Low risk women/better birth facilities - unfair?

[Glassofshloer]

When DD was a baby we attended a breastfeeding appointment at my local stand-alone birth centre and WOW! To say it was gorgeous is an understatement - double bed, huge whirlpool bath thing, fairy lights and bouncy balls in every room. Looked like the Ritz compared to the tiny, dimly lit room on the CDU where I gave birth. Just a bed and some wall stickers of flowers

AIBU to think this is unfair on high risk/Consultant led women? And that we all deserve equal facilities, high risk or not? Fully prepared to be told IABU!

@Glassofshloer

Do fairy lights and double beds make a difference when you’re in established labour?

But a lot of women on CDU aren’t in established labour if they’re being induced.

I was taken to CDU at 2am, had my waters popped & then had 4 hours of early labour before they decided to put me on the drip. In hindsight I started having regular contractions immediately, baby was fine and there was no need to put me on a drip other than to speed things up presumably for their own convenience - had my waters broken naturally, I would’ve been sent home for 24 hours to see if labour started on its own, so not sure what the difference is 🤷🏼‍♀️ but that’s another story..

Anyway, I really would’ve liked a pool for those first few hours at least, I was exhausted and in pain but instead had to walk around a tiny room, half of which was taken up by my bags.

DH was also exhausted after being awake for 24 hours, and could’ve done with a nap on a double bed/sofa bed rather than sat upright in a plastic chair. Yes, I know the NHS doesn’t ‘owe’ anything to birth partners, but given they rely on them for postnatal care these days, it would’ve been much better had one of us been rested.

Baby was born in the late afternoon and we were immediately wheeled off to postnatal ward - certainly within half an hour at most. Postnatal ward was a bay of 8(!!) women and their newborns, at that point I hadn’t slept for nearly 2 days but couldn’t drop off because of the level of noise in the room. One lady was watching Love Island off her phone in the opposite bed with no headphones.

I had had a lot of stitches and really couldn’t climb out of bed or stand to reach DD, if I pushed the bell it would take a long time for anyone to come. I wanted to send DH home but I had no choice but to ask him to stay because I couldn’t cope on my own.

I was on that ward for 4 days, every day it was full of visitors and children running around, including in and out of my cubicle when my stitches were being examined because they had become infected. Which was humiliating to say the least.

I was nearly hallucinating with exhaustion by the time I was discharged, it took me a very long time to physically recover from a relatively straightforward birth which I put down to the sheer stress and exhaustion of my experience.

So yes I do feel it’s very unfair that some women have the whole pool, double bed, quiet room, one-on-one midwife experience just because they happen not to have my medical condition. It feels like being kicked when you’re already down to be honest.

*Note I said nothing about fairy lights.

Agree with everything you say here, and you went through so much. All of it avoidable. Didn’t have to be that way

Pool room isn’t in the mlu here it’s in the main hospital delivery ward.

Also again I said for post delivery rooms a lot of midwife led still stick you in shared wards or you just planning to pick and choose what I said?

I said my own midwife led unit postnatal word is what led me to wanting homebirths and to demand a direct discharge from the pool room when I had no choice but to go in due to lack of midwifes?

I honestly think the first thing to campaign on is adequate staffing levels. Not the rooms.

Theres no guarantee of anything though with the current system. Even fully birthing a baby at home, you may need to go in to hospital and to the postnatal ward if there are any issues after such as issues delivering the placenta. It’s less likely but still possible. And of course you could refuse to leave your house.

@Horst

Pool room isn’t in the mlu here it’s in the main hospital delivery ward.

The point still stands, you got the pool facility, something most MLU rooms have but CDU rooms don’t - shouldn’t everyone have the options you had..? Unless they’re on a drip from the word go, there’s no reason they can’t use it for a few hours of relaxation and pain relief at least?

what do you think the reasons are for maternity care being so woefully underfunded?

The underfunding that has made the entirety of the NHS so woeful is a large factor. Medicalisation of birth is another and the wider range of antenatal care. Everything comes with a price - before scans, amniocentesis, etc became part of antenatal care all the money in maternity services was focussed on birth and postnatal care, now the money has to stretch further. Obviously you could say just put more funding in but which services do you take it from?

