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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To hope Kate leaves hospital wearing..

245 replies

alwayshavepeckham · 02/05/2015 18:04

Slippers, a faded towelling dressing gown, a scrunchie & big soppy grin.
Like most new mums.

Must be grim having her hair & makeup done.

OP posts:
Hakluyt · 04/05/2015 12:51

"A woman in the supermarket queue told me that women used to stay in hospital for a fortnight"

Well, rich women did!

millymae · 04/05/2015 13:29

No it was just rich women Hakluynt - my mum (who certainly wasn't rich) was in a (NHS) hospital for 8 days after having me, 4 after having my sister and 48 hours after her third.

What's more, she tells me that all babies were taken away to the nursery each night so that the new mums could get some sleep and mums had an hour of enforced bed rest in the morning. All three of us were straightforward normal deliveries and the advice given to mum on leaving hospital was to have a salt bath everyday and remain indoors for at least 7 days. So far as I know none of us had any attachment issues as a result of us being taken to sleep in a carefully supervised night nursery and mum managed to breast-fed us all until we were at least 8 months old without any problems

This wasn't the dark ages either - I'm only in my 30's!!

SirChenjin · 04/05/2015 13:46

Anything between 7-10 days was normal in the 60s - which is why my DM opted for a home delivery for my younger sister. Really interesting thread about childbirth in the 60s here - www.mumsnet.com/Talk/childbirth/a1326775-How-it-was-in-the-1960s

limitedperiodonly · 04/05/2015 13:48

It's nothing to do with being rich. Just different practices.

This couple looked like they could afford a number of nights at the Lindo Wing. Maybe she was there for ages but I imagine not. They chose to leave. In a Bentley.

And good luck to them.

At the dawn of the NHS my mum stayed in with my brother for 10 days. By the time she had me she came out the next day. She didn't have to. She preferred to.

She was horrified by the idea of home births. In her pre-NHS experience they meant nothing but fear, misery, injury and death. That's what happened to her mother. That's being poor.

Recently my Polish minge waxer had her second baby here. She was discharged the same day and was appalled. That's not what happened with her first birth at home, she said.

But there was no reason for them to stay in, so why should they? I wasn't going to say that though, what with her holding a spatula of hot wax over my minge.

Idontseeanydragons · 04/05/2015 13:56

My mum stayed in for 2 weeks with me, I'm not 40 yet and we were definitely not rich. 4 years later with my sister she was out after 5 days.

LittleIda · 04/05/2015 13:58

Really interesting thread Sir

fatlazymummy · 04/05/2015 14:02

For my 1st birth (1988) it was 5-6 days, depending on actual time of birth. For 2nd and subsequent births the policy was 2 days.
My 2nd birth (which was very quick and straightforward) in 1996, I was discharged straight from the delivery room, 3 hours after the birth. So there seems to have been a change in those 8 years.
Really, for the majority of uncomplicated births, it's probably safer to go home as soon as possible. Hospitals are full of sick people.

limitedperiodonly · 04/05/2015 14:17

My mum would have told a story similar to the OP in SirChengin's link.

By that time it was me in the '60s, so her third baby, so she was quite battle-hardened. Not that she ever sounded less than assertive even as a child.

She told me that when she was in with me a nurse barked at a first time mother who was having trouble breastfeeding that her baby would starve unless she got on with it but didn't offer to help.

She said she told the nurse off - I well believe that of my mum - and helped the poor girl saying: 'Do you mind if I touch your titty, love?' Grin

She was 41 at the time so more than capable of standing up to officious cunts.

She said there was also another nurse when she was had me or perhaps my elder sister who'd ordered her to take out her curlers because 'Doctor's coming.'

My mum said my dad was coming off a hard day's work at the docks and she wanted to look her finest for him so the nurse and her doctor could bugger off.

I miss my mum. Grin

She was an avid fan of Call The Midwife which is set around her area.

She thought many things were very realistic and could forgive the more fanciful modern notions.

kelda · 04/05/2015 14:20

She sounds great Limitedpeiodonly Smile

Yourehavinganarf · 04/05/2015 14:25

It was interesting to see that another Lindo patient left a few hours before Kate (and got papped) - she was wearing black from head to toe and looked, hmm, like she'd just had a newborn tbh.

