 Felly, rydyn ni'n gobeithio i Chelsea. Chelsea Beckford Proxy. Chelsea yw'r 2nd year student midwife ar gyfer y U.K. ac mae'r prônannu o'r pethau a'r pethau. Mae'r co-chair yw'r Universtiynau Midwifrys ac mae'r hipnobirthig practisiwner a'r anti-racism educator. Chelsea yw'r ffaith yw'r maen nhw'n meddwl hefyd, ac mae'r meddwl hwnnw'n meddwl hwnnw'n meddwl hefyd, a'r bwysig yn ymdweithio a'r brannu, a'r bwysig yn ymdweithio. Yn ydych chi, Chelsea yw'r adbwysig yw'r adbwysig yw'r gyffredig gyffredig yw'r maen nhw'n meddwl hefyd. Yn ymdweith yw'r maen nhw'n meddwl hefyd, mae'r cyfrifio cyfrifio a'r anti-racist proffesiwnol. Felly, mae'r cyfrifio yw'r cwestiynau yw'r cyfrifio yw'r cyfrifio yw'r cyfrifio yw'r cyfrifio yw'r cwestiynau. Yn ymdweithio ar fy holl yn ymdweithio. Mae'n gwen i'r Chelsea i amddindu chi'n llwyddoedd o'r pryd yn ymdweithio. Valyw'r ymddinddiol Llywodraethol. Yn ymdweithi, wrth gwyddiau, a wedi caserionol ar ddiwrn gwybod i gael ymgwr, ymdweithio yn ddod am rin~! Rydyn chi'n ddod a rin i'n oed fynd. The I'll Just Get Straight Into It. Be ffordd wedi gweld i'n ceisio, rwy'n cyhoed mewn ran ystod o'r cyfg熱niad ddiwethaf i fynd, oes Janolod o'r tyfn, mae'n cyffredin frysgfyniad ar y r tourism. Rwy'n ymlaen i chi weld y rhain mae'r cyntaf o'r tymp i gael, ond, mae'n rhai wneud yn rhaid o'r cyddiwydd gyda'r ysbyŵr. This is really important work that I'm very passionate about and we all need to play a part in dismantling these systems that we are working and living within. So i just want to thank you again for joining me. So Diane kindly introduced me, so covering most of what's on this slide. I am a mum as well and was born in Jamaica but raised over here in the UK. Mae'r hyn yn gwneud o'r gwahodd. Mae'r ddweud oherwydd unrhyw mewn ddeicholion o ddweud ffyrdd i ddim yn mynd i'r ddweud. Mae'r ddechrau i'r ddweud am y ddweud yn ymgyrchol cyd-dwylliant. Mae'r ddweud yn gwneud o'r ddweud o'r ddweud. Mae'r ddweud o hwn o'r ddweud i ddim yn mynd i'r ddweud. Mae hwn o'r ddweud o'r ddweud o hetaeth ar amser y cwrs. It was during the first lockdown here in the UK and it was also around the time of the really horrible death of George Floyd. And just so many other things that were taking place, the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement, which kind of spread globally. And that kind of awoke something within me. I attended a local Black Lives Matter protest which was a really peaceful protest and I came away just feeling really inspired. And so I kind of rode that wave and decided to contact my university teaching team and asked if I could share some texts that I think other students would find helpful in kind of broaching the subject of race and kind of looking into it and not kind of shying away from it and reading texts from black and brown authors. Following this, the conversation kind of went on and I started to share some of my ideas with a few of my lecturers as to how I put forward basically ideas of how our education could reflect the needs of the students and also in doing that addressing the gaps in our education that were potentially standing in our way of becoming culturally competent and safe practitioners. And this article that you see the screen grab of is kind of the result of that and I managed to get this published in the practice in midwife journal. It's also open access so I'm quite happy to share links to this article if you want to read it afterwards. So what does decolonisation of midwrefrieducation mean? So as this quote says, decolonising describes an academic movement across the universities and other institutions to highlight inequalities resulting from historical colonial influences and to transform and modernize materials. Now the key words in this quote are historical colonial influences. And no matter how long ago you're told slavery was such a long time ago and colonialism was such a long time ago, the legacies of these things are seen today. And an example of that is the Sims speculum named after James Marion Sims and as he was kind of developing as an obstetrician, a gynaecologist. He was able to perfect his techniques on humans, on enslaved women. And this would have been against without their consent, he was actually gifted these women because they were slaves and seen as property as opposed to people. And so he got these instruments named after him, he has the Sims position named after him and we still use these things, we still use them today. So what is it that students need? Now in my opinion students really need a knowledge of the history of obstetrics and gynaecology and how this can have an impact on how we practice today. So throughout history we see that the idea of race and connotations of differences basically be in tantamount inferiority in the field of medicine. And again that kind of crops up with the whole James Marion Sims repeated experimentation on women without the use of analgesia. And that's a key factor without not using analgesia was because he assumed there was a belief that black people did not feel pain in the same way or as white people did. And so that kind of justified the use of the non use of analgesia, I should say. It's really important that student midwives have an idea and understanding of historical context of what we're doing today. Because it does have these things do have a kind of transgenerational