MSE Parent Club - Part 2

SusanC_2

janey_uk wrote: »

(I had to read it in detail as part of my job - not quite that big a nerd... yet!)

I probably would have been that much of a nerd.

janey_uk

SusanC wrote: »

Sounds better than our first one. The first thing they did was have us practise labour positions. Would have been good if they'd told us before hand as i's not really practical when you're wearing a skirt. We then had to fill in some sheet of what we did in a day at that time and what we would do in a day after the baby was born. The midwife went on about how bad it was and how girls are horrible and basically painted a grim picture. Finally we watched a video about how if you are stressed then it is bad for your baby.

Oh they all do that one... they seem to roll all the potential negatives into one big exercise to try and scare you. My instructor included making hubby dinner and doing all the houseowrk in her 'imaginary day'.... I didn't realise I was in training to be a 1950's wife!!!!

nadnad

Lu - it cost £1500, and Js is right in Northern Ireland the way it happens is you choose your consultant (who also works in NHS), and go to him or her for all your appointments - i saw mine A LOT! The appointments are usually at the doctors house - mine had an annex built for this purpose. At each appointment she did the usual - blood pressure, had a poke about on belly, and scanned me, answered any questions etc. She also took the bloods that were required.

However you still have your baby in an NHS hospital (although must say with the elective section being private meant i got to have an input as to which day and i was also 1st to have a section that morning), you can also choose to have a private room but I didnt really want to, the ward was quite spacious anyway and I wanted other mums to chat to!

You also have your 22 week scan at an NHS hospital.

And if you wish you can still go to see NHS midwives throughout your pregnancy, I didn't do this until about 30 weeks when i needed my blood pressure monitored a lot.

TBH i thought £1500 was very reasonable, I lost count of how many times I saw my doctor, both due to the blood pressure and hyperemesis (i was sick until 25 weeks!), so imagine the next time she'll bump the price up on me to compensate! I honestly feel it was money well spent especially as i had a "difficult" pregnancy, I felt looked after and secure, I could ring her at any time, she talked through everything and included me in the decision process. OH was at every appointment with me which was lovely too.

SusanC_2

Nadnad that sounds pretty good. I had (NHS) consultant care in addition to midwife care because of hyperemesis and to be honest it was a waste of time (and work of walking to the farthest end of the hospital for every appointment). I saw the consultant twice and a registrar once and had to go in to the hospital for scans and tests. When I saw the registrar at 36 weeks and I said that I still felt really ill but hadn't been sick for a week she wrote "Feeling much better" on my notes. I also found there was never time for me to ask questions and discuss things so for example when I tried to find out why I was having another GTT I eventually managed to get the answer that it was "trust policy" but not any decent explanation. I think the advantage of private is that you are payingthem directly so they are more accountable to you whereas with the NHS they are accountable to the trust rather than to you and they also have more time.

Lu_T

SusanC wrote: »

I probably would have been that much of a nerd.

Erm, I actually am that much of a nerd! Printed it off and took it with me!!

That's where the 36% VBAC after c-section figure came from. Despite everyone telling me that the 'average' is 70-80% and this was what the consultant told me at the start of the discussion.

I do agree that there could be some fudging going on, but also have some symphathy for the fact that they have no computerised system so the only way to find out this kind of info is to go through the notes of every woman who has given birth that year by hand :eek:

He said lack of info had been a constant problem for the team and seemed pleased about the new system being on its way. It does seem mad that he and my MW couldn't have a conversation about me based on a shared set of notes, because the only person who has access to these is me. There is no central record of anything connected to this pregnancy and all of my old notes from last time were in a big fat paper folder. I know the NHS has a big IT programme, but you would think that sharing info about patients between relevant health professionals is a basic necessity!

Despite all of this (and figures to the contrary) I do feel he is very supportive of me having a VBAC and hope that's what I'll end up with. Now we just need to negotiate on the constant monitoring during labour. I am so not up for spending the whole of it sat on a bed and will probably just take it off myself so I can move around. I know that's what works for me and I don't want a more difficult labour because some checklist says "If has previously had c-section, monitor constantly during labour regardless of whether this is clinically necessary". I'm being stubborn, but then it's the last time I'm planning on doing this, so I want to be able to have the best birth possible - given that there are only certain factors I can control!

Dormouse

Curious_George wrote: »

when they were prepping me for the epidural at my C section the song playing over the radio was Comfortably Numb by the scissor sisters,
it made us giggle too!

a bit of useless trivia for you - 'when a child is born' was number one when i was born

When I was in labour with DS1, Bryan Adams and Can't Stop This Thing We've Started came on the radio... and made us giggle too!

Becles

I was in labour on a match day, and kept getting wrong off the midwife for paying more attention to the footy results coming in on Sky Sports News rather than concentrating on my contractions

Sami_Bee

Lu - Its my understanding (that could be wrong!) that the only extra monitoring you'll need is them checking ur scar for weakness during the labour/birth which they can do if u are in most positions

* I am right in thinking ur c/s last time was not emergency as in she was in distress aren't I ? coz I think that if it was distress they would need to monitor more.

Can I ask have any of the mummies on here had a vaginal breech birth?
there is lots of talk about breech babies on the preg thread at the mo and Chris was breech late on but I managed to turn him by spending many hours on my head! I'm just wondering because if I was told I had feet 1st breech I would want to attempt a "normal" delivery

Curious_George_2

DS was breech and personally i wouldnt even consider trying a V birth,
infact thinking back it wasnt even given to me as an option but i certainly wouldnt have wanted to try it anyway...
I was offered a manual turning procedure which i think is just barbaric (and according to the stats rarely works) and ruled it out straight away or a c section,
my DD, she got her head stuck at the last moment and it took a lot to get her out (i pushed for 2 hours solid before they had to cut me and use forceps) and she was the right way up....
the thought of DS getting his head stuck when the rest of him was already out... well that just scared the life out of me

bearing in mind of course that i cant think of anything worse than a home birth... and you can probably figure out that im the better safe than sorry type when it comes to pregnancy!

nadnad

forgot to mention little Oz started to crawl yesterday :T and he looked soooo cute. there'll be trouble now in my house! he'll be at everything! when he did it i was all yippee and look at my clever boy and clapping my hands and smiling - and he just looked at me as if to say what is your problem :rolleyes: :rotfl: . then i started to think i'd imagined it, but he crawled again today and I have witnesses so thats ok then!

with regards breech babies, i dont know anyone whos had a v birth with a breech baby. Oz was breech every other second - he never stopped moving (and i mean NEVER) in all my scans (of which there were a lot) he nevr sat still and did tumble overs all the time, he didnt settle until about the last week, and even then he turned a couple of times.

And did everyone know (probably do but anyway) if baby is breech towards the end of pregnancy they will be checked for hip problems - not just the usual hip checks but Oz had to have a scan at 4 months and then an x-ray at 7 months, apparently being breech can increase risk of clicky hip and things like that. (which no one told me by the way til i got a phone call from hospital with the appointment and i was very confused and didnt know what was going on - thought something was very wrong and no one had told me!). Luckily he's fine the only thing consultant said was !he's extremely bendy and supple" just like his mum (am double jointed in places!)