questions for midwife

[mizznicole]

Hi there,

I'm looking for good interview questions for a midwife.

With my firstborn, we had a horrible experience with the midwife. I had back labor which was excruciating. At one point the MW broke my waters, then pushed my cervix open with her finger. After 2 hours of pushing she looked up and said, well, we need to transfer you for vacuum or forceps. After an hour long drive to the hospital I ended up with a c-section. The baby was posterior. I think CPD was probably the diagnosis.

I'm really shaken about my last experience and am looking for good questions to weed out mediocre MWs - once who claim that they are non-interventionist but then do what mine did! I did not understand all the implications of what my MW was doing in the last birth while it was happening. I don't know how to foresee what else could go wrong. I had done a lot of reading and STILL ended up with a frickin' c-sec.

So now I'm VBAC which adds to the complication. Please help!

[jennica]

Ask questions like:

Under what circumstances would you recommend breaking the water?

Do you do vaginal exams in labor? Would you be comfortable not doing any exams during labor?

Do you instruct clients to push once they are dilated to 10, or to wait until they feel the urge to push?

There are lists of questions on the internet too. When I interviewed I took the questions from other lists I liked and then I added questions that pertained to my last birth experience that addressed the things I did not like that were done to get a feel for how I would be treated this time. It sounds like you were really mistreated at your last birth and your midwife was very impatient. I can understand why it was such a bad experience and why you want to avoid that from happening again. Good luck in your search.

[Ophelia]

I had the horrible back labor too (so bad that when I got into the birthing tub it didn't even help!), which ended up in a cascade of interventions including pitocin cranked up to an almost unheard of amount, epidural, and vacuum.

I totally understand wanting to be prepared and be able to avoid it the second time around, that is exactly what I am doing and currently setting up MW interviews.

You can ask them what they do to help prevent back labor, and what they do if at labor the baby is still posterior. Would those questions be open-ended enough?

There is also a book No More Back Labor