Why Did I Choose A Midwife?

I think when people hear the word 'midwife', they think of only home births and no pain relief. Another misconception is that they are primarily hippy women that burn incense, listen to Yanni and don't shave their armpits. While I am not privvy to the personal preference of every midwife, this is not true on the whole. My friend who has a midwife is having a home birth, while Chris and I are choosing to deliver in a hospital. I might even have drugs. I'm not sure if the midwife delivering will shave her armpits or not, but I don't really care, as long as she safely extracts that child from my womb.

A few people have asked us why we chose to have a midwife instead of a obstetrician or doctor. Since it's been a common question, I decided to post it for anyone that was wondering. Keep in mind much of this is going on what my friends that have or have had midwives say, since this is our first kid, and therefore our first midwife experience...

1. At the moment I don't even have a family doctor! There's a pretty mean shortage here in BC, unfortunately. That was my first concern: was who was going to deliver our baby? I didn't love the feeling of having a strange (though qualified) doctor I have never seen prodding around 'down there'.

2. Better service. Midwives take more time at each appointment with you to answer questions and are thorough in telling what's going on (compared to a walk-in clinic). The first time I was at the walk-in to 'confirm' our pregnancy, the doctor basically just said, 'Yep, you're pregnant now go take these blood tests'. I thought it would be great to have the doctor be excited with us in this first experience, and have the time to answer questions and just inform us of things, since we have no clue! So far it's been that way with our midwife, so thumbs up.

3. It's free. It's covered by MSP, it costs us nothing, so why not?

4. At the birth, the midwife will be there for just me. My friend, who is a nurse at SMH says the doctors are often pulled in many different directions when it's busy, naturally. So sometimes the doctor doesn't even do the delivery...which is okay because a nurse does it (someone has to!), but you sometimes don't really know who is going to deliver! I like the assurance of knowing who will be delivering the baby.

5. In the event of an emergency... We have a pager number on hand so we can reach her at any time, day or night.

6. Lower risk. Check this out: Midwifery clients experienced lower rates of forceps, vacuum extractions, cesarean sections, episiotomies, infections and babies born requiring resuscitation, in studies where midwifery was compared to physician led care. (that's from bcmidwives.com) Sounds good to me!

If you have any other questions, shoot.