General discussion - Mom and Dad Esq.

[SEC_Chick]

Originally posted by dtb
DON'T READ THIS, ATTICUS

I can't remember if you've had the baby already or not, but I think you haven't. If you have had the baby (and perhaps even if you haven't), this will be irrelevant (for you), but maybe not for others:

No baby yet. Our childbirth class is this weekend and I still have a little ways to go. Thanks so much for the advice.

As for the nurses disregarding your wishes... In theory, the hospital's practice (assuming no need for NICU or other emergency newborn care) is to let the mother have the baby for the first 45 mins to an hour for skin to skin contact and to allow for that first nursing attempt (which is recommended to occur within the first hour after birth). Then they take the kid to be weighed, measured, tested, etc. with the father watching, and then you can either have the baby in the nursery or room in. They recommended rooming in to better establish BFing, and I plan to do so. Am I overly optimistic that this will remedy some of the problems?

(BTW, the Center for Missing and Expolited Children has some tips for the hospital to keep your child from being abducted that really freaked me out. OTOH, I don't know that I'm going to be getting that much sleep anyway if the kid is going to be attached avery 2 hrs or so anyway.)

[mommylawyer]

Originally posted by SEC_Chick
They recommended rooming in to better establish BFing, and I plan to do so. Am I overly optimistic that this will remedy some of the problems?

After I yelled at them about not giving him a bottle, I let him stay in the nursery...I'd get as much rest as you can during those two days..... you'll be missing rest soon enough, and babies aren't really hungry during the first two days, its more the need to suck and get the colostrum.....

sending you good nursing vibes...

ml

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by SEC_Chick
TexLex, did you deliver at Women's? If so I will watch them like a hawk. I wasn't expecting that problem, since most non-BFers bitch about the pro-BF attitude of the nurses.

I hesitate to venture into this area, but I note that when our first child was born, my wife got similar static while she was in the hospital before the milk came in and the feeding started to work.

The nurses really wanted to be able to give the baby some formula overnight, but my wife stuck to her guns, despite feeding visits every 90 minutes or so with crying infant and a "You're starving your baby" comment. The kid did not perish, and is still going strong.

Funny part is my wife switched to formula full-time after about 6 months, both due to production issues and because it was a pain in the butt.

In fairness to the nurses, the crew caring for the child post-partum (at least in our hospital) were not the OB-GYN nurses who cared for my wife. They were a separate crew whose job was to care for the newborn babies -- so that was their prioirity.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Secret_Agent_Man


The nurses really wanted to be able to give the baby some formula overnight, but my wife stuck to her guns, despite feeding visits every 90 minutes or so with crying infant and a "You're starving your baby" comment. The kid did not perish, and is still going strong.

Incentives. If the baby dies from malnourishment during the first few days, the hospital gets sued. If the baby's IQ is a few points lower and has a less developed relationship with her mom, good luck proving the hospital is to blame 18 years later.

[nononono]

Originally posted by mommylawyer
After I yelled at them about not giving him a bottle, I let him stay in the nursery...I'd get as much rest as you can during those two days..... you'll be missing rest soon enough, and babies aren't really hungry during the first two days, its more the need to suck and get the colostrum.....

sending you good nursing vibes...

ml

The nurses would not let me let #1 stay in the nursery overnight, because I would not let them bottlefeed her, and she was crying.

[pony_trekker]

Originally posted by Secret_Agent_Man
Funny part is my wife switched to formula full-time after about 6 months, both due to production issues and because it was a pain in the butt.

Geez, when were you going to stop breast feeding? Kids get teazed if they are still breastfeeding at little league games.

http://archives.cnn.com/2002/HEALTH/...troversy.otsc/

Spree: story about psycho moms nursing kids 8 and 10 years old.

[dtb]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
Incentives. If the baby dies from malnourishment during the first few days, the hospital gets sued. If the baby's IQ is a few points lower and has a less developed relationship with her mom, good luck proving the hospital is to blame 18 years later.

That is crap. (The "correlation" b/n long-term bonding and breastfeeding.)

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by dtb
That is crap. (The "correlation" b/n long-term bonding and breastfeeding.)

Making it even harder to win damages!

[robustpuppy]

Originally posted by TexLex
I don't know what sort of jollies they get in the hospital from trying to ply the baby with formula against your wishes, but we had that problem both times. I won't go into it, just be prepared and have your hubby prepared to say no - you may not feel up to arguing about it when the times comes, so make sure hubby knows what you want and why you want it.

***

Supply - not eating enough good quality protein or enough calories, low iron, sheer exhaustion and lack of sleep, pain, stress, dehydration, and PP depression can all kill supply, so be sure to take preemptive measures where you can.

