Maternity Coalition on The Peninsula

October Event: Rhea Desmpsey on Healing After Caesarean

2011-10-10T01:40:00.000-07:00

Rhea Dempsey is a childbirth educator and birth attendant with over 30 years experience, she is also a mother of three. She is a birth guru and birth counselling practitioner. She runs sessions for birth preparation, post-birth debriefing, birth attendant training courses and more. She is joining Maternity Coalition on The Peninsula this month to speak about healing after caesarean.

Whether you have had a caesarean, concerned you might need one or simply have questions you want answered about caesarean sections, please join us. Rhea is a fabulous public speaker. No matter who you are or what the topic is, you are bound to get a lot out of one of Rhea's sessions.

Free for first time guests at a Peninsula MC event, for returnees $5. Karingal Place is a kid friendly venue. We ask attendees to bring a plate to share with the room if possible.

21 October · 12:30 - 14:30

Karingal place community house

103 Ashleigh Ave

Frankston, Victoria

Feel free to RSVP on the Facebook event page.

Relevant links

Rhea Dempsey's website

Birthrites - Healing After Caesarean

Caesarean Awareness Network Australia

Fertile Discussion in July

2011-06-30T08:45:00.000-07:00

Join us this month for a discussion about natural fertility with Jo Dechrau from Apples and Ovaries. Hear about her conception journey, everything you need to know about your fertility, common fertility myths and answer your questions about nurition and baby making.

Friday 22 July

12:30-2:30

Karingal Place

Free entry to first time guests, $5 for those of us returning

If possible, please bring a plate to share.

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

RSVP on our Facebook event page here

Mark Your Calendar

2011-01-07T03:27:00.000-08:00


Come meet us!

Peninsula Birth Support will be resuming monthly meetings from Friday February 18th.

All meetings are held at Karingal Place, 103 Ashleigh Ave, Karingal 3199 on the 3rd Friday of the month from 12:30pm to 2:30pm.

Children are welcome (some toys provided). When possible please bring food to share with the group. Free entry to first time visitors and $5 for return guests/members to cover venue hire costs.

Details regarding discussion topics and guest speakers are forthcoming.

Stay tuned...

Annual Report 2010

2010-12-31T02:52:00.000-08:00

February 2010 Peninsula Birth Support held their first group meeting where local mothers gathered to share their birth stories. One Friday a month for the rest of the year, between five and ten mothers (and their children) came together to discuss a range of topics.

These meetings were initially made possible thanks to a $200 start up grant from Maternity Coalition, which covered the cost of venue hire, until PBS group members decided a $5 entry fee to meetings for regular attendees was reasonable.

In February a circle of women came together to share their birth stories. We welcomed guest speaker Rhea Dempsey to our March meeting for a discussion about the current maternity system in Australia and how to get the birth you want. Eastside midwives Andrea Bilcliff and Helen Barrington joined us in April and May to speak about antenatal testing, routine obstetric interventions and what to expect from different models of maternity care. In June Michelle Newton introduced attendees to Calmbirth, and in July Rhea Dempsey returned to talk about building a birth support team. Steven Booth from Seven Stars Shiatsu was our guest speaker in August, introducing group members to the theory and practice of acupressure, acupuncture and shiatsu massage. Attachment parenting was the discussion topic in September. Yvonne from PANDA spoke to the group about ante and postnatal depression in October. And in November the group shared experiences of parenting and grief with the support of Life/Birth Coach, Sue McLeod.

Unfortunately volunteers did not find time to organise fundraising events, though discussions about having movie nights on the Mornington Peninsula began. This is an area we would like to work on in the new year.

Finally, we very excited to welcome three tiny members to the group: Charlotte, River & Eleanor who were born in 2010. Congrats to Vicky, Loz and Sarah on bringing these three adorable babes earthside xoxo

Sarah & Eleanor immediately after birth

Ante & Postnatal Depression Event: Guest Speakers From PANDA

2010-09-30T22:45:00.000-07:00

Come and learn about antenatal and postnatal depression, such as:

~ warning signs,

~ how to find support,

~ how to support loved ones suffering depression etc.

Volunteers from the Post and Antenatal Depression Association (PANDA) will be speaking at this meeting and bringing info packs for attendees.

