I can have a homebirth but only at 39 weeks plus!

[sweetkitty]

Had my booking in appt this morning (am 28 weeks pregnant but we have moved area) in my new area the rules regarding homebirth are that you can have one as long as you are 39 weeks +, before that you must go into hospital to deliver.

This is due to midwife shortages, there will be 2 1/2 midwives on permanent 24 hour call from 39 weeks onwards so for a total of 3 weeks in theory. They cannot cover from 37 weeks as this would mean a total of 5 weeks and as there are a lot of women requesting homebirths in this area they do not have the resources to cover all the women who may go into labour.

Am a bit upset about this as with DD I went into labour at 37+5 weeks, I know I probably won't go that early again but if I go at 38+6 days whats the difference between that and 39 weeks?

Midwife was trying to convince me to go down the 6 hour discharge route think she doesn't want to be on 24 hour call rather than objecting to me having a homebirth. Also I'm only being "allowed" to have a homebirth as it's a second baby!

Hi Sweetkitty

Have a look at this site

www.homebirth.org.uk

There is an article "Homebirth Before 38 Weeks" which should help you.

Ignore the "allowed" comment, it is up to you whether you have a home birth or not, no matter whether it is your second or not.

Who's on call or not is not your problem. Don't be bullied by the "we don't have enough midwives available" tactic. You are giving them plenty of notice.

Good luck

Agree - I was told that due to shortages there was no guarantee that a midwife would be available and I might have to go into hospital.

I wrote to the chief exec. of the local trust (there is an excellent letter here .

Needless to say I had my home birth with 2 midwives in constant attendence.

Good luck.

I really regretted not having a home birth for ds3, I was .1 under the minimum for iron BUT it turned out there's been no need to take the blood test; they ahd forgotten to record the OK one. I just went along with what they said, then the local unit refuseed to have me for the same reason, and I ended up in the place I had dreaded so baldy due to past experience. I should have argued. When I went into labour, the midwife asked me to get to the local unit as things were going quite quickly, I said I couldn't coz of tests, she said 'Why on earth did you tell me that?'

Fight for what you want, often the midwives actually support you but are just giving the answers dicatted to them

It's your legal right to have a homebirth, go to the aims site and there'll be some advice and support to contest it. Most places consider 37 weeks+ term and fine for homebirth. Good luck, I've had 2 homebirths and wouldn't change it for anything.