When I indicated that I wanted to have a home birth there were very interesting responses. I must say from the medical side in, when I arrived in this country, it was a very supportive reaction. My GP was, was behind me 100 per cent, and that I really appreciated. But from family it was a bit of a different story. My own mother is quite sure that if I hadn’t been born in a hospital I would not be around today. And that’s, that obviously affected her view on the matter, and she was a bit worried and advised me not to go for a home birth. My own husband was also not too sure and his family was also not too sure. So the reactions all around from family were, were pretty negative. But I was pretty sure of what I wanted and I, and I stuck to it, and did lots of reading, so I armed myself with information to argue against these sceptics. And it was also really helpful that I knew someone who had recently had a very successful home birth and so I could, as well information I could use her story to convince them.

How difficult was it to persuade your family that you were going to do this and it was going to be okay? I mean, how much pressure did you feel under?

Well, when I was trying to persuade my family members that it was a good idea to have a home birth, I would say I did feel under some pressure to change my mind. But the way that I dealt with it was basically not to discuss it with, with my wider family, but just to discuss it with my husband. And after the reading that we did together, he came round, he came round to it and I think that he decided that the, if, whatever I was going to be happy with was going to be the best option. So that was decided on. But there was quite some pressure, I would say, from family. It’s just a matter of whether you take it to heart [laugh].

What was the midwifes advice about a home birth?

The midwifes advice about a home birth was that she was 100 per cent behind me, I would say 200 per cent behind me. Independent midwives are really used to delivering babies at home and I would say that’s their main work, actually. And so when I asked her, for example, because this was my first child, ‘Would that be an indication that it would be risky to have a home birth?’ she, and the other midwives that I spoke to as well, said, ‘Absolutely not’, that, ‘There, there are hardly any indications that would prevent you from having a home birth.

My ideal birth plan would be to move around as much as possible right up to the last minute. I did think about the birth pool, but I think I’ve gone off that idea.

What are the pros and cons in your mind of that?

Well, I think you, you’re going to be in one place. Obviously you can’t move around if you’re sat in a, in a pool, you can’t move around as much as if you were up and walking around. And I think one of the main things I, after reading a lot in my textbooks, I think – I think I’ve read a little bit too much this pregnancy actually [laugh] – but I think reading the textbooks I think I’ve decided that moving around, you know, as much as you possibly can is meant to be a good thing. Pain relief, I’ve got a TENS unit that I’ve borrowed from a friend, which I will try, but that works for some ladies and not for others, so just have to wait and see I guess. And I think I will have to say that I will have an epidural on standby, just in case. I’m not going to be that brave, I don’t think, if it comes to it. [laugh] So, yes, so, you know, the plan is to be as natural as possible. But I’m sure most women when they go into labour think that, and different things take over and, and happen. And it doesn’t always, you know, they say your birth plan is only there as a guide, don’t they? So that’s what it’ll be, but that’s the plan.

I mean, no doubt you’re aware that you can make a plan and then things don’t turn out as you planned they will. Will you be very disappointed if you can’t have the birth that you imagine?

No, I don’t think so. I think as long as the baby’s healthy and, you know, is delivered fine, I think, you know, any plan that I’ve made, if it goes out the window then as long as the baby’s fine then I won’t really care, I don’t think [laugh]. It’s just something to think about, you know, and if it, if it all does go to plan and the baby’s healthy and it all works out, then that’s, that’s great. But, you know, certainly if, you know, if things don’t go as we wanted it and something else happens, then that’s fine.

I think I just desperately hoped I would be good enough mother, and that everything would go well. And I had also a lot of expectations about having a natural birth and I felt that there was quite a lot of literature about how it was almost in ones own control to have a natural birth. And I felt afterwards, after we didn’t have such a natural birth as we had hoped, I felt quite cross with some of that literature. I had a book on active birth from the seventies that someone had given me, and it said things like if you communicate correctly with your baby it will get into the right position and there was a sort of sense that you were a failure if you, if you had pain relief, and there was a sense of failure if you didn’t have this wonderful natural birth at home. So I was quite cross about that, that there was that expectation for women.

