The TV show is based on a book of the same title.  In the book it goes
into detail of how the mother insisted on skin to skin with her
preterm baby against medical advice (they wanted to transfer the baby
to an incubator in a hospital) and expressed breastmilk and dripped it
into the bay's mouth.  Unfortunately the TV show doesn't show her hand
expressing or even mention that it is breastmilk.

Sharon Economides LM, CPM, MMID, IBCLC

On Oct 10, 2012, at 1:42 PM, heather <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

>> This show was shown in Australia on the ABC (the public broadcaster) and has just finished. Jean, the time was the post-war period, 1950s or very early-1960s, and the midwives did home deliveries - including of unexpected triplets in one of the last episodes. You may have noticed in the show, they went off on their bikes, carrying their delivery kits, when called to a delivery. This waws very different form the US situation for the same period.
>
>
> Is this the UK programme 'Call the Midwife' which was on British TV last year, with Miranda Hart?
>
> If so, then it certainly is post-war, and based on true stories.
>
> The author died shortly before the TV programme was broadcast, sadly.
>
> The show caused quite a lot of discussion over here and the consensus was that it was pretty accurate.
>
> Home birth, with a midwife, was the norm in the UK until the early 60s. Midwives and district nurses all rode bicycles round their patch.
>
> Formula feeding from birth, with no bf at all,  was fairly unusual until the mid 60s, though supplementation and early switch to formula was very common. This comes from talking to women about their experiences - it's not in any stats.
>
> It was also common in the 1950s, 60s and 70s for women to be told not to breastfeed. If your baby was slightly pre-term, slightly post-term,  underweight, overweight, if you yourself were 'tired', or thin, or younger, or older, or if your milk looked 'weak', if your labour was long,  some know-it-all busybody would stick their nose in and order you not to breastfeed.
>
> What we never had here, as far as I can tell from talking to women, was routine meds to dry up the milk.
>
> Heather Welford Neil
> NCT bfc, tutor, UK
>
>
> --
> http://www.heatherwelford.co.uk
>
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