Am I the only one who has no faith in midwives - contentious topic I know....

[RedFraggle]

I had a bit of a nightmare delivery and ended up with an emergency c-section so possibly my views are slightly warped...

I am having an elective this time around for various reasons, but I have to admit that I felt a huge flush of relief when I realised it meant I wouldn't have to rely on any midwives as I have no faith or trust in them at all. Can I be the only woman on Mumsnet who would really prefer NOT to have midwives involved in their birth? All the threads I have seen seem very pro-midwife and I was just curious...

May get shouted at for going against the grain of this convo, but
I had both dd's in the exact same room, on the exact spot , kneeling on the floor. My MW's were so great. Checked me regularly, encouraged, gave support. I had the same midwives both times for antinatal checks. They were great.
DD1 took some getting out as she had her arm up round her head, cord round neck. She cut her cord circ off with each push and it could've been very nasty, but they were great.
I can't praise them enough, and I hope you wont hol your experience against ALL MW's, but can totally see why you have trust issues with them. Hope your next exp is better.

I had a bit of a rotton time with midwives too. From hearing stories, I think at the big London hospoitals, the midwives are run off their feet and are desperate to find reasons why they don't need to attend to a woman. My midwife refused to believe I was in labour, and left me with two paracetamol. By the time the new shift came on, and my husband persuaded someone to come look at me, the head was almost out. She then told me to get onto my back (even though I'd got this far on my own by walking around) and then told me I tore so badly because I had moved in labour!

Piffle, I guess that's what I mean - it's what you're used to.
It is a physiological thing, but then so are many of things we go to a doctor for.

Redfraggle - no, no scan, I saw my midwife every week towards the end and she would have a good feel of my belly before writing down the baby's position on my notes. She had 27 years experience as a community midwife and adored homebirths, so I had total confidence in her skills. Guess I was very lucky.

HI, I had a traumatic time.

The midwife from hell for the last couple hrs. Never spoke to me, never looked me inthe eye. No support at al, told me off when i said i wanted to get off thebed, as she had a bad back and couldnt help me if the baby started to come.

I was pushing on my back for 3 hrs, and when baby came she burst out, and i have never regained a good pelvis floor, and have had to have counselling.

I made a complaint tho. It was the most shocking painful expaerience, but I think i would have coped better had she been nice to me, i would have know she had tried.

She even 'sighed' when i asked for some tissue to wipe my hand cos i had doen a poo and soem had got on my leg and i was embarrassed. She made me feel like an absolute failure.

You do have my sympathy RF, as I've had a negative experience in the past. However, I have gone on to have a much more positive experience, which taught me not to judge the whole profession according to one episode of incompetence.

I had my DD when I was 22 and unmarried. This was nearly 16 years ago and attitudes to young, unmarried mothers weren't particularly enlightened even then. When I went into hospital to deliver, I was assigned the most spiteful and uncaring individual masking as a midwife. When I told her that my contractions felt very strong and painful, she commented that I was "asking for it by being so stupid and getting pregnant in the first place". She then went on to tell me that if I thought the pain was bad now, I had another think coming. In the same breath, she refused to let me have an epidural. She spent most of my labour sitting in a chair on the other side of the room, reading a book and ignoring me. She also refused to allow my other half to move a chair to my bedside, so he could sit down whilst being at my side. She told him he would have to stand up throughout the labour rather than move a chair.

We noticed that with each contraction, DD's heart rate dropped. The midwife didn't seem interested at all. My other half decided to leave the room and seek help and before we knew it, the room was swarmed with staff, all showing concern. The Obstetrician on duty waded in and asked the midwife why she hadn't been examining me and why she hadn't noted the dropped heart rate. She just replied "I know what these young ones are like, making a fuss about nothing." An additional midwife was then asked to sit in on my labour. She was lovely and ended up delivering DD - she even answered back when the original midwife carried on making spiteful remarks.

The experience left it's mark on me, I'm afraid. Five years later, when I was expecting DS, it really played on my mind. I ended up opening up to my community midwife about it. She was great - really understanding. She recommended that I have a 'team delivery', where one of the midwives from the community team would go to hospital with me to deliver the baby. This worked fantastically. I got to know all of the team beforehand and had a lovely midwife who did an excellent job of taking me through labour and delivery. I managed with just gas and air and had no tears or cut. I couldn't thank her enough. After I'd given birth, she went off to ask the hospital staff for a cup of tea for me - the hospital midwife she spoke to seemed to have taken offence at her being there and refused to let me have a cup of tea, telling my miwife that she should have brought her own!!! My midwife handled it and sorted it out and we laughed about it later. Thansk to her, my faith in midwives was restored.

I'm now expecting my third baby in May. Due to cutbacks in the area where I live, the community team has been educed from six down to two, which means that 'team deliveries' and home births are no longer options. Luckily, there is a midwife led birth unit nearby and I have chosen to go there. I am much happier now to be cared for by midwives. I'm also older and more experienced now, so I know that if I don't like slomething, I will challenge it or do something about it at the time, rather than allow myself to have a bad experience and end up feeling horrible whenever I think about it later.

