Love and Midwifery

Author: Diane Ménage and Jenny Patterson

Paperback

This book argues that love underpins safe, effective, high quality, sustainable midwifery care, and enables readers to explore sustainable and compassionate ways to engage with their profession.It is an essential read for all midwives from student to experienced practitioner, and the wider maternity care workforce.

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Summary

Description

This unique book argues that love underpins safe, effective, and high-quality midwifery care, and enables readers to explore sustainable and compassionate ways to engage with their profession.

At a time when midwives are struggling to stay connected with the passion that brought them into the profession, and fear, distress, and trauma are prevalent within maternity care for both staff and those receiving care, this book maps a new way forward. It encourages reflection and discussion about how love impacts midwives’ experience of their practice and improves the quality of care they are able to provide for women and their families. It develops a theoretical basis for understanding why love is relevant to midwifery, how midwives think of love, and the ways that it is communicated in practice. It offers practical ways in which love can be appropriately nurtured and applied in contemporary maternity settings, whilst upholding the professional standards required of all maternity care providers. Many chapters include the authentic words of midwives reflecting on the role of love in their own practice experiences.

Love and Midwifery is a valuable contribution to the literature around compassion, kindness, resilience, moral distress, and trauma in maternity care, helping midwives to realise and feel proud of the love in their work. It is an essential read for all midwives from student to experienced practitioner, as well as the wider maternity care workforce.

About the Author

Diane Ménage is a midwife with a life-long interest in women’s health and well-being. Throughout her career, her focus has always been on providing individualised evidence-based care through relationships. As a midwife, she has worked clinically in hospital settings, community midwifery, and independent practice. She completed her PhD research on Women’s Lived Experience of Compassionate Midwifery at Coventry University (UK) in 2018. She has written extensively for midwifery journals, contributed to book chapters and co-authored the textbook An Introduction to Research for Midwives, 4th Edition. Diane is a part-time lecturer in Midwifery at De Montfort University. In her role as a midwifery educator, she is passionate about embedding compassion and self-compassion into midwifery education.

Jenny Patterson has worked as a midwife since 2007, within the UK NHS and independently. Jenny has a particular interest in traumatic birth experiences and her PhD thesis explored post traumatic stress disorder in women post childbirth (PTSD-PC). Jenny has been part of an international group of midwives, midwifery researchers, and lecturers that explored midwives’ needs regarding stress and trauma across the UK and Ireland. Following completion of trauma management training, Jenny has led workshops for women and midwives. She has published several midwifery journal articles, contributed to a few book chapters, and presented in the UK and Europe. Jenny currently lectures in midwifery at Edinburgh Napier University, Scotland, UK. Current research interests include exploring how maternity care providers and interpreters can best collaborate to provide high quality care for women whose first language is not that of the country in which they are receiving maternity care.