I wouldn't wear a white dress for at least 2 weeks each month. I left hospital with DD in a very sensible pair of black maternity trousers.

Good for Kate though, I can't think of anything worse than having to go through that media circus 10 hours after giving birth.

Lweji · 04/05/2015 14:32

I would gladly have gone home the same day, were it not for feeling very faint, probably due to blood loss and not having eaten much or slept much the two days prior to the birth, which happened overnight.
I also managed to have a shower, and would easily have washed my hair, was it not for feeling that bit faint for the first day.

I couldn't get home soon enough.

(St Mary's hospital, but the other wing Grin )

limitedperiodonly · 04/05/2015 14:52

In an ideal world I would be fabulously rich but anonymous.

Except for where it counts.

So I'd be able to be welcomed lavishly wherever I wanted, buy whatever I wanted, have hairdressers and make up artists primp me when I felt like it and avoid the attentions of the paparazzi and kidnappers.

It can be done but I'm never going to be there Sad

Hakluyt · 04/05/2015 14:58

"In an ideal world I would be fabulously rich but anonymous."

Well, Kate Cambridge has damn nearly achieved that!

TiredUponRising · 04/05/2015 15:18

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Strokethefurrywall · 04/05/2015 16:12

All clothes/hair/make up talk aside, I think she and William looked totally and utterly besotted. She had that gorgeous "I've just given birth to this incredible baby!" smile and it really shone through in the pictures that I've seen.

I was lucky that I had very easy straightforward births with both my two and quite honestly looked better straight after delivery with them than I do right now. Minimal bleeding, slightly uncomfortable from stitches with the first but still able to move easily. DS2 I was tired from a 6am birth but did my hair and make up and DH took me out for lunch once we were discharged from hospital and I felt amazing.
I didn't feel any pressure from anyone else but felt myself with some make up and my hair done.

But let's face it, Kate was damned if she did and damned if she didn't. She isn't there to send a message to the masses, she isn't there to make other women feel shit about what they wore or looked like 10 hours after childbirth. She's just a woman in the public eye, walking out with her newborn daughter and smiling for the cameras. No hidden agenda as far as I could see!

I've no doubt that with the world's press waiting to see what she's wearing, Kate needed to be primped and ready to greet the nation. But I've also no doubt that the whole time she was doing it she was probably thinking "let's get this over and done with so I can go home, have a lovely cup of tea and start enjoying my life with my two babies" - congratulations to them, a new baby is such a blessing.

susannahmoodie · 04/05/2015 16:16

Yes I though that about the hair too, her roots were showing after George.

Tbf I think the first few hours after giving birth both times I was on a total high, and probably felt and looked a lot better than I did a few days later with engorged leaking boobs, weeping uncontrollably...

LuluJakey1 · 04/05/2015 22:13

It would have been nice for them if she could have done a Cherie Blair and been to the hospital, given birth and got back home then announced it to the press.

LuluJakey1 · 04/05/2015 22:19

I think most couples have that besotted in love look when a baby is born. DH and I were all gazy and lovey and secret smiles. He could not do enough for me. I remember him holding open the car door for me to get in and then closing it cos that is a regular thing usually
I was made cups of tea galore, breakfasts in bed, he did all the housework and cooking ..........for a week and then we were back to normal shares. Ds is almost 20 weeks and we still have that shared thing about we've done something amazing together.

Ecudadordreaming · 05/05/2015 11:08

I wonder if the lady (and man!) all dressed in black would have dressed differently if she had known that there was a press pack outside as she left the hospital?

seafoodeatit · 05/05/2015 11:32

Perhaps she had a rather straightforward labour? 10 hours is a good amount of time to get ready if labour was short and without complications.

My labour was 5 hours from waters breaking and I was up and about pretty much straight afterwards despite needing stitches, I had a shower 3 hours later and another the following morning before heading home. I certainly wouldn't have left the hospital looking like a mess. I wore a navy nursing wrap dress (which I'll probably re-use for my next pregnancy) and two pairs of underwear on the way home - paper pants just looked like they would be too uncomfortable.

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