Dad's overnight on postnatal wards - yay or nay?

[BernadetteRostankowskiWolowitz]

Taking this debate off another thread so as not to derail

For me, unless you book and pay for a private room, overnights are for mums and their babies only.

No recovering woman should have to handle overnights with upwards of 4 stranger men sitting in chairs in close proximity to their bed.

Dad's there to care for the woman and baby is unacceptable - not their job. Not at the expense of the other women wanting privacy overnight.

You’re not getting it. Your partner might be a saintly man with averted eyes. Many, many, many are not.

It’s like the old thing of ‘not all men are like that’. No. They’re not. But women have absolutely no way of knowing which ones are the ones to avoid. So in a space where a woman is at her most vulnerable, protect her.

Men can visit for 12/24 hours. That’s enough. They’re not equal in this experience.

@Whiskeypowers you literally just ignored everything I said about why my partner being there was essential. But nice try though trying to play the victim.

Thankfully, not in my NHS trust he won’t be.

I arrived the post natal ward at midnight and DH was sent home and told he couldn't return until midday.

I was in a corner bay at the far end of the ward and unable to get up easily. I didn't see a single person till DH returned at midday. I discharged myself because the care was so poor.

In an ideal world post natal care would be adequate, but until then I think partners should be allowed to stay.

I’m on the fence. In my post natal ward each bed was surrounded by full curtains. I could hear other people but I didn’t see anyone else and they didn’t see me unless I was fully covered in a dressing gown on the way to the bathroom. (I was in for 3 days).

Night and day don’t really have much meaning at that time anyway, so I can’t get too excited about banning men at night when they are there during the day. And what if a baby is born in the middle of the night, would that mean the Dad could not come to get the Mum and baby settled?

My DH stayed 1 night, very quietly dozing in a chair. There was an asshole in the next cubicle who played action movies on an iPad at full volume and was borderline abusive to his partner, but the staff chucked him out, rightly so.

Dad on the other side was a fundamentalist Christian who spent over an hour lecturing the new brother about what God expected of him now he had a baby sister. That was in the daytime though!

I was in a 4 bed bay on my own overnight so the staff expected my DH to stay after my c section and PPH. They also expected him to help me shower. If he wasn't there I wouldn't have eaten or had anything to drink; the unappetising lunch was brought just after my PPH and I couldn't face it, then the evening meal was just awful. DH had to go to Subway (the only nearby takeaway) and fetch me drinks.

I was in quite a bad way and not fit to look after a new baby on my own, but the staff were far too busy. I'm very glad we had the bay to ourselves, as when I shuffled to the shower in the evening I wasn't even wearing knickers and just had rags between my legs. It would have been awful to have done that in front of strangers.

Jesus, did you really just say that to another woman?

These are the rules for my trust. So come 5pm it's goodbye strange men!

So happy my hospital trust supports and enforces this.

Excellent. Women being placed first and foremost. 🫶🏻

It's a no from me. I had to stay in for a week with both of mine and I'll never forget being in tears repeatedly trying to get an hours sleep while having to listen to constant loud snoring from several cubicles. Or trying to get the midwives attention while passing a massive clot and finding her attention taken by a father asking how to change a nappy. Or having to wait ages in a corridor in a horrible exposing gown for the toilet as a man was in there or worst of all having to hear the nurses telling the fathers that the meals ( it was self service) were for the mums and to ensure there was enough left for them.

Some women

@BunchHarman pulling her up on "did she really say that to another women" yet you can continue bashing men as a whole when only the minority have let them down.

@BunchHarman are the women in your care being left for hours post c section unable to get up to get screaming babies? If not then fair enough if they are then that’s sickening. Read the thread. Without partners a lot of women have been left traumatised by the days they spent in hospital unsupported and in pain, exhausted and crying unable to pick up a baby with absolutely no one there to help them. I ended up with pnd with my first because of this. I was in for a week, two days in labour which ended in an emergency c section I was then told they thought my dd had Down syndrome. Midwives we’re no where to be seen all night every night I was in. I was so glad my dh was aloud to stay the second night I was in with my son because it was the same situation.

I’m not bashing men, I’m saying they’re totally not entitled to be on a postnatal ward. It’s a woman’s space.

If you think all men are your partner, think on. Read the postnatal ward threads. I dare you.

It says one OTHER so that isn't saying Dad can watch the birth and then only be there 2 hours a day. It's saying you can have other visitor for those times

The sidelines.😂 Is you partner a jealous little man or something?

Because my partner accepted that he was dad and knew that meant he had a different experience of expecting a baby and them arriving in the world than I did. He was supportive through my pregnancies, came to scans, felt baby kick and generally cared for me. He didn’t feel sidelined, he knew that pregnancy is something females go through and he did what he could.

He was there through the births and spoke up for me when I couldn’t. He cut the cord on one of our children. He dressed our babies in their first clothes. He got to tell everyone when our babies were born. He changed and cuddled our babies during DAYTIME visiting hours.

Then he went home and slept overnight and was back the next morning. Hardly sidelined! Just accepting that as a man, a father, there are things which he couldn’t do. Having a baby isn’t shared equally, the woman is pregnant, the woman gives birth, the woman breastfeeds (if she can and chooses to) the woman needs aftercare and privacy.

Imagine a man feeling sidelined, what sort of selfish, jealous idiot is this sort of man. No decent man would feel like that. And for a woman who has endured pregnancy and birth to be feeling sorry for the poor ‘sidelined’ man. Fucking hell!

Read my posts. The solution is to properly staff the departments, not to allow men 24hr access to a ward full of physically and mentally vulnerable women.

@BunchHarman believe it or not I do understand what you're saying, we clearly just have different points of view.
I don't want any stranger having to see me in a state, man or woman, I don't think they'd want to look at me either!

Imagine a man feeling sidelined, what sort of selfish, jealous idiot is this sort of man. No decent man would feel like that. And for a woman who has endured pregnancy and birth to be feeling sorry for the poor ‘sidelined’ man. Fucking hell!

I know. I’m really disheartened by the amount of NAMALTs on here.

@SleepingStandingUp

It does say that yes, but it's my local hospital and health board and as I've given birth there three times I know this to be the case, that the men have to leave. So glad my local hospital has it right.

And until then?

Some men like to stay in postnatal to keep an eye on their wife/partner so she doesn't have a chance of talking with a midwife about the abuse she gets.

@BunchHarman what you're talking about is a pipe dream. And even if staff wards were staffed adequately 24/7 I still don't want a stranger helping me wipe myself after going to the loo after a section, amongst a whole bunch of other intimate things!

@BloodAndFire I've read enough. Don't have the time to read through 19 pages though. I was in a bay with 5 other women babies and dad's. My epidural went wrong so I couldn't feel or move anything below my eyes and no one else to help with baby. Even by the third night my stitches meant I could barely move or lift. What exactly do you think dad's would be interested in apart from there own partner and baby?

Birthing is messy it's just how it is, the entire process you're going to be surrounded by strangers while your shting yourself in labour and at your most vulnerable.

Yes, but those strangers are qualified and vetted medical staff with a duty of care to you, which includes protecting your dignity as best possible and acting in your best interests. Not some random man whose partner just happens to have given birth around the same time as you.