Midwives say women should pay for epidurals

[TheDullWitch]

At least £500 a baby it says here

Hi Caligula - yes I know it does happen. Each of mine was in a different area of the country - so there are good ones out there.

Joash, gosh, really?
Of course it all depends on what you mean by 'treated like shit', but of 5 or 6 close friends of mine who have had babies in the last few years, all but one or two experienced at least one midwife who made the experience worse than it should have been by refusing to listen to them. Out of the 4 midwives I saw during my labour, 3 were great, one was dreadful (didn't believe how much pain I was in etc, then didn't show me how to use the gas & air properly so when the anaesthetist came to do the epidural she was horrified it hadn't been explained). Another friend had her baby in the toilet (cubicle, not actually in the bowl!) because the mw didn't believe she was ready to push!

joash, i did not misread. i don't think midwives are the ones to tell you when an epidural is necessary. That is based on personal experience.

What I'm trying to say - not very sucessfully - is that it's a shame that all midwives are being tarred with the same brush. I don't think it's about taking things personally, it's more about people hearing all the crap that gats bandied around about bad professionals and assuming that because you're in a certain profession - the crap applies to you. We've all seen people faces when nurses, midwives, social workers, police officers, etc, etc say what their jobs are. People make judgements because all they hear is the bad side.

There are enough threads on here (and I can think of at least three MNers off the top of my head - Aloha, Greensleeves and Jabberwocky, and I know there are loads more) from people who've had appalling labour experiences - real Dark Ages stuff.

Personally, my labours have been good - I've felt supported by midwives who've read my birth plan and talk to me about things - but then I've had straightforward births with no intervention. The postnatal ward, now that's another story

I don't think anyone here is tarring all midwives with the same brush. However, given that the RCM is meant to be representative of the profession, they are going to do incalculable damage to the image of the profession if they press ahead with this idea!

I think it's improved enormously in the last 30 years, but there's still an awful long way to go.

It just makes me cross that the RCM appears to be attacking, rather than supporting mothers. I know this is not their intention, but it just doesn't make any sense to talk about restricting pain relief separately from all the other issues around labour - and as midwives, they must know that.

Hear hear Caligula.

I'm staying out of this. I don't trust myself to speak. I'll allow myself one tiny comment before I go away....

The vicious, evil, sadistic, butchering, bloodthirsty, sociopathic b@stards.

greensleeves

I not only think a woman in labour is entitled to en epidural upon request, but I also think she ought to have consultant care upon request.

And sometimes when a womans body has not gone into labour, it is a cry for intervention, not a cry to wait longer... for what? the baby to die? Sometimes that is what nature would arrange.

I absolutely believe intervetion has more benfits than drawbacks. Thank God for the emergency caesarean that saved my DD's life.

Message withdrawn

Hmm, I would recommend that every midwife who thinks epidurals are "too easy" should trying enduring the contractions that syntocinon brings on without an epidural.

Spot on tribpot.. I was in sheer agony when I was induced on my first labour. The pain was absolutely horrific (for me anyway)and I couldn't have an epidural because it was too late for me.

I did have an epidural with my second even though I went into labour on my own. I was in 'slow labour' for five days and by the time I'd gone into proper labour I was knackered and I wasn't progressing properly. The midwife recommended an epidural which I had and really it was the best thing I'd ever did!

inconvenience. Snort!

OMG Normsnockers I thnk you are right. How chilling.

There should be a public inquiry into the number of certifiable lunatics practising as midwives in the nation's hospitals. I suppose, as a profession in which you have vulnerable people in agonising pain completely at your mercy, it would attract some sadistic weirdos if not properly monitored. It stands to reason.

Message withdrawn

I apologise if anyone else has mentiones this - when nuns acted as midwives to single mothers in Ireland, they used to yell 'You had your few minutes of fun and now you're paying for it!'

That's a murmured "sweet nothing" compared to some of the things those vile women said to me.

BBC News website 'Have your say' is doing a discussion on this.... some choice comments, including,

"If women can't take the pain then they shouldn't get pregnant in the first place, there are already too many people in the world"

!!!!

...though actually to be fair, the majority of comments do seem to be supportive of free epidurals, lots & lots of them from men!

Ooooh, another good one:

'I am a man and don't know much but I do believe that child birth is such a wonderful thing that every women should experience it naturally. If you tank them up on drugs then they will not remember the wonderful plesures that come with natural child birth and this will be the biggest tragedy.'

Kathy - could you post a link?

Give me five minutes with that man's bollocks, a pencil sharpener and a bottle of vinegar and I guarantee you I will have him singing a different tune

Have Your Say epidural discussion

Ooh it worked

LOL at Greensleeves.

This is ludicrous - every labour is different, every woman's pain threshold is different, everyone has different ideas of what they want from their birth.

I chose to have my children in a hospital where there were no epidurals. Having read up about them, I decided that no way on earth did I want one. And part of me thought, that if I was at a hospital where they were available, I would 'give-in' under the stress / pain.

But it was my decision. If I had wanted one, or at least the opportunity to have one if things went awry, then I would have chosen another hospital.

Woman should be given the choice and to ask woman to pay for something like an epidural is ludicrous!!!

'Easy' labour for the well-off, tough-s**t if you can't pay - you'll have to put up with the pain!!!!!! Ridiculous!!!!