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?

Bleeding heavily, getting boobs out and trying to establish breastfeeding whilst recovering from birth? Not to mention the hormones and feelings of vulnerability.

No. Men shouldn’t be allowed to stay amongst vulnerable women trying to recover from birth!

Random men who haven’t been background checked is the reason I chose home birth with mine. There’s no way I’d share a sleeping space with men I don’t know at my most vulnerable with a new baby.

A male partner opened the curtain of the shower I was in whilst I was on the delivery ward. There were cubicles of 4 showers with curtains, he'd helped her to the shower & she'd forgotten her wash bag, sent him back for it and he opened the wrong curtain on his return.
I was mortified & DH was absolutely fuming when I told him, no one else seemed to care very much though, including him and his partner.

I understand some women need help but it doesn't make for a very nice experience when other women are having their privacy and dignity intruded on by strange men.

Seems that opinions are v divided.

Perhaps what we need is a ward for women who want their partners to stay and a women only post birth ward.

In either instance, men are not allowed to wonder the wards, they have to sit down and shut up. No being loud and obnoxious. They definitely should not use the maternal facilities such as loos and showers. They use the main hospital loos if necessary.

I’m due for an ELCS in a few weeks. I’ve booked a private room as I think being on a ward with snoring, loud, thoughtless men and women would drive me insane. DH can’t stay with me, the private rooms, despite costing the same as a night in a five star London hotel, operate the same visiting hours as the maternity wards. I wouldn’t want him to stay anyway. He’ll need to be rested to help me look at the baby after a c section and trying to sleep on a hard plastic chair doesn’t sound particularly conducive to a good night’s sleep.

Nope. I would never even consider having to pay for private healthcare just because I had twins. Having twins or multiples isn’t a opt-in privilege - again, the support of the partner at all times in a multiples birth is 100% essential.

Men weren't allowed to stay on post natal wards when I was a midwife. Nobody considered it for a second.

Sadly I think it's been encouraged as staffing levels are so low, as many of you are pointing out here, that they are seen as an extra pair of hands by the decision-makers.

Men have no place in such female spaces. I'd have been horrified to have to sleep in close proximity to strange men.

Completely unacceptable. We need proper staffing levels, not dads.

The only thing that will stop this is women loudly protesting about having to share spaces with strange men. The problem of course is that most women are in a vulnerable state after giving birth and in no state to fight their corner. It's not just women "tutting" in a corner. Some women are discharging themselves early when it's not safe to do so or refusing to stay overnight against clinical advice to escape an environment in which they feel unsafe and that their dignity is not respected.

Daughter of a midwife here. Where my mum works they tried this for a while but had to stop it due to the amount of men who abused it. The idea was that they would take care of the baby while the mother slept. In reality they brought in beer, played video games all night, talked loudly on their phones, walked around in their boxers, wouldn’t use the showers and toilets that were set aside for them and so the women couldn’t get to the showers and toilets, ate the food from the meal trays that were intended for the women, snored, slept on the beds (often with the new mother spending the night in a chair). One night shift there was a Muslim woman who was very upset as she did not feel comfortable being in a nightdress in the presence of men to whom she wasn’t related so she stayed fully clothed all night.

Can someone who is adamantly against fathers being there please explain why it is my job to look after a demanding newborn from 2 hours out of major surgery when I was barely cognitive?

If my husband had to go in to hospital to have surgery soon after I had given birth would he have to bring the baby in and look after it while recovering?

The reality is something like this needs to be a policy that mass society wants and unfortunately for women who want no partners to be around ever, most women don’t want this. It’s only a decisive thing on mumsnet. I don’t know anyone in real life who wasn’t stressed about the potential of giving birth alone during covid or their partner being sent away immediately after.

Perhaps there needs to be some sort of bay system in place where all the partner bays are near each other as much as possible. A flat ban only puts one want above another, there are ways it could be more of a compromise.

Also “no men help, they never help with the baby, the mum does still everything in hospital, they only eat pizza and play Xbox etc etc etc” …who the fuck are you guys having children with?? I know there are some pretty shitty partners on mumsnet but in the real world most men are loving supportive fathers. This is the equivalent of ‘I’m not like other girls’ so posters think their partner is helpful and supportive but every other man is a disrespectful shitbag.

