starlight - my care on the MLU, delivery suite, theatre and recovery area was faultless. I must have met 50 staff and they all apparead to have read my birth plan and quoted from it. MrNC and both other partners were with me throughout with no question, except during the night G went home to sleep properly (MrNC+D alternated on a mattress and a dodgy reclining chair), and only MrNC came into theatre. He was changing out of scrubs and G was interpreting instead in recovery when A went blue - MrNC then returned as A started to move again.
Was transferred to postnatal while A went to SCBU, so MrNC and I arrived to our small but nice single room to meet G+D, and we were all in a bit of a state of worry, expecting an update in 2 hours. However the day's midwife came to say hello and also that A was on his way up to us after only an hour.
The ward I was on was routine postnatal at the other end, but my end was the more complex cases, about 6 single rooms and 4 4-bed bays, either for women who had given birth or for antenatal care. The day shifts were great - I had people falling over to help with breastfeeding (I suspect I was nearly the only one trying, as the bf room with TV and sofa was empty every time I went there), friendly paediatricians, etc.
The first night, however, was not good. Partly it was never going to be, seeing as I was in shock and pain, attached to a drip and a catheter we found was tied to the bed, and then had diarrhoea as well as a newborn baby. But as G stayed with me (on a decent mattress), it was OK. They were clearly understaffed - my new midwife said hello but we didn't see her again for hours. When we called the bell, random women would say they;d sort whatever, but we had no idea if they were midwives or people with no power or what. In particular I needed good pain relief, but was only getting paracetamol as was told I wasn't allowed to take my own meds. I couldn't remember if codeine affected the baby, so didn't just tell them to stuff it. And they (some junior staff, I think) didn't want to take my catheter out on the grounds it would be easier for me not to have to go a whole 7 yards across the corridor to the loo. Which might have been right if I hadn't got the runs, but these staff didn't seem hired for joined-up thinking. Got to a low point around 2am, but a woman turned up and asked if I'd mind if she walked my baby about for a couple hours to give me a break (gratefully accepted). Then another woman came in and said she was a midwife, how was I doing. I said, backed up by G, that I was in too much pain to sit or lie down, but at least I'd managed to start bf and done it for about 20 minutes all together.
At which point this woman said "we don't help people move around or pick up their babies for them, you'll have to do that yourself. And if you don't breastfeed for at least 30 minutes on each side, it doesn't count!" and walked off. I was convinced I was mishearing or hallucinating, but G confirmed that that's exactly what she said!! And that said woman was clearly bonkers...
Fortunately, a pair of orderlies turned up to clean up me and the bed, and they were lovely - two reassuring middle-aged women who kept telling me I was doing wonderful, hang in there darling, don't worry, seen it all before, etc. They came back about 3 times and saved my sanity, helped build a mountain of pillows for me and A to sleep on, and also said "course you can have codiene, loads of women here on it". My midwife then came in at 4am, I burst into tears on her, and she agreed for the catheter to come out if I wanted, and ordered codiene. At which point life got a lot better - I went to the loo and phoned MrNC and begged him to turn up early.
But the other two nights were fine (well, as fine as trying to feed a newborn gets, when unable to sit in bed, or get to the cot in under 5 minutes), MrNC did one, and G the other, passing me the baby when he cried, and we could take him off to the bf room for a couple hours while others slept, and they helped pull me into comfy positions in bed to try feeding and cosleeping. During the day I was remarkably awake which helped, and had a few visitors.
Shame about the one midwife being a total cow, but thanks to having someone with me, I didn't end up in total hysterics (just tears), and got as good care as anyone. My day midwife admitted that when people have someone staying with them, they do leave them to do more caring, just because of their workload (there were two women that night needing constant care). I was very glad not to be in a 4-bed bay though as they have open doors and I would have been panicking about people sneaking up on me - as opposed to getting woken up by so many people opening my door to replace water/offer bf help/top+tail demo/see I was asleep and push off again, which at least didn't make me anxious.
The care in the day was good, decent food (one poor meal but all others were good if you got there while it was hot), unlimited tea/coffee/hot choc outside my room, whole place was very clean with just about enough loos and showers/baths (in the middle of works building more). The matron also checked in with me a few times to check no-one had given me problems over people staying with me, which they hadn't.
So next time I'll make sure that details of any regular medication are in my birth plan and that I expect them immediately I get to the PN ward! And if I have any SPD, ask for a wheelchair-accesible room, as they have hoists and en-suites, but I wasn't to know I'd get so much worse in labour - it doesn't seem common.
A is now glugging for England - midwife bloke came today and confirmed he's fine. A did a wonderful demo of his urinary and bowel functions all over him. Bed now...