some of you might remember that I was asking about your knowledge of lotus births a few months ago (ie. when the placenta and cord are left attached to the baby until they drop off naturally). Well, my friend who wanted to practice this gave birth to a fine girl on monday morning. I watched in awe, it was beautiful
She had an independent midwife who was... not my cup of tea but friend had a a good relationship with her.
Anyway, girl born at 0902. Around 4.30pm, friend gets up for a wee and calls me to the bathroom to check what's hanging out of her and it's something that as a student midwife I had not seen before but I guessed it was a prolapse of the vaginal wall.
I called the midwife who said to put her back to bed and she'd call in the morning after telling me that it wasn't a prolapse as a prolapse bleeds and friend just had the normal post-birth bleeding. Unhappy with this response, I called my training hospital and one of the midwives who knows me, confirmed my suspicion that anything that shouldn't be outside of the body was a prolapse and it might bleed or it might not. She talked me through pushing it back inside friend (with her consent of course!), and advised rest, also saying that if I wasn't happy with anything then I should get the midwife out, no ifs buts or maybes.
I was very unhappy as I went to be a support to my friend, not as an unqualified midwife.
And I know midwives have their own practices and preferences, but some things she did, were not in line with what I'm currently being taught, such as fetal monitoring during birth - in the hospital we're meant to listen to the fetal heart after every contraction, and record accordingly. She listened in twice (although I really hate listening in after every contraction as it does disturb the mum....) and, when she went down to write her notes, she left the baby in the wet, cold towel she rubbed her off in! A huge no no!
The midwife didn't undertake a babycheck, as I assume it's policy in that area to get the doctor out on the same day to check babies. The baby hadn't fed since birth so by 4pm I took her temperature as she was very sleepy and completely disinterested in the breast (I know that some babies are like this, but she was also totally uncovered as well) her temp was 36.3 and when I mention this to the midwife when I called re the prolapse, I was sharply told "I never take babies temperatures. She's warm. She's pink. She's got skin to skin contact. She's fine" HELLO! The midwife left hours before so how did she know she was in the same condition???
Finally, midwife came the morning after, as promised and decided to stitch friend up, having told her that the birth had torn her labia. Errr, does anyone else know of internal labia????
I don't think I'll ever tell my friend my concerns but I'm certainly going to type it up for my own interest.
Just wanted to rant as I really should not have been put in the position of putting my poor friend's insides, back inside!