Jennie Nash wanted to have a home birth. She had set up a birthing pool and made all the preparations. Sadly, she didn’t get the experience she had wanted.

“Unfortunately, they were understaffed, and we couldn’t get a midwife to actually come. It was devastating to make a trip to hospital,” says Jennie, 39 (pictured above).

The mum-of-one, from Leeds, said it meant her labour was probably longer than it would’ve been if she could have stayed at home.

“It was really upsetting when we got home and walked past the room where we had the pool and the fairy lights and the music set up, after having quite a long, complicated birth. It was hard to see what could have been,” says Jennie.

Jennie explained that one of her friends, who lives a couple of streets away from her had a home birth on the Monday, two days before she went into labour. “I wonder if the time of year I gave birth was particularly busy for the midwives and that’s why we couldn’t get one,” she says.

She says she decided to have a home birth because hospitals make her feel uncomfortable and she wanted to be in an environment that was natural.

Jennie said her baby was in an awkward position so she thinks that may be why her birth was longer than expected. When she initially entered the hospital, she had to wait in the corridor while she was having contractions as there wasn’t a spot available in the maternity assessment unit.

“Then I was moved into a west ward and there was somebody having a suspected miscarriage in one bed, then someone else being violently sick across from me on the same ward. It was quite different from the calm environment we had created at home.

“It changed the way my body reacted. My adrenaline started kicking in, rather than the oxytocin that you need to make you dilated. It took a long time to get painkillers as well. It just wasn’t what I wanted,” she says.

Jennie explained how she didn’t have one midwife with her throughout her birth, she thinks she was in labour through three different shifts in hospital. She says, “When I was moved onto a hormone drip, another midwife started her shift. Then another midwife and a student midwife. At the last part of your labour, having a different face changes the atmosphere a lot.

“It’s a personal thing, you develop a bit of a relationship with one midwife, and then for it to switch felt quite odd. The midwives were saying they rarely get to see the full birth.”

She says she felt a lack of autonomy in hospital and that she was pressured into having medication and pushed to do things she didn’t want to.

“I think pretty much everything that I didn’t want to do ended up being quite close to an option. Had my partner not advocated for me so well, I think it would have been really easy for it to have gone down a path that I didn’t want.

“It’s constantly a battle, rather than it being your choice,” she says.

About 2% of births are home births in the UK. Yet, Jennie thinks that they are becoming more popular and awareness is increasing. “For the pregnant people I knew, three out of 10 of them were either considering it or actually had a home birth. Unfortunately, only one of them actually managed to have a home birth. Everyone else was in the same situation as me where they couldn’t access a midwife.”

Hayley Cook, 33, from Leeds, had a very different experience for her second birth. She was able to have a home birth.

“My home birth was so healing and empowering. It was one of the best days of my life and feels like such a huge achievement. I felt really in control, supported, safe and loved.”

She did, however, have her first birth in hospital during the November 2020 Covid lockdown. “I had a tough experience; it felt very out of control. I was encouraged to have an induction which led to further interventions I really wanted to try and avoid.

“I wasn’t aware at the time of the rollercoaster this was putting me on. I really struggled to understand what happened and afterwards I was very upset by the experience.”

She says the main reason she opted for a home birth was because of her experience with her first birth. “I realised during that second pregnancy that home birth have me back everything I needed. The more I read the more I understood what happened negatively the first time around and what I could do to avoid the same happening again. I found the solution that fitted me best,” she says.  

Hayley explains she had total autonomy throughout her home birth. She choose where to move around her house and she wasn’t made to push and felt she was allowed to follow her body.

She knows people who have been unable to have home births due to midwives not being able to attend due to staffing issues. She says, “I was concerned about this myself when I was pregnant. It makes me sad that services being suspended mean somebody could miss the opportunity to experience birth the way they want.”

Natalie Young, 34, a banking consultant from Leeds, had her first two births in hospital and her third at home.

“It was amazing and so much more straightforward than I ever could have imagined. It was such an intimate experience that I only wish I had experienced it with my other children too,” she says.

She says she was totally in control of what happened and her husband helped with this. “I wanted to have the first hour in the water [birth pool] to breastfeed, have skin to skin and relax after the birth. I did all of that and it felt so special and amazing. Just having that time to look at him [the baby] and him look back at me for us to take each other in was just beautiful. My favourite moment of my birth.”

Natalie says it was a huge contrast to her first birth, in which she had an epidural, episiotomy and forceps delivery, followed by six nights in hospital on antibiotics for a suspected infection.

During her second birth, she says, “I quickly asked for the epidural but was told the doctor was in surgery and they wanted to examine me. I was examined and was told that I was 4cm dilated, however no longer than 25 minutes later my baby was born with no pain relief.

“I also experienced foetal ejection reflex with this birth and my waters broke while my baby was already on its way out.”

Natalie says, “I truly believe my second birth could have been a home birth and I wish I had explored that option more.”

She says the midwives listened to her wishes and her birth plan during her home birth. “I decided not to have any cervical examinations and my midwife respected that right away and it was a bit of a surprise to me to not have to explain myself or fight for what I wanted.

“If I had any more children I’d love to have another home birth.”