Joy Cocks wrote of doing heel sticks with baby in mother's arms and at the
breast.  I have done this on occasion myself.  When I do PKU screens, the
mother and baby have been discharged and are returning for a quick once-over
including the test.  So I can time the stick for when it is least upsetting
to the hopefully sated baby who is supported by presence of at least one
parent.  About 9 of 10 babies I take blood from don't even whimper.  Not
bragging, just telling it like it is.

On the ward, routine tests are done first thing in the morning and it is the
lab staff who set the terms: no mothers wanted in the room, all babies to be
lined up and ready, warm packs on feet for 10-15 minutes in advance.  They
are given glucose 30 per cent just prior, on initiative of the staff, who
feel very proud that to be making it better for the baby.  Before they
started with the glucose, the staff never even went in to the room to
comfort screaming babies during lab rounds, nor were they conscientious
about returning them to their mothers immediately after, nor did they make
mothers aware that despite the wishes of the lab staff, it is the baby's
right to have a close relative with it at all times in the hospital.  Blood
samples from adults are taken at the patient's bedside.  Babies are herded
into a corral together.  Babies in some contexts are not really people, it
seems.

I do think that if the baby is going to be subjected to many heel sticks
over a matter of days, it may be worth separating the painful stimulus from
the breast, even if only by a few seconds, so that the breast is clearly a
source of comfort AFTER the pain.   I have observed one child who had
tremendous tension around BF despite obviously loving it too, and his
parents had been advised to do tendon-stretching exercises for his bilateral
club feet when he was latched on and BF, because that was when he was most
relaxed.  Not for long!  Things improved when tendon-stretching was moved to
bath time, with the added relaxing effect of warm water.  The BF was saved,
despite some of the nastiest nipple trauma I have ever seen.  Baby was cup
fed and wet nursed alternately by three different women for over a week
while mother manually expressed.  Giving EBM at the breast was not possible
due to skin trauma, hence the wet nursing to give him more feeding pleasure.
He was grateful for it, too!  In fact, he was weaned at age five and a half.
(Years, not months.)  He was exclusively breast fed, if not exclusively by
his own mother, for well over a year, apart from his EBM meals by cup during
that short period at age one month.

in hopes of a world where people are people regardless of size or verbal
skill
Rachel in Kristiansand, Norway where the RAIN has now washed away the huge
snow we had between Christmas and New Year's

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