Andy Dufresne Posted May 31, 2021 Share Posted May 31, 2021 1 hour ago, Honest Saints Fan said: We now have a 5 year old. Ben is 6 on thursday,i don't know where the years have went. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scottsdad Posted June 1, 2021 Share Posted June 1, 2021 On 30/05/2021 at 23:39, keithgy said: It is now 15 months since the kids have seen their mother. Sorry I don't know the history of this. But I have something of a similar experience, but from the other side. When I met my now-wife, her daughter lived with her ex-husband. Things started out OK, she stayed with us every second weekend and half the holidays. Things changed when we went to pick her up one day and casually mentioned that we had got married. I don't know what trigger this sent to her dad, but after that he stopped our access completely. We went to court and all that jazz but there was a time (again, about 15 months or so) when we didn't see her. We saw her when she was 4 and a half, then again when she was almost 6. That's a big chunk of time to miss. This is all ancient history now of course. But over the years we missed out on huge chunks. I won't go in to all the ins and outs but we eventually got to the place where we thought "she'll come to us when she grows up". We became these strangers who would sometimes visit but had no real connection with her. Fast forward to last Christmas and she moved out of her dad's place and now lives 5 minutes from us. There's still a big emotional distance though. We saw her yesterday and to be blunt, we have small talk and not much else. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andy Dufresne Posted June 3, 2021 Share Posted June 3, 2021 Happy birthday to my wee man Ben 6 today 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dons_1988 Posted June 8, 2021 Share Posted June 8, 2021 So mum and baby are back in hospital tonight. Feeding hasn’t been going well and our wee one isn’t gaining weight as we’d hope. This has maybe been the hardest fortnight we’ve had as a couple. Sounds stupid but I never appreciated the pressure of breast feeding and the unbelievable stress that comes with it not going well. The wife has given absolutely everything but she’s exhausted and devastated in equal measure. Baby will be fine, I’m confident of that but hard to watch it all unfold. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pandarilla Posted June 8, 2021 Share Posted June 8, 2021 So mum and baby are back in hospital tonight. Feeding hasn’t been going well and our wee one isn’t gaining weight as we’d hope. This has maybe been the hardest fortnight we’ve had as a couple. Sounds stupid but I never appreciated the pressure of breast feeding and the unbelievable stress that comes with it not going well. The wife has given absolutely everything but she’s exhausted and devastated in equal measure. Baby will be fine, I’m confident of that but hard to watch it all unfold. That's absolutely shite, mate. Hang in there. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Don Diego De la Vega Posted June 9, 2021 Share Posted June 9, 2021 4 hours ago, Dons_1988 said: So mum and baby are back in hospital tonight. Feeding hasn’t been going well and our wee one isn’t gaining weight as we’d hope. This has maybe been the hardest fortnight we’ve had as a couple. Sounds stupid but I never appreciated the pressure of breast feeding and the unbelievable stress that comes with it not going well. The wife has given absolutely everything but she’s exhausted and devastated in equal measure. Baby will be fine, I’m confident of that but hard to watch it all unfold. My partner and I went tough this when our son was born, he just would not latch on at all, no matter how much she offered it up to him he didn't want to latch on and she didnt seem to be producing a lot of breat milk to expel either, but the breast feeding nazis insisted it was the only way to feed a newborn as it makes them super children or something. my partner was also devastated and starting to get really low because of it, as well as just going through 80 hours of labour and then an emergency section, it was as if the nurses were on a bonus for getting babies to breastfeed and not taking in to consideration the health of the mother. Eventually enough was enough and we told them to bolt put him on a bottle and he was fine, in fact thriving, he's a healthy happy fit 4 year old in the 91st percentile. thank f**k he didn't breastfeed or he might have been some sort of giant! lots of babies don't breastfeed doesn't make them any less loved or the mothers less than mothers that do. i was disgusted/angry with they way the nurses pushed for the breastfeeding even though they could see she was drained i'm not surprised that post natal depression is a thing after what i witnessed you've got to do what is best for you and family my advice buy a perfect prep, share the load on feeding, have a great time bringing up your child 8 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RH33 Posted June 9, 2021 Share Posted June 9, 2021 8 hours ago, Dons_1988 said: So mum and baby are back in hospital tonight. Feeding hasn’t been going well and our wee one isn’t gaining weight as we’d hope. This has maybe been the hardest fortnight we’ve had as a couple. Sounds stupid but I never appreciated the pressure of breast feeding and the unbelievable