Understanding Birth. Preparing for Birth. Making Sense of Birth.
One-to-one midwife-led support before birth, when plans change and afterwards.
Birth is enormous.
You can prepare for it, make plans for it and still find yourself with questions you never expected to ask.
You might want to understand birth and your choices. Plans might suddenly change. Or birth might be over, but you are still carrying it.
That is where I come in.
No judgement. No agenda. No telling you how you should give birth or how you should feel about the birth you had.
Just time, experience, evidence and honest conversation.
Because birth matters. And so do you.
How I Can Support You
Birth Preparation
Not another antenatal class.
One-to-one time to understand birth, explore your choices, ask the questions and work out what really matters to you.
When Birth Plans Change
When something changes and suddenly you are being asked to make decisions you never expected to make.
Time to untangle the information, understand your options and find the questions you want answered.
Birth Debrief
Sometimes you need to tell the whole story.
Space to talk through your birth, ask questions and make sense of what happened, without judgement and without being told how you should feel about it.
Birth Rewind
When your mind knows birth is over, but your body still seems to be living there.
A gentle, structured approach to reducing the distress attached to a difficult or traumatic birth memory.
Afterbirth
Because once the baby arrives, almost everything becomes about them.
One-to-one postnatal midwife support for feeding, recovery, movement, baby massage, emotions, questions — or simply some much-needed space for you.
Hello, I am Gemma.
I am a midwife, birth educator, Birth Rewind practitioner and fairly relentless advocate for women.
For 16 years I have worked alongside women through pregnancy, birth and the aftermath of birth.
I have seen birth at its most extraordinary.
I have also seen what happens when women feel frightened, unheard or swept along by a system that does not always have enough time to stop and ask:
What does this woman actually need?
That question sits at the heart of The Alternative Midwife.
Let's Talk About Birth
What do you know now that you wish you knew then?
Let’s Talk About Birth is a growing collection of women’s voices, stories and lived experiences of pregnancy, birth and what comes afterwards.
The things we were told.
The things nobody told us.
The things we only seem to tell each other afterwards.
Because women have always learnt from other women.
I think we need to hear more of them.
Not Sure Where to Start?
Birth does not fit neatly into boxes. Neither does support.
If you are not sure what you need, get in touch and we can work it out together.
You do not need to have it all figured out before you reach out.