Mothers who have survived antenatal and postnatal depression please feel welcome to join us and share your stories.

In the meantime, if you think you or someone you know needs help, please call PANDA's helpline 1300 726 306 between 9:30-4:40, Monday to Friday. Or collect info and resources from their comprehensive website: http://www.panda.org.au/

Friday 15 October

12:30-2:30

Karingal Place

Free entry to first time guests, $5 for those of us returning

If possible, please bring a plate to share.

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

RSVP on our Facebook event page here

Attachment Parenting Meet

2010-09-25T00:01:00.000-07:00

Thanks to all who came to our very casual chat about attachment parenting. It was lovely to check-in and hear how everyone is going and to meet the newest little additions to Peninsula Birth Support.

Looking forward to seeing you all again at our October meeting to learn more about postnatal and antenatal depression from a couple of volunteers from Post and Ante Natal Depression Association (PANDA). Details to come.

Attachment Parenting Discussion: September Event

2010-09-14T04:11:00.000-07:00

Join the mums and children of Peninsula Birth Support for a casual afternoon chat about attachment parenting: what it is, what does and what doesn't work for these families. Share your wisdom and experiences and bring along any questions or issues challenging you, hopefully together we can leave the meet feeling more confident and supported in our approach to parenting.

If you can, please bring along some food to share with the group.

Friday 17 September

12:30-2:30

Karingal Place

Free entry to first time guests, $5 for those of us returning

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

RSVP on our Facebook event page here

Acupuncture, Acupressure, Shiatsu & Cupping Event

2010-08-20T05:07:00.000-07:00

Today we had the pleasure of meeting Steven Booth from Seven Stars Shiatsu who introduced the group to acupuncture, acupressure and shiatsu for pregnancy and birth.

Discussion included use of acupuncture, acupressure and shiatsu for treating: infertility, overdue pregnancies, pain in labour, turning breech babies, PCOS, PMS, PPH, and promoting overall health.

Steven also provided live demonstrations of cupping therapy:

It was a fascinating topic which lead to interesting discussions and a lot of learning. Our group was delighted to have Steven come all the way from Essendon to spend a couple of hours enlightening us to these complimentary therapies.

(One member's child playing with Steven's meridian point doll)

Peninsula Birth Support meets again on September 17 to discuss "attachment parenting" in a mothers-group setting. Dads and parents-to-be are most welcome to join us! For more details see the event page on facebook here.

Acupuncture, Acupressure & Shiatsu Massage Event!

2010-08-10T21:20:00.000-07:00

Unfortunately our guest speaker for our August meet on "Acupuncture for pregnancy and birth" fell through, but every cloud has a silver lining and ours is Steven Booth of Seven Stars Shiatsu. Steven is able to join us at the same time and place and can talk to us about the same topic! Better yet, he can also tell us about acupressure and shiatsu massage for pregnancy and birth!

Friday 20 August

12:30-2:30

Karingal Place

Free entry to first time guests, $5 for those of us returning

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

RSVP on our Facebook event page here

Acupuncture For Birth: Our Aug Topic

2010-07-24T03:02:00.000-07:00

Kirsten Doughty is a Doctor of Chinese Medicine, Registered Acupuncturist, and Natural Fertility Awareness Trainer and she is Peninsula Birth Support's guest speaker for August. Kirsten is coming to discuss how acupuncture can be used for pain relief, breech babies and to reduce the length of labour, to name just a few uses.

Friday 20 August

12:30-2:30

Karingal Place

Free entry to first time guests, $5 for those of us returning

Kirsten works at Mornington Complementary Medicine. You can view their site here.

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

RSVP on our Facebook event page here

Rhea's Returning! Our July Speaker

2010-07-10T00:22:00.000-07:00

Rhea Dempsey is returning to The Peninsula to continue sharing her wisdom about roles and archetypes at birth. Rhea's talk at our March meet was a big hit (which you can read about here).

Friday 16 July

12:30-2:30

Karingal Place

(New child friendly venue!)

Free entry to first time guests, $5 for those of us returning

Rhea is a birth attendant, childbirth educator and counsellor with over 30 years experience in playing a role in other women's birth spaces. See Rhea's website here .

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

RSVP on our Facebook event page here .

