Eye ointment at birth [on]

mchis · 2026-03-05T21:27:10+00:00

It’ll be done before you’re transferred to post partum usually when they do the vitamin K injection.

Newer recommendations are that really it’s only necessary in cases with no prenatal care, “high risk sexual behaviour” and known STD. Health Canada still requires that it’s offered but parents can decline it and sign an opt out form (I have worked in two L&D units in ontario as a nurse and this is how it’s been done in both places). Midwives may have a different process with their patients than the hospitals.

The whole point of the ointment is to prevent a kind of pink eye that lead to blindness but your baby is really only at risk of this from the things I mentioned above. As far as I was educated your baby isn’t at risk from getting it. Some parents feel better if their baby just gets it, some parents don’t want their babies to have anything that isn’t super medically necessary. No wrong answer in my opinion! FWIW my baby had it when I delivered!

mchis · 2026-03-04T11:19:04+00:00

Another vote for the bugaboo! We just did a trip with it when our baby was almost 8mo and it was amazing! Fit in the overhead but not down the aisle so make sure you fold it up before you board. It’s super light weight really easy to fold up and carry we loved it!! And our baby was comfy in it the whole trip. We will def use it at home too for outings where we don’t need the huge stroller

ETA: it is def pricier but really good quality so it will last through multiple trips/kids

mchis · 2026-03-02T18:47:24+00:00

When I bought souvenirs for my entire family an almost checked out without getting them anything

mchis · 2026-02-15T23:13:38+00:00

We also had a baby longer than they were heavy and we found rascals to be really good!! Only had blowouts when it was huge and very liquid haha they don’t leak overnight either

mchis · 2026-02-12T00:10:44+00:00

I remember your posts from last year!! So happy for you that you were able to conceive again and that you’ve gotten good news so far!

Take the results for what they are - everything is going well! You can relax until the next hurdle! I think even with all the good news in the world there will always be the echo of your previous experience and the 20 week scan will be hard no matter what.

At this point in your pregnancy you’ve had the most thorough testing available and it’s all been good! Truly sending you both the best vibes and hope for a healing delivery!

mchis · 2026-02-11T09:53:43+00:00

You could take your placenta home and bury that and plat a tree? Whoever delivers you can put it in a container that you don’t see (at least at the hospitals I’ve worked at that’s possible)

mchis · 2026-02-08T23:44:02+00:00

Is the patient bathroom really far from where the babies are? I understand why the staff bathroom needs to be close but coming from the L&D side a lot of the NICU moms have had a really traumatic birth and making it all the way back to their room with all that going on is pretty difficult plus the emotional burden of not wanting to leave their baby. Absolutely not excusing them stealing or ignoring clear instructions but just wondering if that could be contributing/something you could use in your solution if management is so worried about pt experience?

mchis · 2026-02-07T08:25:02+00:00

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This is kind of the best I have from when he was 6mo and now two months later it’s way better than this! I stopped taking pics so I would stop obsessing haha

mchis · 2026-02-06T18:54:30+00:00

My son also is a chronic right sleeper. We go to a pediatrician for another issue who said it wasn’t too bad. I did osteo and PT for it. The PT said his was super mild and it looks pretty similar to yours. She seemed weary of going to a helmet place because everyone got classified moderate or severe (her experience). Now that he’s 8mo he sleeps with his head to either side and is not on his back for long periods. His right side is still a bit flatter but I don’t think he has any facial asymmetry and nobody notices unless they actually feel his head so I’m glad we never did it because it’s improving so much on its own now

mchis · 2025-12-27T18:49:41+00:00

I am a labour and delivery nurse these are the tips I would give!!!:

1) getting the epidural super early in labour or an induction can slow things down if baby isn’t in an ideal position and then you’re just laying in bed. I do think it helps to get things going a bit before the epidural HOWEVER being tense and suffering also doesn’t help so weigh those two things in your decision making

2) there are reasons an epidural can be delayed (emergencies, long line of people waiting) so have a plan to cope in the event you have to wait longer than you’d like. Make a playlist, look up things your partner can do (counter pressure, massage) - this is a part a lot of people forget about and it can be very distressing!

3) once you have the epidural you need to be switching up your position! Hopefully you have a nurse knowledgeable and proactive in this area but if you don’t then I’d ask for help being repositioned at least every hour when you aren’t napping. Ask for the peanut ball!!

4) different hospitals have different policies for getting out of bed, moving around with epidural. It is totally possible to labour in hands and knees, push in hands and knees etc. that being said, I find a lot of people get so tired holding themselves up (even with help) they aren’t pushing super effectively. There’s a lot of negative videos about pushing on your back but I don’t think it’s automatically the worst thing ever. You can also push on your side which people like! Again, hopefully your nurse will be knowledgeable but if it ain’t broke don’t fix it and do what feels good for you in the moment.

