commented. Her wardrobe had a distinct lack of pink and now they suddenly were surrounded by a riot of pink, frills, lace, flowers and flounces.
"Thank god for the Blackhawks jersey." Adam pulled the tiny hockey jersey from beneath a pile of pink and kissed it dramatically. "Thank you Halstead. Polly is gonna rock this jersey."
Kim enjoyed watching Adam's reaction to the various outfits that she pulled out. He didn't know much about dressing girls, and to be honest he was still struggling to get any clothes on her in something that resembled a reasonable time frame. "If only she would stay still things would be so much easier." He had moaned and Kim laughed at his attempts to dress her but in reality she wasn't much better. Some of this stuff that Kim was showing him was just plain cute, some not so much. They did agree on one thing, those flowery headbands were a definite no-go. Adam screwed up his nose. "Surely they are meant to hold back hair and she doesn't have any."
They were swamped with phone calls and text messages so Adam took both phones and put then on silent. After Polly had woken and been fed again they both got some much needed rest and Kim was asleep before her head hit the pillow. He had asked their families to give them at least a day to themselves to settle in before visiting. However he was thankful that his mother had been over before they came home and stocked the fridge and freezer with meals that they could just heat and eat as they tried to get into the routine of life with a newborn.
Surviving their first night alone was their first goal. And it was a long night with all three of them awake every two hours, although she did manage to make almost three hours from 4am. Kim woke with a start and had a small flutter of panic when she eyed the clock and it was almost 7am. She flew out of bed but Polly was still sleeping peacefully in the bassinet in the corner of their room and it wasn't long before she was awake and crying fiercely, she had a fair set of lungs on her as Adam tried to change her diaper before giving her to Kim. It wasn't so much the diaper he had an issue with it was trying to get her thrashing legs back into her suit.
Holding back their families was like trying to hold back the tide. Kim's mum arrived the next morning and promptly set about cooking and cleaning while Kim was made to rest. Adam was able to get out for a run while she kept and eye on both of them. "Where's Adam?" Kim was surprised to see just her mother in the kitchen when she came out with Polly ready for a feed.
"I am sure he won't be long." Adam had been with her constantly since Polly arrived only heading home once to grab a shower and run a few quick errands. "I had to push him out the door." Her mother laughed, "He took his phone, just in case you need him."
"He's besotted with Polly, sometimes I have to fight him just to hold her. I swear he'd breastfeed if he could." She laughed before grimacing as Polly attached herself to her very tender nipple. They assured her that the pain would subside after a few days once her body adjusted to it's new role. She inhaled deeply for a few seconds until it eased off. That was yet another delightful discovery. After feeding she passed the baby over to her mother while she went and grabbed a shower trying to wash away the joys of being three days post natal.
Adam's mother came over in the afternoon and Kim was able to get in a nap between feeds while Janet did some washing, particularly all of Polly's new clothes; their laundry basket had certainly changed along with their whole life.
"Oh god." Kim groaned loudly. Adam sat up suddenly having quickly become used to the jarring process of being sound asleep and then suddenly awake, usually by Polly's hungry cries. "What's wrong?" he glanced over towards Polly and there was no movement or noise and the room was only just starting to lighten up with morning.
"My boobs. God, they are as hard as rocks and leaking." Kim was holding them both feeling the dampness spreading beneath her fingers. Adam turned on the bedside lamp as Kim was peering at her suddenly full breasts and wet bra, and they both eyed the damp stain spreading across the sheets.
Adam was stunned as he peered down her top and let out a long slow whistle; they had grown overnight. "Wow. So I guess this is what we have been waiting for? I'm impressed."
When Adam made a move to feel them Kim slapped his hand, a little harder than she anticipated "Don't touch me."
"Oww." Adam shook his hand.
"They are so freakin' sore and it feels disgusting and soggy." Adam told her to shower while he changed the sheets. Kim was still showering, finding that the hot water soothed her swollen breasts and she was in no rush to get out until she could hear Polly's tiny cries through the streaming water and knew that her time was up and Adam would be changing her ready for her morning feed.
