Tuesday, February 22, 2011

Postpartum modesty

You know, before I gave birth everyone told me that when you're in labor you lose all modesty. That made sense to me, and I was expecting it. And it definitely happened.

But what I didn't realize is that after the labor, your modesty doesn't come back, exactly.

I mean, it's back now, for the most part. I'm not about to whip off my shirt entirely when I nurse in public. I don't have any photos of my placenta or anything, and if I did I certainly wouldn't be showing them in public. I wouldn't answer the door naked or anything like that.

But we were in the hospital for two days after Callum was born, and during that time, I did not get dressed.

Maybe this is just me? I honestly don't know because I haven't heard anyone else discuss this. But when I was in the hospital with Callum I pretty much spent the whole time just wearing those awesome mesh panties they give you. I also had a hospital gown, which I wore from time to time, for photos, and certainly whenever I had to leave my room. But we were having nursing issues, and also focused on bonding, and one of the ways to address both of those is skin on skin time, and you know what gets in the way of skin on skin time? A hospital gown.

So for the vast majority of those two days, I was in the my hospital bed, sitting on a disposable protective sheet, wearing only mesh underwear, as people came in and out of the room.

Not visitors. I mean, if friends or family had come to visit us in the hospital, I would have gotten dressed, or at least put on my hospital gown. I didn't lose my modesty to THAT extent.

But I also didn't realize how many non-visitor people would come into the room during those two days. There were the nurses, of course. There were also the other people who would come in regularly to check my vital signs or Callum's. (These were checked at separate times by separate people. I don't know if they were nurses or medical assistants or residents or what. But since the baby and I did not get checked at the same time, it felt like they were there a lot.)

Then there was the pediatric resident who came in a couple times to get Callum for his routine exams. And the pediatrician who came in several times to discuss his jaundice treatment. And the med student who came in offering a free massage. And the different lactation consultants who came in to help us at several different points. And the volunteer who came to do Callum's hearing test. And the room service people who brought us our meals. And the housekeeping staff who cleaned the room. And the maintenance guy who fixed our broken clock. And so on and so forth.

Other than the maintenance guy (for whom I did cover up... because he knocked!), all of these people saw me in my mesh-undied glory. And none of them blinked an eye about it. And what can I say? If they had blinked an eye, I would have blamed them... because they didn't knock before they came in the room. So I can only assume that they were expecting to see me in a state of near-undress.

Of course nothing was quite as awesome as the nurses who would stroll into the room and casually pull aside the mesh undies to check on my bleeding level. Is this normal? Again, I don't know, because I haven't heard anyone discuss this situation in much detail. Maybe they did it more often in my case because I passed a very large blood clot a few hours after delivery and they wanted to make sure I wasn't having bleeding issues after that. Or maybe it's standard for all postpartum women. But either way, I definitely got used to having people I'd never seen before, or only seen once or twice, look in my underwear. And then push really hard on my uterus for good measure, to make sure it was tight and small the way it was supposed to be. (It always was. But that didn't stop them from checking again the next time.)

And the thing is... writing this is making me cringe a little bit. Like maybe I really am the only one who had this experience? Maybe all the nurses were sitting at the nurses' station being like, "Oh my god have you seen the woman in room 506? The naked one? What is she thinking?" and playing rock, paper, scissors on who had to come check on me and who got to go take care of all the other post-partum women who were fully dressed and beautifully made up.

I'm guessing not, somehow (and when I mentioned this to one friend from our Bradley class she told me that she also hung out in her room in just the mesh undies til she was discharged, so at least I know I'm not TOTALLY alone), but my point is that while in retrospect this makes me cringe? At the time, it didn't. It just felt normal. Everyone acted like it was normal, I got used to people poking around in my underwear, it was fine. I guess I took my cue from the nurses, and they very much acted like it was normal.

Also, you know, I HAD just pushed a baby out while squatting on the floor and grunting in front of a midwife, a nurse, and a med student while wearing only a sports bra. Then several other nurses had shown up and cleaned the blood off the floor and watched me have a very private area stitched back together. Then ANOTHER nurse had shown me how to use the peri bottle to avoid wanting to die every time I had to pee. So, you know, before I even got to the recovery room there were already quite a few people who had seen me quite intimately, and I guess that changes your standards a little bit.

So yeah. I'm glad to be home now, wearing clothes and not having people barge in on me naked all the time and grab my underwear to see what's going on down there.

I tend to get sick of people saying that nobody ever told them X or Y about pregnancy, because I feel like in general, and especially online, people really do talk about most pregnancy things, including the very un-glamorous stuff, and thanks to that openness, I didn't encounter many surprises in labor and delivery. But this one genuinely caught me off guard, I really had never heard people talk about this before, and therefore I'm writing about it even though it's making me cringe.

