DO I HAVE TO SEE A MIDWIFE LEGALLY?

[JL1]

I am 9 weeks pregnant and do not wish to see a lecturing midwife. Do I have the right to refuse treatment until the birth? If not, why?

curlywurly.

I've been through this personally having had a so called 'concealed' pregnancy. DD was born on my mums floor, and even the paramedics at first thought I'd put my back out, then that it would be a late miscarriage. She was perfectly healthy.

The midwife told us she would have to refer it to the hospitals in house social worker. They then made checks and talked to us before we could leave.

To be honest I didn't see it as an infringment of my rights. Especially as we were in a different town to where we live, they have to cover all sorts of suspicions.

I also insisted we were seen by a peadiatrician as I had all sorts of worries and concerns about DD given the lack of antenatal care.

I know this is slightly different though.

AmI, I understand you didn't feel upset by the SS "checking you out", however some women in that situation may not be so lucky. You were obviously treated with respect (or so it would seem from your post), however you are are a prime example of a "concealed" pregnancy not actually being as it seems, i.e. someone hiding something. You also showed your intentions by demanding to see a pead and not just leaving, which you had every right to do if you had wished to. I am aware we have a duty to protect children, however a little detective work (and yes I know we are all pushed for time, but so are SS and I think this is when they can make sweeping generalisations and get the situation wrong) could have clarified things i.e. it is quite easy to have a person vetted by SS without them having to be involved IYKWIM.
Having re read my initial post I feel I should appolgise for jumping on Stripey's initial comments, it certainly wasn't meant to be a personal cirtisism, however it does look a bit like one, so I am sorry Stripey.

Obviously the area in which I work now makes it much more unlikely that I will have to deal with these issue, however I did work within a very deprived area where child protection issues were not uncommon. I just strongly feel that we need to very delicately balance the rights of women with the needs of a child. I would hate the rights of a childbearing woman to become erroded slowly because certain women decide to make choices that are not favourable with the general public. Again I want to confirm I am neither supporting or condoning any of these actions, merely concerned about what may come of this sort of situation if it escalates.

Can I appologise if there are some grammatical errors in my posts, the kids have been messing with my keyboard and some letters appear not to be working (am afraid I can't use this excuse for my poor spelling )

Stripey I can understand that it can be a potential child protection issue, but would also depend on a variety of other factors including the mother's current, past mental state, living conditions, mother's physical health etc.

Pregnancy is not an illness, although has become more and more medicalized to the point where it's virtually the norm now.

As a m/w I can't make that call, which is why I have to refer to ss. Hospital policy and if I didn't do it I would lose my job. Only had to do it once and explained it well (I think) to the lady in such a way that she didn't mind.

Not sure if its based on any national guideline/recommendation.

Curly,

Just read your last post with interest - don't worry no offence taken with anything.

Interested what you said about getting people vetted by ss without the person knowing. I've always been told that should not be done and that the person must be informed of whats happening. I had to fill out a CAF form with the woman, she signed to say she was giving her permission for the form to be done. If I remember if she didn't give permission the form would still be done and it would be written that permission wasn't gained.

I would also hate to see womens' rights be erroded and if a woman has made an informed decision not to have antenatal care then I would be supportive of that decision.

Unfortunately as far as whetehr or not I have to fill out a CAF form in some scenarios, as an NHS employee my hands are tied and I have to follow hospital policy. However I hope in situations where I'm doing something I may think doesn't need doing that I do it with tact and sympathy. I certainly wouldn't be afraid to say to a woman that I don't think it needs doing in her situation, but its policy and I have to do it.

Sure i understand why you don't want anyone including midwives and consultants involved in your pregnancy as it is something that is so special, a personal experience to be treasured but you are putting your baby and yourself at risk not only of not identifying any difficulties that your scans and blood tests are in place to detect but because of hospital safeguarding you will achieve the opposite of managing your own pregnancy and birth as social services will be involved and will stay involved until they are satisfied there isn't any risk of neglect. It is also midwifery, hospital dr's +consultants that decide when your baby and yourself are ready to be discharged and if they decide that is only possible with social services having put your baby on the child protection register then that is what will happen. You need to put your babies best interests first. Take care it happened to me

Her baby is now at school

Well not literally now as it's saturday

There's absolutely no problem in avoiding midwives during pregnancy. I had very bad experiences with midwives so I opted out of seeing them completely. I had a great gp and consultant shared care and then just a gynae for the second one.

Beware though if you end up in hospital and there are midwives there doing rounds or whatever they can be rather snotty with you, I tried to be super nice and not any trouble at all even though I was in pain and upset. Despite this they still made unpleasant comments and could be quite cruel. Never in front of anyone though of course.

No midwife will ever come near me or my child again if I can help it. More than one of them nearly killed both of us on more than one occasion with ignorance and a terrible dismissive attitude.

Just a thought. Pressumably you will need notes when you go into hospital to give birth . Things like your blood group need to be known if anything happens

STB

ZOMBIE THREAD

Aaarrrgghghhh. Why do people resurrect zombie threads? I've just been getting myself all riled up for no reason!