I can quite vividly remember feeling frightened and nervous all the way to the hospital when I was in established labour. I could feel every bump in the road and was very aware of my breathing. Subsequently, I can also remember the surge of relief I felt when I arrived at my hospital and was under the supervision of midwife number one. There was just something about being with professionals that suddenly puts you at ease.

Within about an hour I had been assigned to the Midwifery Led Unit (which is where they like to put their ‘low risk’ patients), had my first internal check (moo!) and was settling into the birthing pool. As I opted for the birthing pool and was lucky enough to catch it when no one else was using it, I had a lovely private room with its own toilet and shower. The overall feel of it was calm and relaxing (yes, even with the knowledge that birth was a-creepin’). My first midwife was nice and I also had a student midwife in with me to observe. I would just like to add that you shouldn’t feel obliged to have a student in with you if you really don’t want to. The only reason I did was because I felt comfortable and was only too glad that I could help them train more staff. In all, I was with these two for about the first five hours of my labour. Then along came midwife number two.

She was lovely and made me feel so safe, in control and was very supportive. I had her for about 8 hours in all and only wish that she could have stayed with me right the way through. I was allowed a nice little radio on in the background and she couldn’t do enough to help me. Every so often she would leave the room so my husband and I could have a quite 15 minutes together, which I really appreciated (as did he, we had great fun with the gas and air, but shh) so everything was progressing nicely. Then I was told that she had to leave as her shift was about to end, and due to the shortage in staff, I had to be moved to the Labour Ward (hideously clinical place) and go through the rest of my labour with a third midwife. Well, I crumbled. I remember going from feeling safe to feeling devastated (even started to cry) and rejected.

Now here’s a trick…try walking from one floor to another when you are in labour and have what feels like an elephant in your pelvis – not exactly what I would call ‘fine holiday fun’. It all went downhill from there really. I was made to feel like a nuisance on a night shift and was pressured into having a pethadine shot (I still resent midwife number three for that), which in my opinion didn’t even take the pain away, it just made me feel dopey and out of control.

I really don’t want to scare any first timers too badly here, so I wont go into any of my gruesome birth details and will just leave it as: after much pushing and a bottle of wines worth of blood, I had my baby girl. I think it’s important that we talk about our experiences with the midwives at hospital as it can be so daunting, putting your life (and your baby’s for that matter) into the hands of a stranger. Even though I had a pretty bad experience, it was what I went through to get my baby girl and I honestly wouldn’t change it for the world – no matter how daft that sounds – and I do understand that for the vast majority, all the midwives want to do is help the best they can.

All I can say is thank goodness for my Husband. He was better than all the staff there put together and I couldn’t have done it without him. Just remember ladies, every hospital experience is different, some good, some bad, and even with all the silly mistakes that my midwives made during my labour and birth (putting me in the birthing pool to early on which slowed my labour, tried to break my waters by hand, not with the appropriate tool etc) I will always be thankful to them for bringing my daughter into the world.