Family matters...

This post is not so much about me as a student midwife but about me as a person, about my family. I've already told you all about losing my brother after all. I know I've mentioned my sister but I don't expect I've told you much about her and her family. This is all heading somewhere but I just feel that the background is vital....there is no point me telling you the ending without you knowing what came first and I believe that the whole story plays a part in where we are today. It's a part of what makes me who I am. It's a part of what makes up the relationship that my sister and I have today.

My sister is 5 years older than me. As a child I idolised her, I wanted to be just like her. I don't really know why...she wasn't very nice to me - I was her nuisance baby sister. Our mum used to occasionally dress us the same - not a problem for me but I am sure it was pretty embarrassing for her. She wasn't really mean to me but she'd want to sit and read her books and I wanted her to play with me so she'd often tell me to go away and leave her alone. If she wanted to play however, she'd make out she was doing me a big favour and sit and play with my flower fairies and my little ponies with me. We used to share a room until I was 10 and she was 15, and we moved house. We had bunk beds and we both wanted to sleep on the top bunk so she'd tell me to stay awake and maybe she'd let me sleep on the top bunk. I am sure I was often asleep when she came up but I can certainly remember the occasions when I managed to stay awake and she wouldn't swap.

However for me, her halo slipped when she was 17. She had a new boyfriend and we didn't see much of her. When she was at home she'd be in her room, when she wasn't in her room, she was a typical teen and all you'd get was hormones. Then all of a sudden she left home. My parents were out one day and my sister was "in charge" of me and my brother. She left a note for my mum with me and she left. As it turned out, the note was to tell my parents that she was off to live with her boyfriend and she wasn't coming back. My parents were devastated as you can imagine. I was only 12 but I can remember a lot of hushed conversations at home. One day at school, one of the girls asked me if my sister was pregnant which I denied. When I told my mum however, it turned out to be true. There followed discussions with my sister and her boyfriend and his parents and eventually it was decided that they were going to get married, and they were both going to move back in with us. My sister's halo didn't slip because she left home, it didn't slip because she was pregnant, it slipped because she upset my parents so badly.

I recall it being around this time that I was allowed to get my ears pierced whereas my sister wasn't allowed until she was 16. My sister moaned for years about this fact - she didn't realise that in part it was because of her I was allowed mine done early. I don't know what I did, but my mum told me I was a big help to her at that time. Anyway my sister married her boyfriend and shortly before she turned 18 she became a mum. I have loved being an Auntie ever since and I was honoured to become her baby girls godmother. My sister and her husband moved into their own place and a couple of years later had a little boy. Life got better and they managed to buy their own house and 5 years later had another baby girl. I was so proud of them. They hadn't made the best choices but they'd pulled their socks up, worked hard and made a life and a home for themselves. I used to visit my sister weekly at that time, her youngest daughter just a baby. We used to go shopping a lot.  Life went on....there were ups and downs but generally life was good, life was "normal", life was uneventful - oh wasn't that nice! Then followed a catalogue of events that sometimes blurs in which order it all happened. It's the part of our lives that we sometimes think people wouldn't believe. However I am going to focus on the events directly involving my sister and her family, although it was around the same time as my brother falling ill and me getting married.

My eldest niece was 13. My sister and her husband had separated and although we were all initially shocked, it certainly seemed to be the best decision. Then came the bombshell. My niece confided in a friend at school. Her father had been sexually abusing her. Our lives changed in an instant, although of course, hers had changed some time before when it had all begun.

There is so much more to say that it is simply too much for one post alone so I shall tell the next part of the tale next time....

5 years - a sensitive post!

Today it's been 5 years since my brother lost his fight against the brain tumour in his head. The night before I had been so happy, his son had been born on the Saturday and whilst he hadn't been well enough to be there, we were hoping that his wife and son would be home on the Monday and he'd meet his son. However in the early hours of Monday 8th May 2006, he slipped away peacefully in his sleep. Whilst he never did get to hold his son, he did at least know that he had been born and that had made him happy. Losing my brother changed me - in ways I can't really explain, all I know is, I am different to the person I was before he died.

This week a friend of mine had her life changed forever in one of the cruelest possible ways. Her son William, who was soon to be 3, didn't wake up. He hadn't been ill, though he'd been under investigations as it was thought he had epilepsy. They'd been on holiday and the day before they'd spent the day at the beach and he had thoroughly enjoyed playing in the sand, and chasing a beach ball. It is wonderful that his last day was so happy and carefree with his parents and older sister, and I am sure that those memories will bring comfort as well as pain in the days, weeks and years ahead.

