Partners sleeping on maternity ward?

[Jaaxe]

I’m due a csection in December, it’s not my first csection so I know birth recovery especially csection isn’t a walk in the park with a newborn and that having your partner in the hospital is helpful and good for bonding but aibu to think partners shouldn't be allowed to stay overnight to sleep in the bays alongside all the other female patients overnight? A side room is fine with me but a bay with other female patients at their most vulnerable, no thanks. I think the flexible visiting during the day is great but having partners camped next to your bed with just a curtain between is a no from me. Aibu?

I'm due a baby in June and I hope to god my husband is allowed to stay overnight. I think partners are at the moment. Staff are overworked and I know he would do whatever was needed to help me. I don't feel nervous by other men being there tbh but I can see why some people would. However I don't feel like there should be restrictions

My brother had the hospital staff demand he stay after his twins were born, there was such a shortage of staff that they couldn't manage to have someone there all the time & his wife needed support as she was recovering from an emcs with two babies under 5lb but not needing incubators. He stayed for four nights until they were able to go home together. I was in the same hospital when I had ds, even the nights I was in HDU & so seriously ill they told me there was a chance I could die they wouldn't allow my husband to stay with me.

The thing is - not everyone plans a C section. Some are emergencies. Realistically these are most likely to need help and their partners there to lift baby etc. Not all of them will have known they would need a C section or be able to afford private care

@user97645374895

I am sorry you had shit service when you were having your baby, but many other women experienced this too. I am not going into it right now, but I had a fucking horrific time during labour and birth, ending in an emergency c-section. DH was there all day but had to go at 9pm and come back the next day. (He went an hour and a half after my c-section.) No way was he allowed to stay overnight. Men weren't allowed, and were told to leave by 9pm. Which is how it SHOULD be.

Why should your need to have your husband there literally while you are asleep, trump the wishes and welfare and safety of other new mothers and their babies? As has been said, women NEED a safe space when they are so vulnerable and nervous and anxious, and don't want someone else's man 6 feet away from them all throughout the night.

There IS very little the men can do, so what on earth do they need to be there all night for? And whilst I know not all men are predators and sex pests who will abuse women, they are more likely to be than other women! I know you have your opinions, but you are being quite self-centred, and only thinking of your own needs. If I had just had a baby by c-section and am lying in bed in my nightdress in a state of vulnerability after major surgery, I don't want your bloody husband 6 to 8 feet away from me all through the night ta very much!

I would have been lost without DH with my after my emcs. I'm thankful he was able to stay with me. I couldn't move for hours afterwards and the midwives, although amazing, took forever to answer the bell when I did push it. No way I would have managed without him - and I say that as a stubbornly independent woman who hates "needing" anyone else to do things for me.

My husband wasn’t allowed to stay with me. This was 2017. He was sent home at about 1:30am (after a complete shambles of a birth experience as well)

Partners should be allowed to stay. If u don't feel comfortable pay or ask for a side room.

But you can't. At least in my hospital I couldn't. I tried to pay for a separate room (having had an awful time in the postnatal ward for my first birth) but they said I couldn't as I had had a c section, and they needed to keep an eye on me in the main ward. My second baby was born in the middle of covid. While it wasn't ideal that my partner could only stay for 1 hour per day, I would prefer that to having men sleeping in the ward as was the case for my first baby. One creep had the curtain open looking at me and I was in too much pain to get up and fully close my curtain. Midwives were rushed off their feet and ignored the buzzer. It was awful.

Actually, even following my first birth I sent my husband home for a good night's sleep so he would be ready to look after us the next day rather than be shattered!

Why should your need to have your husband there literally while you are asleep, trump the wishes and welfare and safety of other new mothers and their babies? As has been said, women NEED a safe space when they are so vulnerable and nervous and anxious, and don't want someone else's man 6 feet away from them all throughout the night.

Yes, exactly.

I do ‘t think I’m being self/centred at all, I think I am offering an opinion different to yours and your are being quite rude about it.

