Could you please come and give a feminist view on this thread?

[Koothrapanties]

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/childbirth/2016142-Man-sleeping-on-ward?msgid=45551970#45551970

It is an interesting subject which has caused quite a split in opinion. I would be interested to hear feminist viewpoints on the matter if thats ok?

It is about whether partners should be allowed to stay on the postnatal ward.

Thanks.

Sorry clicky link:

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/childbirth/2016142-Man-sleeping-on-ward?msgid=45551970#45551970

My husband insisted on staying and just wouldn't leave...they eventually gave us a private room. however in our case our daughter had problems soon after birth - so he didn't want to leave her or me.

we didn't even stay one night after our son was born because i didn't want to be on my own. he was born in the morning and we left that evening.

it is clearly an outdated system which is rooted in the organisation of hospital maternity units as being woman-centred. This is just the start of the whole leaving men out of child rearing cycle which continues in every sense after the birth.

If we could have afforded it I would have liked a birth centre where we could all be together - my husband and my other child.

it comes down to choice - for the woman and the man. each should have the right to do what they want during the birth experience. but the NHS doesn't offer choice...I couldn't even choose to give birth at home.

The previous and current government have an ongoing commitment to put an end to mixed wards.

So from that perspective it feels inappropriate to have men spending the night on maternity wards.

Same as partners aren't allowed to stay overnight in any other circs really.

And there is are space / noise / the nurses knowing who is who and being able to keep control of everything type issues.

Our maternity ward does have some private rooms for low risk people - I wouldn't mind there. But on a ward where women are hooked up to monitors and piss bags and morphine and so on - no it's not appropriate. It is primarily a medical area.

POst-natal wards I mean, not maternity wards.

No it's a hospital ward. I don't want strange men hanging about while I am trying to bf, catheterised, leaking blood.

I wouldn't want men there. It would make me uncomfortable .

I don't see it as a male/female issue, I see it as a patient/non-patient issue. I wouldn't mind male patients in a hospital ward with me, as there are procedures for privacy if it's needed.

Obviously it would be challenging for male patients to be in a post-natal ward (medical miracle!) but from a principle perspective that's how I see the problem. For a range of reasons - shared experience, equal vulnerability, not interfering or getting in the way, equal compulsion to stay...

Having come across foul-mouthed, offensive and abusive men on Materinty wards during visiting hours, I would find it completely unacceptable to have to try and sleep, breastfeed and go to the toilet (leaky and blood stained) next to one of these people 24 hours a day.

Unfortunately some women are also quite frightening to be around (I'm thinking of the friend of the new mum who insisted on staying the night with her friend and who got abusive when asked by other people in the bay to switch off the TV at 2am).

And I feel it is completely unfair to make the MWs take responsibility for picking and choosing who is suitable to stay.

So - given the current levels of facilities - I don't think any non-patients should stay unless they and the woman can be allocated a private en-suite room. In an ideal world we would all have private en-suite rooms with enough staff to properly care for us.

I would have given anything to have my dp with me the night after dd born. It was one of the worst nights of my life, I would have put up with no end of horrible strange men on the ward to have had dp with me for that crucial first night. I might not have got Pnd and dd might have been successfully breast fed if he had been there to support me.