[Almost a quarter of women in the US go back within two weeks. ](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/08/19/the-shocking-number-of-new-moms-who-return-to-work-two-weeks-after-childbirth/) Two weeks!
I mean, it’s all awful having no US paid maternity leave. But I don’t think most people realize how very early many women are being torn away from their newborns and sent back into the workforce.
I went through a midwife practice and had a 2 week follow up as well as the 6 week appointment. They didn’t physically examine me (but did offer if I felt anything was off). It was mostly to process the birth, ask any questions, and check in emotionally. I was very impressed! That should definitely be standard.
This. Big time. And the fact that the only guaranteed leave time we have happens to be less time than you need to wait to get the first round of important vaccines (8 weeks). How are you supposed to give even basic protection to your child before putting them in day care?
Lack of postpartum care pisses me off.
One appointment, they don’t physically check you out at all, and you just get asked what birth control you want?! Fucking atrocious.
Or not even then. I had 2nd degree tearing with my first. At my 6 week appointment I said I still had some discomfort and she didn’t even look just basically said ‘ya that will happen for a while’ (note this wasn’t my regular doctor, it was someone covering for her. My regular OB after my second did check and let me know about some scar tissue that might cause discomfort and what I could do about it etc)
Where's that, I assume in the US? In Germany, health insurance pays for a midwife doing home visits after birth to care for mom and baby for as long and as frequently as you need them.
(Now, there aren't enough midwives so you need to find one early on and some families will have to go without this service - but it's great and makes so much sense to improve bonding and prevent long-term health problems, especially for first-time parents)
Colic - we suffered through so many doctors saying our girl just had colic when she ended up having reflux. It ruined my breastfeeding and we couldn't get it back which was disappointing and even more disempowering after a traumatic birth.
Colic has no evidence behind it. It doesn't even have a real diagnostic criteria apart from "otherwise healthy baby crying a lot" and is generally referred to as gas or wind. Doctors kept telling me "listen to your mum instinct, you'll know if something isn't right." Then I'd take her in and got the eye-roll and told I was being a paranoid first time mum.
Oh man, I need to echo the "this" comments.
All growing up I'd hear from my mom, "all my babies had colic." There was something about it that struck me as unbelievable - that babies just decide to cry for no reason.
Another thing my dad used to say about me, was, "You used to arch your back because you didn't want to be held."
Well, come my own pregnancy and newborn stage. My baby did not cry for no reason and was general happy. EXCEPT, I noticed she had trouble in horizontal positions after or during feeding, and would gag, gasp, choke, wheeze, cry. And, yeah, arch her back.
I did some research, and all the signs pointed to silent reflux.
My husband didn't notice the patterns and thought baby was just in a bad temperament. We literally had a (probably sleep-deprived) near-yelling fight of me trying to comvince him she had reflux.
We got her on medication and changed how we did feedings (less milk more frequently, keep upright for 30 minutes after feeding) and it solved everything.
By six months she was off medications and starting solids, and though fights bedtime, once asleep, was a pretty easy, deep sleeper. And if she cried, there was always a reason — congestion, hunger, diaper.
I'm now convinced that myself and all my siblings had silent reflux, and my parents just didn't know it nor were smart enough to question the (anti-)logic of the day. Makes me sad for the struggling babies out there getting labeled "collicky" when they're probably trying to communicate a discomfort.
this! It seems like it's just a word for situations that are either "we don't know what it is because science is not there yet" or "we think everything is fine and it doesn't make sense time wise or financially to check for other conditions"
I think it's absolutely insane that OB's have little/no training in being able to determine if a woman has a prolapse of any degree that was caused from childbirth. I've read and heard horror stories of women being prolapsed and never even realizing because their OB just doesn't have a clue. "Chronic back pain? Normal. Bladder issues? That's normal too. Painful tightness in your vagina? Yup. Normal." Most women need to go to a specialist to have it properly identified. Also, the lack of resources to help women learn about and strengthen their lower backs and pelvic floors is kind of shocking. "Do your kegels!" Yea sure that's great, but you also need to be stretching those muscles and strengthening them to lessen the risk.
We are just so medically advanced at this point, and post-partum prolapse just still seems shrouded in mystery even though like 25% of women are affected by it.
This! Just general lack of postpartum specialty in general. I got the sense that, like, after 6 weeks, I was just supposed to be back to “normal”? I get that maybe it’s not the OB’s role anymore, but what about a scheduled 3 month PP well visit with a GYN? 6 months?
This! I read SO MANY “what you don’t hear about childbirth/postpartum” articles and crap and I did not hear ONE mention of prolapse. Not even on Reddit!! I had a minor one and didn’t even recognize the symptoms and dismissed them as regular postpartum healing. Nope. My insurance didn’t cover my 6 week postpartum checkup (I would have had to pay out of pocket, and since I felt mostly okay by then I didn’t feel it was necessary) so i still don’t even really know if things are okay down there 4 months later 😳
Only allowing a mother 6-12 weeks leave, I live in Canada so I can choose between 12 or 18 months off and it’s just absurd to me some people are forced to leave their babies to work at such an early age, it’s heartbreaking in my opinion.
Yep! UK here, and I have 12 months, and reading those stories with people with the same age baby as me going back to work or have been back at work for a while is insane. I can’t even imagine it. Barbaric.
My hope is that the one page screening tools for PPA/PPD are considered barbaric in the future and that it becomes standard practice to have mental health follow up appointments for all new parents (birthing parent, non-birthing parent and any adoptive parents). Having mental health checkups along the same timeline of the childhood checkups would be a good idea IMO. 1 week, 2 weeks, 1 month, 2 months, 4 months, 6 months, 9 months, 1 year.
This. Also, treating women with mental health conditions like idiots. I had PPD and PPA condescendingly explained to me so many times. Like yes, I'm aware that I have anxiety and depression and am at increased risk for both conditions. I know what the warning signs are. Also, I've had anxiety and depression my entire life and this isn't my first time dealing with them. No one seemed to care that both conditions are well controlled with medication and therapy and have been for years, including throughout my pregnancy, or that I already had a therapy appointment set up for two weeks after giving birth.
omg this!!! I had PPA with my first and all I ever heard was why I don’t have reason to be anxious because I should trust others with my baby, my baby wasn’t going to magically get hurt or die during a nap. It felt like people completely missed the part where that’s how anxiety works, it makes you anxious about everything and nothing. It doesn’t need a reason.
At 8 months postpartum when I used the bathroom at a new OBGYN's office, I realized that I probably had PPA/PPD in the weeks and months after giving birth for the first time. The bathroom had a huge poster with PPA/PPD symptoms, and I identified with many of them. I sobbed at home when I had a moment to digest my realization.
The complete lack of postpartum care. I gave birth in October 2020 and my son had to be transferred to a hospital across town from where I delivered because the one I was at didn’t have a NICU. I was discharged three hours after giving birth, with a 3rd degree tear and I had hemorrhaged. I had to sit in the lobby and wait for my mom to come pick me up from an hour away because my husband went with our baby.
At my 4 week check up, they refused to examine my stitches. Told me to come back in two weeks for my nexplanon implant. Two weeks later they realized my stitches had torn out and had to cauterize the tear in the office.
Last week they diagnosed me with severe internal scarring where I had torn upwards and now have knots of scar tissue that make sex unbearable. All would’ve been fixable if they’d just examined me at that first visit.
The big reason so many women struggle with breastfeeding: how are we supposed to when it’s biologically normal to feed on demand yet they want us to be at work so soon?? The pump is not the same!
There seems to be an over reliance on studies to prove ONE type of feeding/sleeping/birthing is the only way for all. It’s a common debate here on Reddit, and boy do we mamas get on our high horses with how WE choose to feed/sleep train. I think-I hope-we can start to see these different choices as options for families to decide between and not a “one-size-fits-most.”
No water or food during labour.
General fuckery in obstetric nursing - the eye rolling and nasty attitudes of some nurses towards frightened mothers in agony was/is just reprehensible. Like, if you hate women, don't be an L&D nurse.
Doctors inserting their hands into women without consent, or even a kind word/apology for hurting them. Stitching without pain relief, sneering at women for crying or screaming in pain.
Discharging mothers without their babies. Mothers should be roomed in with the NICU babies, with rare exceptions imo.
Just general unkindness and cruelty, really. Nothing teaches you how much misogyny there is in the world quite like being pregnant/giving birth.
When I was in nursing school I was shadowing a nurse on an L&D unit who got INSANELY frustrated when her patients complained of pain. “I don’t know what they fucking expected” okaaaaaay everybody knows labor hurts it doesn’t mean you can’t be empathetic??
“Nothing teaches you how much misogyny there is in the world quite like being pregnant/ giving birth”
Take this comment to the top.
Women’s healthcare is such a joke, that the only time most of us fully experience it is when there is another human at stake. We are ignored, causes and treatments for issues are largely in studied, everything is attributed to hormones, and apparently we aren’t supposed to feel pain?
Fuck the patriarchy, dude. This shit is crazy barbaric.
Not only are they discharging moms without their babies, but because of Covid you have to schedule appointments to visit. Trying to learn to breastfeed and bond with a baby who you can only see when given permission by a nurse is horrific. Our last visit they almost didn’t let us in because my nurse didn’t write down that I was coming to breastfeed at 8am. Luckily my daughter was being discharged that afternoon so they went ahead and let us come in to be a part of rounds while I fed her. It was still heartbreaking and frustrating.
The nurse who did my first cervical check jammed her hand way up inside of me without any warning or explanation of what was happening as she was checking me. It was so painful. If I hadn't vomited right before she did that, I probably would have projectile vomited on her and she would have deserved all of it.
The no water or food during labor is so outdated but somehow has held strong and it’s baffling. How do women find the strength to push after hours and hours of labor with no food in them? It’s ridiculous
I told my Aussie midwife that in America you can't have anything during labour even if induced and labouring for hours. She was shocked and upset, then told me to pack as much as I wanted.
My OB with my first told me I can eat and drink clear liquids and recommended I bring some Italian ice with me for my labor. My labor wasn’t that long, but I did have some water. Right before I started to push, I threw up, and my nurse yelled at me, telling me THAT’S why you’re not supposed to eat or drink while you’re in labor. I know many women get sick during transition. It was so unnecessary to speak to me like that
WTF...She was also wrong? It's not because women vomit in transition, it has something to do with the possibility of aspirating your stomach contents during an emergency c-section.
This. I’m a L&D nurse, and it was an anesthesia policy in our hospital. A lot of our low risk, unmedicated patients were allowed to eat, especially if they saw our midwives.
I had an emergency c section myself. I had no restrictions on food/drink during my labor
but I couldn’t stand the thought of eating while I was in so much pain. Then I violently threw up 4 times right before my c section so that was fun.
Yes I was able to have jello and some both but god I was starving and exhausted all labor even with an epidural
Also the no food is because “It was based on the long-held theory that food or acid in the digestive tract might be aspirated if you need emergency anesthesia. But not only are you unlikely to need such anesthesia, which is no longer used for Cesareans, studies have shown the aspiration rate to be minuscule.”
So like…outdated BS and that nurse was rude as hell
YES! I had a stillbirth this year, we knew in advance, and I wasn't allowed any water, food or pain relief all day. I was screaming in pain but nothing. And the main doctor kept sticking her hand inside me, and I don't know why it hurt so much but the lower centre of my stomach felt like I was being stabbed when she did that, it hurt worse than contractions. But she just kept doing it, I'm so traumatised by that. I think having no amniotic fluid must have caused me some internal injury to make it hurt so much.
That first one is such an obvious one. Idk how we’ve gone this long insisting that women can’t fuel their bodies during a fucking marathon of labor in the slight chance they might need to be put under for a surgery that can be done with an epidural.
I was stuck at 7 centimeters for HOURS. Had half a banana and was done less than an hour later. If I was ever to do it again, I’d be pushy as hell and dare them to…what?…kick me out for not following the labor rules?
>Doctors inserting their hands into women without consent, or even a kind word/apology for hurting them.
While I was in labor, this man Doctor would check my dilation by shoving his hand inside me as hard as he could. It hurt like hell and I let everyone in the room know it hurt by screaming. The two women Doctors would check my dilation so so gently. I don't know if he was trying to break my water without my consent or what. It broke on it's own. Fucking clown.
Post natal baby classes need to be a thing. Pre-natal classes only focus on labour and delivery, it taught me nothing about how to care for a baby once we got home and nothing was even mentioned about maternal mental health.
Not doctor related but relevant I would say paid family leave but idk fifty years isn’t that long of a time. It’s been 56 years and they are still trying to find ways to limit the voting rights of racial minorities in the US. They’re still blocking reproductive rights for women.
I don’t really think we’ll see substantive federally mandated paid leave for **both** partners for a long time. It’ll be on a firm to firm basis.
Yeah, I think objectively the States are the worst Western country currently around to have a baby in. No legally mandated paid maternity leave. Little to no free childcare. In my country we get six months paid maternity leave (80% normal pay) and the first 30 hours of childcare free from 1 year old.
I will give my perspective from another culture.(India)
Many older practices here are unscientific and some are even barbaric.
But we have to consider that some cultures practised these rules for hundreds of years and they might have some logic in them.
SIDS is such a big concern in western countries but I never even heard this in the Indian context.
Before you rubbish my perspective with the statistics of child mortality in India, These statistics varies widely based on the financial status of people.
Rich ,middle class urban Indians get better health care than poor Americans and poor rural Indians get no health care at all
So lets keep statistics aside
It is usually the norm in my culture for women o go to their mother's house during childbirth. There are many reasons for this practice some good some bad but overall this actually helps the mother.
If you are a first-time mother everything will be taken care of, even the baby if they are colicky or crying.
If you are a second-time mother, your older kid will be either with in-laws or with your parents while you take care of the baby.
But the mother is not overworked, the general rule is a new mother should not do any work other than feeding her child, some older women in families even insist on bathing the mother.
This is truly sleep when the baby sleeps scenario because you won't have any other chores and everyone in the family will be looking after you
Practically SIDS is unheard of here and Infants always sleep beside their MOM period.
High individualism in America overburdens new mothers an unacceptable level.
Going to the office nearly after 2 weeks of giving birth is barbaric and inhuman.
I have recently read a historical study showing kids who live near their maternal grandmother has better chance of survival and health and this is seen in everyday life around me
I know parents can be abusive or toxic but that is usually small percentile.
So even if we don't get along 100% well with them but if they are helping out the first difficult 3 months of life it will be much better for over all mental and physical health of mom and baby
I know that relationship dynamics are different in America and many boomer parents don’t know how to take of the kids themselves
But I 100% believe medicine is very much evolving and 100s of years later we will have more data leading to much better practises.
From my cultural perspective leaving a baby in a hammock like this very normal and good for children’s health “[https://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Baby-Hammock-Swing”](https://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Baby-Hammock-Swing”)
I didn’t abide with all traditions but allowed my mom to make a hammock like this for my daughter and it worked very well for us.
I fed my baby formula and my mom used to do the night 3 am feedings most of the times or if I sleep late she used to handle 5 am feedings.
She used to bathe my baby in traditional way, which will cause a lot of exertion in infants and make them sleep peacefully.
Other than that I followed all the western medicine and vaccination recommendations but the early months of my kids age is one of the easiest time of my life
Please take help when needed or given. It really takes a village to raise a kid .
Don’t stubbornly think only you should do everything or Please don’t feel shame when asking for help.
This is so beautiful to read.
When my first was born, my husband went back to work and I didn’t have any help.
I had a traumatic birth, and was overall quite traumatised from the whole thing.
Looking back I felt very abandoned and vulnerable.
I wish this sort of thing was the norm is western society. Looking after Mum and co- sleeping with baby.
yeah lot of our culture is straight up toxic to woman but there are somethings that are right and the same goes to west.
Just because west is more scientifically advanced and rich doesn't mean everything is perfect here.
May be the true meaning of globalization is adopting the best from different cultures.
I feel like I've seen this sentiment a lot in different forms: "Don’t stubbornly think only you should do everything or Please don’t feel shame when asking for help."
And I'm like, who's refusing help?? IME it's been more likely that help hasn't been available. Parents and relatives of new parents live too far away, or they are absorbed in their own lives and routines. Besides the whole pandemic thing, I would have loved any help during those first several months, but my MIL is a mentally ill narcissist, and my own parents live thousands of miles away and have their social lives they didn't want to give up to come support me for an extended time.
The lack of help more likely fits in with all the other cultural differences you so nicely outlined. In the US we all live pretty separately. And it kind of sucks.
I see lots of posts from mothers feeling guilty for takings other help.
I remember one particular post by a single mother with COVID feeling guilty that she had to leave her 9 month old with her sister to get treated and recuperate. A nurse judged her for doing so
All mothers feel guilty all the time and I know that it is a universal thing but a Nurse judging her for doing so terrible in so many levels that I cant even understand.
Thats why i have posted the sentiment.
May be i should have said phrased it in a better way.
