to ask if you had a birth plan?

[user1467032004]

First of all, I was going to post this in childbirth but it isn't very busy and thought I would get more responses in this topic. Please move if not allowed.

I'm an avid reader of the Baby Bumps sub on Reddit and noticed that a lot of the woman have birth plans prepared for the hospital. I know that in the US it is different - a lot of people pick and choose what they want to happen in labour. Some women type up massive lists of instructions and others simply make diagrams. A lot of effort goes into these! Most of the time the birth plan seems to go out of the window so I'm unsure if there's even any point.

Do the NHS offer an equivalent? We really want to start trying for a baby but are doing some research first!

P.S I've attached a birth plan I seen on baby bumps so you can see what I mean.

DW had a birth plan for the first one... It went completely out of the fucking window within a couple of hours. Didn't bother again. Complete waste of bloody time.

I find it very odd - someone has never had a baby and yet they think they know what they want!
I have never bothered - much better to be flexible and go with the flow.
Babies don't fit in nicely - they haven't read it!

I had no birth plan for my first, and my second was a load of bullet points preceded by 'I'd prefer' 'I intend to' 'provided everything is progressing as expected', etc.

So: I wanted a water birth (but accepted that if I became high risk it wouldn't happen)
Wanted delayed cord clamping (provided baby was ok)
Was happy to have an artificial delivery of placenta (once the cord was clamped)
Intended to breastfeed (as long as we were both ok).

The only absolute I had was that I did not consent to the use of forceps without clear instruction as to why they were the most appropriate course of action.

As it was I got everything I wanted, a truly crunchy birth... And then a massive bleed which resulted in me being raced to the delivery suite from the MLU, an obstetrician up to her elbow inside me and then a GA to sort it all out. It was fine though, and I still felt great afterwards - because I'd thought worst case scenario through and I was comfortable with it. For me it was a very positive experience.

Having plans causes lots of disappointments when it doesn't happen.
Much easier not to have expectations.
I had 3 lovely births, in hospitals, without a single plan.

Before I actually had a baby I couldn't understand why women would decline internal exams- wouldn't they want to know how things were progressing ect? Now ive done it myself in going to ask for internals to be kept to an absolute minimum next time, because they were the worst and most painful part of labour for me.

My midwife didn't ever discuss birthing options when I had my twins a few months ago, she said go in hoping for a natural decision but things will change you just have to take their advise on the day and do what's safest for babies.
No movement as needed constant monitoring, no real choice on meds incase of emergency c section needed to be ready with the epidural, no option of water birth.

Regardless I always dreamed of a nice calm non medical water birth. Ended up induced, waters broken 24 hours after, 20 hours of labour and an emergency c section

The only thing I had written on my birth plan was that my then partner (now DH) was to stay with me at all times but if there were complications and the baby had to be taken from me he was to stay with her. MW also asked me to state whether he could make decisions on my behalf if they felt I couldn't consent to something for me/baby, which of course I agreed to.

This was the only thing I really thought I could plan/decide. I was open minded about drugs, and allowed a student to sit in on my labour too I have medical conditions which meant I had to have a student/midwife with me at all times

I never made birth plans for any of my three as I just couldn't see any point in trying to plan the totally unpredictable.

I tend towards complicated births anyway, so just as well that I didn't attempt to plan them.