Being drove insane on the postnatal ward

[TrappedWindArse]

I gave birth yesterday via section, had a nasty hemmorage and am now stuck on the postnatal ward with a very lethargic and jaundice DS. I haven't slept properly in days. 20 mins here and there. I'm fucked.

There's a seemingly pleasant couple in the bay opposite me with their own newborn who is quite difficult to settle, so they do have my sympathy.

The problem is the dad has adopted a method of trying to sooth the baby by making that noise you make when you're trying to beckon a cat "click click pspspsps click click pspspsps"

Obviously it doesn't work, but that doesn't deter him.

Now imagine that on loop constantly, alongside not instead of, the poor grizzly newborn. All night long. Into the morning, then afternoon.

"Click click pspspspspspsps"

Another lady on the ward kindly introduced the mum to white noise on YouTube. It helps the baby a little, hurrah, mum is very thankful, but the dad is still doing that bloody cat noise.

WIBU to strangle him and cite temporary insanity due to hormones and extreme provocation? or at the very least ask him to bloody stop it

You have my sympathies! I was on a post natal ward for a week after having my little boy! Hope you are allowed home soon!

I agree with PP who said MN should do a campaign for better post natal care.

@Anonymous48

This makes me so glad that I gave birth in the US, where all the rooms are private. I can't imagine anything worse than sharing a room just after having given birth.

I gave birth in Australia in a private hospital.

It was bliss compared to these horror stories. My own en suite room, double bed, (So DH allowed to stay but I didn't want or need him to be!); Baby in a night nursery if you so chose, breast feeding consultant on tap.

Oh it's horrible being ill and stuck with fools! When I had DD2, there were only about four women on the ward but one thought she was the bloody boss and in the day, she'd suddenly go to the main light switch and turn the lights off!

I was weak following surgery and couldn't argue but I was also depressed and being forced to sit/lie in semi darkness was terrible!

Eventually a nurse came in and said "Why are all the lights off!?" and turned them on. She was quite cross...ha!

I don't think you need to completely ban partners or visitors, but to bring back enforced visiting hours.

When I had my bunch, dad's could "visit" between 9am and 9pm, so all day.

Other visitors were limited to two 2 hour slots, something like 3pm to 5pm, leave for tea time.
Then 7pm to 9pm .

Only children allowed on the ward at all were siblings.

I don't see how that wouldn't be fair?

New mums only stay 24 hours at most these days, so I don't understand why dad's need to stay all night?

@FortunesFave

Oh it's horrible being ill and stuck with fools! When I had DD2, there were only about four women on the ward but one thought she was the bloody boss and in the day, she'd suddenly go to the main light switch and turn the lights off!

I was weak following surgery and couldn't argue but I was also depressed and being forced to sit/lie in semi darkness was terrible!

Eventually a nurse came in and said "Why are all the lights off!?" and turned them on. She was quite cross...ha!

Sounds horrible! Glad the nurse stepped in

When I had my DCs (24, 20 & 10 years ago) there was no option for dad's to stay on the postnatal ward overnight.

There's enough noise with 6 new mums & 6 babies per bay. Thank god there weren't another 6 people too!

Oh a private room for every woman sounds bliss. Being on a ward is horrible. And it’s a double-edged sword re partners. Not nice having strange men around but when there’s no visitors staff are often too overstretched to help in the most basic way. Women, often recovering from major surgery or other injuries, expected to just get on with it AND look after/be responsible for another human. Not surprising we have such high rates of PND when you see how so many of us experience birth and the postnatal period in hospital.

Every woman should have a private room after birth. It’s just basic dignity, and the real need to rest and recover after the birth.

I really don’t think fathers should be able to stay all night, or beyond clearly set out visiting hours, especially not on wards as we currently have them. No one needs that noise and disturbance. Why can’t we have a women’s space after giving birth?

I would have paid for a private rooms when I had dc2 but they were all full.

Postnatal is the seventh circle of hell.

