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AIBU?

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Original poster

To believe this? - Is this just an old wives tale? 50's baby routine. My partner thinks I'm stupid to believe mums used to do this..

258 replies

NinaJade666 · 08/07/2013 11:28

So I've heard from lots of people that 'back in the day' (specifically the 50's) that new mums were advised to get baby into a strict routine, which involved parking babies in their pram at the end of the garden and bringing them in every 3 or 4 hours for a feed. Crying or not.

My partner says don't be an idiot and believe that, that's just an old wives tale. QUOTE - "They never would have done that. Put baby as far away as possible from mum? In the garden alone? They weren't stupid back then you know."

Anyone know if their parents or grandparents did this or were advised to?
Any links anyone can provide to 'prove' I'm right? Or wrong?

TIA

OP posts:
ladymariner · 09/07/2013 08:26

lottie I had one of those for my ds, or very similar, it was grey and silver and I absolutely loved it. We walked everywhere really as I couldn't get it in the car and if I ever had to use the little buggy thing I felt like I was pushing a dolls pram! Couldn't bear to part with it, it's all polished and vaselined and wrapped in the attic, waiting (hopefully!) for grandchildren....

meddie · 09/07/2013 08:35

both mine (23 and 24 now) where put outside of an afternoon to sleep in the big pram. They slept like logs in the fresh air. weren't left to cry though.

MumnGran · 09/07/2013 08:38

LadyMariner, I agree that sleeping in the pram in the garden is a lovely option if circumstances permit - I often did it with mine - but the OP was aking about the 50's habit of literally pushing the pram as far away from house as possible so screaming was as inaudible as possible, and leaving it there until the next feed was due 4 hours later.
There is a big difference Smile

Blamenargles · 09/07/2013 08:39

Both my mum and Auntie were left out side in the fresh air, I'm 26 and there are pictures of me and my sisters in their old silver cross pram out on the front lawn at my grandmas house.
I did the same when DS was little And the wether was nice.
We were never left to cry tho.

mrsjay · 09/07/2013 09:06

I am sure these babiesself soothed and were not screaming the place down I am sure 1950s mums were not heartless

Bogeyface · 09/07/2013 09:11

My mother did this in the 70's. and I would cry and cry and cry. She said that if she saw the pram rocking she knew I was ok.

I think she had PND, we never bonded and she didnt actually like me very much at all. Sometimes she would talk about me in the way you would a naughty older child, its only now that she acknowledges that at 3 months old, I could not have been "very naughty". The HV ok'd it, but I am not sure she knew about the crying, it was so bad that the neighbour used to pop around regularly, which mum has always written off as her being a nosey old busybody. :(

BuntyCollocks · 09/07/2013 09:16

My mum did this with my sister as I had been a clingy child and she wasn't having another - she's 23! So not just a 50's mentality. DM thinks I should do the same with mine, but I can't.

MumnGran · 09/07/2013 09:17

mrsjay ...you obviously never met mine!!

Seriously, though, there was simply a totally different view of babies. Nothing was child centred in those days, and picking babies up off schedule was considered as 'spoiling'. Babies crying were not considered to be 'communicating' in the only way they can, but as being naughty for not sleeping on schedule. Babies under this method of parenting literally did scream until they fell asleep from exhaustion.
Yes, I am sure they learned to self soothe eventually, but they also learned that their needs would not be met.

mrsjay · 09/07/2013 09:19

you know I am sure you are both right maybe i am just thinking they all couldnt have been that bad

Lilymaid · 09/07/2013 09:32

Both my brother and I had our tonsils out in the 1960s. Parents were not allowed to visit. I remember going into hospital on a Wednesday afternoon - quite fun as there was another girl in next bed who I played with, operation on Thursday ... next meal was Fish and Chips on Friday Shock and then my parents were allowed to collect us on Saturday morning. When my brother had his tonsils out he was so traumatised that he wouldn't speak to my parents for weeks after (even when his throat was better). I'm sure my mother would have visited/stayed if she was permitted but it was not permitted.