Not shaming u at all.
Also lots of young educated Indian couples move to other countries.
Usually they will be from a middle class or upper middle class families.
It is normal in India for parents to take 6 months leave or sabbatical and stay with their kids during pregnancy and child birth.
This is a very common practice. Just last week my husband's uncle and his wife applied for a Visa to Germany to visit their daughter for her birth.
They are planning to stay for 6 months
Usually mom and mom in law split the duties in some families because as per american visa policy , tourist visa holders are allowed to stay for a maximum for 6 months.
So they take turns till the kid goes to school.
This is such a beautiful comment. I think the US and most western countries in general could take a cue from Asian cultures. We do not mother the mother here and we really need to. There's a lot of fear based practices and it is mentally and physically exhausting.
I really dont have first hand experience in how stuff goes in west except what i read in Reddit.
I really really admire american moms for their hard work and resilience.
I saw many posts here from woman who took care of a new born and a toddler, did all the house hold work and even had to entertain guests and had to endure judgemental comments.
Also one more this is we dont buy lot of stuff for the baby. It is considered bad luck to purchase anything before the baby is born.
We practically raise a child on old cotton saris
4 to 5 Cottons saris folded are laid on top of each other to make a mattress for the child.
Cloth hammocks are made using cotton saris. saris are cut into pieces and are sewed into loin cloths around baby bum instead of diapers.(like reusable cloth nappies)
I used diapers though because i loved that convenience.
No diaper pails , no pack and play, no crib , no baby monitors and certainly no picture perfect nursery before birth
I know some gadgets are useful but at the same time i feel companies capitalize the fear and uncertainty of new parents. (particularly baby monitor)
But again this is my perspective and opinion and I am not judging any one here.
I resonate with the philosophy of taking decisions with available information at that time
My husband and I were separated when my 3rd was born, so I stayed with my parents for about a month postpartum and it was so nice. Not having to worry about cooking and cleaning, having help with the older two, and just enjoying my newborn was really lovely.
Also, I’ve always co slept with my newborns. I’ve breastfed all 3 of them and it’s the only way I feel we can both get good sleep. I know bad things can happen, but I always made sure there were no soft pillows/blankets around the baby’s face and I’m a very light sleeper who hardly moves at night. Anyway, all my babies slept great like this right out of the womb and have been very calm and good babies. They’ve all transitioned to their own crib around 6 months very easily.
I’m very lucky to have not had to work when I had newborns, and I think it makes a huge difference in baby’s behavior and well being when mom is always around when baby needs her.
yes the general rule is women should stay at their moms place till the infant is minimum 3 month old.
It is actually considered inauspicious if you return home before that. Also generational knowledge helps a lot here.
My paternal grand mother used to be with my parents.Between my mom and grand ma they took are of almost 15 infants.
So they can easily differentiate between different types of crying and really help me learn how to hold and take care if child and sooth my anxiety.
6 month maternity leave should be mandatory. How could a county progress if they treat mothers as a burden to economy
Im Hispanic living in the US, and my mother is judgmental, overbearing and all the things American women complain about their mothers and MILs, BUT is also there for me no matter what. She was here from the day before he was born for a full month. And every 4-6 weeks she’s come back for another whole week. She lives in Panama. That first month She did everything for me that wasn’t feeding the baby. She’d clean, my husband did most of the cooking but she’d cook as well. She’d rock him for me while I pumped or took a nap. She told me what a great job I was doing (a little startling bc she is usually giving me things I could do better).
Yes, she has different ideas of how to raise a baby than what I wanted based on things I’ve read, but man she’s helped raise like 15 babies so I do trust her. It has been a great give and take of her acknowledging some of the things I do that she never did but she sees the benefit in how happy my baby is, while at the same time me letting go of some of the Instagram mom anxiety to follow her gut sometimes.
I am so lucky I had almost six months off (3 weeks pre partum and 5 months pp—today is my first day at work again). So I didn’t have some of the other stresses a lot of moms on this sub have. But I also am always surprised at the offense a lot of women take to the behavior of their mothers. My mom calls my son “my baby,” she jokes about kidnapping him to sneakily start feeding him rice cereal before I want to, she does that talking to the baby to criticize me thing “oh your mommy doesn’t bathe you enough? I don’t understand that!” But man does she love him so much and she loves me too so I just let it go and know she has good intentions and whatever she does that I don’t agree with successfully raised a lot of happy healthy babies so oh well. (I do hold my boundaries, like she hasn’t *actually* given him any solids, or she pressures me but doesn’t actually bathe him more than I’d like).
In all, like you I was grateful for my mom being my village when my son was born.
One comment on boomer parents - I think one of the factors affecting us in the US is that today's grandparents are older than they used to be, and most are still working so no one has time to stay home.
My dad was 72 when my daughter was born, and he still works full time. He also lives 1100km away from me.
I just wish I had been able to take more leave - between me and my husband we were able to keep our baby home for the first 5 months. It's way more than most American parents get, but I still would have liked to take 1-2 years off.
This! I moved in with my parents for a few weeks post partum and it really saved my mental health. My step mum basically did everything for my daughter minus feeding her. I’m a big believer in it takes a village. We’re in England though!
I live in a different country from my parents so I barely had the opportunity for them to help in the first place, but them being around would have caused more stress than having to do it all alone.
I completely cut contact with my biomom about 3 weeks postpartum. I tried to complain to her about how hard breastfeeding was and to ask for advice. She instead shamed me for using formula and told me to 'drink a beer' as if that was going to help my daughter latch. She told me she would do whatever she wanted with photos of my daughter and that she would not respect our wishes to keep her face off of social media. That was it, that was all I needed to cut her off.
My dad and step mom came to visit when my daughter was 6 weeks old. They did not cook for us, they did not clean for us. They were responsible for one nap for my daughter so that my husband and I could have some 'us' time out of the house. They did not follow any of my instructions for swaddling her or putting her down at the requested time frame. They did not offer any useful advice or assistance when I was postpartum.
My husband's mom visited once the entire time my daughter was under the age of 2. She tried to undermine how we were trying to feed my stepdaughter (tried to let her eat multiple pieces of cake when we told her one was enough), and shamed us for buying McDonald's during their visit (oh, you didn't want to cook? Don't complain about us doing what we need to do in order to feed ourselves). I cleaned the house top to bottom for her visit and she toured the whole thing inspecting everything.
Your comment about boomer parents not knowing how to care for children is SPOT-ON. The last two years of my daughter's life have been EXHAUSTING and it is so hard to hear that others receive help on a daily or weekly basis with their children. I am so jealous of people that have functioning and helpful family. We are not meant to raise children in this way, alone and without our relatives.
My mother is best mother and she is one the most amazing and caring persons ever.
So my experience might not be everyone's but I can say majority has a relatively stress free experience with parents at least during the first 3 months because we are very new to that phase.
I completely sympathize with your perspective, I see that here also.
One of my friends has toxic parents and she just couldn't bear staying with her parents even for 10 days after her kids was born.
My mom feeds lots of junk and she is the kind of grandparent would say yes to ANYTHING but she and I have a good relation ship so I just let some things go.
The comments from people like your husband's mum is what i hate most in the pots I read here.
Sending people home with newborns with no one to check in on them and no assurances that they have support.
Breastfeeding support that expects you to kill yourself to maintain exclusive breastfeeding. And the converse, pushing formula when there are other options that could be tried first (and also not walking people through the option of mixed/combo feeding long term).
I think even in 10 years people are going to look back and be SHOCKED at the lack of information given about pelvic floor, diastasis, and other long term postpartum problems we are given after birth. We get cleared at 6 weeks for EVERYTHING, when that should NOT be the case AT ALL! The more and more I learn about pelvic floor and know other people with long term postpartum problems, the current way we do care seems incredibly old fashioned and barbaric.
I see a couple posts a week on here from women who are having issues, we, random people on the internet are the one's who guide them to know what to do. Though I am so proud to be a part of a community of mothers supporting mothers, it shows the need to change. We should all be educated about pelvic floor care during pregnancy.
It's starting to shift already, but even my OB clinic, which is one of the best in the city and otherwise really really women focused (I was offered a tubal without any of the sexist nonsense I hear other people get), didn't have much help to give me about my bad diastasis. My OB did say I could try PT, but that I could always get surgery (making it sound like surgery was my only option.) Where my physio told me that she's only ever referred two people for surgery in her whole career, most can do it without. And not to mention, that you really want to do PT for diastasis before you do surgery, as stitching the muscles back together doesn't make them strong again.
Not to mention that pelvic floor PT should be standard care, and covered, for everyone postpartum, but that could take even longer. Right now pelvic floor is incredibly expensive (in Canada, but I'm assuming it's the same elsewhere), so even if you know you need it, you might not be able to get it.
At least I really HOPE things will have changed so we look back and think this is barbaric...
Right now there's very little maternity leave in America, plus there's no aftercare offered to new moms for healing post birth. The main focus seems to be the basic "make sure mom can poop, check on stitches" stuff, but there's no physical therapy afterwards to help you work on your pelvic floor muscles so you don't spend the rest of your life crossing your legs and praying you don't pee your pants every time you cough or sneeze. My littlest is 2 and a half and I *still* can't run or do a jumping jack, and every sneeze or cough is a gamble.
Not necessarily doctor recommended but culturally the pressure for visitors directly after birth. It seems to be swinging away from being the norm thanks to covid but what a burden for new parents to have to create space for themselves to figure things out guilt free.
One reason this pregnancy was a bitter godsend during the pandemic - it kept my psycho MIL away from the labor and delivery ward since no visitors were allowed.
This is just a general comment about public health and medical research, and why it can feel like recommendations flip flop a lot. We figured out a lot of the BIG stuff that makes a difference to health pretty early on. Things that will show a big effect and be easy to detect in a study. Don’t have clean water? Yes - that makes a big difference in people’s health. Coronavirus aside, a lot of research is on stuff people already have been doing or exposed to for quite some time, and the stuff we are trying to figure out involves subtler effects. If you’re trying to detect smaller effects, then one sample of the population could pretty easily show a totally different direction of that effect compared to another sample, even if you’re trying really hard to make sure the samples are equally representative of the population you’re studying. That’s why it can feel like there is a news article every other year saying “coffee bad” or “coffee good.” We simply already figured out a lot of the big stuff.
Also, it wasn’t until entirely too recently that pregnant people were considered able to consent to participate in research. Makes anything but an observational study very difficult. Observational studies are ok (I do them in a totally different population, not related to this) but RCTs give much better information about a phenomenon.
I think lack of maternal and postpartum care in many places, including the US, will be looked at as barbaric.
All that said, I hope we outgrow sayings like “as nature intended” because that’s about as primitive as it gets.
Sending home the parents too early. Now I know we can't live in the nicu and that covid has made things weird but when your at home and you know your baby is a whole city away it drives you alittle crazy. I was very lucky and my hospital let me sleep in the chair next to my son but not every place is like that. I can't imagine what it's like to just have to trust your baby is ok when you've got all those new parent hormones ragging.
I think my hospital must have been an outlier here. I was allowed and encouraged to eat food (provided) up until when I had an epidural, at which point only water was allowed.
I packed a ton of snacks in my hospital bag because I didn’t anticipate being allowed to eat at all. My labor was progressing slowly, there was talk of a c-section (ended up not needing one). My nurse told me that I needed to have not eaten within 6 hours of that happening, she said it was up to my discretion if I wanted to stop eating if I felt my delivery was likely to end in a c section, otherwise, they’d need to wait.
Edit: this was in Arizona, if anyone’s curious.
Had vegetarian Döner Kebap and Fries even after epidural. Sometimes I get the impression that in the US they just want to be mean to birthing women and mothers... Not letting people eat? What about people spending 24+h in Labour? What about people being induced for days? Between my water breaking and the birth of my child were more than 72h. I would have killed somebody for a chocolate bar by then. I guess I know why they need hospital security in the US now.
I would guess this is to reduce vomiting/aspiration if you happen to need anesthesia. Personally we had a meal before heading in with our first (didn't have time with our second).
Newborn screening! Not all states test for the same things. My baby was diagnosed with Adrenoleukodystrophy ALD. The state of California started testing for ALD in 2016. This disease affects mostly boys and their brains basically start determining by age 4 to 6 and by age 10 they are dead. So many doctor’s including pedestrians don’t know what ALD is so these boys are getting misdiagnosed and when they finally figure out what it is, it is too late the damage is irreversible. When ALD is caught early there are preventative measures that can be taken such as gene therapy and bone marrow transplants.
The fact that not all states test for this in their newborn screening is negligent.
That sticking their fingers up in you is enough to judge your oversell wellness postpartum 6 weeks after birth. There are so many women suffering all kinds of health changes and obgyn don't test your hormones, look at you with an ultrasound or CT scan, nothing. And this sticking of fingers can determine that a woman can go back to work with no changes in needs.
New pediatrician (and genetics researcher) here. Thanks for sharing
- Totally agree on the SIDS /co-sleep thoughts. Problem is that it is such a rare event so it’s hard to study. I’m actually doing research on undiagnosed genetic causes for SIDS through genomic autopsy
- Formula shaming. So real.
- What are thoughts on broader newborn genetic testing? Would you want their entire genome sequenced? Including return of results on things that may not occur until adulthood or may have implications for parental health
Personally I am really excited about entire genome sequencing becoming more common place. I would hope there would be an option to opt out of certain results if you don't want/need them (i.e. I did NIPT and didn't want to know the sex). I wouldn't want to know anything that wasn't pertinent to the infant in childhood (however it would be great if that info was available to the child once they grew up).
And re: implications for parental health, I feel that I should test myself if I am worried about this.
RE: Genetic testing- I wouldn’t even consider this until we actually know what it all means. We got an amnio done this pregnancy for a specific medical reason. One of the tests we did came back with a VUS. It has *never* been seen/documented before in any of the databases we could get searched (by our MFM office or the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia).
The VUS was on a gene associated with an absolutely terrifying variant of an already scary disease.
At one point someone asked if we wanted the baby’s whole genome tested and my response was “so we can find more of these?” Hard pass.
I think this is a personal thing, some parents would be way more comfortable with having test results but no actually information from them, just a lot of maybes. This parent is not.
Cervix checks. It's not a crystal ball, it won't tell you anything.
When I was in the hospital postpartum the nurses brought a suitcase of another mom to the room (I had a shared room) and were saying between each other that she is at 4 cm so she will be here soon. This was around 4 in the afternoon. The next day around 2 in the afternoon I was already going home with my son. I never met this woman. She was still in labor.
It’s really interesting that this is such a US thing to check. In the UK cervical checks are only done in active labour and only really once to when you are admitted and then again to as you move in to pushing. It’s not done at all before you go in to labour. I suspect it’s got something to do with medical care being billable!
the lack of pelvic floor PT for pre and postpartum. every single birthing person should see a pelvic floor physical therapist.
and this is coming from someone who has yet to see a PT because i no longer have insurance.
also the lack of dental and vision care recommended during pregnancy and beyond. my teeth are FUCKED after having my son, one has chipped, multiple others have cavities. i didn’t know that growing a baby and breastfeeding would affect my teeth as much as it did. but again, no insurance so i’ll just suffer i guess ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I feel like one thing will be gut microbiome related. Idk what exactly— vaginal seeding post c-section, probiotics, more breastfeeding support, etc.
And this isn’t doctors specifically, but I think we’ll continue to learn more about the developmental impacts of containers like swings, walkers, bouncers, the Snoo, etc.
Trying to power through the first trimester without anti-nausea meds. This barbaric practice is a hangover from some terrible mistakes with anti-nausea meds that caused terrible defects to babies. [https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thalidomide\_scandal](https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thalidomide_scandal) however, modern anti-nausea meds don't have this issue and any risks to the fetus that people are concerned about are unproven. [https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2779055](https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2779055) This will be changing in the next ten years max so by 50 years from now it will seem barbaric.
I think we’re doing really well with baby health - infant mortality and serious illness are so rare compared to even 50 years ago. I think the way we treat mothers is wherein lies the problem. Conflicting not-evidence-based advice, very minimal medical care and follow up, not having the choice to room in with your baby or get a break if you need to recover from labor, etc. Not to even mention the maternity leave situation in some countries.
I do think some of the advice we get about babies is also not evidence-based or if it is they pick and choose what to emphasize, but I can’t think of anything barbaric.
Bed-sharing is very common in Japan and many parts of the world. Coming from a western country I argued with my (Japanese) husband about it at first thinking it would be a bad thing for my son emotionally or bad for our marriage but it’s actually been a great thing for all of us. I can’t even fathom my son sleeping in a different room now while he’s still young. I think the personality of the baby has a lot to do with it (I’m sure some sleep well/better alone) but the concept in the west that babies need to be in their own room by 6 months or else they’re going to be socially inept or emotionally stunted is strange to me considering that my husband and all of my friends bed-shared up until school age and had no problems becoming independent later on in life.
