How I manage a young family and birth photography...

While birth photography is 100% what I want to be doing, I have three young children and I always tell clients that if they want a more 'reliable' option that I won't be offended if they go with someone else. This was Sally's response to that message:

"I've had my heart set on having you as my photographer from the start. I think the fact that you are a midwife just sits good with me. And I've followed your photography for a while now. There's never any judgement or anything like that, which I am really self conscious about. I just love your work, I show all my friends when you post new content"

Childcare is hard for me to arrange at certain times BUT I am usually able to pull something together when the time comes. Upon booking, you will be booked in for a newborn session and if I make the birth I will invoice you afterwards. To allow me to be on call for your birth, the newborn session needs to be paid in full.

Most clients are really understanding of this and a huge concern for people is 'what if you don't make it in time' so this system seems to work well for most.

Fast forward to the 26th of May 2022. Sally's waters broke and she headed up to the hospital. The following afternoon there was still no contractions so she decided that induction would be the safest option. Within an hour of the syntocinon drip starting the contractions were starting to bite so I packed my bag and headed on up to the hospital. Sally laboured so beautifully with the support of her partner James. You can see from the imagery that they worked as a team throughout the whole labour and birth. 4 hours after the induction was started, baby Thea made her entrance into the world. A beautiful, powerful entrance into the world. Sally so kindly has given me permission to share these images, and while this helps me to promote what I do and is much appreciated, there is always the option to keep the images and video to yourself.

There is a video at the end of this blog, these are an inclusion in all birth packages, this particular video has been shortened and edited for the purpose of this blog so that it only included clips that Sally was happy to share.