Prisoner!

[crazybutkind]

So I had a baby on Tuesday evening and I am still currently in hospital. We are ok baby's temp is just a little low but they have ruled out anything serious.

As you can imagine nobody wants to be in hospital on their own with a newborn at the minute but I have been in the same room now since 7:30pm on Tuesday. I'm not allowed to open the window because they don't want baby getting cold, I'm not allowed the fan on because of the same reason and I'm not allowed to go to leave the ward for some fresh air because of covid.

It's absolutely roasting outside, i am just stewing in my own sweat at the minute. All I want is 5 minutes of fresh air.

It's been 36 hours now and I feel ill.

I just want to go and stand at the entrance for 5 mins AIBU?

Yes that's exactly it - just say - but I've been out earlier, the doctor recommended getting mobile and getting fresh air.

Jesus how to encourage PND!

When your new nurses/shift are on now, they'll do the obvs, then medication. Then about 10pm or so, once they've done your bp etc., given you your meds, go out for a little fresh air before bed-time. I also hope that you get a lovely sleep.

Could you ask them to write down exactly why you are unable to go outside/open the window in the room and write down exactly what is happening with your baby. Then you have written evidence of what exactly has been said

PS, the weather forecast for London tonight is not lower than 20 degrees and to be very muggy. So just sleep in your jim-jams/nightie or you'll be a lather of sweat. A sheet is enough probably if you feel cool in order to get to sleep.
Was it a natural birth? Want to tell us if it's a boy/girl/weight etc.?
I'm sorry that your time in hospital has been so nasty.

Ask them where the signed and witnessed DoLs paperwork is for you.
If they haven't got it, they can't stop you going anywhere you please.

What a awful situation. Being in hospital is crap at the best of times with the lack of fresh air and windows but during a heatwave and when you can't even have DP with you must be awful.

Good on you for standing up for yourself today.

Surely it's safer for you and your baby to be at home than in a hospital at the moment?

I hope things get better

OP I had a homebirth in high summer a couple of years ago it was boiling. They baby’s temp was under 36 at first. Wrapped him in a blanket, hat, mits and he was like that for about 3 days till temp up to a good level. Took him out for walks (in the fresh hot air!) and not one health professional was concerned. He also did not breastfeed properly for several days, again no one was overly concerned. I have also had two hospital births. After one hospital birth they would not discharge me until they had seen the baby have a substantial feed. She had one but because they hadn’t seen it they would not discharge me! In the end I discharged myself and was told off and made to fee extremely reckless but the baby was bloody fine.

It’s up to you whether you discharge yourself and you need to be sensible about taking advice from strangers on the internet over medical professionals but
in my experience (and that of others I know) hospitals can have stringent requirements for discharging people but it’s not always necessarily the life and death situation it’s made out be (provided you’re don’t live 2 hours from the nearest hospital).

Your health (mental and physical) is absolutely as important as baby’s and you are a good mother if you recognise that and take care of yourself!! Good luck!

This is the kind of nonsense referral social services get from hospitals occasionally and they get read, laughed at and binned. I was in a similar situation with my daughter and I really wished I discharged myself so I could get a decent rest.

@GimmeAy

Just be nice as pie, praise them, and then do what you feel like. That's what I do.

Long time since I had a baby, but I remember with my second, I had no cigarette for 2 days (gave birth by c-section on Wednesday pm), I was in bed all day Thursday and Friday morning I'd have clawed through every human to get out for a cigarette.
Except the morphine had stopped so I was in a lot of pain, so this bitch of an old nurse gave me pethidine and said 'now stay in that bed'. I didn't know it was a medical instruction, I figured it was her being rude, so when my aunt (also a smoker) came in to visit, I begged her to bring me down for a cigarette. Nurse was like, well she shouldn't really be going out yet and I said - I'M GOING OUT. Off I tootled and promptly fainted mid-cigarette outside the hospital door. Cue a big fuss of getting wheelchair to get me back up to the ward and me not being let out again until a new shift came on lol.

