Dads staying overnight on children’s ward

I’m a Paeds nurse and our parents tend to take it in turn. It’s never even occurred to me who stays and who doesn’t! It’s the children who’s parents never stay or visit, I feel sorry for.

We’re not allowed to close the curtains at the night or in the day unless it’s for privacy reasons such as intimate care, ward round etc. It’s hospital policy and our lives are a constant curtains battle.

I think about it through the lens of safeguarding - who is in a vulnerable position? Who needs to be safeguarded?

When the woman is the patient - she's in a vulnerable situation and needs safeguarding, like after giving birth, or is poorly and may not be in a position to complain about a man on the ward. Hence I don't think men should stay on wards past visiting times on female wards, post-natal etc.

When the child is the patient, they are the ones who need safeguarding hence having a parent or guardian with them. The women staying with them are not the ones in a vulnerable position needing safeguarding, so no issue having dads stay overnight as well I'd say.

DS1 had 4 weeks in hospital once and my mum, DH and I switched off every few nights - as did many of the other parents too.

If another mum has an issue with it that’s her problem! Your husband has every right to be there to look after his DC. Sometimes sick kids want their dads just as much as their mums.

I was an inpatient a couple of weeks ago - 4 women and one of the women's boyfriend stayed past visiting hours and kicked off big time when asked to leave as lights were going out. The Matron got involved but it was a strict policy of no males.

But absolutely no issues when it's a child

I get why somebody might overthink this.

Different scenario, but a long time ago I worked on a children's wear department. I was often on the fitting room, and I remember one little boy who was disabled went in to try on clothes and his dad went into the cubicle with him to help. All the mums waiting outside for their children, who had been chatting up until then immediately went silent and moved so they could see into the fitting room.

My supervisor later told me I shouldn't have let the father in.

This can happen with mums on children's wards too. Funnily enough, I never had any issues with the dads but had 2 issues with 2 different mums.

One was very intrusive, she kept on opening my son's curtain when it was closed which meant that her children copied her and I had to be stern with it. She snored very loudly at night too and when she wasn't snoring, was either talking on the phone loudly or watching something loudly on her phone.

The other one was almost the opposite. She wanted perfect silence after 7pm so her child could sleep which wasn't always possible on a shared bay for many reasons. We ended up having words at one point when my child was crying and she opened the curtain and snapped at him that he was upsetting her child.

Obviously people with their child in hospital are going through a hard time so I was incredibly patient and tried not to hold any grudges but it wasn't easy practically living with a bunch of strangers thrown together along with unwell, grumpy children.

I’ve edited my comment as I think my first reply was quite defensive and reading more comments made me realise so 😂

I couldn’t work out which way to vote but of course you should swap out if that works for you. My daughter had a stretch of time of being in the hospital a lot and we always had my husband stay over night and me do the days just because I couldn’t sleep at all on the wards. Didn’t even think of it as an issue to consider.

you are clearly a very kind person to worry about this amongst all this. I hope your wee one is doing better.

of course a loving dad should be allowed to stay next to his sick child.
If God forbid this was our kid my husband would stay no issue, and wouldn’t give a crap what anyone else thought. Anyone taking issue should be focusing on their own child.

Men/ Dad's have just as much right to be with their sick children? Who on earth would have a problem with that?

Wouldn't have bothered me op, hope your son is ok 💐💐

It’s such a different scenario from when Dad stay on the antenatal or the postnatal awards where it’s the mother that’s vulnerable so the female patient that’s where it feels a little bit awkward with Dad staying
Not on a children’s ward

It’s absolutely fine. Either parent can stay. No curtains is rubbish though - that would have been terrible for us (and it was all quite terrible enough…) You do what works for you all, and don’t get too tired!

My ex husband is just as much an equal parent as I am. Anyone having a problem with him (really decent respectful man) needs to get therapy

Well... the mood I've been in lately, i wouldn't be too thrilled at the sight of a man anywhere tbh 🙄😒😄

It can't be helped girl, he was probably feeling awkward himself, and he shouldn't. I understand that you were just asking for opinions though, rather than being unkind about him.

Wishing your son well, op 💕

My issue with partners staying on mat wards ..both pre and post labour is that they were generally noisy and inconsiderate.
It's one thing to be there to support your partner..but in my experience I never saw much of that. The partners there were either snoring loudly, talking loudly on the phone, or listing to crap on their phones. It was that and not the babies, labouring women or nurses that disturbed me.

My overriding memory of my last labour is the murderous thoughts I was having about the man in the bay next to me who was playing tiktok videos on high volume and laughing obnoxiously.

He wasn't a weirdo or a sex pest, just an inconsiderate dick.

Women in both hospitals I've worked in and the hospital I trained in campaigned for someone to stay with them the entire time they are in for induction, labour and the postnatal period.

In two hospitals, they were only allowed to sleep in labour ward/the birth centre. In one hospital, they were allowed to stay in the postnatal ward as well. No hospital allowed men to stay in the antenatal ward for induction after hours. But in all three, they were allowed to stay for all of it after campaigns and surveys.

It was the staff who had mixed opinions, not the women. Very few wanted it to stay as it was but not all choose to have their male partner stay either.

Potentially but I guess this is different in that if a single fathers child was in hospital they would of course need to stay. Whereas on a womans ward unless something is seriously wrong it's maybe more debatable.

Does this train of thought stem from dad's and post natal wards? As almost everyone disagrees with dad's staying then.

It is unacceptable that there were no curtains. What about a child's privacy and dignity?

My son had a long hospital stay until his discharge in January, he started out in PICU and then was on 3 different wards (as well as 2 more brief visits to PICU, liked to keep us on our toes!) and I didn't care at all when a father stayed. Most swapped over frequently with the mums and it was never any issue.

Always do what is best for your family, OP, especially in such difficult situations.

I hope your little one is doing better now.

Did you and your DH not take it in turns?

I wouldn’t be bothered about normal dads staying with their children. It’s awful when you’re in hospital and there is an aggressive person there (male or female) so really it’s the behaviour of the parents not their gender that would matter to me. I had an aggressive father right next to me on the maternity ward and I checked myself out early post c-section because I was scared of him! Maternity wards are different to children’s wards.

I have also spent a lot of time in hospital with my child and I hate being in a bay. I hate that my child is exposed to additional infections they don’t already have- the worst is being put in the RSV bay when they don’t have that …yet.
Anyhow I digress, I have been told off multiple times for closing the curtains, apparently it’s against the rules. However, I find it so uncomfortable trying to sleep with strangers and the lack of privacy. I worry about my snoring and one night I woke and my boob had come free from my pyjama top for the whole bay to see! So I suppose in that respect I was more embarrassed about men being in the bay in those circumstances but equally my husband does take his turn and stay over.

To be totally honest I would probably feel more comfortable with open plan on a children's ward from a safeguarding perspective so that all children are in the immediate eyeline of the staff at all times especially if there is a period where their parent isn't there or needs to go to the loo for example. Curtains in that situation would put children at risk from the other adults on the ward. If a child is particularly vulnerable then being in a ward with other mobile children is still going to be an issue for infection control anyway.

Personally if I was at rhe breastfeeding stage and dc were in hospital overnight I'd find it awkward but in any other circumstance I couldn't care because your focus is usually just the child and nothing else comes into it at that point.