I know William's mum, through an online community. Some people might fight it strange that I keep sobbing for William...after all I never met him. I have met his Mum but never his Dad or older sister. However the nature of the online community means it felt like I knew him, like I knew him almost as well as I knew my "real life" friends. I know I'm not alone in feeling like this - the whole community has been shocked. Many of us have children of similar ages, we've debated the SIDS guidelines, the appropriate weaning foods, breastfeeding, co-sleeping etc. It's seems trite to say it, but things like this don't happen to people you know but unfortunately that's just not true. Many members of the online community are buying and planting Sweet William, in his memory. A memory that should always be kept alive.

This week I have had times where I got cross with one of the girls for leaning on me, for not leaving me alone, for not going to sleep when they should, for not getting dressed quickly enough. I have worried about money and stressed over housework. When I read the news from my friend on Friday, all I wanted to do was gather the girls in my arms. I know I am not alone, in checking more frequently on the girls when they are sleeping. Life was thrown into perspective in a very harsh way.

I can't help William's Mum and family, I can't ease their pain. I can't begin to understand how they feel at the moment, though some feelings might be familiar to me, grief is different for everyone. Today I shall be spending time with my parents and my sister, and with our children. We will be lighting a candle for David, my brother and I shall light a candle for William. Take a moment today, to appreciate what you have - give someone a hug, tell someone you love them, smile.

RIP William, you will be missed x

Tagged!

I've been tagged on Twitter by @naomiwinters_  to answer a few questions! I do like a challenge so here we go! I have been tagged to complete the sentences below and to tag 5 fellow bloggers who I would like to see do the same.

I am.....thinking about my brother today. Today should be his birthday....he would have been 37 and that feels very strange. In case you haven't read some of my other posts but I lost my brother almost 5 years ago to a brain tumour. When I meet new people and they ask if I have brothers or sisters, I hesitate. I don't want to not mention him, but I know the reaction I'll get when I say I have a brother that died. Anyway today I spent the day with my Mum, Dad and sister - we had lunch and enjoyed spending the time together. We certainly didn't sit around and cry or get sad, he wouldn't have wanted that, he didn't like a fuss.

The bravest thing I have ever done is.... taken antidepressants. Or potentially I guess it was the first trip to the doctors to admit I was struggling with life. Depression is a very lonely experience and for me it felt ridiculous that I could be depressed. I was a coper, I was an optimist, things didn't get me down so how could it be that I was depressed. However the reality was that I thought my family would be better off without me - not that I was suicidal, but that I shouldn't be in their lives as I was clearly bad luck and they'd be better off with someone else. Looking back I can see how ridiculous that was, but at the time I completely believed it. I was lucky that I had good friends who helped me to see that I needed some help; they encouraged me to approach my doctors for advice which thankfully I did. It takes a far braver person to admit they need help, than to do something on your own, in my humble opinion.

I feel prettiest when.... well now I don't have great self confidence in my looks. I don't think I'm pretty. However I guess I felt at my prettiest on my wedding day and my husband always tells me I look beautiful; whilst I don't believe him, I appreciate he believes it and that means far more than anything to me.

Something that keeps me up at night is.....well it doesn't take much to keep me up at night because I am a night owl and a bit of an insomniac. It's far harder to get me up in the morning. Whenever I am worried I do tend to suffer more with the insomnia.

My favourite meal is.....my Mum's roast lamb with all the trimmings followed by rhubarb or apple crumble with custard....and that has to be runny custard not the thick stuff you can stand a spoon up in.

The way to my heart is....through being a genuine, honest, kind and big hearted person.

I would like to be.....a Midwife but I guess you knew that.

So five bloggers I'd like to see join in are
https://copperhobnob.wordpress.com/

http://generationwhynot-stupidgirl.blogspot.com/

http://www.totallylaurasummers.com/

http://snipsnaphappy.blogspot.com/

http://www.bushbb.com/

I look forward to reading yours!

Oh and here is a link to Naomi's
http://www.naomiwinters.com/?p=34

Passion and fear

This week I have witnessed two ventouse deliveries - this is where a suction cap is attached to the baby's head and as the woman pushes, the doctor pulls which helps the baby to be delivered. There are various reasons why a ventouse delivery might be deemed necessary - maternal exhaustion, prolonged 2nd stage (the pushing stage), fetal distress, amongst others.

