Thank you NHS
This morning I woke up to find one of my daughters in my bed. Bleary-eyed, I stroked her hair and called her by the wrong twin's name. She huffily corrected me: 7 going on 17 is a delightful age, it has to be said. When I had a brief scan of social media I clocked the Happy Birthday NHS messages. 70 years old, what an achievement. I tried to convince the kids that this surely meant that, as an NHS employee, it was also my birthday too. No flies on those two, they were having none of it.
It's been a couple of weeks of feeling as though my role as an NQM was kicking me in the face at the precise moment that my mental health decided to pull the rug out from under me. Today's celebration of our much-loved and taken for granted NHS has given me an opportunity to reflect and be thankful.
On a day-to-day basis, the NHS gives me very little (obviously joking). I'm lucky: I take no regular medication and have no health concerns, my kids have the occasional syringe of Calpol, but (touch wood) they have had no need for anything more. Lucky and grateful.
The same cannot be said for when I was pregnant. Fortnightly scans and midwife appointments, blood tests, urine dips, BP, injections, steroids, entonox, a clean spangly hospital in which to give birth, a bed, a pillow (a rarity, you'll agree), clean sheets, midwives, resuscitaires for my premature babies, a fully-equipped neonatal unit to host first one and then the other briefly, a five day stay in a private room to make sure the girls started gaining weight, the use of a breast pump, teeny tiny cardigans made by kind volunteers for my dinky babies, iron tablets, the offer of a blood transfusion just before discharge home (I declined – I really wanted to go home and I figured that if I'd survived to day five without it, I'd probably be OK).
I'd paid taxes and national insurance since I'd graduated, but even if I hadn't then the outcome would have been the same. I had an expensive maternity experience, but I was waved off with an “Enjoy your babies”. No bill was pressed into my hand. In terms of woman-centred care my experience left a lot to be desired, but it was safe care and I'm sure that all the staff I met had the best of intentions and wished me no harm.
The NHS have taken away one of my nan's kidneys to spare her the wrath of a destructive cancer; they cared for my hero-worshipped granddad before the machines were switched off; they delivered my nephew by caesarean section when it was needed; they tested my other nephew for innumerable allergies and saved him from anaphylaxis on several occasions; they X-rayed me when I failed at a spectacular trampolining stunt; they supported my ridiculously brave friend through the heartache of countless miscarriages. They have diagnosed and treated and stuck back together many of my friends and family, and they will continue to do so. I am a single mum and flat broke, but I know that if any of my crazy little family needed medical attention tonight, I could get it without worrying what my bank balance was.
Most recently, the NHS trained me and welcomed me with open arms into a profession I hope to stay in for a very long time, not for the money or the sociable hours or the glory, but for the satisfaction of helping and caring and doing my best, for absolutely everyone who walks through the door. Through the NHS I have gained a band of fearless women, a tribe, who have my back: we are a work family. The NHS has taught me skills and given me mentors and life gurus. It has also pushed me to my limit and reeled me back in again. It's seen me sweat through my underwear, laugh until I cry, cry through frustration and fear and fatigue. It's seen me bouncing off the walls with joy and it's seen me sob all the way home after a traumatic shift. The NHS has seen me answer one woman's buzzer 24 times in a 12-hour shift, give women hope and strength and courage, and witness the best and worst moments of life. It's by no means perfect, and we have a lot left to improve and achieve.
I've worked shifts in a state of thinly veiled dehydration and ketosis; I've been covered in a cacophony of other people's bodily fluids; I've been scratched along my forearm by someone else's scraggily toe nail as I attempted to put on surgical stockings; I've had a woman sitting (accidentally) on my arm and leaving a bum print in blood on my skin. The NHS is not for the faint-hearted nor those who are unsure what else to do with their lives.
That said, as I sit here tonight watching my kids play for a blissful two minutes before a civil war erupts, I am feeling grateful to be a part of this institution. I feel incredibly lucky that I live in a country where my babies were given every intervention needed in an NHS hospital. I am grateful that some of the strongest and most loving people in my life are also gainfully employed by the NHS.
As a rule, we are pitifully underpaid for the job we do and the hours we work and the amount we care, but we stand tall at the beginning of each shift because we are NHS midwives. We are warrior women who love what do.
