Early in 2023, I found out I was pregnant; I was very nervous and scared because of my mental health and because I had experienced a loss in 2022. When I registered with the midwife team, I quickly realised that due to my mental health, I would not be able to travel and attend my appointment as I had in my previous pregnancies.

I was then referred to the Iris team, who would come to my house for appointments, which made things less stressful and scary. I don’t usually like people in my home because of my severe anxiety; however, I also have social anxiety and hardly leave my home, so I knew I just needed to get through this. This was when Emmeline showed up to my home for our first appointment. By the end of the first appointment, I felt very at ease with having Emmeline in my home. She was very understanding and all for me having yet another dream homebirth.

Fast forward a few months, and my pregnancy journey became a little scarier and more unpredictable as the baby was breech and her growth became slow. Even during this time, Emmeline was very reassuring and helpful with whatever questions I had. At the end of my pregnancy, I quickly knew a homebirth was not going to happen, and things were now becoming very scary as everything I didn’t want seemed to be happening. But still, Emmeline was there to make sure things went as smoothly as possible.

She contacted the perinatal team to make sure I would get the mental health support whilst I was going through this unplanned experience, and she made sure she kept in contact every step of the way. I have never ever experienced the special, uniqueness of a pregnancy journey with a midwife like Emmeline because, despite the struggles of my mental health, the unpredictable ending and labour, she just always made things okay. Truly a huge credit to the NHS and midwife team. If it wasn’t for Emmeline, I don’t think I would be thriving as much as I am now with my new healthy baby girl. She's a true angel.