40 years ago parents didn't stay with unwell babies?

[UndertheCedartree]

Am I right in thinking that 40 years ago if a baby was taken to the big city hospital (from being born at the local town hospital i.e critically ill/likely to die) that the parents and definitely the dad did not go with them?

They definitely did here.

I don’t know about that, but I had my adenoids out about 50 years ago and spent a few days in hospital. I was in a children’s ward and my mum could just visit during visiting hours. I would have been about 4 or 5. Different times.

Yes I think this was probably still happening 40 years ago.

50 years ago, my mum had twins. One was stillborn, and she wasn’t allowed to see him, he was taken away. The other twin, my big brother, was what we’d now call a micro preemie.He stayed in an incubator for 5 weeks, and every day, mum would visit him. There was no option for her to stay with him.

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i had my tonsils and all 4 wisdom teeth out when i was 12.. so 40 plus (ahem) years ago, and my mum was only allowed to visit between the regular visiting hours. and to be honest, she didn't drive and the bus trip was a pain so i was left in hospital for a week on my own with no visitors... my mum even got the parents of another child being discharged the same day as me to bring me home so she didn't even turn up for that!

my dad never turned up once

Same story here - my mum only visited at visiting time as far as I remember.

I was about six when I had my appendix out, circa 1972 , and (oddly!) I really liked it. The nurses were glamorous, kind and lovely and there was a little school room with a nice teacher who did lessons with us.

40 years ago when i was a toddler i had an operation and my mother was with me day and night in the hospital.

Maybe further back.. in the 50s and 60s when larger families were more common and traveling wasn’t that easy.

I was born in 1982, so 42 years ago. Exactly like you said, I was born in a town, 15 miles out of a big city. Critically ill when born, went straight to the children’s hospital in the city within an hour of being born. I stayed there for about 6 weeks. My Mum remained in the small maternity hospital for a week and when she was allowed to go home she never stayed with me. She came in to visit but never stayed.

My brother had his tonsils and adenoids out about 55 years ago. When my Mum and I went to visit him the day after the op, his bed was empty and he had been taken to intensive care overnight as he had some complications. Nobody told us until then!

Different hospitals had different rules.

My parents stayed with my critically Ill brother in the local hospital & also when he was transferred to Guys hospital in London for kidney failure & later a transplant. This was around 1986-1990.

I think there was a parents room on the ward & also they had camp beds.

I trained as a nurse in the late 80s. I remember my stint on the paeds ward, parents could stay but less than half did. Honestly most parents didn't.

SIL was a preemie (36 weeks so not awfully early) 60-odd years ago and needed to stay in hosp. MIL left her there and just phoned up 9 days later to see if she was still alive.

My parents didn’t stay at hospital with me when I had tonsils out 45 years ago.
I was in ward with lots of bed, and a table in the middle for doing drawing etc on.

40 years ago was the 80s not the Dark Ages 😳🤣

I remember both my parents visiting me in hospital in the early 80s getting adenoids out

And if a child was critically ill/likely to die then both yes parents would be there.

My brother had heart surgery in the 70s and my parents stayed at the hospital with him.

That's so sad , I'm sorry you were alone. in the early 90s I had a couple of hospital stays and a parent stayed the whole time with me and i cant imagine having left any of my kids alone but the rules have certainly changed over time

I work in a children's hospital. We have a history book written about the children's hospital. It was more common from the 80s/90s on wards for parents to be allowed to stay 24/7 with the children who were patients.

I had my tonsils and adenoids out age 3 in 1977 and my parents didn’t stay with me in hospital.

As a three year old I spent around two months on the children’s ward. My parents (usually my mother I think) visited once a day when they could. There were other children at home and limited access to transport.
I still have distinct memories of that time. Being shouted at by a “nurse” because I had bled on to a pillow case. Being told that an injection did not hurt. Being told I should be brave and not cry when my parents left. The nurses voming round and collecting all the sweets after the parents had left.

My sister was hospitalised as a very young child in the 70s. Both my parents went to see her, but it was only visiting hours, no one stayed with her overnight.

My only experience of 80’s and 90’s children’s wards comes from, well, Children’s Ward. They didn’t have parents hanging around very much at all.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Children's_Ward

I was in hospital a few times when I was young (early to mid 1970’s) and my mum never stayed with me - but she had 3 other children at home and a job as a nurse working nights as well so there’s no way she could have stayed
with me.

She would visit me when she could, and I’m sure she would have rung on days she couldn’t visit. I also remember her taking me on the train to Great Ormond Street Hospital for an admission and leaving me there to go home.

It’s the same still in other countries. My daughter had an overnight stay in a Japanese hospital and there were no facilities for parents to stay outside visiting hours, and they were confused as to why I wanted to when I enquired about doing so.

I had my tonsils out in the mid 1990s aged 9 and ended up being one of the rare cases with complications. I remember coming round from my second emergency operation and my parents had already gone home because it was after visiting hours.