So please, please, please: tell me I'm not alone.

30 comments:

  1. I hadn't really thought about it, but I think you are right about the modesty coming back somewhat but not as much as before. I didn't go without my hospital gown while there, but I had a LOT of people coming to visit...my mom and sister, Ryan's parents and sister, friends from in town, friends from out of town. It was awesome to see everyone, but it definitely meant not as much private time as we probably should have had. Also, I had a c-section, and I couldn't move very well and they wanted me to do a little walking off & on, and so I had to leave the room. I would take James in his bassinet and pace the halls.
    I did, and do, however, nurse in public (meaning in front of people other than my husband). I don't take my shirt off, but I'm sure there are times when there was side boob or whatever. I figure that if I am in my home/hospital room they can deal with it. I don't use a cover when out in stores either, but I do usually try to find somewhere out of the way (Barnes & Noble was great, with their chairs placed all over the store), and I would try to lay a blanket kind of over my shoulder. It's easier now, not only because James doesn't nurse so often but also because he's bigger, so I don't feel so exposed if I DO have to NIP.
    Anyway, yah; I agree about the modesty being slow to return. And next time I have a baby I think that I might very well consider sitting in my hospital room topless. That does sound a lot easier.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I wore the hospital gown, often upbuttoned at the shoulder(s) and the mesh undies. I didn't go w/o the gown, but rather tucked the baby inside the gown with me. I had lots of visitors, though, as all my friends are the child-birth type, and many of David's family lives close, so I think that's probably why I was clothed... too many people coming to visit all the time...

    ReplyDelete
  3. My experience was slightly different, but I'd agree that modesty went out the window. I had to leave my hospital room every time I wanted to see my son, so getting dressed (or at least putting on the hospital gown) was required. However, I also pumped while in my room and pretty much everyone came in to see my boobs exposed in some machine that pulls and sucks and makes noises and yeah, they didn't bat an eye. Also, if you want to talk about modesty, let's talk about being on restricted bed rest before giving birth and needing a nurse (or husband) to get the bedpan situated anytime you wanted to go to the bathroom. And then, when they finally said it was OK to walk to the in-room bathroom, needing a nurse (or husband) to come with you, because she needed to unplug and drag your IV dispenser. And then, post c-section surgery, when you're withering in pain, needing a nurse (or husband) to come with you to the bathroom to help you clean yourself with the peri-bottle. Modesty cannot exist when you're in the hospital.

    ReplyDelete
  4. I never went without a hospital gown, but I certainly didn't get dressed up or look beautiful. hehe

    And the checking "down there" thing? Totally normal. Fun stuff.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Yep, I rocked the mesh undies and a hospital gown...I didn't get dressed until we left and even then, basically put on pajamas for the next two weeks. We had a lot of hospital staff in and out of the room, too. :)

    ReplyDelete
  6. Oh, you're totally not alone. I had a lot of these experiences as well. So much so that when the doctors offer for me to stay longer in the hospital to 'rest'. I look at them like they are crazed lunatics. Rest? Hmph.

    I find that my modesty is pretty much compromised until I quit nursing and start remembering that normal people keep their shirt on pretty much all the time. Even in public where I would cover up as much as possible and still have the baby be comfortable enough to eat...you know, most people don't get naked in public even under a blanket.

    ReplyDelete
  7. My experience was way different, but I wish I'd had those same feelings! The c-section made me feel somewhat detached from what had happened, and I was in my hospital gown the entire time. I did have a nursing gown, though, so it was helpful to pull away and snuggle with Maddie skin-to-skin. I also refused to let anyone help me in the bathroom or the shower... which I DO NOT recommend. There is nothing stupider than a two-day postpartum/post-surgery woman cleaning her own blood off the floor because she's embarrassed.

    So yeah, much different - although my boobs? Yeah, NO modesty there whatsoever. Lactation, whoever - and over the next ten months my family ALL saw them at one point or another because I got tired of hiding away in a bedroom every two hours.

    I think what you did was perfectly, totally normal. My sister is an L&D nurse and it sounds like this is much more common than you would think.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Yeah, exactly the same experience. And then my mom came to help out the next week and I was still getting the hang of nursing and pretty much couldn't do it with a shirt on.

