Let me tell you: this book set me on an emotional rollercoaster, and some of the women's stories will stick with me for life and all I can do is commend Leah for being the kind of midwife that should I ever be pregnant I would wish to have. One of the many things I've learned from Leah's accounts is that my heart is too soft for midwifery - and, as Leah notes, how sad and frustrating this is for a profession that's seen as caring and compassionate. For Leah, she is just a brief participant in these women's stories, a side character in what is for many a new chapter in their life - or, in some instances, a very, very sad end to a chapter that barely got started.

And then there's the NHS. The UK's good ol' National Health Service. Something I will fight for til my very last breath - the right to free healthcare. But the system is flawed. In a lot of ways I've lost complete trust in the NHS from my experiences dealing with mental health - something that is sorely underfunded - and from reading Leah's experiences it looks as if the funding issues are prevalent in other facets of care. In much the same way mental healthcare is seen as we should just strap up our boots and get on with things - surely the key to feeling better is to, in fact, just feel better? - that childbirth is as easy as a few good pushes and out you go, on with your life. I've read elsewhere recently - and I think even in this book too - that Western medicine seeks to cure the ailment while other cultures seek to improve overall wellbeing and, in fact, keep you well. This most definitely seems to be how the NHS works. The sooner you're deemed 'better' - in midwifery, the baby arrived - the sooner you can be discharged so a bed can be given to someone else. And this is where we see the failures that affect both the staff and the patients. My heart broke reading Crystal's story, never knowing the outcome. I will forever live in fear for what happened to Pei Hsuan and if she ever got the help she truly needs. This is a book I would recommend to our current government, a cry for help just as loud as the cry of a newborn baby. Our system should be doing better than treating patients like a revolving door. Our system should be doing better to provide support to the staff. Thank you, Leah, for this touching account. I will never forget it.

In this true memoir of life as an NHS midwide, we learn about how Leah starred her career after having her two children and how the patients she has helped have influenced her life both positively and at times also challenged her for the better through her career.



From a lesbian couple dealing with cancer and a new baby, young teen mum Crystal, a lady called Olivia trying to breast feed after her mum's influence and a woman escaping abuse, we see the trials each woman faces as she comes to meet her baby and also how much they impact that midwife that helps them too.



It is such a heart warming read and reassuring too to know that there are NHS staff out there who take the time to care and not just provide a service to the public as Leah shows how the patients she's had have impacted her life as she can recall the stories she does in this brilliant memoir.



Many thanks to the publishers for allowing me to review this book for them!

Leah Hazard tells us her stories of working as a midwife. These stories are told in detail, they tell us of the variety of work midwives do and the struggles they face with their health mentally.

I loved reading this book, it gave me an insight into midwifery, how challenging it can be along with many other difficulties from the midwives themselves or their patients. It was an interesting, thought provoking book which kept me turning the pages.

Many thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for an advanced copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

Hard Pushed is an honest and heart-warming book of the author’s experiences as a midwife in the underfunded and often frustrating maternity service in the NHS. The stories are retold from true events and while some are lovely with happy outcomes, some are heart breaking that stayed with me for a while.

What comes across is that our midwives across the Uk are bearing these emotions daily with true grit and a heroic attitude as they move on to their next patient. Midwives and indeed all NHS staff are our saviours and we are extremely fortunate to have them serve us. Let us hope as Leah Hazard and many others do, that the NHS receives more funding so that continued care can be administered to ease the pressure.



My thanks to Net Galley for the digital ARC , these are my own thoughts on the honest and open memoir Hard Pushed.

A real eye opener. Candid, heartbreaking and funny. Outlines the repercussions of NHS Cuts. A recommended read.

Oh my God, I have such respect for these angels in blue scrubs after reading this book. From the humourous to the tragic, and the absolutely shocking events that our author was part of and shared with us, I have had my eyes opened fully. She writes it so well that you can see, hear and feel the drama and at the end of it, you feel like you have been on shift with her. Highly recommended.

I’d like to thank Random House UK, Cornerstone and NetGalley for giving me the opportunity to read ‘Hard Pushed’ by Leah Hazard in exchange for my honest and unbiased review.

