Exceptionally Scary Story - TMI Warning

[Fi]

Hi All,

I was told about this today, and I'm lying awake at this god awful time of night, and I figure there is a reason, so I'm going to post about it.
It is a frightening story, and people should be prepared to be shocked.

OK a friend of a friend had her baby in the last week in a fairly major hospital - like one where 4-8 babies are born a day. My friends sisters was the support person for this couple who are on the slower side mentally, but do understand instructions when they are clear and repeated.

After the birth of the baby, the midwife showed the new mum how to breastfeed the baby (the mother was in a lying back/semi reclined position), from what I understand the baby was left lying on top of the mum if that makes sense, and was left to it. My friends sister left for about 20mins to have a cigarette outside.

At some time during this first feed the baby was smothered accidentally by the mothers breast. When she returned from outside there was pandemonium with people running everywhere, and they were performing mouth to mouth on the baby. Apparently there was a pulse, but they estimate that the baby stopped breathing for up to 40mins.
Tests have shown that the baby has acid in the blood, and it is now in special care nursery. They have no idea at this time whether the baby suffered brain damage.

I dont want to start a public vs private debate, nor do I want to bag midwife care, but I had never, ever, ever heard of this happening before. I think that if the mother has made it through the birth, there is nothing wrong with the carer leaving mum and bubs alone for a little while to enjoy that first feed - providing it all looks like its going OK.
But I guess for a mentally slower person (still all there, just a bit slow) they didn't realise that the baby wasn't sleeping, it actually wasn't breathing. I didn't even know that this could happen with feeding as I thought bubs nostrils were shaped so that air came in the sides.

I just dont know what to think, and I feel so sorry for the family and the poor, poor midwife who had to deal with this situation. I shouldn't imagine this will be publicised - Do you guys think it should be?

Anyway - while I feel sick about telling you guys, I thought I should. Hopefully I can get some sleep now.

Fi

[~Jo~]

Oh God what an awful horribly sad story. Is the baby going to be ok? I can only imagine what that poor mother is thinking. I know how very busy midwives are but you would think mum wouldnt be left along so quickly. It seems we are always bombarded every half hour at least with someone wanting to probe and poke and check all your temps,bp etc. I can remember though with Sammy being distracted by people visiting while i was feeding him and he was actually turning bright pink because he was enveloped by big boozies..that poor poor mother. Hope baby is ok. What a sad lesson to learn.

Jo

[expat]

That's a very sad story. Now what's even harder s that if the baby survives and can function, it may have reduced mental function and I'm sure it can't be easy for slow adults to raise a developmentaly troubled baby.

My fiancé's brother is intelectually impaired and so is his partner of 6 years. Earlier this year on advice from everyone (doctors, social workers, family, etc) she was sterilised as a joint decission (with her consent) was made that it would not be in a child's best interest to be raised by those 2. Whilst I was shocked and a little bothered by the eugenic control, I must say when I thought about it, it is probably for the best. She especially is not able to handle any stress whatsoever and is not able to look after herself without some supervision and he cannot read and can only write his name (much as a 5 year old would) and has the maturity of many 14 year olds so there would be no way the 2 of them could raise a child without at the very least a lot of help and perhaps having a relative or friend move in for at least the 1st couple of years.

On the upside, he's thrilled he's going to be an uncle and I'm sure he'll have a blast holding the baby and playing in supervised conditions so perhaps he can experience a little of that through us.

[expat]

I wanted to ad...

My cousin is a quite senior in a NICU in a major hospital in Melbourne. She has a couple of cases each month of adults who are not capable of looking after themselves having babies with serious problems sometimes due to parental drug abuse. They are obliged to offer any help they can to these poor babies who may only live a couple of months, even then they are full of pain, tubes and wires and in and out of surgery their entire short lives and she says she is really torn as to whether to offer everying to these babies or to strongly suggest to the parents that pain control is all that should be offered and to let the little ones go peacefully.

She's become quite hardened by what she's seen over these last many years and would probably support mass sterilisation of impaired people...but I guess that would put us back to the humane level of Nazi Germany.

[BellyBelly]

I have never heard of this before either - I don't think its a matter of private vs public vs midwives or whatever, perhaps it's a matter of not having correct health supports in place for such people to learn about their baby - at the very least. Unfortunately the health system is such that midwives cannot stay with couples for long. Of course some can but especially in busy hospitals this is a problem. Not the fault of the midwife, but what her job demands of her. It's a sad state for ANYONE learning to adjust to a new baby. If a couple cannot understand that they their baby is not breathing then they perhaps need specialist help, outside the care of a midwife. It happened so quick, its impossible that a midwife could be there constantly. It is a very sad story though Fi, no wonder you are feeling upset.

[Trish]

Oh Fi, that is terrrible. That poor little baby and of course bub's parents. What a horrible thing to have happen. I am with Jo thouhg, I remember after having my babies in hosp that I was barely left alone for very long with my babies that so to birth, always someone wanting to check something.

40 minutes is a very long time for that baby to have been without oxygen, I would be pretty certain that there would have to be "some" damage done to bub's brain and other organs. You simply can't go that long and not have any damage. Sad as it is, I'm suprised they got bub back after that long

[Fi]

I'm pleased you guys have taken this in the right way. I was thinking about it later, hoping that you didn't think it was an urban myth or me being grusome.

The couple aren't impaired - just a little slower. They live independently and just like you or I, just I guess they didn't understand. I do support sterilisation of more deeply impaired people, but this is by no means a situation like that.

They aren't sure how long it stopped breathing, but by calculations it could be up to 40mins.

Its just so awful. My friends sister has been a support person through several human births as well as birthing lots and lots of animals (dogs, horses etc) so this wasdevastating forher as well. Not something you can get over in a hurry.

[Melbo]

Fi, that's terrible for everyone involved. It's very sad.

I have a close friend with a sister who is intellectually impaired. She can look after herself with help but it was still a concern for them what would happen if she became pregnant as she is now living in shared housing. Recently, the family arranged for her to have a tubal ligation. It wasn't an easy decision for them but I can fully understand why they did it and why other parents in the same situation think about these things.

[*Efjay*]

I read about a mother who fell asleep while bfing her baby & woke to find the baby had been smothered & passed away. She blamed it on BFing. But really I think it was just a freak accident & maybe an overtired mother. From memory it was in the UK.

The baby should have been able to breath while at the breast. To me this sounds like a case of poor positioning of the baby during the feed. If the mother is on the slower side & had not been shown correctly the right way to do it, I can see how this has happened. Like you said she may not have realised that the baby was not breathing & just thought it was sleeping.

I sure hope everything works out ok for the little baby & all those involved.

[chelleg]

We have actually had a couple of cases of this happening where i work - no baby has ended up in the NICU and there has been no adverse outcomes but we have had baby's needing a bit of resus after being smothered by breast tissue and it hasn't been during breastfeeding but during skin-to-skin. If women have large breasts then this seems to be a little more af a risk. To combat this we now have a policy that all babies are placed skin-to-skin in a vertical position rather than a horizontal position, so the baby's head is up on the boney part of mums chest - if mum is a little drowsy and in that blissful hormonal place after birth and the baby kind of slips it's not going to slip into the breast tissue. During the first breastfeed we try and stick fairly close but like Kelly said due to other demands we are not always able. In this case we try and make sure there is a support person who is going to stay in the room and be fairly able to keep an eye on the baby. So scarey I hope that baby has a good outcome Fi.