trauma effect and they can. It's a legacy that kind of lasts because even now you still think you still see in modern research that doctors, student doctors still hold that belief that black people do not feel pain in the same way. And that can impact the way that black and brown bodies are treated. I think representation is a really important thing. It really matters because for me, I am a student midwife. I'm a mum, but above all else, I'm also a black woman. When learning, learning materials largely leaning towards, you know, the Eurocentric Eurocentric value Eurocentric physicality and are often presented through Eurocentric lens. So when we study the maternal pelvis, we concentrate mainly on the gynaecoid pelvic shape. And this is despite pelvic shapes being widely varied between geographical regions and even within the same populations. So this kind of Eurocentric leaning kind of reinforces the idea that the care that we are providing is more suited to one part. Of society and not another. And as again, as a black student, I value representation. I value seeing my educators, some educators that look like me and I hope to be joining a workforce where other midwives look like me as well. I think that our learning should include cultural competency. Having a culturally competent caregiver can make all the difference to women and birthing people who may feel isolated in society, who may feel that they're not understood, who may feel that their cultural practices are not understood and therefore there's misconceptions there. There's a chance of misunderstanding and they're not likely to come forward and ask for help if they feel like they won't be understood. I think it's vitally important that midwifery students have an understanding of what racism is and what racism isn't and also how to be actively anti-racist. And I'll go into this a little bit more later. And above all, we need a safe space to grow. As a student on placement, it's really easy to just kind of make yourself small and not speak up for fear of being seen as a troublemaker. It's not enough for the women and birthing people in our care for us to just not say anything or not challenge behaviour that can be harmful. And that needs to be a safe culture, a safe environment needs to be kind of nurtured by our teaching teams and also the practitioners that we train with. So why do we need to address racism as student midwives? This infographic here is taken from the most recent embrace report and it says a lot without having to say very much. The numbers kind of speak for themselves. As a black woman in the UK, I'm currently four times as likely to die during pregnancy, childbirth and the postnatal period as white women are purely because of my ethnicity. Now, that's really, really triggering to me personally and it's quite scary to think that. But what's scary is that this isn't new. These statistics aren't new. These disparities have been carrying on for quite some time now and there have been many explanations put forward to try and explain it, ranging from poverty, barriers to accessing care to black, Asian and mixed heritage birthing people being more susceptible to certain illnesses. Now, that being said, I don't feel that just pointing the blame squarely back at the people that are at risk of these mortality rates is very helpful because this kind of blaming the victim behaviour kind of evades the real problem or one of the major problems which is addressing racism within healthcare. And it just kind of gives institutions like a get out of jail free card and so they're not looking inwardly or inwardly as to how they can improve the care but just kind of put it down to oh, you know, these bodies are just defective and this is just what happens. That's not useful. That's not helpful. So we can't, as long as people focus on these kind of issues or minimize or dismiss the experiences of black and brown birthing people, nothing's going to get changed. But as student midwives, we are in a prime position and midwives as well. We're in a prime position to make positive differences to women and birthing people who are at high risk of mortality. Now, I mentioned about racism and what racism is or what it isn't and how that's really important for students and for midwives as well. Now, racism for me, my interpretation of it is racial prejudice, racial prejudice against people who have a different skin colour to yourself but in addition to institutional power. So that is my definition of racism and that can kind of come in different ways. It's presented in different ways. So you have overt racism which a lot of people will kind of instantly think of the very intentional, obvious and harmful attitudes and behaviours towards people but what we really need to break down and what we really need to go against is covert racism which is very concealed, very subtle acts that basically serve to restrict or deny people from ethnic minorities access to certain privileges and benefits and unfortunately one of those privileges and benefits, not that it should be a privilege is healthcare and it gives perpetrators an opportunity to gaslight the victim or just deny harm altogether. Again, we go back to the victim blaming, your body is more likely to be susceptible to certain illnesses so that's how we can explain this and that's not right. I've just put at