Sorry for such an enormo-post; I just wanted to demonstrate that midwives are not all bad. There are some excellent, dedicated professionals out there and it reallty isn't fair to tar them all with the brush of a bad experience. Also, as mentioned elsewhere, if you do have a bad experience, you should take action rather than allow it to influence and inform your future experiences.

I changed mw's in my 8th month with my DD - the first one I could do nothing 'right' (she always had some nitpicking point about my care of myself, size of my bump etc) but we got on reasonably ok - probably as I actually did as I was told. I'm a bit too convential, maybe {blush] The mw I got when I moved to my current house didn't like bodily fluids (!) and insisted on repeating all the pg tests even though I had a bulging folder full of pg notes from my previous mw. The only thing she didn't insist on was a scan which I thought was a bit odd as my last one had been at 20wks and I really wanted to know what I was having by then {grin].

The good thing about it is that my current health authority have the notes for my last 5 weeks/birth but I have the notes for the rest of the time since they didn't want to keep them.

No, I'm with you. There is a lovely midwife on MN, but all the ones I've encountered have been utterly evil or really stupid. I was so, so relieved to get out of their hands and into the care of real professionals.

I am really relieved that I am not the only one who doesn't think all midwives are ace!

I do realise that as with any profession you get some bad and some good, but I just cannot trust midwives after my last experience.

This is not a case of me tarring them all with the same brush Creena, it is just my personal feeling. I can't help the fact that I have no faith in them. I know from reading other threads that many people (in fact seems like all people a lot of the time!) have really positive experiences with midwives. That is the reason I started this thread, I wanted to know whether I was totally alone in feeling this way (and therefore a bit of a nut ) or whether other people also felt this same lack of trust.

I know from my debrief with the consultant that I had a lot of rare complications all at the same time so I was very unlucky with my experience - but feeling let down by your main carers just doesn't inspire confidence in my experience.

SOrry, can`t agree. with you Redfraggle. I laid all my faith in a midwife at her clinic, and there were no doctors around. It was my first child, so I had no experience. With her giving me complete freedom to do as I wanted, plus promising me there would be no such thing as an episiotomy in her clinic, I managed to have what I would call a perfect delivery. I believe if I had been at a doctor-led clinic, the outcome may have been different.

But I have heard some stories of unsupportive midwives, but they really dont deserve the title of midwife. I mean why become a midwife if your only going to look down on a woman in labour?!!! I felt loved by the midwife who delivered my baby. Yes, I can say loved, even though I hardly knew her, except for the odd check up. But its a fact that the c-section rate is <strong>much</strong> lower in countries where midwives have more power. I think the US has a 25% c-section rate, because midwives dont have much say there. Or they are just "token" midwives without real power.

Glad (but sad) to hear that others have had midwives who think they can tell how dilated you are by looking in your eyes . I'm going to start a thread on top tips if anyone wants to add anything.

No I'm not, I'm going to add one here.

I worked on the following basis

a) the mat unit will be mega busy so do what you can yourself
b) the Anethetist will be on a training day bun fest therefore too busy to shove needles in your spine.
c) I'll get MW from hell so try and cope without
d) DH is squeemish so don't rely on him. Get 3rd party support (bf)

In truth I was such a bolshie but interested patient that I pretty much got my own way and even discharged myself from the mat unit 2 days before DS arrived. the CMW kept visiting to tell me I wasn't in labour and was quite severe on the 2nd day that I was to make a further AN appointment for after the weekend. She did BP and baby heartbeat and I asked for an internal. ASeems I was 8cm dilated and had to get to hospital ASAP! (no, you're not in labour huh!)

CMW delivered DS that evening and all was wonderful.

part of the issue is under staffing..and all the issues that entails

but that does not make up for rude, substandard care

as has been pointed out , you need to make complaints, formally , to the PCT about that

there are around 10 000 midwives short in the UK.......so the ones that are here and practicing are often overworked and undersupported

and that is a real issue

midwifery led units are being closed all over the UK...despite the need for them

if there is a situation where only obstetric led care is provided..it will mean a massive upsurge in intervention and c.s IMO....obs are experts in the abnormal, where as midwives are experts in the normal

but midwifery skills are dying out...eg...vaginal delivery of a breech is being a lost art , as women carrying breech babies tend to be recommended to have a section

having a baby is a normal part of a woman;s life, but it is becoming overmedicalised, and a conveyor belt ...you have to labour under time limits, with constraints, with the clock ticking, hospitals are scared of litigation ....a long labour used to be classed as 24 hours, now it is something like 12....

it is a side effect of funding cuts, less midwives, that women have terrible birth experience...not the only reason, but a big one.....a midwife should be 'with woman' , supporting the labouring woman, and helping her achieve the birth she wants, not the birth the hospital wants...but if she has 5 or 6 other women to attend to, that won;t happen

i would rather have a midwife, involved in any birth, than an obstetrician, and a good midwife too !

