[babyktchr]

Originally Posted by jhhrn68

I have certainly had days like that. We have that strict rule of only 2 visitors at the bedside when a pt. is in labor and a total of 5 visitors - 2 at the bedside and 3 in the waiting room and they can switch off. Most of the time, the pt. will show up for her induction at 11 PM with all her friends and relatives, including small children. But I am currently working at another hospital on a temporary basis where it is much more relaxed and informal. The atmosphere is a lot friendlier and there is less animosity. I personally would not want an audience during a delivery but other people do like that. I think we as nurses get too got up in our "rules". Sure, our OR will only accommodate one person for the C-section and we stick to that. But maybe we spend too much time worrying about the visitors and trying to enforce the rules.

I agree with what you are saying, but our rooms just don't accomodate the circus that people have with them. I don't really want the added drama of attending to the patient AND their gazillion family members (can you get me a drink?)

When did giving birth become a spectator sport anyway?????

[ktwlpn]

[quote=santhony44;2778730]Personally, I've never grasped the concept of childbirth as a spectator event. If you weren't there at the conception, I didn't want you there for the delivery, unless you were medically necessary. QUOTE > That is spank-my- butt funny! No consortium needed during my labor and delivery ,either.Comes the time to grow up and away from mommy,too. I think it's a great bonding op for the couple..Not MIL,SIL <BF and HUBBY .Why can't the baby daddy be allowed to handle it all alone?

[Nidawi]

What a horrible day! I have to say that I never had more than my child's father in the room with each of my deliveries. Except with my second one. I wanted my son's grandmother in the room. I've always just loved her, and in addition to that, she was an RN, so I know I didn't have anything she never saw before. I actually had my kids in the same hospital she worked at, so it was convenient for her to stop by the next day and check in on us and visit our son.

When I had my last baby (I have 3- 2 boys, 1 girl), I actually BEGGED the nurse to please make everyone leave! I was so tired, and it was late, and nobody cared about how I felt, they just wanted to stay forever oogling and touching my daughter. In addition to this, my SO's mother showed up (different woman than discussed above) and she was so nasty to me and wouldn't stop running her mouth. I would have paid my nurse to physically pick that hateful, evil woman up and literally toss her out on her rear end!

Having a baby is personal, I think. I agree with the "if you weren't there for the conception" thing. Kind of like, If you wouldn't be present for a general gyn exam, then you don't need to be there! come visit after mom and baby are cleaned up and rested a bit. I also don't understand how people can want their young children in the room to "watch their baby brother/sister being born". Wouldn't that traumatize the child? Do many people do this?

[Elvish]

Originally Posted by Nidawi

I also don't understand how people can want their young children in the room to "watch their baby brother/sister being born". Wouldn't that traumatize the child? Do many people do this?

It is definitey a personal choice, and my own jury is still out for baby #2, but kids are not as traumatized by it as one might think. Some watch wide-eyed with wonder, some are fast asleep, and some are oblivious to the miracle as they color in their coloring book. The key is educating them beforehand what to expect. We live in a pretty sanitized world where there's little if any exposure to birth or death...it wasn't always this way. People (including kids) watched animals give birth replete with all the blood and goo, and back when the majority of women birthed at home, I am sure some siblings of all ages were around to witness it.

I remember when I saw my first birth (nursing school) and wrote and email to everyone I knew about how awestruck I was, what a miracle birth is. My stepfather (born in 1916) replied that I was awfully late in witnessing a birth; he had grown up seeing animals (and a few people) give birth and that yes, it IS a miracle.

Sorry for the novel.

[RNmama05]

Many of our labor rooms are kind of small so too many visitors can be a nuisance, but I'm not a stickler for the rules. Birth is an important event to many people, and they have a right to share it with family. I need to be able to do my job, but it isn't the patient's responsibility to make my job a pleasure. So, if there a five family members that include patient's mom, dad, father of baby, sister and grandma, and they're all nice people, I'm inclined to work around them. If it's a patient with her four teenage girlfriends and a couple of boys, I'm more likely to be strict about the number at the bedside.

[super_rn]

Although not an OB nurse, I do have a child. I must say that one great quality of living 12 hours away from family--no one fighting to be in the room. It was just my husband, me (duh!), the doc and a nurse.

I've seen plenty of hoo-haws, but I sure wouldn't be too keen on displaying mine for family. Ack.

[Vikingkitten]

As a Labor ane delivery nurse for part of my career (my only claim to fame was being the only male L & D nurse in a state in the middle of the country) I too saw what my OB-GYN called her "Cecil B. Demile " delivery. There was a camera crew (3), the Dad, the Parents and Parents-in-Law, a couple of other family and friends, and to top it off, Grandparents holding the other children up to the window (outside with the curtains pulled back). I kind of lost count as I had patients to care for! Told the Dr. if she did something like that again, I wanted Hollywood rates! Mom and baby were fine. I went home after that one.

[Vikingkitten]

Btw, really am a male, just can't seem to change my profile. Sorry All.

[crysobrn]

LOL... Not at you but because I have totally been there. We have a three person rule for vag deliveries and try hard to enforce that but I'm only once person and these people are standing on the other side of the curtain as if that doesn't really count as being in the room, or they are right outside the door. I have to explain again and again that because of the privacy of the other patients on the floor we cannot have 27 people standing in the hallway for this patient... People are really ridiculous sometimes, same way when we let the dad in the nursery after a c/s and then I turn around and he's letting in 12 other people because they "can't get pictures from the window" uggh... Hello people there are other babies in here...

I'm pretty sure that everyone in the whole hospital where I work thinks we just "sit around and rock babies" I had a two night stretch that I wrote about not too long ago in which I had a patient come in the first night that didn't know she was pregnant and swore she had a period last month deliver a 40 wker within 20 or so minutes of walking in the ER door with a "stomach ache" and then the next night had a relative of one of our nurses come in abrupting and complete at 22 wks deliver for me before I could explain the situation to her ob who was home sleeping of course. on the end of that second night I was sitting there trying to get my charting together and there are 7 screaming babies in the nursery, I walk in and start checking them all and trying to figure out who needs to go to mom now and who just needs a dipey etc, and an aide from the med surg floor walks back and knocks on the nursery door and says "You are so lucky to get to work here because you get to see babies all the time" I wanted to say, you probably would not have thought I was so lucky when I was delivering a stillborn just a few hours before... UGGH.

[suanna]

I'm not OB/GYN but critical care- we have the same problem. Ater a woman walked in and startled her fresh post op CABG husband awake for the 3rd time in 2 hrs- on the vent, multiple drips, bleeding... I explained that that type of visiting is against the poicy -for the umpteenth time. Of course we got the "but I'm his wife- so the rules don't apply to me" argument. I was having a harder and harder time managing to keep him stable with her visits. I then explained that her husband was likely to die if she kept comming in like that and it that was her intention could she please get the information together for the funeral home and bring it to us with her next pop-in visit. We only saw her during visiting hrs after that. Sometimes you have to hit them over the head to get thier attention. I can only guess it's ten times worse in L&D.