stress that comes with it not going well. The wife has given absolutely everything but she’s exhausted and devastated in equal measure. Baby will be fine, I’m confident of that but hard to watch it all unfold. I had horrendous time feeding my son. Every midwife that visited was judgemental rather than helpful. I spent hours with him on my boob, went to "support" group, again judgy and made me feel like shite. In the end I bailed out to my folks and saw the health visitor there, she was like you're exhausted, he needs more and formula isn't poison, get a bottle and formula from the coop. I mixed fed him from then on. When I had my third I nearly died, all the same people were like no don't breast feed your body makes blood ahead of milk. I had to have therapy after my second to come to terms with not being able to feed them and how the visiting midwives made me feel. My son took at least 8 weeks regain birth weight. And the irony of it all......the one that was bottle fed, like her brother and sister, gained weight slowly and had them frowning over the bloody percentile sheets. If you're wife wants to drop me a DM 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brummie Clyde Posted June 9, 2021 Share Posted June 9, 2021 We briefly tried to breast feed our baby, but she didn't seem to be able to latch on and so we bottle fed.Probably makes it easier to share the workload feeding tbh. Plus, I'm better at getting up in the morning than my wife. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jacksgranda Posted June 9, 2021 Share Posted June 9, 2021 On 01/06/2021 at 10:31, scottsdad said: Sorry I don't know the history of this. But I have something of a similar experience, but from the other side. When I met my now-wife, her daughter lived with her ex-husband. Things started out OK, she stayed with us every second weekend and half the holidays. Things changed when we went to pick her up one day and casually mentioned that we had got married. I don't know what trigger this sent to her dad, but after that he stopped our access completely. We went to court and all that jazz but there was a time (again, about 15 months or so) when we didn't see her. We saw her when she was 4 and a half, then again when she was almost 6. That's a big chunk of time to miss. This is all ancient history now of course. But over the years we missed out on huge chunks. I won't go in to all the ins and outs but we eventually got to the place where we thought "she'll come to us when she grows up". We became these strangers who would sometimes visit but had no real connection with her. Fast forward to last Christmas and she moved out of her dad's place and now lives 5 minutes from us. There's still a big emotional distance though. We saw her yesterday and to be blunt, we have small talk and not much else. We haven't seen 2 of the grandchildren for 18 years and thought the same. Didn't happen. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thorongil Posted June 9, 2021 Share Posted June 9, 2021 I have an 8 year old boy and a 4 year old girl. They are great and thriving and the future looks bright. I will say this though, the baby days and days of having very young children are very, very, very hard. Those going through it just now, you have my solidarity and keep going. You will make it! 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RH33 Posted June 9, 2021 Share Posted June 9, 2021 2 minutes ago, Pato said: Same story here - psychological pressure that I'd say strayed into abuse to breastfeed when it was plainly not giving the wee one enough to put on weight. Just get some formula and get them fed. There's something really not right with midwifery. I started asking them how they fed their own child........they aren't allowed to 'promote' bottle feeding..... just make mums feel utterly shite at an already vulnerable time. To the point i think leads/contributes to pnd due to the guilt and anxiety. Plus the percentile charts don't help either. I never for a moment thought breast feeding wouldn't work, I thought baby would latch on and off we went. I hadn't bought bottles or steriliser while pregnant. Reality is it's really challenging and sometimes doesn't work out. Age 12, 10 and 8 you can't tell who was fed what in those first six months! 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dons_1988 Posted June 9, 2021 Share Posted June 9, 2021 Thanks for the advice folks. There’s definitely a stigma on bottle feeding and whilst the midwives in general have been great with us they do definitely try and steer away from formula even when you are expressing concern that it’s not going particularly well. I specifically asked last week if I should buy some formula to have on hand if we feel like she’s not being fed and they said no. I think we’re going to try sticking with the breast and ‘topping up’ with formula and see how it goes but we’ve both stopped worrying about the prospect of bottle feeding as fundamentally we just want the wee one fed. The wife is going to do herself an illness with the lack of sleep and worry she’s been through trying to breastfeed round the clock so I’m relieved we’re finally addressing it. