To expect maternity ward to respect my wishes?

[victoriascrumptious]

I'm a bit fucked off at the moment. I was admitted into the antinatal ward the other day for some checks. I brought my handheld notes with me (as you do).
Basically the notes contain a birthplan template which you are supposed to fill in. Mine contains basic instructions for yes I want to b/f, yes I want vitamin K, yes I am open minded about drugs-would like to see how it goes. Nothing unsual about that

The one point of contention is that there is a question as to whether you want student midwives in the room-so I said yes but only if they are female. I don't want a male midwife present at the birth, I don't want a male midwife or consultant doing internal checks.

It would appear that there is a male midwife on the ward who I am sure does an excellent job. However it seems some of the female midwifes were grousing about what I had written as I heard them bitching as I walked past.

I don't really give a fuck if men want to be midwives however out of personal choice I don't want one present at my childs birth. Men stress me out on a very primal level for reasons I wont bore you with. If I was to have a cx they can invite the whole of the local rugby team into my room if they wish-but I dont want a man there when I am trying to dilate FFS!

When I was on the ward they made a pmy blood pressure/chat to me etc(this was after I had heard them bitching)so they are clearly trying to make some sort of political point as there were about 4 other female mw's in the staff room drinking tea. I didnt care about being seen by him then as I wasnt in active labout but I am really really annoyed that if this has happened once they are going to ignore my requests when I am actually in labour.

This has upset me so much I am now thinking of VBACing at home as I really dont want a fight on my hands/bad feeling in the room when I am trying to give birth.

AIBN? Am I being nuts?

Sorry typo (hit backspace by mistake)

Should have read "When I was on the ward they made a POINT OF SENDING A MALE MW TO CHECK MY BLOOD PRESSURE......."

What would you do if a male midwife turned up for a homebirth?

I have full sympathy with you, but I have no idea what to advise.

Prehaps you need to explain your reasons to the supervisor of midwives.

Ie. if you have experienced sexual abuse then you might have a case for throwing equal opportunities out the window.

No you DANBU. DEFO NOT!
And it is fucking awful that you are worrying about there bieng bad feeling when you go into labour.

Is there a particular midwife who you can talk to on the ward, who you see more than the others and who you feel that you can discuss this with?

It is likely that the male midwife wont be on duty when you go into labour, however even if he is it is HIGHLY likely that he is well aware that there will be many women who will object to him treating them, this is a given i think. He himslef will probably have no problem at all with this. You will not be the first and defo wont be the last to have an objection.
He is a proffessional and will will have a professional attitiude about it, he wont take it personally!

yabu. And sexist.

From the hospital's perspective, I think YABU. Male midwives need to train and have experience. The question that was posed to you was whether you would wish to have students in the room with you or not. I don't think you have a right to pick and choose who those students are, especially if you are going through the NHS.

However, if your past experiences have a strong bearing on how you feel about male midwives being present, then I'd suggest talking to the staff about that specifically. You don't have to go into detail, but they might be far more sympathetic if they knew that there were concrete reasons behind your wishes.

usually i would say yabu, but if you have deep and primeval reasons for not wanting a male birth attendant then i presume that there are issues that need respecting, rather than just awkwardness

i woudl advise seeing the supervisor of midwives and discussing this

if you had met a female midwife you did not like/clashed with etc, you are perfectly iwthin your rights to ask for her not to be one of your caregivers

if the fact he is a male will cause you psychological problems in labour, then you should not have to have care from him, it is a recipe for disaster to have someone in with you when you birth, that you are not comfrotbale with

i can see this from both sides, but in this case, i think YANBU

I dont think its sexist at all..this is not politics love..not every woman is comfortable with a man looking at and having hands on experience with her genitals and why should she for the sake of political correctness??

I was going to say exactly the same as Reallytired. They are acting very unprofessionally by bitching about it and especially within hearing distance. They should all be aware that there may be very good reasons why someone would not want a male MW - eg if they had experienced rape of sexual abuse. If it is something like this then you would need to speak to someone senior to explain why you do not want a male mw.

However, if this is just a preference you may be disappointed and quite frankly you probably actually won't give a shit anyway when in full labour. When I had DS I was of the mind set that I would be fully clothed, dignified in manner and would have the sheet right up to my chin until the final stage. However the reality was that I was stark naked for hours, screamed and swore like I never have before and when things got a bit hairy there were lots of medical staff in the room in case I needed an emergency caesarian. So you may end up with a female midwife (and the chances of this are very good anyway if there is only one male midwife) but if you need any other staff there such as paediatricians, anaesthatists, consultants etc, it is likely one of them may be male. They will all be very professional and will do their best to put you at ease. Hope it all goes well for you

I think there's a rule that you are allowed to specify a particular health care practioner who you dont want to be caring for you. So find out this person's name and write into your birth plan that you dont want him there.
However, if you have complications and have a episiotomy/forceps/ventouse/cs it is likely that it will be performed by a man because the vast majority of obs are men.

Yanbu

Its not up to you to provide training and experience for male midwives.

If there is infact 'one born every minute' I am sure there a lot of women who do not object and therefore plenty of opportunites for men to train.

This is not predjudice, its a personal choice. Giving birth is an intimate personal experience and you have every right to not want a male member of staff there. It doesnt mean you hate men, it means you dont want a strange man with you at that particular time.

