Did your hospital encourage you to breast feed? Or insist that you bottle feed?
@beautyqueen26 (16030)
United States
June 14, 2008 5:21pm CST
Did your maternity ward help or encourage you to breast feed your baby?
Were you encouraged to feed your baby formula for "your own convenience"?
Did they provide free formula as an enducement to use formula?
When my baby was first born, we spent almost three days in the hospital,
because she had a fever when she was born.
And, they wanted to make sure she was alright.
Although I specifically told them to bring her to me for
nursing and milk, they would often keep her overnight
in the nursery and feed her formula.
By the time we got out, my milk supply was almost non-existent.
A nurse at our clinic encouraged me to keep trying to feed the
baby and I'm glad she did.
I was able to feed her for almost four months or more.
But I was not happy with the hospital maternity ward.
They dropped the ball.
I'm not surprised. In my room, they had a big cart of baby formula
(sealed) bottles that they expected me to feed to the baby.
They said it was just in case I wanted them. And, I did not.
They sent me home with a huge bag of free baby formula, several
cannisters and pamplets from manufacturers about the safey of using
formula.
That was very confusing!
8 people like this
3 responses
@Modestah (11177)
• United States
15 Jun 08
first child they were not encouraging though not discouraging either.... they made bottles available and had no problem telling me to supplement with them and elleviated my fears of the baby getting "confussion"
second child
they knew that I was choosing the natural food for my baby and did not offer any supplement - but they also had me rooming with someone who did not have a c section and had lots of company... I had to walk out of my room and into another area to feed my baby - where as the woman who did not have any sugery should have gone elsewhere with her voistrous friends..
last child
I was only there over night (c-section) and they were indifferent as to whether I did one or the other. no bottles/supplements were offered or at my disposal.
1 person likes this
@mommyboo (13174)
• United States
16 Jun 08
Oh.. not fun. I had a LDR room - labor/delivery/recovery room so I did not have to move at all. It was also a private room, which I enjoyed. I'm friendly but on my terms, I dislike HAVING to share a space with a stranger when it's not by choice. One thing that was super nice about the hospital I delivered at was that they had a pull out chair/bed for my husband in the room and they also gave him meals. More than I expected!
One time I remembered that my husband and I were changing a diaper and he helped a lot, I was so nervous with the baby because she seemed so small. LOL! Then it was funny because a nurse came in right after we'd finished and were re-swaddling her and she asked me why we didn't call somebody to come do it. He pointed out that he was an expert (he already had two kids, 14 and 12) and I pointed out that I was the mommy and that was just diaper number one out of four thousand seventeen... better to start learning immediately!
@ruby222 (4847)
•
14 Jun 08
I tried but I just didnt produce any milk...I was in hospital and feeding my first child..and he kept crying and crying ...so they decided to test weigh him...and then they found that I wasnt giving him anything to drink!!...in fact i just hadnt produced an milk..and it wouldnt come in...so that was abandoned and he went on the bottle,but he then was a happy baby.
@mclendon (308)
• United States
14 Jun 08
The milk doesn't come in right after birth. It can take 2 or 3 days. Usually a rich substance called colostrum is produced first. This is very high in nutrition but not high in volume. This is natural and the baby can survive fine on colostrum for a day or more. The hospital should have known this, unless the baby was underweight or you were in the hospital for more than 2 or 3 days, they shouldn't have expected you to produce a lot of milk. It is not unheard of for babies to lose a few ounces in the day or two after they are born. They are OK.
4 people like this
@MsEddie86 (234)
• United States
16 Jun 08
The maternity ward encouraged nursing so much when i had my daughter. as soon as she came out and she was cleaned up and i was cleaned up they brought her over to me and showed me how to get her latched on and they really encouraged to teach her to latch on as soon as possible and to help her get the colastrum (i cant spell the work) but yes my hopsital really encouraged it. the even sent a specialist to my home after i had went home from the hospital to help me out because she was not latchin on correctly. i only had to feed her formula one time while i was nursing her because my milk had not come in jus yet at the hospital. but my milk dried after four months and i tried to keep nursing her but it jus dried up on its own. but yes the hospital really did encourage nursing. they say it promoted healthy babies and helped keep them from gettin ear infections and other infections as well i was very pleased with how much they encouraged it
