When someone asks, “Have you written a birth plan?”, you might feel excited to get planning. Or you might feel completely overwhelmed.
When I was pregnant with my first child, my initial thought was basically: How am I supposed to plan for a birth when I don’t really understand birth yet?
It felt daunting. It felt like a lot of work. And it felt overwhelming.
For some people, a birth plan might feel like a checklist, a beautifully organised document or something you’re supposed to decide on before you give birth. Some people feel like a plan is set in stone, or that it’s about creating the perfect birth.
But none of this is what a birth plan needs to be.
A birth plan is an opportunity to learn about birth, explore your options and make informed decisions about your preferences. And I genuinely recommend thinking about your preferences for different possibilities, not just the birth you’re hoping for.
It doesn’t have to be War and Peace, either.
Start by learning about your options
There are downloadable birth plan documents available on my website and lots of other places online. Some are as simple as ticking a box to say whether you’d like something, don’t want it or would like to know more.
For example, you might come across delayed cord clamping on a birth plan. You could tick that you’d like it, but first, do you know what it means? Is it something you and your birth partner, if you have one, want to discuss? Is it something you’d like to learn more about before making a decision?
That’s the point. Your birth preferences give you an opportunity to ask questions, have conversations and understand the options available to you.
You don’t need to know all the answers before you start. Learning about your options is part of the process.
Plan for the birth you want, and for the possibilities you don’t
When I was pregnant with my first child, somebody told me not to make a birth plan because, when it all went wrong, I’d only end up upset. I listened to that advice, and I wish I hadn’t.
They’d had a water birth with their previous baby and really wanted that experience again. However, when they arrived at Peterborough City Hospital, the birth pool wasn’t available. With only one pool, there’s always a possibility that it might be in use or being prepared for someone else, so a hospital water birth can’t be guaranteed.
If having a water birth is really important to you, you could explore the options available to you, including whether a home birth might be suitable for you. For some people, hiring a birth pool for home use might be an option, but it’s worth discussing your circumstances and choices with your midwife.
Of course, I can understand why someone would have their heart set on a particular birth experience, especially if they’d enjoyed it before. When we’re pregnant, emotions can be all over the place, and it’s easy to become attached to how we imagine our birth will be.
But this is exactly why I recommend thinking about your preferences for different possibilities.
If you’d love a water birth, absolutely plan for one. But also think about what you’d like if the pool isn’t available and you give birth on land. If your first choice isn’t possible, you’ve already considered what matters to you in an alternative scenario, rather than having to work it all out in the moment.
And this doesn’t just apply to water births.
If you’re planning for a vaginal birth, think about what your preferences might be if you have an abdominal birth instead. Would you like music playing? Would you like the lights dimmed? Are there things that would help you feel more comfortable during the experience?
If an induction is recommended, what would you like to know before making a decision? What are your preferences around monitoring, movement and the different options available to you?
If another intervention is recommended, what questions would you want to ask? What matters to you when weighing up your options?
You can write these preferences down, even if you hope you’ll never need to refer to that part of your plan.
If you’re in hospital, feeling emotional, scared or overwhelmed by the information you’re being given, it can be difficult to work through a decision from scratch. But if you’ve already explored those possibilities during pregnancy, you’ve had time to learn about your options, ask questions and consider what matters to you.
That doesn’t mean you’ll necessarily make the same decision when the time comes. You can always change your mind. It means you’re going into that conversation with some knowledge of your options and an understanding of your own preferences.
The plan hasn’t gone out of the window. You might simply be heading in a different direction.
It’s about more than how your baby is born
Your birth preferences aren’t just about the type of birth you have. They’re also about the experience you would like to have and the care you and your baby receive during and after the birth.
You might want to think about whether you’d prefer to have only essential staff in the room, how you’d like people to communicate with you, or what might help you feel comfortable in that space.
You could also explore your preferences around pain relief, moving around during labour, vitamin K for your baby, feeding and skin-to-skin contact as soon as possible after birth.
And it’s worth thinking about what you’d prefer in different circumstances, too. For example, what are your preferences around skin-to-skin if you have an abdominal birth, or if your baby needs some additional care after birth?
There’s plenty you can explore before your baby arrives, from your experience during labour to those first moments with your baby and beyond. You don’t need to decide everything in advance, but understanding your options can help you feel more prepared.
Your birth plan is a conversation starter, not a set of rules
Writing down your preferences can be a really useful way to start conversations with your birth partner and the professionals caring for you.
It gives you the opportunity to talk things through before you’re in the middle of labour. If you have a birth partner, discussing your preferences together can help them understand how to support you, including helping you ask questions and communicate your wishes if you need a little help in the moment. They can’t make decisions on your behalf, but they can help you feel supported.
A written plan can also be useful to share with your midwife when you arrive at hospital, if that’s where you’re giving birth. But it doesn’t replace having conversations with your maternity team.
And, importantly, writing something down doesn’t mean you can’t change your mind.
You might write that you’d like a physiological birth without pharmacological pain relief, then arrive at hospital and decide you’d like an epidural. That’s absolutely fine.
Equally, you might plan to have an epidural and find that you’re coping well with labour and decide you don’t want one after all. That’s fine too.
Your preferences belong to you. You can change them as your circumstances, feelings or understanding change.
So, do you actually need a birth plan?
A birth plan can be short or detailed. It can be written down, talked through with your birth partner or a combination of the two.
If you’re planning to give birth in hospital, having your preferences written down can make them easier to share with your midwife. But there isn’t one perfect format, and it doesn’t need to be a lengthy document covering every possible scenario.
The most important thing is that it’s useful to you.
If exploring your preferences helps you understand birth, feel more prepared and think about the decisions you might face, brilliant.
If it starts to feel like another overwhelming task on your pregnancy to-do list, remember that writing a birth plan isn’t an essential requirement for giving birth. You can still learn about your options and talk through your preferences without producing a formal document.
You don’t need to control every detail of your birth to feel informed and involved in the decisions you make.
Need a little help working through your birth preferences?
If you’d like support learning about birth, exploring your options and working out what feels right for you, that’s something we can cover in a private 1:2:1 antenatal course with Embrace Parenthood in Peterborough.
We’ll explore your options, talk through the questions you have and work out what matters to you, without pressure to make decisions before you’re ready. It’s an open, honest and hopefully easygoing space where you can ask all the questions you like. And no, they won’t be silly questions.
We can also work through your birth preferences together, so you have something that feels personal and useful to you.
Because you can plan for the birth you hope for while also preparing for the possibility that things might happen differently. And both of those things can be true at the same time.