What do you think about women's pain not being taking as seriously as men's?

It’s very difficult to say whether this is true since there’s no directly comparable situation for men. To use your example, your brother’s GA affected only him, yours affected you and your baby. GAs are used less for everyone now, hip and knee replacements are carried out with an epidural and sedation.

The thing that would really improve women’s birth experience in my view is more midwives and HCAs to support them during and after birth. I think it’s really shocking that women have to deal with random men up close and personal when they’re at their most vulnerable because they’re expected to look after their partners. But where are those midwives going to come from when the NHS is already haemorrhaging them?

I don’t have the answers but I think attributing the problem to misogyny and sexism is unhelpful because it doesn’t help us find solutions.

@Bookingfatigued

Theres no guarantee of anything though with the current system. Even fully birthing a baby at home, you may need to go in to hospital and to the postnatal ward if there are any issues after such as issues delivering the placenta. It’s less likely but still possible. And of course you could refuse to leave your house.

Of course, my point is at least the home birther has options even if for various reasons they can’t use them - CDU mums don’t even start out with the options. It’s assumed they should just be grateful to have medical attention at all & they get shoved in a cupboard with a bed in it.

I'm high risk and just glad that I'll be getting safe medical interventions.

Because using it for only a few Horus of relaxation stops someone using the room properly.

On one hand we have this whole it’s what mum wants it’s her body her medical experience then in the other side it’s but I want it to look like hotel room with plush cushions and candles. Make up your mind.

Nobody has to be consultant led you can go against it. If you don’t trust them to know what’s best for you.

My pool room again looked like a standard labour but with a big bath/pool in the middle a radio and some rope light around it.

My midwife led was a room with a corner bath (not allowed to deliver in) bean bags on the floor then a full on bed with leg stirrups should they be needed.

None looked like plush hotels they look like delivery rooms.

The point still stands, you got the pool facility, something most MLU rooms have but CDU rooms don’t - shouldn’t everyone have the options you had..? Unless they’re on a drip from the word go, there’s no reason they can’t use it for a few hours of relaxation and pain relief at least?

Agree with this. I was high risk at the very end of pregnancy due to raised blood pressure - I can’t think on what planet it would be conducive to relaxation and lowering BP to carry on blindly with an induction with a baby in no immediate danger but in back to back position (due to being in hospital night before said induction), confine the woman to her back with loads of monitors on, hardly any access to food, the additional pain of stronger closer contractions due to the induction itself, then tell her several times in established labour that an epidural was coming and then it wasn’t but then also not allow use of a pool 🤷‍♀️

I don’t have the answers but I think attributing the problem to misogyny and sexism is unhelpful because it doesn’t help us find solutions.

Even if the problem is related to sexism and misogyny?

Ignoring the reasons why women continue to receive poor care will not help find solutions either.

You say that it's difficult to say if it's true that women's pain is not taken as seriously as men- Google 'women's pain not taken seriously' and see the long list of results. I'll add just a few:

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/books/2019/sep/02/why-dont-doctors-trust-women-because-they-dont-know-much-about-us

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-9444891/amp/Womens-pain-perceived-intense-mens-pain.html

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.scotsman.com/health/insight-will-womens-health-finally-be-taken-seriously-3295608%3famp

@Horst I feel like you're being deliberately obtuse. Postnatal care is still rubbish for women who deliver on CDU. The difference is you got to labour in a calm environment, most CDU do not consist of the facilities you've described while labouring, no one is trying to take them away from you, just give them to others too. Everyone deserves the same standard of health care, regardless of background and medical conditions.

@Horst

Because using it for only a few Horus of relaxation stops someone using the room properly.

On one hand we have this whole it’s what mum wants it’s her body her medical experience then in the other side it’s but I want it to look like hotel room with plush cushions and candles. Make up your mind.

Nobody has to be consultant led you can go against it. If you don’t trust them to know what’s best for you.

My pool room again looked like a standard labour but with a big bath/pool in the middle a radio and some rope light around it.

My midwife led was a room with a corner bath (not allowed to deliver in) bean bags on the floor then a full on bed with leg stirrups should they be needed.

None looked like plush hotels they look like delivery rooms.

