Hospital Backup Plans for Freebirthers
Many women choose to put in place a back-up plan for transfer to hospital if ever necessary. There are several ways to go about this.
You can have a care provider based in the hospital you wish to use for backup, and go to them for prenatal care while omitting to tell them about your birth plans. A strong disadvantage of this is the stress of prenatal care with this type of care provider.
You can go for a check-in appointment where they give you a check over and book you into hospital around the time you are due.
You can simply plan what you intend to do on the event of a transfer and make your support people, partner and family members aware of their roles.
Here is a thread with women's experiences of hospital backup plans and bookings on our forums.
Also worth a read is the Medical Professionals & UC page, especially if it is known that you intended to birth at home all along.
A basic plan for you and your support people for the hospital transfer process.
A basic plan to use at the hospital should you decide to transfer there.
A basic plan to use at hospital should an emergency caesarean situation arise.
Emergency situations and how to identify and respond to emergencies.
Remember: You can go home whenever you like - you don't need anyone's permission.
You may not feel like arguing, of course, so your partner can deal with this.
If you want to go home and staff are not co-operating, you can just get up and walk out with your baby, after telling them where you are going.
