I'm a bit cross about the box ticking on my hospital notes. What do you think?

[BroccoliSpears]

I was having a read through my Midwifery Record. There's a page titled 'Postnatal Breastfeeding Checklist'. It says...

"ALL of the following topics should be discussed with all breastfeeding mothers before they return home"

Without reproducing it in full, it goes on to list positioning & attachment discussed / observed / mother's confidence, hand expressing taught, help offered, baby led feeding explained, room & bed sharing discussed, teats, dummies, nipple shields, importance of exclusive bfing, support group details given and explained, leaflet given and explained.

Now, I did find a leaflet and some details of local babycafe groups in the paperwork when I got home, and I think I was asked if ds was feeding okay. I'm a bit surprised though to see big ticks in all the boxes next to the above points, and someone's signature to say it's all been discussed / explained. None of it was.

Actually I'm doing fine with the breastfeeding, but I'm cross because they don't know that but have signed off anyway. With dd a couple of years ago I had the most horrendous time - weeping at every feed for weeks - I wonder if someone signed to say the above had been explained to me then too?

What do you think? Am I silly to feel cross? I really can't decide if it's worth a letter, or if I should just be happy bfing is going well, and accept that hospital staff are busy.

Write a letter and include observations, what an utter disgrace!

Brocolli, do write.

It annoys me when hospitals plaster the walls and make a big thing about breastfeeding, an then let women down like this.

It is very likely that the new babies crying for milk would have been fine tucked up skin to skin with mum and near if not actually on a nipple. Babies don't come out desperate for food, on the whole, but they do come out desperate for love, security, closeness.

You have every right to feel cross. DH was furious with the slatternly midwife we had during the birth of DD1. She left us in a public ward without any form of pain relief for around 15 hours, then timed the labour from the time I got into a delivery room at which point I was already fully dilated and pushing. She deliberately tried to falsify my medical records by timing the labour at 2 hours rather than the 17 hours it actually took. Quite deliberately. He was very calm about it and just told her not to falsify medical records.

On the flip side, my SIL was in hospital a few weeks ago after my nephew was born. The woman in the next bed had a visit from a BF supporter of some sort (my trainer is really hoping it wasn't one of her girls) who spent FIVE hours with her! The new mum had visits from doctors and nurses in that time, she her drain and catheta removed and the whole time she had this BF woman sitting next to her!

I offered to ring my trainer for my SIL and she said "No way! Not after that!"

BTW, I was typing late last night without my book next to me, not well and trying to remember what is in my book.

Another wonderful horror story!

I had DS (now 2.5) at a hospital in East London. The birth was fairly traumatic and I didn't get to see him for 8 hours afterwards, so wasn't able to start feeding straight away. I don't know if that made a difference, but I found the classic bf hold really difficult, but there was a fantastic BF lady who showed me different holds and DS and I found the "rugby" hold worked well for us.

Back on the ward, a MW comes along as I am feeding him and says "What are you doing? You'll never bond with your baby if you hold him like that!"

Luckily I think I was still pretty spaced out and just ignored her, but it makes me sad to think now that another new mum might be really affected by comments like that.

PS- Broccoli, good luck with your letter

"slatternly" midwife. Fabulous!