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Pregnancy

Talk about every stage of pregnancy, from early symptoms to preparing for birth.

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Original poster

DH at which appointments

69 replies

HolyShmoly · 02/10/2017 20:11

Hi, which appoints did your DP come along to? Ive told my DH that he's coming to the initial GP appointment (although it sound like that's not much) but then I guess it's just the scans? Is it useful for him to be at the booking in appointment or any of the others?
It's all very, very new!

OP posts:

Are your children’s vaccines up to date?

Set a reminder

HerSymphonyAndSong · 03/10/2017 07:17

Going to all appointments

And it's just one red flag, in the absence of any other concerns it's meaningless

practicalmagick · 03/10/2017 07:17

MagicFajita sorry you've had horrible experiences of this but glad your DP is supportive

practicalmagick · 03/10/2017 07:19

Why does going to all appointments make a difference? There aren't that many.

HerSymphonyAndSong · 03/10/2017 07:22

Because the implication could be that they do not want you to be left alone with an HCP and want to control what you disclose to them. there really is no need to be offended by this - it's to protect other women

practicalmagick · 03/10/2017 07:30

I just checked the NICE guidelines and the actual red flag is defined as "intrusive other person in consultations" - key word there being "intrusive". In other words, going to the appointments is fine. Acting intrusive while there is a red flag. That seems sensible.

I'm not offended by anything. I'm saying it's counterproductive and untrue to suggest that simply going to appointments is an indicator of abuse. NICE seems to agree with me.

MagicFajita · 03/10/2017 07:33

I was surprised (pleasantly so) that during this pregnancy the mv asked me in for the booking appointment alone. I'd never had that happen in other pregnancies and when she explained why (looking for/asking about dv) I was very glad. Pregnancy can be a vulnerable time.

Anyway op , sorry for derailing!

MagicFajita · 03/10/2017 07:34

*mw

AccrualIntentions · 03/10/2017 08:19

@practicalmagick depends on your pregnancy. I've had fucking loads since being diagnosed with GD. I've barely got time to go to them myself, never mind dragging my husband along to take up room in the waiting area.

katmarie · 03/10/2017 09:20

My DP has come to all of my appointments so far. He's as excited about this baby as I am, and neither of us would want to miss out on any bit of it. He also works for himself which helps, I've no doubt things would be different if he was working to someone else's schedule.

The appointments where he was actually useful were the booking in appointment - due to needing family medical history, and the scans - he remembered to bring tissues to give me when I cried like a baby (I didn't even think to bring any). Also at the 24 week apointment I got to see his face when he heard the heartbeat on the doppler, and I'll treasure that memory forever :)

mindutopia · 03/10/2017 09:33

The only appointments mine came to (and I wouldn't have given him the option to come to any others, to me, it seems odd to bring him along to medical appts) were my scans. I've never had a GP appt in pregnancy. We don't do those here as we self refer to the midwife team, but I wouldn't have brought him to that either. It's enough of an effort to balance our work schedules with the school run (so makes for a very short day for one of us each day) and we're both self-employed, so there's no 'time off' for appts. We just need to work a longer day if one of us has to go to one, that it's much easier when only one of us has to do that. But no, I don't think there is anything interesting about any of the other appts to warrant bringing a partner. It's just box ticking and giving urine and blood samples. The only thing I could see possibly wanting to bring him to is if you had a high risk pregnancy and you had an appt towards the end to discuss how you were going to birth because they had some concerns. Then you might want some support for making those decisions and planning an induction/c-section if you needed to take into account both your schedules and childcare needs, etc.

PandaCat · 03/10/2017 11:10

All the scans, and any one appointment after 16 weeks as they listen to the heartbeat. Other than that there's no real reason to for him to come to any midwife appointments tbh.

WaitingTillJuly17 · 03/10/2017 11:30

Hey @HolyShmoly 👋🏻 Good to see things are progressing, how are you feeling? My DH has just been to my scan and consultant appointment so far (I was referred due to previous op which means I need a c-section so not a routine appointment). He would have come to my booking appointment if I'd asked but it was awkward with his work and I knew it was just a heap of questions and blood/urine tests so didn't insist on it. That being said, if he was off work anyway, he would have come with me so just do whatever you want to do! I'm sure he'll come to my later appointments when they discuss birth in more detail and antenatal classes but other than that I'm happy to go on my own.

user1490100454 · 03/10/2017 12:26

There's so many appointments to go to it's hard to keep track, I wouldn't bother but for the scans definitely.

personally it's hard for my OH to get time off work but I would say it's important for him to attend the 20 week scan. Our scan picked up a defect and I don't think I could have got through it without him there, I certainly wouldn't have wanted to be responsible for driving myself home! I'm not saying anything will be wrong with your baby but we went in there expecting to just find out the gender

GreenGoblin0 · 03/10/2017 18:12

In my first pregnancy DP came to booking in appt which was helpful as the midwife actually called hospital to book the 12 week scan in.

He went to all scans (we had an extra growth scan at end) and came with me to hospital for glucose tolerance test.

I went overdue so he came to the last few appts with midwife as I was too massive to walk up steep hill to the clinic!

2nd time around he probably came to less appts but still came to scans and a 3rd trimester appt that we also took daughter to so they could listen to heartbeat

He came to less 2nd time round mainly because by this point we had moved further away from work places and midwife appts were at inconvenient times that didn't work for him work wise/we had go factor in childcare

it's definitely worth your DP going along at some point but he certainly doesn't need to go to all midwife appts

ethelfleda · 03/10/2017 18:30

My DH has come to all so far apart from two - one of the scans (we had two anomaly scans as DS was hiding too much on the first and we thought it would be nice to ask my DM to come instead) and one MW appointment. Is east for him to get the time off though and he is better at remembering what questions to ask as this is our first!

MummaGiles · 03/10/2017 18:33

Booking appointment and scans.

Original poster

HolyShmoly · 03/10/2017 19:48

Thanks everyone. it seems like a very mixed bag.
I think he's going to come to the GP app (as it's after work anyway) and possibly the booking in appointment, and then the scans and probibly the one where they use the doppler.
If I go to the hospital I want to, it will be close to my work and close to his work for the moment, but he's moving offices soon which will actually be close to the other hospital. He can manage his own time to a certain extent with work so shouldn't have to take much precious holidays. Although we want to keep it under wraps until after our first scan so he will make up some excuses for those two!

Hey @WaitingtillJuly17 I hope you're keeping well! It's so nice to see familiar faces over here too. Are you on the May babies board? I'm feeling fine, it's still super early days (I'm actually not due AF till tomorrow!) so no real symptoms yet.

OP posts:

WaitingTillJuly17 · 03/10/2017 21:13

No @HolyShmoly I'm due in March if you can believe it?! Hope things stay nice and symptom free for you!

TheCatsMother99 · 04/10/2017 09:02

Scans only for the dads. There’s no need for them to be at the others. Midwives like to talk to m2b without the men there. Helps weed out the abusive controlling ones.

I'm sorry but I don't agree with this.

My DH would have been gutted if he had missed hearing the heartbeat at 16 weeks.

My midwife doesn't mind partners there at all, we asked at the first appointment, and I'm sure she would be able to spot other red flags than a partner who wants to be involved in his partner's pregnancy.

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