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[Pinstar]

An optional toggle to a hospital zone, if enabled, it would impact the behavior of dwarven mothers.

With a hospital zone defined with a maternity ward, the following would happen.

If a dwarven mother comes due to give birth, she will still interrupt her current job, but instead of giving birth on the spot, she will make her way to the hospital zone. If there is an empty bed she would claim it, stay there for awhile before finally giving birth.

Giving birth in a hospital zone in a bed would generate a happy thought.

A new wood-only item would be available for production at a carpenter's shop: The Crib

If a crib is placed in a hospital zone, newborns will be placed in it rather than carried around by their mothers.
Newborns in a crib must be given food and water by hospital workers in the same way that injured dwarves are. The main benefit being that the mother does not endanger her infant by carrying them around all the time, allowing them to more safely serve in the military. That said, you must ensure that there are nurses in the hospital who have access to food and water or the infant will starve or die of thirst.

Goblin snatchers are naturally attracted to cribs and will try to steal children out of them.

Cribs can also be placed in bedrooms. If a mother is carrying her infant and goes to their room to sleep, they'll deposit their infant in the crib first. This doesn't serve any huge purpose, though the crib will add to the room's value in the same way that any other furniture does.

Babies who grow old enough to become children will automatically leave their cribs and act normally.

If your fort doesn't have a maternity ward, dwarven mothers will act exactly the same as they do now, giving birth in the field and carrying their children.
If there are no available beds in a hospital when a mother shows up to give birth, she'll just give birth on the floor but receive a bad thought.
If there are no open cribs in a maternity ward, the mother will still carry the infant around with them.


Stretch suggestion:
I'm not sure if gender-specific jobs are possible, but if so, make a new skill: Wet Nurse

The 'skill' cannot be used untrained. Males cannot gain xp in this skill.
The act of giving birth gives wet nurse xp to the mother, enough to give at least one level in this skill, even if she doesn't have the labor enabled.

A wet nurse enabled labor will cause the nurse to perform the following jobs.
If there are infants in the hospital zone who are hungry or thirsty, they will feed them. Doing so satisfies both hunger and thirst of the infant but does not require any food or fresh water. The mother will gain more skill in wet-nurse every time she performs this job. Each time this job is performed, the mother the father and the infant all get good thoughts about "Urist McWetnurse took good care of my baby/me". The strength of the happy thought would be tied to the skill level of the wet nurse. The wet-nurse will gain happy/unhappy thoughts depending on their personality, with a preference for caring for others generating happy thoughts.

If there are any infants not being carried by their mothers, (Mother died, or a failed goblin snatcher attack) a wet-nurse will attempt to bring them to a hospital zone and put them in cribs. If infants need to be moved to another location (due to burrow orders) wet-nurses will act as infant haulers as needed.

Migrant women who come to the fort with a child will have a random skill level in wet-nurse.

[Meph]

I really like this, good suggestion.

[callisto8413]

I like it.   Adds detail but nothing a player can't handle with a little planning.  A birth should generate good thoughts and be in a semi-clean place and not in the barracks or in the mines or during a battle or during a meal in a public dining area.  Eh...

[Rimmy, Sniper]

This is a really good idea, finally meaning that Urist MrsAwesomeSwordsdwarf will stop using her infant as a shield from Orc snipers.

I do think that the crib in bedroom idea should be expanded on a bit, in that if the mother is called to military duty (and there is no Maternity Ward), she will put him/her in the crib and retrieve them when the military duty is over. I'd say do it for all jobs, but then the infant would starve as the mother would keep getting job after job and not feeding her infant.

[Maklak]

Giving birth in a hospital isn't normal, because a pregnancy is not a disease. When her time comes, a woman can go to some bushes and return with an infant, or stay at home and send for a midwife. Either way she can go back to working in the field the next day.

