MNHQ here: have you got strong feelings and personal experience about partners staying overnight on postnatal wards?

I'm all for Dads to stay on the ward with a two strikes and you can no longer stay policy.

All the men who stayed on the ward when I was in for a week after having DD were very discreet and helped their partners hugely.

As there seems to be quite a few people against it, maybe they should have half the wards where partners can stay and half can't?

Men don't need washing facilities on site as they can leave at any point and go home to wash/eat.

I'd would have hated been stuck in a private room. It would have been so isolating not to really have seen anyone for nearly a week.

Tricky one. I completely understand the concerns over privacy and emotional wellbeing of everyone. However in my experience (four hospital births) a night alone on a maternity ward when you are bruised and battered physically and emotionally after giving birth is just torture. There were never enough staff on the ward to meet everyone's needs, so help from midwives was often hurried and took a long time to arrive.
Agree that allowing partners to stay is probably not the right move but something should be done to better support new mums. For me personally the best thing would have been a quicker discharge, so I could have my own bed and all the help I needed from DH!

Also just as a talking point in contradiction to the stories of dodgy men on wards: When my eldest was born I was 19 and ex P was useless. On the second day after she was born he didn't bother getting to the hospital until 5pm. Birth was a nasty foreceps affair, and DD was quite badly jaundiced. I was on my own all day and was exhausted, helpless and so lonely that I cried on and off all day. One of the new dads on the ward came over and asked if I was ok, and then spent a good 15 minutes chatting to me and reassuring me. It was the best support I got from anyone that day, and I was so grateful to him (and to his partner who gave him up for quarter of an hour to help me!)

I'm for it. I had severe carpel tunnel in both wrists, was in splints and couldn't pick my baby up, let alone care for her. Hardly any help was available and I was completly alone. Having dh would have been invaluable.

There is a separate precident here though, which hasn't been brought up yet Dd has had a couple of very short hospital stays. In this situation a parent can stay, and it can be the mum or the dad. There seems to be no problem allowing dads to stay on shared children's ward's so I why they shouldn't stay on an adults ward where a problem can be communicated.

Katy

I gave birth to my second child 9 weeks ago. The visiting rules had changed at the (same) hospital since I had had my first child.
This time there was open visiting between 2pm and 8pm. It was supposed to be 2 visitors per bed and only your own children visitors (not your pals' kids). At one bed in my ward of 4 beds there were 10 visitors. Sat all day. At the other, 7. It was horrendous. I felt anxious and vulnerable. On top of the physical aspects of a section. Did anyone manage this situation? No of course not. Because the midwives and nurses had jobs to do that didn't involve being bouncers.
And my point is just this- allowing partners on the ward sounds ok in theory. But who polices this? Who checks that others in the ward are comfortable making their way to the single toilet with leaking plastic pants on? That the others are comfortable trying to establish breastfeeding or discussing bleeding or other issues with the laughable privacy of a curtain? With the best will in the world, on a ward- there is no time or resource for this. So partners should not be allowed. The very thought of a man in close proximity to be in these circumstances makes me extremely anxious.

I think its totally inappropriate for men to stay in shared rooms - they are not patients. It also puts pressure on them to stay, whereas actually there may be other children. Where do you draw the line? It would have been convenient for my toddler to stay too but this is obviously not going to happen

'Why on earth wouldn't they be able to stay - they're the baby's parent too? Plus I needed help looking after baby - I'd have been terrified on my own'

The current partner is not always the baby's father. When I gave birth to DC3, the midwives kept referring to all the males as 'your man', when I asked why, it was explained to me that it's not uncommon for the mum's partner to not be the father of the baby.

At any rate, they are not patients, and as such, the ward is not designed to accommodate them and mums and babies, too. Hence, not enough space, no separate showers or enough toilet facilities. It's not a hotel, but plenty believe that if they are in there, they should be equally accommodated as the patient is.

This comes up on every one of these threads and the problem is lack of staff, a problem that should not be solved by assuming every single woman has another human being around 24/7 to do the work of staff.

My DH was kicked out to leave me on my own with my newborn less than 3 hours after I had had a general anaesthetic. I cannot begin to imagine how this is considered appropriate. I was in a labour room, so on my own not a shared ward, and yet he was still sent away. How can it be that you aren't allowed to go home alone after a GA, but I was left alone to care for a newborn?

It might have made all the difference to my subsequent lack of mental well being if I had had the support of my partner over night those first few days.

In two minds, DH didn't stay in fact was asked to leave but someone else had her baby during the night and her DH was allowed to stay. She apologised profusely about him being there, I didn't really care but could have done with someone to fetch me water and help me to the toilet. I really wasn't in a good way afterwards.

I chose to give birth in a midwife led unit (forgoing an epidural) so that my partner could stay in our single room. I don't regret it for a second. I can't imagine being left so tired, emotional and in pain without a bit of backup!

For those saying they could not have done it without their partners help - I absolutely get that. BUT the thing is that help should be provided by healthcare professionals. More nurses/midwives/nursery nurses - it is after all a hospital not a hotel.

Men used the men's toilets (pretty obvious) and clearly they don't use the showers so you're hardly going to bump into them in there.

What male toilets? There might currently be one visitor's toilet on the ward, and 6-10 for patients.

