to think not everyone has someone to look after DCs whilst they give birth????

[deliakate]

For one reason or another, the two close friends we've made in this area since moving here 20 months ago are not going to be in a position to take DS (20 months) for as long as is needed whilst I give birth this May. I feel really embarrassed as have no family nearby that would do it either. So we are a bit stuck. He can go to our elderly neighbours, but not to sleep, and I know labour has a habit of going on all night sometimes!

Could we take DS to the hospital with us? And have him sleep in buggy somewhere? When he was born, I was moved into HDU, and there were about 10 medics in there, so he would have to have been outside the room. Would they even allow this?

What else can we do??? Surely we aren't the only ones in this position. Or is DH going to have to miss this birth?

OP -No not everyone does and IME some MW and HCP just do not/will not get that. A lot of people with family care pretty much on tap will not either and will be very dismissive of the problems.

Chose a home birth with second LO - but had so many people offer to help friends, neighbours, work mates - it was so touching.

Had to move and with third birth literally no-one would help us - complete opposite to before and a bit . Also had MW who did everything including lie to stop us having a home birth as she disliked them. One of her comments was I was not allowed to give birth in same house as my DC . We got the go ahead for HB but rapid labour and MW fucking round taking over an hour to get from less than three miles away possibly to punish us for complaining to management with accompanying proof about lying MW told meant they were 40 minutes to late. All fine but very scary and unnecessary risky thanks to them.

MW, HV refused to believe our family could not help out and our friends would not. I can only echo what everyone else has said and looking hiring either someone to be with you during labour or babysitter for DC and making sure your happy with the arrangements so you are not stressing during labour.

DS came with to hospital when DD was born due to family not being close by and friends unavailable that weekend (she was quite early and labour was quite short). In the end during the actual birth he just kind of fell asleep in a room next to the delivery suite with a student midwife who was manning the desk keeping an eye on him.

It wasn't ideal and it meant that DH couldn't be with me for most of the labour as he was walking round the hospital with DS but it all kind of worked out in the end. DS has no memory of it at all! I don't remember the staff complaining really - they just seemed to understand the situation and get on with it!

mathanxiety you seem to be p**d off that I don't capitulate under the weight of latin and soundbites. I don't get why you can't simply read a thread and get the messages delivered - is it because they're expressed in plain english? My experiences are fairly extreme, both in terms of number of numbers and quality and no, I don't think they relate to all women and no, I am not so arrogant as to think I am some kind of birth guru. The poor OP is in a fix. She wants DH at the birth, understandably. She may well not be able to manage that for practical reasons. She's not helped by another poster telling her that for totally extraneous reasons, however tragic and real, that poster is still choking back tears five years on simply because DH wasn't present, despite the fact that the outcome of the birth in question was a third healthy child. I thought, as other posters thought, that the fact that many women have to give birth 'alone', would give OP support. This thread has shown more than anything else that women having their second or subsequent births, far from family, or with uncooperative family and with no community support have still managed fine. The bottom line is that if the birth goes wrong the fact that DH wasn't there won't make it better because the outcome was heartbreaking anyway and if it goes fine then thank your lucky stars, even in this day and age, that you have a normal healthy baby and now the work can begin.

'both in terms of numbers'. It's been a long day. Why is there no edit function for incompetents like me?

But Yellowstone, who elected you the judge of what helps or doesn't help the OP? Did she ask you to sort through the replies to her post and save her the trouble? So not pissed off as much as puzzled about your self-appointed role as arbiter of what is or is not helpful, in other words. And also wondering if you are tone deaf.

Yes, the fact is that many women give birth without the support of a DP. Many have managed fine. But at least one poster did not and it really is not kind to have characterised that person's response the way you did, nor is it necessarily true that because many women have managed fine the OP will too.

She's not helped by another poster telling her that for totally extraneous reasons, however tragic and real, that poster is still choking back tears five years on simply because DH wasn't present, despite the fact that the outcome of the birth in question was a third healthy child

So charities set up to help women who have experienced birth trauma are a waste of time and the women should just thank their lucky stars they have a healthy child?

By the same token women that have PND should just be grateful they have a healthy child?

That's how your post reads yellowstone

The bottom line is that if the birth goes wrong the fact that DH wasn't there won't make it better because the outcome was heartbreaking anyway and if it goes fine then thank your lucky stars, even in this day and age, that you have a normal healthy baby

Having dh with me did make it better at the birth when things went wrong - it helped a great deal.