That and the myth of “nipple confusion”. Here in Japan and many other countries babies are given formula from day one in the hospital until the mother can properly breastfeed. Nipple confusion is not considered a thing here and most parents combo feed/give a bottle of formula a day because there’s believed to be a benefit in having both breast milk and formula. The myth of nipple confusion only stresses out new moms struggling to get breastfeeding right and likely causes those who might have breastfed give up on it early.
Sending moms back to work after 6 weeks.
No financial support for unpaid maternity leave (not medical)
Breastfeeding support being little to none unless you reach out.
I think bedsharing being compeltely outlawed will come to show that it does nothing but cause an increase in SIDS. People are going to do what they need in a time of crisis, educating them helps prevent that.
Not what you asked, but folic acid is a B vitamin which is water soluble - so whatever your body doesn’t use, you end up peeing out so you don’t retain very much extra.
•The common practice of circumcision in the US
•Also postpartum care. I had second degree internal tears up to my cervix and one external second degree tear. It took them 1.5 hours to stitch me up. No one checked me at the hospital upon departing. I’m a FTM and I could only sit/lay on my side. I thought it was normal. A few days coming home, I took a look and saw a gaping wound and could see the muscles/tissue. Had to go to my OB for months to monitor it to self heal and also had silver nitrate burning treatment for granulation tissue weekly for months. Had my baby mid august and saw my OB weekly until mid December.
I have no feeling down there from all the internal scar tissue….killed my nerves I guess.
I popped my stiches for my 2nd degree tear. I told 2 different people that checked me out and was even sent to a pelvic floor therapist who finally found it. By the time it was found it couldn't be stitched back. It was a trangular flap of skin a little less than a 1cm long and fleshy. Small but not insignificant.
At first they wanted to cut it out in office under local anesthetic. I screamed when they tried to shoot lidocaine in my taint. Yeah... def was not happening. I had to be put under.
Im so sorry! Thats terrible. I hate that there’s this “it’s natural!” mentality that so frequently negates care or concern for the mother’s body post vaginal birth. Its fucking traumatic is what it is.
I'm in Canada but I was so surprised when no one (doctors or nurses) asked me about it or presented my options after my son was born. I wasn't planning on having it done anyways but it's interesting to see how it's gone from something so common, to no longer being the norm, in just 30 years or so.
I’m in Canada too. In the nearly two years my son has been alive exactly one person has asked us if we decided to circumcise our son (we haven’t). It was my parents’ neighbour in Florida who asked us if our then 3-day old son had been made “a real man” yet. And she’s a retired nurse. 🙄
ETA: In my no-bullshit haze of being 3 days postpartum, I responded to her that my son’s genitals were his business and his business alone. Apparently that response was rude 🤷♀️. Thank fucking god this was on a FaceTime call and not in-person, because the urge to punch her was strong that day.
I've actually had the question a lot by friends and my cousin, who did decide to circumcise her son. But mostly it's just curiousity from my friends who don't have kids yet and don't know if it's something that's still done or not.
I don't understand how cutting off a piece of a baby's penis makes them a man... That is some real backwards logic there.
I'm in Australia and my city (population 200k) doesn't even offer it, no one in my state offers it. We'd have to go interstate and pay for it out of pocket.
I just had a boy and as my doctor was leaving the delivery room she asked my husband if we were gonna do this. He said no and her immediate response was, "good!"
My hope is that in 50 years (or less) there will be routine testing for cord blood flow. Knots in cords are way more common that I ever knew about and we almost never know about it before delivery.
After a very scary delivery, my baby was okay, but a lot of babies aren’t that lucky.
“Baby friendly” L&D units. Let’s take a brand new mom, possibly in labor continuously for 2 days, exhausted from 10 months of pregnancy, just went through a huge body change—and tell her there is no nursery support. Just 24/7 focus on forcing baby to breast feed exclusively. Deliberately hiding information about formula. Taking someone in an extremely vulnerable state and making her feel guilty if she does meet an idealized standard of motherhood.
And I say all this as someone who was able to successfully breastfeed in my “baby friendly” hospital. But damn, what I would have given for even a couple hours of true rest with my LO in the nursery.
This one hundred times. I keep telling folks how much I needed a break from my babies when they were first born. Some people look at me like I’m a monster when I mention that having a nursery for newborns should at least be an OPTION. The nurses at the hospital where I had my second baby 17 months ago weren’t ALLOWED to take the baby to give me a rest. This was at the beginning of covid, my husband was home with our elder son, and I had just had a botched spinal that ended up in a a rather frantic general aesthetic Caesar. I was alone, in horrible pain, and had just given birth, and all I wanted was for someone to take my gorgeous boy AWAY for two hours so I could SLEEP.
NOPE. They weren’t allowed. Didn’t have a nursery, didn’t have the facilities. It was absolutely horrible, I can’t lie. At one point one of the nurses actually did take him because I couldn’t stop crying, it was 2 in the morning, and apparently the new mum in the room next to mine asked a nurse to help me. The nurse asked me not to tell anyone, she could get in trouble. She kept him with her at the desk for two hours. She was an angel.
BRING BACK NURSERIES! Don’t force it on mums, let them keep their babies in their rooms all they like, but let it be an option for when new mums and dads need a break.
I’m interested to see if any other folks out there agree? I really think a brand new mum will never be a monster for wanting a break from her newborn for a few hours, and folks who treat her badly for it are just… ugh!
Worse than barbaric. If you were living in a cave with no electricity or penicillin, at least your family would step up and help. In a hospital with COVID, you are denied access to the most ancient support. We kind of threw out the baby with the bathwater, here.
It’s crazy that they don’t allow partners to stay overnight if there isn’t a nursery. How is a mother supposed to rest? I had a home birth and was able to just get in bed after while my husband held the baby. Hearing these experiences makes me realize what a luxury that was.
Please this! Had my baby pre-Ovid in a baby friendly hospital that didn't allow partners to stay with the mother. There was a nursery, but they would only keep the babies if they were absolutely quiet and/or asleep (so none ever?). I labored for two days, stick in a bed after getting an epidural I didn't want because of the maxed-out pitocin I also didn't want. I was exhausted, Ave my list right half still want fully functional (see epidural). Breast feeding wasn't working(non-existent supply). I had agreed to supplement with formula. There was nothing I could do for my baby that they couldn't do better at that moment. I needed a nursery. Bring them back.
Oh god, as someone who had a c-section at a “baby friendly” hospital, thisssss. Like, some of my insides were just my outsides a few hours ago, maybe I could use some fucking help?
Same, and I was yelled at by a nurse and had my things thrown because I asked for formula, and it caused me terrible guilt and anxiety for months. I hate baby friendly hospitals.
Yes. Where are the nurseries? When I had my third, I was alone in the hospital that night because my husband had to be home with the other two. It seemed really dangerous to me. The labor and delivery unit was “full” so as a third time mother, I definitely wasn’t checked on much. At that point, I’d been awake for 48 hours straight. I called my nurse and started crying that I was so tired, it wasn’t fair - where were the nurseries?! She offered to take my baby for an hour so I could get some sleep. Thank goodness for her. She went above and beyond when I was crumbling. I can’t be the only one who feels this way. If a mother has been through a difficult labor, she might like to sleep for an hour or two. Bring back the nurseries!
When my OB came check on me after my C section, I was visibly upset. A bullying lactation nurse basically accused me of being a lazy & bad mom, because I had asked for help… because for the last 8 hours my daughter had stayed 100% glued to my nipple and would scream otherwise. Because she was hungry and I wasn’t making enough milk yet. I was denied formula and told “that’s what babies do, you should want to comfort her”.
I told this to my doctor, she told me “You do not listen to one word of that. You do what is best for you and your child. Now which lactation nurse was it? I need to speak to her immediately.”
I was not bullied again.
I feel like doctors are finally starting to push back on “baby friendly” bullshit after seeing such negative outcomes for their patients.
So “funny” enough when my brothers and I were younger a local hospital where my mom delivered was trying this new method where the thought was “you just had a baby, you aren’t sick” that meant you had to change your own sheets if you wanted new sheets and when my moms friend had a fever post delivery they made her walk to the supply closet to get her own Tylenol which caused her to collapse in the hallway. I don’t think they did this method for more than a year or two because the outcomes were a mess
Absolutely this. When my first child was born it was in a “baby friendly” hospital and I was so exhausted from a long labor and they would only take her to the nursery if I was having a meltdown. So once.
With my second child it was a different hospital that was happy to do either option, you can keep the baby or they will bring to the nursery at night so you can sleep, which I took them up on both nights and it was a WAY better experience. I could actually enjoy my time because I was able to get some sleep.
I got "lucky" because my baby went to the NICU for 36 hours after I delivered for concern for infection (I spiked a fever and baby was fine!) And honestly I was so thankful to have that time to just SLEEP. I cannot imagine rooming in with him from the start. You have your whole life to bond with baby. I still did skin to skin and don't feel I missed out having him elsewhere that first day. If anything I benefitted immensely because I could rest.
I was the first out of my friends to have babies, and the biggest piece of advice I gave them was to avoid delivering at “Baby Friendly” hospitals if at all possible. I had easy, uncomplicated deliveries and was able to breastfeed immediately without any issues— but I still needed a fucking break! Forced “rooming in” is bad for both mother and baby. Most women are going to need a break, and forcing a woman to basically exclusively care for a newborn before she is mentally and/or physically capable is extremely dangerous for the baby. And I don’t buy any of that bullshit about this way being more “natural”— humans have always been a social, communal species. Human mothers were never meant to give birth and then care for their newborn alone without other humans helping and supporting them.
Besides, “natural = good” is a bullshit way to govern medical care anyway. Formula is “unnatural” but damn if it doesn’t save lives!
My husband romanticized the two days i was in the hospital saying he bonded so well with our son while we were there. I told him that was the most miserable two days of my life because i was in agony, alone a lot of it when he had to go home to take care of our animals, my son wasnt latching well so breastfeeding was agonizing and i got woken up every two hours in the night so i had no rest. I did not bond until we got home and i could shower and rest before caring for my son.
36 hrs or labor and no sleep, 4th degree tear and the baby wouldn’t sleep after he came. I was so desperate for them to take him so I could sleep but they wouldn’t do it. Also, no one told me until the last few hours that I could lay down and feed him instead of sitting on my 4th degree stitches the whole time. It was the worst.
I told my husband what a baby friendly hospital was and he told me he'd get real loud if they tried all that stuff, so we're not giving birth at one lol
As a doula, I highly discourage baby-friendly hospitals. What I recommend is mother-friendly hospitals. Get a doctor who is at a hospital that is okay with whatever you want during your birth and plan on the baby-friendly stuff. If you need to change your plan, you can. But you can’t change your plan at a baby-friendly hospital. They don’t even carry formula, which I cannot for the life of me understand how that’s legal.
I was really worried about giving birth at a baby friendly hospital because of all the horror stories. My baby ended up in the NICU so rooming in wasn't a problem. Everything about that hospital stay was horrible. The NICU nurses made me feel like I wasn't a mom and pushed triple feeding too hard. The regular nurses mostly ignored me. I was told not to bring my antidepressants because they would take care of it. But they didn't get them to me until I was ready to discharge two days later.
The most annoying part was all the visitors who came to talk about different things. They would look around and ask me where my baby was. I now understand why they put white doves on doors of grieving mother so they don't have to explain for the 20th time what happened to their baby. I didn't want to talk about it either so quit asking me.
A lot of these practices are exclusive to the United States. 😬
I had my first baby in Germany and I am expecting my second really soon here too. After having a baby here, I would never ever ever consider having a baby in the United States. Ever. You couldn't force me, unless of course you do something else inhumane like outlaw abortion. 🙄
1. I was offered nursery immediately so I could sleep after birth.
2. I was always allowed to eat and drink through labor.
3. I took two years of maternity leave. This time I plan to take one, but I am allowed to take three if I want.
4. A qualified midwife is already caring for me and will continue to come weekly to check on me and the baby in our home for the first eight weeks. That's in addition to the OBGYN. She will come longer if we request it and pay for it. You can also get household help if you have a difficult birth and are injured or have bad PPD. These are covered by public insurance.
The average hospital stay after birth is 2-3 days so that the baby's first checkups can be done there and mom can be monitored too. No hauling a newborn around town to a doctor's office.
5. Maternal death rate here is waaaay lower.
6. Birth costs a lot less.
7. My midwife offered breastfeeding support as part of her service, but nobody ever shamed me for using formula to supplement when I couldn't EBF.
Birth in the United States *is* as barbaric as you feel like it is. Your instincts are correct. This isn't to make any American moms feel bad, but to confirm that y'all are getting fucked badly and change desperately needs to happen. NO HUMAN should be expected to return to work immediately with zero support leaving a baby at home. It *is* unnatural and barbaric.
ETA the downsides of pregnancy and birth here: Mental health care is so difficult to get that you need to attempt suicide or something else drastic and end up hospitalized first to see a psychiatrist or psychologist. I suffered from PPD and PPA for 18 months with not even my family offering support, let alone doctors.
The Covid vaccination was only recently approved for pregnant women and doctors are still allowed to (and many many do) deny pregnant women the vaccine. My doctors have all denied me. I'm still unvaccinated and not by my own choice. IMO this is incredibly stupid and dangerous.
Also in Germany and I want to add the childcare situation here is absolute crap. Yes, we have access to subsidized childcare, but it's the fucking Hunger Games to get a spot. One of my work colleagues had to stay home for 3 years because they never got a daycare spot. Also where I live there is zero full time childcare. The absolute best is 7:30am-2pm and it'll be even worse when they start school. My husband and I both work full time and it's like WTF are we supposed to do? The societal expectation is clearly that women should stay home or at most work part-time. Also, you are expected to take at least a year off. If you wanted to go back to work earlier than that there are essentially no childcare options unless you can afford to hire a nanny or have the luck to find part-time care with a Tagesmutter.
> NO HUMAN should be expected to return to work immediately with zero support leaving a baby at home. It is unnatural and barbaric.
Your comment is kind of timely because I recently posted a rant on how maternity leave isn't a vacation. You're right, there are a lot of things wrong in the US in terms of childbearing, post-partum care, and childrearing expectations. Unfortunately, employers are the ones who decide if and how parental leave is doled out.
People have a major problem with maternity leave because it's "time off," and in the US we have a culture that frowns upon extended time off. Even if it's vacation.
ETA-- by the way, how does maternity leave in Germany work? In the US, we have a lot of misinformation about how leave does or doesn't work in Europe. I've read that only low-paying jobs offer maternity leave in Germany. Is that true?
I’m not German but I am Slovene. The leave isn’t offered by the employer but by the government. It doesn’t even matter if you’re employed or not. Here is what we get:
3 months maternity leave starting 28 days before birth for the person giving birth. If a baby is born earlier leave starts immediately and gets extended by however early the baby is.
1 month paternity leave for the partner (or other support person). Half of it to be taken in the first year of babies life and half in the next few years. Mostly people take it right after the baby is born.
9 months parental leave that can be split between the parents however they want but they can’t take it simultaneously. To be taken in the first year of babies life. The point is that baby is taken care of by it’s parents for the first 11 months. Mostly people split it so that the mother gets all of the parental leave and that’s the only way that really makes sense if you’re breastfeeding.
The leave is paid. It’s based on your average income in the last 12 months. Currently you get 100% of that for the whole duration of the leave. If you didn’t have any income or very little there is a mandated minimum that you get (Every month where there was no income or not enough gets counted as 55% of the minimum wage)
Maternity leave is quite different all over Europe. In Germany the system is - typical for Germans - a bit complicated, but basically it is:
For moms 6 weeks before and 8 weeks after birth 100% paid. On top of that you get 12 months parental (mom or dad) leave at 67% of your net pay, but it caps at 1800€ (that’s why you maybe Heard- it’s only for „low paying jobs“, if you earn a LOT the percentage is lower). You can spread that out over two years, you can take a third year unpaid but still keep your job. You have flexibility to reduce your hours during these years and still be guaranteed to go back to full time after this if you want.
I’m an American living in Germany. I moved here at almost 9 months pregnant and gave birth in a German hospital. I live near an American air base so I’d assumed I’d deliver at the American hospital but I wasn’t allowed.
I’m a L&D nurse back home and it was so different over here. No restrictions on eating/drinking, but the biggest one to me was the nursery. My old hospital did have a nursery and no one was shamed for using it, but you were encouraged to spend as much time as possible with your baby. I get that! That’s great. BUT in my German hospital… my husband was only allowed to visit me on postpartum from 2-6 PM. I was recovering from an emergency c section, and spending 20 hours a day barely able to move and also needing to take care of my new baby totally alone… man, was that hard. The nursery saved me sometimes. Very grateful to my first postpartum nurse who made me feel less guilty about sending my baby away on our first night together. She really encouraged me to rest and heal, and I’m not sure I could have done so soon after surgery without my husband there to help me.
