How I Made Peace with being a Midwife In The System

I experienced a traumatic incident in my clinical practice.

Long story short, I ended up self referring to the support services within the trust that recognise that PTSD and moral injury are a real “thing” that happens to health care professionals. Especially midwives.

So this small part of my story touches on EMDR therapy, midwifery, the influence of Free Birth Society, and my experience of being home educated.

It would not be the first time I dug into my past looking for answers to why I am who I am today. This time, through EMDR, what came up for me was an aspect of my childhood and teenage years that I was aware of, but had never associated with the trauma I experienced as a midwife.

As a Child my parents made the rather radical decision to keep me out of school, and educate me themselves. I had friends, activities, and a busy schedule, but it all happened within the container of like minded people who shared the same radical beliefs and values.

I was raised to be different, but not necessarily by choice. It was just who I was before I had a chance to know myself. Were there positives to this? Naturally. But they came with the heft price tag, which was an internalised sense of never belonging.

So fast forward 30 years later. It is no surprise that I turn out to be the type of person who feels the most at home in more radical spaces. When you are raised with black and white thinking, immovable beliefs, and dogma, "absolute truths" and living on the fringes does not feel brave or edgy, it feels oddly safe.

Although I sent my kids to school and deconstructed many of the beliefs i was raised with, I was and still am far from someone who fits into mainstream society. After three years of immersing myself in mainstream midwifery education and practice, and struggling with much of what I was seeing. I was craving a different narrative. There are some great alternative narratives out there when it comes to the wide world of midwifery and birth work, but trust me to gravitate to the most extreme one available!

I started listening to The Free Birth Society podcast every week. It was full of unbelievable stories of women giving birth without medical professionals. The stories captivated me. I was inspired personally, and I was absolutely influenced when it came to my own experience of being a pregnant midwife. I ended up having an ultrasound free pregnancy and giving birth at home with just my husband.

However alongside the inspiring birth stories, this unhelpful belief started to take root in my mind.

"As a midwife in the system
you are doing harm
you are hurting women
you are part of the problem
end of story, don't argue"

It's complicated. Because no one is denying that there are some serious problems within the system. We know there are women experiencing trauma, and being harmed. Institutionalised birth that refuses to implement evidence around continuity of midwifery care and place of birth is going to continue to result in more poor outcomes than are acceptable, and investigations are going to continue to happen, and the media will capitalise on horrific accounts of poor care.

But it is not the entire story.

As I am vulnerable to extreme black and white thinking, Over time I internalised these beliefs. So much so that I found myself sometimes being fearful of performing the routine interventions and procedures of my role because I was so afraid of hurting women and causing harm.

Although I did not consciously believe this, I believe on a subconscious level I had allowed myself to be brainwashed into another vein of extremism and immovable dogma.

Unfortunately, my fear of "doing harm" meant that I encountered a situation where i could have possibly intervened sooner. It was a situation I had encountered many times and that I had successfully managed using conservative non invasive measures.

In this instance, when those measures were not enough, I absolutely intervened and called for help, and with all the help of the wider team, and thank God, all was physically ok in the end, but not without a few terrifying minutes where I was absolutely scared something bad was going to happen and it would be my fault because I did not intervene sooner. Ironically, the exact opposite of what I was trying to avoid.

I felt totally exposed. My childhood wound of "You do NOT belong anywhere and with anyone" was ripped wide open.

I was too "medical" and "with the system" for one crowd, and "too radical" for the system I was working within.

Lots of sleepless nights, anxiety, low mood, tears, feeling extremely self conscious at work ensued.

Thus my journey into the past.

The EMDR therapy helped. As well as many other things like debriefing with seasoned birth professionals both within my workplace, and outside of it.

I am extremely grateful to Dr. Rachel Reid for her support and input through the Reclaiming Childbirth Collective. I am also appreciative of the input from the senior obstetricians who I have great respect for.

I learned.

It's changed my practice.

It's changed me.

But it's also been an opportunity for me to heal from the past.

And most important.

I am now much more at peace with the work that I do within the system, and I am excited about what I am offering women outside of it. It matters far less to me if I am not enough or too much for certain ideologies or agendas.

There is more to this story, and I could talk a LOT about this subject of how to work as a midwife with integrity in mainstream environments. but this was the turning point, the catalyst for me in making peace with my path, and promoting individual experience and story over dogma and ideology.