to feel sad that friend is happy to be separated from her newborn for first 3 nights

[Whoneedssleepanyway]

My friend is due to have DC2 in a few weeks and after a very bad labour resulting in some problems for her DS, she has booked into a private hospital for an elective CS.

I w her the other day and she said the hospital insist she stays in 3 nights and it is brilliant as they will take the baby to the nursery all night for her so she can sleep and will feed the baby for her as she doesn't intend to BF.

I didn't pass comment as this is up to her but I can't help feeling a bit sad that her baby won't be with its mum for the first 3 nights of its life but will be with some stranger, both my DDs slept with me (on my chest) for first 3 nights.

AIBU?

There's also the fact that as a midwife if I have a baby out at the desk with me I'll pick up on early feeding cues straight away and take the baby back for a b/f. Stay with the mum and help as needed.

Plenty of first time mums won't pick up on obvious feeding cues as they're just not used to it yet. The amount of times I go to answer a buzzer to find a harrased mum who says they've been trying to settle the baby for ages and I take one look and can see the baby is desperate for a feed.

And if a baby hasn't woken for a feed and I think its due one I'll take it back even if its settled and wake mum and get her started on skin to skin. Wheras a mum is likely to sleep through if baby is sleeping. I can't keep track of who has woken when for a feed, I can't wake a mum up at 3am to ask when the baby last fed incase she only just finished feeding and got to sleep 15 mins ago.

So I run round at 7am trying to check on the ones I'm not sure about and just pray that I don't get a well rested mum who says that the baby has slept since 10pm.

Tantrum, yy. First two were ebf, then dd2 was born without a suck/ gag reflex etc. I expressed for 6 weeks for the tube, but it damned near killed me. It really isn't all that important in the long run, but it doesn't stop the guilt. Particularly when the helpful assume you are a bit cold and heartless. Oh, and selfish. Almost forgot.

It really isn't that important.

My twins adored being swaddled and only dp could do it the way they liked it-seriously. However I did it it was never right. When he did it they immediately settled.I think it was because it was so squashed in there(2 nearly 7 lb babies they couldn't handle space).

I liked the fact that they were swaddled but I would have liked to swaddle them myself and have them near.

shag in your last post you said it was best for establishing and maintaining Breastfeeding, OPs friend isn't breastfeeding

That's all it boils down to,another breastfeeding lecture, yawn, I wish someone would change the record on that one.

yes nice and tight was apparently the way to go

Mils friend did dd1 I was to scared to do it but she wrapped her up nice and tight im sure she was squashed to sleep after the friend showed me i was away and did it with dd2 when she came out of baby care

Why would you want to do it yourself.My dp was extremely hands on(he was the only one who could wind dtwin1 the right way to actually produce wind too).I don't get this mum only shit.

We're a family.

I wanted to do it myself in the hospital rather than have the nurses do it. I fully expected exH to be an active parent, but when we got home with DD1, I found that exH wasn't really into the nuts and bolts of baby care -- his loss. By the time I had had DC5 I could do it all in my sleep (and frequently did.)

Everything beaver says is similar to what happens in my unit.

Wondering if we work in the same me now

Thyme out - there is a WORLD of difference between taking a baby for a few hours if a mum is feeling really unwell, because there is no one who will sit in her cubicle and watch her and her baby sleep; and reinstating a whole night nursery service for anyone who wants it. The latter institutionalises regular and prlonged mother and baby separation within a context where many mums are already struggling to establish breastfeeding. How can that be a good thing for mothers and babies? And midwives and MSW are already struggling to find the time to help women breastfeed . Where do the staff find the time to sit around cuddling babies?

Tango - even babies who are not being breastfed benefit from lots of skin to skin in the ways I mentioned earlier.

'Because, patently, the longer and better you breast feed is utterly indicative of how long, happy and fulfilled life you will lead'

This is one of the silliest, comments I have EVER seen about breastfeeding.

Leading a 'long, happy and fulfilled' life has very little, if anything at all to do with how long and how 'better' you were breastfed.

Even if you were lovingly breastfed till you were 12 years old, the millions of other experiences and interactions you have in this time will shape you far more as a person.

You're missing the point shag

Your facts, stats, etc are the type of thing that are making new mothers ashamed to ask for help.

Well done.

Viva - 2 questions: how many of the staff on your unit are as clued up as you? Because in my nearest unit there are many staff who woukdn't recognise a feeding cue if it came up and poked them in the eye.

Second question: how often do you see mums doing S2S on postnatal?

You almost never see it where I am. Postnatal ward too busy and so little privacy. Nobody encourages it.

Tantrum - why would they not ask for help if they need it?

What have I said that makes you think new mums don't need and shouldn't be offered help?

The OP is about newborn baby who will be experiencing planned, prolonged separation from its mum in hospital.

I did s2s about 10 minutes after my cs. And I didn't have to insist, they encouraged it.

Maybe you need to get out and about a bit more then, shag. It's v common in most places. As are clued up professionals. Sad that isn't the case where you are, though. Do you spend much time on the ward?

Shag your wording is very telling...

YOU say 'the mum should be offered help'

Tantrumsandballoons is asking what would happen if that help was not forthcoming and, because of views like yours asking for help seems a step too far.

Is that really so unbelieveable?

I was alone with a NB and a 13MO and expected to cope alone. I'm still dealing with the fall out from that. I never once dared ask for help and, as sure as eggs are eggs, no bugger offered it.

Shag, from my experience here - id say more or less all of the midwives. We're all level 3 UNICEF trained, and have regular updates.

Even gynae staff and nurses on the children's ward are given the same training.

With regards to skin to skin, not as much as it could be used but it's promoted a lot, and one of the best tools to get a reluctant baby feeding.

I think banning all visitors would be a huge help in mums doing more of it. But that's a whole other debate for another day

All staff are as clued up as I am. Inc hcsw.

We have a very good infant feeding coordinator who ensures we are able to recognise feeding cues. We also have to make sure that all women have been told feeding cues before they leave hospital. We have a page in pn notes with a list of about 30 different things we have to tell women about breastfeeding before they leave.

All women are advised to have s2s immediately after birth. We have to document in the notes start and end time of s2s.

Anyone with feeding problems or an unsettled baby will be advised to do s2s as the first thing to try.

Our IFC audits our work by visiting/ringing women and asking them to tell her 5 ways to recognise effective attachment, 3 different feeding cues, etc. She states she is getting a very high percentage of women who can answer such questions.

Shag

Please read Viva's post about the difficulty of keeping track of whose baby has fed when because they can't see what's happening in individual cubicles.

The OP's friend is proposing to ff. I imagine the private hospital nursery also accommodates bf babies for the few hours between feeds to enable their mother's to recover. I think the same service should be available to all mothers in NHS hospitals, whatever sort of delivery they have had. As it always used to be.

I wonder how many women give up b.f. because they are too sleep deprived to cope in the early stages. Better to have a midwife bring you your baby to be fed so she can help than be struggling on your own behind a curtain. And then pop in and take it away again to give you another few hours.

Under the old system, babies were sleeping peacefully in the nursery and mothers ditto on the wards. How was that bad?

And there were many other factors in operation as variables to breast feeding rates in the 60/70's.

I was in for 4 nights with DS after EMCS. He wasn't allowed in with me. The last night they let me as I was the only one in the room and I cried!.

Never did DS or me any harm attachment wise - but I did miss him.

I had to learn my instincts.