W Channel would love to hear your stories/experiences about being on the maternity ward

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Childbirth can be an incredible time, filled with a host of different emotions for all involved, including the midwives who help many get through it all. Each person’s experience on the maternity ward is unique to them, which is why to celebrate the launch of the second series Emma Willis: Delivering Babies, airing Mondays at 10pm, W Channel would love to hear your heartwarming midwife stories from your experience being on the maternity ward.

You can watch the trailer at the top of this thread. App users please watch the video here

Here’s what W Channel has to say about Emma Willis: Delivering Babies: “Last year television presenter and mother of three, Emma Willis, spent 10 weeks working on the frontline of a busy maternity unit. Now, in a brand new eight-part documentary series for W, she’s been given the chance to return to the Princess Alexandra Hospital in Harlow, Essex to complete her training.

Over the course of 16 weeks she will immerse herself in the role, supporting the hospital’s charismatic midwife team. From elective caesarean sections to natural births, complicated theatre procedures to water births Emma will share the pressures, the fears and the joys of bringing new life into the world.

Don’t miss the return of the award-winning series Emma Willis: Delivering Babies, new and exclusive to W - Sky 109 | Virgin 125 | BT 311 | TalkTalk 31”

Perhaps you have a funny story about your partner’s reaction to you giving birth? Or perhaps you are the partner and have a story to share about being on the maternity ward, watching your loved one give birth? Or maybe your midwife did something that really put you at ease or had you uncontrollably laughing?

Share your stories on the thread below and everyone who does will be entered into a prize draw where one Mumsnet user will win a £300 voucher of their choice (from a list).

Thanks and good luck with the prize draw!
MNHQ

Standard Insight T&Cs Apply

I have two fantastic DC and vividly remember the highs, lows and laughs of their births.
DD arrived after an easy labour only 10ish hours and a little help at the end with forceps, she was 9lb10oz.
The drama then kicked off and I had a large PPH/24h stay in recovery/ blood transfusion etc but we were cared for so amazingly I felt in safe hands at all times

DS took 4 days after initial induction attempts were made when the pessary just didn’t work. On day 2 a midwife was mid-sweep to try and move things along and a lady opposite pulled her emergency cord- not the buzzer- to ask for something. Sweep midwife was so professional about having to immediately stop the sweep, pull off her gloves and go running, her face was a picture. The lady got a proper bollocking but I thought it was really funny.

When they finally got me into get started on the drip, breaking my waters disengaged his head, the cord prolapsed and I had to be rushed through to theatre with a midwife holding things in place inside and the baby sucking on her finger!! It really lightened the seriousness of a scary situation. We were looked after fantastically that time too and I was relieved to have the EMCS in the end as DS was bang on 11lb.

I can honestly say that my midwives for all 4 births were all fine. I did make it clear at the onset that I wanted them to be very direct with me, give clear instructions and wasn't worried about warmth & fuzziness from staff. I like to feel in control and can keep more focused when I know exactly what's going on. At the end of the day they are there to keep me and my babies safe.
I think I shocked DH with how quiet I was each time- on TV it's all screaming and grunting! The funniest moment was with our first baby, who 'exploded' with meconium shortly after birth and my poor DH was almost through an entire back of baby wipes before a nurse came in and calmly suggested he might be better off bathing him instead. He still recalls the horror!

Midwife pretty much left me alone to birth my own baby. If I hadn't had my mum there, I'd have been a bit lost.
I did enjoy the aromatherapy and luckily I had a complication free birth, although they insisted I wasn't in labour, when I was at 6cm dilated, and insisted I did not need to push when I did!

My main Midwife related memory is being rang by a Community Midwife who asked if I could go to clinic earlier as the woman before me had had a miscarriage, so she had an earlier slot. I have three children and it depends a lot on your luck as to which Midwife you get. Generally most Midwives and MCAs ideally like to do as little as possible on a night shift, especially post natal.