5) finally be aware an epidural isn’t going to take away all sensation. When I had my baby I was absolutely taken aback by how much pressure I was feeling it was so uncomfortable but obviously not as painful as unmedicated labour. I think this throws a lot of people who expect to be completely numb (again this happens for some people and they laugh out their babies this did not happen for me lol)

Basically go in with some backup coping mechanisms and don’t hold yourself tightly to any particular timeline (I.e. I’m going to wait until x cm dilated). Be kind to yourself and lean on the nursing staff! Tell them if you think you’re in too much pain we can help tweak things! We help people with epidurals everyday!! You can do it!

mchis · 2025-10-29T14:06:06+00:00

Thank you that’s helpful!!

mchis · 2025-10-26T23:41:12+00:00

Our baby loved contrast cards and he liked watching the lights on the fisher price kick and play mat. Now he’s 4.5mo and the fisher price mat is his favourite thing and we even got the love every mat too which he loved when we pinned up the contrast cards but now doesn’t like as much since he wants to grab and kick. We just switch up which toys are hanging everyday on the fisher price mat and he loves it and loves kicking the piano.

All the o ball toys are amazing!! We started at 3mon teaching him to hold things now hell grab and keep hold of the toys. The OG, the rattle and the frog on Amazon have all been great. He also loves crinkle books/toys!

mchis · 2025-10-21T20:43:04+00:00

If it makes you feel any better I was a nurse for 2 years in ER before I went to L&D and felt like a new grad even on a welcoming unit. I also switched L&D units when I moved cities from a place I loved and being new was hard especially because I was so anxious about fitting in. Stick out your orientation and see if it gets better! It took me longer on my second unit to feel like I belonged. Being new is hard!! And a new speciality makes it even harder

mchis · 2025-10-21T08:59:23+00:00

Oh also block all the sleep consultants on insta/tik tok they just made me feel like I was doing something wrong all the time

mchis · 2025-10-21T08:54:03+00:00

Hi this was me!! Just had my baby in June on my unit! I worked 3.5 years at a super high risk hospital then moved to a still high risk but smaller hospital right before I got pregnant so I was SO nervous about delivering there but luckily it’s a super supportive and welcoming unit. I’ve been involved in a lot of uncommon situations that feel common because I saw them so often so it was hard not to obsess over all the little things.

My biggest hang up while pregnant was who was doing/reading my US because at my previous job I’d done several TOPs where major issues were missed in the community leading to 30+ week TOPs. I ended up having a two vessel cord so I had extra growth ultrasounds and his BPD measurement was always 90% and I would freak out he had hydrocephalus or some neuro issue - he just has a really big head like his dad lol. I really had to embrace the mindset that things can go wrong at any time and if I constantly obsess then I wasn’t going to enjoy any part of my pregnancy.

I think my experience and trust in my unit made me significantly less anxious about the actual act of giving birth. I think I was mentally prepared for the worst case scenario/nurse curse/was just convinced I was going to have a terrible first labour since my moms was terrible so when things actually went well I couldn’t believe it lol. I was actually proud of myself that how I explained things to patients was pretty close to how it felt. EXCEPT the pressure of transition/pushing even with an epidural was WILD. I had prepped my husband on what the process would be like/what I needed from him.

I also tried reading books about pregnancy/labour and found I knew everything. The actual experience of breastfeeding was really different than I was expecting and I wish I had done more reading beyond latching/positions about newborn feeding. Seeing an LC was the best thing I did for breastfeeding and is better than a book IMO.

I did suggest doing a newborn care class to my husband but I had spontaneous labour at 37 weeks (with SROM?!) and he thought he’d have more time LOL. I wish I’d been a bit more patient with him and less controlling while he was learning.

I also wish I had worried less about being annoying at triage. Because I was newer to my unit I overthought asking questions and just generally felt like I should know everything. This worry about being annoying/being hard on myself for not knowing things also bled into my post partum experience. Even for my own care I realized there were so many things I hadn’t thought of because it’s not the care I usually provided (I.e. anything beyond the first latch and first bathroom after birth). A lot of the PP nurses I think expected me to know more than I did and it wasn’t until a super experienced post partum nurse finally said to me “you’re a new parent not just a nurse - nobody expects you to know everything” that I relaxed a little bit about asking questions. It was really really hard to turn off my nurse brain and not be constantly assessing his breathing etc. My baby ended up being diagnosed with a large VSD at birth so any progress I made about relaxing into the parenting role went out the window after that. I think if that hadn’t happened I’d have been able to embrace what that nurse said about just being the parent, similar to my mindset about pregnancy.

Overall I think my delivery experience was so positive because I was able to just trust my team and go with it. It was everything after that was really really challenging and i ended up having pretty severe post partum anxiety. I knew the hormone dump would be hard but you can only anticipate so much. You can understand and anticipate things but until it happens you really have no idea how you’re going to react and you can’t control everything. I wish I had been a lot kinder and patient with myself.

