I have finally found a few moments to open up my computer and send a few
emails.
I am happy to announce that I had a baby boy exactly three weeks ago!
My happy and healthy bundle of joy and a miracle.
So when I finally opened up my Gmail and noticed the "how long is too long"
thread I was naturally very interested.
I only have a customer's experience with hospitals American and Israeli.
But hoping that some might find my thoughts interesting.
And my thought number one is please look at baby and Mom first, look at the
papers later. Linked to it is the second thought - when Mom (or Dad) talk,
please listen - it is polite and you might hear something useful.
This is thank G-d my baby number 9, so I am pretty much familiar with the
routine. And I know all about stupid rules that must be obeyed for the sake
of covering everyone's behind, but...
After a very long labor my baby was born with Apgar score of 10. He was not
interested in nursing right away and this did not bother me since some of
my kids nursed right off and others did not. At that point I was up for
over 40 hours and have not eaten anything besides honey and water for over
24. I was tired and very, very hungry.
After we (mainly DH) first politely, then less politely refused eye drops,
vitamin K, PKU, bath, formula and sugar test (because the baby weight was
over 4 kilo, which is normal for my babies and my sugar was fine) and
sighed a bunch of papers to that effect I sent DH home, hoping for a nap
while the baby was asleep. Needles to say the baby was rooming in with me.
Fifteen minutes after DH left a nurse from the nursery came "to check the
baby's diaper". She made sure to wake him up good and proper telling me how
it has been an hour and the baby has not nursed yet. Any objections I had
were simply ignored. When I told her that I have nursed successfully 8
other babies and it is not critical for the baby to eat right now but it is
critical for me to get a nap, she brushed me off saying that he will surely
fall asleep again...
True enough, he did. After a marathon cluster feeding. 12 hours later!
Nothing horrible would not have happened if the nurse let us sleep. But she
had to check off a box on her report, that she did something to initiate
breastfeeding. If I would not have been so experienced and so stubborn my
baby probably would have ended up in the nursery with a supplemental
bottle.
I was also surprised that nurses or hospital lactation consultants were not
going to differentiate between babies whose mom's had pitocin, epidurals or
other medical interventions and babies delivered without drugs.
I remember my Mom telling me that in Russia, 46 years ago, when I was born
Russian medicos believed that colostrum was at best unimportant and at
worst detrimental to babies, so babies were not given to Mothers or fed for
3 days. Mothers were made to pump out and discard colostrum. I am
definitely not suggesting this as a standard of care, but most of these
mothers went home nursing and continued nursing for at least a year! Why?
Because one needed a doctor's prescription for formula, plus it was very,
very expensive. Also there was a negative social image of the women who did
not nurse or children who had formula. I remember being about 9 years old
and listening to my Mom and Grandma "discuss" one of the cousins, I do not
remember what that relative did, but I remember my Grandma's verdict -
"What do you want, he was formula-fed..." And that was not a baby they were
talking about but a person in his/her 30s! One other point - in USSR
maternity leave payed for 2 years after the baby was born and child care
for very young babies was very difficult to obtain and very expensive too.
--
Henya
Migdal HaEmek, Israel
Want to know me better - visit my blog
<http://chickenstitches.blogspot.com/>
Stitch markers and more from Chicken Stitches
<http://www.etsy.com/shop/ChickenStitches> on Etsy
I am knitmammy on Ravelry <http://www.ravelry.com/people/knitmammy>
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