Success

I've survived my first day of placement, Hooray!

That is an achievement in itself; I managed to get up at 5:30am in order to get the bus at 6:20am. I hate buses with a passion, I wish I had my car it would make things so much easier. Anyway after getting confused about buses we finally managed to get the bus to the right place and arrived very early. Laura and myself managed to arrive with little fuss so we were sat nervously in the waiting room for a while, we met our main mentor got introduced and began our day as student midwives.

First thing in the morning was clinic and then in the afternoon was home visits, I preferred the clinics because I was able to see all aspects of pregnancy, whereas community was more postnatal and breastfeeding issues and concerns.

The first lady I saw this morning was to term and was in the high risk category because of the risk of preeclampsia. She had protein in her urine and was palpated by the midwife, urine was dipped and blood pressure was taken. There was a small amount of protein in her urine but no obvious other signs of preeclampsia so my midwife was happy for her to go home and wait.

The next women we saw was an overdue lady who looked like she was ready to blow, and was quite uncomfortable again the midwife checked her urine, BP and palpated. Then it was my go...

Basically I hadn't got a clue and was nervous as hell, there was definitely something in there and it kicked my hand as I palpated. I freaked out (in my head) it has to be the weirdest thing on earth, like a little alien wiggling about in there and how on earth does it all fit! But anyway we listened to the baby's heart beat and it was honestly the most amazing thing I’ve ever heard. When you think about the anatomy and our bodies you never imagine the length it stretches and moulds itself in order to protect and nurture another human being. It's just weird, very weird. She was offered a sweep and the midwife talked about a show. I sat there with not a clue about what was going on about. After the lady left I had to ask as my curiosity got the better of me. So that morning I'd learnt how to, properly test urine, what the symptoms of preeclampsia where, how to palpate a pregnant belly properly and what A show was and what a sweep was and why it was done. So my brain had to work at 300mph in order to keep up with all the new information.
We also did a lot of postnatal appointments in the clinic, this meant that babies would be weighted and mothers would be checked for any signs of postnatal stress or depression and also to help to see if mother and baby were bonding well. Babies can and are expected to lose 10% of their body weight after they are born because this is when the baby needs to establish feeding habits, whether it may be breast milk, formula or a mixture of both. I found that many women who had breast fed their babies had problems and felt guilty about moving to formula. Although midwives are supposed to be very pro breast milk, I personally don't see the point of having a mother dread feeding their baby because of the pain. This means that they often feel stressed and unwell and it can affect how mothers bond with their babies. Personally I believe that there shouldn't be a stigma of not breast feeding after the first few weeks because everyone is different and for some people it may be too much to cope with. I could see that a lot of mothers put themselves under pressure in order to breast feed and when they couldn't they felt like they had let down their baby and were a failure.

Anyway I need an early night and I have a very boring day tomorrow so I will tell you all about the afternoon shift tomorrow Night J