Stay as a (currently unhappy) midwife or train to be a health visitor

[Monr0e]

I posted a few months ago about how much I was struggling as a newly qualified midwife and received lots of really helpful messages of support and advice. I had hoped as time went on that I would start to feel more comfortable and confident in my position. I have now rotated to another ward and while I am finding it better in terms of the staff, I am still not happy. The whole maternity unit is chronically understaffed, we are constantly being pulled back to delivery suite leaving the staff on the ward overwhelmed with work. I find myself physically and emotionally drained after every shift.

I had been looking at my options and applied for a student health visitor post. I found out this week I have been offered a place on the course. However, the following day I have also been informed that if I wish I can transfer onto a community team later in the year and be a community midwife.

So now I am torn! Do I stay in a job that I trained the last 3 years for but which is currently making me very miserable in the hope that I will be happier in a community role? Or do I train for a further year to be a health visitor and leave midwifery behind?

If anyone has any experience of this, or has retrained and can give me some insight I would be extremely grateful. I realise I am very lucky to have this choice at this time, I just want to make the right one. Thank you

I’d personally give the community midwife job a go. You’ve trained hard for 3 years and if you change jobs this quickly you won’t have built up enough skills to easily go back in a few years. Health visitor training posts come up every year. Can you defer your place for a year to give you time to try out the midwifery job?

That's worth a try I guess, I could enquire about deferring. I haven't seen many other student health visitor jobs being advertised though, this has been the only one I have seen in my area so far.

I'd definitely give the community job a go. You won't get the opportunity again, and like PP said, you have always got HV training as a future option.
Maybe they will let you defer your place till next year, if you are worried about losing it?

Wondering if you work with me tbh!

Have you looked at other trusts? Some are better staffed and have less women.

I too am considering options at present. Hv isn't for me though as I think there's a lot of safeguarding and that is one of my least favourite areas.

I work on labour ward and as much as I love it, the sheer amount of work leaves me mentally and physically exhausted. It certainly isn't sustainable.

If you think hv would suit you then I would take the place offered.

There is a huge shortage of midwives, certainly within my county you can practically walk into a mw job. The hv training posts are limited.

My best mate is now a hv and does agency and bank work as a mw to keep her skills. She much prefers this and is far happier.

I actually think you’ve got more chance of another community midwife job in the future than HV training place. So you could do the training and if it’s not for you go back to midwifery.

But is it out of the frying pan and into the fire? Being a HV will have it’s own set of stresses and pressures. Where I am the HV have been taken over by the council......they’re now paid on council rates not agenda for change and are financially worse off.

Do you think you’d enjoy HV work? Lots of working with very vulnerable families, safeguarding, working with childrens services, etc? I would hate it. But some people must find it rewarding.

I've had times where I've struggled in a field not dissimilar to you. The advice I was given that I have applied lots of times I've struggled with work is if you're not sure go with what keeps your options open.
I'm not sure about how and whether you can go back to midwifery if you leave or how often HV training posts come up (but I'm sure it will be more than once) but in general I would advise to shut down future options as little as you can.
My gut would say try the community post and then if you're still not enjoying it you know you gave the profession a really good go. If you like it then you can stay in the profession you have trained hard for. Different roles and even different Trusts can feel like completely different jobs. If you can defer your HV opportunity even better. But like I said I'm not aware of how rare the opportunities are.
Good luck whichever you choose.

Oh and if you are really unhappy remember midwifery is a qualification not a life sentence

I have a relative who trained as a HV after being a midwife. She eventually left because of the safe guarding issues. I would say go for the community role. As others say, you can always choose HV at a later date.

I’d give community midwifery a chance, I left an incredibly busy, understaffed unit for community midwifery 7 years ago and have never looked back, I get to give good quality care, build up relationships with families and provide continuity of care in a way I never could before. Some community midwives feel they become deskilled but I do on calls and feel the positives massively out way the negatives. I’m less exhausted on my days off and the hours are generally more family friendly. Health visiting wouldn’t be for me, but I’ve had friends who’ve done it and loved it and two others who returned to midwifery after a year or two. So as you can see I’m biased to community midwifery but hope this helps.

With community midwifery think about whereabouts your unit is with continuity teams. Would you enjoy working in that model? Some love it, some hate it. It’s coming everywhere......maybe only for a few years until the next big review but it’ll be rolled out most places.

Thanks everyone, lots to think about. My worry is I'll be just as unhappy on community and miss my chance but its definitely worth seeing if I can defer for a year.

I know it's difficult at the current time but have you spent any time with health visitors? I imagine it's quite a different job and like pp said a lot of safeguarding.

OP, I’m a nurse, have been qualified for 7 years now.
I remember feeling how you feel, and sometimes I still do feel that way.
Being newly qualified is HARD. Wards understaffed, you get less support and more responsibilities than you should have.
Older staff can be hard going too, they can be mean, unsupportive and very set in their ways.
My life was made miserable at the start because of a certain old school nurse who felt that I needed to prove myself to her.
But it gets (mostly) better. I’ve rotated though 3 wards now, and I am happy where I am. I couldn’t imagine doing anything other than critical care.
Some days are still hard and there will always be those days but some days will be amazing.
At the end of the day, you can choose to do your health visiting qualification, and also maintain enough hours to stay on the midwifery register (it doesn’t take a lot) by working bank shifts. Then you would have the option to switch back at a later date.
This probably doesn’t sound the way that I want it to, but I’m crap at typing things out!