    ReplyDelete
  9. I was pretty modest in the hospital, but I also never got to the pushing point so it was probably a different story. I wore a nursing nightgown with the mesh underwear and yoga pants and a nursing tank once my swelling subsided. But now? I'll feed that baby anywhere, and I get annoyed when B offeres me a blanket to cover up. Feeding a child here, people, not exposing myself.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Definitely not alone! I don't think I wore anything except a blanket and mesh panties in the hospital

    ReplyDelete
  11. I just don't like to be naked, so I as definitely dressed. In fact, I wore my own nursing pj's while I was there. And I breastfed in public, but no one ever saw anything so I don't consider that having anything to do with modesty.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Nope, you're not alone at all! I always felt like if I had any residual pride left by the time I was done having the baby, it all went away when I had nurses checking and changing my pad several times a day. It is definitely on my list of things I never would have thought I'd experience.

    ReplyDelete
  13. This sounds pretty normal to me. I actually don't remember what I was wearing, although many of the pictures of me during this time seem to indicate very little. Also, especially after my second, that lack of modesty kind of stuck around. I went back to work (baby in tow--yay) six weeks after delivery, and once in a one-on-one conference with my boss whipped out my boob and started nursing. He almost knocked over a chair in his haste to get out of the room. So: cringe. Yet at the time it felt fine, and I chalked it up to prudishness on his part. (Lack of modesty PLUS self-serving rationalization! A great combination!)

    ReplyDelete
  14. Yeah, you're definitely NOT alone. I tell my friends without babies all the time that you lose ALL modesty while having a baby. Some can't imagine it, but at least when it happens, they'll be like, "Oh yeah, Mary told me this would happen!".

    ReplyDelete
  15. haha, i can't tell you how fast i flew to the comments to read more about this. like you, i feel like one of the HUGE bonuses of reading blogs is finding out all these Things No One Told Me, so THANK YOU :)

    ReplyDelete
  16. OMG Jess you are freaking me out! LOL. But I'm glad you're writing it. I need to hear it.

    I have no idea how I'm going to be in this situation. I do have some PJ's I'm planning on bringing to the hospital but have no clue if I'll actually wear them.

    ReplyDelete
  17. I could not have said this any better!

    All my modesty was out the door when I was trying to arrange my tucks pads, on the ice pack, on the pad, in my mesh undies while squatted over the toilet.

    ReplyDelete
  18. I always wore the gown, but we had relatives and friends in and out of the room all the time, and often without much of a knock- more of a "here's a tap to indicate that my body will be following this tap into your room in point five seconds." So I kept it on, but it was a pain and was always getting gross from the blood and stuff. I did leave one or both of the shoulders unbuttoned most of the time for nursing ease.
    AND since I luckily didn't tear this time, no one was checking my underwear! First time that's happened out of the three deliveries. I thought they'd check it for the bleeding at least, but at the hospital I delivered in with Jameson, they just kind of depended on me to tell them if it seemed too heavy. I think since I'd had two kids before they figured I'd know what was normal?

    ReplyDelete
  19. I wore the gown with Bud, but it was usually unsnapped and loose because neither of us had any idea what we were doing when it came to nursing. With Lucy, I wore my own clothes. She was in the NICU and I was being wheeled all over the hospital to get to her. I decided I liked that, and wore my own clothes after Liv too. I just pulled down my pants when the nurses came in to "just check your bottom, dear."

    ReplyDelete
  20. I wore the gown and mesh undies but my boobs were out a lot of the time and I could not believe how many people just paraded into the room without knocking includin the guy who collected the trash and dirty linens and the guy who brought the meals. I vaguely remember several people coming thru the room when I was in labor (not the midwife or nurse ). And the whole peering in your undies thing... Yep- cringe!

    ReplyDelete
  21. I have always been very modest and shy (I didn't take a shower for a week at camp because it was locker-room style), but in the hospital I didn't care. When the nurse was helping me to the shower the first time after my c-section, I took my gown off right in front of her, and if someone had told me beforehand I was going to strip in front of another adult---even a nurse---when I didn't have to, I'm not sure I would have believed them. I also PEED in front of a nurse, and that one even more so: I MIGHT have believed that SOMEONE ELSE SIMILAR TO ME might do such a thing, but I would have thought _I_ would have done so only if forced. And after the first time, I didn't blink when the nurses came in and just immediately started prodding and peeking without mentioning they were going to. I agree: their attitudes (along with the surreal feeling of the whole childbirth experience) REALLY affected how I felt about things.

    ReplyDelete
  22. I've always been a prude, I never lost the modesty but in the hospital with doctors I tend to not care/play it cool. i used the gown, but I used my own undies because snug boxer-briefs hold that mess together better than mesh undies. I also had a lot of people coming in my room but they all knocked and it started to annoy me and I wish they'd just freaking come in already. The most unnerving thing about my hospital stay was realizing somewhere at the end of it, that the nurses could hear everything we were saying in the room from the nurses station. So all the bad shit we were saying about them being incompetent? yeah. I hated nursing in front of a nurse because I wanted to figure that out on my own (with 2nd/3rd kids) and not have someone interfering. With my first, in the nicu, there was a dr there who was just tossing my boob left and right with reckless abandon and I was so giddy with the possibility that the kid might latch on that I did not care.