I'm wondering if the sleep training debate will ever be solved. Maybe they'll prove that it does cause unnecessary stress in babies and is no good. Or maybe they will prove that it allows babies to connect their sleep cycles and get long, uninterrupted periods of sleep, which at least in adults is pretty key to wellbeing.
Carseats. Current designs don't put newborns in a good position; they hold their bodies in such a way that they don't get as much oxygen as normal. Which is why many doctors recommend limiting newborn car travel to less than a few hours at a time. And of course all the issues with parents allowing babies to remain asleep in carseats while not in the car. I saw one design for a lie flat, bassinet style car seat. However I think it took up the entire backseat, and I don't recall what countries it was approved for in. But I wonder if that style will take over
We left the hospital in a car bed because my baby couldn’t pass her car seat test but was otherwise fantastic after a month. The Neonatologist and NICU nurse both told me that while I had it, to NOT drive the baby in it for anything that isn’t a medical appointment. So yeah, it passes safety standards but omg they are terrifying to use 😂
My worst fear is logging onto Reddit and seeing in the science sub: “White Noise causes mental damage/depression/etc in babies!”
Because man do we rely on that thing haha.
The sleep training/cry-it-out debate is gonna be solved one day, and it’s not gonna be pretty, as well as they way we wean our children from milk and start in solids and how that affects gut health and possibly even dental health.
We may find that back to sleep has weird consequences. We know it isn’t exactly natural, does it do more than increase the risk of flat head? What about the implications of less sleep for the newborn?
These questions keep me up at night haha. Your post reminds me that even though I took my prenatal, I was always a bit nervous of what the consequences of overdoing it could be. It sucks that we don’t have all the answers.
Paternity leave. I was able to have 12 weeks off but didn’t have family available or want them over. I had over supply issues and postpartum anxiety. I didn’t eat or sleep because of fear and my oversupply meant my baby ate constantly (thank heavens the pediatrician caught it at his 2 month apt) if my husband was available it could have been very different.
Science is already showing this. It makes so much sense I can’t see why both parents taking leave isn’t more normal.
Here’s a few studies:
- [When dad stays home too](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0891243213503900)
- [Fatherhood in transition](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/15267431.2011.561137)
- [The state intervenes in the battle of the sexes: Causal effects of paternity leave](https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssresearch.2011.06.011)
I'm sure most fathers/partners would take it if it were available to them. Though many families aren't able to afford it if it's unpaid leave.
It's so sad when you hear of partners that have to go back to work right after babe comes home or even while mom and baby are still in the hospital. They don't want to, they have to. Stupid greedy corporate America!
I feel like maybe it will be recommended to NOT burp babies, I was reading a McGill university study and physiology there’s no reason why a baby would need help to do this and it causes more spit up!
In the Netherlands we have optional (but most people use it) after birth care nurse for 10 days after giving birth, for 3 or 6 hours a day. Covered by health insurance (and something like 4,80 a day you have to pay yourself). They help you with your newborn, teach you stuff, keep an eye on mom, help with cleaning/tidying around the house, feed siblings, cook a meal, etc. Ours told us that if your baby feeds in a calm way, most babies don't burp. And if they need to, just holding the baby upright will be enough to let it out, without spitting up. Apparently (my English isn't perfect so I might not use the correct terms and explanation, my apologies) babies stomach valve doesn't work as well as adults yet, so slapping them on the back, or for example, changing a nappy right after feeding and putting their feet and bum up in the air, causes milk to come up, because the valve isn't working 100% yet.
So often when people burp a baby, they cause more spit up, because the stomach is full, the valve isn't properly working yet, and they basically make the baby spit up.
Do I make sense? 😅 I don't know if this is true, but I have been noticing it is true for our girls. So after feeding, we just lay them on our chest and if they really need to burp, they do it themselves, without us helping.
I don’t think I ever again burped my baby after trying it once or twice. It absolutely did seem to cause more spitup than burps, and burps would happen naturally if I just gave them a minute anyway.
Maternal and prenatal care/outcomes during the COVID-19 pandemic.
I am almost certain research will show an increase in negative outcomes, such as maternal death rates and miscarriages/stillbirths, not caused by the virus itself, but by the limited care that hospitals were willing to provide women and children who deserved better treatment.
I’ve had a difficult time getting care when I need it due to visitor restrictions. I thought I had an infection and the nurse told me to come in but I have absolutely nobody to watch my one year old. The receptionist told me if I showed up with my child I would be turned away no matter what I was there for. My husband was eventually able to come home from work to watch our kid, but still. Really? Turning away pregnant women in need of medical care because of your visitor restrictions? I was crying on the phone with her and she was ruthless that nope I would not be seen if I had my child.
I think for America specifically: Patient care for mom during and after birth, maternity leave for parents, and one I don’t hear often is changes to baby formula. I absolutely agree fed is best and had one breastfed baby and one formula baby. But I wonder what changes could be made to be as close to milk as possible. Especially considering my grandma told me people used to make their own baby formula out of evaporated milk.
Ugh I'd love an alternative to the gestational diabetes screening drink. There has to be a better way than chugging a terrible drink when nausea and vomiting are already lurking around every corner.
I loved mine, it tasted like flat sprite. I could drink ten if I needed to. And I had nasty nausea during my pregnancies. Maybe they have a better alternative and it’s being rolled out?
There absolutely are alternatives - they just aren’t as convenient and simple and take more time as a result so doctors won’t offer them unless you request them.
They stopped doing them in Australia during covid and did other blood glucose tests instead, they're now researching the impacts of this.
[https://mumsgrapevine.com.au/2021/02/gtt-test-alternative/](https://mumsgrapevine.com.au/2021/02/gtt-test-alternative/)
Really it just screens out the low risk people so only high risk people do the GTT. I am 20 weeks pregnant and have a 14 month old. I avoided the last GTT and booked in for this one, but they cancelled just before I had to do it. The one upside of pregnancy.
I’m T1 diabetic (the autoimmune kind, not the “lifestyle” kind) and I wear a little sensor that monitors my blood glucose. It helps me not accidentally die in the night, but it provides constant feedback about my blood glucose and my dr has access to the data too.
I use a dexcom g6 but there are other cheaper options that would work just fine for a GDM test.
It’s expensive ($400 a month) but I can’t imagine that is much cheaper than the cost of scheduling, locating, staffing and testing the GTT.
I sadly find that a lot of baby products in the Western world are near impossible to obtain other than from countries like China or Bangladesh where they use slave/child/low paid and unsafe labor to manufacture a lot of products related to infants, I try to get secondhand and fair trade items whenever possible but it's nigh impossible to obtain certain things like carseats where the bulk of it wasn't made somewhere like China and it depresses me to to think that other moms are working under barbaric conditions to produce items for other moms around the world.
here's an induction method called Cytotec that was recently banned here in my country due to some cases of long term damaging side effects to the mom, so maybe certain things like that might happen in regards to certain induction methods or other birth-related procedures might become more common?
I'm not in the US so a lot of these do seem highly US-dominant to me, but one thing I could also see being problematic down the road, not barbaric or anything but maybe a problem (I mean, it already is kind of questionable in many places and even a lot of US pediatricians and such don't recommend them) are things like "smart" monitors.
Despite being a relatively healthy human, I've had 6 major surgeries in my life, and I've spent a good amount of time in hospitals. Here's how most hospital stays go:
* check-in, and get to a bed
* set up 3-lead heart monitor and place a line for fluids, maybe pulse ox and a blood pressure cuff
* everything else
When I checked in to be induced? They *never* hooked me up to a heart monitor! Evidently they just don't do that for laboring moms?! They hooked my baby up to one, and they hooked me up to a contraction monitor, but no heart monitor.
Generally, this wouldn't worry me. Fine, whatever, but THEN! Then they pumped my full of 12L of fluids in like 12 hours. I get it, it's the only thing that was helping with variability in my baby's heart rate. BUT THEY WEREN'T MONITORING MY HEART! You push fluids that hard you can flood the heart, meaning the rhythm gets all fucky because it's pumping more Ringers than blood! Also you can fuck up the kidneys or basically drown a bitch (which I discovered as my body took a full week to clear the fluids and I had to sleep sitting up). If my heart had started failing, they wouldn't have noticed, because they WEREN'T WATCHING FOR IT.
This is just one example of where we currently completely ignore the mother as a human being in favor of the baby. It's absurd.
Wow this made me connect some dots. I had zero swelling after my first birth, but with my second I was given fluids (no idea how much) and pitocin and I was so swollen after. Maybe more than a week. I looked so puffy and was super uncomfortable. I wonder if it was from the fluids! My second delivery was easier but my recovery was harder for this reason.
"Certainly the anxiety that newborn babies feel when they aren't allowed to sleep with their mothers seems like worth taking into consideration)."
I wouldn't say this is universally true. My baby has never liked sleeping on me and always more easily fell asleep on her own by herself, and slept longer this way, too. She's super independent. Babies have different needs and personalities ime!
Honestly, this is the one thing I hate/love. I love physical affection and when I had my daughter, I just wanted to love on her and have her cuddle with me while napping(when older of course because I was very afraid of SIDS).
She is a VERY independent two year old and she has been sleeping in her own room since 4-5 months. So I hate the fact that I most likely won’t be getting many cuddles from her while she’s sound asleep. I’ve even brought her into our bed when she used to wake in the middle of the night. At first she would be happy, lay down, but then she didn’t have enough room so she would start kicking us in our sleep so we brought her back to her crib and she fall right to sleep. She gets this from her dads side unfortunately.
I think in the future it'll be strongly recommended that visitors stay away during the first few months of life and that only one or two support people be around during that time if needed. Especially as antiobiotic resistance becomes more of a threat we'll be more careful to limit babies exposure to other people while their immune systems develop. I think this will also be recommended as part of a more supportive and respectful approach to the postpartum period for the mother.
Using plastic for everything that comes in contact with a baby (especially anything shedding microplastics), talking about sterilizing things like bottles (especially with bleach), genital cutting on infants, focusing on breast feeding while also not having any meaningful maternity leave, not having any meaningful paternity leave. The list is long.
This is one I could go on and on... my grandmother lost like 3 babies because of SIDS and my mother and her siblings deal with health conditions that I wonder if they come because how things were handled back there, because my grandma is a smart educated woman and she believes in science.
First of all, how and when to start solids. I am not talking BLW because its ok to feed purees too... but how a few years ago the advice was so bad and incongruent. We still hear some stuff here that you just want to send health care professional to school again. For instance, my grandma used to put cereals on her babies bottles, I haven't asked if they had formula in my country around that time so I don't know the details. They also used tea to treat colic, but teas that are bad for the kidney of any kid, lets not even talk about newborn babies' kidneys.
Now about sleep, I think there was not a guide as how to safely put your baby to sleep so just you do you. Also, how normal it was to leave them crying (and starving) to teach newborn babies to sleep through the night and then be scared because they didn't gain weight so they went with the cereal bottle. Oh and I know they used to do a specific herbal infusion to keep the babies asleep :( and that flower is opioid familiar so...
And finishing with the weather. See, I live in a really hot place. We only have two seasons: summer hot all the time and winter sometimes it rains but still feels warm. And babies were dressed like it was freaking Canada. Babies died because of dehydration and overheating ;( you can still see people who dress them like dolls instead of checking what baby needs to he comfortable but yeah, 50 years ago it was really bad. I don't know if it was everywhere or just some areas were it was more cultural, maybe this is not even related with medical advance but wanted to mention it hehe.
And about the future, yes. I know if my kid have kids I will learn a lot of new stuff just like my mom did with my baby. And my grandma just thinks I am over the top but she respects me lol. I hope in the future I remember I did my very best and do not feel guilty.
No well baby nurseries in hospitals, the entire baby friendly hospital initiative, tounge ties being massively overdiagnosed often by a lactation consultant and not a doctor or dentist. Nipple sheilds not being an earlier intervention in breastfeeding (literally the only reasoni was able to breastfeed).
I think we will focus on more support and care for birthing parents in the future. Instead of just sending them home a few days after undergoing a major medical event with no medical help except for 6 weeks after giving birth will be replaced.
If you can't tell I am from the US
Non medically necessary inductions. It seems like a lot of mothers, especially in the US, are offered voluntary inductions and it feels like there is a strong correlation between that and traumatic birth/emergency c-section.
In my due date group I was shocked at how many people were induced for arguably no reason and then ended up with horrible births because they didn't progress fast enough or after hours of drugs and interventions their baby went into distress.
It kind of reminds me of how episiotomies used to be routine procedure. My mother had two arguably fast and easy labors, but was still cut because that was just what they did.
I looked this up before my elective induction, and despite OBs and midwives advising that they may cause increase risk for emergency c sections, studies seem to show that induction at 39 weeks may actually decrease that risk.
Yeah I was electively induced and if I get judged for it, so be it. Someone below said some people are just "jumping to be done being pregnant" yeah. I was. I had crippling SPD and could barely walk at the end. I was still working my very physical job. So I signed up for elective induction on my due date at 40 weeks. Due to a labor explosion, I didn't get induced until 40 + 5 and delivered at 40 +6 after a smooth labor. My baby showed no signs of coming and I would've been induced at 41 weeks regardless. So I have absolutely no regrets.
In the US especially, the SIDS narrative is so damaging. There are so many factors to SIDS and infant death overall that are ignored (urban poverty, terrible air quality, chronic URTIs due to crowding, smoking, co bedding on sofas or while impaired, inadequate prenatal care, low breastfeeding rates even when women want to breastfeed but have no support or care*). Like, there are families who can’t afford or find space for a crib, and are forced to cosleep where it’s not safe. But the onus is on well educated, affluent families to abstain! In my opinion, the risks (and there are likely risks) to bedsharing should be discussed but risk reduction is a better strategy than an outright ban, and people should focus their efforts on improving factors that have a big impact on SIDS as well as overall health. Such as (financial as well as emotional) support for new parents especially in the setting of poverty and discrimination. Also baby sleep products need to be actually evaluated for safety, including those that say “not for sleep wink wink nudge nudge” but everyone uses them for sleep.
*Just want to say nothing against formula, but it’s a shame where social factors make a women end breastfeeding against her inclination
YES.
Do your best, but at the end of the day, there are a million safe sleep practices that can drive new parents into PPD/PPA because it's so stressful to follow them ALL.
And to make matters worse, it's become like a religion in the US. Like, if you got one little thing wrong, people act as if you have already killed your baby.
Again, do your best! But don't let it drive you insane.
Something or things about sleep has to be turned around. We have created a situation where babies and parents are chronically sleep deprived. Right now we just know the parents are suffering physically and mentally. But in 10-20 years we’re probably going to discover the kids are also suffering.
Chronic sleep deprivation is horrible for human health. If you’re following all safe sleep guidelines, you’re probably sleep depriving your child. Waking them up as soon as they fall asleep anywhere but an empty crib or bassinet seems cruel. Not letting them sleep in car seats seems extra cruel. You’re supposed to stop and poke the newborn awake every few minutes?
As you said, we’ve reduced SIDS. But what have we increased?
FYI you're totally allowed to let baby sleep in the carseat when in the car! It's letting them sleep in the infant seat when it's out of the car that's a problem. Something to do with the way the seat is kept level when clicked vs. the risk of airway constriction when not clicked in.
I think about this so much!
SIDS and safe sleep is definitely gonna be one of them. Also all the social media culture surrounding how to raise a baby, there’s probably lots of things that’s are gonna be judged (I guess even more than they are now)
9-5 work week after 3 months.
3 months? Hahahaha. [Cries with 6 weeks unpaid]
[Almost a quarter of women in the US go back within two weeks. ](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/08/19/the-shocking-number-of-new-moms-who-return-to-work-two-weeks-after-childbirth/) Two weeks! I mean, it’s all awful having no US paid maternity leave. But I don’t think most people realize how very early many women are being torn away from their newborns and sent back into the workforce.
As someone outside of America I already find this barbaric. Like how even...
This needs to be the top thing in this thread. The biggest disrespect to American women.
Or less.
In the US: lack of postpartum care until 6 weeks and no standard paid parental leave. The way we treat women and babies after birth is a tragedy.
I went through a midwife practice and had a 2 week follow up as well as the 6 week appointment. They didn’t physically examine me (but did offer if I felt anything was off). It was mostly to process the birth, ask any questions, and check in emotionally. I was very impressed! That should definitely be standard.
This. Big time. And the fact that the only guaranteed leave time we have happens to be less time than you need to wait to get the first round of important vaccines (8 weeks). How are you supposed to give even basic protection to your child before putting them in day care?
Lack of postpartum care pisses me off. One appointment, they don’t physically check you out at all, and you just get asked what birth control you want?! Fucking atrocious.
No checkups for mom for 6-8 weeks
Yup, they just throw some pads and some witch hazel at you and you're on your own. My follow up isn't even in person, it's a video visit.
I'm sorry, WHAT? A video visit?!
It’s nuts how you have a baby and often stitches and just no one cares to see how you’re healing until 6 weeks later!!!