After completing her training, Leah decides to concentrate on working in the Maternity Assessment Unit, otherwise known as ‘Triage’. Through Leah’s eyes we view the world of pregnancy and birth, meeting some of her patients, for example, Eleanor whose wife Liz has health problems, Crystal who’s having a baby but is little more than a child herself, Olivia who’s had enough of her mother’s ‘helpful’ hints and takes charge herself and the heart-wrenching story of Pei Hsuan who needs an interpreter as she speaks only Mandarin.

We’re taken through the blood, sweat and tears involved with bringing another human being into the world, some of the stories desperately sad, a lot so amusing it made me laugh out loud, but all of it informative. We learn about how the Government cuts are affecting the NHS in causing staff cuts and bed shortages, and what a huge difference it would make to be well-resourced and appropriately staffed. We’re told how the midwives continue to work twelve-hour shifts when exhausted and unwell because if they’re not there for the pregnant mothers then who will be? I have nothing but respect and gratitude for the dedication Leah Hazard and her fellow-midwives around the country give to their profession. ‘Hard Pushed’ has given me a lot to think about.

A superb book that leaves you in no doubt just how hard the Midwife's in hospitals work and the pressure that sits firmly on their shoulders when bringing new lives into the world.

I loved the honesty and compassion in this book, being a Midwife is a massively important role and those of us who have had children will know the true magnitude they play when you are in labour and how they work tirelessly to ensure the safe arrival of your baby with as little intervention and dramatics as possible.

I loved this book and will be recommending it to everyone as it left me in absolute awe of the brilliant work Midwife's do and how Leah even when pushed to her upmost limits is still 100% dedicated to providing the best care and experience she possibly can for all mothers.

Thank you so much for sharing your story with us Leah and for continuing to help bring new lives into the world.

My own child bearing days are long gone. Once you've been there though, I don't think you ever forget the most painful, exciting, awe inspiring event of your life that is child birth; as the song goes - Nothing Compares. Since giving birth is probably one of the most intense times you'll go through as a woman, you're probably unlikely to forget the midwife who was there to help you deliver your baby.

When this book came up on Netgalley I jumped at the chance to read it. I really enjoy anything medical related and after reading the first paragraph of the synopsis I was even more eager to read this. With references to the "NHS Front line", and "working within a system at breaking point" this had echoes of a book I read towards the end of last year by Rachel Clarke - Your Life in My Hands which was so insightful as well as touching.

Well this book lived up to and even surpassed expectations. I enjoyed every page. Leah comes across as such a kind and dedicated professional. She shares with the reader her reasons of why she went into midwifery, shares some wonderful stories of the more unusual birthing experiences she has encountered during her work. She also shares the sheer exhaustion that she feels at times. Working 12 hour night shifts, coming into work feeling ill but not wanting to let her overworked and understaffed colleagues down. Struggling with labour ward bed shortages and the total overwhelm that is often felt by NHS staff working in an underfunded and very overstretched health service.

With compassion and an obvious dedication to her role, Leah Hazard paints an insightful picture of what life is really like for a midwife working on the NHS front line of maternity services.

If you liked the TV programme One Born Every Minute, you'll love this book. There's no playing up to the camera here, just true life stories that will melt your heart, break your heart but make you smile too.

This is a moving, warm tale of midwife's experiences through her own eyes. Midwives are very very special people and this book only clarifies that.

I really enjoyed reading this book. It makes a change for me to read a real life story, but to get an insight in to the working life of a midwife was very appealing to me. Through a series of thoughts and anecdotes, Leah brings to life the gruelling, sometimes tragic and often miraculous day to day life experience of working in a busy maternity unit. It is nitty gritty reality, often funny, but giving a real vision of what it's really like to do that job. Thanks to NetGalley for a preview copy.
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As a Midwife of over 30years experience I approached this book with some trepidation, but I need not have worried, Leah Hazard has written a worthy account of the challenges and pressures we face every single day. We do have great moments of highs and lows and many of these aspects are well written and documented. The abiding sense of humour found in the majority of midwives is here for all to see with some wonderful and also very sad moments.
Told with humour and honesty with accounts of the complex care needed for today’s society, this is an enjoyable book and one I would have no hesitation in recommending to colleagues, friends and clients!

