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West Yorkshire Paths

West Yorkshire Paths is a specialist service.  We offer psychological therapy and midwifery interventions for women and birthing people who are experiencing moderate to severe mental health needs from birth trauma and/or baby loss. This can include:

  • Birth trauma, trauma from maternity and neonatal care
  • Severe fear of birth
  • Baby and pregnancy loss up to one year old; loss during fertility treatment and parent/infant separation at birth by childcare proceedings.

We offer support to people who live in Leeds, Bradford and Craven, Wakefield, Kirklees, and Calderdale.

We accept referrals on our birth trauma, baby loss and tokophobia pathways for women without their babies or with babies over One year old. For women and birthing parents who are pregnant or with a baby under one year old please consider a referral to the local perinatal mental health team or Talking Therapies.

We accept referrals for women who are currently pregnant and have been issued with a Public Law Outline (PLO) on our loss due to safeguarding procedures pathway.

We recommend that referrals are not made sooner than four weeks after trauma to give the body and mind a chance to adjust. After baby loss, distress will understandably be present, however, if this is contributing to the development or worsening of mental health difficulties a referral can be made.

Why would someone choose the service?

We pledge to offer a safe space for people from all backgrounds, cultures, ethnicities, disabilities, religions, spiritual beliefs, sexualities, gender identities and family arrangements.

We work hard to be a trauma informed service where we provide a safe, trustworthy service that listens to you and gives a choice about your care.

We understand that people come to us with a variety of experiences and strive to be sensitive to people’s individual needs.

We offer evidence-based treatment and expert knowledge to provide excellent quality of care.

As a service we are committed to supporting all people to access our services. All our staff have training to ensure we are culturally sensitive to people’s needs. We are able to provide virtual appointments and can offer a location more suited to your needs if virtual appointments are not suitable for you. Please ask our staff members about how we can support you to access our care.

LGBTQ+

At Paths, we strive to create a supportive and inclusive service that uses language to make you feel safe and welcome. Adopting more comprehensive language in order to make LGBTQ+ individuals feel more included and valued. We use terms such as “women and birthing parents” which we believe does not diminish or erase the term “woman” but rather adds another term that promotes an atmosphere of acceptance, openness, and inclusivity. We recognise the importance of language in creating a welcoming and affirming environment for all patients, regardless of their sexual orientation or gender identity.

Please state to us what terminology makes you comfortable to ensure our staff can create a safe environment in our care.

Trauma informed service

All of our staff at Paths have had specialised training to understand better and support individuals who may have gone through tough experiences. Our approach is based on being aware of the impact of trauma, and we’ve designed our services to be considerate of this.

We understand that people might have had difficult experiences even before they come to us for help. We pay attention to signs and symptoms of trauma and respond in a way that is caring and understanding. We make sure to really listen to the people we work with, acknowledging and validating their experiences and feelings. We also make sure to explain all aspects of care thoroughly and plan together with them. We believe in giving choices and empowering people to make decisions that are right for them.

Feedback

We invite our service users to complete a friends and family test to gain feedback.

If you have any other feedback you wish to contribute please email us with the subject ‘Feedback’.

Lived Experiences Voices focus group

The Lived Experience Voices focus group is comprised of a group of women and birthing parents who have experiences of reproductive trauma. The group has helped us to develop the service to ensure it is accessible, meaningful and representative of the population.

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