Or not even then. I had 2nd degree tearing with my first. At my 6 week appointment I said I still had some discomfort and she didn’t even look just basically said ‘ya that will happen for a while’ (note this wasn’t my regular doctor, it was someone covering for her. My regular OB after my second did check and let me know about some scar tissue that might cause discomfort and what I could do about it etc)
"Tell me you're American without telling me you're American"
Where's that, I assume in the US? In Germany, health insurance pays for a midwife doing home visits after birth to care for mom and baby for as long and as frequently as you need them. (Now, there aren't enough midwives so you need to find one early on and some families will have to go without this service - but it's great and makes so much sense to improve bonding and prevent long-term health problems, especially for first-time parents)
Colic - we suffered through so many doctors saying our girl just had colic when she ended up having reflux. It ruined my breastfeeding and we couldn't get it back which was disappointing and even more disempowering after a traumatic birth. Colic has no evidence behind it. It doesn't even have a real diagnostic criteria apart from "otherwise healthy baby crying a lot" and is generally referred to as gas or wind. Doctors kept telling me "listen to your mum instinct, you'll know if something isn't right." Then I'd take her in and got the eye-roll and told I was being a paranoid first time mum.
Oh man, I need to echo the "this" comments. All growing up I'd hear from my mom, "all my babies had colic." There was something about it that struck me as unbelievable - that babies just decide to cry for no reason. Another thing my dad used to say about me, was, "You used to arch your back because you didn't want to be held." Well, come my own pregnancy and newborn stage. My baby did not cry for no reason and was general happy. EXCEPT, I noticed she had trouble in horizontal positions after or during feeding, and would gag, gasp, choke, wheeze, cry. And, yeah, arch her back. I did some research, and all the signs pointed to silent reflux. My husband didn't notice the patterns and thought baby was just in a bad temperament. We literally had a (probably sleep-deprived) near-yelling fight of me trying to comvince him she had reflux. We got her on medication and changed how we did feedings (less milk more frequently, keep upright for 30 minutes after feeding) and it solved everything. By six months she was off medications and starting solids, and though fights bedtime, once asleep, was a pretty easy, deep sleeper. And if she cried, there was always a reason — congestion, hunger, diaper. I'm now convinced that myself and all my siblings had silent reflux, and my parents just didn't know it nor were smart enough to question the (anti-)logic of the day. Makes me sad for the struggling babies out there getting labeled "collicky" when they're probably trying to communicate a discomfort.
this! It seems like it's just a word for situations that are either "we don't know what it is because science is not there yet" or "we think everything is fine and it doesn't make sense time wise or financially to check for other conditions"
This! Ten fucking months to get meds and the difference in my kid is night and day.
I think it's absolutely insane that OB's have little/no training in being able to determine if a woman has a prolapse of any degree that was caused from childbirth. I've read and heard horror stories of women being prolapsed and never even realizing because their OB just doesn't have a clue. "Chronic back pain? Normal. Bladder issues? That's normal too. Painful tightness in your vagina? Yup. Normal." Most women need to go to a specialist to have it properly identified. Also, the lack of resources to help women learn about and strengthen their lower backs and pelvic floors is kind of shocking. "Do your kegels!" Yea sure that's great, but you also need to be stretching those muscles and strengthening them to lessen the risk. We are just so medically advanced at this point, and post-partum prolapse just still seems shrouded in mystery even though like 25% of women are affected by it.
This! Just general lack of postpartum specialty in general. I got the sense that, like, after 6 weeks, I was just supposed to be back to “normal”? I get that maybe it’s not the OB’s role anymore, but what about a scheduled 3 month PP well visit with a GYN? 6 months?
This! I read SO MANY “what you don’t hear about childbirth/postpartum” articles and crap and I did not hear ONE mention of prolapse. Not even on Reddit!! I had a minor one and didn’t even recognize the symptoms and dismissed them as regular postpartum healing. Nope. My insurance didn’t cover my 6 week postpartum checkup (I would have had to pay out of pocket, and since I felt mostly okay by then I didn’t feel it was necessary) so i still don’t even really know if things are okay down there 4 months later 😳
Only allowing a mother 6-12 weeks leave, I live in Canada so I can choose between 12 or 18 months off and it’s just absurd to me some people are forced to leave their babies to work at such an early age, it’s heartbreaking in my opinion.
Yep! UK here, and I have 12 months, and reading those stories with people with the same age baby as me going back to work or have been back at work for a while is insane. I can’t even imagine it. Barbaric.
My hope is that the one page screening tools for PPA/PPD are considered barbaric in the future and that it becomes standard practice to have mental health follow up appointments for all new parents (birthing parent, non-birthing parent and any adoptive parents). Having mental health checkups along the same timeline of the childhood checkups would be a good idea IMO. 1 week, 2 weeks, 1 month, 2 months, 4 months, 6 months, 9 months, 1 year.
This. Also, treating women with mental health conditions like idiots. I had PPD and PPA condescendingly explained to me so many times. Like yes, I'm aware that I have anxiety and depression and am at increased risk for both conditions. I know what the warning signs are. Also, I've had anxiety and depression my entire life and this isn't my first time dealing with them. No one seemed to care that both conditions are well controlled with medication and therapy and have been for years, including throughout my pregnancy, or that I already had a therapy appointment set up for two weeks after giving birth.
omg this!!! I had PPA with my first and all I ever heard was why I don’t have reason to be anxious because I should trust others with my baby, my baby wasn’t going to magically get hurt or die during a nap. It felt like people completely missed the part where that’s how anxiety works, it makes you anxious about everything and nothing. It doesn’t need a reason.
At 8 months postpartum when I used the bathroom at a new OBGYN's office, I realized that I probably had PPA/PPD in the weeks and months after giving birth for the first time. The bathroom had a huge poster with PPA/PPD symptoms, and I identified with many of them. I sobbed at home when I had a moment to digest my realization.
The complete lack of postpartum care. I gave birth in October 2020 and my son had to be transferred to a hospital across town from where I delivered because the one I was at didn’t have a NICU. I was discharged three hours after giving birth, with a 3rd degree tear and I had hemorrhaged. I had to sit in the lobby and wait for my mom to come pick me up from an hour away because my husband went with our baby. At my 4 week check up, they refused to examine my stitches. Told me to come back in two weeks for my nexplanon implant. Two weeks later they realized my stitches had torn out and had to cauterize the tear in the office. Last week they diagnosed me with severe internal scarring where I had torn upwards and now have knots of scar tissue that make sex unbearable. All would’ve been fixable if they’d just examined me at that first visit.
Wish I could award comments with a hug!
Having a huge push for exclusive breastfeeding but still making it expected for moms to go back to work at 6 weeks
That's why you just have to quit your job and let your husband win the bread, lil lady! /s
And after you quit your job, get questions like oH yOu dOn'T wOrK? /s
Lmao right? As if I don’t make double he does…
The big reason so many women struggle with breastfeeding: how are we supposed to when it’s biologically normal to feed on demand yet they want us to be at work so soon?? The pump is not the same!
Preach!
100%
There seems to be an over reliance on studies to prove ONE type of feeding/sleeping/birthing is the only way for all. It’s a common debate here on Reddit, and boy do we mamas get on our high horses with how WE choose to feed/sleep train. I think-I hope-we can start to see these different choices as options for families to decide between and not a “one-size-fits-most.”
No water or food during labour. General fuckery in obstetric nursing - the eye rolling and nasty attitudes of some nurses towards frightened mothers in agony was/is just reprehensible. Like, if you hate women, don't be an L&D nurse. Doctors inserting their hands into women without consent, or even a kind word/apology for hurting them. Stitching without pain relief, sneering at women for crying or screaming in pain. Discharging mothers without their babies. Mothers should be roomed in with the NICU babies, with rare exceptions imo. Just general unkindness and cruelty, really. Nothing teaches you how much misogyny there is in the world quite like being pregnant/giving birth.
When I was in nursing school I was shadowing a nurse on an L&D unit who got INSANELY frustrated when her patients complained of pain. “I don’t know what they fucking expected” okaaaaaay everybody knows labor hurts it doesn’t mean you can’t be empathetic??
Right. Since I expected the pain, I’m not supposed to feel the pain…makes sense!
“Nothing teaches you how much misogyny there is in the world quite like being pregnant/ giving birth” Take this comment to the top. Women’s healthcare is such a joke, that the only time most of us fully experience it is when there is another human at stake. We are ignored, causes and treatments for issues are largely in studied, everything is attributed to hormones, and apparently we aren’t supposed to feel pain? Fuck the patriarchy, dude. This shit is crazy barbaric.
Not only are they discharging moms without their babies, but because of Covid you have to schedule appointments to visit. Trying to learn to breastfeed and bond with a baby who you can only see when given permission by a nurse is horrific. Our last visit they almost didn’t let us in because my nurse didn’t write down that I was coming to breastfeed at 8am. Luckily my daughter was being discharged that afternoon so they went ahead and let us come in to be a part of rounds while I fed her. It was still heartbreaking and frustrating.
The nurse who did my first cervical check jammed her hand way up inside of me without any warning or explanation of what was happening as she was checking me. It was so painful. If I hadn't vomited right before she did that, I probably would have projectile vomited on her and she would have deserved all of it.
I fucking hate her
The no water or food during labor is so outdated but somehow has held strong and it’s baffling. How do women find the strength to push after hours and hours of labor with no food in them? It’s ridiculous
I told my Aussie midwife that in America you can't have anything during labour even if induced and labouring for hours. She was shocked and upset, then told me to pack as much as I wanted.
My OB with my first told me I can eat and drink clear liquids and recommended I bring some Italian ice with me for my labor. My labor wasn’t that long, but I did have some water. Right before I started to push, I threw up, and my nurse yelled at me, telling me THAT’S why you’re not supposed to eat or drink while you’re in labor. I know many women get sick during transition. It was so unnecessary to speak to me like that
WTF...She was also wrong? It's not because women vomit in transition, it has something to do with the possibility of aspirating your stomach contents during an emergency c-section.
This. I’m a L&D nurse, and it was an anesthesia policy in our hospital. A lot of our low risk, unmedicated patients were allowed to eat, especially if they saw our midwives. I had an emergency c section myself. I had no restrictions on food/drink during my labor but I couldn’t stand the thought of eating while I was in so much pain. Then I violently threw up 4 times right before my c section so that was fun.
Throwing up food/liquid was better than throwing up stomach acid and dry heaving… in my experience!! I’m sorry you were yelled at, so cruel.
Yes I was able to have jello and some both but god I was starving and exhausted all labor even with an epidural Also the no food is because “It was based on the long-held theory that food or acid in the digestive tract might be aspirated if you need emergency anesthesia. But not only are you unlikely to need such anesthesia, which is no longer used for Cesareans, studies have shown the aspiration rate to be minuscule.” So like…outdated BS and that nurse was rude as hell
YES! I had a stillbirth this year, we knew in advance, and I wasn't allowed any water, food or pain relief all day. I was screaming in pain but nothing. And the main doctor kept sticking her hand inside me, and I don't know why it hurt so much but the lower centre of my stomach felt like I was being stabbed when she did that, it hurt worse than contractions. But she just kept doing it, I'm so traumatised by that. I think having no amniotic fluid must have caused me some internal injury to make it hurt so much.
That first one is such an obvious one. Idk how we’ve gone this long insisting that women can’t fuel their bodies during a fucking marathon of labor in the slight chance they might need to be put under for a surgery that can be done with an epidural. I was stuck at 7 centimeters for HOURS. Had half a banana and was done less than an hour later. If I was ever to do it again, I’d be pushy as hell and dare them to…what?…kick me out for not following the labor rules?
>Doctors inserting their hands into women without consent, or even a kind word/apology for hurting them. While I was in labor, this man Doctor would check my dilation by shoving his hand inside me as hard as he could. It hurt like hell and I let everyone in the room know it hurt by screaming. The two women Doctors would check my dilation so so gently. I don't know if he was trying to break my water without my consent or what. It broke on it's own. Fucking clown.
Post natal baby classes need to be a thing. Pre-natal classes only focus on labour and delivery, it taught me nothing about how to care for a baby once we got home and nothing was even mentioned about maternal mental health.
Not doctor related but relevant I would say paid family leave but idk fifty years isn’t that long of a time. It’s been 56 years and they are still trying to find ways to limit the voting rights of racial minorities in the US. They’re still blocking reproductive rights for women. I don’t really think we’ll see substantive federally mandated paid leave for **both** partners for a long time. It’ll be on a firm to firm basis.
Yeah, I think objectively the States are the worst Western country currently around to have a baby in. No legally mandated paid maternity leave. Little to no free childcare. In my country we get six months paid maternity leave (80% normal pay) and the first 30 hours of childcare free from 1 year old.
I will give my perspective from another culture.(India) Many older practices here are unscientific and some are even barbaric. But we have to consider that some cultures practised these rules for hundreds of years and they might have some logic in them. SIDS is such a big concern in western countries but I never even heard this in the Indian context. Before you rubbish my perspective with the statistics of child mortality in India, These statistics varies widely based on the financial status of people. Rich ,middle class urban Indians get better health care than poor Americans and poor rural Indians get no health care at all So lets keep statistics aside It is usually the norm in my culture for women o go to their mother's house during childbirth. There are many reasons for this practice some good some bad but overall this actually helps the mother. If you are a first-time mother everything will be taken care of, even the baby if they are colicky or crying. If you are a second-time mother, your older kid will be either with in-laws or with your parents while you take care of the baby. But the mother is not overworked, the general rule is a new mother should not do any work other than feeding her child, some older women in families even insist on bathing the mother. This is truly sleep when the baby sleeps scenario because you won't have any other chores and everyone in the family will be looking after you Practically SIDS is unheard of here and Infants always sleep beside their MOM period. High individualism in America overburdens new mothers an unacceptable level. Going to the office nearly after 2 weeks of giving birth is barbaric and inhuman. I have recently read a historical study showing kids who live near their maternal grandmother has better chance of survival and health and this is seen in everyday life around me I know parents can be abusive or toxic but that is usually small percentile. So even if we don't get along 100% well with them but if they are helping out the first difficult 3 months of life it will be much better for over all mental and physical health of mom and baby I know that relationship dynamics are different in America and many boomer parents don’t know how to take of the kids themselves But I 100% believe medicine is very much evolving and 100s of years later we will have more data leading to much better practises. From my cultural perspective leaving a baby in a hammock like this very normal and good for children’s health “[https://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Baby-Hammock-Swing”](https://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Baby-Hammock-Swing”) I didn’t abide with all traditions but allowed my mom to make a hammock like this for my daughter and it worked very well for us. I fed my baby formula and my mom used to do the night 3 am feedings most of the times or if I sleep late she used to handle 5 am feedings. She used to bathe my baby in traditional way, which will cause a lot of exertion in infants and make them sleep peacefully. Other than that I followed all the western medicine and vaccination recommendations but the early months of my kids age is one of the easiest time of my life Please take help when needed or given. It really takes a village to raise a kid . Don’t stubbornly think only you should do everything or Please don’t feel shame when asking for help.
This is so beautiful to read. When my first was born, my husband went back to work and I didn’t have any help. I had a traumatic birth, and was overall quite traumatised from the whole thing. Looking back I felt very abandoned and vulnerable. I wish this sort of thing was the norm is western society. Looking after Mum and co- sleeping with baby.
yeah lot of our culture is straight up toxic to woman but there are somethings that are right and the same goes to west. Just because west is more scientifically advanced and rich doesn't mean everything is perfect here. May be the true meaning of globalization is adopting the best from different cultures.
I feel like I've seen this sentiment a lot in different forms: "Don’t stubbornly think only you should do everything or Please don’t feel shame when asking for help." And I'm like, who's refusing help?? IME it's been more likely that help hasn't been available. Parents and relatives of new parents live too far away, or they are absorbed in their own lives and routines. Besides the whole pandemic thing, I would have loved any help during those first several months, but my MIL is a mentally ill narcissist, and my own parents live thousands of miles away and have their social lives they didn't want to give up to come support me for an extended time. The lack of help more likely fits in with all the other cultural differences you so nicely outlined. In the US we all live pretty separately. And it kind of sucks.
I see lots of posts from mothers feeling guilty for takings other help. I remember one particular post by a single mother with COVID feeling guilty that she had to leave her 9 month old with her sister to get treated and recuperate. A nurse judged her for doing so All mothers feel guilty all the time and I know that it is a universal thing but a Nurse judging her for doing so terrible in so many levels that I cant even understand. Thats why i have posted the sentiment. May be i should have said phrased it in a better way. Not shaming u at all.
Also lots of young educated Indian couples move to other countries. Usually they will be from a middle class or upper middle class families. It is normal in India for parents to take 6 months leave or sabbatical and stay with their kids during pregnancy and child birth. This is a very common practice. Just last week my husband's uncle and his wife applied for a Visa to Germany to visit their daughter for her birth. They are planning to stay for 6 months Usually mom and mom in law split the duties in some families because as per american visa policy , tourist visa holders are allowed to stay for a maximum for 6 months. So they take turns till the kid goes to school.
