This Mom Refused To Room In With Her Baby In Hospital

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New mothers know just how precious a few hours of sleep can be when dealing with a newborn baby.

Natalie Thomas certainly does after a wonderful experience with her firstborn, but when her second baby came along things changed.

When Natalie’s daughter was born four years ago she thought she would have been a protective and anxious mother. However, she says she “was so Zen(and equally exhausted)” she let the nurses take her baby to the hospital nursery so she could get some sleep.

Natalie says people had recommended she let the nurses take the child when they offered but she thought “Oh sure, like I’m going to send my newborn away and out of my care in a hospital with hundreds of other people!”

But she did and claims it was “the best idea (and sleep) I had all year.”

Now almost five years later she gave birth to her son, at a different hospital to where she delivered her daughter and knew the benefits of getting some all-important sleep. Here she requested that the baby room in the nursery, however, she was met with some resistance from the nurses.

“The nurses informed me that the hospital was a “rooming-in” facility, meaning moms are encouraged to keep baby with her in her room at all times. Which, in practice, meant the hospital actively discouraged you from having your child stay in the nursery,” Natalie writes for www.thebump.com.

She says she instantly felt judged by the nurses and felt that they would think she didn’t want to bond with her baby, “making me a selfish, detached mother”. Eventually, though, the nurses accepted her wish and her baby was taken off to the nursery and the new mother was grateful for some uninterrupted sleep.

Hospitals encourage “rooming-in” so mothers can bond with their babies, which is a valid point. However, Natalie says “Moms are in the hospital for 48 to 72 hours, and we’re awake for the majority of that time,” and doesn’t think that the two to four hour period a child would be in the nursery affects bonding time.

“I still fed, cuddled, nuzzled and studied my son. I changed his diapers and helped with his bath. We had skin-to-skin contact; I sang to him and took five million photos. Make no mistake, that little boy and I bonded and I was in a better mental state to do so after getting a little shut-eye,” she explains.

There are many benefits to rooming-in, from establishing a routine with your baby, learning baby cues to allegedly helping with the baby blues. But each to their own and everyone has a different experience as a new mother.

Natalie says “I’m simply saying that a sleep-deprived, emotional mom who’s just gone through childbirth (not to mention nine months of pregnancy) and who would like a few moments of uninterrupted rest should be fully supported, not questioned or judged. After all, it’s her baby and her experience. Why should anyone else, especially a hospital policy, tell her how to do things?”

Natalie is a lifestyle blogger and you can catch up with her posts here:

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