Homebirth v's Hospital - you decide

[VanillaMilkshake]

Please help. I am 32 wks PG, due in December

My midwife has recommended a homebirth - which I am in favour of, about 70/30, while I try to find out more about them.

But my best friend is completely anti, and is working hard to turn my DH to her point of view. She says I am being selfish and putting myself and the baby at risk. And that when I am out of the room and she asks him about it he says he's not happy.

I have M/C'd 3 times, but after the first one had a lovely baby girl, born in 7 hours at hopital, no complications. But she says conceiving this one was so hard as I had the other 2 M/C's that my midwife is awful to suggest it in case of complications.

I am getting really cross with my firend about her attitude - I never tell her what to do with her DS's, but both were born before DD - so it was'nt like I had experience anyway.

Last night it got so bad I actually told her I refuse to discuss the subject with her anymore. She is a brilliant friend but we are so divided on this issue that I am worried for our friendship. She keeps telling me she has told some friends of hers and that and they all say it's a bad idea. They live in a different area and all tend to be stay at home mums with at least 2-4 children each.

She's even told them that my DD had stomach problems and did'nt feed for 4 days after her birth, resulting in her admitted to Special care. Conveniently forgetting it was actually my breast milk that did'nt come in which was the problem and DD was starved - not ill. (dont mean to be blase but I hope you see what I mean)

All my friends where I live say I should go for it, but we only have 1 or two children each, so this friend doesnt seem to think we have as much experience.

The most important thing to me is DH's support and I keep asking for his true feelings on the subject but he just says that we always have complications when we dont want them and is afraid something will go wrong or I'll need to go in to hospital.

My MW has offered to come round at 36 weeks to go through what would happen with me and DH, I have complete faith in her, and she inspires confidence in me.

But because my friend has some medical knowledge from years ago when she worked as a triage nurse (sp) I do turn to her for advice on some things, and she knows DH also listens to her and is using it to her advantage. But this time her advice is unwanted and uninvited, and it's always her who brings it up with DH, not the other way round.

It's actually got so bad it is making me dig my heels in to the point my decision will be based on defying her - not what I want.

Sorry this had gone on so long but what do you all think?

Ditto to Shivvy - being rhesus negative has NO impact on your risk of haemorrhage.

I had to talk DH round to the idea of homebirth - turned out he was more worried about the mess than anything else.

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Message withdrawn

vanilla - you've got brilliant advice here and you should definitely get your dh to look at the homebirth links. Your friend is being terribly alarmist - the evidence is that for low-risk pregnancies a homebirth is as safe as a hospital birth. Some would even say it's safer. I read an amazing study which matched by 'gynacalogical risk' women by opting for homebirth with those opting for hospital birth and found that the homebirthers were far less likely to need intervention, and far less likely to need a caesarean.

Personally I am rhesus negative - had my first dd in hospital because I was poorly informed and didn't really think homebirth was an option first time round, then had my second dd at home, and it was an amazing, relatively calm (!) and magical experience. I'm sitting typing this about 3 feet away from where she came into this world .
I hope one day I'll have a third, and would love to do the homebirth thing again.

It's not important what your friend thinks but it is important that you feel supported in your decision by your husband. Why don't do some reading up on it together - looking at stats and birth stories? And if I were you, I'd ask him - as diplomatically as possible - to stop talking to other people about it - it's your decision on how you're going to bring your baby into the world.Talking about it, particularly with someone outside the situation with such strong views, is most definitely not helpful.

(I'm a big fan of home births btw, having had an amazing home birth experience just four months ago - OK, I was lucky in that it went to plan but it was just the best day, getting into your own bath and bed afterwards is wonderful... could go on but I won't)

Thanks everyone. Dh and I have discussed the thing about my friend and he agrees that it;s nothing to do with her. I think he is alarmed that her continued anti-HB coments are if nothing else going to be what cements my decision. So we will just be saying to her 'we're still undecided'

Have looked at some of the links and have begun bringing the subject up in bite-sized chucks for him to digest. Will keep this going and let you know how I get on.

Thank you to everyone for your imput so far - nice to know I have virtual support on MN even if not much in the real world.