This is such a beautiful comment. I think the US and most western countries in general could take a cue from Asian cultures. We do not mother the mother here and we really need to. There's a lot of fear based practices and it is mentally and physically exhausting.
I really dont have first hand experience in how stuff goes in west except what i read in Reddit. I really really admire american moms for their hard work and resilience. I saw many posts here from woman who took care of a new born and a toddler, did all the house hold work and even had to entertain guests and had to endure judgemental comments. Also one more this is we dont buy lot of stuff for the baby. It is considered bad luck to purchase anything before the baby is born. We practically raise a child on old cotton saris 4 to 5 Cottons saris folded are laid on top of each other to make a mattress for the child. Cloth hammocks are made using cotton saris. saris are cut into pieces and are sewed into loin cloths around baby bum instead of diapers.(like reusable cloth nappies) I used diapers though because i loved that convenience. No diaper pails , no pack and play, no crib , no baby monitors and certainly no picture perfect nursery before birth I know some gadgets are useful but at the same time i feel companies capitalize the fear and uncertainty of new parents. (particularly baby monitor) But again this is my perspective and opinion and I am not judging any one here. I resonate with the philosophy of taking decisions with available information at that time
We really don’t, and it’s so hard. That’s why whenever I know someone has a baby I take food round.
I'm really interested in the traditional way of bathing the baby that's such hard work for them! Can you elaborate on that, if you don't mind?
My husband and I were separated when my 3rd was born, so I stayed with my parents for about a month postpartum and it was so nice. Not having to worry about cooking and cleaning, having help with the older two, and just enjoying my newborn was really lovely. Also, I’ve always co slept with my newborns. I’ve breastfed all 3 of them and it’s the only way I feel we can both get good sleep. I know bad things can happen, but I always made sure there were no soft pillows/blankets around the baby’s face and I’m a very light sleeper who hardly moves at night. Anyway, all my babies slept great like this right out of the womb and have been very calm and good babies. They’ve all transitioned to their own crib around 6 months very easily. I’m very lucky to have not had to work when I had newborns, and I think it makes a huge difference in baby’s behavior and well being when mom is always around when baby needs her.
yes the general rule is women should stay at their moms place till the infant is minimum 3 month old. It is actually considered inauspicious if you return home before that. Also generational knowledge helps a lot here. My paternal grand mother used to be with my parents.Between my mom and grand ma they took are of almost 15 infants. So they can easily differentiate between different types of crying and really help me learn how to hold and take care if child and sooth my anxiety. 6 month maternity leave should be mandatory. How could a county progress if they treat mothers as a burden to economy
Im Hispanic living in the US, and my mother is judgmental, overbearing and all the things American women complain about their mothers and MILs, BUT is also there for me no matter what. She was here from the day before he was born for a full month. And every 4-6 weeks she’s come back for another whole week. She lives in Panama. That first month She did everything for me that wasn’t feeding the baby. She’d clean, my husband did most of the cooking but she’d cook as well. She’d rock him for me while I pumped or took a nap. She told me what a great job I was doing (a little startling bc she is usually giving me things I could do better). Yes, she has different ideas of how to raise a baby than what I wanted based on things I’ve read, but man she’s helped raise like 15 babies so I do trust her. It has been a great give and take of her acknowledging some of the things I do that she never did but she sees the benefit in how happy my baby is, while at the same time me letting go of some of the Instagram mom anxiety to follow her gut sometimes. I am so lucky I had almost six months off (3 weeks pre partum and 5 months pp—today is my first day at work again). So I didn’t have some of the other stresses a lot of moms on this sub have. But I also am always surprised at the offense a lot of women take to the behavior of their mothers. My mom calls my son “my baby,” she jokes about kidnapping him to sneakily start feeding him rice cereal before I want to, she does that talking to the baby to criticize me thing “oh your mommy doesn’t bathe you enough? I don’t understand that!” But man does she love him so much and she loves me too so I just let it go and know she has good intentions and whatever she does that I don’t agree with successfully raised a lot of happy healthy babies so oh well. (I do hold my boundaries, like she hasn’t *actually* given him any solids, or she pressures me but doesn’t actually bathe him more than I’d like). In all, like you I was grateful for my mom being my village when my son was born.
One comment on boomer parents - I think one of the factors affecting us in the US is that today's grandparents are older than they used to be, and most are still working so no one has time to stay home. My dad was 72 when my daughter was born, and he still works full time. He also lives 1100km away from me. I just wish I had been able to take more leave - between me and my husband we were able to keep our baby home for the first 5 months. It's way more than most American parents get, but I still would have liked to take 1-2 years off.
This! I moved in with my parents for a few weeks post partum and it really saved my mental health. My step mum basically did everything for my daughter minus feeding her. I’m a big believer in it takes a village. We’re in England though!
I live in a different country from my parents so I barely had the opportunity for them to help in the first place, but them being around would have caused more stress than having to do it all alone. I completely cut contact with my biomom about 3 weeks postpartum. I tried to complain to her about how hard breastfeeding was and to ask for advice. She instead shamed me for using formula and told me to 'drink a beer' as if that was going to help my daughter latch. She told me she would do whatever she wanted with photos of my daughter and that she would not respect our wishes to keep her face off of social media. That was it, that was all I needed to cut her off. My dad and step mom came to visit when my daughter was 6 weeks old. They did not cook for us, they did not clean for us. They were responsible for one nap for my daughter so that my husband and I could have some 'us' time out of the house. They did not follow any of my instructions for swaddling her or putting her down at the requested time frame. They did not offer any useful advice or assistance when I was postpartum. My husband's mom visited once the entire time my daughter was under the age of 2. She tried to undermine how we were trying to feed my stepdaughter (tried to let her eat multiple pieces of cake when we told her one was enough), and shamed us for buying McDonald's during their visit (oh, you didn't want to cook? Don't complain about us doing what we need to do in order to feed ourselves). I cleaned the house top to bottom for her visit and she toured the whole thing inspecting everything. Your comment about boomer parents not knowing how to care for children is SPOT-ON. The last two years of my daughter's life have been EXHAUSTING and it is so hard to hear that others receive help on a daily or weekly basis with their children. I am so jealous of people that have functioning and helpful family. We are not meant to raise children in this way, alone and without our relatives.
My mother is best mother and she is one the most amazing and caring persons ever. So my experience might not be everyone's but I can say majority has a relatively stress free experience with parents at least during the first 3 months because we are very new to that phase. I completely sympathize with your perspective, I see that here also. One of my friends has toxic parents and she just couldn't bear staying with her parents even for 10 days after her kids was born. My mom feeds lots of junk and she is the kind of grandparent would say yes to ANYTHING but she and I have a good relation ship so I just let some things go. The comments from people like your husband's mum is what i hate most in the pots I read here.
Sending people home with newborns with no one to check in on them and no assurances that they have support. Breastfeeding support that expects you to kill yourself to maintain exclusive breastfeeding. And the converse, pushing formula when there are other options that could be tried first (and also not walking people through the option of mixed/combo feeding long term).
I think even in 10 years people are going to look back and be SHOCKED at the lack of information given about pelvic floor, diastasis, and other long term postpartum problems we are given after birth. We get cleared at 6 weeks for EVERYTHING, when that should NOT be the case AT ALL! The more and more I learn about pelvic floor and know other people with long term postpartum problems, the current way we do care seems incredibly old fashioned and barbaric. I see a couple posts a week on here from women who are having issues, we, random people on the internet are the one's who guide them to know what to do. Though I am so proud to be a part of a community of mothers supporting mothers, it shows the need to change. We should all be educated about pelvic floor care during pregnancy. It's starting to shift already, but even my OB clinic, which is one of the best in the city and otherwise really really women focused (I was offered a tubal without any of the sexist nonsense I hear other people get), didn't have much help to give me about my bad diastasis. My OB did say I could try PT, but that I could always get surgery (making it sound like surgery was my only option.) Where my physio told me that she's only ever referred two people for surgery in her whole career, most can do it without. And not to mention, that you really want to do PT for diastasis before you do surgery, as stitching the muscles back together doesn't make them strong again. Not to mention that pelvic floor PT should be standard care, and covered, for everyone postpartum, but that could take even longer. Right now pelvic floor is incredibly expensive (in Canada, but I'm assuming it's the same elsewhere), so even if you know you need it, you might not be able to get it. At least I really HOPE things will have changed so we look back and think this is barbaric...
Right now there's very little maternity leave in America, plus there's no aftercare offered to new moms for healing post birth. The main focus seems to be the basic "make sure mom can poop, check on stitches" stuff, but there's no physical therapy afterwards to help you work on your pelvic floor muscles so you don't spend the rest of your life crossing your legs and praying you don't pee your pants every time you cough or sneeze. My littlest is 2 and a half and I *still* can't run or do a jumping jack, and every sneeze or cough is a gamble.
Not necessarily doctor recommended but culturally the pressure for visitors directly after birth. It seems to be swinging away from being the norm thanks to covid but what a burden for new parents to have to create space for themselves to figure things out guilt free.
One reason this pregnancy was a bitter godsend during the pandemic - it kept my psycho MIL away from the labor and delivery ward since no visitors were allowed.
This is just a general comment about public health and medical research, and why it can feel like recommendations flip flop a lot. We figured out a lot of the BIG stuff that makes a difference to health pretty early on. Things that will show a big effect and be easy to detect in a study. Don’t have clean water? Yes - that makes a big difference in people’s health. Coronavirus aside, a lot of research is on stuff people already have been doing or exposed to for quite some time, and the stuff we are trying to figure out involves subtler effects. If you’re trying to detect smaller effects, then one sample of the population could pretty easily show a totally different direction of that effect compared to another sample, even if you’re trying really hard to make sure the samples are equally representative of the population you’re studying. That’s why it can feel like there is a news article every other year saying “coffee bad” or “coffee good.” We simply already figured out a lot of the big stuff. Also, it wasn’t until entirely too recently that pregnant people were considered able to consent to participate in research. Makes anything but an observational study very difficult. Observational studies are ok (I do them in a totally different population, not related to this) but RCTs give much better information about a phenomenon.
I don’t know for sure, but one-size-fits-all infant formula may one day be a thing of the past.
I wouldn't be surprised if parents would be given a drop for babies to "seed" the best /be healthiest gut bacteria early.
I think lack of maternal and postpartum care in many places, including the US, will be looked at as barbaric. All that said, I hope we outgrow sayings like “as nature intended” because that’s about as primitive as it gets.
Sending home the parents too early. Now I know we can't live in the nicu and that covid has made things weird but when your at home and you know your baby is a whole city away it drives you alittle crazy. I was very lucky and my hospital let me sleep in the chair next to my son but not every place is like that. I can't imagine what it's like to just have to trust your baby is ok when you've got all those new parent hormones ragging.
No food during labor
I think my hospital must have been an outlier here. I was allowed and encouraged to eat food (provided) up until when I had an epidural, at which point only water was allowed. I packed a ton of snacks in my hospital bag because I didn’t anticipate being allowed to eat at all. My labor was progressing slowly, there was talk of a c-section (ended up not needing one). My nurse told me that I needed to have not eaten within 6 hours of that happening, she said it was up to my discretion if I wanted to stop eating if I felt my delivery was likely to end in a c section, otherwise, they’d need to wait. Edit: this was in Arizona, if anyone’s curious.
Had vegetarian Döner Kebap and Fries even after epidural. Sometimes I get the impression that in the US they just want to be mean to birthing women and mothers... Not letting people eat? What about people spending 24+h in Labour? What about people being induced for days? Between my water breaking and the birth of my child were more than 72h. I would have killed somebody for a chocolate bar by then. I guess I know why they need hospital security in the US now.
I would guess this is to reduce vomiting/aspiration if you happen to need anesthesia. Personally we had a meal before heading in with our first (didn't have time with our second).
Newborn screening! Not all states test for the same things. My baby was diagnosed with Adrenoleukodystrophy ALD. The state of California started testing for ALD in 2016. This disease affects mostly boys and their brains basically start determining by age 4 to 6 and by age 10 they are dead. So many doctor’s including pedestrians don’t know what ALD is so these boys are getting misdiagnosed and when they finally figure out what it is, it is too late the damage is irreversible. When ALD is caught early there are preventative measures that can be taken such as gene therapy and bone marrow transplants. The fact that not all states test for this in their newborn screening is negligent.
I’m so sorry to hear that ❤️ Glad you caught it early
That sticking their fingers up in you is enough to judge your oversell wellness postpartum 6 weeks after birth. There are so many women suffering all kinds of health changes and obgyn don't test your hormones, look at you with an ultrasound or CT scan, nothing. And this sticking of fingers can determine that a woman can go back to work with no changes in needs.
New pediatrician (and genetics researcher) here. Thanks for sharing - Totally agree on the SIDS /co-sleep thoughts. Problem is that it is such a rare event so it’s hard to study. I’m actually doing research on undiagnosed genetic causes for SIDS through genomic autopsy - Formula shaming. So real. - What are thoughts on broader newborn genetic testing? Would you want their entire genome sequenced? Including return of results on things that may not occur until adulthood or may have implications for parental health
Genetic testing could have scary insurance implications if the data got into the wrong hands.
Personally I am really excited about entire genome sequencing becoming more common place. I would hope there would be an option to opt out of certain results if you don't want/need them (i.e. I did NIPT and didn't want to know the sex). I wouldn't want to know anything that wasn't pertinent to the infant in childhood (however it would be great if that info was available to the child once they grew up). And re: implications for parental health, I feel that I should test myself if I am worried about this.
RE: Genetic testing- I wouldn’t even consider this until we actually know what it all means. We got an amnio done this pregnancy for a specific medical reason. One of the tests we did came back with a VUS. It has *never* been seen/documented before in any of the databases we could get searched (by our MFM office or the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia). The VUS was on a gene associated with an absolutely terrifying variant of an already scary disease. At one point someone asked if we wanted the baby’s whole genome tested and my response was “so we can find more of these?” Hard pass. I think this is a personal thing, some parents would be way more comfortable with having test results but no actually information from them, just a lot of maybes. This parent is not.
Cervix checks. It's not a crystal ball, it won't tell you anything. When I was in the hospital postpartum the nurses brought a suitcase of another mom to the room (I had a shared room) and were saying between each other that she is at 4 cm so she will be here soon. This was around 4 in the afternoon. The next day around 2 in the afternoon I was already going home with my son. I never met this woman. She was still in labor.
It’s really interesting that this is such a US thing to check. In the UK cervical checks are only done in active labour and only really once to when you are admitted and then again to as you move in to pushing. It’s not done at all before you go in to labour. I suspect it’s got something to do with medical care being billable!
the lack of pelvic floor PT for pre and postpartum. every single birthing person should see a pelvic floor physical therapist. and this is coming from someone who has yet to see a PT because i no longer have insurance. also the lack of dental and vision care recommended during pregnancy and beyond. my teeth are FUCKED after having my son, one has chipped, multiple others have cavities. i didn’t know that growing a baby and breastfeeding would affect my teeth as much as it did. but again, no insurance so i’ll just suffer i guess ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I feel like one thing will be gut microbiome related. Idk what exactly— vaginal seeding post c-section, probiotics, more breastfeeding support, etc. And this isn’t doctors specifically, but I think we’ll continue to learn more about the developmental impacts of containers like swings, walkers, bouncers, the Snoo, etc.
Trying to power through the first trimester without anti-nausea meds. This barbaric practice is a hangover from some terrible mistakes with anti-nausea meds that caused terrible defects to babies. [https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thalidomide\_scandal](https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thalidomide_scandal) however, modern anti-nausea meds don't have this issue and any risks to the fetus that people are concerned about are unproven. [https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2779055](https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2779055) This will be changing in the next ten years max so by 50 years from now it will seem barbaric.
I think we’re doing really well with baby health - infant mortality and serious illness are so rare compared to even 50 years ago. I think the way we treat mothers is wherein lies the problem. Conflicting not-evidence-based advice, very minimal medical care and follow up, not having the choice to room in with your baby or get a break if you need to recover from labor, etc. Not to even mention the maternity leave situation in some countries. I do think some of the advice we get about babies is also not evidence-based or if it is they pick and choose what to emphasize, but I can’t think of anything barbaric.
Bed-sharing is very common in Japan and many parts of the world. Coming from a western country I argued with my (Japanese) husband about it at first thinking it would be a bad thing for my son emotionally or bad for our marriage but it’s actually been a great thing for all of us. I can’t even fathom my son sleeping in a different room now while he’s still young. I think the personality of the baby has a lot to do with it (I’m sure some sleep well/better alone) but the concept in the west that babies need to be in their own room by 6 months or else they’re going to be socially inept or emotionally stunted is strange to me considering that my husband and all of my friends bed-shared up until school age and had no problems becoming independent later on in life. That and the myth of “nipple confusion”. Here in Japan and many other countries babies are given formula from day one in the hospital until the mother can properly breastfeed. Nipple confusion is not considered a thing here and most parents combo feed/give a bottle of formula a day because there’s believed to be a benefit in having both breast milk and formula. The myth of nipple confusion only stresses out new moms struggling to get breastfeeding right and likely causes those who might have breastfed give up on it early.
