Hacker News Reader

Comment by 0xEFF | Hacker News Reader

The grudge against the breast is best is legitimate and valid. My son was just born in a baby friendly hospital 6 weeks premature. Mom was pumped full of fluids for days before the delivery and they built up in her lungs. The day after delivery, she woke up to the cardio and respiratory alarms going off at 6am and she was talking nonsense to the nurse, presumably because she wasn’t getting enough oxygen. That day, the nurses kept coming into her room and the top priority was to get her to pump. The top priority. I finally had to go talk to the charge nurse and demand they look at her lungs because she obviously couldn’t breathe.

So yes. The hyper focus on breast feeding is a problem. Baby friendly is often hostile to the mother. The medical community is to blame while in the hospital prioritizing pumping over breathing.

View on HN

I don't know that it really has that much to do with "breast is best". I think nurses are just normal overworked people following their script. If it wasn't the breast is best thing, they'd be ignoring you for different reasons.

We had twins two years ago and some of the nurses were just very lacking in empathy. A few of the other ones were fantastic.

The second night we were in the hospital, I went home to stay with our older daughter. This left my wife on her own in the room, and the understanding was the nurses were going to give her time alone and handle a couple of the feedings for her. Well, shift change happened and the new nurse didn't give a care. Have to follow the script.

Sure they took the twins away after the feeding, but when they need to eat every two hours and it takes an hour to do, and then they have a half hour of other checks they need to get in, basically my wife didn't get any sleep all night.

She broke down crying in front of her nurse and the nurse basically said, "Suck it up." Without considering that my wife was dealing with a C-section, new twins, having nurses in and out of the room constantly, and me not being there to lend a hand.

I came in at like 5 am, and she was basically just sobbing in her bed. Thankfully one of the nice nurses came in and sat with her and calmed her down, and then said she would have a chat with the younger nurse and let her know that she needed to cut new moms some slack.

The other noteworthy thing that happened was my wife ordered supper, and while the nurses were in the room, she very obviously was having an allergic reaction to it. They just carried on like nothing was happening because "we're here for the babies". Finally I put my foot down and pointed out that my wife was obviously having an allergic reaction and her eyes were basically swollen shut. Then they finally were like "oh, I guess we should get her something for that."

Which is a long way of saying, I agree that nurses aren't nearly attentive enough. And can relate. But also, I'm not sure if its the focus on breast feeding that is the issue.

Not noticing that someone can't breath when their face is visibly swollen isn't a matter of being overworked its rank incompetence. If its caused by fatigue one has to wonder how the facility managed to collect the most money in the world for the same situations and manage not to afford enough personnel.

My understanding is that the status quo is 24 hour shifts.

> Baby friendly is often hostile to the mother.

As it should be. You're the responsible adult in the room, and you will have to make sacrifices to take care of the helpless person you chose to bring into this world.

If you think "mom comes first", then get a fur baby instead.

It is not as black and white as that. You cannot simply ignore the mother and let her deal with baby blues or whatever pops up on her own or else you are not taking care of the child either. There is enough room to care for both the mother and the child.

> There is enough room to care for both the mother and the child.

I didn't say that there isn't. What I said, literally, is that the mother doesn't come first.

You do know what the difference is between anecdotal evidence and statistics right?

Your example sounds so far away from everything normal.

Right, and I suppose modern medicine should ignore rare conditions and syndromes, treating only patients who fall nicely into a normal distribution.

His point was that one anecdote of a bad experience at a hospital does not dispute the statistics that breast milk is better than formula.

The data does not support the claim breast milk is better than formula for long term outcomes [1]. Given this, it’s appropriate to be angry and frustrated at the way society and modern medicine treats women who do not breast feed. Especially when the woman is struggling to breathe.

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2019/jun/20/is-brea...

That is STILL anecdotal. Srsly there are bad people working in hospitals who are doing a bad job. But some of them also just be overworked or don't care or whatever.

“This is the most important thing you can do for your child, and if it doesn’t work for you, that’s very unfortunate and, in the long run, will have serious consequences.” never crossed my plate. In germany mothers try, if it doesn't work, it doesn't. Thats it.

No. Where did i say that?

Has it ever crossed your mind, that medical people have a simliar distribution than every other field? Do you think every software developer is an expert?

Do you think everyone who is painting, paints equally well?

Do you think just because someone studied, that person is smart?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com