Selfies from the delivery room

People are snapping, filming and live-ticking in the delivery room. This harms the child and makes the midwives' and doctors' work more difficult.
When do we miss something? When the overwhelming moment is over and we haven't captured it? Or when we haven't savoured the moment because we were busy pressing the trigger?
Parents-to-be also have to ask themselves these questions. At least since the reflex has become second nature to us: when something special happens, the mobile phone is at hand. Photograph and share.

It's not uncommon for a child to be born at 8.34pm and photographed for the first time at 8.37pm. "We sometimes have to say to the fathers in a friendly but emphatic manner: 'Why don't you take a look at the child first? Stroke it. Make eye contact," says Bernd Gerresheim, Head of Obstetrics at Bethesda Hospital in Basel. "A photo shouldn't be the first thing you take." Of course you can send a photo to the grandparents a few hours later. "But I sometimes have to say to the parents: This is your moment now!"

Chatting instead of talking

The mobile phone has arrived in the delivery room. To the chagrin of many midwives and doctors. The smartphone makes communication more difficult, says Gerresheim. Especially in the early stages of labour, when the woman is still chatting with friends and relatives. Some mothers virtually ticker live from the delivery room, keeping those around them up to date on the labour pains and getting supportive comments. "We often don't have their full attention because they have one eye on WhatsApp messages."

Gerresheim sees fathers sitting in the corner playing on their mobile phones or answering work emails during this phase. "The partner doesn't have to constantly jump around the woman, rub her back or hold her hand. But he should be there, be present." The best thing would be to ban mobile phones, says Gerresheim. "But I find bans problematic." He prefers to sensitise expectant parents to the issue. However, there are also hospitals that prohibit photography and filming in the delivery room, such as Bülach ZH.

The opening phase sometimes lasts hours - but little seems to happen, says Jessica Pehlke-Milde from the Institute of Midwifery at the Zurich University of Applied Sciences. "The beginning also requires a lot of attention. You shouldn't wait for the hours to pass, but instead pay attention to body signals and, depending on the situation, actively go into relaxation or activate labour."

Missed experiences

"You take on the perspective of a reporter of your own life," writes Zurich media psychologist Daniel Süss in the magazine of the midwives' association. This creates the risk of missing out on significant experiences internally and therefore only being able to process them superficially. Taking photos and being present in the moment at the same time is not possible. "Multitasking is an illusion: you can't have your full attention in several places at the same time, you can only quickly switch your focus back and forth."

There are even women who take their own photos during labour, such as the photographers Lisa Robinson-Ward and Lauren Chenault. Their pictures went viral. German influencer Janine Fischer also had herself filmed giving birth. So did model Lisa d'Amato: she streamed live on Facebook as her child was born. No such cases are yet known in Switzerland.

Birth is a highly intimate moment - "an event that needs to be protected", says Professor Pehlke-Milde. "And I don't know whether it's right for children to be able to watch their own birth later." Midwives feel more monitored by film recordings and are more afraid of making mistakes and being sued for them later. This does not have a relaxing effect on the atmosphere in the labour room.

Mobile phones during birth are only an issue for women if they receive an epidural anaesthetic, says Andrea Pollheimer, a midwife from Riehen BS. Without the pain suppression, a woman has no capacity to deal with a device. Not during the active labour phase anyway. "There are such powerful forces of nature at work that there is no time for it," says head physician Gerresheim.

The use of mobile phones during the postpartum period is also worrying for specialists. You should also go offline sometimes "to be fully available for your own feelings and for the needs of the people present", writes media psychologist Daniel Süss. Intimacy is not possible if you are on digital reception at the same time.

"The newborn expresses its needs through a cascade of subtle signs," says midwife Pollheimer. If it is hungry, for example, it moves its head and makes small smacking noises. It is important to sharpen your perception and focus your senses attentively on the child "so that you don't hear the last sign of hunger: the crying."

A baby also has a right to privacy

"We have to ask ourselves what we are giving the child when it is staged in photos from the very first moment," says Pollheimer. "Even very young children start posing. This turns a child into an object." The staging disturbs the child's being in the moment, the light-heartedness of not yet having to conform to any role models. And a baby cannot decide whether it wants its first minutes of life to end up on Facebook three hours later. It may be nice for parental pride when likes and heart emojis from friends arrive every minute shortly after the birth. But: "A newborn baby also has a right to privacy," says Pollheimer.

There is great magic in the moment of birth and the time afterwards. To experience this consciously and undisturbed, to fully engage with the other person, can give parents a lot of strength. Pollheimer recommends that mothers avoid using their smartphone completely during the postpartum period and communicate appointments via the father's mobile phone. "We also call this the 'baby honeymoon'. It's like being newly in love. You don't want to be disturbed and distracted all the time."

But the smart phone is not just the devil. It brings parents moral support from friends and families after the birth. When mums feel overwhelmed and alone and don't have time for calls and visits, digital messages can help. Apps document breastfeeding times and sleep patterns and turn the mobile phone into a baby monitor.

Until the 1980s, babies were strictly separated from their mothers after birth. They lay in the nursery and were only brought in to breastfeed every four hours. Fathers were only allowed to look at the newborn through a pane of glass. Today, bonding and closeness are the be-all and end-all in the puerperium; there are no more glass panes between parents and baby.

Recently, only a small screen: the smartphone.

Article from the Beobachter Familie. Published on 24.10.2019