    ReplyDelete
  23. This sounds very much like my own experience, and these were all of the parts of the hospital experience that I loathed. The labor and birth, the time afterwards with my husband and my new baby girls felt perfect - I just wish I had a little more, for lack of a better term 'dignity'.

    I realize that all these things are normal, and not one of them makes me flinch when it is someone else, but it often felt like nurses/doctors/hospital employees helped themselves to touching, prodding, or discussing personal things in front of visitors too freely. Before, during, and right after the birth I was surprised that I didn't really care - but when things wound done, I really would have preferred a bit more sensitivity in this area.

    I am and always been painfully shy, so I bet other people care less. I have already discussed with my doctor working things differently this time (we are expecting #3 in about five weeks), and I think I am going to ask for less staff in the room, and more oppurtunities to ask for help if I need it - intead of entertaining a parade of random hospital personnel.

    ReplyDelete
  24. With my daughter I gave birth totally naked on all fours. The gowns just got in the way so I threw them off at some point. It was just me, my midwife, husband and 2 nurses but if anyone had told me that was what I would do beforehand I would have laughed in their face. With MAD I wasn't nearly as strict with who was in the room during the birth (for labor I wanted to be alone, though). I told them I didn't want any "extra" people in the room but there were a few nursing students and a resident there that had never seen a drug-free birth and by the time they asked I couldn't care less. Mark said there were 9 people in addition to us in the room at the time of the birth, I didn't notice them. But, this time I was in a more traditional laying-on-the-bed position.

    Both times I couldn't wait to ditch the gown for my own clothes. I have these super-stretchy, comfy gaucho PJ pants that were awesome (as Temerity Jane would say, they had optimal floppiness). And I wore a nursing tank that provided maximum openness down to my navel for skin-to-skin and nursing. Then, because I was chilly I wore a long cardigan which I would button up as needed (because, lets face it - that tank did nothing to contain the girls).

    Pre-birth I was all about the nursing cover and using a blanket for public nursing but then M wouldn't have it... and I couldn't maneuver with one. Until she was about 2 months I just made sure I would have a private-ish place to nurse if out and about... many times that was the car. Once we both got the hang of it I was more comfortable nursing in public. I've even done it in front of my dad - which 5 years ago I would have never, ever considered.

    ReplyDelete
  25. Well my birth experiences have involved things like catheters and even a suppository (I know, ew!) so yeah, modesty wasn't much of an option.

    ReplyDelete
  26. I went back to full modesty once the baby was born. I was constantly shifting my gown to make sure I was appropriately covered. Since moving around was such a chore after the c-section, I asked visitors politely to be done visiting when it was time for me to get up and walk to the bathroom.

    ReplyDelete
  27. You are not alone. I remember having these thoughts as I took my first shower after birth. There I stood, stark naked, leaking fluids and having a nurse help me into the shower and I didn't care one bit.

    Everyone saw my butt. Everyone saw my breasts. It just didn't matter anymore.

    I did feel bad for the man who came to clean the bathroom, though. It was...messy.

    ReplyDelete
  28. ha!! I totally had people coming in to look in my undies and mash my ute. So funny how all the sudden it seems normal to have someone inspect your pads for you. And i had no idea they would do that even though i read a ton before!

    ReplyDelete
  29. Well, after my c-section, a nurse came and wiped my...well, you know...all night long. I couldn't have cared less. I also got stuck sitting on the toilet the first time I was allowed to get up to pee and had to have the nurse help with all of that fun too.

    I had to leave my room to go see my girls, so I had to get dressed. I did, however, frequently pump in the NICU and had my boobs exposed to basically every hospital staff member there. Plus some other families that were with us...and once their 5 year old daughter saw my boobs. So yeah, what modesty?

    ReplyDelete
  30. I'm modest to a fault, so I can't say that anyone other than nurses and Eric saw anything much. I had a c-section so they weren't really moving underwear around after the initial hours of labor, and the incision wasn't anywhere you wouldn't see in a swimsuit so that helped. The nurses did have to get me to the bathroom the first few times and showed me how to use the peri bottle and helped me up, but I don't remember thinking that was weird at all. Maybe it's because that wasn't my first time in a hospital setting? I'm not sure. Either way, I was SO glad to be home where I could have my shirt off in total privacy!

    ReplyDelete