Birthing at Northside?

[southernfriedkarma]

I am 24 weeks pregnant with our first baby, and we're planning a midwife attended homebirth.  We are, however, seeing an OB for back-up in case we need to be transferred to the hospital for the birth.  Our OB only delivers at Northside, though, and I'm looking for some recent experiences with delivering there.  Can I refuse to have the baby taken away from me after birth?  Can DP go with the baby if he or she needs to go to the nursery or NICU?  Will I get any trouble for refusing eye goop/ Vitamin K/ Hep vaccine?  I've heard they push formula supplementation - any truth to this?  Are there other policies I should know about?  What's the absolute fastest we can go home (assuming everyone is healthy)?

I'm hoping not to be transferred, but I'd like to be prepared if we do end up at the hospital.  

[milosmomma]

I delivered my daughter at Northside in March.  For whatever reason, several of my nurses this time were either Caribbean or Asian and really supportive of attachment parenting & more holistic medicine.  (This could just be a coincidence, I don't know)

It was my third birth (2nd VBAC) there.  All good experiences (the 2nd two were the VBACs and much better, but that probably had more to do with MY level of knowledge than anything else). 

After both VBACs the baby stayed skin to skin on my chest until I was ready to put a diaper on.  The only time they were out of arm's reach was when they were being measured, and that was just on the other side of the room.

With #1 they offered formula, along with a lactation consultant.  With #2, they mentioned that it was in the bassinet cabinet.  This last time, they didn't even mention it to me.

With #2, I delivered at 2p and was out the next morning.  This last time, DD was jaundiced so we were there for a extra day.

I know the reputation that Northside has, but I've been happy with all of my experiences.   I hope this helps.

[kindyll]

I delivered at Northside in October, and generally had a good experience.  I went natural up until the end, but DD was sunny side up and got lodged up against my bones, so we ended up with a c-section.  The doc didn't let me do skin to skin after the section, because they needed to sew me up.  I nursed in the recovery room though. 

DH went with DD for cleanup and weighing etc.  We refused eye goo/K/hep B and they had us sign the piece of paper about it, but didn't blink an eye or try to argue. 

The nurses were all very supportive of breast feeding.  DD's weight started to drop a bit (I had a bunch of IV fluids because of the section, and I blame that) so they started to talk about maybe needing to supplement with formula, but they didn't push it and she didn't lose the magic 10% or more where they start to freak out for real. 

The lactation consultant is the one who actually (quite sheepishly) gave me some formula on the day I was leaving, because there are 'gift baskets' from the formula companies for new moms.  I got a similac diaper sorter that came with a giant thing of formula.  Threw out the formula, kept the sorter, end of story.

We ended up staying longer than I thought we would because of the section, but we kept DD in the room with us the whole time, except for her daily check up from the pediatrician.  A nurse would come get her (and DH) and bring her to the nursery, where there were a ton of babies all getting checked on in a row. 

I don't like that they kept doing heel prick tests to check for jaundice, and one nurse got a little snotty with me when I said no pacifier.  I asked if I could feed her during the test to give her comfort instead, and they said no because the tests etc have to be done in the nursery.    With the number if babies in the nursery, I can see how it would be easier to deal with having them all right there, but it still annoyed me that I couldn't hold her etc while they poked and prodded her.  In retrospect, I am curious what they would have done if they came to get her and I said no.