Eastside Midwives Return: May Guest Speakers

2010-05-04T18:03:00.000-07:00

We're looking forward to the return of the Eastside Midwives this month. Following from last month's antenatal testing discussion, Eastside Midwives will be chatting about routine interventions during childbirth.

Friday May 21

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.

Antenatal Testing: Making Informed Decisions

2010-04-23T01:35:00.000-07:00

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

2010-04-21T22:13:00.000-07:00

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

2010-04-15T21:56:00.000-07:00

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

2010-04-08T16:41:00.000-07:00

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

Birth Support in The "Labour By-Pass Era"

2010-03-12T22:09:00.000-08:00

This afternoon ten women gathered to hear Rhea Dempsey talk at Peninsula Birth Support's March discussion meeting. Amongst us were mothers, birth workers, a pregnant mother-to-be, a grandmother and a handful of young children.

Rhea spoke about the current culture of birth in Australia, describing it as "the labour by-pass era", where women who want a normal physiological birth need to be "savvy" particularly during moments of a crisis of confidence.

She also spoke about birth being a "leap into outter space" in a culture where physicality is avoided (eg. taking drugs to avoid menstrual cramps, minor aches and pains, lack of exercise etc.). Rhea spoke about different models of care and the difference the people present in the birth space can make to a woman's birth experience.

The women present also shared their wisdom, exchanging memories from their own births and those they attended as friends, sisters and doulas.

Thanks again for a really terrific discussion, Rhea and women!

Rhea Dempsy: March Guest Speaker

2010-02-26T21:50:00.000-08:00

For anyone with an interest in childbirth and questions about what role partners, lovers, mothers, sisters, cousins, midwives, doulas etc. should play in a woman's birth space, we have a real treat for you! The wise and brilliant public speaker Rhea Dempsey is coming to talk about ''Roles at Birth'' on Friday March 12 at Orwil Street Community House, Frankston, 12:30-2:30pm.

Rhea is a birth attendant, childbirth educator and counsellor with over 30 years experience in playing a role in other women's birth spaces. See Rhea's website here .

For more information feel free to contact us.

RSVP on our Facebook event page here.

Birth Stories Meeting A Success

2010-02-13T21:00:00.000-08:00

Thank-you to all the mothers and children who made Peninsula Birth Support's first meeting a great success. For those who missed it, we had the honour of hearing four very different birth stories: a complicated hospital birth, a freebirth, an uncomplicated hospital birth and a homebirth attended by a midwife.

There was also a homebirth photo album there for visitors to look at and a range of books and magazines on pregnancy and childbirth (including Maternity Coalition's "Birth Matters" magazine).

The only hitch was the double booking of the playgroup room, which unfortunately is going to be an ungoing issue. For our March meeting if you're bringing little ones please bring toys and activities to entertain them with. If the room becomes too much for them there is a park next door, but unfortunately the fenced off backyard with outdoor toys is off limits to our group on account of the double booking. We are very sorry for the inconvenience.

Group Submission

2009-12-11T21:52:00.000-08:00

The Green's party successfully referred the amendments to The Midwives and Nurse Practitioners Bill 2009 (which would effectively end homebirth midwifery in Australia) to a senate inquiry, the submission deadline was Friday. The following was Peninsula Birth Support's submission:

To Senator Moore,

Inquiry into Health Legislation Amendment (Midwives and Nurse Practitioners) Bill 2009 and two related Bills

The following submission outlines the concerns of members belonging to Peninsula Birth Support regarding the Health Legislation Amendment (Midwives and Nurse Practitioners) Bill 2009. Peninsula Birth Support is a group of maternity service consumers living on The Mornington Peninsula, Victoria. We aim to provide information about childbirth to the community and support to mothers interested in making informed choices during pregnancy and childbirth. We have observed that many mothers-to-be are not aware of the maternity care options available to them and we are gravely concerned that not only will the Bill make this situation worse, it will also eradicate some of the lesser known options, such as giving birth at home with the assistance of a qualified and registered midwife.

Presently independent midwives provide homebirth families with a series of antenatal and postnatal in-home appointments, as well as attending births at home and living on-call throughout the last weeks of their client’s pregnancies. These are highly trained medical professionals who come to a woman’s home, prepared to provide medical care if need be. They are the experts on normal physiological childbirth. In the rare event that a homebirth mother’s pregnancy or labour becomes high risk, independent midwives work with the mother and other medical care providers, such as obstetricians, to ensure that mother and baby are safe.