What is ‘using it properly’? If you mean actually giving birth in water, you need to re-read the thread - nearly half of first time mums in MLUs get transferred to labour ward, so won’t be ‘using it properly’.

Overall, including second+ time mums, a quarter will be transferred to labour ward. So they won’t be ‘using it properly’.

And out of all women that give birth in an MLU that start in the pool, a third get out to deliver. So they’re not ‘using it properly’.

As a first time mum, you had less than a 50% chance of a spontaneous VB, so the odds weren’t in your favour to ‘use the pool properly’ when you got in.

So if the prerequisite of having a pool is that you definitely give birth in it, almost nobody should be offered one, including you 🤷🏼‍♀️

Was that all you took from my post @WrapAroundYourDreams? How disappointing.

I didn’t have a pool for my first birth. I was high Rick consultant led who gave birth in the midwife led because there was no other rooms for me. I was actually told to go home because they didn’t believe I was in labour despite being 9cm when I appeared at triage.

“Because using it for only a few Horus of relaxation stops someone using the room properly.”

The few hours of relaxation and pain relief might be the difference between a baby turning into a better position for birthing, hence avoiding epidural, episiotomy or emergency c section and avoiding a long stay on the postnatal ward.

You don't seem to be taking much from mine @Blossomtoes, to read up on women's pain not being taken seriously, and a woman who doesn't want to see the misogyny that impacts on us is more than 'disappointing' tbh.

@Horst

I didn’t have a pool for my first birth. I was high Rick consultant led who gave birth in the midwife led because there was no other rooms for me. I was actually told to go home because they didn’t believe I was in labour despite being 9cm when I appeared at triage.

Sorry your posts are quite muddled. So you had a high risk VB in the MLU, and subsequent water births? But you don’t think other high risk women (even second+ time mums, like you were when you had water births) should be entitled to a pool? Because they won’t use it properly?

I was high risk based on age nothing more.

I then had a home birth because I was treated like shit on post natal.

Then a pool birth because yet again midwifes didn’t believe I was in labour so by the time they realised I was there was no more community midwifes.

The rooms I gave birth in made not one tiny bit of difference to the labours or deliveries I had. That’s my point. It’s the midwifes and their attitudes that made the whole experience different.

@WrapAroundYourDreams

You don't seem to be taking much from mine *@Blossomtoes*, to read up on women's pain not being taken seriously, and a woman who doesn't want to see the misogyny that impacts on us is more than 'disappointing' tbh.

You mean because I don’t lazily attribute the deterioration in maternity care to misogyny? Because I’ve given the issue some thought and analysis to why it’s got worse in the last few decades? OK. I thought this was an intelligent discussion.

You could have a lovely fairy tale room but if you’ve got a shitty midwife who talks to you like crap like you know nothing no matter what room you in it will be shit.

You could give birth in the corridor with an amazing midwife who cares and looks after you amazingly and it would be a much better experience than the plush room.

Wow, you're lovely aren't you @Blossomtoes, basically calling anyone with a different opinion to you thick.

It isn't lazy to consider that just maybe, some of the issues surrounding women's poor maternity care are down to inherit sexism. You've given it some thought and analysis? Believe it or not, others have, and may have come to different conclusions. Did you even read this, that I posted earlier in the thread?

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/04/as-long-as-sexism-lies-at-the-heart-of-childcare-babies-and-women-will-continue-to-die

@Horst

I was high risk based on age nothing more.

I then had a home birth because I was treated like shit on post natal.

Then a pool birth because yet again midwifes didn’t believe I was in labour so by the time they realised I was there was no more community midwifes.

The rooms I gave birth in made not one tiny bit of difference to the labours or deliveries I had. That’s my point. It’s the midwifes and their attitudes that made the whole experience different.

I see. And what about other women sent to CDU based on age alone? Why do they not deserve a pool?

Quality of midwife care isn’t inversely proportional to how nice your room is - it’s not like having shit facilities make better midwife care more likely, why can’t we have high expectations of both?

And this- 'patriarchal ideas of female inadequacy', as mentioned in this article, seems spot on from the experiences I love had:

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.independent.co.uk/voices/nhs-maternity-scandal-shrewsbury-telford-hospital-birth-trauma-pregnancy-a9210241.html%3famp