Too much knowledge...

Whilst my experience of being a midwife has generally been very good for preparing me for motherhood, there are definitely times when it has not been so helpful. I know some of my fear during the transition stage in labour was due to remembering various problems encountered during some of the births I'd attended as a midwife. It also means there are times when I'm struggling with something, such as trying to get the hang of breastfeeding again and it takes me a long time to ask for help because I feel like I should know what I am doing! 

Good news

I’ve been getting anxious over the last few days as two of my lovely independent midwife friends are currently providing my midwifery care and it was looking like they wouldn’t be able to provide intrapartum care after 25 October due to the EU directive requiring them to have professional indemnity insurance (currently unavailable). Thankfully the Nursing and Midwifery Council have confirmed that independent midwives can continue practising as normal until early next year and so I can now relax knowing my friends will still be able to be my midwives even if Pod wants to wait another couple of weeks!

End of an era

Had a letter today to confirm that my midwifery registration has now lapsed and so I am no longer a ‘registered midwife’ although I am still a qualified midwife. I could become registered again next year if I complete the required number of clinical and study hours but realistically that’s not going to happen and so I will have to do a return to practice course in the future if I want to practise again. I knew when I decided to be a full-time mummy that this would happen but part of me is still a little sad about it.

Maternity leave

I have now finished the last of my visits and said goodbye to the last of my mums and babies, finished off all the little bits of paperwork that I still needed to do and switched my work phone off. I am now officially on maternity leave and ready to put my feet up and relax until Jessica decides to make her appearance. It does feel a little bit odd to be stopping work completely with no real idea of when I’m likely to make a return or if it will even be to exactly the same job as before.

Getting back to work

When I finished work a couple of weeks ago to take time off for Jessica’s operation, it was all very uncertain as to whether I would start my maternity leave at that point or not depending on the outcome and care for my last clients had to be taken over by my colleagues just in case. It has been good to get back to work again in the last couple of days. The last of my babies has now arrived and so I just have a few postnatal visits left to do before I go off on my maternity leave.

Preparing to return to work

I met up with my colleagues for lunch today and enjoyed catching up with them all. I’m still off work at the moment, recovering from last week’s surgery. We had to put plans in place to cover my two remaining clients (one of whom has yet to give birth) as it was uncertain when (or if) I would be coming back, depending on how things went. Whilst I’m not planning on being fully on-call (contorting over a birth pool is no longer very easy to do!), I’m hoping to be back doing some visits from the end of this week.

Handing over care

I have managed to avoid telling my clients about the concerns with my own pregnancy until now (although had introduced back-up midwives with the explanation that I had a family member who was unwell and would possibly need time off to support them). Now that I’m finishing work sooner than anticipated, I have had to tell a couple of clients the full story (particularly as one hasn’t yet had her baby) which has been really hard. I don’t want my clients to worry about me but I needed to let them know why I can’t stay involved in their care.

Causing confusion

Had an early start to the day – being called out at 4am to go and support a client in labour. I caused a little confusion when I arrived at the labour ward – they thought I was a patient when I first arrived until I explained that I was a midwife and there to support someone else! Several hours later, there was the joy of welcoming a beautiful baby boy into the world. It feels odd to think that this could be the last birth I attend for some time as I shall be going off work in a week’s time.

Keeping busy

Work has been quite busy over the last few weeks – June did look set to be a busy month though with a few babies due. Being busy has been a blessing in some ways – I haven’t had the time to sit at home and worry, but have still managed to have time to bond with Jessica whilst sitting in traffic jams travelling to visits. There have been times when I have found my job a little harder, but my situation has also meant being more able to empathise and support my clients when things aren’t going so well for them.

Hoping for a quiet night

I’m hoping that tonight I will get an uninterrupted night’s sleep in my own bed after three nights in a row of being out all night although not sure quite how likely it is given that I still have two women who are waiting for their babies to arrive. It was good to welcome a beautiful baby boy into the world late last night, particularly after he’d decided to take a few days deciding whether he was going to arrive or not! It was also very, very good to finally arrive home to my bed and get some much-needed sleep!