I am sure there are a lot of people who will disagree but its such a personal thing, surely we are allowed to make the choice?

If it is a choice that is acceptable on religious/cultural grounds I dont understand why it isnt on the grounds that it makes you feel uncomfortable.

did you make this no male staff preference clear at first booking in appointment? A hospital offer a service with the staff they have available.You should have enquired if they have male midwife's.upon finding out they do you should have considered another unit.The ward you are attached to has a male mw,so he could potentially be on duty the day you are admitted.The hospital is offering you trained staff present at your birth. Hospital cannot be expected to provide alternative female mw only for you. They can only allocate staff they have. if you feel so strongly transfer to a ward with no male mw.

True Mumcentreplus it's not sexism as in terms of I don't think men can make good midwifes. In fact this particular male midwife was with me when I was being given my spinal for my cx following an failed induction and he was lovely. I don't want to hurt his feelings.

When I was inducted last time before the cx I went to 3 centimeters dilated when I was first examined (according to the female mw who examined me). A male consultant came in an hour later stuck his hand up me which made me anxious and a while that after a follow on check I was back to not being dilated at all which is weird. My rational brain seems to have no problem with men midwifes but I wonder whether another part of me is not so happy.

There are reasons in my past why I would react like this. I really don't want to upset anyone on the ward but I also dont think it's right that the female midwifes should want to put him or me in that position.

YANBU
You need to be able to relax and are not doing this to be mean.
You should pull them up on it. They were wrong to bitch about you and make you feel akward.
They should remain profesional and if they cant shold find other jobs.

If he's working on the Antenatal ward, then he won't be on delivery suite, surely?

There must be a level of sexism in my thinking though as when this guy was in the room holding my hand when my spinal was being done last time I just assumed he was an anesthetist until I saw him on the ward the other week-oh dear

even if he is on the ward, niceshoes, the OP is quite within her rights to not have him there, just as if ther was a female midwife she did not want there,. he can be assigned to another room, and the OP can have a different MW

there is no reason she should be forced to have a male birth attendant when it could have a really adverse affect on her birth

I've seen him on the ward where women go to recover after birth Stanausurus (is that antinatal?), it's the same place where they have you post and pre birth. They then move you to the delivery room to deliver. I've seen the same midwifes in the outpatients midwiffery bit of the hospital too-they just seem to move about. I thought that was normal.

if he's lovely and you like him can you talk to him about it and explain that while you have no doubts about his professionalism there are underlyng reasons you'd rather not discuss as to why you'd rather not have him looking after you at delivery?
Someone I knew vaguely was on duty when I went into hospital in labour, she later told me she sent someone else as she prefers not to deliver the babies of people she knows, so it works both ways, and MWs can opt out of certain deliveries.

And I'd have been happy with anyone at my labour (think there was a student at the 2nd one) but completely respect other women's rights to say no

Polarbear-that might be a good idea yes. Didnt think of that.

just seems les like going behind his back / complaining about him, which I know you're not.

I think that sounds like a very good idea - and would probably mean that he then stopped the bitching, e.g. if they were moaning about it inappropriately, he'd be likely to say 'actually, she spoke to me personally and explained that for private reasons that we won't go into, she would find it awkward to have a man in the room'.

Staff can rotate from antenatal,to labour ward,and post natal,community.The mw may be available.A hospital will not guarantee to exclude a specific member of staff from a treatment as that would be discriminatory to that staff member. There is precedence for not discriminating against staff.mw sues trust.In that case the issue was race,not gender.Hospital cannot undermine its staff either. OP,did you check out whether there was a male mw at the unit

I was going to say the same as StealthPolarBear - talk to the male midwife concerned, and explain as you have explained here that you have deep primal reasons for not wanting to be attended or examined by a man whilst in labour. If he is as nice as you say he was last time you saw him, he will understand and will put your needs ahead of his feelings.

Hopefully he would also then explain to the other midwives on the ward, whose current behaviour is appalling and unacceptable. In your shoes, I would also be talking to the senior midwife in the unit, telling her what you've told us and what the other midwives have been doing, and making a formal complaint.

Any half-way decent midwife should understand that giving birth is a very intense experience and that they should put aside their personal feelings about your choices and do their best to make the birth go well for you - whereas their current behaviour is stressing you out and upsetting you - and to do that deliberately is unprofessional in the extreme.

yanbu
its quite common for people to write female only on their birth plan page? i did exactly the same as you, on the question about students i wrote "females only" and somewhere else i think i put something like female midwives prefered, male doctors okay if in case of emergency/necessity but otherwise dont want males. i put for religious reasons as wel as thats just my preference, literally nearly every other person i know has written the same and its not been a problem. perhaps you can call and speak to the most senior midwife in charge, and tell that uv heard those other midwives bitching about your preferences, see if that helps at all? there's no way you should be forced to have a male midwife. i know theres equal rights for them but many women are happy to have them, so why force it for the ones who dont when there are not many males anyway so i doubt it would be a case of "only males available"
its better for the midwife himself to be working where he is wanted, than in a room with a woman that's feeling uneasy about his presence
in cases of anasthetist or doctors coming in emergency where others aren't available that's different, but if they make a point of trying to send a male to you in labour when you dont want, that is very very unprofessional and wrong