the end there microaggressions. Microaggressions are a type of covert racism and what they are, it's basically a statement or an action or that's kind of like you would say it's indirect or very subtle or unintentional discrimination against someone from a marginalised group and I have plenty of examples of microaggressions I've experienced being told that I speak very well even though I was born in a country where English is the first language and I have grown up here speaking English perfectly fine all my life. There was an assumption because of where I'm from or because of what I look like but I couldn't hold a professional conversation on this telephone and that was from one of my very first jobs and I was told that by one of my managers and another one of good old favourite is that to be told that you are pretty for a black girl which is the biggest backhanded compliment I think I've ever received in my life is that I am somehow the exception to the rule. Now on the surface you could say that you know these people you know that it's a compliment, these things are compliment, they're not compliments. On the surface they may not seem so bad as being called the n-word you know which is very overt but when you experience these things on a daily basis multiple times throughout the day they can really have an effect on you, they can chip chip chip away at you and it can really result in, it can be detrimental to your health, your mental health resulting in depression and even trauma. So why is cultural competence important? So we are living in an increasingly multicultural society and cultural competence is really important when delivering pregnancy care because it can help reduce barriers of care to women and birthing people. Without it we would have less of an opportunity to build meaningful relationships and we would basically just coexist with people that we just wouldn't understand and that kind of lack of understanding of different cultures, different cultural practices would just give rise to increase in chances of misunderstandings and also developing biases. So cultural competence, I love this quote from Sobralski and Katz cultural competence relies on a strong foundation of knowledge about other cultures. It allows the practitioner to appreciate, understand and empathize with that culture and as a result deliver appropriate and effective healthcare through changes in both approach and technique. Now as midwives you know the meaning of the word midwife is to be with women and to have an understanding of that woman and her culture and her family setup is really important in how we deliver our care and being sensitive to the nuances between different cultures and how things work is really really important and women and birthing people will truly appreciate that extra effort that we put into taking time to actually educate ourselves about their cultures. So what can we do? These are just some things that I think are really important in how we can deliver really good care and also challenge ourselves when it comes to race and racism is to not avoid conversations about race or racism. It will make you feel uncomfortable and that's okay like as I said at the very beginning this is not a comfortable topic to discuss but it's part of the process. You need to kind of sit with that discomfort in order to really kind of challenge yourself and make changes within. We need to also check our personal biases and we need to keep doing that. If you walk into a room and you're caring for somebody who is from a different culture to yours do you feel uneasy? Do you feel uneasy with that? Then ask yourself why is that? What makes me feel uneasy and how can I change that? How can I change the way I communicate? How can I make this interaction both easier for the person that I'm caring for and also for myself? How can I deliver the best possible care? Another one is to not get defensive or to send to yourself. Now I'm going to use the phrase white fragility in a very general sense. The focus is on the fragility part and so if someone brings up this topic that you shouldn't just shirk away from it and say well I don't do that, I don't do those things just for fear because what it is is you're just kind of retreating back to your place of comfort where really you need to kind of push through that and putting yourself at the centre to say how you feel about these things is not really going to push forward and it's not going to keep the momentum of these kind of conversations going. Actively listening to the experiences of black Asian and ethnic minority women and birthing people is really, really important because you will gain so much understanding for their lived experience which sometimes they feel like they're not being listened to and for you to take the time to actively listen to ask the right questions and then get to the crux of how you can actually improve things can go a really, really long way. So recognising privilege. Now I'm using the word privilege by using this word I'm not referring to, I'm not making any assumptions that people have not had to work for what they have achieved I'm not making an assumptions of how much money you have in the bank or anything like that. Privilege for me is your life not being made harder when we talk about white privileges. Your life is not made harder because of your