That’s very interesting. When, what do you think is a more realistic approach to that issue?

I think, I think people should be told to be much more open minded, and that often you don’t have any control and that it’s important not to feel that it’s anything to do with you, ultimately. And to listen to medical professionals who know what they’re talking about, and if they say you need to be induced, they probably have a good reason for that. And if they say you need forceps then they probably have a good reason for that. And sometimes you have to surrender control, I think, because you just can’t say, ‘I’m going to do this at home and it’s all going to be wonderful and natural”, because I know lots of people for whom that hasn’t been the experience and it’s ultimately been right that they should have some sort of medical intervention for the sake of their health and the baby’s health;

Did you, did you make a birth plan?

I did make a birth plan but it sort of went out the window half the way through [laughs].

And what was in this fantasy document?

In the fantasy birth plan we had that we were going to start with the TENS machine for pain relief and then work our way through the analgesia up to an epidural, but hopefully a normal delivery. But because I had to be induced everything, everything changed, because they had to artificially rupture my membrane and use prostaglandin gel and then put up the drip so it was, it was all completely different from the very start.

Do you think there is much point in people making birth plans?

I think it is a good idea to make a birth plan because I think it is a good idea to have thought about what you would like to do in labour before you actually get there. I think you have to realise, though, it would probably have to be very flexible because things change, things happen and you can’t predict entirely what’s going to happen. But I think if the birth plan is there, and it’s written down then at least the midwives and staff know what your original ideas were and what you originally thought you would like to do. And try and stick with that and bring up things that are just, that are written in the birth plan;

Did you feel during pregnancy that you were helped to think through how you’d like the birth to be? Was that discussed with the midwives?

Hmm, yes, but brief, it was really brief. How do I want to give birth? Do I want an epidural? I was offered an epidural from like day dot, but me not liking needles turned it down. And I think if anything that was what was pushed onto me, more than anything else. An epidural was the most frequent word used [laughs] when it came to labour terms.

Had you got a written birth plan? You know, things that you wanted to happen, things you didn’t want to happen?

Yes

You did?

Yeah, yeah. I had one sheet, and basically I had to write down who I wanted as my birthing partner, how did I want the birth, did I want music. But the form kind of went into “Did I want music? Did I want ‘ – it specified something else as well, something like therapeutic – but the midwife was like, ‘You get offered that, but it’s not really like that. You either get the bed or you get the bath, you don’t really have music and candles. And you know, she basically put it to me like that, it was one of the two and it’s not really cosy, that’s the kind of impression. And it wasn’t. It wasn’t that cosy, it was the bed, and I wasn’t allowed to move to a comfortable position that I thought was comfortable. I had to stay sitting down, sort of thing. So it wasn’t good. At first I could stand up but where they had the monitor thing over my belly I had to sit upright. And it was like, “I want to lie down,” and she was going, “No, you’re going to pull the needle out and I can’t hear the baby,” and it was just like, “Sit up and shut up,” sort of thing.

Did they ask you about that, when they were talking through the birth plan, whether you wanted to be monitored?

No, no.

So it wasn’t offered to you as an option?

No.

And it sounds like this is a sort of form that the have that they fill in with you?

Yeah, it’s just a standard form. I think I filled, I remember filling that in myself and bringing that back to like my next appointment basically, and going through with her and she basically said oh, kind of like, “Oh well, you can’t have that person’ or ‘You can’t have too many people,” she said. “You can only have one,” and then that turned into two. And I wanted my mother-law there as well, or my mother-law wanted to be there as well and basically I had to say to her, “Well you can’t,” because I wanted my partner and my best friend there. So there was a little over that as well but…

So kind of you ended up feeling that some of the things you wouldve chosen didn’t happen the way you wanted?