I will third or fourth that don't let the nurses talk you into formula bullshit. I ended up giving my little one about 50 ml total via syringe over the course of 10 hours because some total bitch of a nurse had me convinced at 2 AM that the baby was hungry and dehydrated (hungry, yes, but absolutely notdeyhdrated) after the other nurses on other shifts kept bugging me that the baby had lost (exactly) 10% of birthweight and they were worried and the baby had to gain weight, etc etc. I still feel guilty and angry about that. Going in, I was absolutely committed to exclusive breastfeeding, and after an emergency c-section and hospital-stay-induced exhaustion (let me fucking sleep, please!) I gave in, because I thought the biggest concern was nipple confusion, without knowing that exposure to formula is less than ideal with respect to the baby's GI tract. And my milk was really slow to come in (it took 6 days) despite the ginormity of my boobs (all the conditions TL listed were present except PP Depression, despite alll the hospital bullshit I was really happy and upbeat) so I thought I had no choice. Only afterward did I found out that even the hospital Ped didn't think formula was necessary - the nurses made me think he did.

I wish I had known going in that I had to hold firm against the neurosis-inspiring statements of the nurses. They are overworked, surely, and they just want to get things taken care of as easily as they can. They want you to BF but also think supplementing with formula is the greatest thing since sliced bread, and they convinced two exhausted parents that the baby needed it.

Next time I will put a card on the baby's bassinet that says "I'm breastfeeding, please no bottles, pacifiers, water, or formula!" And I will have the baby room in with me every night. I let them take baby to the nursery the first night, and some idiot gave baby a pacifier! (I was shocked.) Luckily (at least it was lucky then), the baby latched on well right away (if painfully) and never developed a preference for a rubber nipple.

As I've stated here before, I'm not so much into the pregnancy and child care books, but That's What They're For by Janet Tamaro is actually pretty useful, despite the goofy title, and is a quick read.

Sorry, just had to vent there. I'm still pretty irritated about many aspects of my hospital stay.

P.S. Percocet and abdominal surgery and iron supplements are extremely constipating. FYI.

P.P.S. My residual anger over the formula issue is not due to the fact that I am currently constipated.

[mommylawyer]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
Incentives. If the baby dies from malnourishment during the first few days, the hospital gets sued. If the baby's IQ is a few points lower and has a less developed relationship with her mom, good luck proving the hospital is to blame 18 years later.

No - incentives from Johnson & Johnson etc...get the mom to supplement, which will in the end decrease her milk supply due less nursing and then she will have to use formula...money in J & J et al pockets....

babies are not being starved nor will they within the 2 days - breasmilk doesn't even come in until like the second day...babies are constantly nourished in utero...they don't even know what it is to feel hungry for a few hours....


whether one nurses or not is a personal decision...while i am personally pro-nursing, it doesn't mean a mom who opts not to is a bad mom, but i hate that your starving your baby crap...you must ha skipped that class in nursing school. It always helps to have info as ammo when they start that crapola...

ml
ml

[dtb]

Originally posted by mommylawyer
whether one nurses or not is a personal decision...while i am personally pro-nursing, it doesn't mean a mom who opts not to is a bad mom, but i hate that your starving your baby crap...you must ha skipped that class in nursing school. It always helps to have info as ammo when they start that crapola...

Most of the kid-care "industry" in NYC is pro-BF (annoyingly so, imo), and my pediatrician and all the hospital nurses were very encouraging of BF. I'm so surprised to hear so many of you have had the "You're starving your baby" BS. The baby would have to go for weeks before starving.

[robustpuppy]

Originally posted by SEC_Chick
No baby yet. Our childbirth class is this weekend and I still have a little ways to go. Thanks so much for the advice.

As for the nurses disregarding your wishes... In theory, the hospital's practice (assuming no need for NICU or other emergency newborn care) is to let the mother have the baby for the first 45 mins to an hour for skin to skin contact and to allow for that first nursing attempt (which is recommended to occur within the first hour after birth). Then they take the kid to be weighed, measured, tested, etc. with the father watching, and then you can either have the baby in the nursery or room in. They recommended rooming in to better establish BFing, and I plan to do so. Am I overly optimistic that this will remedy some of the problems?

Make sure policy and practice are the same. I had an emergency c-section but not a complicated one, and they did not bring me the baby for about 3 hours until I got out of recovery and into my room. They kept saying they were bringing the baby but just never got around to it. They wanted to wait until I could move my legs, or my chills subsided, or my pain meds kicked in, or until they gave the baby a bath (???!!!) but since I was feeling rather crappy it was hard to put up an effective fuss or to keep track of time.

And this is a hospital with a mom holds the baby within an hour policy.

I'm really not bitter! Just frustrated by all of it -- not the way I expected things to go. Next time I'll take more charge of things - or have hubby prepared to do it.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by robustpuppy
They kept saying they were bringing the baby but just never got around to it. .

I'm surprised you weren't more insistent in telling them that you gotta see the baby.

[dtb]

Originally posted by robustpuppy
And this is a hospital with a mom holds the baby within an hour policy.

There are policies about this? With both my kids, I held them within the first few minutes. They had to work on the first one for a minute, but the second one, as soon as he wasn't so gooey (maybe 90 seconds?) he was in my lap.

[robustpuppy]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
I'm surprised you weren't more insistent in telling them that you gotta see the baby.

I'll have to use that one next time - I might get a laugh from my L&D nurse. I can do a mean Long Island accent.

Oh, and SEC Chick -- I have the Medela PIS Advanced and it works quite well. I'm at home till baby's six months old and I try to pump 1x day now just to get a little supply in the freezer for when we have to take a car trip or go to a party or something.