i was told 3 times by paed. nurse in MRI children's A&E that there was no place for me to breastfeed

[sherazade]

Yesterday when took dd1 to a&e i asked if there was a baby room or feeding room where i could breastfeed my distraught 10 month old. was told 'no'. Is there any baby room? 'no'. Is there just a room with a chair 'No'. this is a childrens outpatient dept. and there is NO feeding room? 'no'. what kind of hospital is this? 'There's a nappy room but its taken'. went to the said nappy room which was just a disgusting toilet with a changing table and it was actually empty. Makes me suspect the nurse was not happy about me bfeeding full stop. Would have been happy to feed dd2 anywhere really but didn't fancy the hugely overcrowded , tinsy winsy waiting room with coughing/puking/ staring patients.
so how do I go about launching a lengthy complaint? whole thing is a bit hypocritical considering there were those silly ' breastfeeding gives my baby the best start' posters stuck on the walls.
I did, however, half an hour later, shout at another nurse a bit hysterically that I needed to feed my baby and that i was told 3 times by the previous nurse that there was no room with a chair, to which she answered 'of course there's a room with a comfy seat for you' and directed me to one!

sounds like said nurse was having very bad day, or really against bfing
should be a complaint department in every hospital. Terrible behaviour.

might be worth a letter of complaint to the health trust involved? nurse in need of a spot of re training me thinks

I'd have fed my baby wherever I was, coughing, puking, staring patients or not. I don't think you need a comfy chair and 'special' room to feed your baby. You just need your baby and your boobs.

Juuule - not a helpful comment really!

Sherazade - PALS is the place to make a complaint to. Have a look on the hospitals website and there should be a link.

It just stuns me that things like this happen.

this nurse should be ashamed of herself, do you know if this is a baby friendly hospital? i agree that you should be able to feed anywhere, but i can also see your point about not wanting to be the star attraction in the waiting room. think really your complaint lies against the nurse given that the second person found you a room to go to.

definitely complain. The hospital will have a duty to respond to your complaint and hopefully it will make a difference.

Juuule, I know what you mean... I once bfed ds standing up in the check-in queue at Gatwick. It was crazy busy and within seconds a member of staff directed us to the front of the queue... I HATED doing it though and was almost in tears - I had huge problems bfing at the start so had little confidence doing it, and I deeply dislike doing it in a crowded place where people do clearly stare.
Let alone in a hospital waiting room which is not the healthiest place in the world.

I feed dd2 in waiting room, but was offfered a little room on ward to feed her if i wanted. Personally I hate shuting myself away to feed DD. I would defo contact PALS though, especially if it was likely to happen again, maybe to a less confident mum.

Iliketomoveit - why not a helpful comment?
One of the questions on this board has been how do we make bfing accepted as normal? I think part of the answer to that is that if the mothers who are bfing consider it normal then that would be a big step forward. You don't need to hide away. You don't need special facilities. If you are sat in a waiting room then I can't see why you need anything else. As long as you are not going to need to strip to the waist to feed your baby then it doesn't need to be a private act.
As far as a waiting room not being the most hygienic of places, I would agree. But if you are waiting there with your baby anyway then your baby will be exposed to whatever is in there. In fact, by bfing you might be reducing your baby's exposure as your baby is only in contact with your breast and breathing close to your skin/clothes.
And I agree that it is awkward to feed a baby standing up so a chair at least makes things a lot easier.

I would also like to add that if the more confident bf-ers didn't rush off to a 'special' room then maybe the less confident would feel better supported and less likely to feel that they need to hide away.

I agree with juuule
(second time today )

To normalise bf we all just need to DO it
If we go into other rooms then its not being seen
also definitely will be no bother just because your in a room of sick people, you were there anyway.

I agree with juuule and trinity - I won't say any more as trinity's put it so well .

