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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

At comments about young mums = bad mums

124 replies

teenagedirtbag · 15/12/2011 22:17

Had my sacn today. We had a diffrent nurse than usual and as she was looking through my records she said
'oh you had your first child at 16. she read down ah I'm not surprised'
Dp gave her look of death and asked what the comment was for. She said
'well that he passed while you were so young'
(lost him shortly after birth)
I shrugged it off as me being paranoid.
She then said 'Oh well you kept your other kids alive'
She then turned to DD2 who we had to bring with us as we had no child care and she was bored of colouring and was wandering around checking out the room. The nurse turned to her and said Do mummy and Daddy feed you? or is he step daddy number 10?. She turned to Dp and said' Tell your wifes child to stop prancing in my room'
(All the DC's are ours)
She also kept asking if we had a council house? (Does that matter?)
and if we actually worked for a living. (Dp does I've been a SAHM since DD2 was born)
So am I paranoid ?or Can I go back tomorrow and complain?

OP posts:

CardyMow · 16/12/2011 11:56

I was 16yo when I had DD - and I had plenty of comments like this. Admittedly that was 13 years ago, but I did.

When I was in the delivery room just after the birth and I asked the MW if she could show me how to latch DD on, she was very dismissive - and told me "Oh, don't worry about that, I'll go and get you a bottle, 16yo's don't BF". My reply was "Well, this 16yo is going to, with OR without your help".

When I was in labour with my second dc, I was (just) 20yo, and I asked for pethidine - the MW refused, and told me that "The pain will teach you to keep your legs closed in future" - yes, I DID put in a formal complaint at that one!

When I was 17yo, and running through the town centre as I was running late, and a woman in her 40's stopped dead in front of my pram to rant at me that I shouldn't have a baby, I was stealing her tax money, and I was a benefits scrounger, and I ought to have my baby taken away from me, and I was probably spending all her taxes on drugs and neglecting my DD - I raised an eyebrow at her and said "Could you please move out of my way, I need to get my DD to Nursery quickly as I am running slightly late for work". Her face was a fucking PICTURE. . (It was true BTW, I was on my way to work)

There are LOTS of people out there with shitty attitudes to young mothers. It doesn't mean that anyone should accept these comments - and certainly not from a HCP.

IF this OP is true, then PLEASE make an official complaint. In writing. And don't let it rest until you have an official apology AND the HCP is given some training on people skills at the very least.

IF the OP isn't true - then kindly stop posting bollocks.

CardyMow · 16/12/2011 11:58

OH - and I certainly wasn't a 'benefits scrounger' back then - that was pre- Working Family Tax Credit even. I was working for £3.10 a fucking hour to support my DD, and going to college too.

StaceymAloneForver · 16/12/2011 12:01

mine was only 7 years ago so i don't know if these days it's less common or i avoid rude people !

knittedbreast · 16/12/2011 12:11

thats disgusting. she should be severly disciplined

Haziedoll · 16/12/2011 12:18

It seems entirely unbelievable to me. If true the midwife will lose her job if the hospital believe you. Why would she make comments that she knows will result in her losing her job?

VivaLeBeaver · 16/12/2011 12:19

Well I think she'd have been a midwife not a nurse and I'm staggered if a midwife actually said that word for word as you say it happened.

Are you sure it wasn't more along the lines of she's looking at your history, commented on your first child and then just as a statement said that you'd had other children who were still alive. Part of her job is to confirm your obstetric history so that would not be unusual. Then if your child was prancing about and distracting her and she asked you/your DH to control them are then perhaps slightly narked with her?

And yes asking about employment and housing is part of a midwife's role. Where I work its part of the booking appt to ask those questions and write the answers down. Then if someone is in appropriate housing we might be able to help/support them. With employment, both yours and your partners there are some occupations where a pregnant woman would have to take precautions, or if her partner is a farmer. Plus I imagine it all gets fed back to government statistics.

Complain if you are sure it really happened. However be warned she will say its not true and I think her manager would probably believe her unless she has a reputation for being crazy. In which case I wouldn't imagine she'd still be employed.

Sloobreeus · 16/12/2011 12:23

Complain. Outrageous remarks. Totally inappropriate. Let us know how you get on.

