I retrained from a previous unrelated career in my thirties. The training is hard - it's 50% theory (i.e. lectures) and 50% practice (placement in a hospital or clinic). The lecture weeks are nothing like most degrees - you're in lectures 30-40 hours a week, plus extra reading, assignments etc. The placement weeks are largely shift work, including nights and weekends, working 37 hours a week. Sometimes you also have assignments to fit in around your placement. So you need really good, reliable, flexible childcare. If you're a teacher you're probably well acquainted with having to do lots of overtime, juggling your social life around work commitments, etc, so that experience will stand you in good stead. As will your familiarity (I assume) with lots of paperwork and bureaucracy / workplace politics.
The job itself is wonderful in so many ways - the joy of seeing a woman becoming a mother, and of seeing new life. The relationships you build with the couples and families in your care. The satisfaction of making a positive difference to someone's experience. But there are lots of difficult things too. The workforce is so overstretched you constantly feel like you're compromising your care and compassion for the sake of moving women along the conveyer belt of the ward. You have a great deal of responsibility and very little protection or autonomy - all of your seniors might be telling you to do something, and if you do it and it wasn't the right decision, the buck stops with you. I had to learn to develop a very thick skin and become very assertive PDQ - you have to stick up for what you believe to be the best decision, otherwise you'll get steamrolled by your superiors and they won't be there for you when you get summoned to court. (Not speaking from personal experience, but I've seen it many times with colleagues.) There are many, many nights spent lying awake - particularly in the first couple years of your career - wondering if you made the right decision, worrying that you missed something, etc. The job is also physically difficult; lots of us have bad backs from contorting ourselves into awkward positions all day, I've been hit, kicked in the face, and bitten by labouring women, and physically threatened by tired and frustrated dads. And the shifts take their toll - your risk of cardiovascular disease goes up by 30% after working shifts for 5 years.
I don't say all that to scare you or put you off, but to balance out the idea that many people have of midwifery being mostly rubbing women's backs, holding babies, and eating chocolates. It's such a rewarding career, and some midwives stay in the job for decades. But many others last a couple years - because they didn't know going in what it really involved. I'd do it all again in a heartbeat (except for being bitten maybe, that was an admin nightmare), and if you're passionate about it, then you take the bad with the good.
Go to some open days, taster days etc, and read all you can. You're right re bursaries, and I think they're going to alienate a whole demographic of potentially excellent midwives - particularly those with previous degrees and loans, or those who are slightly older and have other financial commitments - by scrapping the bursaries. I don't think history will be kind to Jeremy Hunt and his cronies for that decision (or many others, but that's a discussion for another thread!)
Apologies for how long this post is! Feel free to PM any specific questions :)