Anticipating a busy week

I have a sneaking suspicion that the theme for this week will be ‘sleep deprivation’. With two women now just beyond their due date and a third looking like she is going to have her baby a little earlier than anticipated, it could end up being quite a busy week. Having spent last night with a client in early labour (fortunately did get a little sleep though) and with tonight looking set to be another disturbed night, sleep is not looking high up on my agenda. I love my job but prefer it when things are a little less busy!

Back to work

Back at work again after being off trying to get my head around everything last week. Being a midwife is a challenging job anyway but I think it will be harder over the next few weeks. Fortunately, I have three wonderful colleagues who have been covering my workload over the last week and have already started putting back-up plans in place to allow me to have time off as needed over the coming weeks for appointments or if everything just gets a bit too much. It’s good to be back though, even if it is now more of a challenge.

Mini midwife in the making?

Antenatal visits when there are older siblings are just magical sometimes, particularly when the older child is around the age of 2 or 3. They generally are quite fascinated by everything that is going on. It is so funny when I have just listened to the baby’s heartbeat with the Doppler and then the older sibling lies down and lifts up their top wanting me to listen to their tummy too! My niece Ebony used to pick up my Pinards stethoscope and put it against my sister’s bump to try and listen to the baby’s heartbeat before Erin was born.

Happy birthday, Erin!

My beautiful niece Erin is five years old today. I can hardly believe that five years have passed since I was there to welcome her into the world – having had the joy of being my twin sister’s midwife when Erin was born. Seeing a baby enter the world is always a miracle, but it is extra special when it is part of your family. I have been lucky enough to be there for the births of two of my nieces – I was also a birth partner for my twin sister when her first daughter Ebony was born. Happy birthday, Erin!

Looking forward to time off

After being on-call 24/7 since January (apart from a couple of days where I was at a friend’s wedding), it is so nice to have the prospect of a couple of weeks of being able to switch the phone off and just relax. I haven’t missed days off as much as I thought I would (perhaps losing the guilt of visit-free days has helped!) but I am looking forward to being able to completely relax. I’ve got a spa day planned, trips home to see my family and Spring Harvest coming up so should be a good couple of weeks.

Catching up with colleagues

A lovely afternoon spent catching up with a few of my former colleagues. I think everyone has now found new jobs – mostly back in the NHS, but at least we are all now employed one way or another! It was a good opportunity to say goodbye and good luck to Chanti who is emigrating to Australia to go and practice midwifery there. I also got to meet Katie’s six month old baby Sophie and have a lovely cuddle with her. It was good to see everyone again and catch up on all of the news from the last few months.

A day in the life...

Spending the morning at a postnatal visit and getting to have lots of lovely cuddles with a very snuggly newborn baby, an afternoon meeting some other independent midwives as well as catching up with my colleagues, finally getting my website up and running and then an email from someone who wants to book my last available space – it’s been a good day. Then finishing it off with a bit of a date night with my fabulous hubby – going out for a Chinese (anywhere that does ‘all you can eat’ is good with me!) just made my good day even better.

Dealing with an emergency

Every year, I have to make sure I attend training on obstetric emergencies to keep my skills updated. Thankfully, the situations I’m trained to deal with are fairly uncommon but when they do happen, they can be very scary. I had my first experience of a true shoulder dystocia at a recent home birth. The 5 minutes it took to free the shoulder after the baby’s head was born and then the next 5 minutes spent resuscitating the baby felt like the longest 10 minute period ever. Thankfully all was well, but not an experience I would want to repeat.

Filling up the spaces

Another client has booked for maternity care and my available spaces until I go on maternity leave are now almost filled up – possibly just room for another one (depending on due dates) and then I will be completely fully booked which is fabulous. I still haven’t managed to get my website up and running yet (although the group website is up and registered on the IMUK website) – there’s less incentive to do it now that I’m pretty much fully booked but it still would be good to do it. I’ll try and finish it off at some point this month.

My wonderful midwives

One of the many lovely things about being a midwife is being able to choose my own midwives now that I’m having a baby myself. I have complete faith in my two wonderful colleagues who have agreed to be my midwives – I know they have the same philosophy about labour and birth that I do and will completely support Michael and I throughout the pregnancy and beyond. They understand that I might be a midwife with all the knowledge that entails, but that as a pregnant woman, I still need reassurance and someone else to confirm what I already know.