MistressFrankly · 16/12/2011 12:40

It all does sound a little over the top but saying that when i was 16 and losing my first baby i was told "stop crying, a girl like you will be pregnant again soon enough and you can have another one"

People do assume its ok to be extraordinarily rude to the young.

comedycentral · 16/12/2011 12:40

Moominsarescary · 16/12/2011 14:05

There are nasty bastards in all walks of life, usually their clever though and might say something to you but not in the hearing of others such as dp or dh

purplewednesday · 16/12/2011 14:14

Bollocks.

Nurses don't do scans, and why would you have the same sonographer as before anyway.

Agree with the poster who said that NHS staff have to put up with enough crap without people making up stories to get attention

GlueSticksEverywhere · 16/12/2011 14:17

MistressFrankly That's awful!

gothicangel · 16/12/2011 14:37

op i agree with you, and for all you that are calling her a liar ect.

the same thing happened to me, i left every scan i had with DD in tears, (i had 8 scans, due to gentic problems that could have been passed from DH, so i was kept under obs)

dont let them upset you and go back and complain.

WiiWishYouAMerryChristmas · 16/12/2011 14:51

Although the above does sound unlikely. When I was being induced with DS due to PE, the MW kept referring to me as 'our teenage Mum' with a cats bum face to boot, to which DP or I corrected 'I'm / she's not a teenager!' I don't get what the problem is with younger Mums in some people's eyes. There are a lot of older bad Mums too.

Richlinn · 16/12/2011 14:58

Complain, then come back and tell everyone what happened.

fluffy123 · 16/12/2011 15:37

Complain, I wish I had the confidence when I had my scan for DS1 23 years ago and the lady asked if I was putting my child up for adoption. I was 19 and looked really young.

champagnevanity · 16/12/2011 15:51

I had to comment, i'm a young mum 23 in jan, and as i haven't had the traditional 'young mum' comments. I've had one midwife in particular, who gave me some shitty comments about going back to work so soon.

It annoys me how they feel they have to comment, especially in such a negative way.

I also had one midwife, when i went for a scan tell me 'its not just a pretty picture you know'

If your in the UK, complain you can do it through PALS, i think thats the procedure.

Hope your okay.

FioFio · 16/12/2011 15:56

I wasn't a teenager but had my first at 21, 2nd at 23 and no-one said anything remotely nasty to me. Infact my eldest had severe disabilities (12 now) and I was never treated like a bad Mother because of my age by health professionals, they were all really supportive and professional.

mewantcookiesmenocanwait · 16/12/2011 16:04

I had my first DC at 26, but looked a lot younger (not a stealth boast - I look bloody ancient now), and had mildly bitchy comments from midwives, health visitors and GPs for a couple of years. Obviously I don't know whether this story's true, but I don't find it particularly unlikely.

Popbiscuit · 16/12/2011 16:30

Cookies your post made me laugh. I had my first at 25 (didn't think that was particularly young at the time) and looked much younger too.

Also look bloody ancient now, 10 years later...funny how that works, isn't it?

butterflyexperience · 16/12/2011 16:49

Awful!

CheerfulYank · 16/12/2011 16:56

I'm going to choose to believe it's true, because I can't believe anyone would be so cruel as to lie about having lost a child, since there are those here who actually have.

LEttletownofBOFlehem · 16/12/2011 17:00

You sweet trusting darling

CalmDownDearItsOnlyALikeButton · 16/12/2011 17:02

Unfortunately cheerful trolls have invaded the bereavement boards in the past. It would be nice to think that there aren't nasty people in the world.. but it would be naive to do so :(

Sassysusan was a particularly nasty one.

Get0rf · 16/12/2011 17:04

at bof. There is a reason why I always think of you as one of the nicest posters on here, cheerful not like the rest of us cynical cows

I never got any blatant comments, it was the looks though which were very hurtful. Hence why I never once went to the health visitor and baby clinic (apart from that fact that the HVs were nuts, I just knew that I would be patronised and given the 'look').

I often think how nice it would be to have a baby in my 30s as a hatchet-faced professional, and see if I would be treated with a bit more respect.

I still don't think though that any HCP would be that blatantly unprofessional and twattish as told in the OP, though.

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