Hospital Family Supports

My husband stayed while I was in surgery. After surgery my husband went to have lunch and let dog out and then get kids from school. Yes. you will be very tired. When my husband came back with kids it was hard to stay awake. I felt bad about falling to sleep on them. After my husband and kids left to go home I slept as much as I could between being woken for vitals, meds, and blood drawn. Walked that night around hospital floor and when I finally fell asleep it felt good until I was woken in pain and needed pain meds. I was okay without someone staying the night because you need your sleep to help heal properly. Good Luck on your surgery. Mine was last week. I am 6 days Post-Op.

Thank you all for the thoughtful replies. The only other time I have stayed in the hospital is when I had my babies and then my husband stayed too. At nights he was really helpful with changing and helping feed the baby etc. I know this isn't the same but that is my only frame of reference.

For me, it was important to have someone at the hospital DURING surgery who could advocate for me if necessary. I had planned to have someone at the hospital with me for my entire stay, but sent my people away a few hours after getting to my room because, at that point, I knew that I was fine and wouldn't need an advocate. Someone came back the following day to give me a ride home.

I feel that it's very important to have an advocate present when you can't advocate for yourself. But, beyond that, it's best to keep people to a minimum.