My second pregnancy was high risk, and i asked my obs if he would deliver the baby,,his response was, you don;t want me there, if i am there, something has gone wrong, you are much better off with the midwives....

i beleive if midwives were allowed to pracitve the art of midwifery, things would be very different.

for all those traumatised by a bad birth, please do seek help

BTA

i am 3 days over due and have a hospital appt on fri. if i go in and asked to be induced that day will they do it, or will i have to wait?

unlikely to induce you at term + 3...and they will have to check there is a bed on labour ward...induction usually at term + 10 or 14

also, if your body is not ready for induction, then there is no point in doing it.. a bishops score of 6 + is better for induction...based on the length, position, dilation, effacement of the cervix

a tightly closed, non effaced cervix is not rip e for induction.

i've not seen my midwife for over 2 weeks now and they've told me nothing. absolutely useless!

should be seen weekly the last month...they will tell you what is what on friday...

hope so! thanks

I know they vary like any other people in any other profession but I've only seen this one once, and she's already been unable to give me basic information about the blood tests she wanted me to have and fibbed to me about the risk of m/c after an amnio.

I mentioned this to my GP who, luckily, is fantastic and she said 'Oh, you've got [midwife's name], haven't you? Well, if you have any questions, do come and see me. Or ring me. Any time...' So obviously someone knows there's a problem...

I find this very interesting, having given birth in a country where there are no midwives, all care is obstetric led and when you go to hospital to labour you are cared for by nurses who merely monitor you until it is deemed time for the OB to sweep in, don gloves and gown, and "deliver" your baby. It's a totally different ball game I can assure you. There is a VERY much higher rate of routine intervention associated with this type of care. That means almost everyone is assumed to be high risk - loads of routine scans, tests, you name it during pregnancy, and very little choice of how you give birth, almost always flat on your back with stirrups, episiotomy, continuous monitoring, about 96% epidural rate, cesarean rates over 70% in some hospitals. Does that sound like an attractive scenario? Maybe it does to some, and that is fair enough, but not my cup of tea. The main difference between midwives and obstetricians IMO is one of perspective. Most OB's are trained as surgeons. They rarely if ever see normal, everyday, uncomplicated births. They see birth as a dangerous, risky thing, and their job is to step in proactively and "manage" the situation. Hence the very much higher rate of interventions. Midwives, in contrast, are generally trained in a much more hands on and less "medical" environment, they have more of an attitude that birth for the vast majority of healthy women, is a normal, natural event and part of life. Yes there are risks and they will sometimes need to step in where things do not go according to nature's plan. Of course these are briad generalisations, it's impossible to say all OB's or all midwives are the same. I guess in the end it all depends what you are looking for. You always have the choice of opting to give birth in an obstetric-led unit, or going private if you can afford it. And if things continue the way they are going obstetric-led care will be how we'll all be giving birth anyway as the midwifery-led option will be taken away from us. I don't mean to be unsympathetic to those who have had negative experiences -it does sound like some of you have had some pretty horrendous birth experiences and I am sure that must be very traumatic. But is it fair to tar all midwives with the same brush? You may also find that independent midwives are different again from NHS midwives with all the pressures they are under. So maybe it is not midwives per se but the individual midwives that cared for you, or maybe the system that they find themselves operating in.

They tend to know more about normal births than doctors because doctors see the births that go wrong so they tend to be better overall unless you have a medical problem when obviously doctors are better.

As a midwife who currently works on a low risk midwifery unit I feel so saddened to hear of some of your appalling experiences. I wholeheartedly believe that short staffing levels can make it impossible to be a good midwife. However it is completely inexcusable to be rude and uncaring!
I have mixed feelings about the examining women to see if they are really in labour or not. Where I work the midwives seem to feel it is almost being a failure as a midwife if you have to perform a vaginal exam to see if someone is in established labour. Most midwives there feel it is unpleasant for the woman and it also introduces a risk of infection, especially if there is any chance that the "waters" have broken.( alot of women are unsure if they have or not when they come to us). If you then have to decide whether someone is in labour based on appearance, strength and frequency of contractions, and how much distress/pain the woman is in surely it is inevitable some will be sent back home with paracetamol etc who ARE in established labour. There again, especially if it is not your first baby, you could be examined and only be 1cm or 2cm dilated so be told to go home but easily progress quickly so by the time you get home you are 5/6 or more cm dilated as noone progresses at a textbook rate. It is impossible to always get this right, however with bed/midwife shortages all women cannot be kept in hospitals from the start of contractions.

In response to Ellasmum1, I was induced (at +8) and left to my own devices for a while.... I had some stomach ache - like a period pain - but deliberately didn't think much about it until I was examined again about 2 hours later. They found I was 6cm dilated so the next thing I knew, I was being taken across to the delivery suite where things really got going after that . They even asked me how come I hadn't realised that I was in established labour as I was so dilated? Well, how would I know? DD was my first birth so I had nothing to base it on and I'd expected a bit of pain along the way anyway. I wasn't offended by my treatment - in fact everyone bar one OB and one paed was very nice to us - but I thought it was a daft question.