Try being there with a room full of happy parents with their babies, whilst yours is in NNICU and you aren’t well enough to visit them yet.

I feel for you. I went through something similar with the noise on the ward. I was in the hospital for about 9 days as my baby had jaundice. I remember breaking down and saying to my husband that he needed to get me out of there. I just needed sleep and a shower in a clean bathroom that didn't have blood everywhere or a filthy bath and an overflowing sanitary bin. I was terrified I was going to get an infection.

@rach2713

When i was on the postnatal ward there was a women who snored and was deaf in 1 ear. Her baby was crying for ages rang the midwife and i asked if they could wake her because baby was crying told me yeah shes deaf in 1 ear so cant hear baby cry asked them to ask her to not sleep on the eat she can her so can hear baby cry cuz no1 else is getting a sleep between the snoring and her baby crying..

I'm sure she didn't sleep on that ear intentionally ffs

@LittleDoritt

God, this thread is bringing back so many horrible memories. With DD1 I was that mother who wouldn't pick up her crying baby. I had an epidural, a spinal block and an EMCS and I couldn't move at all from the chest down. Tiny DD was crying and crying and no one came to help. I pressed the buzzer so many times, I shouted for help and the midwifes were just too busy to do anything. Finally, after literally hours, one came and shoved the baby at me - and then once she was settled I couldn't twist to put her down. I was so tired I was terrified I was going to drop her. There were a hundred other horrible moments in those first few days on the post-partum ward, but that one broke me.

This has just reminded me of when DD had just been born via section. DH had her while they stitched me up and in recovery the midwife pissed about and faffed about and I really wanted to get DD on the breast but I was hooked up to all these wires and couldn't get my breast out of my gown and the midwife wasn't there to help. She was crying and DH was getting really overwhelmed too because he knew we both wanted to fulfill the most primal urge but we couldn't. She came in and faffed and faffed some more and eventually DH let out a moan and she asked very sharply if something was wrong. He said sorry it's just the heat (she was born during this years July heatwave) then once we were sorted I sent him home to look after DS and the midwife said sarcastically to the HCA when she came in 'daddy was tired and hungry so he went home'...she knew I sent him home to let my mum away, she was there during that conversation...she must have been having a bad day I guess. It would be hard to work throughout that heatwave.

You have my sympathies, OP. I don’t think I’ll ever forget how absolutely horrendous being on the PN ward was.

The noise. The annoying/infuriating conversations. The staff that don’t want to be there. The chorus of crying babies. The broken sleep. The jobsworths. The shit food.

If a man was making a cat noise anywhere near me on the ward I think it would have either sent me into orbit in terms of how enraged I’d be, or I’d be hysterically crying over it. No in between.

I hope you and baby are doing well, though. Congratulations!

I'm so glad my hospital (nhs) had only single rooms sounds horrible op, hope you get some rest soon. They should get rid of bays it's not dignified and not very good for infection control.

@PurpleFadesToGreen dad's are allowed to stay in my hospital. I had two caeserans and wasn't able to walk the first night after my first so he needed to be there to look after the baby. He didn't stay after my second one though as was an elective so was up and moving about by that night. It was all private rooms so slightly different though.

OP I feel your pain. It was bad enough with DS1 with the couple in the bay next to me who never stopped talking I swear to god they must have talked all bloody night.

The worst (but consequently funniest ) was with DS2. He had been born very early and was very unwell at birth as was I. We had been through a rough time. I had spent a while in ICU but eventually ended up in the 4 bay ward for NICU mums. I have to say the hospital were fantastic, the lights were low and the blinds closed so we could all sleep as you can imagine we were all trooping at different times to the NICU unit to pump or feed etc all through the night. A separate pumping machine stayed in our ward for our use only. All of our babies were very poorly.

Importantly the door was kept closed. Fairly obviously none of us would cope very well with hearing other babies. Things were quite rough and frankly everyone knew if you were in our ward your baby was struggling...we know everyone knew because of the permanent looks of pity.

