Some days I feel like I live on the dark side of the moon.

I am a safeguarding midwife. I work with a group of midwives and nurses and liaise closely with doctors, children’s services, health visitors, GPs and other agencies to protect our most vulnerable clients – unborn and newborn babies.

I worked in London for 10 years in a variety of posts as a midwife and was alongside some of the most vulnerable women and damaged families. I then moved out of London to start my own family. We live in a beautiful part of the country, within the commuter belt in a very green and affluent county, yet the complexity of family life and broken people exists no matter what the postcode is.

I can’t remember the last time I received a thank you card, but I do remember the bone-crushing hug I received from a woman fleeing domestic abuse with her two-day-old baby as we worked to place a safety net around her. I also won’t forget the paranoid narcissist father shouting in my face demanding that I listen to his list of complaints.

One of the most difficult and draconian tasks is removing a baby from its mother at birth. In extreme cases, the court rules that once a baby is born, it must be taken to a place of safety away from the birth parents.

Midwives compare this to stillbirth. It is complicated, distressing and goes against everything we are taught about bonding and attachment, skin-to-skin and first interactions. To physically remove a baby from their mother is horrific, tragic and never easy, especially after a labour and birth. It’s not an everyday occurrence. In London it happened on average once a month, now I am in the home counties it is slightly less, but only marginally.

There is no training in the world that can prepare you for the animalistic howl from a woman as her baby is moved to a “safe” area. How long do you “allow” a woman to hold her baby? One minute? 10? An hour? Where is the rule book when you need it most?

Do you allow a perpetrator of domestic abuse into the unit because the mother desperately wants him there, believing that the baby will make it all better and stop him bashing the living daylights out of her and ignoring their other children? How long for the woman escorted in by police as she has broken bail and is so high she doesn’t realise she’s in labour? What time limit do you allow the woman whose last baby was adopted after receiving non-accidental injuries (broken bones and detached retinas) while in her care? And what of the young mother who is giving a registered sex offender a second chance after he groomed her and made her totally dependent on him?

Safeguarding babies rarely ends in the happy ever after. The threshold for referral into services is high because the help on offer is minimal. Mental health services rarely exist within maternity, yet more and more women have a history or are currently battling depression, anxiety, PTSD and eating disorders. Women have to be jumping off the balcony before deemed at high enough risk to have a psychiatric review.

The Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) has long recognised that midwives need training in mental health but to date there is no postgraduate qualification available. Some trusts have perinatal mental health services for pregnant women and postnatal mothers, but most of the UK does not have this much-needed service. Women can only be seen by a psychiatrist if they present to A&E or their GP calls the community crisis team. This only works if the woman in crisis has a family around her who see the signs and knows how to summon help.

The NHS is running a depleted service. Working in the NHS has been likened to an abusive relationship – making you survive on very little, wanting more without providing what you need to keep safe, working you to the brink and then berating you when standards aren’t met. I can see bad things coming, yet there is very little that can be done to stop the cycle of abuse. I have to keep reminding myself to stay in my role. I tell myself that I am not a housing officer/counsellor/psychiatrist/magician – I am a midwife and can only offer maternity services.

There are days when I think I can’t subject myself to any more sad stories, tales of broken lives and damaged children. I rush home to my own family and fill my days when not working with colour and light, laughter and love. I know I am capable and the team I work with keep me sane and grounded; they allow me to vent my frustration, cry at the sadness, take deep breaths – we support each other.

I often think of what else I could do for a career, but I am a midwife. It is a huge part of my identity and the babies in my charge of care deserve the best protection we can provide.

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