To mention March with Midwives

[Izzy24]

I’m such a tech illiterate that I have no idea how to post a link but perhaps someone can very kindly do it?

On Sunday 21st November Doulas, Midwives, Birthwork people, and families are gathering (not actually Marching) around the nation to try to bring into sharp focus the parlous state of maternity care in the UK. Midwives are on their knees and families are suffering.

Please look to see what is (and isn’t) happening.

I feel quite foolish posting this when I don’t know how to put an actual link and was hoping there might already be a thread. Thank you for reading.

@Sunshinealligator

I'd love to attend something like this, but I'd feel a little weird about it, I can't bring about change, is there anything else we can possibly do to show support to our local midwifery team?

Currently pregnant and trying to take up as little of my midwives time, knowing that her workload is absolutely massive and stressful to manage

Congratulations on your pregnancy. Your midwife wants you to take up her time because she wants you to have a safe and happy pregnancy and birth - she just wants to be able to give you that care.

And just by being at one of the vigils you can be part of the change. There are details of all the vigils on Marches with Midwives and links to suggestions for trying to raise awareness of this situation.

www.facebook.com/groups/marchwithmidwivesuk/permalink/480329229929275/

Thank you for wanting to help.

And you could sign the petition on the link upthread?

@Sunshinealligator

I'd love to attend something like this, but I'd feel a little weird about it, I can't bring about change, is there anything else we can possibly do to show support to our local midwifery team?

Currently pregnant and trying to take up as little of my midwives time, knowing that her workload is absolutely massive and stressful to manage

Thank you. But as a midwife that last part breaks my heart a little. I felt awful on my last shift trying to look after 15 women plus their babies on postnatal ward as the only midwife, more than one woman said "I'm so sorry to interrupt you, I can see you're so busy" I don't want women to feel like that, it's awful! Making connections with women whether in community, in labour or postnatal is why I do my job and makes it worthwhile. Please do take up our time! We want to look after you! I love my job, I want to provide good care where everyone leaves feeling like they were given enough time. I am angry that we are so often not able to provide that.

Our local March with Midwives is going to be a family centred event with face painting for the little ones. I can't go as I'm working(!) but my husband is thinking about taking our kids down. He never protests, has never done anything remotely political so the fact he's even considering going speaks volumes.

I'll definitely sign the petition and look into how to take part in the vigil. I've had 5 babies, each time the midwives have been excellent despite being so busy.
With my last, the one midwife was looking after 12 mums and 12 newborns, all in the ' at risk of infections' rooms. She was so apologetic at the time it took her to help someone, it wasn't her fault they were short staffed as usual

@PillowySoft

Exactly this. 💔

And it is not easy being married to a midwife.

@Sh05

Thank you. Thank you.

I am a retired midwife. I completely support women being with women.There is far too much meddling and rushing. Women being forced to endure neglect and humiliation, surrounded by men they dont know on the post natal ward is disgraceful. There should be enough staff that women and babies can be able to recover from birth in safety and dignity. Animals in zoos get better care.
We need more midwives and they deserve respect and a decent wage.

I think it’s the whole of the NHS that is underfunded and under staffed. I blame the government.

Thank you to everyone who has read/contributed to this thread.

Please could anyone who has used/will use/knows someone who has/will use maternity services try to sign the petition and support the vigils on 21/11/21.

I do agree with @PeachesPumpkin that there are problems throughout the NHS. The problems in Maternity care are reaching tipping point BUT there are changes that could happen quickly which could start to make a difference and we can enable those by signing and vigilling.

Oh dear - I didn’t see it. All I’m trying to do is raise awareness of the vigils, awareness of the petition and , most of all, awareness that maternity services really are in desperate need of change. I believe we really have reached that tipping point.

I really thought Mumsnetters would be interested in this but I think perhaps I was wrong.

Sorry, an awful lot of reallys there 🤷‍♀️

@PeachesPumpkin

I think it’s the whole of the NHS that is underfunded and under staffed. I blame the government.

And yet, the various trusts have thousands of pounds to throw at Stonewall. Not to mention all the time and money wasted in erasing any words that refer to women from their literature. Meanwhile, the word "man" is allowed to remain untouched.

Strange, that.

I am so, so tired. I just cried on the way home from my shift.

I feel like every aspect of my life is only half done. My work is never finished. I have no time for my children. I have nothing left to give.

Please march with us. Women, birthing people, babies and families deserve to have whole midwives. We all deserve better than this.

@PeachesPumpkin

I think it’s the whole of the NHS that is underfunded and under staffed. I blame the government.

As well as that I think a hell of a lot of the money they do have is wasted.

This is such a huge important issue which just seems to be continuily swept under the carpet.

Mu colleagues are exhausted, completely running on empty. Half are off sick, the other half petrified that they will be next. We are in a permanent state of fear. Fearful of letting women and families down, fearful of coming on shift to a full board and staff shortages again, fearful of colleagues not returning, fearful of joining them, fearful of letting down our remaining colleagues because at some point we have to put our own health first before trying to care for anyone else.