whiteness or your proximity to whiteness whereas my life in certain situations being black is made more difficult, is made more awkward purely because of the fact that I'm black. That's what I'm alluding to but you can turn that on its head and you can actually use it for good if you know a colleague of yours or someone in your care is not being listened to you in your position of privilege can advocate for them you can speak up for them and it could be the case that you can open doors that they can't so always use your privilege for good. A big one, a big for a part of mine is people claiming to be colour blind and I know it usually comes from a place of goodwill it's not usually meant to be harmful but in saying that what it actually does is it kind of negates the cultural values and norms and experiences of people of colour so you denying the existence of their race is also denying their experiences of person which isn't helpful. Don't be afraid to get things wrong it will happen but what really matters is how we learn from our mistakes we don't learn things from always getting things right we learn from the things that we get wrong and improving on them so having someone challenging you or someone kind of educating you is not a bad thing, is not a negative thing and we should always just keep pushing forward and remembering that being non-racist is not enough now we're at the point where being not racist is actually quite passive you can say oh yeah I'm not racist and then that's it, that's not enough we must now be actively anti-racist. So what does being anti-racist mean? So this is a brilliant quote by Ibram X.Kendi by a book that I highly recommend called How to be an anti-racist. To be anti-racist is to think nothing is behaviourally wrong or right inferior or superior with any of the racial groups. Whenever the anti-racist sees individuals behaving positively or negatively the anti-racist sees exactly that. Individuals behaving positively or negatively not representatives of whole races. To be anti-racist is to deracialise behaviour to remove the tattooed stereotype from every racialised body. Behaviour is something that humans do not races do. And I think that's an incredibly powerful powerful quote. Anti-racism requires continuous action It means that there will be parts of this journey that you will feel uncomfortable and moving through this journey you will pass through different zones so you will have the fear zone where you will avoid these kind of conversations you want to be comfortable so you kind of just deny that these things are happening around you. Then the learning zone follows that so you recognise your privilege you're educating yourself on structural racism and you're also challenging your own biases. And then you move through the growth phase which is kind of like infinite really because then you start actively advocating for anti-racist policies you're speaking up when you hear or see racism and you don't let mistakes hold you back or stop your work. So it's a continual thing. Are you ready to be an anti-racist ally? In order to do this education is key I live by the mantra of knowledge is power and I really do believe especially in this instance that that's really really important. Don't rely on other people to educate you there are people willing to do that but not everybody is willing to do that it can be a lot of emotional labour for some people, particularly people of colour so find out reading materials find resources again I'm happy to share some of those with you speak up now this is a really important one and it's also a really really difficult one because I am so anti I'm really not a confrontational person at all but I found that I'm now I feel like I have to say something like even if it's just you know something that just makes someone stop and think about what they've just said it doesn't have to mean a really kind of negative interaction it doesn't have to be any aggression behind it something as simple as asking someone what did you mean by that what did you mean when you just said that thing it can kind of cause someone to stop and think about what they're actually saying so another way to kind of educate yourself I guess is to diversify who you follow on social media the kind of people that you interact with online and also through the books that you read I think for birth workers in particular having an understanding of intersexual feminism is really really important my for me if feminism is advocating for women's rights and equality between the sexes intersexual feminism is the understanding of how overlapping identities can change that experience for somebody so for instance my experience as a cis woman can be completely different from the experience of an Asian trans woman our experiences are very very different and having a kind of sensitivity towards that is really vital particularly in birth work with regards to what language we use and how people identify it's really really important that we have knowledge of that and also during the work for the right reasons and as I said previously before using privilege for the benefit of not just yourself but for the benefit of others who may not have the means or may not have allowed enough voice to push doors open so I would like to invite you on the International Day of the Midlife to be the change that