Anyway smokers are every nurses worst nightmare. Though I've been told that we're the first to get on our feet, due to our undying desire for a fag. Lol. Doctors are more sympathetic sometimes when you explain that you are a heavy smoker and asked for patches which you haven't been provided so you need a cigarette before you go into withdrawals. If you're polite enough, they let you away with a lot. If you're a pushover though, they'll keep you in bed.

I’m speechless...

Honestly - doctors have been known to note that smokers are least likely to get blood clots from lying in bed, as they're the first to walk out for a cigarette, come hell or high water.
They will try to get you off it, but if you say, 'as soon as you provide me with patches, I'll start' they shut up.

Unless you're a smoker you can't realise what 2.5 days without a cigarette does to your body. And unless you're a smoker, you can't understand what lengths you'll go to to prove that you're fit to go for a cigarette.
The ones more likely to develop DVT are the overweight ones who don't move from the bed/can't move from the bed.
It's been commented to me by more than more than one doctor during different admissions 'ah, I see you're a smoker and have been walking out a few times a day'.

So just tried to say I'm going out and Iv been stopped

Their response to my 'I'm trying to give up' is usually, 'No, from our viewpoint in hospital it means you're mobile'.

So just tried to say I'm going out and Iv been stopped

Tell them you're going out whether they like it or not.

Just say calmly, I am very hot, I have no fresh air, I want to go to the entrance to cool down, if you have a nurse who wishes to accompany me, that's fine, but I AM GOING OUT.

I feel like I’m on another planet than the other posters on here.

Complaining about not having ice for your water? Food portion sizes? Really?!

I understand it’s shit to be kept in hospital and not allowed to open window blah blah but they are medical professionals and they are trying to raise your baby’s temperature. Agree with a PP it would be different if you were at home, had a homebirth etc but you aren’t and you didn’t. They are responsible for the well-being of your baby. And of course they will contact SS if you discharge yourself and your baby against medical advice.

I had a very sick child in hospital during this pandemic and my husband was not allowed in. It’s horrible, yes. But it’s for the safety of other vulnerable babies. It’s just a couple more days.

YANBU at all! I think the attitude of the midwives is shocking tbh, and i say this as a fellow nurse. Your baby is safe and warm in an incubator, ooen your window and tell them it is staying open, or you will be putting in a formal complaint. I'm so sorry you are going through this when it should be such a happy time.

Tell them your doctor advised you earlier to get fresh air and to get mobile.

This thread makes for some uncomfortable reading! @crazybutkind I'm so sorry to hear you're going through this ordeal, the fact your baby is being monitored and you can't even get some air - it's almost as though they're trying to break you into somekind of breakdown or something, it's so disturbing. Can you keep your phone on record in your pocket for the next few interactions - ask that you want to know precisely WHY you're not allowed to go out, why you haven't been allowed any kind of air since Tuesday, HOW an open window affects a closed incubator etc. and record all the answers - ask as many people as possible on the ward and use the BS responses as evidence against their negligence OP. Is this your first baby and do they know that?

They won't contact SS. They didn't when I discharged myself and baby against medical advice. No one can stop you leaving except the police with a court order.
The hospital sounds awful and who eats tea at 4 and is then expected to go until 7 the next morning without eating. I really hope you can get home tomorrow.

On the face of it, it seems unreasonable not to allow you to open the window but, as your child has a low temperature, and they have explained why, then you should think of your child's health and put up with it.

The problem is that the advice OP has been given has a distinct whiff of "computer says no" about it - it's just the standard advice trotted out for every baby with temperature control difficulties and no-one has stopped to think that it is simply irrational in a heatwave.

I had one baby in January, one in December. The January baby had jaundice. It was in the days when three day stays were standard, and the wards were heated to tropical levels. My babies then had to be taken out in icy temperatures to the car and taken home where we kept the temperature of the house at more normal levels. They both did absolutely fine.

They need a DoLS to keep you in against your will. And since you seem to have full mental capacity they can't get one for you. Ask them who to call to complain about being imprisoned.

If your baby is in an incubator then they are in Neonatal, no?

Otherwise baby is in a cot?

Och, your poor thing. That sounds torturous. Mental well-being is just as important as physical health!
Congrats and hope you get home soon