Antenatal Testing: Making Informed Decisions

Peninsula Birth Support enjoyed the company of midwives Helen Barrington and Janie Nottingham this afternoon. The discussion meeting was very relaxed and informal with women sharing their own experiences, asking questions and listening to the midwives share their perspectives and experiences too.

The topic was antenatal testing. Helen and Janie stressed the importance of being prepared for what the result of any test you consent to during pregnancy, will mean to you personally.  For example,  what will you do if the test comes back negative or positive? Will it change your plans? Will it change your feelings about this pregnancy or towards your baby?

The midwives also reminded attendees regularly that anyone can decline anything suggested or offered to them during pregnancy and birth by their careproviders, no matter where they are giving birth. This led into a discussion about the power imbalance between careproviders and birthing women and strategies for navigating the system and keeping themselve and their babies safe.

Peninsula Birth Support meets again on May 21st. The Eastside Midwives will return to discuss routine interventions during childbirth

Reminder: Meeting Tomorrow With Eastside Midwives

Tomorrow we have our April meeting with guest speakers: Eastside Midwives, who will be chatting to us about prenatal testing.

We also have a special treat lined up, one of our members, a mother of five, is bringing along a DVD of one of her four homebirth experiences.

Hope to see you there!

Introducing An Entry Fee

Peninsual Birth Support brings locals together with birth savy mothers and knowledgable guest speakers who possess midwifery and doula skills. In order to continue providing our community with this service we are now charging a $5 entry fee to our monthly discussion meetings, to returning attendees. 

This is to ensure that we can cover the costs of hiring a child friendly venue and provide our guest speakers with small tokens of our appreciation for their time. First time visitors to a Peninsula Birth Support meeting are not expected to pay this fee.

While we would love to continue providing free community talks, it is simply not feasible at this point in time.

Eastside Midwives: Our April Speakers

This month Eastside Midwives Andrea, Helen and Karen are joining Peninsual Birth Support to talk about prenatal testing. If you know any mums-to-be or mums planning to concieve in the near future, please invite them to join us.

Friday April 23

12:30-2:30

Orwil Street Community House

For more information feel free to email us at mcpeninsula@gmail.com

RSVP on the event's Facebook page here See Eastside Midwives website here