To think about a home birth for my first baby?

[consideringhomebirth]

Trying to decide. Initially I thought home birth was a crazy idea and that things can go wrong in a split second, but I have seen research online which says there is actually no increased risk. Now I am thinking twice.

I know I either want a no-interventions birth, or a planned caesarean. Two extremes but I don’t think labouring for ages in my hospital would be ideal for me and I would feel quite stressed, plus the recent enquiry into UK maternity services is not great. 45% of all births in the last couple of months at my trust were C-sections, majority being emergency ones. A large proportion of women seem to end up being induced and there is a high rate of induction being unsuccessful and leading to emergency section or assisted deliveries, which would be the worst of all worlds for me.

I am low-risk and baby measuring on the 60th centile. Is home birth the gamble everyone says it is? We are 10 minutes from the hospital by car. If we went for this option we would have midwives at home from the homebirth team and you get transferred to hospital should anything be not quite right.

I’d be so much more relaxed at home- but only if everything went right, obviously, and I understand birth is quite unpredictable.

I’m speaking to my midwife about the options I’m considering soon. In the mean time any thoughts or experiences welcome. :-)

I haven't RTFT so apologies if I'm repeating itself but the main thing I would consider is the ambulance performance in your area- if the are continually queued up outside your local A+E then I would reconsider homebirth- it's all well and good saying you'll get transferred in if something goes wrong but that relies on an ambulance being available to get to you. Not slating the ambulance service here at all but in my area there are often 30 or more ambulances queued up waiting to offload patients into the emergency department. It was the deciding factor for me against a homebirth with my DD2.

I've had all 3 of mine at home and it was great.

Surprised by talk of mess, it's really not much and the midwives do sort of scoop it all up. And you can get in your own shower and snuggled up in your own bed with your lovely new baby

@Nursemumma92 the ambulance would go directly to the maternity unit so would that still be an issue? Or do you mean there are no ambulances free to respond because they are all waiting to off load parients? Sorry as where I live this is thankfully not the case.

I mean that there are often long long delays on ambulances attending due to them not being able to offload patients. This was nearly 2 years ago for me now but the situation in my area is not much improved.

Most of the mess I remember was from my first shower. Blood everywhere. That's what I was delighted to have sluiced away in someone else's big wet room shower. Wouldn't want all that anywhere near my own.

It wasn't my only reason for not giving a home birth even 30 seconds of consideration but all the things that people say are advantages (like being able to get in your own shower and bed right away) weren't tempting at all for me.

Lol what do you suppose happens to period blood

Well that's never poured out of me in a twentieth of what came out after birth but maybe I've been lucky.

10 minutes is close enough.

That 10 minutes is what it takes for them to get ready for you to transfer from birthing ward to surgery anyway.

And you'll be in an ambulance, blue light to hospital so even quicker than 10 minutes.

I had a homebirth for my 3rd baby and it was amazing.

Baby came at 9PM and we were settled in bed by 10:30PM.

Midwives didn't stay long. I had 2 midwives but ended up having 4 as there was a shift change and the original 2 waited for the baby to be born before they left!!

And we read up what to do if the baby came before the midwife arrived - and ended up having 4!! Haha.

You don’t have to give birth on your back in hospital! You can labour and birth in whatever position you want.

My UK hospital also had an excellent birthing unit with pools etc attached to the maternity ward. I ended up being blue lighted to hospital due to complications in Labour, so I couldn’t use the birthing unit as I was so high risk, That might be an option for the OP though.

Will you? That's if an ambulance shows up!

I didn’t have home births, but I did have lovely births in hospital. I stayed at home until very late every time, going in only for the last bit. I think I mostly got there from 7cms+ for all 3 births. Private room, pain relief if I needed it, midwife with me the whole time. They dimmed the lights and played music. Even the food wasn’t too awful.