Thanks Netgalley and the Publisher and also the author. This was a great read looking at things from a different perspective (after having 4 children) and makes me so feel proud that we still have the great NHS here in the UK

A brilliant memoir of an NHS midwife. This book is warm, funny and heartbreaking all at the same time. After two high risk pregnancies and months in hospital I met a lot of midwives, good, bad, indifferent and amazing. And I appreciated them all as they were doing what I couldn't under difficult circumstances. I've seen them crying, laughing and literally shaking with rage and this book gives me an insight into the other side of the bed to see what they have to deal with on a daily basis. Hard Pushed is an honest and gritty look into their world and should be handed to each expectant mother with her maternity notes and a request for patience.

Here is a background insight into the life of a midwife in the nhs of today, Not all of it is sweetness and roses, some parts are heartbreaking so get your tissues ready.
Thank you to both NetGalley and Random House for my eARC in exchange for my honest unbiased review

This was a heartfelt, funny, personal and at times harrowing story of life as a modern day midwife in the NHS. Call the Midwife it isn't!! A really interesting read.

We all know what midwives do. They do an amazing job bringing new live into the world, and they get to cuddle babies all day and night – just how lucky do they want to be?

Ok, so maybe it’s not quite all cuddles and teeny tiny feet and fingers. In fact, it’s very often not like that at all. Leah Hazard (yes, that’s her real name) came to the profession a little later in life, and threw herself into her new role as an NHS midwife with impressive gusto. A sensitive, yet sensible mother of 2, she has seen it all, and to be frank, covered in most of it.

Leah is like that friend you have that you go to when you want real advice, rather than platitudes. She’ll tell you the truth, but do it gently, in a way that makes you appreciate her sensitivity rather than get defensive and want to slap her. She brings this quality with her to the maternity ward, and as hundreds of expectant women swarm the phone lines to Triage, she has to try and separate out those who are convinced that their recent fake tan has harmed their baby, and those who are genuinely in urgent need of medical intervention, but who think they’ll just be ‘making a fuss’.

Easy to read and full of heart, this book is in some ways a female focused version of Adam Kay’s spectacularly successful debut novel “This is Going to Hurt: Secret Diaries of a Junior Doctor”. While I felt really uncomfortable and frustrated at how the pressure is unflinchingly piled on this essential resource and the consequences that this has for the midwife, the patient and underpinning it all, the NHS, Leah Hazard has written a warm, witty and compelling account of why these services should be protected at all costs.

I generally love reading these true account type books from workers within health settings. I think it gives us, members of the public and professionals working in care to see the other side of the coin. Hazzard takes us through her career both as a student starting out and as a qualified midwife, working with people from all walks of life, different colleagues and the joys and horrors encountered helping bring babies into the world.

I read the kindle version of this, there is a list of words/terms used within the book that readers will find helpful especially if not familiar with midwifery. If reading on the kindle it may be worth checking them out before starting the book so you don't have to flip back and forth. Hazzard gives an honest look into her day to day duties and how different one birth can be to another. Different aspects of her job, the joy, the fears, the sheer volume and crises midwives of today have to face.

I loved reading her passion for what she does, it comes across pretty much throughout every encounter. I learned a few things too and whilst I have always respected midwives for what they do I didn't realise how much their job entailed and if possible have an even greater respect now. Being with and assisting another person bring a child into the world is an amazing thing and sometimes we forget or ignore all the potentials that can go wrong. The book gives insight into it all and I have always said women who gave birth should have a gold star, I am thinking two or more now! The human body is an amazing thing and stories like this bring home just how fantastic and wonderful it can be. An emotive read and an eye opener of yet another service that is working under the strain of cuts from the government, more demands than often they can cope with and yet the staff continue to give 100 percent because what else can you do when working with people. 4.5/5 for me this time, the book is out to buy from May 2nd, ebook and tree book format.

As someone who works for the NHS as a nurse I totally "got" this book. When the days are good, they are fantastic but when days are bad, they are REALLY bad. I totally empathised with the writer throughout and understand how heartbreaking and joyous the job can be. Really enjoyed it.

A ‘warts and all’ telling of a midwife’s lif e. Nothing is spared. I found myself laughing one moment and crying the next! It shows the stresses and strains of those working in today’s NHS. I had great difficulty putting it down and am still thinking and talking about it. I have told so many people that they need to read it ....even a nurse sitting next to me on a plane!
Read it if youcare.