Home Birth - would love to hear your stories (positive and negative and neutral even!)

[amorningperson]

Hi all,

I've been discussing a potential home birth with my midwife. I'm about 16 weeks right now so I have plenty of time to think about it. we live in a two bedroom flat in Glasgow, have 2 dogs and another DC who is 4. We don't have family but I have lovely friends close by who could take DC and would be happy to help (he knows them and their kids etc so would be a fun thing for him).

Anyways that's our situation - any stories, thoughts, suggestions would love to hear!

Many thanks :)

I had my 3rd baby at home in a birthing pool. My mum took my toddler to the park for a couple of hours and my eldest stayed home and wandered in and out. My partner and sister stayed with me and I had a midwife all to myself for the whole of active labour, and another one arrived for the birth.

It was honestly magical, obviously it wasn't pain free but at no point did it feel unbearable or scary or like I wasn't in control. The whole birth took 4 hours from the first contraction to holding my baby, and within an hour of the birth I was in my own bed with all the kids eating a toastie.

I'd had two straightforward births and live close to the hospital so didn't feel worried at all, and honestly it was the best experience. I'd recommend it to anyone in my position.

Hi OP! I had my second child at home 2 years ago and am planning the same with my baby due in July. It was honestly the best experience ever. We live in a flat too and prewarned the neighbours lol however not one of them knew what happened until I left the house with the baby! I felt so relaxed in my own home and was able to labour the way I wanted to, use aromatherapy and watch whatever I wanted on the TV. Midwives were with us for 3 hours before baby was born and left an hour later and I was able to jump back in bed. My first born woke just as I was pushing but his gran came to get him and brought him back after she had given him breakfast. We live close to a hospital which made me feel at ease as there is always the possibility of requiring transfer to hospital and due to being born during the lockdown the transfer times for getting to hospital and transferring from the midwifery unit to labour suite were roughly the same which eased any of my anxieties. I can honestly say I never felt anxious once, luckily had a very straightforward and fast labour with 3 minutes of pushing before my son was with us. I can't recommend home births enough but do the research and make sure you feel comfortable in your decision. In my area we can only have gas and air at home which was fine for me as I had a tens machine which worked wonders. If you feel you need more medication then transfer to hospital is a must however I knew as previously stated that that would be easy enough should I have decided to do that. Best of luck to you xx

@User56436674 that sounds amazing! Can I ask few questions: what were your other births like and how far from hospital were you?

@2littleloves what a great story! Sound’s incredible! Was your first DC ok to leave? How far away from hospital were you? We are about 20 minute drive… depending on traffic ofc as in a city. I love the idea but still slightly on the fence due to some scary horror stories. My first birth was in medicated pool birth and feel confident about doing that again, really ‘enjoyed’ (weird word but what I mean was it wasn’t horrible scary or too painful)

@amorningperson my little one was 2 at the time and was totally ok to leave as he has a very close relationship with his gran so she is a very safe person for him. We are about 10 mins from hospital, I wished I could have had the pool however looking back I wouldn't have had time to fill it and unsure about space also! I think if you have a very straightforward pregnancy and try to be positive in your mindset it's half the battle. I must say I was so anxious going to a hospital in the throes of COVID that being at home was definitely the preferred option for me. Ultimately you do whatever you feel the most comfortable with, I'm so hoping I can have my home birth again this time also. One of my main worries was not being able to get to a hospital and birthing outside lol. Only 40 mins of active labour and they wouldn't have allowed me in until that point so the worry of getting my youngest sorted and to the hospital in time was another big decision maker! Xx

I had three home births and it’s the best decision I ever made. I had independent midwives for two and three which was better as I knew who was going to be there. Given the current state of hospitals I genuinely think it’s safer. My third was two weeks overdue though and I suspect that community midwives would have insisted I go to hospital- easiest birth if the three.

You’ve asked for opinions so...

Don’t get me wrong- I think a home birth can be a lovely thing in hindsight. Trouble is, you don’t know what’s going to happen with this baby. No one does. It’s possible to stratify your risk but it’s just a guesstimate. It’s why you put your children in car seats- because occasionally something out of the blue happens and if it does, you want them to be as safe as possible.

Your placenta gets a litre a minute of blood flow at term, you have 5-6 litres of blood in you, so if it decides to really bleed, you’ve got 5-6 minutes before your entire circulating blood volume is on the floor. If a baby loses its blood supply, you’ve got about 8ish? minutes until brain damage starts occurring.

