While we are all able to be leaders in our own lives and spheres of influence, this is a love

letter specifically to those of you in positions of ‘power’ in the hierarchy.

 

Dear midwifery leader,

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It’s hard from where you sit. You don't feel seen in the work that you do.

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We see you right now.

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It must be lonely sometimes, caught between the paralysis of not being able to tackle the biggest challenges, and the feverish action needed to keep the show on the road. No wonder you find it hard to talk to staff about what it really feels like to be a midwife in the current NHS. That’s a scary place to go, especially when you want midwives to go on going on. And some midwives are angry, or very sad. Neither are easy to be with.

 

This book is for you too. It is not about setting up resistance to anything or anyone. Instead it is about taking the time to pose the most important question of all – is there another way? In acknowledging this, and walking through the experiences and exercises in the book, the purpose is to bring us together.

 

To sit with each other

 

Be with each other 

 

Not fix it there and then

 

But share it…

 

This book invites a pause, which helps open up deeper conversations and a creaking door of hope. Your daily psychological challenges may look slightly different from the ones described in Part 1, but whether you’ve lived the extremes of the peaks we’re about to explore, you’re still on the mountains where the air is thin. You too may experience ‘unbearable feelings of helplessness in the face of service limitations’.[1]
 

So let us let this journey deepen our connection with colleagues, and learn together how we can deliver health – all round. 

 

With compassion, and curiosity about what now and what next,

 

Kate (on behalf of all of us) 

 

 

[1] Rizq R. The perversion of care: Psychological therapies in a time of IAPT. Psychodyn Pract [Internet]. 2012;18(1):7–24. Available from: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14753634.2012.640161

 

 

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