Of the two ventouse births I witnessed, one was due to slow progress in the 2nd stage and the other was due to fetal distress. I can't really share too much information about the deliveries themselves due to confidentiality but in the event of the fetal distress, my heart was in my mouth and I felt very emotional when the baby was safely delivered. I'd helped to care for the couple all shift and learnt quite a lot about their journey so far, and therefore I found it mattered a lot to me, my part in their story. I was really pleased to be able to see them again the next day. 

I now have 5 deliveries to my name, three of which you already know about in my last post Not one but three. I've been lucky to work with a brilliant team and I feel like I have learnt loads in just the last week. Four out of my five deliveries were in the semi-recumbent position but the fifth (actually fourth but this could get confusing) was on all fours.....it was brilliant to get my head round exactly where I was putting my hands, and to have a different perspective - however I have got to say....it's far messier. My final delivery of the week was lovely and controlled and as a first baby, my mentor had loads of time to point things out to me as the baby progressed. 

This week I am onto day shift and I think I will experience very different shifts to the night ones - there will be far more postnatal checks that need to be done than there are in the night time but there are also generally more staff. It will be really interesting to see the difference though of course I am hoping for a couple more deliveries and moving towards becoming more autonomous. I shall be investing in a book where I can keep a record of all my own deliveries as I am sure I will want to look back on them all one day. 

One thing that has struck me this week is the value of good support. I have been told how lucky I am to be able to witness birth and I agree I am lucky. However I am also lucky to witness the amazing roller coaster of emotions during labour and the special bond between the woman and her birth partner.  I have seen the love, the fear, the hope and the excitement all in the eyes of the birth partner as well as the woman. With the couple whose baby was in fetal distress, I witnessed the pure joy on the face of the mother, that the time had arrived to meet her baby, which was contradicted by the absolute fear in her partner's face as he could see the slowing heart beat and the number of people suddenly in the room. Not for one moment did he let his wife know just how worried we all were, but he continued to support her, to encourage her and be by her side the whole time. And then once the baby was born, I continued to watch that amazing bond between them, the continued joy and amazement on her face, and the relief and joy on his. You tell me I am lucky - I wholeheartedly agree and  no matter how lucky you think I am, I know I am 20 times more lucky than that. 

Inspirational Midwives

I have heard it said that along the way in my training it is likely I will see some bad practice, some ways of practising that I won't want to use and hopefully a lot of good practise. So it got me to thinking about putting down in writing what it was about the two midwives that I know, that inspired me so much, so that when I am suffering from a lack of confidence I can look back and read it. Of course it will be hard to convey exactly why they are so inspiring in writing but I shall do my very best. Those that know me and are local to me will know exactly who I am talking about but obviously I need to keep this confidential so I shan't be mentioning their names - I shall call them Jo and Annie for the purpose of this post.

I first met Annie when my eldest daughter was about 5 days old. She visited me at home to perform her heel prick test and she unfortunately had to come back and repeat it when she was 9 days old as she just hadn't bled well enough. I opened the door to her and cried with relief at seeing her. Now I shall talk in more detail about breastfeeding later but on day 9, I was at the end of my tether with breastfeeding. I was sore, my nipples were cracked and bleeding, I was incredibly engorged and I had a baby that wanted to be constantly feeding. Annie helped me to get her latched properly, and encouraged me to attend the breastfeeding support group later on that day. So later on that day I managed, somehow, to get myself out the door and down to the group. I shan't bang on about the group now, as I will cover it in more detail when I talk about breastfeeding, but Annie ran this group so amazingly well. She'd manage to balance supporting women, without ever judging them or pressuring them. She knew when it would help for someone to have a peer supporter provide one on one support and when someone needed more. When Annie ran the group we had a thriving membership, sometimes there weren't enough chairs; yet when government funding was pulled back, it meant she was only able to drop in on the group when she could, and the running of the group fell to the peer supporters themselves. Whilst the peer supporters did a fantastic job, the membership dwindled considerably. It was down to Annie and that group that led me to breastfeed as long as I did, as well as myself of course.

I can't remember when exactly I first met Jo as she'd sometimes come along to the breastfeeding group, though that was more Annie's domain, or whether or not it was at the  Baby Massage class that she ran. Jo has a wealth of knowledge on many many subjects not just midwifery related and I believe she has recently completed her Masters.

