Sunnybrook or St.Michaels

I had midwives with St Michaels. The experience was amazing. Can’t tell anything about Sunnybrook 🤷🏻‍♀️

Those hospitals are quite far from one another. If you’re planning to give birth in a hospital, which one is closer to where you live? You may want to take that into consideration. You don’t want to be stuck in the car for a long drive while you’re in labour! Trust me lol If you’re hoping to give birth at the Toronto Birth Centre, it’s about a 3-4min drive to St.Michael’s from there should you have any complications and need to be transported to a hospital. Some things to consider, for sure!

Omg so lucky!! Midwives get booked up so quick. Glad to hear you have some options - and both are great options. Do you plan to give birth at home or the birth centre or you are sure you want to give birth at a hospital (with option of epidural or other pain management medications, etc). Which hospital is closer to you or easier to get to? Also, another thing for consideration is that St. Mike’s family health & prenatal care is awesome but their labour department shares the anesthesiologist on duty with trauma centre. Mount Sinai has dedicated anesthesiologist for labour but I believe has a bigger labour practice. Either hospital you choose, you’ll most likely still meet the midwife for appointments out of the midwife’s office, which might not be at either location (they often see patients at their clinic and only go to hospital for delivery, etc). I’d ask them for general appointment location as well.

I've been thru this and we initially were going to go with seventh gen midwives (hospital privileges at Sunnybrook) but ended up choosing Riverdale midwives (St michs). Simply because our experience with seventh gen wasn't great. We are extremely blown away with Riverdale. Our midwife is Kathy macerello

@Mel Kathy was my backup midwife and delivered by daughter. She was wonderful!!

@Cindy I'm so glad to hear it! I'm looking forward to seeing her in action when I go into labour in April! I hope we get her on the day we need her lol I know she's crazy busy! She blows us away with all the support and knowledge she's given us thus far! When was your girl delivered?

@Mel August 31st! I went into labour before actually getting a chance to meet her (Tia was my main midwife) but I loved her coaching and demeanor through the process. I felt very well supported between her and Laura (my other backup midwife who was also there)

I had a terrible experience with St. Michael’s every step of the way.

@Cindy omg I missed this post sorry! It's so good to hear your experience. Sounds about right based on my experience with her xoxxo

@Masha Niko shit. What happened? It looks like I might have to get a c sectioo soon at st michs

@Masha Niko when did you give birth?

@Mel I gave birth mid Feb and I really regret not having a midwife to advocate for me. I didn’t know I needed one but it’s basically like being on trial without a lawyer. It’s a really long story but I was in labour for 30 hours and my epidural ran out at the end despite my being very vocal about my fears that this would happen. I don’t blame any one individual, it’s just a lack of organization, being under resourced and overworked. I had a great nursing team at one point but when the shift switch happened I was left with a new team who I’m guessing wasn’t briefed or didn’t understand what I wanted. They were so many mix-ups along the way, they have no computer database, and my OBY visits were sometimes 2 hours of waiting past my appointment time. Not to scare you but just be super informed before you go in.

@Masha Niko I completely understand and already face poor health service like this which is why I love my midwife in general. I'm happy you shared this with me because I believe you completely but I am not happy you went thru this awful experience! Hugs and love to you mama. I hope new and better experiences overrode this awful one. Try to take the best of it and leave the rest!!! 💕💕💕