Meet the midwives working to end birth trauma
The number of women experiencing birth trauma in the UK is skyrocketing. Emily Whitehouse speaks to the founders of My Independent Midwife who are living proof that birth stories can be positive.
Devastatingly, the most recent statistics show birth trauma affects 30,000 women across the country every year. Though this number is much higher than it should be, it isn’t relevant to everyone. A friend of our publication recently became a mum for the first time and to help her through her pregnancy and childbirth she used a company called My Independent Midwife. To use her words, she said that ‘every woman deserves to have what I experienced’, and after speaking with the two women who created the organisation, I couldn’t agree more.
My Independent Midwife was founded in 2022 by Sarah Fitzsimmons and Jenny Johnson – two midwives who previously worked for the NHS. They created the company to de-bunk the myth that women’s pregnancies should be managed by hospital staff. To use their own phrase: ‘Our company is like Call the Midwife but with Fiat 500s.’
Jenny explains how it all began: ‘Sarah and I previously worked for a local NHS Trust. Sarah was the midwifery-led unit manager, and I was a senior midwife. We’re both very passionate about supporting women to have uncomplicated births and birth naturally, but we felt the NHS was making it very difficult.’
To give some context, data from the Royal College of Midwives shows over 50% of midwives are considering leaving their role due to understaffing pressures and fears they can’t deliver safe care to women in the current system. It’s estimated that across the UK up to one in five women develop some form of mental health problem during their pregnancy or in the year after they give birth.
‘The NHS has a lot to deal with and it has to be very systemised, which means they have to pigeonhole a lot’ says Sarah, jumping into the conversation. ‘Birth is very individualised and it’s unique to every person, and whilst working for the NHS we just didn’t feel we were able to be the midwives we wanted to be.’
However, everything changed for Jenny and Sarah when the government introduced new rules concerning insurance for private midwives.
‘The government said you had to have indemnity insurance to deliver births, but this never existed. However, in 2022 Zest Midwives managed to work with an insurance company that already insured American midwives and bring birth indemnity insurance back to the UK,’ Sarah says. ‘Jenny and I were actually among the first midwives to get that insurance and shortly after, we left our roles to go independent.’
Sarah continues: ‘When we first started out, we recognised that there was definitely a need for our services, but nobody knew it was there. To help spread the word we attended lots of events where we’d try and educate families that birth offers choices, and you don’t always have to go through the NHS. After this, our business began to snowball and we’re now growing as a little team. We’re currently comprised of three members, and we’ll quickly move to four if we find the right person.’
After setting up their business Sarah explains that their next step was working out how many women they could care for: ‘We knew we always wanted expecting families to feel like they are always a priority, so we decided to cap the number of women we care for at a time to 10. By doing this we’re able to deliver traditional midwifery – almost like back in the day when your GP knew you and your entire family.
‘As midwives we’re sort of like Mary Poppins, we fly in for a little snapshot of time and then once families have found their feet, we leave them to it.’
Chipping in, with a huge smile across her face, Jenny adds: ‘Being able to properly connect with families is both the best and worst part of our job. We establish such a close relationship with expecting mothers, their partners and existing children – if they have any. When I was working for the NHS, quite a lot of the time when I’d go in to help deliver a baby I’d be meeting the families for the first time, but now I can remember the names of family members, job roles and what their beliefs and fears are. It’s like having 10 friends.
‘When it comes to leaving, we have to wean ourselves away and I think we need that as much as our clients.’
Although, as with many good things, there’s always some negatives involved. In this instance it’s bittersweet. Sarah recalls that when they tell women they have a choice and are in full control of their own births they’re often left in shock. She says: ‘According to the annual NHS statistics, at the minute in the UK, the induction rate is 50%, but ours is 3.3%, which is how it should be. Back in the day being induced was a huge deal and it should still be a truly informed decision.
‘At the end of the day, it’s our job to provide families with the necessary information based on their pregnancy, but it’s up to them to decide how they want to proceed. It’ll never feel normal to me that pregnant women discuss when their induction date is with other expectant mothers at weekly prenatal groups or yoga classes.
Giving birth isn’t like scheduling in a weekly coffee date, it’s one of the most important days of your life. You wouldn’t book a big wedding the day you wanted to get married, you pour loads of time and effort into planning and giving birth should be the same.’
Image: The full My Independent Midwife team.
On the topic of effort, the amount of time these women have poured into their company is amazing. Although it’s only been running for two years, My Independent Midwife, which provides services in Cheshire, Lancashire, Merseyside, Manchester and surrounding areas, was named the best private midwifery care provider in the UK at LUXLife Magazine’s 2024 Parent and Baby Awards.
‘The support we’ve received since creating our business has been incredible,’ Sarah says. ‘But the support that went on behind the scenes whilst we were in the process of setting up was also amazing.’
She explains: ‘Zest Midwives have a directory of all the independent midwives in the UK and so we all support this. We’re like a big community and we all train together and support each other.
There’s constantly someone asking if anyone’s got the most recent piece of research to hand about a certain pregnancy condition and someone is always quick to help.
‘We all also share the same view that women should know as much as possible about their birth before they decide on how they want to do it. I understand that a lot of women don’t want to go private, but if I could offer any mum-to-be one piece of advice it would be to try and educate yourself as much as possible on pregnancy and childbirth. Giving birth is one of life’s greatest pleasures and families should enjoy the experience every step of the way.’
This article was first published in our other magazine Macclesfield Now which has recently released it’s Christmas issue.
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