I’ll be there. I may be a bit broken but I will no go down quietly. Maternity services need help. Now.

There's a vigil in my town and I'm not working so will try to attend (not a midwife but I'm a nurse standing in solidarity).

I'm expecting twins in May (will be forced into an induction April though) and I'm dreading the birth/being stuck in a postnatal ward after.

I think part of the problem is that a lot of people, myself included, don't want to complain about poor maternity care because its too upsetting and you want to focus on your baby and move on. I probably would benefit from counselling one day because even after 7 years I'm still upset by my second birth so just couldn't get involved in anything like this.

I agree with the comment above. I was so traumatised by my birth and the way that midwives treated me (which I'm sure in part was because they were so overstretched) that I can't bring myself to attend this march. I want to be supportive but not one single midwife (in hospital, my community midwife was exceptionally good) was supportive of me.

@October2020

I agree with the comment above. I was so traumatised by my birth and the way that midwives treated me (which I'm sure in part was because they were so overstretched) that I can't bring myself to attend this march. I want to be supportive but not one single midwife (in hospital, my community midwife was exceptionally good) was supportive of me.

@October2020 This is so so hard to hear. We are there to be your advocate, your voice, your support. Your memory of your childs birth should be one of your happiest not one of your worst.

I'm so sorry you received poor care. Please believe that the vast majority of us do the job because we want the best for you, your babies and your families.

The state of midwifery in the UK is at crisis point. I've been in the job since 1993 and never known morale and conditions so bad. We are massively understaffed, staff retention at an all time low, many many students qualify and leave within months as unable to cope with the stress. Many experienced midwives suffering with PTSD.

We are being forced by the government to set up continuity of care teams which for many midwives will need retraining in high risk care and vice versa high risk midwives retraining for community setting.
Many midwives in my unit do not want to work like this for so many reasons which involve financial and work life balance though they say we will benefit from it. We won't.

We have been there before with teams which caused massive burn out and midwives either left or returned to work in the unit.
At our unit we have been told we have to use our own car when the teams are set up. Many midwives car share with their partner and have been told they can lease a new car!! Why should we take on a debt to do our job. When on call the single parent midwives have to arrange child care with costs whether they are called out or not.

They have no real plan, at least not in my unit, for retraining midwives who have been working in community for 20+ years to come in and look after high risk labouring and sometimes seriously ill women, yet women are being told how lovely it is to know your midwife who will see you through your whole pregnancy but they aren't telling them the same midwife might not have worked on a labour ward in over 20 years.

I could say so much more and in my unit we have spoken out but plans are still ongoing for continuity teams which is laughable as we can't even staff our own unit to template never mind teams. We rely on our staff working bank shifts to cover the gaps.

Just so tired of it all. We have to do something now. Please march with us if you can we are doing this for you and your children and the future of midwifery in this country.

Completely agree that continuity of carer is pie in the sky. And I’m not massively convinced it is what women want. Or certainly not what is top of their list.

What I wanted when I gave birth was someone who was kind, caring, knowledgeable and good at their job. I didn’t care if I’d never met them before.

I think if women knew that a continuity of carer model meant potentially being cared for on a high risk labour ward in an escalating situation by a community midwife who has spent the last 15 years working out of GP surgeries and Sure Start centres who has no passion for high risk care they’d think again. Or a midwife whose passion is high risk labour care, who can start a woman on the protocol in 10 minutes flat while keeping a smile on her face and providing a calming presence to the scared mother would be sitting in on the MARAC meeting or making recommendations to social services regarding whether you’d be a fit parent instead of your community midwife who has navigated that system for years and is an expert, If women knew that, I bet they’d rethink whether continuity of carer, at the expense of midwives working in their preferred area of expertise, was really worth it.

Because that labour ward midwife who has been forced into community is stressed out as instead of working 3 long shifts she has to find childcare for 5 days per week and an on call at the weekend that she may or may not be called out for. She can’t afford to lose her shift enhancement and is panicking about not being able to pay the bills. Meanwhile the community midwife forced into the unit is shitting herself as she’s not done nights for years and she can’t sleep during the day as her body clock just won’t adapt which is why she moved into community in the first place. And she has no one to take her kids to school as normally she leaves for work afterwards. And that’s just examples picked up off the top of my head.

In units local to me those that want to work in a CoC model have already gone out into teams to do so. In order to meet targets set by the government staff are now being forced out. All this does is create situations like above and contribute to the demoralisation of staff.

And this is on top of a situation where I worked a bank shift recently where with me included we only had half the number of required midwives to staff labour ward. Did we close? Nope. Did we survive? By the skin of our teeth.

@GrealishHairband

Absolutely everything you have said.

Plus, we CAN achieve the continuity that women do care about most - antenatal and postnatal continuity of carer.

It really really matters and makes a difference to outcomes and satisfaction.