Why don’t U.S. hospitals let women sleep quietly for the night in the hospital after giving birth?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:More coordination with checks could help.

If only you were the only patient. Alas.

I can’t stop laughing at the woman who whined that an entire laundry list of people (including the lactation consultant, who can have dozens of patients at once, and the janitor, who can have 100 rooms to deal with) didn’t just “coordinate” so she could sleep. Please. Bring a competent family member or friend to help you or GO HOME if you want no one to interrupt you.

I think you’re missing the point. Plenty of us wanted to go home. I wasn’t allowed to leave until 24 hours.

I gave birth at 5am. Got to my postpartum room and passed out. I remember the doctor waking me up to talk about the baby at 8am. I fell asleep while he was talking and he woke me again. If you all make me stay 24 hours, why can’t they group stuff or even give women a few hours to sleep?? I hadn’t slept in days. And if you think they’re in your room nonstop at night, during the day they are in even more.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No one sleeps in the hospital. Everyone gets checks. Use the bassinet. Have someone stay with you.

No. The baby is a patient and should be cared for by hospital staff. Not by another patient that just had an intensive medical procedure.

No.

By that logic no one should take care of you either. Good luck!

I’ve had my kids. Their *father* “helped” me. No luck needed, but thanks for your concern!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:More coordination with checks could help.

If only you were the only patient. Alas.

I can’t stop laughing at the woman who whined that an entire laundry list of people (including the lactation consultant, who can have dozens of patients at once, and the janitor, who can have 100 rooms to deal with) didn’t just “coordinate” so she could sleep. Please. Bring a competent family member or friend to help you or GO HOME if you want no one to interrupt you.

I think you’re missing the point. Plenty of us wanted to go home. I wasn’t allowed to leave until 24 hours.

I gave birth at 5am. Got to my postpartum room and passed out. I remember the doctor waking me up to talk about the baby at 8am. I fell asleep while he was talking and he woke me again. If you all make me stay 24 hours, why can’t they group stuff or even give women a few hours to sleep?? I hadn’t slept in days. And if you think they’re in your room nonstop at night, during the day they are in even more.

So leave at 24 hours. Problem solved.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The problem is not hospitals, the problem is that families are so splintered, many new mothers have nobody to take care of them!

I didn’t mind interrupted sleep during my hospital stays because I got a lot of support, and I knew when I went home I would get even more support. I fed and cuddled with my baby, and when I wanted sleep I handed him off to someone he was related to by blood. Would never hand him off to a medical professional unless he had medical needs.

It’s the job of the hospital to care for patients dong dong, not family members.

[Anonymous]

I had a baby in 2019. I asked my OB for a hospital with a nursery. She tried to guilt me saying I wouldn’t need one. LOL. Went to the hospital and they guilted me as well but took my baby from 12 pm to 7 am and allowed me to sleep. Honestly though? I don’t breastfeed and I should have been able to sleep as long as I wanted. The mind games we play on mothers in this country are horrific.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Where do these nurses for holding babies magic come from?

Appropriate hospital staffing. Doesn't have to be highly medically trained staff to fulfill this function either, just gentle responsible and common sense providers.

LOL. Good luck with that. Nursing is completely short staffed in 2023. They aren’t going to hire some phantom “gentle, responsible and common sense” non-nursing staff either.

Hospitals are businesses. If you treat your patients like shit, don't be surprised when women with options make different choices for their births and postpartum care.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No one sleeps in the hospital. Everyone gets checks. Use the bassinet. Have someone stay with you.

No. The baby is a patient and should be cared for by hospital staff. Not by another patient that just had an intensive medical procedure.

No.

By that logic no one should take care of you either. Good luck!

I’ve had my kids. Their *father* “helped” me. No luck needed, but thanks for your concern!

Exactly. Only women like you deserve to recover after surgery.

[Anonymous]

I get the annoyance with sleep disturbance from random nurse checks, that’s a separate issue. But those of you who are annoyed that you couldn’t send your baby away all night - what did you do when you get home? Did your support system get better? If so, why couldn’t you implement that support system in the hospital?

I could not imagine sending a healthy non-NICU-requiring baby away all night to strangers, right after it had been born, after it had been with me for 9 months. It sounds so weird to even write it down!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I get the annoyance with sleep disturbance from random nurse checks, that’s a separate issue. But those of you who are annoyed that you couldn’t send your baby away all night - what did you do when you get home? Did your support system get better? If so, why couldn’t you implement that support system in the hospital?

I could not imagine sending a healthy non-NICU-requiring baby away all night to strangers, right after it had been born, after it had been with me for 9 months. It sounds so weird to even write it down!

What changed is that I recovered from my c-section. There’s a huge difference in taking care of a newborn 4 hours after a c-section versus even four days. The multiple layers of my body that were cut through began to heal. The pain became less which meant I took fewer pain meds that are not safe to take while driving a car (so why are women taking them and solely taking care of a newborn?). Because I became more mobile, basic tasks like changing the baby, picking something I dropped off of the floor, turning on the lights, walking to the bathroom etc became easier. It was simply time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I gave birth in 2016, 2018 and 2022. No nurseries at all and these were at 2 different NoVA hospitals.

