Hoping I am not going to be judged for what I am writing here as I feel like "I should have known".

I didn't realise how angry and upset I was about this until a friend was telling me about her experience with bf at hospital at hospital and how wonderful it was.

Long story short... (actually it didnt turn out to be short...sorry)

I had DD at 3:12am, first feed was at 5:30am.
Had no idea what I was doing and I didnt think it was working. I asked the midwife how do I know when to feed DD? I was told that "babies dont actually need milk in the first 24hours as they still have all the nourishment in their bodies from the placenta". I was also told "dont feed DD unless a midwife is there to make sure attachment is correct".
Left delivery and into maternity at 7:30am. Big changeover of staff because of time of day.
Visitors, doctors, midwives come and go through the day, I do a physio class, the day just flies by and it all seems to be a bit of a whirlwind.
Had another visitor at about 4:30 who asked me when I had to feed DD. I said I have no idea! No one has come and told me. I hadnt fed her since the morning. She was in shock and said I needed to feed her and went and got someone.
The midwife then came in and looked at my notes and seen I hadnt fed her. People had been checking my notes all day & not said anything.

I feel so stupid now as its common sense but it really wasnt explained to me and even when I asked this midwife how often to feed her she said every 5 hours, another said every 3 hours. I was just so confused!!!! It wasnt until I saw the LC at hospital that I got the right info and felt better about breastfeeding.

Oh dear, so embarrassing...I know this sounds really dumb but I had no idea how often a baby needs to be fed, I was sleep deprived after 63hours awake and not using my brain and DD was sleeping all the time so I just didnt think that I needed to wake her. After all I was waiting for them to come and tell me it was time.

I am just really angry that this happened. I was lucky that I really was determined to bf and gained alot of support and info from BB and we are still going well on our bf journey but it is devastating to think about that first day.

I didnt complain at the time because I felt embarrassed (still do a little bit but needed to get this out).

I dont know about midwifery courses, but it seems that there needs to be more consistency with the information that is given to new mums. Every time a midwife changed shift I was told something different..

Thanks for listening. Sorry its a bit rambled. No replies needed. Just needed to get that out as I have been holding it in for a while.