Patient choice really does work!! You can request to go to King's or Lewisham (and probably others too) - it's your right.

I was adamant I wanted to go to King's this time as I had a great antenatal experience, great labour experience, but TOTALLY RUBBISH postnatal experience at Lewisham (ignored, told off for not feeding, not getting bf support when I specifically asked, yet being told I couldn't go hom until my son had fed, ignored the second night, finally on the following day I decided I'd rather be at home without a clue rather than in hospital getting no support, so I asked to be discharged at 10am on the Sunday to be told "but it says here you were discharged last night.....", being shouted at by a cleaner for daring to be in the loo when she wanted to clean it.....needless to say bf failed and this was a major contributing factor to my (now resolved) PND). I do understand that 3 years is a long time and apparently things have changed - my colleague's son was born at Lewisham and now, for example they show a video showing breastfeeding techniques every day, which I would have loved, but even then, she has a medical condition for which her son should have had regular bloods done and they had to prompt and prompt and prompt to get seen for these on the ward....

I should have complained, but by the time I realised I really shouldn't have been treated like that so much time had passed... what did I know, I was a new mother!

So I'm off to King's this time - I work there too so it's a lot handier. Incidentally when I asked my GP to refer me to King's because I hated my Lewisham experience, she told me she wasn't surprised to hear that as she'd heard similar from a lot of people!

Re the midwives care - I am being seen antenatal at King's but when I have No2 and leave the hospital I'll be discharged back to Lewisham community midwives and I can imagine it will be similar for you. I didn't really miss the continuity of care last time.

Ah well, all will become clear in about 8 weeks or so!