you wish to see in the birth world this work is not easy and it's got a long long way to go but the more of us that are kind of pitching in the more of us that are challenging these status quo and the more of us that are kind of shaking tables the better because only good can come of a collective work towards a better way of practising but here are some references that I have used again I can share these with you if you need to following this presentation Excellent Chelsea thank you very very much for your wonderful presentation there are some questions that have come through if it's okay if I ask you is that okay? So Renee is asking from a birthing perspective do you have a top 3 books you might recommend reading to further intersectional feminism understanding So they're not exactly birth specific but a couple of books just off the top of my head one is called hood feminism and another is the killing of the black body again I can kind of put these in an email or something like that if you wanted me to send those on to you just pop your email in the chat and I will make sure that I contact you with that but they're the two that kind of jump out at me Excellent fantastic we can add that to your presentation when it gets published on the internet as well for those So another question that's come through is Deepa says as a mature student midwife I still find it difficult to question unnecessary remarks that make me feel really uncomfortable and it does take courage and I will try using what do you mean by that I know you had some other ideas there as well Chelsea about how people could navigate as a student or a midwife when they feel it's time to speak up what kind of things can they do and how can they approach that with colleagues Yes I totally agree with that it's very hard sometimes to kind of find that moment where especially in the heat of things and you kind of think do I let that slide or not but if you feel uncomfortable enough with what's been said I think I know it takes a lot of courage because it's something personally I've had to work on a lot I wouldn't say boo to the goose so it goes when I first started my studies but confidence kind of comes and yes so asking simple questions like what do you mean by that or or even just saying I'm really not comfortable with that what you just said it can be really really difficult but it doesn't always have to be in a really confrontational space and if you're not feeling up to actually saying it to that person directly going to the midwife in charge or going to one of your link lecturers something like that to discuss it with as well they can also kind of guide you but it is really scary and I totally appreciate that but it's not always as easy as just going up to someone and starting a conversation but there are people there who will definitely support you Fantastic Thanks very much Chelsea that's great I had another question that came in from Reena Do you feel there should be a movement within midwifery or medicine to stop using procedure names that are based on racist people who discovered the procedure such as the Sims position for example should we all be referring to this as an exaggerated side-lying rather than Sims Thank you for that Reena Personally yes I do think that we should move away from from those kind of from using the names of those people now I know probably not everyone will agree with me but you know I feel like my stomach actually turns whenever someone tells me to go and get a Sims speculum or you know putting someone in a Sims position it really makes me feel uncomfortable but at the time you're giving care to somebody else so you can't really think about it but what about honouring the women that he experimented on essentially we don't hear about that we don't see that so why should he get the honour of us naming things after him That is a really really really good point We also have some other questions that are there any other organisations that are looking to investigate this issue or social media threads that you can recommend at all Chelsea that you want to point anybody in the direction of Yes there is the five times more in the UK there's a five times more campaign which recently they launched a government petition which was I think it was a couple of weeks ago that was debated in Parliament and what they're now off the back of that there's going to be more kind of research into why there is this disparity with maternal mortality rates in the UK and also looking into not just the mortality rates but also the near misses which were not included in any kind of report so to have a clearer picture of how care actually varies between women of different ethnicities so that's going to be really interesting development to watch out for and also the organisation birthrights.org they're also gathering lived experiences from women and healthcare professionals who identify as being black Asian or of mixed heritage just to get a really clear picture of both sides of the actual maternity care workers and women and birthing people in their care so those are two that I would really look into birthrights and also five times more I'm not sure whether you'd be able to watch the parliamentary debate I'm not sure if that could be recorded somewhere I'll try and find a link for it but it was really really inspiring but also quite