In a hospital, a slick team working absolutely flat out can go from oh shit, to your baby being out in around 10 minutes. You can be having a blood transfusion in around 2-3 minutes.

If you’re at home?

Very unlikely scenario and everyone’s perception of acceptable risk is completely different. As is it should be, because we are all individuals. Wishing you a lovely happy delivery whatever you chose.

@amorningperson my first two births were uncomplicated, first was long, 2nd was pretty short and in a birth pool in the MLU. I live around 15 mins from the hospital.

Obviously there are risks to home births. There are also risks to choosing a hospital birth - the cascade of interventions being the main issue. It's a very personal decision and while I wouldn't have done it for my first birth, I am so happy I did for my last baby. It was the kind of dreamy birth that people say is unrealistic and never really happens.

@Mummyingetc that’s a very good point and def one that is in the pro hospital column. I think my research however has shown that even though you are likely to have a better outcome if you have a severe PPH in hospital, that risks are higher for other poor outcomes in hospital. For example, fetal hypoxia is more common in hospital as the environment doesn’t facilitate labour to progress as fast as home environments. There’s an absolutely brilliant meta analysis published in the Lancet that looks at all this : www.thelancet.com/journals/eclinm/article/PIIS2589-5370(20)30063-8/fulltext

Have you read it? It’s really interesting and does mention PPH as you have- a big risk at home, though it does explain that home births lower the risk of PPH due to lack of intervention and less likelihood of a long labour.

Anyways all food for thought!

That is an interesting article. The evolutionary processes we’ve gone through to get to the point where how we feel about and the physicality of our environment have a quantifiable effect on our labours fascinates me. Our bodies are completely amazing!

I have two thoughts this thread has provoked for me-

Firstly- how @amorningperson is appearing to see intervention as a negative. I have to say it has no inherent positive or negative association for me. Unnecessary intervention, now that would be a negative but I’m quite keen on appropriate intervention myself. I wonder if this perception of intervention is what Ockendon is really drilling down into? Also, there’s probably a difference between intervention rates (if that is a deciding factor for you) on a MLU vs a delivery suite, though I don’t know what they are on your units. OP is contemplating MLU vs home I understood?

Secondly- did you clock those confidence intervals on the stats for neonatal mortality from the same group that wrote the lancet article you linked to? They published those separately to the maternal outcomes- I think it was citation 6?? Now stats is not my strong suit but I think it’s saying as a woman who has had a baby before, you might have no difference in neonatal mortality having your baby at home, or you might be 5 times more likely to suffer from that outcome- they can only be 95% confident that it’s somewhere between those values. Man I hate stats- someone will probably come along and say I’ve got the wrong end of the stick there now- love mumsnet!

I also hate being heavily pregnant waiting round for a baby… but that’s another thread!

I planned a home birth for my first baby but ended up transferring in for more pain relief. I was happy with the decision and had planned hospital births the next two times for reasons that we lived further from the hospital and I had moved to another country, and those were fine as well although there were things about the hospital experience that I was less happy with.

Particularly for my third the travel to hospital bit was the most annoying and disruptive part. It would have been brilliant if I hadn't needed to do that. I actually think it probably slowed down the labour. Much preferred the system where a midwife would come to your house and you could stay where you are!

I do take the point about emergencies but really there is very little in birth that is a totally urgent emergency with no signs that could have been spotted before. If they are even the slightest bit worried they will advise you to transfer in. If you need a crash section I was told it can take them half an hour to get the theatre and staff ready so it didn't make that much difference if you're 20 mins away by ambulance vs 2 mins away down the corridor. My second baby needed to go to NICU and again this was not a hugely time critical emergency - it took them a couple of hours to get everything sorted and him transferred, which would have been similar at home. There was an issue because I wasn't a patient at the hospital where he had been transferred to I couldn't stay nearby for feeding etc, which I hadn't realised in advance, so that might be something you want to find out how it works and bear in mind.

There are some scenarios where being at home would have a worse outcome but they are rare and I felt this balanced against the higher risks of routine interventions, consent overriding and needless procedures at hospital. Not everyone would make that decision but it felt right for me. I didn't have any pain relief at hospital that I couldn't have had at home.

Sorry just realised my last sentence and first are a bit confusing -i transferred in for pain relief (opiate) for a rest due to slow progress but by the time I got there it had moved on so I didn't end up taking that pain relief.

I had a good experience with a home waterbirth.

All hospitals are a min 20minute drive from me, so that was a major worry.