Didn’t happen no, yeah. That’s right.

I mean, it was probably just those last stages of anxiety. Also because like, because I did quite a lot of reading, yeah? I read quite a lot of books, like I read like, you know, all the books about natural childbirth and all this. And you’re reading all the books and they say you should have a birth plan, and you should have this and that. And so I went and said, Oh, you know, it says, it says you’re supposed to have a birth pla and they did have a thing in the folder, a page in the folder which said about, you know, a birth plan or something like that. And I hadn’t got one, and I was coming up towards the end sort of – it was quite far in – and I said, Oh, it says in all these places ‘make a birth plan’ And she says, Oh, no, no, no, don’t worry about that and stuff. And so I wasn’t sure if it was like normal to, to not have a sort of a written down birth plan. I mean, in my mind, because I’d done quite a lot of reading and research and I’d read all the horror stories of people who had emergency caesareans, so I thought well, for me personally I’m quite – as long as the baby comes out hap-, in one piece – I didn’t want to have too much intervention in my pregnancy, and I was doing antenatal classes and stuff, like yoga and stuff. So, so I knew in my mind that I was going to go for as long as possible without any intervention, and I was prepared to try and learn things to help me do that.

But I think if you were the kind of person who didn’t read books, and stuff like that – I spoke to a younger mother, actually, in the, when I was doing my washing in the launderette and she hadn’t read anything about having a baby. And I think in that situation you might be, you, it might make you more stressed out in the birth if you haven’t had someone sit down with you and say, These are the options and this is what might happe and stuff like that. I think other mothers who don’t inform themselves would find that would make their, could ruin their birth [laughs].

So did you actually make a birth plan anyway, whatever she said, or?

I had in, as I say, I had it in my own mind, really, how I wanted things to go. And when I did the final, when I did the NHS antenatal class, and they talked of the different pain reliefs I knew which ones I didn’t want to have and which ones I was prepared to have, in whatever, in the event of needing that.

So in my mind I kind of made my own, had my own idea of exactly what I would and wouldn’t do, want in there. So I, I suppose I felt relatively prepared in myself, because I knew in my own mind, and luckily weve got a very good maternity unit here, where they actually will listen quite carefully to what you want. And you’ve got one midwife who stays with you for the whole of her shift in the birth, when you’re actually in the hospital. So that made it quite easy to communicate with what you would want, sort of thing, and didn’t want. So I think, so it didn’t matter so much in the end, but I did sort of – yeah, I don’t know. I wasn’t sure if it was like standard that you have a birth plan with your midwife that you see every week, or if it was something that they just say in all the magazines and books, say, Oh you’ll be doing this and doing tha, but then it doesn’t happen in reality.

I don’t know. I – I’ve not got really, really strong opinions about it at the moment. I think what I’m scared about is being forced into making snap decisions, and being pressurised into having things I don’t want. Having said that I want all the technology at my disposal at the click of my fingers if I feel that’s necessary, so that is slightly contradictory. But, you know, I want everything in the background as a kind of insurance policy, but I’d like to kind of negotiate my way through it as we go. And as I said, you know, I quite fancy at least using a water birth as pain relief. And even, you know, staying in for the, for the full deal if possible. But in most units it just depends whether anybody else is using – most units only have one kind of water birth bath or pool or whatever they’re called. So you can’t usually guarantee whether that’s going to be available.

Yes. Well, in my family there is a long history of ten-month babies. I myself was a ten-month baby. And people in my family said to me from the start, ‘Oh, yes, well, you won’t be having your baby the month you think you’ll be having it. You’ll be having it the following month. And they were right as it turned out. The NHS policy, as I understand it, is that anywhere between 10 and 14 days after term you’re strongly advised to have an induction of birth, of labour. And I, that’s something that I really wanted to avoid in keeping with my philosophy that I wanted to have as natural a labour as possible, and, as, and a birth as possible.

