I just had to add my .02 to this issue, based on my experience with my last
baby (now 7 yo).  He was born via normal vaginal birth except that I had a
fever 102+ and gas pains (worse than labor pains) that threw me into labor at
37 weeks.  I mentioned in an earlier post that the only medication I had
during labor was a dose of Stadol.  On the delivery table Peter sucked
"wrong", "banging" his tongue against the nipple.  I was still able to keep
him on breast, and express colostrum in his mouth, until he "caught on" a
little.  Over the next 23 hours, he went to breast at least 15 times, never
leaving my side.  As the day wore on, however, I noticed him making this
little "puh, puh" motion with his mouth between nursings.  (I later learned
this is one sign of "grunting", or early neonatal respiratory distress.)  His
color never changed, and he never fought at the breast.  No congestion, & my
breasts aren't terribly big.

At 11pm (23 hours of age), I asked one of our NICU nurses to check him out
before we went to bed.  I just had a "funny feeling" that all was not right.
 She observed the grunting, checked his O2 saturation.  He was satting at
about 85% after feeding.  She suggested I let them watch him in the nursery
that night (and promised on a stack of breast pumps that she'd bring him out
for me to feed if he so much as licked his lips!)  A good thing I
agreed--because he "crashed" less than an hour later, and ended up in the
NICU for 2 weeks with sepsis!  Turns out I had an enterovirus (that sent me
into labor), that he had caught somewhere along the way, which led to sepsis
and respiratory distress.

Bottom line:  microbes that are just "annoying" to us old folks can spread
rapidly in newborns and wreak havoc in a matter of minutes or hours.  He
NEVER looked "distressed".  Only when the alarm went off when his O2
saturation fell below 65, did they suspect anything seriously wrong.  Had I
kept him with me in bed, he would quite likely have slipped into full arrest
without my ever knowing.

Thankfully, he's now 7 and reading Goosebumps books fluently--no brain
damage, except for a volatile temper! (yes, tantrums--and he nursed well past
2 1/2). :)

Carol, in balmy St. Louis (hey, it's still over 0 degrees!)