However my local hospital trust is Shrewsbury and the awful stories I had heard from friends about how they were treated (neglected) made me think twice.

In the end I realised that having 2 midwives in attendance throughout the birth would be preferable to the chance being left on a trolley in a hallway for hours without pain medication.

I received excellent 2:1 care throughout - by midwives who were competent, focussed and not overstretched.

I was less stressed because I wasn't in public at any point and had total control over who was in the house/room with me.

I got out of the pool, onto the settee and was handed my baby and a cup of tea!
That bit was pretty awesome looking back.

@equuscaballus I think this is something that worries me now, especially after/still during the pandemic - the NHS is stretched THIN. I went in for a routine appointment as my kicks had changed and waited for 4 hours because they were understaffed. My last birth was great but it was all luck as I got there too far gone for them to send me away like they were doing to everyone else to drive to a different hospital 40 minutes away!

@BertieBotts Ah this was really interesting! Can I ask how far away you were from hospital the second two times. Did you have to wait for ambulance or OK to transfer in your own car?

@Mummyingetc I am actually a (very green) statistician working in geriatric health care (I'm a nurse primarily). You've interpreted it right, the CI of 95% of women either falling between around 0.7 and 1.75 (round about) morbidity, in either scenario. CIs can be a bit tricky with meta-analysis as the stats they are using will be collected differently and (although this will be taken into account in the analyses, especially in a manuscript accepted by the Lancet) I think they show a reasonable similarity between risks of perinatal morbidity for mum/baby in both scenarios. As for intervention, I don't think it's generally terrible- it's actually amazing that we can get help when we need it. But it also carries risk for both baby and mother. Obviously the Ockendon has shown the worst of the worst but anecdotally, most of my friends who have had instrumental deliveries have had babies with neck/head injuries, and they themselves have suffered a lot from pelvic issues varying in severity from pelvic pain/episiotomy infection to prolonged incontinence.

Though as I said, I'm still on the fence. As a clinical person I feel very comfortable in clinical settings so I think I'd actually prefer to go to the birth centre if I could ensure that my birth wasn't slowed down by lack of staff, lack of space etc. as these things can happen on a busy ward by chance. At hoe I'm guaranteed my own chilled out space, privacy and the attention of two midwives just for me (not getting called out for another birth)... soooo much to think about!!!

Thanks to everyone who has weighed in, it's really helping just having a discussion and hearing all your thoughts.

All three of my children were home births. London, 15 minute walk from a hospital. All straightforward pregnancies, and straightforward births, fairly quick. Excellent care, at least 1:1 care, usually 1:2. Unknown midwives, but all good. I realise I was incredibly lucky on so many counts - it was an amazing experience each time and I am glad I did it. Very very nice to get into my own bed with my baby at the end.

I planned two homebirths and had a lovely experiences with the homebirth midwife teams,
. Both times almost all my appointments were at home and they were very knowledgeable and experienced with home births. I did hypnobirthing and was very prepared for my relaxed home births but unfortunately my body didn't co-operate.

First time I laboured at home and enjoyed the pool for most of that, unfortunately ended up with an ambulance transfer and emergency C-section and baby in special care for a day before I met her. 2nd time I just didn't go into labour and at just over 42 weeks I became so anxious about reduced movements and worrying why I hadn't gone into labour I ended up going into hospital for an induction (which still took 2 days) and forceps delivery.

I'd love to say I'd have a homebirth 3rd time round but to be honest I no longer believe it's something my body can physically do naturally. I didn't experience the urge to push at all and don't feel like my body is cut out for birth. I would have a planned C-section next time. I think homebirth is a brilliant choice if everything goes well though, and I wish I could have had that experience.

I will say that actually though everyone in hospital was very lovely and even though I was in a lot of pain it wasn't the horrible contrast to home that I'd expected from reading all the books on how much better home birth is. In fact both times I had a long stay, over a week in hospital and found it really hard coming home and just being left alone with no nurses to check things with and all the cleaning and housework to struggle with again.

I had my 4th at home, after a

I am planning a home birth for my first baby and thought it might be useful to share an appointment I had recently to discuss my plans. I met with a consultant obstetrician and the deputy head of midwifery at my hospital.

The OB was very focused on risks, and the limited range of responses available. Along the lines of 'if this happens in hospital you're 30 metres from theatre, if at home you're dead'.

Pretty scary.