And I’d, from my reading I’d just learned that if you start down that path you may end up with a lot more interventions than, than you planned on. And I, so I just didn’t want to start down that path in the first place. I was really impressed with the NHS care in that regard, because even though they have this guideline in our area that after 12 days after term you should be induced, they were quite flexible with that, with that guideline in accordance with my wishes, which I really appreciated. Instead of using, instead of inducing, the alternative that we used was to monitor the baby after 42 weeks, because the pregnancy went to 42 + 3 I think, and to use the health of the baby as a reason to go forward with the pregnancy, instead of just to induce according to any guidelines, but to look at the individual case. And fortunately my baby was healthy up, right up until, until birth, even though he was so late.

So I went along, saw this first registrar, who felt my baby and said, ‘Ooh, you’ve got a big baby here. Hes at least 9lbs 5. How tall are you? 3, 5 foot 3. You know, you really should get – first baby, untried pelvis – really should get this baby out as soon as possible before it gets any bigger. How, how overdue are you? Nine days. You should come in for an induction tomorrow. Ooh, need to get it out. Ooh, placenta could break down. And I’d sort of asked the various risk factors – refused to comment. ‘Oh no, you know, caesarean’s very bad. Don’t want a caesarean. Fair enough, huge problems with caesareans. But in the, she actually said to me, ‘Right, this baby needs to come out of you, and it needs to come out of you within the next forty-eight hours. Induction or caesarean, your choice.

I went away and I thought, ‘Right. Well, if you’re, if you’re actually so concerned this baby has got to come out and you think it’s going to get stuck because it’s so big and I’m not a big woman, well, caesarean it is. I’m not messing around with induction if you think theres going to be problems anyway and it’s a big baby and it’s going to get stuck. And I did some more reading about it, and I didn’t like the sound of the Syntocinon drip, and I thought, ‘I don’t want to go down this route at all. [Coughs] ‘Oh right, okay, says the midwife. ‘Well, if you’re sure you’ll have to go in again and talk to anther doctor. So I went in the following night, bearing in mind all this time I didn’t have a car, and I’m in a rural area, it would be an hour and a half on the bus or I had to get my parents to drive me over each time, ten miles away in the dark in the middle of December, great. Lot of stress that I really didn’t need, I just wanted to hibernate at home and just wait for it to happen naturally.

And I kept saying to all these people, I said it to the midwives, I said it to the registrar I’d seen that day, I’d said it to the other guy, ‘Isn’t there anything else you can do to check this baby’s alright, rather than just saying, ‘Oh, it’s late. The placenta might break down at any moment, could be still born, have to get him out of you. Isn’t there anything else you can do to check that everything is fine? Because I think everything’s fine, and surely I’d have some inkling that things weren’t fine if they weren’t fine? And every time you check his heartbeat’s beating fine. ‘Ah yes, but that just checks at that moment. ‘And every time he moves hes moving the same amount, for the past four weeks. ‘Ah yes, but that just checks at that moment, and it could change the next moment and it could happen at any time. The placenta could break down at any time, and it’s really unsafe because you’re, you know, you’re so late.

And what about birth plans this time? Have you thought about it?

Well, I’m not allowed to, I have to go straight to the main hospital. So I don’t have any choice on that, but I’m, I’ve got to back at thirty-six weeks to have a chat with the gynaecologist to see how the baby’s lying, how it’s presenting etcetera. Because I would like to do what they call trial by scar, which is natural childbirth following a caesarean. But there is a danger of a rupture so – which I hadn’t realised until I’d sort of chatted to her – so were going to have a discussion at that point and see how things are and sort of make a decision from there.

So I suppose that’s not the sort of thing they can really explain to you fully when you’re actually faced with the choice initially.