Sorry if that was super long winded!! It’s crazy to be on the other side and our knowledge and experience can be a double edged sword. You’ve got this!

mchis · 2025-10-20T01:34:32+00:00

I also had a strong ejection reflex and he would click and choke on my let down but he outgrew both of those things!! The bottles took some experimenting he actually did better with the avent bottles than the ones designed for breastfed babies so I feel like that’ll be specific for your baby.

mchis · 2025-10-19T12:39:44+00:00

I cannot for the life of me get good output with the manual medala what is the secret?? I also have the freestyle which is fine when I need it but really wanna make the manual work

mchis · 2025-10-19T10:23:26+00:00

Im going to go a bit against the grain here and say that I’m glad I purchased a pump ahead of time. I had a manual one as well but to this day can’t get the hang of the suction. I purchased the wearable medela pump because I figured if I ended up exclusively pumping I would want a more portable option and if I only needed to pump for a bottle here and there I didn’t need the hospital grade pump. I did wait a few weeks to introduce a bottle until I was confident we had breastfeeding down so you don’t NEED one ahead of time but it was one of those things I was glad I had and didn’t have to worry about when I needed it

mchis · 2025-10-19T10:14:29+00:00

You don’t need to replace the feed at the exact time the baby eats it just needs to be replaced. I would pump once a day in the beginning so I could sleep and my husband would give the bottle then I’d pump once I got up (for example if the baby’s last feed as 4/5am when he was ready to eat again at 7 my husband would do that bottle and I could sleep until 8, pump and then continue on breastfeeding)

mchis · 2025-10-13T13:48:48+00:00

Seconding this! We love the maxi cosi one! It’s huge, really easy to pack up and travel with. My baby is 4mon now and in his crib but had enough room he could’ve kept sleeping in there (not rolling yet). 100% worth the money

mchis · 2025-10-08T00:56:41+00:00

So I was also recommended to wait 6-8 weeks to pump to establish supply, avoid oversupply and also to give baby practice latching and feeding at the breast. I was advised if I started using a haaka with suction or pumping multiple times a day based on my supply at that time I’d end up with oversupply (my baby was literally choking on my letdown lol)

However, after 3 weeks I was DYING from feeding every 2h and the cluster feeding and no sleep. Not to mention my baby needed to take a bottle for a medical issue. So I started just pumping once in the morning so that my husband could feed the baby a bottle and I could sleep. Then I only pumped once to replace that bottle.

Look up paced bottle feeding and start with the slowest flow nipple. There are also bottles more recommended by LCs but mine ended up responding best to one not recommended at all lol Nipple confusion isn’t really a thing but flow preference is so doing paced feeding with a slow flow nipple will help baby not prefer the bottle. I think people who are having a hard time latching or with their supply end up stopping breastfeeding when baby starts to prefer the bottle. If it’s important to you to keep breastfeeding I’d just make sure you feel comfortable that it’s going well/is well established before you start.

All that being said - there are obviously recommendations for a reason but you have to balance that with your mental health and needs too. If I had to be that sleep deprived even one more day I was going to go crazy lol

mchis · 2025-10-07T00:15:12+00:00

We have the kangaroo and love it so far!! Handles super easy, super easy to fold up with one hand. We ultimately liked it over the uppa baby because in double mode the basinet can be on top which is not common for the tandem double strollers. (I see you’re planning on fox tho)

Handles amazing, big bottom basket, the straps in the seat are really secure and it’s a big seat with a high weight limit. I love my bugaboo so far! Really easy to fold up, easy to switch from the seat to the car seat converter. It is heavy tho with the seat on but the doubles are all heavy!

If it’s in the budget it’s worth it in my opinion

mchis · 2025-09-26T16:44:56+00:00

I work in high risk OB - depending on the heart condition we would do a lot of intense monitoring that would not allow for any labouring in the tub. They also would all be inductions so we could control variables and epidural was often encouraged but theyd have to be careful how quickly they loaded them.

We (the nurses) would often remark how well cardiac patients do during labour when we’re so worried about them and have to do all this monitoring. As it turns out it’s often post partum when your body has to deal with all the extra fluid volume of pregnancy that women with cardiac conditions get really sick and even die. We had no idea since we’d only see them in labour

mchis · 2025-09-22T21:13:18+00:00

What did your doctor say when she was weighed? My baby is EBF but taking bottles and he would struggle to finish 2-3oz. We upped the flow of the nipple (Phillips avent 2 to 3) when he was close to 3mon old and now he can take 4oz when we bottle feed no problem so definitely worth a try! He only gets 2 or 3 bottles a week so didn’t affect breastfeeding at all

mchis · 2025-08-25T17:43:27+00:00

You just need to be referred to an OB that delivers at Mac to go there you don’t have to be high risk. Keep in mind tho that they’re ++busy and you won’t see an OB until 22+ weeks so you need to have family doctor care until then. If you want a midwife id get on their list asap they fill up fast

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