The first time I just thought this was my burden to bear. I tried and tried. I was so sleep deprived, shaking and I remember sobbing at nurses. It definitely teed off my postpartum depression. I had been in labor for days before my induction. And then my induction started at 7pm. I gave birth two days later at 6am. I truly just hadn't slept in days. I have few memories of the whole thing, just a lot of pain and exhaustion.

2nd and 3rd births I was armed with information. DH slept near the door and stopped any nurse that came near. I refused all colace and brought my own. DH would run out and tell nurses if I was up and nursing at 3am so that they could take my blood pressure or do whatever the eff they wanted during that time (maybe they need a button we can push to say we're awake?) so that they didn't wake me up 15 min after I went back to sleep. I checked out promptly at 24 hours and it was a struggle. At home I had a husband and 4 grandparents to care for me. My mom is a doctor. At home I felt like a princess and dh could properly care for me.

Speaking of which, my mom is an OB. As a kid I would stay at the hospital overnight sometimes (dad traveled and mom was on call. I slept in the on call room). There were nurseries filled with sweet sleeping babies. Dads and grandparents would sit there rocking babies for hours. Fast forward to when I gave birth and there were no rocking chairs. Only delivery rooms had them, not postpartum. Nope, in postpartum, you just had the screaming baby on mom 24/7. Baby was unable to leave the room, no rocking chairs. Dads couldn't even push the crib around the halls (moms could). I remember my inlaws trying to visit, but I was sick (vomiting) and they didn't want to be in the room with me. They wanted to see the baby but there wasn't anywhere else to go.

Ugh. This is the problem. You aren’t a “princess” (how old are you?) and you aren’t entitled to be treated like one. You had a baby, just like millions of other women have done throughout history.

what is wrong with you? if there is ONE time a woman is entitled to special treatment, it is after she has her first baby.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I get the annoyance with sleep disturbance from random nurse checks, that’s a separate issue. But those of you who are annoyed that you couldn’t send your baby away all night - what did you do when you get home? Did your support system get better? If so, why couldn’t you implement that support system in the hospital?

I could not imagine sending a healthy non-NICU-requiring baby away all night to strangers, right after it had been born, after it had been with me for 9 months. It sounds so weird to even write it down!

Sounds like you base a lot of your decisions and actions on EMOTION. There’s something amiss if you can’t imagine why a woman wants to sleep and recover after delivery and/or surgery. That or sorry but you have a low IQ.

The fact you refer to nurses at the hospital as “strangers” is a huge red flag. Let me guess…you don’t work?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:


“The nursing staff is usually not the most educated lot in the medical profession.”



This is unnecessarily rude.

You all do realize that the nurses are only doing what the doctor orders, right? I imagine that for nurses waking up a patient at 3 am who hates them and thinks they’re stupid is not their idea of a good time either. If you have issues with the routine check-ins you should take it up with the doctor on call.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:And put the baby in a nursery room for the night. The recovery should be treated like recovery from a surgery; no interrupting sleep.

Have you had surgery? Sleep is absolutely interrupted for medical check ins. I don't disagree with you that someone who just gave birth needs sleep to recover, but the hospital isn't restful for anyone.

Sleep is important for ALL hospital patients.

And yet the PP you responded to is 100% correct.

No PP is not correct. Disrupted sleep in the hospital is being recognized as a problem for all patients. Sleep is not optional - it’s actually essential to health and hospitals are trying to do something about it for all patients.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2023/02/19/sleep-deprivation-hospitals/

At a minumum, bring back nurseries if you are going to insist that new mothers should not be allowed to sleep in the hospital. Because that is NOT safe for the baby to room in.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I get the annoyance with sleep disturbance from random nurse checks, that’s a separate issue. But those of you who are annoyed that you couldn’t send your baby away all night - what did you do when you get home? Did your support system get better? If so, why couldn’t you implement that support system in the hospital?

I could not imagine sending a healthy non-NICU-requiring baby away all night to strangers, right after it had been born, after it had been with me for 9 months. It sounds so weird to even write it down!

Sounds like you base a lot of your decisions and actions on EMOTION. There’s something amiss if you can’t imagine why a woman wants to sleep and recover after delivery and/or surgery. That or sorry but you have a low IQ.

The fact you refer to nurses at the hospital as “strangers” is a huge red flag. Let me guess…you don’t work?

Get some rest.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:


“The nursing staff is usually not the most educated lot in the medical profession.”



This is unnecessarily rude.

You all do realize that the nurses are only doing what the doctor orders, right? I imagine that for nurses waking up a patient at 3 am who hates them and thinks they’re stupid is not their idea of a good time either. If you have issues with the routine check-ins you should take it up with the doctor on call.

I don't think so. It is necessarily a factual statement. Most of them are not very scientific or educated for the work they do. Nurses are notoriously incompetent, poorly educated and unscientific. They are trained in some medical procedure but you cannot depend on them for due diligence. They are the factory workers of the hospital. Incapable of making sound independent decisions.

On the other hand, I have had very good experience with foreign-born and trained nurses.