Taking care of newborn babies is no easy thing! Recommendations and advice are constantly changing and each generation has its very own guidelines. Sometimes old advice even seem weird and dangerous! In fact, Micala Gabrielle Henson recently shared on Facebook a hospital-issued "Instruction For Mothers" sheet from 1968 that her mother found and it's quite something!
"My mom was going through her things and we say this – it's rules in regards to just having a baby," Micala Gabrielle Henson wrote on Facebook "It gave me a chuckle. How things have changed!".
If these instructions were recommended today, they would probably cause mass outrage! Take a look for yourself!
The first thing that draw attention is the narrow specific time slots for new-parents to see their newborn baby! : "Babies are on display at the nursery window from 2:30 to 3:30 p.m. and 7:00 to 7:45 p.m.," it even says "Do not ask to see baby at any other time." How sad is that!
Also, the time allowed for nursing is really spaced out and baby is only allowed to breastfeed for 5 minutes during the first day! There is no bonding time with the mother, and if you are the dad you can completely forget it as you will not be allowed during nursing periods.
New mothers were asked not to smoke when with baby, but any other time was fine? Smoking in hospitals was allowed! Nowadays, no hospital would ever allow that.
The section on banned foods for new-mothers is really something! They even put the instruction in all-caps. As a new mom you were excepted to refrain from chocolate candy, apples, cabbage, nuts, strawberries, cherries, onions, and "green cocoanut cake." What exactly is cocoanut?
The website Bored Panda interviewed Vilnius-based doctor V.J. on these recommendations and in her opinion new-parents should not rely in these old tips as they may be harmful to babies development:
“According to the newest recommendations, the child should be breastfed exclusively with its mother’s milk, even without any water. The child should feed as much as it wants, but not less often than every 3 hours. This should continue until it is 6 months old. That’s when you should start introducing new products into the child’s diet one by one, starting with vegetables,” said the doctor. “When it comes to contact between a child and its mother, skin-to-skin contact, keeping the child close, and breastfeeding strengthens the emotional connection between them. What’s more, it helps with the production of breastmilk,” she added.
What were the recommendations when you had your baby? Did you follow them?