So far she had been getting about two hours between feeds and occasionally it was closer to three but she was hoping that now she had a bit more milk available they could stretch it out a little longer. The midwife did assure her that it was not uncommon that the first few days were constant feeding whereas once the milk arrived things settled down into more regular and spaced out feeds. One could only hope because she was not sure how long she could keep going at this pace. This was from a woman who slept like she was dead, as Adam often commented. Not any more and it had been pure torture so far.
The poor baby choked on her first mouthful as the milk gushed into her mouth. She spluttered and cried before settling back down and feeding well and she then slept for almost four hours. Everyone seemed to have glossed over the dirty, soggy uncomfortable delights that came with being a new mother. "No wonder no-one talks about it. It's like some secret little pact between mothers. Don't talk about the leaking orifices." She complained loudly. "And look at me I still look like I am about to give birth." She poked her flabby belly. This postnatal thing left a lot to be desired.
Adam seemed just as shocked as she was about all the little things that no one really talked about.
Like the black sticky poo that stuck to everything, he now understood where the comment 'stuck like shit to a blanket' came from. As it gradually changed colour it had the habit of getting into every single crevice and lord knows girls have a lot of crevices. Or the milk that dribbled out of her mouth or shot out at surprising velocity that then worked it's way into the creases of her neck or into her ear and they were stunned when it actually came out her nose. By the end of the first week they had been wee'd on, shat on and vomited on. Kim was still bleeding and it wasn't unusual to have breast milk leaking through her clothes but at least her nipples had stopped hurting and they fell into bed completely exhausted every night.
Why did nobody tell you about all this? All the cute little baby photos that populated the Internet hid the real truth. Babies were noisy, messy and a law unto themselves but they loved her.
A week into his Paternity leave they took Polly out for the first time. "How much shit do we need to take? She's a little baby." He had already hauled a baby bag, which was overflowing with spare clothes and diapers, blankets, their coats and the pram down to the car before even getting to Polly.
"It don't want her to get cold. It's freezing outside." She was making her first trip into the District. Adam had also laughed at Kim's chronic indecision about what to dress Polly in. "She's going to be wrapped up, no-one is going to care what she is wearing." Any further comments died on his lips as he saw the sharp look that Burgess gave him.
Kim had spent some of her rare spare time trawling the Internet for clothes for Polly, either ordering them online or asking her sister or mother to pick them up for her. They had only bought pretty basic clothes, which were mainly white before she arrived and now Kim was keen to dress her up more like a girl. Adam groaned at the thought of what this was doing to his Credit card.
"Nobody actually thinks we are going to be any good at this, I want to at least show people I have some idea." Finally she decided on a white all in one suit and a woolly coat with large bright flowers on it and matching beanie, which almost swamped her. Adam laughed as he squeezed her into the car seat and tucked a thick blanket over her. Kim nudged him playfully. "She looks cute."
Platt almost leapt over the desk when they arrived. "Oh my god." She squealed. "About time." And there was no way they were getting upstairs without Platt having a cuddle. Adam disappeared quickly and left Kim to deal with the mother hen that was Aunt Trudy. As well as whisking Polly out of her arms, she simultaneously demanded that someone, "ANYONE" get Burgess a seat.
"Ruzek. Couldn't stay away." Antonio saw him first as he bounded up the stairs.
"Obviously not." Although no one was really interested in seeing him and Lindsay squealed with delight when she spotted Kim and Platt coming up the stairs behind him. "Look who's here for her first visit?" Platt cooed and eventually she relented and handed Polly over to Lindsay and soon enough even Voight was out of his office having a cuddle.
"So when do we get to wet the baby's head." Antonio asked and then burst out laughing as Ruzek looked expectantly at Kim to gauge how likely that was going to be.
Kim just rolled her eyes.