The first half of my labour didnt go very well.. new mum + being induced early + a panicky student midwife... However the second half was completely different thanks to a lovely old Irish midwife who looked after me incredibly well, even had me laughing at times! Thanks to her great sense of humour and unflappable spirit I enjoyed every minute after she came on shift.

I was very lucky and they were all very nice and kind to me (c section though). But they did forget about privacy and kept leaving the bloody curtains open when I was breastfeeding.

I was an older mum, and they were all lovely to me. But I noticed a sharp change in tone when they spoke to the teenage mother in the bed next to me

After having my first child by emergency c-section I have to spend a few days on hospital and I found the midwives to all have very differing opinions.

For example, on the first night, moved my baby from the plastic crib into the bed with me (making sure he was perfectly safe of course) and upon the midwife's rounds she promptly put him back into the crib stating it was too dangerous to have him in bed with me. Nevertheless a few hours later he was restless so I moved him back into my bed and the next midwife on duty came in and said " Aww, there's lovely, you two are bonding".

The breast feeding advice was so different from each midwife and after the last one said I wasn't getting it right and pulled my nipple to place correctly, I gave up and sent my husband out for formula which some midwives understood, but others were quite offish!

A more consistent approach would have been much more helpful.

I had lovely midwives throughout both my DC’s births. The first one I was in hospital for 14 hours before delivery and a while after with complications. Everyone was so kind and they kept me on the delivery suite for over 24 hours after the birth to try and give me as much rest as possible which was so appreciated. For my second DC’s birth the delivery midwife ended up being one I had met as a trainee during DC1s pregnancy and she remembered me! She was so excited as she was still fairly new to midwifery and she said they don’t actually get to deliver quite as many babies as you might expect so she was very pleased to have my DC born on her shift.
Looking forward to this series returning, I really enjoyed it last time.

I had 'in my head' what my labour would be like, soft music, in water, sipping water and looking radiant - the real experience was yelling like an animal, crying with emotion, sweating and passing wind as I pushed. I had a male midwife Jeffrey who was wonderful and did not make me feel embarrassed at my sweaty/panda eyed/emotional person I was.

I had midwives telling me I was nowhere near ready to push and then within the next half an hour I was indeed pushing and it was all a big panic situation, tbh they were nice enough but a bit dismissive at times and with my first the midwife was very stern with me, she said it was tough love which is fair enough and it got the job done but I don't exactly look back on it fondly!! Mind you I'm extremely thankful to them all for delivering my babies safely however they managed it , I don't mean to sound ungrateful, I can't even remember if I was being particularly difficult I probably was!

Whilst I cannot thank the NHS and midwives enough for care in my first pregnancy in a life or death situation and subsequent care of my premature baby my own care was inadequate. Twelve years on and I still can’t write anymore without crying to be perfectly honest.

I can't bring myself to comment or read most of this thread, it's too traumatic & raw & I can barely handle thinking about certain parts of my post natal experience without sinking into a very poor mental health state, to the point where I've recently been speaking to the health Visitor about how to deal with feelings about self harm. All directly as a result of some of the things that went on on the recovery ward etc and in the data following my return home. I think I may need to look at counselling options once the fog has lifted but suffice to say I don't think I'll be able to (physically and emotionally) consider having another baby, I just can't.

Sorry yes I should have added, no issues with the care my baby received. Me? Like a slab of meat, no one gave a shit about me afterwards, inconvenient first time annoying mum with incontinence issues and in huge pain, shut up basically, you lived. So that was a success?!?!?

I gave birth to my first baby in a stand-alone MLU. Quite a number of my friends were a bit scare mongering about it but it was wonderful. The midwives were allowed to just get on and do what they are the experts at: supporting labouring women and delivering babies. I knew the whole (small) midwife team from ante natal visits and I was completely supported right through the birth and getting bf established. One of the midwives while chatting to me one night as I fed (imagine, midwives having the time and space to do that!) said how much more job satisfaction she had in this job than in her previous one in a huge hospital.