That said, I'm not particularly keen on children following their mothers all the time or wandering around and getting in harm's way. An ability to burrow or pasture kids would mostly solve it for me. As for orphans, I've run into that problem and I'd like an aunt or any other woman to adopt the kid instead of watching it die from thirst.

[forward]

Really good idea, but is it sensible to tie the crib feeding to a hospital zones and nurses? I think baby could be fed also in a bedroom or dormitory crib. Mother just has to cancel her other duties every once in a while. It's less efficient, I know, but I like more of an idea of seeing mother feeding the baby at home and a proud father standing around getting happy thoughts, instead of a big baby ward. It would also be more realistic.

-> wet nurse idea could still work, it would just not be constricted to a hospital zone. Wet nurse could have access to other people's bedroom if there's a baby and take care of them, while their mothers are serving in the military.

[Xazo-Tak]

Here's the problem with wet-nurses though:



Not that I have any idea how lactating works, aside from the obvious temporal post-birth.

[forward]

I don't see a problem. Just google wet nurse. Suckling (or use of breast pump) secretes prolactin, that can start lactation regardless of pregnancy.

It makes sense that wet nursing is a skill, since continuous breast feeding rises prolactin level and keeps it high. Getting rusty is also sensible, I think, since without breastfeeding prolactin level drops. Low skill level would possibly require longer time/multiple attempts, before baby could be fed, or it might fail all together. After giving birth wet nursing skill should get a temporal boost (important!).

(From this it also follows, that good wet nurses are usually mothers themselves, since they've had training.)

[Yoink]

I remember that one fort where I tried to make a heavily-defended underground nursery to keep them stupid brats from getting snatched.
It worked pretty well, had a little guardpost and barracks at the entrance, food stockpiles and all kids (and mothers with babies) were burrowed in there. Ended up being the last surviving part of the fort when the rest of it was overrun by a siege- I remember, when all seemed lost, the leader of the 'Nursery Guards' charging out with his warbear and breaking the siege.


...Regardless of that rambly nonsense, I love this idea!

[Xazo-Tak]

I don't see a problem. Just google wet nurse. Suckling (or use of breast pump) secretes prolactin, that can start lactation regardless of pregnancy.

It makes sense that wet nursing is a skill, since continuous breast feeding rises prolactin level and keeps it high. Getting rusty is also sensible, I think, since without breastfeeding prolactin level drops. Low skill level would possibly require longer time/multiple attempts, before baby could be fed, or it might fail all together. After giving birth wet nursing skill should get a temporal boost (important!).

(From this it also follows, that good wet nurses are usually mothers themselves, since they've had training.)

Alright then.
How about giving birth to a child instantly gives a couple thousand exp in wet nurse, and taking care of any child slowly gives exp in wet nurse?
And yes, also powerful rust mechanics.

[callisto8413]

When you remember that some females can have six or seven kids by the time they arrive, your going to get some wet nurses right off the bat.

I like the idea of assigning cribs to bedrooms or allowing them to be free.

(How would you assign the cribs?   No last names -  put a crib in a bedroom and take five minutes trying to figure out whose babies belongs to that family)

Maybe a crib in a bedroom is automatically used by the owners, just as if you placed a bin or chest in there.

Like the idea of a Maternity ward.  Maybe keep some food in their for the mothers or the wet nurses.  Maybe even assign a bed to them inside the ward to encourage them to stay with the babies.  Brings up a lot of cool ideas on how to get it to work.   

Course, if the baby dies you will just feel even more horrible.   

Do you have any idea about how to deal with orphans?

[Waparius]

It'd probably be easier on the player if dwarven parents just claimed cribs and put them in rooms on their own - if they worked as tools or something instead of just furniture. Though that might be a bit trickier to put in at present.

[Repseki]

It's a cool idea, but I have a feeling the most likely outcome would be a whole lot of babies dying of dehydration while their parents or the wet-nurses attend parties in the Main Hall.

[Sutremaine]

It'd happen no more often than hospitalised dwarves starving or dehydrating.

[Dovale]

This sounds nice.