And why wouldn't they have a shower? If they're staying over they might well expect to

For my first two DC partners were not allowed on ward after visiting and nursery nurses were there to help mums and babies.

By the time DC3 came along things had changed massively. I was in a ward with 4 beds but there was only me and one other woman in this particular ward. My DH went home and the woman's partner stayed. I didn't even know partners we allowed to stay. Bloody pair of them kept me awake all night cooing over their baby. I was not very well after the birth and during the night I needed a nurse urgently and some sleep would have been good too. I got neither 😞

The last thing I needed was some random bloke in the next bed.

I absolutely do not agree with partners being there all night. Yes, it's all well and good that they can help but I really think that putting the onus on partners to be there to help means fewer midwives/nurses staffing the wards which in my case could have been dangerous.

sorry it's jumbled I'm on my phone

If there's spare money in maternity then I'd far rather it got spent on improving conditions for mothers and babies, perhaps employing more midwives, HCAs, lactation consultants and breastfeeding support workers, than on overnight facilities for fathers.

Plus I needed help looking after baby - I'd have been terrified on my own.

this would be a total non issue with adequate staffing of hcp

Also some of these logistical questions are very easily answered. Men used the men's toilets (pretty obvious) and clearly they don't use the showers so you're hardly going to bump into them in there. As for sleeping there were lazyboy style recliners in each bay. It's not hard.

Does anyone know if you can leave your baby on their own while you go to the loo?

You take them with you in the little fishbowl on wheels. Plenty of space.

Also you may need it to use as a kind of zimmer frame

My hospital encouraged partners to stay and I assumed that was the norm. Why on earth wouldn't they be able to stay - they're the baby's parent too? Plus I needed help looking after baby - I'd have been terrified on my own.

YellowLawn, Yes! A new mother is a patient and should be looked after by midwives and hcps however I could never find one when I needed one and pressing a button made no difference (I couldn't move due to epidural following surgery and couldn't pick up dd to feed her when she cried).
Does anyone know if you can leave your baby on their own while you go to the loo? Or is it a safety thing? Are women supposed to wait until visiting hours to pay a visit? (What if they are single parents or have no visitors??)

Problem is in this day and age there shouldn't be wards - individual suites would be far better and that way each patient would have their own space and privacy.

Gave birth in private hospital, husband stayed whole time and they even had a large couch for partners to sleep on in rooms. It's as much their child as it is the mothers and it's horrendous that new fathers get treated with very little respect.

This seems really divided, but I was actually delighted that my partner was able to stay with me the whole time I was on the postnatal ward. I know I'd have felt very lonely and I'd have struggled without him. I didn't have a c section, I just had stitches, but I did struggle to get up and down. And labour is just exhausting - many lasting over a number of days! I think it's a bit of a baptism of fire to expect a mother to have to cope completely alone in a. Yay and noisy hospital when they are completely exhausted.

I think it would be very unfair for a man to be ushered away when the baby is equally their responsibility. I know absolutely that if my partner had left and I needed help I wouldn't have got it at all - the wards were just far far too busy. It took absolutely hours to be discharged.

I feel strongly that they should be able to stay, although I've no desire to distress other women by dh's presence and, in an ideal world, maternity wards should all be single, ensuite rooms. I've experienced horrendous midwifery care in the past and do not feel safe without my husband present.

I completely agree with BigDeskBo and reikizen. How big do people think maternity wards are? In our local hospital the wards are normally filled to capacity so I'm not sure where these extra men are going to go. I understand if you've had a tough labour etc you would like the support but practically it's not viable.
(Might I add I didn't have any complications and I actually really enjoyed the precious time I had with my babies when my husband left)

As a midwife (and a mum) I think it is a terrible idea! Very difficult to manage any safeguarding issues - we recently had a case of a dad watching women breastfeeding for example. I certainly would have been appalled at the idea of bumping into a man in the shower/bathroom and I can't imagine how dreadful that would be if you had been a victim of abuse. Whose job would it be to 'police' male access to shared bays? Please don't think it would be possible for the midwife (looking after 15 women and 15 babies on a ward of up to 50 women) to remember whose partner was whose! I would find it very hard to relax and sleep imagining strange men wandering around the ward.
What about the bathroom facilities? Shared? Do you want to go into a toilet after 50 men have had their morning shit and shave? What about feeding these men? Do the NHS pay for that as well? And bedding/towels etc.
As a midwife I feel horrified at the prospect of adding 15 men to my workload - and believe me- no matter how helpful you think your partner was to you, the midwife will have felt very differently about their input usually, they tend to become aggressive and demanding if they are not accommodated immediately which I am sure they think is their way of looking after their partners but merely exacerbates the problem of competing demands on staff. Men on postnatal wards do not replace staff in any way.
I know how awful it feels to spend that first night alone, but it is an NHS hospital, not a hotel and we cannot get the two confused. If you think postnatal wards are hot, overcrowded and chaotic now, try doubling the number of people in that space and see how that pans out!

In a private room, fine, on a ward no way. It's bad enough trying to sleep without a bunch of noisy, talking, snoring men added to all the screaming babies. Wards are already overcrowded. There's also a safety issue. You're so vulnerable after having a baby and now any strange man can be in the bay beside you... A man who could have any kind of history. Just no.

I don't think partners should be on a shared ward with other women. Not fair on others who are entitled to privacy.

The ideal would be all private rooms with the option of partners staying though.