For every women that doesn't want men there there will be one who does want her partner there. I certainly wish mine could have stayed after my dd1 was born via emergency section. I didn't get back on the ward till 11pm at which my mum and dh were chucked out. I was given no painkillers overnight, my blood pressure skyrocketed and the midwives were moody when I asked for help. It was a shitshow and my mh suffered after that birth. I wouldn't have minded if my mum had stayed instead but I just wanted someone with me.

@luxxlisbon I agree. That certainly isn't a description of my dh. Surely if a partner is that feckless they wouldn't want to stay anyway?

My hospital don't allow anyone besides the woman who gave birth to stay anyway.

It isn't your partner's job either. Otherwise what about single mums/women with partners who can't stay? Partners aren't a substitute for proper care. If they're intended to be, they need to be properly trained and subject to a code of acceptable conduct.

It is entirely wrong that some women cannot access the postnatal care they need due to feeling unsafe on what are essentially 'mixed' wards.

Women are at their most vulnerable after surgery. Having unknown males in the vicinity whilst you’re in a state of undress, incapacitated and possibly highly emotional is not acceptable. It’s completely irrelevant that those men may well be saints - they are males in what should be single sex spaces.
The norm should not be ‘there’s not enough staff so my dp needs to be here to help me’.
When I had my first baby, it was an old hospital, with a single long ward. All the babies could sleep in the nursery overnight if their mothers wished, with the staff bringing them to the mothers for feeding. Auxiliary staff made sure we had time for a good soak in the bath, rinsed out our blood stained underwear, helped us breast feed, brought us tea, toast and meals. In other words, they actually looked after us.
the issue is that there just are not enough support staff in maternity units!

It’s your ‘job’ as you nicely put it, because it’s your baby! If you want your partner to look after you, have a home birth.
what other types of post surgical wards are there in a hospital where a patients partner is allowed to stay over to ‘look after’ them? Oh yes, the children's ward!

I'm sorry you went through that but it's not about 'comfort' it's about safely of women. Your DH might be a lovely respectful guy but not all are. In the hospital where I gave birth there were some proper unsavoury characters during visiting hours which I wouldn't have been comfortable spending the night with. Hospitals need to ensure that women get the help they need after giving birth but from staff, not partners.

I agree generally but sometimes I don't think the staffing makes it reasonable for them to leave. When I had DD2 a few months ago there was a woman who had just had a c section and couldn't move, was vomiting a lot (and was vomiting over herself and the bed because she couldn't move), she couldn't sort formula, pick up the baby or change a nappy. Her DH was sent home and there just weren't enough staff to look after her. It was absolutely horrendous to expect a woman in that state to care for a newborn with very little support.

I couldn’t imagine being alone with strangers, ie all the other women on the ward and not have DH by my side. He’s the only person I wanted so no I don’t agree. But I do think that women who feel uncomfortable with partners could be offered a side room

My partner chose to have a baby too, it’s equally his job. I didn’t want him to look after me so don’t quite something I didn’t say.
I needed him to look after our child.

Also “no men help, they never help with the baby, the mum does still everything in hospital, they only eat pizza and play Xbox etc etc etc” …who the fuck are you guys having children with?

I second this sentiment. To me this claim people are making seems really strange. I don’t recognise it from real life in the slightest. Trying hard to explain it and I don’t know if it might depend slightly on what population a hospital is serving? Perhaps if there are a lot of very young parents or something?? But even that seems far fetched!

I also wonder if it’s slightly cultural. Not for the first time on here, from what I read I start to wonder if relations between men and women are slightly different in Scotland and if that affects things more broadly. I do think there are definite cultural differences, I’m just not sure if they can have this level of impact! Or if it’s all just part of the distortions of the internet.

No no no.
The other way round should be the rule. If you want your partner to stay then you pay.
It's a hospital, not a hotel.

Maybe a solution would be allow another woman to stay overnight with the new mum Thier mum, sister or friend perhaps?

@Goldbar It isn't your partner's job either

Its not my partner’s job to look after their own child? So I should not expect my partner to parent they own child …. because single mothers exist and do it on their own?

I don’t even know what to say back to that, I literally just could not disagree with your outlook on life more.

Or maybe those who want partners to stay should pay for a side room?

In my opinion, there’s one thing that wold make partners staying not being needed, and they would be enough staff on the wards to practically assist the women and enable them to respond to call bells.

Until staffing numbers means that sufficient care can be provided to women then I think that in some cases it is perfectly acceptable to have partners stay so they can provide the care that the maternity staff can’t.