I asked a few questions and the deputy head of midwifery (who has obvs had a long career including home births) said two things that reassured me. First, that those kinds of complications are very very rare in any setting. Second and most importantly, when they do occur there are almost always signs in advance and midwives look out for them. The latter matters because it means an ambulance can be called before the emergency happens.

There are also ways to reduce risk, e.g. a managed 3rd stage reduces the risk of PPH.

The risks obviously still exist in a home birth, and serious emergencies can happen without any notice at all, but the risks are small.

So really it's all about how comfortable you are with the risks to you and baby in each setting, and IMO having in mind an idea of what may change your calculation as labour starts and progresses.

With my first birth we just drove in in the car. Ex partner driving of course :) it wasn't an emergency so no need for ambulance.

Where we are now we are only about 20 minutes drive from the hospital but it's all the way across town, and depending on the time of day there would be traffic etc. Before it was literally around the back of our house so less than 5 minutes by car. Also I live in a flat and I felt a bit self conscious about neighbours hearing as well as going through the stairs/lift etc in advanced labour! I went into hospital fairly early both times so it wasn't as bad as I feared but the car journey was uncomfortable.

The other thing was that where I live now if you want a home birth you have to hire your own midwife and they get booked up so fast I didn't even bother trying. So it wasn't something I really thought that much about this time.

I'm a paramedic, ambulance services across the UK are on their knees. There are no special ambulances held aside for you and your baby. If all the ambulances are stuck outside of hospital then there are no more. I've been to life threatening incidents (RTCs where the patients have needed care at the regional majority trauma centre) where there had been no ambulance resource at scene for in excess of 30 minutes. The last major trauma I went to, we were the first ambulance on scene, we drove 32 miles on blue lights to get there.

This is the current reality regardless of what any midwife tells you. Therefore what is your plan if things start going wrong in your home birth? Is this a risk you are willing to take with your or your baby's life or neurological function?

Oh but with the third, for the travel to hospital bit I'm including covid regs in that. So it took much longer, probably about 2.5 hours in total. We had to drive there, I went in on my own, had loads of checks half of which were fine and non intrusive with low lights etc and half of which were stressful, painful and completely unnecessary and pissed me off. Then they wouldn't let DH in so I spent an hour wandering the corridors which was not conducive to a productive labour and then they finally let him in and things carried on ok from there.

With DC2 there was also an intrusive bit where we traveled in and then we had to spend ages going back and forth in corridors to do forms because it was Sunday I wasn't really in established labour, I'd just gone in because my waters had been broken several hours and I was GBS+, but if I had been in a later stage that would have all been annoying and unhelpful too.

To some extent I don't know how much this is Germany vs UK but I found the whole triage and waiting around bit quite stressful on top of having to leave your nice comfy home to get into a car where you can't move around with contractions. And I didn't have any of those things at home. I'm sure they did triage me but there was no monitoring, no IV, no lighting being changed, no receptionist to talk to and no being moved around from ward to waiting room to private room. I was in my own private space the whole time and could have my birth partners with me the whole time.

Shortage of ambulances is a huge concern, I hadn't really factored that in, I don't think it was that bad 14 years ago when I had my home birth. (Maybe it was and I was more at risk than I'd realised).

@BertieBotts

Shortage of ambulances is a huge concern, I hadn't really factored that in, I don't think it was that bad 14 years ago when I had my home birth. (Maybe it was and I was more at risk than I'd realised).

It wasn't that bad 14 years ago. Back then we'd be shocked if we waited an hour at the hospital with a patient, now we're shocked if we don't, and patients are frequently handed over from one ambulance crew to the next shift still waiting on the ambulance. 9 hour delays are common, and 20+ hour delays not unheard of.

I considered having a home birth with my second but didn't, and I'm so glad I didn't. As long as I live, not having a home birth will probably be the best decision I ever made. What could have happened is something I think about every day.

I had been in labour for about 28 hours and was quite far along, in a birthing pool in a hospital, at which point I had a massive placental abruption and my baby's heart rate started to rapidly disappear. She was born by a category 1 c-section within a couple of minutes (under GA, husband couldn't come in, no time. Fortunately she is absolutely fine and is a very rambunctious nearly-three-year-old. I absolutely dread to think what would happen had I been at home. Even the 10 minutes it would have taken to get from my home to the hospital could have resulted in a brain injured or dead baby.

The placental abruption was very sudden and very acute. I needed a lot of transfusions etc afterwards.

I had a normal vaginal birth with my first. I had no risk factors for placental abruption. In fact I had no risk factors for anything at all!