Etiquette midwife?

[tankel]

I am wondering if I should tell the DH to be prepared to feed our home birth midwife during my labor? What do you guys think? Also, for house visits, should I offer her something to eat? I am going to offer her a drink (I'm not a barbarian ) but food seems like overkill. Please help me!

 

[bucherwurm]

It could be nice to have some easy healthy snacks available, like fruit or something, especially if your husband and you will be snacking throughout, but I would think the midwife would come prepared with her own snacks, too.

 

[RaspberryK]

Dh made our poor hb midwife about 10 cups of tea, he also also went out and fetched himself and the student kfc the midwife had drinks and packed lunch with her.
Xx

 

[Kittycat155]

I think I would have a few options of soup or similar heat and eat in pantry/fridge and say help yourself to anything. Chances are she will be ok with her packed snacks unless it is a really long labor.

 

[MommyJogger]

Our midwife packed her own snacks, but we had stuff available for the birthing team and ordered pizza during the delivery, lol. For the prenatal home visit, I made scones, but the appt was right in the middle between lunch and dinner and they literally take maybe 6 minutes to get into the oven. I compulsively feed anyone who comes through the front door like they just came home from war.

 

[Erised]

My midwives (2 each birth) have always asked for a kettle so they can make themselves tea and some biscuits. That's all =)

Both home births we had a massive range of biscuits and chocolates laid out and it was never touched. Definitely don't go out of your way, they'll be prepared

 

[BunnyN]

I thought about food and decided to have sandwich stuff on hand because it was too complicated to try and coordinate propper food without knowing when what would be happening. I meant to tell her to help herself. As it was labour progressed slowly and we only called her to come after I'd been in labour almost 24hrs. It was after 10pm so didn't think to mention food. She had a long night, including leaving us to attend another patient for an emergency, and coming back. We did offer her a bed for a sleep which she was glad of. By the next morning I was far too tired and concentrated on labour to offer her anything. So we went through breakfast and lunch without offering her even a cup of tea. I hope she had brought herself something! After the birth in the afternoon OH finally offered her coffee and toast which she was obviously glad of! This time I am going to make sure I tell her from the start to at least help herself to the kettle!

 

[MindUtopia]

For visits, a drink is plenty unless you're having some biscuits yourself, then I'd offer to share. To be honest, the midwives I saw at home said they were so sick of even tea because they do like 8 visits a day and feel compelled to have tea with everyone! At your birth, they will bring their own meals and won't expect to be fed a meal, just like with any other job where you'd take your lunch to work if you didn't expect to have time to run out and get anything. But it's nice to have some snacks like biscuits or toast or whatever isn't too much trouble around so they can help themselves if they need to grab something else quick. If you have a longer labour, they may be there awhile or if it's quick, they might not have time to eat their lunch, so a few biscuits might be nice or anything else you can store away in the cupboard that doesn't need to be prepared. I had biscuits, dried fruit and energy bars. I think they probably did have a cup of tea and biscuits, but I'm not sure they ate anything else. I put in my birth plan that there were things in the kitchen for them and asked them to help themselves, largely to keep them in the kitchen so I could have some time to labour on my own, which was what I wanted.

 

[Dtswife]

I second the sandwich stuff for the actual birth idea. You don't know for sure how long it will take, when they've had a chance to eat or WILL have a chance to eat. I didn't with my first birth, and I feel really bad about not thinking of them.

 

[BunnyN]

We had #2 since last posting here. He came 5 days early. Our first was 10 days late so it caught us a bit off guard. Hadnt had the chance to think about getting food ready at all. The MW popped in late morning because she was on another visit I was still fairly early in labour so she went out for a walk and got her own lunch. In the evening OH finally decided to order pizza because everyone was hungry and things were fairly slow. Of course as soon as he ordered it I started pushing! We had a student MW there who hadnt been at a birth before so was really excited. When the piza arrived she got sent to the door to pay. She didnt want to miss the birth so said "quick, quick, we are about to have a baby!!" to the bemused delivery man. Of course the pizza was put aside and went cold but everyone was glad of it warmed up an hour later.