Hard labour: The maternity service in crisis in the Daily Mail

This is a shocking tale of maternity services in the NHS. It's a story of another mother given a rough ride. It's a miracle she's alive - this was a catalogue of disasters.

Why is a temperature in a mother always excused as something minor instead of being read as the sign of an infection as it once was?

That's not to mention her detached placenta, her baby's distress and increased heart rate, the delayed pain relief and emergency caesarian.

For those who follow the story, this is a Tooth Hurty update.

This morning's early wake up call was, "Daddy, I can whistle through my teeth and do you know why? DADDY, I said do you know why?"

"No idea, Harry. What time is it?" It was way early, but we agreed that whistling was good, and that the tooth should go in a safe place for bed time, and I went back to sleep.

When we were all properly awake and eating breakfast at a sensible Sunday hour, the subject came up again. I don't know who was the most excited - Harry and all his money the tooth fairy would bring ("But Harry, the tooth fairy is only small, so may not be able to carry very much money") or Emily, because she's got fairys on her new nightie, and a real fairy was going to come - in true life, Daddy?

We like believing in fairies. It means there is some good and some magic in this world.

I just hoped there was something suitable in my trouser pocket or there's going to be hell to pay.

Harry looked green even after he'd been sick this afternoon. Skipping supper, he had a bath at the usual time and got ready for bed.

Suddenly he found new strength while watching CBeebies - all signs of being unwell have vanished and he began playing merry hell. I had to stop reading half way through the penultimate chapter of Prince Caspian (as I warned I would) and say goodnight.

Now he is dancing around in his bedroom, shaking the lights in the kitchen ceiling. He has broken the landing nightlight and is winding Emily up as well.

I've been up twice, read the riot act, then explained calmly that naughty behaviour is not acceptable. So far I have said goodnight three times. In return I've had Bear thrown at me, his photographs of Mummy have hit the deck and he's hurrumphed until I lost my temper. Only a child can recover from sickness so quickly.

He's angry. He's angry with me for telling him off, for playing the bad cop and for not giving him any tea or bedtime milk. All I can do is explain why and tell him I love him. "No you don't and anyway, I hate you, you silly man." I do and you don't.

What he won't be aware of for another hour (going on past experience) is that he's really angry because he doesn't have his mother, and he'll be sad that he discarded her photographs from his bedside chair. The only thing I don't know is whether he'll fall asleep before realising all of this or whether he'll come down the stairs, sobbing.

Mum gives birth in car park because 'hospital didn't have midwife' from the Daily Mail

Unless the NHS can ensure adequate midwifery staff numbers and stop its ludicrous plans to close maternity units I fear this is going to happen more and more.

What the bureaucrats seem to forget is that childbirth is a traumatic experience for a mother and her child to go through and it is only safe when you have adequate levels of care in place.

There is going to be a tragedy if things don't change soon enough.

"Does it feel strange, having people read about your life?" I was asked today by a Mum. "I feel it's a bit voyeuristic reading your blog."

I hadn't really thought about it that way. I know my parents, siblings, friends and some of the Mums and teachers at both Harry's and Emily's school read my blog - sometimes that's the only way people know what I'm up to, because I'm totally useless with a telephone and can be fairly forgetful about email as well sometimes. My web stats page tells me others read it too, but I often think of it as a number, not real people.

Every blogger has their own reason, and mine is two-fold. I want people to know about, and remember, puerperal sepsis: there is no reason or need for a mother in Britain (or any developed nation) to die from it, so fore-warned is fore-armed.

I also like writing about my children - they mean everything to me - and I like writing about the highs and lows of being a single parent and about coping, every day, with children who say things like, "I don't have a Mummy, 'cos she died and went to live in heaven."

It's not meant to be a sob story, though people do. It's meant to be a taste of a strange life that, God forbid, most will never know. Next time your other half has a go at you for forgetting to do something, for doing the wrong thing or just generally stuffing up; relish it - it keeps your feet on the ground, and proves that you're loved. Well it did for me, and it's one of the things I miss most.

