SCBU should I be there all day? Feeling guilty

[Esmeralda1988]

I had my first baby on Monday at 34+3 after my waters went at exactly 34 weeks. The birth was pretty horrific partly as I was already shattered from a 3 day hospital stay, and ended in forceps and episiotomy in theatre. I lost quite a lot of blood but just under transfusion threshold. Baby is absolutely fine and a good weight, just need to establish feeding and she can come home. I'm really thrilled with her and the mental effects of the birth have faded fast. I wanted to breastfeed but 4 days later my milk still hasn't come in, so we 'practice' when I visit her. Because of coronavirus my partner is only allowed 2 hours a day with her but I can be there all the time. Which leads me to my worry.. should I be spending all day there with her? At the moment I go for 2 hours or so in the morning by myself then home for a few hours then back with my partner once he's finished work. I feel horribly guilty not being there all day but physically I feel dreadful, I'm still bleeding heavily, I'm short of breath and generally just want to lie down and recover after any activity. I want to get myself properly well before she comes home. I thought what I was doing was fine and a good balance until the nurse there yesterday suggested I stay the full day and 'pop out to town for a break and some food'. Its all I can do to make it back down to the ground floor of the hospital at the moment! Is there anyone who's been in a similar situation who can maybe make me feel better about this? I feel like such an awful person for not being with her as much as I possibly can

Yes, it does sound very much like the OP doesn't feel like the baby's Mum, but rather someone who is a visitor.

Op - you ARE the Mum!

Get your bloods done as a priority and try to get a full night's sleep but try to spend the day with your dd. Eat well, even if you have to put steak dinners on your credit card. Loads of snacks, water and maybe ask for a trolley to nap on while you stay all day.

I think you need to speak to someone though.

I know nothing about premature births but your thread came up in the active list and the first thing I thought when reading your OP was that it sounds like you’re low on iron. It can leave you breathless and absolutely on your knees with exhaustion. Please do insist that your bloods are checked again. Best of luck with your new baby.

Congratulations!

I gave birth at 32 weeks via a c section and generally my time in SCBU looked like this:

8-12 at hospital
12-1 lunch
1-6pm at hospital

6-8am at home

I pumped on a 4 hourly schedule at home and through the night and took whatever I could get into the hospital with me the next morning.

My DS had no sucking reflex so he had a teeny dummy to stimulate him and once that was developed I had to try and shove him on the boob as much as possible to get him to try and feed.

There was also a pumping room in the SCBU unit I would use so I didn't interrupt my pumping schedule.

I was really lucky and I felt absolutely fine after my section. I was a little stiff for a few days but generally I was able to move around and take care of myself etc. I'd try and spend more time at the hospital if you want to establish breast feeding and also make sure you pump around the clock to stabilise your milk supply but don't feel guilty if you can't get to the hospital more or can't pump much.

Congrats again xx

I also think no one is in a place to comment if they haven't had a baby is SCBU as you have NO idea what it is like.

Also popping back to say get rid of the hand pump. I went electric and coughed uk for a made last and it's was worth it's weight in gold.

I completely get not feeling like she is really yours. I felt the same. My daughter is now six and I still privately celebrate her coming home day as that is the day I felt I actually had a baby. I celebrate her birthday for her but for me it was a horrible day full of trauma. Her coming home day gives me joy.

Are you expressing through the night? This is really important to improve supply.

I’ve not had a preemie but both of mine were re admitted for weight loss and neither felt like mine until I’d spent a few days at home with them. I didn’t leave my first but did leave my second for 6 hours and was quite prepared to leave them all night as I was desperate for some rest.
The chairs and beds are hell if you’ve had a c section. I certainly don’t judge if you don’t spend all day there. It will probably affect bf but a knackered ill mother isn’t much good either.
As others have said make sure you get a blood test for iron levels and that you eat well.

Madela*

Oh and ask to borrow the hospital pump they are much better

I had a similar experience, lost a lot of blood but didn't quite have a transfusion (which I regret in hindsight). I had a bruised coccyx and couldn't sit upright for weeks. I know the absolute mindfuck of the exhausion.

