Making a Midwife | Life of a Midwife Ep. 1
Happy Mum
Giovanna Fletcher
4.8 • 5.8K Ratings
🗓️ 5 May 2026
⏱️ 19 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
To celebrate the international day of the midwife we’ve got something very special for you — the very first episode of our brand-new miniseries!
Every Thursday, we’ll be sharing powerful stories from midwives, past and present, as they reflect on the moments that have shaped their lives and careers.
In this first episode, we'll trace the moments two women were pulled into midwifery.
We’ll return to our regular guest episodes next Tuesday xx
If you’re interested in being part of the Life of a Midwife series, we’d love to hear from you — just drop us an email midwives@pixiu.co.uk
Links from our midwives:
Little Light Support offers independent, trauma-informed birth debriefs for women and families — particularly those who’ve had complex, confusing or difficult experiences
Petition · Make birth safer: protect midwives' working hours - United Kingdom · Change.org
Hard Pushed: A Midwife's Story and Womb: The Inside Story of Where We All Began
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Often, life begins not with certainty, but with surprise. And the same is true of the past we find |
| 0:16.3 | ourselves on. In this episode, two midwives traced the moments that pulled them into their work. |
| 0:23.1 | One, through a difficult first birth that left her needing answers. |
| 0:26.6 | The other, an early instinct she ignored for years until it returned. |
| 0:33.1 | I'm Giovanna Fletcher, and from Happy Mum, Happy Baby, this is Life of a Midwife. |
| 0:46.8 | Marie's nearly 20-year career in midwifery has shown her birth in its many ordinary and unexpected forms. |
| 0:56.4 | Birth often announced itself with drama. |
| 1:01.3 | But sometimes, as you'll see, it barely announces itself at all. |
| 1:08.3 | I was a midway for, I think it was just short of 20 years, |
| 1:11.5 | so I like to round it up to 20 years because that sounds better, doesn't it? |
| 1:13.1 | Most round number. |
| 1:20.1 | I got into midwifery because, and I think this is like a very traditional thing now, |
| 1:31.4 | where I'm going to show my age because somebody came to give us a talk at school, and I was sat in the library next to my friend and this midwife was given us a talk about, you know, what midfifery was like and I remember thinking, oh my goodness, like, |
| 1:36.6 | A, I never really knew this existed, but this is, this is me, this is my job. I turned to my |
| 1:43.7 | friend and I said, oh my God, like I'd love this. |
| 1:47.0 | And the look on her face couldn't have been worse. |
| 1:50.9 | And she was like, oh my God, it's disgusting. |
| 1:54.4 | She was like, and you'd be terrible at it. |
| 1:57.5 | I was so embarrassed to have that. I never mentioned it again. |
| 2:03.6 | I followed a different path and I did my A-levels and I went to university and then I dropped out of university and I joined the Air Force. |
| 2:14.6 | Because the RAF likely to be very well-rounded, |
| 2:19.3 | they will pay for you to do lots of different education and whatever. |
... |
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