Hmm. It’s, again it’s one of those difficult things. Only you can decide what to do. Theres pros and cons. I mean the C-section’s the easiest answer, really. You just book in and go in, and it’s no distress on the baby and theres no rupture. But then you’ve got to recover from the operation, which I don’t really want to have to do, so. And I’d quite like to experience birth, you know, so I’m, I’m hoping to go for as natural again as possible, but I’m quite happy to be guided by the professionals.

Do you have the choice of having a, would you have had the choice of having a natural delivery?

After having the first caesarean section, yes. You can, you have the choice of having another elective caesarean section or a vaginal delivery and I had to be under consultant care this time so that they could discuss that fully with me. And there are advantages and disadvantages. Theres a slightly, well, theres a ten times increased perinatal mortality which is, you know, the baby dying around the time of birth with a natural delivery because of the risk of the uterus rupturing after a caesarean section but then – after a normal delivery I should say. But theres actually a slightly higher risk to the mother having a caesarean section. So you’re weighing one set of risks against another. So I had to discuss that all with the consultant and come to some decision about what to do.

How did you make that decision? I mean…

It was very difficult to decide whether to have an elective caesarean section or whether to go for a vaginal delivery. There were several factors, one was that the consultant felt that if I was trying to have three or four pregnancies then she would very much advise that I tried for a vaginal delivery because each section technically gets more difficult to do and you’re slightly more at increased risk of having complications. I also had to weigh the fact that there is an increased risk to the baby having a vaginal delivery but an increased risk to me having an elective caesarean section. So it was a very difficult decision but in the end I decided that probably we were only going to have two children, so probably the safest thing for the baby to have the elective section. And as I recovered very quickly from the last time and I didn’t have any complications and I’m hopeful that it will all be the same this time.

When we were talking, when I was talking about the, with the consultant about methods of labour and delivery, she was saying that for my son it wouldn’t matter what sort of delivery I had as long there wasn’t anything traumatic in terms of it being very traumatic or long or – she wasn’t concerned about long labour, she was concerned about anything that might affect his heart rate. So nothing that she wouldn’t be concerned about with other children really, or other babies, but..

Where my consultant was very good, she was trying to identify the fact that I was going to have issues about wanting to make the birth as simple as possible and also she talked about how it would help the paediatricians to know when my unborn baby was going to arrive. So she was saying if we could do either a caesarean or an induction then we could plan to have a daytime birth for your child. Which means the paediatrician’s going to be more awake, there will be more of them around and they’ll know that hes en route. So I went to the speak to the paediatricians who ran the special care baby unit. Because I was sort of incredulous that it would make much difference to them when he arrived really, and I didn’t want an induction and I didn’t really want a caesarean;

In fact before I got into all of this I was planning a home birth, and, and if not, then as much of it at home, much of my labouring at home as possible. So, I went to speak to the paediatrician who ran the special care baby unit and she said, ‘It would make a big difference to know that your child was going to arrive at a particular time of day and in fact lunchtime would be good’ [laughs]. She said, ‘No, but seriously, daytime when theres more of us around, we haven’t been hauled out of bed. Because I think the consultants come and work during the day, and then come into the SCBU, special care baby unit, at night if theres a real need for them. So if she could do it within her regular hours when she was going to be wide awake, then she was going to be happier. So I said, ‘Fine, okay well, in, if that’s the case I think induction’s going to be a less exact science. So I said, ‘All right, let’s have a caesarean. And that really surprised me because I really – oh I did resist, I did really investigate whether it was going to be worth it and it was, it seemed to be. So against all my previous plans I went for a caesarean, and I have no regrets at all. It was really the right thing to do and I’m actually really grateful to the consultants who were really being quite honest what would help. Because firstly when it came to the crunch I didn’t really want him to come out, I didn’t want to give birth. Having since given birth naturally, vaginally, I know that it’s not easy and you have to really want to push and to release your baby into the world, and I don’t think I was in the mental state to really want to do that.