Are you aware that with so much blood loss you're milk will come in later than other 'normal' mothers? I had to combination feed at first, or my baby would have died. I am pro breast feeding but my body was so stripped the milk took forever to come in. We combination fed for a month or so and then ebf was fine.

I appreciate how dreadful you feel.

It depends how you feel about breast feeding vs formula feeding. If you are keen to breastfeed I think you'd be better staying in for the day with her to try to trigger your milk to come in. I tried to breastfeed at every opportunity I had, and although I understand why you needed recovery time I personally would now leave her side as little as possible.

Please don't feel guilty, it's all so surreal. Spend extra time with her and hopefully everything will come with time x

Please ignore the harsh, unhelpful and in some cases cruel comments on here. I am shocked at them and the posters clearly have absolutely no idea what it is like to have a baby on SCBU.

I just don't know what I'm supposed to be doing. I just want to be able to take her home and look after her myself. It doesn't really feel like she's mine at the moment
I think that’s normal. No one on the neonatal unit sits you down and tells you what they expect of you or what you are meant to be doing. I initially felt I was veering between being completely useless and in the way as I had no clue what I was meant to do and not being there enough (because I wasn’t there every waking second). And I’m not surprised she doesn’t feel like yours at the moment, firstly she has arrived as a shock and you need time to process that and secondly she has the neonatal team looking after her and doing lots of things for her so it might well feel a bit like she is “theirs” rather than yours and that you’re just a bit of a hindrance who has no idea what to do.

Not sure why everyone is going on about uncomfy chairs and csections, OP didn't have a caesarean!

I spent all day in ICU and felt guilty about not being there at nighttime. I was very lucky and managed to establish breastfeeding. My DS was asleep most of the time only awake for feeding and nappy changes and maybe a bit more. I had a difficult birth but not as bad as you describe. If you are feeling unwell can you maybe go more often but for shorter time periods? I personally think that hospitals should have more comfortable places for Mum's to stay. You are literally left to sit on a hard chair for hours when usually in pain. The nurse told me that a lot of ICU mum's get PND and I said with the lack of support they get that doesn't surprise me.

@TuckerCh
You clearly have no fucking clue and your comment is breathtakingly insensitive.

I don't know how you could be relaxing at home while your baby is in the hospital alone???. I am staggered that ANYONE could think this is what the OP is doing. No one with a baby on NNU is relaxing at home.

It's so hard when you have a baby in hospital and you've had to go home. My 2nd was born at 25 weeks and spent 10 weeks in NICU and then in the SCBU. Having an older child meant I couldn't spend all day every day there and I felt really guilty to see other mums spending every waking moment with their baby. In terms of getting breastfeeding going then the more you can express the better, especially setting your alarm every 2 hours over night. Has anyone shown you how to hand express? If your milk hasn't come in yet I wonder if you are managing to pump any colostrum or not? For my eldest he also went to the NICU briefly and a wonderful midwife showed me how to hand express which I found much easier to start with. With my littlest in NICU I also found expressing next to the incubator was really helpful to get things going (they should have screens you can put up around you). I recommend as much skin to skin as possible and like you say you're doing, putting baby to your breast
during the tube feeds. I did manage to move to exclusive breastfeeding with my littlest so it can be done. I would totally agree with pp about seeking help from the midwife as it does sound like maybe you are anaemic which will make you feel extra exhausted and weak. Having a baby in hospital and not with you is a really tricky situation to deal with, thinking of you lots and going you feel better soon.

My ds was born at 39 weeks and was in scbu for a week. I had a similar birth, failed ventouse, forceps and episiotomy in theatre. He was also born on a Monday. I stayed with him all day (was kept in myself until the Friday) and was encouraged to bf very frequently, including overnight as I was still a patient myself.

Dd was born at term, almost identical horrific birth, and she was admitted to scbu at 10 days old with suspected meningitis. Fortunately despite having birth injuries and a very busy toddler we'd just about established bf, though it was made clear that to maintain this whilst dd was tube fed and too poorly to try bf, I should use the hospital's electric pump frequently whilst I was there, and my own manual pump overnight.

It is hard, lonely and isolating being in scbu but I do think you should be with your baby as much as possible in these first few days - especially if you want to succeed at bf.