For me, the risks outweighed the benefits (being so close to an theatre if required and not having to be transported in a state) as well as resuscitation/nicu for the baby if required (one did end up there for a brief spell) and I much preferred the mess and blood not being in my house.

Im not saying don’t have a home birth, but just because your in hospital doesn’t mean it will be awful!

YANBU. I had home births with both of mine, if you're low risk then it's almost as safe as hospital for first tine births, ace definitely safer for subsequent ones.

It turned out I was actually high risk though we didn't know it (hidden condition discovered later) and I had no issues at all, but always discuss with your midwife of course.

Just pointing out that the critique of the birthplace study in particular was not accurate as far as I can remember because intended place of delivery is the category given in the stats - ie a home birth resulting in a blue light and EMCS will be recorded as a home birth. Accordingly any poor outcomes will be properly attributed. By ‘not daft’ I meant that it would be an obvious error that researchers allow for in this way.

It is really odd to try and control something that is uncontrollable by saying you want this or that kind of birth. Your body will dictate this event. You can make limited choices but ultimately whether you need interventions is down to medical need. Your baby could become distressed or stuck. These things cannot be predicted.

Always remember that if you need to go to labour ward and your local one is full, then you DO NOT have a space there.
it will be paramedics to the nearest hospital with space or in an emergency it will be to the nearest ED dept.

There was no mess at all. Midwives were away less than 2 hrs after birth, by this time my husband had emptied the pool and threw the liner away.

You could not tell there has just been a birth.

No more children for us, but if we were to have another. I would definitely have another home birth. My first was born in a midwife centre.

Absolutely - I had both of mine at home and it was all fine (very fast, probably would have been on the way to the hospital if we had planned a hospital birth). However, with the current state of ambulance service I would think very carefully about that now (and I only live 5 minutes from a major hospital).

Our pool emptied straight into the outside drain.

My first and only was a home birth. I had two fantastic community midwives who I'd built a relationship with over the course of my pregnancy.
It was a long labour as DDs hand was against her head throughout the birth meaning I needed an episiotomy but they kept tabs on DDs heartbeat and were happy to let things roll on as long as she was ok.
I'm sure that had I been in hospital they would have been clock watching and wanting to move things on. If they'd used a ventouse there's ever chance they could have damaged me or DD due to the way she was presenting. My partner and I were in control the whole time and I wouldn't change a thing.

I'm talking about the shower drain. The shower I had after birth looked like a crime scene and I left a heap of blood soaked towels there too. I was delighted to leave all that behind and not be in my own shower till I was already significantly cleaner and more comfortable.

Obviously it doesn't remotely bother many women, which is fine. It would bother me and was 1 reason of many I laughed at the suggestion of a homebirth for myself.

10 minutes wouldn't have been close enough for us 😔 I am so grateful we were in a hospital.

First child - hospital birth, went with the flow, ended up with then accidentally rupturing the waters, followed by induction and a 32 hours labour with forceps delivery at the end.

second child - home birth, super quick and easy

Third child - hospital birth due to homebirth cancelled in my area, but under the care of home birth team. Super quick and easy.

For a first I would plan a home birth and mentally prepare to be transferred if required.

As some one who has attended over a thousands of births I agree 10 minutes is sometimes too slow.

I had our 3rd at home after 2 incredibly fast deliveries in our local hospital. I decided to have a home birth as conditions in the hospital were horrific and I was left traumatised by the care we received.

Unfortunately our home birth was also a balls up. We were given the wrong numbers to call for the midwife and ended up giving birth alone. We did dial 999 when it was clear nobody was coming but the ambulance arrived after our baby was born.

Aside from all the obvious horror of the situation I found a home birth absolutely wonderful compared to a hospital birth. Just wish I'd had a mid wife present.

Personally wouldn't choose it for my first though.

If its your first labour I would do it in the hospital. You don't know what you will experience until it is actually happening and nurses etc are usually so helpful and caring. Both times my labour's took unexpected turn but ended up fine.