Opinions on my Birth Plan anyone?

[coffeeandcream]

This is the first draft of my birth plan. I'd like to hear opinions and your thoughts on whether I have missed out anything really important!

Thanks all:

We would like to have our baby at the XXX Midwife Led Unit.

My DH will be my birth partner; we want him to be involved at all stages and he will take advice and make decisions for me if I am unable to do so for myself.

I want to have an active labour and be able to move around as much as possible.

Pain Relief:
I have a TENS machine that I will use at home and in the early stages of labour.
Once at the birth unit I would like to use Gas and Air and the birth pool.
I do not particularly want to use morphine based drugs but will if the pain becomes too much. If possible, I would like to start with small doses and take more if I need to.

Delivery:
My ideal birth scenario would be to be ?left alone? as much as possible, I do not want lots of people ?fussing? around me.
I very much want to use the birth pool to labour and deliver in.
I would like to have low level lighting and my music playing.
I do not like the idea of forceps or ventouse; however if advised to, I consent to their use.
I will have an episiotomy if the midwives feel it is necessary.
I, or DH, would like to ?catch? our baby / guide him out.

After baby is born:
I would like to hold our baby immediately, I do not feel he needs to be taken away and ?cleaned up? first.
We would like to delay the clamping and cutting of the cord which DH will then cut.
I would like to have a physiologically managed third stage; I do not want to keep my placenta!
DH and I would each like lots of skin to skin contact.
I would like to breast feed as soon as baby is ready.
We are happy for baby to have the Vitamin K injection

My advice is
Take it with a pinch of salt!
I wrote a birth plan that ironically was
the opposite to everything that happened!
Talk to your partner about Epidurals beforehand etc as he may be making desicions on your behalf!
Also a good tip which im trying this time too is ask the midwife to not let you know how far youve dilated.. As if you have been in agony for hours and dilated by 1cm it can be very off putting x

:o Are you sure you don't want to keep the placenta?

It looks good to me but it might be worth noting your preferences for the unlikely situation of you needing an EMCS.

It sounds fine, but I've not bothered this time.

Neither of my first 2 births went to plan. So I'm just playing it by ear. DP knows what I'm like, knows my pain threshold, and will speak up for me if I'm unable to.

I never bothered writibg a birth plan. My only thing I kept saying was no forceps. I repeated this a lot to my Oh before birth.

Re:morphine based drugs, as far as I'm aware it can only be given once every 4-6 hours. I would speak again to your Dp about drugs and as someone said above an epidural. I wanted one but my Oh and mw refused and it was the best thing he ever did. Just be very clear to him about what you want before hand..

Everything else seems pretty good, but just keep an open mind with birth as mine was not how I planned it (induced)

Looks good to me (and very like mine) but I'm pretty sure 'physiological' and 'managed' third stage are 2 different things - do you want the placenta to come out naturally (physiologically) or do you want an injection to speed it up (managed)? I am open to changing my mind after labour depending on how tired I am.

Forceps/ventouse won't be used as a matter of course - it would be a situation where midwives felt things weren't progressing so will consider these as a means to speed things up. If you have either of these I suspect you will want an epidural as they will probably need to do an episiotomy to get the tools in and baby out.

As others have said it is worth keeping an open mind WRT labour - its not something that can be relied upon to be straightforward or predictable. My first labour was 'supposed' to be natural and at home. DS ended up being delivered in hospital with an epidural, episiotomy and forceps - however I insisted on being given the chance to push for 2 hours with only gas and air first, I waited as long as possible before going for each intervention - I feel happy that I tried my best at each step before allowing things to be managed for me. It helped me to have a specific birth plan because I like to feel in control, but this time around I have called it 'birth preferences' because I know things don't always go to plan

hope they do for you though, best of luck :)

Ha just read that back and it looks like I said "I must push for 2 hours with only gas and air" like a total martyr! What I meant was I put off intervention as long as possible and kept asking for more time to try and do things naturally as long as possible. It didn't happen that way in the end but if I'd 'given in' sooner I know I'd always have wondered if it could have been avoided and would have blamed myself. Not everyone is like me though!

My doula suggested I add this to my birth plan, which I thought was a good idea: "please don't offer me drugs; I know what is available and will ask if I need them" - obv assuming you want to avoid pain relief! I thought this a good idea for me because I knew when tired and in pain I might well go along with drugs when I really would have preferred n

Whoops sorry - not to have them.

YY to physiological and managed third stages being different things - you can have one or the other, but not a 'physiologically managed' one.

Looks good. Mine was LONG (lots of issues first time round though) and was read thoroughly by the MWs when they got to my house, they did their best to follow it. I had the line in it suggested by UserNameAngst

Sounds a lot like mine with dd. not that anyone read it (but then it was straightforward so maybe they didn't need to?)

Hi everyone, thanks so much for all these replies.

Of course I get that labour raraely goes to plan ... perhaps I should rename my birth plan 'My Birth Wish List'!

I didn't realise I was contradicting myself re the third stage - What I mean is I would like the injection to speed things up and get things finished.

The midwife led unit does not offer epidurals or c-sections. But I suppose it would be sensible to have a contingency plan in case I end up being transferred to hospital. Thats my wishful thinking and being in denial!

I like the suggestion about "please do not offer me drugs..." as I'd like to try to manage for as long as I can without being turned into a zombie

And perhaps I should put a 'disclaimer' on the bottom saying "I reserve the right to chage my mind at any time a demand the opposite of everything I have written here!!"

I think it looks good and I don't think there's anything wrong with a wish plan :) I'm so sick of putting it all with the caveat of - of course things will go as they go!

It's pretty similar to mine, and I think the general gist is you know your choices, you have your preferences but are open to discussion.

The only thing I made clear was the placenta - physiological unless the MW's indicated I had been pushing for a long time, me and my uterus were already tired and perhaps the injection isn't such a bad idea. My MW told me about doing that - just to be open to it being managed.

I think it indicates that overall you're going into this with a really positive frame of mind, intending to be an active participant in the birth, which most MLU's seem to encourage. Ours - although I have an HB booked - don't even offer pethidine and gaily told us all at the talk that they would drag us up onto our feet if needed