call the private midwife - what do you think?

[Ispywith]

www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2128005/Call-private-midwife--sorry-dontt-trust-NHS.html

Wasn't the reason for the drop in midwives the fact that they had to re-register every year at a high cost? If this is the case then maybe we need to drop the cost and get more midwives back for all, not just those who can afford it.

Interesting. I think what would make it tempting for me is the part about 'covering ante-natal visits, breastfeeding tuition and support in the first month of a baby?s life'. That's quite a lot of support, all of which can be hard to access on the NHS.

What strikes me in that article and something I've seen on MN as well is how powerless people feel in the face of their midwives and doctors. It's disturbing that so many people feel they need a real advocate for their interests.

I can only speak from my own experience but my Independent Midwife was worth every penny. Antenatal appointments were generally an hour long. They spent an evening talking about what to do in the case of a BBA (birth before arrival) because I'd had a 2 hour labour with my first. They came so often after dd2 was born, which you just don't (can't?) get with the NHS. I didn't get pnd second time round and I put that down to the support I received, that alone was worth the money I paid.

That said, I don't want to sound like I'm bashing the NHS midwives. The one I had with dd2 (I transferred in and the IM came in with me) was lovely, the one for dd1's birth was awful. I think they do a difficult job...they see so many women. I think my IM's (group of 5) only take on a handful of clients per month to ensure they can be available for their births.

But this is what NHS midwifery care should be: long (sufficient!) appointments, at a time convenient to the mother (school runs/commuting etc), with the same MW throughout pregnancy, birth and with lots of post natal care for a long (sufficient!) time afterwards. The type and place of birth would be the mother's and she would be fully supported by the MW to achieve that. Same for feeding choices afterwards.

At my first IM appointment after two NHS pregnancies and births - I was shocked that she asked permission to take my blood pressure. But that's how it works - I was an equal partner, informed consent was so important. She asked me what I wanted, and why - no telling me what she was going to do to me whether or not I wanted it

With ds the shortage of midwives in our area meant that despite it being my first pregnancy after 8 years of infertility and the fact I was just shy of 40 I didn't get a booking in appointment until 16 weeks and had to organise my own nt scan at 13 weeks. (I went to the GP at 6 weeks). I then saw 5 different midives throughout my pregnancy, all appointments were double booked so we had to wait sometimes up to an hour for a 5 minute appointment. Eventually at about 36 weeks despite having gd I was told there were no more appointments at my local surgery and I would have to go to sit and wait for an emergency midwife appointment at their drop in centre 40 minutes drive away. I had to do this until 41 weeks.
I then waited 72 hours after my waters broke until they could find me a bed in a labour ward for induction. During this time I was in and out of their triage and kept getting sent home as there were no midwives to see me. By the time ds was born I was a total mess as I thought everything had gone wrong and literally noone gave a shit if my baby was ok.
Postnatal care in the ward was horrific due to the midwives being overstretched - noone would come when anyone pressed their buzzers we were having to help each other.
Then when I escaped they sent a trainee midwife to me at home who didn't know anything. Then I only saw the proper community midwive twice after that- who told me I was bfing wrong and I would need to give it up. Turns out she was talking bollocks.
I just felt totally out of control- it was so obvious there wasn't enough staff.
The second timers apparently had a worse time of it.
Nearly every midwife I saw was lovely but they had too much to do.

If I had been lucky to get pregnant agaian and known you could book a private midwife I would've done it like a shot.

The NHS MW's I had at the birth of my DC's were the best, however the ones at the ante natal appointments were rushed, unwilling to talk about anything that might take longer than 5 minutes, got my edd wrong (twice) and I got pushed into making a decision about a test without being able to talk through the consequences.
The only time I got a decent appointment was when the MW came to my house to do a home birth assesment with my 3rd DC, she stayed 20 minutes and went through everything thoroughly.
I would have looked at a private MW without a second thought if I had known I could hae one.

I had IM with both my children. An inspired friend suggested it to make the experience amazing - and it was. Lots of time, continuity, comfortability with people at such an intimate time in your life. Both births went well and the after care was great.

Don't lose the choice of independent midwives!

oh wow wish I had had one of those.
maybe the things that happened would not have and my baby would not have ended up disabled

I remortgaged our house to pay for mine.

Worth every penny!