Together Jo and Annie ran the antenatal group/drop in. They were much like the antenatal classes run by the hospitals in some ways but far far better. They would cover all the usual topics you'd expect at, such as pain relief, positions in labour, instrumental deliveries, episiotomies etc. However what made this group so fantastic is that there was no limit on how often you attended. When I fell pregnant with my second daughter, I attended early on following some bleeding I had and then more regularly from around 28 weeks. It meant that you got to know the others that attended, some would be further along than you, and some would be earlier in pregnancy. When I attended the hospital classes when I was pregnant with my first daughter, we had one of those awkward get to know each other games and everyone was uncomfortable. At drop-in, as I shall call it, we did always introduce ourselves and although it was always a little bit uncomfortable, it got it over and done with, not to mention once you'd been a few times you found it easy. It also gave you a chance to say what had been going on with you that week, to raise something that might be worrying you, to moan about work or relatives. And it always felt like someone else had been through the same or was currently experiencing the same and that made for a very reassuring environment. So Annie and Jo provided this opportunity to access the information we needed, time to speak to a midwife but also time to speak with our peers. Separately they are both brilliant but together they are the best!

When I fell pregnant with my second daughter it was only natural to me to book with Annie. I saw her every week at the breastfeeding group and I felt so comfortable with her. Throughout my pregnancy I saw either Annie or Jo and got to know them both so much more. They gave me the confidence and the information to choose a home water birth. It was the ultimate joy when it was Annie and Jo that were present for the birth of my 2nd born. My first daughter was delivered by the midwives, my second daughter was delivered by me. Annie and Jo helped that to happen and in the case of a normal birth, this is how it should happen. The best part of this is, it's not only me they have this effect on. Amongst my friends, I can see how many they have empowered in their births....whether they were home births, Cesarean sections, instrumental deliveries or inductions....Annie and Jo inspired them all.

If I can be half as good a midwife as either of them, I shall be proud. I feel honoured to have known them, and words can't describe how I lucky I feel to have had them at the birth of my second daughter.

Attitude and Stereotypes

Today we had a lecture about attitude and stereotypes and it really made me think about myself and the kind of person I am. I tend to think I don't conform to the norm and like to be a bit different. However as a female who is more than "cuddly" I certainly think I conform to the traditional image of a midwife. When my eldest daughter was born, I did tend to dress her in pink clothing; though it has to be said, I partially did that so that people would know she was a girl and this continued as she hadn't much hair until she was 2 years old.

In personality I think I am fairly atypical of female traits. I am sensitive, cry easily and wear my heart on my sleeve. I have a tendency to react first and think later - this can be both a benefit and a fault of course. In general I think I have a "good attitude". I mostly look on the positive side of life and am an optimist. However at other times I have a definite tendency towards a negative, pessimistic attitude. My self-confidence is not great and people don't always know this about me as I put on a face to hide it so I would say that is the more negative side of my personality. However when it comes to situations and life in general I am fairly optimistic. I also tend to try and turn situations around and find the positives in them where I can. I also like to think that I always try to see the best in everyone. This is probably because I don't believe that anyone is all bad and that circumstance, upbringing, finances etc. all contribute to who we are; not to forget that everyone is entitled to a bad day.

When I consider my home life I think I am a little less stereotypical. I have a house husband for example - that's definitely not stereotypical. My husband is responsible for the majority of the childcare, the cooking, the washing, and  the housework. My husband is not the type of man to be concerned with how people view him though.  I had however been a stay at home Mum for 4 years before I started the course. I don't think that is unusual, although it's not unusual for women to return to work either. Perhaps slightly more unusual is the fact that I used cloth nappies and a sling which which to carry them. Whilst these are growing in popularity, they are still the more unusual option.

When I was at school Take That were around for the first time and many of my friends were really into them. Me - nope I didn't like them at all! I was into Guns n' Roses and Pink Floyd. I liked to wear Doctor Martens and a leather jacket. So although I wasn't the stereotypical teenager in some ways, I was still conforming to an image of what a Guns n' Roses fan should look like. Not quite so much of an individual after all. These days I listen to what I like and if it's in the charts then great because they'll be playing it on the radio.

So what benefit is this to me in my training as a midwife? I don't fit into a "box". I am not stereotypical because no-one really is. Everyone is unique and an individual and as such the care provided to them needs to be tailored individually as well. As a midwife being able to see the good in everyone should only advantage me I think? Understanding that attitude can be affected by others is essential as well. If I am positive with a woman, in both my language and demeanour, then that can transfer to her and help her to be more positive too. It's important not to be judgemental as a midwife but we all make snap judgements on a daily basis. We make assumptions about what people are like based on their clothes, their appearance, their job. This shouldn't impact on how I look after women. I am most definitely not a saint or an angel, as midwives are sometimes portrayed,  but I do try my best to treat people equally already.