Call the Midwife is back!

[PolkadotsAndMoonbeams]

This Sunday (17th) at 8pm on BBC1.

I enjoyed the Christmas special - it was good to see Delia back, and I think there's going to be a nice romance with Tom and Barbara

The - it looks like we are going to get a thalidomide story.

ok bit of a spoiler but i read an article with the guy who plays dr turner. he is married to one of the scriptwriters and he said in the article that she had said to him 'how do you fancy losing half a lung?'

so i reckon he's going to have lung cancer

Where did you read that? I haven't heard anything about that. The smoking will be addressed but that's the first time I've heard anything like that.

He's married to Heidi Thomas who is the creator and writer and all round big boss!

i can't remember where but i did read it! shelagh-you are slipping up with your insider knowledge

Think! Think! This is serious news!

And of course ShelaghTurner ^^ is his other wife

I am just loving this series, I didnt think it could get any better, but i think this is the best by far.

And i just love Patsy, i thought her and Delia were going to get caught out this week in the kitchen

The thalidomide storyline throughout is gripping, the acting is tremendous, you can feel the fear and confusion

They've done the storyline incredibly well haven't they?
IAmAPaleontologist, I went to Durham (but on the hill instead) and I was aching to shout at the TV "come on you stupid woman, go to Durham too!" It was a weird storyline, I guess not all miscarriages end with a miserable ending but it was hard to be totally happy for him.

Was anyone else shocked at the expectant mother smoking during the pre-baby care classes?

Glad they are tackling the Thalidomide story.

I know a man who was born with no arms. I think he was one of the last thalidomide babies, but obviously still before it was found out.

His story is very sad, although today he lives a normal life.

He was born into a loving family with wonderful parents who were prepared to look after him - and did so until he was a little boy. But when he was still very young the state insisted that he be sent away to a special boarding school. There he was trained how to use prosthetic arms. He was traumatised at being sent so far away from home and he hated it. The prosthetic arms and hands were heavy, clunky and very, very painful, but he and all the children were made to wear them and use them. He says the health service felt they had to be seen to be doing something, even though it was the wrong solution.

As soon as he left the school, he ditched the prosthetics and reverted to using his feet for everything.

I've heard that a lot since I've been reading around this - the fact that they were made to use prosthetic limbs to make them look 'normal' which actually were painful and useless and they mostly ditched them.

MrsJ, that woman's story was amazing!

Alison Lapper has also spoken about being forced to wear clunky, primitive prosthetics. She was also put into an institution at only six weeks old - isn't that barbaric, by modern standards?

www.mirror.co.uk/news/real-life-stories/alison-lapper-happy-son-parys-1734221

She's amazing. I've followed her story ever since the first instalment of Child Of Our Time.

I've been enjoying this series. I like how they're doing Patsy's storyline and how they're not showing the nuns as being so perfect (especially Sister Winifred being so judgy). It was beginning to get on my nerves that they were so hyper-tolerant. This is more realistic.

Is anyone else bloody sick of the way Dr Turner is written/acted, though? Speaking so, so, so slowly, with that irritating 'well, children, now I, the man, will explain all ...'.

I really do think that Heidi Thomas has forgotten that, while to her obviously he must be an attractive man, to most people he's just a minor character in a TV show and we don't want to see him drag a five minute scene out to fifteen! It's embarrassing.

Nope. For a start this is 1961 not 2016. Attitudes were different then, like it or not. Secondly, also like it or not, he is the only doctor in the show and they did defer to him when necessary. That's how it worked and it's there in the original books too.

You're at liberty to like his acting style or not, that's up to you! But his place as the doctor naturally puts him in a senior position in the Tom period.

*time period

And I bloody wish he'd been in 15 minute scenes! He's hardly been in it this series. Thankfully that's going to change so prepare yourself!

Nah, I don't buy it.

Aactually, in the books it is repeatedly stressed that the doctor trusts the midwives as specialists, and Worth points out that midwives have more knowledge and expertise in normal births than doctors did.

The others doctors in the show are presented as pretty unsympathetic, so I suppose you could argue he's there for a bit of balance - but come on, there has been an awful lot of the serious-eyed stare and the slooooooooowwwww enunciation.

I don't think Thomas realises that in trying to make him look like a smouldering heart-throb, she just makes him unlikeable. And his wife has turned from an interesting character into a right simperer. It's such a pity. I wonder what the real Jennifer Worth would think about the way they've done that bit.

Debendox is a other one which was taken in the early 60's and caused some defects.
It was still being used in 1980 when I was pregnant. I took it because I thought I was damage my baby with retching so much and I lost a stone in weight in the first three months of pregnancy. It didn't help - possibly because I puked it all up and I stopped taking it. The drug was withdrawn while I was still pregnant but, thankfully, my daughter was not affected.

Thalidomide is still used for a number of conditions.

Smoking while pregnant would have been completely normal in the 60s. Again, in the 80s, pregnant and nursing mothers were allowed to smoke in the maternity ward day room.

And his wife has turned from an interesting character into a right simperer. It's such a pity. I wonder what the real Jennifer Worth would think about the way they've done that bit.

Oh I agree so much with this. She is becoming unbearable the way she refers to him as Doctor all the time to the midwives.

I find this often happens when tv shows go from "fancying each other" to a proper relationship, though. They seem to have personality transplants.

The boy who plays the son is good though. He is the most believable character in the family by far.

The vicar needs to stand up straight. He walks around like a pensioner with a hernia.

Yes, one thing that really annoys me is ' "Doctor" will do this or that' or 'Give "baby" to me'.

yes in 1999 there was a smoking room on the maternity ward i was on

Frustratingly, this programme is no longer available on BBC iPlayer (BBC - take a look at All 4 and see how a really great catch-up site should work!), but I saw I when it was first broadcast:

www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06hhgz8

Brett Nielsen it utterly inspiring!

Sorry for my awful typos! ashamed

He walks around like a pensioner with a hernia.

I had not noticed this, but now I know it's going to be all I can think about.

I agree the little boy is good - I really like his dark glares when his parents are being sugary.

Is it believable that "Doctor's" wife works?