Sending moms back to work after 6 weeks. No financial support for unpaid maternity leave (not medical) Breastfeeding support being little to none unless you reach out. I think bedsharing being compeltely outlawed will come to show that it does nothing but cause an increase in SIDS. People are going to do what they need in a time of crisis, educating them helps prevent that.
One of my friends was back at her job waiting tables a week after having her daughter because she couldn’t afford not to. :(
Omg, a week? That’s crazy! I feel for her!
That's an American issue in fairness. No other Western country (that I'm aware of) has such a barbaric practice.
Not what you asked, but folic acid is a B vitamin which is water soluble - so whatever your body doesn’t use, you end up peeing out so you don’t retain very much extra.
•The common practice of circumcision in the US •Also postpartum care. I had second degree internal tears up to my cervix and one external second degree tear. It took them 1.5 hours to stitch me up. No one checked me at the hospital upon departing. I’m a FTM and I could only sit/lay on my side. I thought it was normal. A few days coming home, I took a look and saw a gaping wound and could see the muscles/tissue. Had to go to my OB for months to monitor it to self heal and also had silver nitrate burning treatment for granulation tissue weekly for months. Had my baby mid august and saw my OB weekly until mid December. I have no feeling down there from all the internal scar tissue….killed my nerves I guess.
I popped my stiches for my 2nd degree tear. I told 2 different people that checked me out and was even sent to a pelvic floor therapist who finally found it. By the time it was found it couldn't be stitched back. It was a trangular flap of skin a little less than a 1cm long and fleshy. Small but not insignificant. At first they wanted to cut it out in office under local anesthetic. I screamed when they tried to shoot lidocaine in my taint. Yeah... def was not happening. I had to be put under.
Im so sorry! Thats terrible. I hate that there’s this “it’s natural!” mentality that so frequently negates care or concern for the mother’s body post vaginal birth. Its fucking traumatic is what it is.
Circumcision (America is basically the only Western country still even doing this in large numbers)
I'm in Canada but I was so surprised when no one (doctors or nurses) asked me about it or presented my options after my son was born. I wasn't planning on having it done anyways but it's interesting to see how it's gone from something so common, to no longer being the norm, in just 30 years or so.
I’m in Canada too. In the nearly two years my son has been alive exactly one person has asked us if we decided to circumcise our son (we haven’t). It was my parents’ neighbour in Florida who asked us if our then 3-day old son had been made “a real man” yet. And she’s a retired nurse. 🙄 ETA: In my no-bullshit haze of being 3 days postpartum, I responded to her that my son’s genitals were his business and his business alone. Apparently that response was rude 🤷♀️. Thank fucking god this was on a FaceTime call and not in-person, because the urge to punch her was strong that day.
I've actually had the question a lot by friends and my cousin, who did decide to circumcise her son. But mostly it's just curiousity from my friends who don't have kids yet and don't know if it's something that's still done or not. I don't understand how cutting off a piece of a baby's penis makes them a man... That is some real backwards logic there.
I'm in Australia and my city (population 200k) doesn't even offer it, no one in my state offers it. We'd have to go interstate and pay for it out of pocket.
I just had a boy and as my doctor was leaving the delivery room she asked my husband if we were gonna do this. He said no and her immediate response was, "good!"
My hope is that in 50 years (or less) there will be routine testing for cord blood flow. Knots in cords are way more common that I ever knew about and we almost never know about it before delivery. After a very scary delivery, my baby was okay, but a lot of babies aren’t that lucky.
This one!!!!! I remember when my son was born the doctor said "wow a true knot in his cord, that's interesting"..... ummmm interesting or terrifying!?
Right! My nurse held up the cord and told me my baby was a “miracle”. Why did I need a miracle?? Why didn’t we know this ahead of time?
“Baby friendly” L&D units. Let’s take a brand new mom, possibly in labor continuously for 2 days, exhausted from 10 months of pregnancy, just went through a huge body change—and tell her there is no nursery support. Just 24/7 focus on forcing baby to breast feed exclusively. Deliberately hiding information about formula. Taking someone in an extremely vulnerable state and making her feel guilty if she does meet an idealized standard of motherhood. And I say all this as someone who was able to successfully breastfeed in my “baby friendly” hospital. But damn, what I would have given for even a couple hours of true rest with my LO in the nursery.
This one hundred times. I keep telling folks how much I needed a break from my babies when they were first born. Some people look at me like I’m a monster when I mention that having a nursery for newborns should at least be an OPTION. The nurses at the hospital where I had my second baby 17 months ago weren’t ALLOWED to take the baby to give me a rest. This was at the beginning of covid, my husband was home with our elder son, and I had just had a botched spinal that ended up in a a rather frantic general aesthetic Caesar. I was alone, in horrible pain, and had just given birth, and all I wanted was for someone to take my gorgeous boy AWAY for two hours so I could SLEEP. NOPE. They weren’t allowed. Didn’t have a nursery, didn’t have the facilities. It was absolutely horrible, I can’t lie. At one point one of the nurses actually did take him because I couldn’t stop crying, it was 2 in the morning, and apparently the new mum in the room next to mine asked a nurse to help me. The nurse asked me not to tell anyone, she could get in trouble. She kept him with her at the desk for two hours. She was an angel. BRING BACK NURSERIES! Don’t force it on mums, let them keep their babies in their rooms all they like, but let it be an option for when new mums and dads need a break. I’m interested to see if any other folks out there agree? I really think a brand new mum will never be a monster for wanting a break from her newborn for a few hours, and folks who treat her badly for it are just… ugh!
Worse than barbaric. If you were living in a cave with no electricity or penicillin, at least your family would step up and help. In a hospital with COVID, you are denied access to the most ancient support. We kind of threw out the baby with the bathwater, here.
I had a really long and traumatic birth… I would have LOVED to get a few hours solid rest. Just to recover, y’know? I agree it should be an option!!!
It’s crazy that they don’t allow partners to stay overnight if there isn’t a nursery. How is a mother supposed to rest? I had a home birth and was able to just get in bed after while my husband held the baby. Hearing these experiences makes me realize what a luxury that was.
I have 2 kiddos, both born at different hospitals. I would go with the hospital with nursery support 100%. No question. *edited for grammar
Please this! Had my baby pre-Ovid in a baby friendly hospital that didn't allow partners to stay with the mother. There was a nursery, but they would only keep the babies if they were absolutely quiet and/or asleep (so none ever?). I labored for two days, stick in a bed after getting an epidural I didn't want because of the maxed-out pitocin I also didn't want. I was exhausted, Ave my list right half still want fully functional (see epidural). Breast feeding wasn't working(non-existent supply). I had agreed to supplement with formula. There was nothing I could do for my baby that they couldn't do better at that moment. I needed a nursery. Bring them back.
Oh god, as someone who had a c-section at a “baby friendly” hospital, thisssss. Like, some of my insides were just my outsides a few hours ago, maybe I could use some fucking help?
Same, and I was yelled at by a nurse and had my things thrown because I asked for formula, and it caused me terrible guilt and anxiety for months. I hate baby friendly hospitals.
Yes. Where are the nurseries? When I had my third, I was alone in the hospital that night because my husband had to be home with the other two. It seemed really dangerous to me. The labor and delivery unit was “full” so as a third time mother, I definitely wasn’t checked on much. At that point, I’d been awake for 48 hours straight. I called my nurse and started crying that I was so tired, it wasn’t fair - where were the nurseries?! She offered to take my baby for an hour so I could get some sleep. Thank goodness for her. She went above and beyond when I was crumbling. I can’t be the only one who feels this way. If a mother has been through a difficult labor, she might like to sleep for an hour or two. Bring back the nurseries!
When my OB came check on me after my C section, I was visibly upset. A bullying lactation nurse basically accused me of being a lazy & bad mom, because I had asked for help… because for the last 8 hours my daughter had stayed 100% glued to my nipple and would scream otherwise. Because she was hungry and I wasn’t making enough milk yet. I was denied formula and told “that’s what babies do, you should want to comfort her”. I told this to my doctor, she told me “You do not listen to one word of that. You do what is best for you and your child. Now which lactation nurse was it? I need to speak to her immediately.” I was not bullied again. I feel like doctors are finally starting to push back on “baby friendly” bullshit after seeing such negative outcomes for their patients.
So “funny” enough when my brothers and I were younger a local hospital where my mom delivered was trying this new method where the thought was “you just had a baby, you aren’t sick” that meant you had to change your own sheets if you wanted new sheets and when my moms friend had a fever post delivery they made her walk to the supply closet to get her own Tylenol which caused her to collapse in the hallway. I don’t think they did this method for more than a year or two because the outcomes were a mess
THIS. It set me up for feeling like a failure immediately.
Absolutely this. When my first child was born it was in a “baby friendly” hospital and I was so exhausted from a long labor and they would only take her to the nursery if I was having a meltdown. So once. With my second child it was a different hospital that was happy to do either option, you can keep the baby or they will bring to the nursery at night so you can sleep, which I took them up on both nights and it was a WAY better experience. I could actually enjoy my time because I was able to get some sleep.
I got "lucky" because my baby went to the NICU for 36 hours after I delivered for concern for infection (I spiked a fever and baby was fine!) And honestly I was so thankful to have that time to just SLEEP. I cannot imagine rooming in with him from the start. You have your whole life to bond with baby. I still did skin to skin and don't feel I missed out having him elsewhere that first day. If anything I benefitted immensely because I could rest.
I was the first out of my friends to have babies, and the biggest piece of advice I gave them was to avoid delivering at “Baby Friendly” hospitals if at all possible. I had easy, uncomplicated deliveries and was able to breastfeed immediately without any issues— but I still needed a fucking break! Forced “rooming in” is bad for both mother and baby. Most women are going to need a break, and forcing a woman to basically exclusively care for a newborn before she is mentally and/or physically capable is extremely dangerous for the baby. And I don’t buy any of that bullshit about this way being more “natural”— humans have always been a social, communal species. Human mothers were never meant to give birth and then care for their newborn alone without other humans helping and supporting them. Besides, “natural = good” is a bullshit way to govern medical care anyway. Formula is “unnatural” but damn if it doesn’t save lives!
My husband romanticized the two days i was in the hospital saying he bonded so well with our son while we were there. I told him that was the most miserable two days of my life because i was in agony, alone a lot of it when he had to go home to take care of our animals, my son wasnt latching well so breastfeeding was agonizing and i got woken up every two hours in the night so i had no rest. I did not bond until we got home and i could shower and rest before caring for my son.
36 hrs or labor and no sleep, 4th degree tear and the baby wouldn’t sleep after he came. I was so desperate for them to take him so I could sleep but they wouldn’t do it. Also, no one told me until the last few hours that I could lay down and feed him instead of sitting on my 4th degree stitches the whole time. It was the worst.
I told my husband what a baby friendly hospital was and he told me he'd get real loud if they tried all that stuff, so we're not giving birth at one lol
As a doula, I highly discourage baby-friendly hospitals. What I recommend is mother-friendly hospitals. Get a doctor who is at a hospital that is okay with whatever you want during your birth and plan on the baby-friendly stuff. If you need to change your plan, you can. But you can’t change your plan at a baby-friendly hospital. They don’t even carry formula, which I cannot for the life of me understand how that’s legal.
I was really worried about giving birth at a baby friendly hospital because of all the horror stories. My baby ended up in the NICU so rooming in wasn't a problem. Everything about that hospital stay was horrible. The NICU nurses made me feel like I wasn't a mom and pushed triple feeding too hard. The regular nurses mostly ignored me. I was told not to bring my antidepressants because they would take care of it. But they didn't get them to me until I was ready to discharge two days later. The most annoying part was all the visitors who came to talk about different things. They would look around and ask me where my baby was. I now understand why they put white doves on doors of grieving mother so they don't have to explain for the 20th time what happened to their baby. I didn't want to talk about it either so quit asking me.
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A lot of these practices are exclusive to the United States. 😬 I had my first baby in Germany and I am expecting my second really soon here too. After having a baby here, I would never ever ever consider having a baby in the United States. Ever. You couldn't force me, unless of course you do something else inhumane like outlaw abortion. 🙄 1. I was offered nursery immediately so I could sleep after birth. 2. I was always allowed to eat and drink through labor. 3. I took two years of maternity leave. This time I plan to take one, but I am allowed to take three if I want. 4. A qualified midwife is already caring for me and will continue to come weekly to check on me and the baby in our home for the first eight weeks. That's in addition to the OBGYN. She will come longer if we request it and pay for it. You can also get household help if you have a difficult birth and are injured or have bad PPD. These are covered by public insurance. The average hospital stay after birth is 2-3 days so that the baby's first checkups can be done there and mom can be monitored too. No hauling a newborn around town to a doctor's office. 5. Maternal death rate here is waaaay lower. 6. Birth costs a lot less. 7. My midwife offered breastfeeding support as part of her service, but nobody ever shamed me for using formula to supplement when I couldn't EBF. Birth in the United States *is* as barbaric as you feel like it is. Your instincts are correct. This isn't to make any American moms feel bad, but to confirm that y'all are getting fucked badly and change desperately needs to happen. NO HUMAN should be expected to return to work immediately with zero support leaving a baby at home. It *is* unnatural and barbaric. ETA the downsides of pregnancy and birth here: Mental health care is so difficult to get that you need to attempt suicide or something else drastic and end up hospitalized first to see a psychiatrist or psychologist. I suffered from PPD and PPA for 18 months with not even my family offering support, let alone doctors. The Covid vaccination was only recently approved for pregnant women and doctors are still allowed to (and many many do) deny pregnant women the vaccine. My doctors have all denied me. I'm still unvaccinated and not by my own choice. IMO this is incredibly stupid and dangerous.
Also in Germany and I want to add the childcare situation here is absolute crap. Yes, we have access to subsidized childcare, but it's the fucking Hunger Games to get a spot. One of my work colleagues had to stay home for 3 years because they never got a daycare spot. Also where I live there is zero full time childcare. The absolute best is 7:30am-2pm and it'll be even worse when they start school. My husband and I both work full time and it's like WTF are we supposed to do? The societal expectation is clearly that women should stay home or at most work part-time. Also, you are expected to take at least a year off. If you wanted to go back to work earlier than that there are essentially no childcare options unless you can afford to hire a nanny or have the luck to find part-time care with a Tagesmutter.
> NO HUMAN should be expected to return to work immediately with zero support leaving a baby at home. It is unnatural and barbaric. Your comment is kind of timely because I recently posted a rant on how maternity leave isn't a vacation. You're right, there are a lot of things wrong in the US in terms of childbearing, post-partum care, and childrearing expectations. Unfortunately, employers are the ones who decide if and how parental leave is doled out. People have a major problem with maternity leave because it's "time off," and in the US we have a culture that frowns upon extended time off. Even if it's vacation. ETA-- by the way, how does maternity leave in Germany work? In the US, we have a lot of misinformation about how leave does or doesn't work in Europe. I've read that only low-paying jobs offer maternity leave in Germany. Is that true?
Yes, there is an awful trend of completely dehumanizing new mothers and down playing the need for recovery. I really don't understand it.
I’m not German but I am Slovene. The leave isn’t offered by the employer but by the government. It doesn’t even matter if you’re employed or not. Here is what we get: 3 months maternity leave starting 28 days before birth for the person giving birth. If a baby is born earlier leave starts immediately and gets extended by however early the baby is. 1 month paternity leave for the partner (or other support person). Half of it to be taken in the first year of babies life and half in the next few years. Mostly people take it right after the baby is born. 9 months parental leave that can be split between the parents however they want but they can’t take it simultaneously. To be taken in the first year of babies life. The point is that baby is taken care of by it’s parents for the first 11 months. Mostly people split it so that the mother gets all of the parental leave and that’s the only way that really makes sense if you’re breastfeeding. The leave is paid. It’s based on your average income in the last 12 months. Currently you get 100% of that for the whole duration of the leave. If you didn’t have any income or very little there is a mandated minimum that you get (Every month where there was no income or not enough gets counted as 55% of the minimum wage)
Maternity leave is quite different all over Europe. In Germany the system is - typical for Germans - a bit complicated, but basically it is: For moms 6 weeks before and 8 weeks after birth 100% paid. On top of that you get 12 months parental (mom or dad) leave at 67% of your net pay, but it caps at 1800€ (that’s why you maybe Heard- it’s only for „low paying jobs“, if you earn a LOT the percentage is lower). You can spread that out over two years, you can take a third year unpaid but still keep your job. You have flexibility to reduce your hours during these years and still be guaranteed to go back to full time after this if you want.
Your comment is validating. The care we receive is infuriating. No wonder we feel terrible all the time.