I know of someone else whose parents went on holiday when she had her tonsils out - she had to leave hospital and catch a bus (aged about 8 or 9) to stay with her granny!

jacks365 · 09/07/2013 09:38

Mrs jay I've had my mum lecture me on feeding to a schedule, my older dc told off by her for picking up the youngest when she cried etc. I know my mum looks down on me for feeding on demand and not letting my daughter cry. I've been told she'll be fine just left in the garden etc afterall I was! You wouldn't believe the number of times I've been told dd4 would end up spoilt because I had her in a sling not a pram. Am I close to my mum? Not really, we see her a lot but I'd say its more out of duty than anything else.

mrsjay · 09/07/2013 09:40

we have all had that jacks it is what people who did it before us do , we all know lifting a child doesn't spoil them just let it all go over and smile and nod,

mrsjay · 09/07/2013 09:42

20 yrs ago MIL told me to get a rusk into dd1 as she was obviously starving and needed to put weight on (she was under 5lb at birth) she was 9 weeks old Shock

MumnGran · 09/07/2013 09:44

Oh this brought back memories lily Sad
No sign of a parent until they arrived to collect you on Day 3. And the first meal given after the tonsillectomy was .........dry toast.

mrsjay · 09/07/2013 10:09

I was always in hospital in the 70s/80s and the hospital for my medical condition was over 50 miles away mum didnt drive you were lucky if you got a visit once a week all the kids were the same though we are lucky these days childrens wards have changed it was a bit shit tbh Sad

Bogeyface · 09/07/2013 10:18

mumngran DD got toast when she had her tonsils out 5 years ago. The nurse said that the old idea of ice cream and soft foods was no good as it meant that there would be a build up of crap on the throat and could lead to infection, so actually the dry taost did you a favour!

I was 4 when I went in to have my adenoids out, and mum was only allowed one half hour visit per day. The fact that I reacted badly to the GA and was hysterical and hallucinating for several hours after the op was not deemed bad enough for her to be called in to me. It was barbaric :(

mrsjay · 09/07/2013 10:21

YY to the dry toast doing its thing

bogey it is horrible eh I had to get treatments that were none to pleasant alone nobody would let that happen to a child these days

Bogeyface · 09/07/2013 10:25

I am horrified when I think back to how babies and children were treated back in the 70's. When I had to have an op in 85 (8 years after the adenoid op) it was day surgery and mum stayed with me throughout.

I know that a lot of the older generations think that we are too soft on our kids, but frankly I would rather that than have my children put through some of the awful experiences me and my sister went through. I was 4 FFS! Not at school, still a baby really!

ShotgunNotDoingThePans · 09/07/2013 10:26

Thinking about it, if anything had gone wrong with either of my ops, they couldn't have called my parents in - we didn't have a phone!

I know I woke up the night after my (eye) op aged four needing a wee.
I was a bedwetter and had already had one accident which the nurses were really kind about (no one shouted at me - imagine!) but was still ashamed at the thought of it happening again. I unwrapped the copious bandage from my head, took off the little plasters over my eyes Shock and crept past the nurses' office where they were chatting.

The next morning the nurse (kind, again) said they must have fallen off in the night.

mrsjay · 09/07/2013 10:27

my mum had scarlett fever in the late 50s she was in a isolation hospital for months apparently and people used to wave to her from the window once or twice a week Sad My nana did say she was heartbroken , mum missed loads of school as well and didnt catch up,

wonderingsoul · 09/07/2013 10:28

the dry toast was to keep scabs from forming and to keep it "clean" from infection, they still liek to give normal food now for it.

i find it so intereasting, how much things have changed, and how children have grow to be seen as people to.

i wonder how victorains and before that raised their children.

Bogeyface · 09/07/2013 10:33

MrsJay I had scarlet fever when I was about 11, I had 2 weeks off school and that was it. Its weird how treatments change isnt it? My adenoid op was 3 days in hospital, you would be in and out on the same day now!

mrsjay · 09/07/2013 10:36

yes dd had a mild form of it a few years ago it was easter so she was off anyway antibiotics and she was right as rain,

allmycats · 09/07/2013 10:47

My grandmother used to tell me that when I was a baby i was put out in the yard - think row of terraces with 1 big communal area out back, along with other babies in prames (they were proper prams in those days, big Silver cross type carriages, and that all the babies were put out together in the afternoon and 1 of the mums or grannies was on 'baby duty, to jiggle the prams of the cryers. They took it in turns for baby duties, but apparently my grannie got the new mums backs up a bit because she used to hold cryers and was 'spoiling them'.
I used to put my son (now 25) out by the back door (but he was not visible from the street) when the weather was OK and he either went to sleep or 'chattered tothe birds, clouds etc. I must point out that he did have a 'proper pram' great big carriage with sun canopy etc. - it was ace !

working9while5 · 09/07/2013 10:51

I put my "baby" outside to sleep every dry day. He's 1 and I don't let him cry but I do really like him having fresh air! My mother in law, who lives on a farm in Ireland, always shakes her head and says, "we couldn't do that round our farm, the mink would get them. Vicious animals, mink".