Fighting & Fighting

As a laid back mellow kinda gal, I have been surprised by how much fighting is involved when you start a website for student midwives.

There's good fighting like providing legal advice (my previous life was in employment law) and guiding an SM2B through the process of winning her place at Uni back - which I have to say feels really good. Knowing that I made a difference in her life. She came to me devestated, her offer of a place had been withdrawn and she didnt know what to do, fortunatley I did.

She has told me since that as much as she wanted to fight to get her place back she was terrified, and only went through with it at the time because she thought Id be cross if she didnt send the letters I wrote her to send and do what I had advised her to do to get her place back. But she did as I advised to the letter and it worked. Ive seen her grow through this, she's had her biggest knock before she even started her training and with some gentle coaxing and confidence building she stood up for herself and fought. I feel really proud of her, she will make an excellent midwife, if she can stand up for herself at this stage - she will be a wonderful advocate for women.

There's also the bad fighting. Not everyone is happy to see this website up on the big www. Ive had the foulest messages and been pointed to many a discussion about me elsewhere - calling me all sorts for daring to set up a site for student midwives. I am apparently a 'nasty piece of work'. Given I had never met the person, even spoken with them online or otherwise I was quite taken aback by that particular comment. Theres been more and theres been worse. I tried to defend myself, explain why I set the site up but I was shouted down and publically slandered and abused. I was genuinely really upset by that. Id never speak to someone like that, had never been spoken to like that before and I would NEVER allow anyone to be abused like that on my site.

Something I wasnt expecting was how much of a target I would be, personally. This is StudentMidwife.NET not J ™.NET.

This site came to fruition from a series of events... its not as simple as some have accused me of - of wanting to steal anothers crown.

I had to take a year out and wanted to stay connected to midwifery and student midwives. I had to take a year out because I had split with my husband 2 years before and although we remained friends for a long while, it turned sour as these things inevitably do. I had to sell the house that I lived in alone, that we owned together. The house sold at a loss and I was literally destitute, something had to give as my health was suffering. I had been in A&E rather too frequently with the kind of stress asthma attacks that kill you in the end. So with no money, debts and failing health - the course, my one stability, the one place I felt like I belonged had to go - for now. I clung on to my dream for longer than I should have, I was skint, ill and wasnt coping very well. I was at the lowest point in my life so far and I was literally in pieces.

To try and lift my ever flailing spirits a friend invited me to the local pub. Dishevelled and thinking a change of scene may be a good idea I went. There was only one place to sit and she insited I took the seat and she stood. We chatted and she made me laugh and I started to feel a bit better. The guy at the same table chatted to us, he seemed like a nice bloke. I had a flash of a strange thought 'I was going to know him'. He talked about his kids and how it was nice to have a pint as he didnt get to go out much as he had the boys on his own. He introduced himself as 'Rob'.

I liked him after 10 minutes of knowing him. Ive not yet met anyone that hasnt liked him, hes one of those genuine people, what you see is what you get. He'll never lie, play games or be anything other than straightforward. I didnt know at the time but that man would change my life, and I would change his and inturn, for some if you - together, we would change yours.

I was totally shocked by how it all happened as I had decided never to have a serious relationship ever again as they hurt too much when they fail, and I had meant it. I was going to qualify and go overseas and dedicate my life to women and babies in Africa. I fought his friendship but he persisted, I was cold, chilled to the bone with sadness when I first met him.

But there was such a strong feeling of fate that within a few months we had moved in together and I had the family I had always wanted. The spiritual side of me thinks that someone somewhere led me here, to this man that needed lots of tlc, to this family that needed a day to day mum, to feel that the course hadnt been taken away from me by fate - but that fate had had a different purpose for me for a while.

One of the many incredible things that Rob has done for me was to save midwifery in my life. I was so icy when I had to take time out that I tried to tell myself I didnt want to be a midwife anyway. I was trying to protect myself from the utter devestation that I was only a year away from qualifying in the one job that ever felt like it was my true calling in this life. It had been taken from me, by circumstance and no matter how hard I fought I had to let that battle end - for now.

He saved it by buying the domain name StudentMidwife.NET and building this site from scratch. He gave me the arena to let the midwife in me live on, just in a different place, in a different way.

Fate had a few more tricks up her sleeve for me. We went live and members kept coming, and coming and coming. It was an incredible feeling - being in touch with so many student midwives and SM2Bs - midwifery was part of my day to day life again. It felt amazing. I posted up asking for staff to help us manage the site as it was growing so fast. The team you see now are mostly the result of that post. I didnt know them from adam, but I needed some help and I had to trust them. It was all on instinct and my instincts were spot on. The staff who have come after have been hand picked, Ive watched them, got to know them and then approached them.

We all have such a strong bond that many of us have talked about that stuff deep down inside that makes us and shapes us. Ive cried buckets reading some of their posts in our staff area, they really are an amazing bunch of women, truly. It was them that I first opened up to about how I really felt about midwifery, about my path to midwifery and about how it feels like home. The ice began to thaw, as it did I became more confident again, I started to feel like together we could achieve anything. I wouldnt be who I am today if it wasnt for those incredible women.

This chamaeleon process is all so recent and still in progress for me that it takes something like Rob snoring his head off (he will kill me for that) and me not being able to sleep to bring me to my blog to write. I am so busy with this site and MidwiferyWorld that I dont often get to just sit and write, if I do its usually something to help students learn or to progress the sites. It feels good, almost cathartic.

I guess fighting is a normal part of life, its always been a part of my life, nothing has ever been 'on a plate' for me. So my fight to return to practice goes on and I know I will return. It may not be this year or even next but it will happen. My passion and dedication for midwifery is clear, and it is that along with my wonderful man, my wonderful staff friends, and you wonderful members that gives me the strength to fight the battles I have to fight to make this site the best resource for student midwives that I can.

Our eldest (9) summed it all up for me yesterday....

'I think midwives are heroes'

Whys that? says I

'Well cos its just one of them heroey things to do'.

I agree. I cant wait to be one.

'You already are, you were when you helped your first lady to have a baby'.

Im not sure if he meant a hero or a midwife.

But both fight for what they believe in, right? The road to midwifery and doing heroey things can be tough, it will involve alot of fighting at different points. But together, we'll all get there.