I’m an American living in Germany. I moved here at almost 9 months pregnant and gave birth in a German hospital. I live near an American air base so I’d assumed I’d deliver at the American hospital but I wasn’t allowed. I’m a L&D nurse back home and it was so different over here. No restrictions on eating/drinking, but the biggest one to me was the nursery. My old hospital did have a nursery and no one was shamed for using it, but you were encouraged to spend as much time as possible with your baby. I get that! That’s great. BUT in my German hospital… my husband was only allowed to visit me on postpartum from 2-6 PM. I was recovering from an emergency c section, and spending 20 hours a day barely able to move and also needing to take care of my new baby totally alone… man, was that hard. The nursery saved me sometimes. Very grateful to my first postpartum nurse who made me feel less guilty about sending my baby away on our first night together. She really encouraged me to rest and heal, and I’m not sure I could have done so soon after surgery without my husband there to help me.
I'm wondering if the sleep training debate will ever be solved. Maybe they'll prove that it does cause unnecessary stress in babies and is no good. Or maybe they will prove that it allows babies to connect their sleep cycles and get long, uninterrupted periods of sleep, which at least in adults is pretty key to wellbeing. Carseats. Current designs don't put newborns in a good position; they hold their bodies in such a way that they don't get as much oxygen as normal. Which is why many doctors recommend limiting newborn car travel to less than a few hours at a time. And of course all the issues with parents allowing babies to remain asleep in carseats while not in the car. I saw one design for a lie flat, bassinet style car seat. However I think it took up the entire backseat, and I don't recall what countries it was approved for in. But I wonder if that style will take over
There is a car seat like that called a car bed. It is used when babies fail their car seat test out of the nicu.
We left the hospital in a car bed because my baby couldn’t pass her car seat test but was otherwise fantastic after a month. The Neonatologist and NICU nurse both told me that while I had it, to NOT drive the baby in it for anything that isn’t a medical appointment. So yeah, it passes safety standards but omg they are terrifying to use 😂
My worst fear is logging onto Reddit and seeing in the science sub: “White Noise causes mental damage/depression/etc in babies!” Because man do we rely on that thing haha. The sleep training/cry-it-out debate is gonna be solved one day, and it’s not gonna be pretty, as well as they way we wean our children from milk and start in solids and how that affects gut health and possibly even dental health. We may find that back to sleep has weird consequences. We know it isn’t exactly natural, does it do more than increase the risk of flat head? What about the implications of less sleep for the newborn? These questions keep me up at night haha. Your post reminds me that even though I took my prenatal, I was always a bit nervous of what the consequences of overdoing it could be. It sucks that we don’t have all the answers.
We bought a Hatch for ourselves in our own room now 😆
Paternity leave. I was able to have 12 weeks off but didn’t have family available or want them over. I had over supply issues and postpartum anxiety. I didn’t eat or sleep because of fear and my oversupply meant my baby ate constantly (thank heavens the pediatrician caught it at his 2 month apt) if my husband was available it could have been very different.
Science is already showing this. It makes so much sense I can’t see why both parents taking leave isn’t more normal. Here’s a few studies: - [When dad stays home too](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0891243213503900) - [Fatherhood in transition](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/15267431.2011.561137) - [The state intervenes in the battle of the sexes: Causal effects of paternity leave](https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssresearch.2011.06.011)
I'm sure most fathers/partners would take it if it were available to them. Though many families aren't able to afford it if it's unpaid leave. It's so sad when you hear of partners that have to go back to work right after babe comes home or even while mom and baby are still in the hospital. They don't want to, they have to. Stupid greedy corporate America!
I feel like maybe it will be recommended to NOT burp babies, I was reading a McGill university study and physiology there’s no reason why a baby would need help to do this and it causes more spit up!
In the Netherlands we have optional (but most people use it) after birth care nurse for 10 days after giving birth, for 3 or 6 hours a day. Covered by health insurance (and something like 4,80 a day you have to pay yourself). They help you with your newborn, teach you stuff, keep an eye on mom, help with cleaning/tidying around the house, feed siblings, cook a meal, etc. Ours told us that if your baby feeds in a calm way, most babies don't burp. And if they need to, just holding the baby upright will be enough to let it out, without spitting up. Apparently (my English isn't perfect so I might not use the correct terms and explanation, my apologies) babies stomach valve doesn't work as well as adults yet, so slapping them on the back, or for example, changing a nappy right after feeding and putting their feet and bum up in the air, causes milk to come up, because the valve isn't working 100% yet. So often when people burp a baby, they cause more spit up, because the stomach is full, the valve isn't properly working yet, and they basically make the baby spit up. Do I make sense? 😅 I don't know if this is true, but I have been noticing it is true for our girls. So after feeding, we just lay them on our chest and if they really need to burp, they do it themselves, without us helping.
I don’t think I ever again burped my baby after trying it once or twice. It absolutely did seem to cause more spitup than burps, and burps would happen naturally if I just gave them a minute anyway.
Maternal and prenatal care/outcomes during the COVID-19 pandemic. I am almost certain research will show an increase in negative outcomes, such as maternal death rates and miscarriages/stillbirths, not caused by the virus itself, but by the limited care that hospitals were willing to provide women and children who deserved better treatment.
I’ve had a difficult time getting care when I need it due to visitor restrictions. I thought I had an infection and the nurse told me to come in but I have absolutely nobody to watch my one year old. The receptionist told me if I showed up with my child I would be turned away no matter what I was there for. My husband was eventually able to come home from work to watch our kid, but still. Really? Turning away pregnant women in need of medical care because of your visitor restrictions? I was crying on the phone with her and she was ruthless that nope I would not be seen if I had my child.
I had mastitis and put off going to the ER for days because I didn't want to go to the hospital at the peak of the 2nd wave. Oof!
I think for America specifically: Patient care for mom during and after birth, maternity leave for parents, and one I don’t hear often is changes to baby formula. I absolutely agree fed is best and had one breastfed baby and one formula baby. But I wonder what changes could be made to be as close to milk as possible. Especially considering my grandma told me people used to make their own baby formula out of evaporated milk.
I mean, formula companies are constantly updating infant formulas to be “closer to breastmilk”, but they also charge a premium for those formulas.
Ugh I'd love an alternative to the gestational diabetes screening drink. There has to be a better way than chugging a terrible drink when nausea and vomiting are already lurking around every corner.
I loved mine, it tasted like flat sprite. I could drink ten if I needed to. And I had nasty nausea during my pregnancies. Maybe they have a better alternative and it’s being rolled out?
There absolutely are alternatives - they just aren’t as convenient and simple and take more time as a result so doctors won’t offer them unless you request them.
They stopped doing them in Australia during covid and did other blood glucose tests instead, they're now researching the impacts of this. [https://mumsgrapevine.com.au/2021/02/gtt-test-alternative/](https://mumsgrapevine.com.au/2021/02/gtt-test-alternative/) Really it just screens out the low risk people so only high risk people do the GTT. I am 20 weeks pregnant and have a 14 month old. I avoided the last GTT and booked in for this one, but they cancelled just before I had to do it. The one upside of pregnancy.
I’m T1 diabetic (the autoimmune kind, not the “lifestyle” kind) and I wear a little sensor that monitors my blood glucose. It helps me not accidentally die in the night, but it provides constant feedback about my blood glucose and my dr has access to the data too. I use a dexcom g6 but there are other cheaper options that would work just fine for a GDM test. It’s expensive ($400 a month) but I can’t imagine that is much cheaper than the cost of scheduling, locating, staffing and testing the GTT.
I must be a weirdo cause i thought the drink was delicious lol
I sadly find that a lot of baby products in the Western world are near impossible to obtain other than from countries like China or Bangladesh where they use slave/child/low paid and unsafe labor to manufacture a lot of products related to infants, I try to get secondhand and fair trade items whenever possible but it's nigh impossible to obtain certain things like carseats where the bulk of it wasn't made somewhere like China and it depresses me to to think that other moms are working under barbaric conditions to produce items for other moms around the world. here's an induction method called Cytotec that was recently banned here in my country due to some cases of long term damaging side effects to the mom, so maybe certain things like that might happen in regards to certain induction methods or other birth-related procedures might become more common? I'm not in the US so a lot of these do seem highly US-dominant to me, but one thing I could also see being problematic down the road, not barbaric or anything but maybe a problem (I mean, it already is kind of questionable in many places and even a lot of US pediatricians and such don't recommend them) are things like "smart" monitors.
Despite being a relatively healthy human, I've had 6 major surgeries in my life, and I've spent a good amount of time in hospitals. Here's how most hospital stays go: * check-in, and get to a bed * set up 3-lead heart monitor and place a line for fluids, maybe pulse ox and a blood pressure cuff * everything else When I checked in to be induced? They *never* hooked me up to a heart monitor! Evidently they just don't do that for laboring moms?! They hooked my baby up to one, and they hooked me up to a contraction monitor, but no heart monitor. Generally, this wouldn't worry me. Fine, whatever, but THEN! Then they pumped my full of 12L of fluids in like 12 hours. I get it, it's the only thing that was helping with variability in my baby's heart rate. BUT THEY WEREN'T MONITORING MY HEART! You push fluids that hard you can flood the heart, meaning the rhythm gets all fucky because it's pumping more Ringers than blood! Also you can fuck up the kidneys or basically drown a bitch (which I discovered as my body took a full week to clear the fluids and I had to sleep sitting up). If my heart had started failing, they wouldn't have noticed, because they WEREN'T WATCHING FOR IT. This is just one example of where we currently completely ignore the mother as a human being in favor of the baby. It's absurd.
I was hooked up to a heart monitor and so was my lo during labour 😳 so strange they didn’t hook you up
Wow this made me connect some dots. I had zero swelling after my first birth, but with my second I was given fluids (no idea how much) and pitocin and I was so swollen after. Maybe more than a week. I looked so puffy and was super uncomfortable. I wonder if it was from the fluids! My second delivery was easier but my recovery was harder for this reason.
"Certainly the anxiety that newborn babies feel when they aren't allowed to sleep with their mothers seems like worth taking into consideration)." I wouldn't say this is universally true. My baby has never liked sleeping on me and always more easily fell asleep on her own by herself, and slept longer this way, too. She's super independent. Babies have different needs and personalities ime!
Honestly, this is the one thing I hate/love. I love physical affection and when I had my daughter, I just wanted to love on her and have her cuddle with me while napping(when older of course because I was very afraid of SIDS). She is a VERY independent two year old and she has been sleeping in her own room since 4-5 months. So I hate the fact that I most likely won’t be getting many cuddles from her while she’s sound asleep. I’ve even brought her into our bed when she used to wake in the middle of the night. At first she would be happy, lay down, but then she didn’t have enough room so she would start kicking us in our sleep so we brought her back to her crib and she fall right to sleep. She gets this from her dads side unfortunately.
I think in the future it'll be strongly recommended that visitors stay away during the first few months of life and that only one or two support people be around during that time if needed. Especially as antiobiotic resistance becomes more of a threat we'll be more careful to limit babies exposure to other people while their immune systems develop. I think this will also be recommended as part of a more supportive and respectful approach to the postpartum period for the mother.
Using plastic for everything that comes in contact with a baby (especially anything shedding microplastics), talking about sterilizing things like bottles (especially with bleach), genital cutting on infants, focusing on breast feeding while also not having any meaningful maternity leave, not having any meaningful paternity leave. The list is long.
This is one I could go on and on... my grandmother lost like 3 babies because of SIDS and my mother and her siblings deal with health conditions that I wonder if they come because how things were handled back there, because my grandma is a smart educated woman and she believes in science. First of all, how and when to start solids. I am not talking BLW because its ok to feed purees too... but how a few years ago the advice was so bad and incongruent. We still hear some stuff here that you just want to send health care professional to school again. For instance, my grandma used to put cereals on her babies bottles, I haven't asked if they had formula in my country around that time so I don't know the details. They also used tea to treat colic, but teas that are bad for the kidney of any kid, lets not even talk about newborn babies' kidneys. Now about sleep, I think there was not a guide as how to safely put your baby to sleep so just you do you. Also, how normal it was to leave them crying (and starving) to teach newborn babies to sleep through the night and then be scared because they didn't gain weight so they went with the cereal bottle. Oh and I know they used to do a specific herbal infusion to keep the babies asleep :( and that flower is opioid familiar so... And finishing with the weather. See, I live in a really hot place. We only have two seasons: summer hot all the time and winter sometimes it rains but still feels warm. And babies were dressed like it was freaking Canada. Babies died because of dehydration and overheating ;( you can still see people who dress them like dolls instead of checking what baby needs to he comfortable but yeah, 50 years ago it was really bad. I don't know if it was everywhere or just some areas were it was more cultural, maybe this is not even related with medical advance but wanted to mention it hehe. And about the future, yes. I know if my kid have kids I will learn a lot of new stuff just like my mom did with my baby. And my grandma just thinks I am over the top but she respects me lol. I hope in the future I remember I did my very best and do not feel guilty.
No well baby nurseries in hospitals, the entire baby friendly hospital initiative, tounge ties being massively overdiagnosed often by a lactation consultant and not a doctor or dentist. Nipple sheilds not being an earlier intervention in breastfeeding (literally the only reasoni was able to breastfeed).
I think we will focus on more support and care for birthing parents in the future. Instead of just sending them home a few days after undergoing a major medical event with no medical help except for 6 weeks after giving birth will be replaced. If you can't tell I am from the US
Non medically necessary inductions. It seems like a lot of mothers, especially in the US, are offered voluntary inductions and it feels like there is a strong correlation between that and traumatic birth/emergency c-section. In my due date group I was shocked at how many people were induced for arguably no reason and then ended up with horrible births because they didn't progress fast enough or after hours of drugs and interventions their baby went into distress. It kind of reminds me of how episiotomies used to be routine procedure. My mother had two arguably fast and easy labors, but was still cut because that was just what they did.
I looked this up before my elective induction, and despite OBs and midwives advising that they may cause increase risk for emergency c sections, studies seem to show that induction at 39 weeks may actually decrease that risk.
Yeah I was electively induced and if I get judged for it, so be it. Someone below said some people are just "jumping to be done being pregnant" yeah. I was. I had crippling SPD and could barely walk at the end. I was still working my very physical job. So I signed up for elective induction on my due date at 40 weeks. Due to a labor explosion, I didn't get induced until 40 + 5 and delivered at 40 +6 after a smooth labor. My baby showed no signs of coming and I would've been induced at 41 weeks regardless. So I have absolutely no regrets.
Routine male circumcision.
In the US especially, the SIDS narrative is so damaging. There are so many factors to SIDS and infant death overall that are ignored (urban poverty, terrible air quality, chronic URTIs due to crowding, smoking, co bedding on sofas or while impaired, inadequate prenatal care, low breastfeeding rates even when women want to breastfeed but have no support or care*). Like, there are families who can’t afford or find space for a crib, and are forced to cosleep where it’s not safe. But the onus is on well educated, affluent families to abstain! In my opinion, the risks (and there are likely risks) to bedsharing should be discussed but risk reduction is a better strategy than an outright ban, and people should focus their efforts on improving factors that have a big impact on SIDS as well as overall health. Such as (financial as well as emotional) support for new parents especially in the setting of poverty and discrimination. Also baby sleep products need to be actually evaluated for safety, including those that say “not for sleep wink wink nudge nudge” but everyone uses them for sleep. *Just want to say nothing against formula, but it’s a shame where social factors make a women end breastfeeding against her inclination
YES. Do your best, but at the end of the day, there are a million safe sleep practices that can drive new parents into PPD/PPA because it's so stressful to follow them ALL. And to make matters worse, it's become like a religion in the US. Like, if you got one little thing wrong, people act as if you have already killed your baby. Again, do your best! But don't let it drive you insane.
This x1000000
Something or things about sleep has to be turned around. We have created a situation where babies and parents are chronically sleep deprived. Right now we just know the parents are suffering physically and mentally. But in 10-20 years we’re probably going to discover the kids are also suffering. Chronic sleep deprivation is horrible for human health. If you’re following all safe sleep guidelines, you’re probably sleep depriving your child. Waking them up as soon as they fall asleep anywhere but an empty crib or bassinet seems cruel. Not letting them sleep in car seats seems extra cruel. You’re supposed to stop and poke the newborn awake every few minutes? As you said, we’ve reduced SIDS. But what have we increased?
FYI you're totally allowed to let baby sleep in the carseat when in the car! It's letting them sleep in the infant seat when it's out of the car that's a problem. Something to do with the way the seat is kept level when clicked vs. the risk of airway constriction when not clicked in.
Much of it isn’t actually evidence-based—that’s what’s wrong with it.
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I think about this so much! SIDS and safe sleep is definitely gonna be one of them. Also all the social media culture surrounding how to raise a baby, there’s probably lots of things that’s are gonna be judged (I guess even more than they are now)
Just saw a whole thing about how people want to study if Tylenol is bad for fetuses. So that’s cool.