It’s been said many times but definitely get your bloods checked.

I needed a transfusion with my first birth and not with my second (like you, the blood loss was significant but not catastrophic).

I bounced back physically from the first very traumatic birth, the second took me a lot longer to recover from.

Ignore people saying stupid things about not being able to rest if you had your baby with you. Mothers get sick too for heaven’s sake!

I was lucky that my first was in SCBU for just a few days (and wasn’t premature) but it was an odd time. Please continue to look after yourself and do the best you can for your baby while not ignoring your own needs.

You need to make sure you are well but that means asking the medical staff to check you out. Being breathless and feeling light headed needs to be addressed. Also try to get a comfortable chair. Is that possible?

Really appreciate the helpful comments and advice so thanks for those. I posted in prem birth hoping for some support from others who have been in a similar position. I didn't post AIBU for abandoning my 4 day old baby. I've asked for this to be removed because I don't want to look back on it, some of the comments have cut me to the core and I really wish I hadn't posted at all. I don't expect to be soothed and reassured I'm right but there are ways of saying things without causing more upset.

I get that the birth didn't go as planned, but you really need to take your rightful place at the head of the table now as MAMMY. Plonk yourself there, you're in charge, it's your baby. Ask for all the help you can get and for God's sake get some iron into you. I didn't (placental abruption, massive bleed/c-section). I was like you borderline transfusion level but they decided not to. I developed PND and found it all really hard. But I was by my dd's side every second apart from one night in the hospital (maybe 3rd night) where the midwives took dd for the night to let me sleep.

When my son was in the NICU I managed to establish breastfeeding mainly by using a hospital grade pump. I had one at home and would express every 2-3 hours and when I was at the hospital I would spend most of my time trying to breastfeed.
Don’t beat yourself up on how long you spend there. My sons consultant ordered me to take a day off at one point as he could see how exhausted I was. Do what you can and keep expressing as much as possible.
Yes it is true the longer and more often baby is at the breast the better your outcome will be but expressing worked for me. I had a three year old at home so I did what I could. I would have been there all day and night if I could but i couldn’t.
Congratulations on your baby 🎉 I hope you get home with her soon x

Reading the above, I am such a bad mum ... Our son was on NICU for eleven weeks with tubes and wires for most of that time. For two weeks post C/S I was in hospital and could visit more but, once home, we would visit from 1pm to 5pm. I found that if we were there earlier or later, we'd be ushered out of the ward during 'rounds' so it was disruptive. I was knackered from the C/S, at one point my wound gaped and I gushed blood whilst stood at the side of our son's incubator. I was constantly told to look after myself, as I'd need my energy for when we brought our son home.

He was tube-fed, I expressed from day 1 and ended up on medication to increase my supply. We didn't establish breastfeeding but it wasn't the end of the world; once our son came home, we got into a routine where I would pump whilst Dad fed him. After six months he went onto high-cal formula anyway.

I felt a bit distanced and breathless a few days after giving birth and it turned out I needed a transfusion. I felt better immediately! It’s hard enough being a new mother anyway, without SCBU and Covid plus a horrible delivery. Don’t be hard on yourself, you need to be well too. I’d ask for blood tests again and hope your baby is home with you soon. It will be much nicer!

Oh, and don’t beat yourself up if you can’t/don’t want to breastfeed and use formula instead. It will all be ok in the end 😊

OP, sorry you don't like what you've heard, and I wish you luck. It's hard being a new parent. Very fucking hard.

You dont always need skin to skin. My daughter was in an incubator for a week and we still established breastfeeding. I expressed every 3hrs and took loads of photos of her which i would look through when pumping to get the hormones flowing!
OP, I agree with PP who have said you should try and be there a bit more as it will definitely benefit the breastfeeding for you both. But everyone knows that BF only works if mum is happy and relaxed so if you're feeling too exhausted, make sure you take the time out when you need it. Perhaps setting a routine - 3hrs in the morning, back for a few hours over lunch and to relax. Then back for another 3hrs in the afternoon. Make sure you're expressing during the night too. I used to express around 11.30pm, 3am and 6am. It's still much more sleep than you'll get once the baby does arrive home!
Good luck