I had to give birth next time round in hospital under consultant care for medical reasons so I’ve seen both sides. The midwives there were fine, but had so much less time, they were dashing round and it all felt more impersonal

Couldnt fault the amazing midwifes and student midwife I had with both my labours. They passed in a bit of a blur but they gave me confidence and I felt safe and reassured. As a result I felt very calm. My midwife for ds was unbelievably nice and I had her throughout, though out of nowhere at the pushing stage when I was tired and feeling a bit defeated she brought in this ferocious battleaxe midwife who read me the riot act and was like 'pickled do you want to meet baby? Then get pushing, you can do it, no more nonsense' she was defo bad cop but it worked and ds was born moments later and she left me with the nice midwife, so surreal I wondered if I had imagined her or she had been a victorian ghost!

Saw a lot of midwives as I was in pre labour for a long time and spent a lot of it on the unit. All but one were lovely and helpful, although they kept back mostly. We had a student and a midwife for the last bit which happened super quick, they were brilliant - reassuring, kind and when things went wrong they were calm and dealt with it so discreetly they got help without me realising so I didn't panic. So many people came to help and all knew what they were doing and one even stood with my mum explaining what was happening so she didn't freak. All in all very positive. Midwives on postnatal ward also super. Got me breastfeeding after 5 days. Without them would have given up long before.

Post natal ward with dc1 was terrible, they missed how unwell I was and made me feel bad I wasnt up and about straight away.

Dc2s birth was a planner c section (following on from the horror show of dc1s birth), and they were lovely, although pretty thin on the ground.

I see my post has been removed. Perhaps it was because of the (mild) swear word I used to describe the complete lack of midwife care I received.

I could have used worse.

Not sure if this is funny to anyone but my DH, but...

I had planned/hoped for a home birth, since we were so close to hospital and I didn't fancy my chances of finding decent vegan food in hospital. Long story short, I had to come in for an induction, nothing too serious but there were a few concerns.

It was so slow, 4.5 days in total, pessary didn't work, I was fed very little (calories wise) to the point that I had ketones in my urine when I finally got to the delivery room and had visibly lost weight. Induction drip and continuous baby monitoring meant I couldn't move much, but the midwife brought twinkly lights, was quiet and unobtrusive, and let us turn the bed towards the window so I couldn't see the door or monitors. DH did hyno-birthing with me for a long time.

After incredibly slow progress I was too exhausted to stay awake between contractions so the gas & air stopped working as well. So the midwife suggested pethidine, which I reluctantly agreed to, hoping it would help me sleep a bit for the next 12-24 hours (?!) of the induction. (It ended up being only 10, but still!) Minutes after the injection, the midwife asked if I felt any better, and apparently I started laughing hysterically, saying 'I must have been crazy to think that I was going to have a home birth and do this without any pain relief!' DH and the midwife thought it was funny anyway...

My DH ran off to get the clothes from the car as the midwife said DS was very close to being born. He ran back onto the maternity ward and ran into the wrong room to see another lady giving birth. 😂

Midwives In the birth centre were fantastic. Midwives on the labour ward for the one night I was in hospital were in the main uncaring and actually quite mean as I was recovering from EMCS.

@Zebraaa I can assure you I am not exaggerating in the slightest. I bloody wish I was. No one came all night when I was listening to the steamy reconciliation with DS1. No one came for over an hour when I was labouring intensely, entirely on my own in an empty day ward having left my ill young son in the children's hospital. I wish it wasn't true. I wish it was an exaggeration. I guess it's easier to believe these things don't happen maybe?

Dreadful time first time round, although hallucinating due to Pethedine and shouting at a chair thinking it was my husband was hilarious in hindsight.

Second time round much better - elective C-section and bizarrely had a laugh with all the staff in theatre (when not throwing up!)

Both times the majority of midwives were super supportive.

It was fine other than getting no sleep from snoring women and other babies crying after I'd settled mine!!!!