Episode twelve of the second series of Our Birth Stories Podcast is our final episode of the series and we finish with Elizabeth’s final birth story. This is an extra special birth story for our team as so many of us were there either in person or over text. Despite being Elizabeth’s fourth birth this was also her longest labour and gave her many firsts including her first time actually using her birth pool in labour. Baby four was born at home during a party for his arrival. Elizabeth also talks about the challenges they had as baby four didn’t put on weight as much or as fast as he ideally should have and Elizabeth had to fight to get him medical attention.
Topics covered in this episode include pregnancy in challenging family times, the impact of family and community support, not telling anyone your due date, possible breech baby, consultant midwife support, longer labour than previous babies, family barbeque in the house, post-birth transfer for stitches, trauma-informed midwifery led hospital care, mental health specialist midwifery care postnatally, breastfeeding struggles, baby not gaining weight, fighting for medical attention for baby.
If you’re wondering why you might not want to sell anyone your due date, aside from it’s no one’s business but yours, then you might be interested to read a little more about guestimated due dates. https://www.sarawickham.com/articles-2/fixed-point-due-dates-and-wider-windows/
Not all hospitals have consultant midwives but all should have some process for getting further support from a senior midwife if your birth plans are outside of the usual hospital policy advice. Ask your midwife to refer you to the appropriate person at your hospital or contact the head of midwifery there if you find your midwife is not helpful or the hospital website doesn’t have that information like this one for a hospital near us. https://www.uhs.nhs.uk/departments/maternity-services/your-pregnancy/consultant-midwives
If you’re local to us in South East Hampshire and thinking about having a home birth and using a birth pool then you might want to consider borrowing our pool. https://www.informedpregnancybirthandbeyond.org/birthpool