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Anniversary request

Four years ago today, a good mother died unnecessarily from an archaic illness. The world may not have noticed immediately, but the three year old boy crying in his bed, the six day old girl feeding in her father's arms and the grieving widower did.

Together the three of us have kicked, …

Thank you

Since the launch of Friday's Child and last weekend's coverage I have been flooded with comments, emails, letters and calls. It is so moving and rewarding to receive them all, and I may be slow but I am getting up to date with replying.

Trying to keep up makes me think that I am not giving a …

Extracted

This morning I read the extract of Friday's Child, in the Daily Mail . It's strange, reading my words in such a condensed form. They are my words, and it is my story, but only such a small part of it.

It is humbling to read the comments people have left under the story, and so many. Really …

Misconception that matters

… by a mother, Alex O'Connell, who had had a horrific first delivery, and had opted for a home birth the next time, assisted by an independent midwife.

I finished reading it on-line and something jumped out at me. It was the reference to Alex's post- puerperal fever after discharge from hospital first time. How lucky she was that it only took two doses of antibiotics to shift it, and how …

Friday's Child

… Synopsis

In 2004, Jessica Palmer died suddenly of septicaemia, just six days after giving birth to her second child. Distraught, her husband Ben struggled to comprehend his loss and to care for their two young children. It later came to light that Jessica's condition can usually be easily detected and prevented but in this case nothing was done until it was too late. Ben and his family …

Time for T

… the classes, every week for six weeks or so. The classes came to an end and one by one they gave birth within the space of a few weeks: four boys and a girl.

The five of them continued to meet every week, usually for lunch on Wednesdays, until the children started going to nursery school. The meetings became more irregular, but they stayed in touch and sometimes us Dads joined them for …

Childbed fever: the facts

… is a treatable illness that kills mothers. It is defined as infection of the uterus following the birth of a child. This infection, if unchecked, may spread into the bloodstream to cause septicaemia (blood poisoning) - a life-threatening illness that progresses in hours, not days, and may kill swiftly.

Childbed fever is rare, but is still a threat to mothers

Childbed fever is feared by …

NICE delivery?

I've just read a good post on Mother at Large's blog about childbirth, pain and expectations about delivery.

It does sometimes seem as though birth has become a bit too competitive, and often I also hear talk of how quickly a mother was discharged, as though speed of discharge is a measure of success. What we shouldn't forget is that, while now comparitively …

An Inspector Calls

I had a visit from the VAT Inspector this morning. I got a bit behind with my VAT Returns and they wanted to make sure I wasn't up to no good.

Business has been slow to non existant for the past few years, so it didn't take long and we soon started to talk about what I was doing now. I showed …

Virtual Jessica

… of the program’s authors, says, “There is a big issue in the western world with ‘problem’ births and it doesn’t have to be like this. We have a strong trend to alert people to problems, but most of the time things turn out fine.”

If only Jessica could develop a fever and a rash, a few days after being discharged from a normal delivery, then she could be a really powerful teaching …