Lo and behold some embarrassment of a man , who I guess was in his fifties or sixties. So not sure if a father or grandfather threw open the door and called cheerily "Here we go ladies , no need to sit in the dark have a bit of air in here" and wandered off. There was just absolute stunned silence. Very carefully the woman closest to the door got up and closed it.

I'm absolutely not exaggerating when a very short while later , he did it again. "Oh dear still shut in here are you ladies ? Here we go can't keep lying around in here being lazy" as he scattered off on his cloven fucking hooves.

This time though it was like a wave of fury hit the room. At the same time as half of us (yes me included) welling up. (In my defence it was a hell of a time) and we hit our call buttons practically in unison. (We had all had C sections and moving quickly wasn't easy.

I presume because all four went off the same time we got the senior nurse arriving. She listened carefully , stony faced while we all blubbed at her. I've genuinely never felt so worried for another human as I was for him because the anger on her face was incandescent...I mean she was beyond angry. Very polite and professional but my god there was no escaping her reaction. She just quietly and tersely assured us it would not happen again and apologised. (Not that it was her fault ) and she stalked off.
As she went to find him one of the other women after a moment of silence said "Oh shit I think she's actually going to hurt him" and through sheer relief and reaction to what we were all going through we absolutely fell about in peels of laughter

She was right that nurse looked absolutely ready to murder someone. But it was also the first time any of us had laughed in days before our births.

Later when I went to the unit to see DS2 I saw a sign had been put on our door saying only medical staff could open the door. Never saw him again and would take even odds whether she buried him somewhere.

I think you need to take some insulate Britain tactics and sit on the floor with baby in front of the midwife station until they can find you some appropriate resting conditions so that you and your baby can recover. Honestly no idea why the hell of UK postnatal awards is not a bigger issue and is generally just accepted and quietly grumbled about.

Not post natal but following an op, I had a private room due to medical condition. Don't sleep well after anaesthetic so I had struggled to get to sleep. 1am the door opens, main light snaps on and there's a woman wanting to take my lunch order
I might have said WTAF

@Thedogscollar genuine question - how do mothers recovering from a CS cope without the partners or families being there to help with nappy changes / pass the baby across for feeding etc?

@BurnedToast

And why are men staying there? How does that help all the other women and provide the privacy they need? I'm glad that didn't happen when I had my two. It was bad enough being opposite the drug addict talking loudly about SS taking her imminent baby away

My husband was allowed to stay to help me look after DD post emcs. Not sure how else I'd have coped getting up & down to feed her, change her nappy, comfort her every hour or so otherwise.

@Mosky

If I was in charge of maternity services I would commission Travel Lodge or similar to build a block next to the hospital. All women who had uncomplicated deliveries would go to a family room there. Care to be provided by community midwives as if they were at home

They used to do this in the 50s and 60s. They were called maternity homes. No visitors allowed.

This is why All Hospital Visitors should be banned.
Have your partner there for the birth but no more.

What happens for mothers post emcs though? It's major surgery & to have to immediately start caring for a baby after that alone is a huge ask.

You have my sympathies OP.
My first time in postnatal was absolutely horrifying and I spent 5 days there because my perfectly healthy 8lb 9 baby had lost just below the threshold of normal weight loss.
This is why for my second I opted for a homebirth. Didn't have to set even 1 foot in the hospital. No way was I going back to that hell.
You'll be home soon xx

how do mothers recovering from a CS cope without the partners or families being there to help with nappy changes / pass the baby across for feeding etc?

Supposed to ring the call button but if you accidentally knock it off while trying to reach for your baby and can’t move your legs then you have to wait until a midwife comes.

If you can, pay the fee (was £105 a night last I was in 4 years ago) for a suite with your own bathroom, tv, and couch so you can have someone to help you there if necessary.

@Thepennysjustdropped

All these stories show the awful experience women are put through, at a time that's supposed to be lovely, a calm time for bonding with your newborn, and possibly after a traumatic birth. It just screams of underfunding.

I agree - it's appalling. There wasn't even a shower available on my postnatal ward.