Yeah, I have to agree - if I'd had to deliver dd1 without dh, or, in fact, get her diagnosis without him, I'm sure I would have been far more traumatised than I was - his being there made an enormous difference, and having been through what we have, I think I would have really struggled to come to terms with it had it not been so much a shared experience with the person I loved most there.

And while I do get that the OP needs to feel that it will be ok no matter what, I don't think it's necessary to denigrate the feelings of another to quite such an extent in the pursuit of that. I think sometimes opinions couched as fact can be irksome.

valium that's not how my post reads, that's how you claim it reads because you think it will undermine my post which happens to mention the fact that the health of the baby comes above and before anything else.

Please don't plant words in my posts. I never mentioned anywhere anything about charities or PND. It just doesn't follow.

Ok I'd have felt less bad had my husband been there when things went seriously wrong with me on five separate occasions but he couldn't be. Just because you were that lucky doesn't mean that my passing on my pretty tough experience to encourage someone else is bad. I still take the view that someone choking back tears after five years and a third healthy baby is extreme but then the poster herself has acknowledged that someone else's posts about the loss of a child has put the matter in perspective; she also says herself that she feels she does need counselling.

valium and habbibu you were both obviously far more fortunate than me. But if OP does find herself in a situation like mine as opposed to your happier one, then perhaps my experience will help her since yours, with your husbands there for you both, won't be relevant.

Yellowstone (it's Hab) - I guess no-one would have argued if you'd said "you know what, I had a hellish time 5 times over, and DH couldn't be there, but I did get through it, and so can you, OP". That would have been fine, and super-helpful, but I do think that your abrasiveness towards myred helped derail your own point, was unnecessary and the ensuing bunfight (and yy, I am to blame for that in part too, I'll hold my hands up) has probably scared her off.

Fwiw, I'm not sure I'd quite describe my experience with dd1 as "fortunate".

Please don't plant words in my posts. I never mentioned anywhere anything about charities or PND. It just doesn't follow

I didn't say you did Yellowstone. I said that.

You claim that people are 'wet' and should man up and get on with it. That a mother who experiences birth trauma 5 years on is unusual - it's not, that's why there are charities set up to help women -there are hundreds of women who are traumatised by horrendous births. There are many posts on MN alone.

What I'm saying is, if you think women are a bit 'wet' and should just be grateful for a healthy child, by the same token do you feel that about a woman with PND? Do you think they should just get on with it because they have a healthy baby?

Anyway, I really hope the OP manages to find childcare arrangements and has a stress free delivery :)

Thing is Hab I'm not one to shout any misfortune I might have had from the rooftop and I didn't feel I should usurp a thread by banging on about myself. If you look back you'll see that those details which I have given have crept out in response to, or defence against, others. The same way your details have crept out. So no, I wouldn't have taken your suggested line, I feel that would have been wrong. Especially since I haven't ended up actually losing any children at term, it would just have been cheap. I don't feel I've made any misjudgment in what I've said or I wouldn't have said it.

None of us have any reason to suppose myred is suffering from PND, she hasn't said so herself. Should there be a new category of anti-inflammatory law passed to prevent 'birthist' comments being made?

valium your quality of logic is dire. Women with PND should get help as soon as it's clear that the black cloud of PND is looming.

plopp that's pretty ironic ! (just noticed your post).

Because it's patently obvious it's opinion.

I don't defend unkindness, I just acknowledge it happens. mathanxiety you're a great twister of words and ideas and your logic is almost invariably flawed. Too many silly posts for me, just meaningless. You three (math, valium and plopp) are not defending myred, you're using her to have an argument for which I don't want to find time.

OP at least knows that lots of us go it alone and the world doesn't come to an end and that was the point of the thread.

Nobody needs to defend MyRedCardigan, surely? Why would anyone need to defend her? Is someone attacking her?

Unkindness just 'happens'?

I don't think you would know what logic was if it jumped up and bit you on the bum, tbh.

OP knows that it is your opinion that she will be fine if she winds up giving birth without the support of her DH. She may or may not feel that way herself but never mind how anyone else feels. The matter is clearly settled in your head.

Cyber bully? Good grief!

plopp that's pretty ironic ! (just noticed your post).

What the hell does that mean!!?!?!?!?!

yellowstone are you new?