Category: Pregnancy

Nothing less than radical whole-system change is required to fix the NHS’s maternity services | Julia Sanders

It’s vital that Yvette Cooper’s taskforce acts on the Amos and Ockenden reports – and puts the needs of women and families at the heart of maternity servicesIt is hard to find the words to describe the agony for those who have...

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By day five of my labour, I didn’t want an ‘ideal birth’. I only wanted to survive | Natalie Morris

Yvette Cooper’s maternity reforms must change a system that too often fails women when they’re at their most vulnerableOn the third day of being in labour with my first child, I entered a new state of being. It was time to dig...

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My egg, my wife’s womb, our baby: how we found our way to lesbian motherhood

When Leah and I planned a family, we wanted to be as mutual as possible. Could reciprocal IVF – Leah carrying an embryo made from my egg – be the way forward?Late last year, it became my friend’s favourite party trick. “Rosa’s...

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Earlier specialised care could prevent 10,000 miscarriages a year, UK study finds

Charity says starting specialised care after first miscarriage instead of third reduces risk of future lossesGiving women access to specialised care after their first miscarriage could prevent about 10,000 pregnancy losses a...

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‘I was super horny when I made my early work’: Loie Hollowell’s abstract paintings of breasts and vaginas

Equally inspired by childbirth manuals, Georgia O’Keeffe and her own hormones, pregnancy and motherhood, Hollowell paints beautiful anatomical abstractions. She opens up about her cosmic birth and out-of-body experience‘It’s...

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I yearned to be a mother. Why did I feel nothing when my daughter was finally born?

I had presumed I would love her instantly – but a traumatic birth led to devastating numbnessIt wasn’t supposed to be like this. I was waiting for an overwhelming rush of love, but when I looked at my newborn baby what I felt...

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The best of the long read in 2025

Our 20 favourite pieces of in-depth reporting, essays and profiles from the yearVictor Pelevin made his name in 90s Russia with scathing satires of authoritarianism. But while his literary peers have faced censorship and fled...

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