I sort of see juuule's point here ... would you ask for a special room to bottlefeed a baby? It is about normalising breastfeeding, and while I definitely agree that the way sherazade was dealt with was inadequate, particularly in a hospital, and it wouldn't have been my first choice of location to feed, I also feel strongly that when my baby needs fed he will be fed there and then. I think the way to normalise BFing is to treat it exactly as we treat FFing - so, no public taboos, no insistence on special treatment, no exile to the toilets etc.

Thing is, I don't think Sherazade particularly wanted to be a poster girl for the right to b/f anywhere and everywhere at that exact moment. She was vulnerable and worried, as people often are in hospitals.

I'm all in favour of normalising b/f but it's not fair to expect everyone to do what I say whatever their circs.

I agree with juuule tbh.

I agree with juule too. I have to admit when ds was new born, I did ask hospitals waiting rooms for somewhere to feed was very embarrassed about doing it in public. You kind of have to get over it.
On the same note, I was at a breastfeeding group this week and we were talking about feeding in cafes etc and a new mum said she always asks permission from the staff first.

You should complain if you werent found somewhere suitable.

Although I agree with juules in that I would have just b/fed my son wherever I was.

I agree broadly with what Juuule said, but sherazade obviously didn't feel comfortable feeding in public, and whilst I don't think you can expect everywhere to have a feeding room etc, there was obviously somewhere suitable.

Afraid that I agree that it is unreasonable to ask everywhere to provide somewhere private for you to feed. Nice if it is available, but as a "right" I'm unconvinced.

Or lets look at it another way: how would you feel if you had started to feed but the nurse had then told you that you had to go to a private room to feed?

Just because it is a hospital outpatient dept doesn't mean that they have a greater obligation to provide a separate space than say your dentists surgery, the family planning clinic or anywhere that you might have to hang around.

hmmm, i never bothered to o much about trying to find specific places to breastfeed. stick baby on boob, scarf over top. if anyone didnt like it, they could stuff themselves.
(except when newborns. that si a bit harder t o do sdiscreetly_

I once fed my first in the supermarket queue though I did feel bad for the young man serving on the till.

Agree with Ladymuck - the Nurse didn't suggest that you couldn't feed your daughter just that she didn't have anywhere special for you to do it. I don't expect anywhere to have special places for me to feed - sorry.

Sorry, I agree with Juule et al. Their behaviour may not have been super-supportive but is it really complaint-worthy? They are clearly short of space (hence tiny waiting room presumably), and I guess that a special BF room would mean one less bed. Is it more important to have a comfy chair for bfing, or a bed for a sick child?

If there was no space when you asked the first nurse, then there was presumably no space. What was she supposed to do - kick a patient out of a room? Maybe they were slightly less busy when you asked for the second time.

If they had asked you not to feed in the waiting room, that would be a different matter.

Sorry, I hope this post doesn't sound unsympathetic - I am a bfer myself and have had to feed in some horrible environments - but I don't think they treated you badly, they just sound massively under pressure.

hmm. I do think that a Children's Outpatient dpt SHOULD have facilities for parents and children.
PARTICULARLY because it is a hospital and there are likely to be children there who are not well. Don't know about any of you, but when ds is unwell, he more than ever benefits from having a calm and quiet environment to feed.. never mind what I prefer.

Seeing as in this case there wasn't -
of course if it is an issue of a sick child needing a bed vs a bfing mother there is no contest. IME though (I work in an adult Outpatients dpt) sometimes rooms are not available for clinical use (and therefore there is a bed shortage) because there is not enough staff to cover them, not necessarily because all the rooms are being used.

Even if all the rooms were full, presumably somewhere in the hospital there is a quieter place you could have been directed (a relatives room, the 'reflection room' (the chapel type place)??

OK, maybe we should all feel comfortable bfing in public. But some of us don't, and it annoys me that there is pressure to do so from those who DO feel ok about it. Bfing can be hard enough without that pressure.

I also agree with Juule. It wouldn't have occurred to me to ask for a special place to feed - I'd have just done it, and to hell with anyone who didn't like it.