disappointing right at the end but if I can find a link for you it would be a really good thing to watch members, actual members of parliament who had really poor experiences sharing those experiences and really putting quite a lot of emotional labour into sharing those experiences with the house so it was a really good debate to watch Excellent We've had a really interesting point coming from Emily as well and she says thank you so much this is such an important topic among many other areas we need to make a fresh look at education both through school and professional trainings including midwifery to change the normalisation of covert racism in society and so frequently in healthcare and in international development covert unintentional racism reinforces the white male supremacy principle I know you had some thoughts on this yourself Chelsea about suggestions that students can do independently to try and bring about changes in their learning and in their learning environment and also how their programs are taught. If you want to talk to us a little bit about that more Chelsea that would be fantastic Yes, thanks Diane. Emily that's a really really great point because let's not forget that midwifery was you know elder wise women who knew who had that knowledge of the birthing process of the physiological birthing process who were basically kind of elbows out of the way by male doctors so I completely understand that point and I think we do need to kind of go back to that we need to go back to trusting women's bodies and not pathologising birth so much but with them the question Diane raises what students can actively do to kind of bring about changes in their own learning so I as part of my uni's midwifery society I'm trying to organise different kinds of events we're in the process now organising an inclusion event and bringing in different speakers who will kind of share knowledge and understanding of topics that aren't covered in our normal curriculum flag up any events and get your teaching teams to share these things via you know sending out emails flagging up events seminars, talks with members of your cohorts as I did I shared some reading lists and that kind of got conversations going with different students in my cohort as well and also if you have the opportunity giving feedback on your actual course giving feedback we've recently had had an opportunity to input on what we would like to see on your curriculum looking like by university so if you ever get a chance to do that kind of go all out like have your points ready and just let them know what things that you feel are missing because I feel it's kind of a disservice to students to kind of have these three years and then at the end of it you actually feel like oh my gosh there's so much that I don't get and that I don't understand when there is plenty of opportunity to kind of put these kind of things in place like having a workshop on female genital cutting for example having an event that centres on the LGBTQ community like all these kind of things can be really really helpful to our learning but we're missing out on and I think it's it's sometimes it is up to the students to kind of shake tables and make a bit of noise about it that's what you're on mute Diane are you there Diane sorry, sorry Chelsea it was me I thought I had my mic on thank you very much for that I know a couple of people were really keen to get the titles of those books that you mentioned again are you able to write them in the public chat there or just say them again so everyone can note them down that wants them is anybody have a question they want to ask at all Chelsea in person just raise your hand or any more questions in the public chat that's fine everyone's really pleased for the topic here today Chelsea I'm really pleased all really enjoying the information that you're sharing as well aren't excellent is there anything further you want to add at all Chelsea about another five minutes or so oh my goodness I really raced through that I thought oh my gosh I'm going to run out of time just to say that I'm really grateful for everyone that's attended the session and Celine, yes I'm just looking through the chat but definitely and I just hope that this kind of talk has really inspired you to talk to colleagues or talk to other members of your cohorts if you're a student and then bring about change if there's something that's not quite right if there's something that you feel is missing sometimes it's really scary to kind of put your hand up and say but I took that kind of risk and put my hand up and said I think we need to add this and I think this is missing and it's kind of really helped me to grow as an activist and as a student as well and really helped with me just being more of an advocate for things that I really believe in so it's really hard sometimes and it can feel like you're going to be the odd one out or the one that always brings up a race but for me it's really important and I will never not do it and I'll never not I'll never not talk about it Excellent Thanks very much Chelsea I'll just have one quick more check see if anyone wants to ask any more questions just everyone saying thank you so much Juliet saying there thank you for having the courage to present this Chelsea it has been really helpful fabulous and Grace saying there thank you very much