I've recently found a couple of sites linking back here (thank you!) using some graphics I made a while back. I realise that since the last site makeover these are no longer shown on this site, so here is a link to the banners.

There's also an A4 Poster and a DL Flyer I made, which you can download and print to help spread the word. I understand that the poster is showing not only in schools near me, but also as far afield as Dubai, which is amazing!

I've just read this horrific story: Premature baby dies after mother has to deliver it herself in new hospital in the Daily Mail.

Where were the midwives that the health service so badly needs? When are we going to lose the initiatives, the spin, the New Labour hypocrisy and get a decent level of maternity care so that childbirth becomes as safe as we keep being told it is. How many more lives must be lost?

Hospital managers have to realise that 'sincere condolences' and 'being kept up to date with changes' is not a substitute for gold standard care. No amount of empty words will console this poor mother.

Rest in peace, Edward.

We just spent a fabulous weekend in sunny Hampshire, staying with some friends. Just before we left Harry was playing with some of their neighbours outside with remote controlled car and a couple of bikes. One of the boys had a wobbly tooth, so thus ensued a parental conversation about how Harry still had all of his milk teeth, and about the Tooth Fairy's going rate.

I was informed that in the countryside it's a pound a tooth - yikes. I was then told that in London it's two pounds a tooth - bloody hell, that almost makes it worth selling mine.

This morning, bright and early, Harry came into my bedroom saying, "Look, Daddy, my tooth is wobbly."

I'll start saving hard now.

P.S. While there's still time; Londoners, please leave comments on the going rate for a tooth!

The Confidential Enquiry into Maternal and Child Health (CEMACH) publishes triennial reports reviewing all cases of maternal death. The most recently published report, 'Why Mothers Die' is for the period 2000-2002, and I have often quoted (both in these pages and to the press) the statistics it found and also its recommendations, few of which seem to be taken up, as they are repeated report after report in alarmingly consistent language.

The next report, for 2003-2005, is now to be called "Saving Mothers' Lives", as I have just learned from CEMACH's updated website, and it will be published this December.

This sounds to me like spin. The report, by it's very nature, highlights the cases of mothers who have died, not the ones who have had trouble free experiences, or even 'near misses'. If they do plan to discuss cases where the NHS has saved an ill mother, I could let them know of many horrendous near miss stories that have filtered through to me, but I suspect that - whatever the name - it will be the same report on the same causes of the deaths of the mothers that weren't saved.

If this Department of Health sponsored report wants to pat its master on the back, it should do so elsewhere. Jessica's case will (confidentially of course) be included in the statistics, reviews and summaries, and I don't for a moment believe that she will be alone in its 'Genital tract sepsis' pages.

In fact, I highly suspect that there won't be much of an improvement on previous triennia, but I'd love to be wrong. The bottom line, though is that what we and the NHS need to know is Why Mothers Die and how to stop them dying.

Whatever the findings, please let them be acted on this time.

Reminder: the petition closes in mid-October, so there's still time to help it make a difference in advance of December's report.

Day in day out, I wake up too early to the pitter patter of tiny and not so tiny feet on the stairs up to the loft conversion that is my sanctuary. It's soon followed by a face in mine, and an eskimo kiss.

"Daddy, I watch telleee?"
"Climb in the other side, Emily. Come on, in you come too, Harry."

I love it really, but at six o'clock on a Sunday morning? Well, you know.

The last two mornings I've woken just to sunlight, with no little ones, because they've been with my parents, probably rubbing their sticky noses into the dogs'. That's my Summer Holiday treat and I look forward to it, but the house has been eerily quiet.

Even though I've meant to work solidly on my Project 'X', the silence is more distracting than the sound of pencil on colouring book, lego brick on brick or, "Daddy, I'm bored, what can I do?" and I've spent as much time reading other blogs, realising that I should read more. I'm going to start adding some to my blogroll so I don't forget, but in the meantime;

"Can I have them back, now?"