I can’t talk for your husband but mine would have been the difference between me having a mental breakdown, getting an infection which lasted 3 months, having to endure emergency care a fee days after leaving the hospital and relieved me of the delirious state I was forced into through incompetent care.

I’m not saying men that the solution is men staying at all costs but there is a middle ground which could be explored.

I would offer my sincerities to you but actually your comments were unnecessary and as I’ve said rude. Give your head a wobble.

My first post natal ward experience was hell on earth - I wet myself outside the bathroom because some arsehole bloke was taking his morning shit in the only bathroom. I'm not usually one for feeling vulnerable but I absolutely hated having men there all the time and being stuck behind those curtains constantly because I didn't want some random man staring at me. I'd argue that despite the protestations on these threads, that many men are not respectful of women's spaces or privacy.

I had a baby in the pandemic too with no visitors and it was a much more pleasant experience.

Yes it’s disgusting, and not all husbands are helpful and non-pervy.
They need to get them off the antenatal wards also.
Matron!

@user97645374895 YOU are the one who needs to 'give your head a wobble' dear.

And seriously, do people still spout that daft saying on here?

Mixed sex wards were banned some years ago. Having men sleeping overnight on a women's ward effectively makes it mixed sex. I think this is wrong as women are entitled to feel safe, and to their dignity. I get that it's easier for some women to have their partner there, but that desire shouldn't trump other womens' desire for a safe and dignified experience.

😘

All hospital wards not just maternity should be single rooms with facility for a partner or loved one to be able to stay. With the drop in standards of care due to lack of staff loved ones could do the practical stuff such as washing, dressing & feeding which would release hospital staff to do other things & care for patients who have nobody to care for them. My late dp was able to stay with me when I had my hysterectomy, he helped me change when I got back on the ward, gave me food & drinks as it was after evening meal time when I got back & I hadn't eaten for 12 hours. Once my catheter was out he helped me to the toilet & helped me to get dressed ready to go home. This was a private hospital but this is the standard that care should be, he was quiet, respectful, kept out of the way when nursing staff needed to do anything medical but did everything else for me.

I have no idea what I would do without my partner there. I landed at the postnatal ward around midnight after an emergency C section, sepsis and 2 day long failed labour. I couldn’t move and take care of our baby.

I can’t imagine him having to leave me there. There is no way the nurses could provide all the needed care - obviously you must know how short staffed they are.

all the other women also had their partners with them and I don’t think I even saw them. Definitely not at night. Just inferred their presence from whispers.

How hysterically funny you are, Laughing and mocking when women are airing genuine concerns about safeguarding women, and are concerned for their safety and welfare when in a very vulnerable position. Fuck me sideways. This place gets worse.

But what if a woman would only feel safe if her DP could stay with her?

The so-called care I received at hospital on the general ward was the worst part of both my labours. Night time was particularly bad. Not enough staff and those that were there were lazy. I buzzed once to ask for help with latching on and the nursery nurse asked, ‘did you really buzz me out here for this?’ The night staff, with the exception of one or two, were far too busy reading magazines and chatting in the staffroom to do any work. I’d taken in syringes of colostrum that were left to defrost instead of being put in the fridge, therefore unusable. I was asked to wee in a bedpan, told to leave it on the windowsill in the bathroom after my shower for collection and the next morning it was still there. Was told that I was ‘starving’ my DD because I couldn’t get her to latch. I could go on.

I was glad my husband was there. He provided the advocacy and care that I personally found was sadly lacking from the professionals.

1000000%! Thank you! This thread was making me very uncomfortable for exactly this reason.

As ticktick said, YOU pay for a private room somewhere.

Partners should absolutely stay. I had twins and the support was 100% essential, as it is for any mother of multiples.

Fine. Just make sure you pay for your OWN room via private health care, because I don't want your partner sitting next to me all night after I have had a baby.

Partners as the other parent of the new baby absolutely should be able to stay; to both care for the child they have equal responsibility for and to advocate for the mother.