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Honest Saints Fan Posted June 9, 2021 Share Posted June 9, 2021 I tried to breastfeed oldest but after a horrendous labour experience and blood loss I just didn't have the strength to do it. Second time round because he was born premature, I had to express. Fair enough I was extremely ill (didn't know at the time) but that was the most miserable I have ever been. I only continued because breast milk is best for premature babies. In the end I lasted about 3 weeks and stopped because I was about to start chemo. I used donor milk too and would recommend donor milk to any mum struggling who isn't ready to move to formula. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bairnardo Posted June 9, 2021 Share Posted June 9, 2021 My wife and I had pretty well decided before the first was born that she would be bottle fed. She tried to give the wean the first feed, immediately after she was born because apparently it has some top notch goodness in it, but that didnt happen and she had to go down to surgery, so it was formula from day 1. Second wean was C section, so again, there was no dubiety whatsoever. I have to say, there wasnt much in the way of pressure from anyone but when the subject came I, I tended to just shoot it down straight away and not let them badger my wife. I was working away over the spell we had both kids. It would have been too much to expect the wife to loom after them 24/7 when I was away and also do all the feeding when I was home too, so the decision was easy for us. Cant stress enough though, that anyone up to and including doctors can and should be told to shut the f**k up if they push it to the point of causing anxiety. Far too mucb going on at that time already without paying heed to a total strangers bizarre agenda. The mothers hormones, emotions and dignity have taken enough of a tanking over the course of a birth. Its a good time for the dad to step in IMO. 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
robosaintee Posted June 9, 2021 Share Posted June 9, 2021 (edited) 14 minutes ago, Bairnardo said: Cant stress enough though, that anyone up to and including doctors can and should be told to shut the f**k up if they push it to the point of causing anxiety. Far too mucb going on at that time already without paying heed to a total strangers bizarre agenda. The mothers hormones, emotions and dignity have taken enough of a tanking over the course of a birth. Its a good time for the dad to step in IMO. Absolutely agree with this. My wife put herself under enough pressure as she wanted to breastfeed so much and was struggling, without any other people piling in. Those first few weeks are such a fucking blur anyway so any added pressure is really not welcome. Thankfully our health visitor was really nice and our wee man piled on weight early and my wife was happy to start expressing milk via pump in combination with formula which meant we could take turns and get some rest in those early days. Edited June 9, 2021 by robosaintee 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Derry Posted June 9, 2021 Share Posted June 9, 2021 Our first born was bottle fed after my partner got sepsis during the birth and wasn't well enough to breastfeed. He's 5 1/2 and is in the 100th percentile for height for his age and is by far the smartest kid in his class. I'm teaching him to be a defender at football for Scotlands benefit in the future. So nothing wrong with bottle feeding in my experience. My second was breastfed for a year and is the cheekiest and most adventurous child that's ever roamed the planet. So either or is fine, don't worry about it too much. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dons_1988 Posted June 10, 2021 Share Posted June 10, 2021 Mum and baby came home last night after she put on 100 grams in 24 hours so positive news. I have to say doctors and midwives were very supportive of ditching the breastfeeding if it wasn’t working. I stayed up to do two feeds last night so mrs dons_1988 got her first real sleep in 2 weeks and she’s transformed this morning. I now just need to remind her I’m not doing that every night 8 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RH33 Posted June 10, 2021 Share Posted June 10, 2021 1 hour ago, Dons_1988 said: Mum and baby came home last night after she put on 100 grams in 24 hours so positive news. I have to say doctors and midwives were very supportive of ditching the breastfeeding if it wasn’t working. I stayed up to do two feeds last night so mrs dons_1988 got her first real sleep in 2 weeks and she’s transformed this morning. I now just need to remind her I’m not doing that every night Good news! 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pandarilla Posted June 10, 2021 Share Posted June 10, 2021 Mum and baby came home last night after she put on 100 grams in 24 hours so positive news. I have to say doctors and midwives were very supportive of ditching the breastfeeding if it wasn’t working. I stayed up to do two feeds last night so mrs dons_1988 got her first real sleep in 2 weeks and she’s transformed this morning. I now just need to remind her I’m not doing that every night [emoji28]Outstanding. It gets easier, mate. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bairnardo Posted June 10, 2021 Share Posted June 10, 2021 Outstanding. It gets easier, mate. Good first half of your post, descended into a pure fabrication as it went on [emoji23] 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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