In contrast obstetricians are the experts of high risk pregnancies and birth complications. Few women are aware that they are able to hire a midwife and have a homebirth. Obstetrics has a monopoly over maternity services and many women’s initial medical contacts in pregnancy (such as General Practitioners) do not think to share information with their patients about homebirth or independent midwives. Low risk women are needlessly referred to obstetricians due to a lack of understanding in Australia about the two very different models of care obstetricians and independent midwives offer. As a result we have a national rate of homebirth that is under 2%.

Peninsula Birth Support aims to improve childbirth knowledge within the community to combat the lack of information provided to pregnant women about their options. However, there will be no point to our mission come July 2010 when The Midwife and Nurse Practitioner Bill comes into effect. This Bill is set to give obstetricians and GPs power over independent midwives (as outlined in the Health Legislation Amendment), leaving Australian families with no such thing as independent midwifery.

While the Australian government, in conjunction with the Australian Medical Association have stated that this Bill seeks to create collaborative arrangements between independent midwives and doctors, their version of collaboration gives doctors the power to determine whether or not a midwife may practice, and who she can and can’t care for. More alarming is the fact that this means Australian women will not have freedom of choice when it comes to who they wish to employ as their care provider during pregnancy and childbirth. The government is taking this right away and giving it to one group of service providers.

In no other arena of consumption would the government allow one group of service providers to control their competition. Birth attendant Kelly Winder summarised the situation thusly: “Giving obstetricians and GPs the power to choose who can homebirth with an independent midwife is tantamount to giving formula companies the power to choose who can breastfeed.” It is deplorable.

For the government to remove such choice from Australian women is ignorant, unjust and paternalistic. This Bill places doctors, rather than women, at the centre of maternity care. It suggests that the government believe doctors should make women’s minds up rather than leave women to make choices themselves, choices which directly concern their bodies and their babies. Further, it suggests that the government believes obstetrics is a superior service to independent midwifery. This is inaccurate (independent midwifery and homebirth have been shown to be safe according to peer reviewed medical journals[1]) and places many low risk women in danger of receiving unnecessary high risk interventions during pregnancy and birth, because this is what obstetricians specialise in: high risk cases.

The women within Peninsula Birth Support have had many and varied experiences of pregnancy and childbirth. Our group includes mothers who have given birth: in hospital, at home with an independent midwife and unassisted at home. We respect one another’s diverse birth choices regardless of whether we would choose the same for ourselves. All we ask of our government is that they do the same. Our government should respect a woman’s right to choose where she gives birth and who she hires to be her care provider. If the government are able to go forth with The Midwives Bill as it stands these rights will be taken from women and placed in the hands of doctors, many of whom are unsympathetic to homebirthing despite the medical literature which attests to the safety of homebirth attended by independent midwives.

If homebirth is to remain a feasible option for Australian women it is imperative that we have access to independent midwives. It is their independence which enables these midwives to provide such high-quality, personalised and in-home care!

Yours sincerely,
Peninsula Birth Support

[1] de Jonge A, van der Goes B, Ravelli A, Amelink-Verburg M, Mol B, Nijhuis J, Bennebroek Gravenhorst J, Buitendijk S. Perinatal mortality and morbidity in a nationwide cohort of 529 688 low-risk planned home and hospital births. BJOG 2009.Kenneth C Johnson and Betty-Anne Daviss, Outcomes of planned home births with certified professional midwives: large prospective study in North America. British Medical Journal 2005;330:1416 (18 June); Macfarlane A, McCandlish R, Campbell R. Choosing between home and hospital delivery. There is no evidence that hospital is the safest place to give birth. British Medical Journal. 2000 Mar 18;320(7237):798; Olsen O, Jewell MD. [The Nordic Cochrane Centre, Rigshospitalet, Blegdamsvej 9, dept. 7112, Copenhagen, Denmark, DK-2100 O. Home versus hospital birth. Cochrane Database Syst Rev 2000;(2).

Community Talks February - June 2010

2009-12-07T23:00:00.000-08:00

Click to enlarge: