Hannah Barnes article on traumatic birth

If you’re in the Sussex area, you can self refer for physio.
They do ask for gender instead of sex though 🙄
ETA link https://sussexlmns.org/forms/pelvic-health-physiotherapy-referral/

Excellent article. Great about the APPG enquiry- although note this is not as high profile as a select committee inquiry so it will be up to women to write to MPs to make sure the results are acted on. And hope the Women’s Health Strategy delivers for women of course, that is really essential. Thanks Hannah Barnes for your excellent reporting if you see this.

Excellent article. Great about the APPG enquiry- although note this is not as high profile as a select committee inquiry so it will be up to women to write to MPs to make sure the results are acted on. And hope the Women’s Health Strategy delivers for women of course, that is really essential. Thanks Hannah Barnes for your excellent reporting if you see this.

This is a horrific article, sparring no punches. What particularly upset me was that birth injuries are so downplayed e.g. by NCT etc, and the drive for a 'normal birth' that is without medical intervention. I belong to the generation that had children in the late 70s and the 80s. I remember a female doctor telling me I was having too much gas and air, and I bloody well ignored her. But I was not ignored in the way this article suggests. I also was not expected to have a normal delivery if that was not practical. The entire process was designed to have a healthy (or at least alive) mother and baby. Now the process seems to be to have a normal birth, but sadly one or both participants died was badly injured - but we did not use drugs or medical intervention so hey! it's wonderful. Childbirth is dangerous. Women used to write their wills beforehand, or write letters to their child/children in case they died. Husband actually made sure they said a proper goodbye in the sixteenth century because of the chances of their wife dying. We used to know this and now we don't. So women tear so badly they are doubly incontinent and no-one seems to care. Women do not matter, of course.

Same here, I suffered for years and eventually had therapy which included EMDR which helped so much. I never had another child partly due to the way I was treated during the birth of my one and only.

This was in the UK.

Omg- was this in the US?

looking back at my birth in 2006 it’s no surprise we then used our savings to pay for a private midwife home birth two years later. Couldn’t have been more different. Didn’t complain because slightly busy with a baby - but that’s why we don’t complain…

fucking appalling behaviour and I’m angry still.

I had my babies in the 1970s. At that time, the Medical Defence Union (doctors’ insurance organisation) said that the moment a woman set foot over the threshold of a maternity unit/hospital she had given implicit consent to any treatment she was given. What that meant in reality was that there was no need for explicit consent, no explanations, no information, routine episiotomy – they just did what they decided and you just had to accept it.

That was, of course, some fifty years ago, and none of those working then will be in post now. But they would have taught students, who would have taught students, and by the sounds of it there’s still a lingering after-effect of “doctor knows best”.

(As for pain relief: while in labour with my first, I got jabbed with a needle and don’t remember much after that. In the post-natal ward, the woman in the next bed was a nurse who had asked the question – apparently, all patients under the care of that particular obstetrician were routinely given a cocktail of pethidine, morphine, and chloral. Slowed down labour, forceps delivery, floppy baby. Yes, I’m still angry.)

A very powerful article. I’ve had two c sections, both very traumatic in their own way. We treat animals at the vets with 1000 times more care and compassion than we do mothers in maternity and postnatal wards.

100%. It’s so snide. Half the time in hospital I felt like fing screaming about all my university credentials to get them to treat me like an educated person and not a hysterical banshee.

@Matthew54 yes! Also - we are adults and don’t need to be gathered in a circle like schoolgirls (whilst the men are sent to the pub of course!) and informed in hushed tones that we might poo ourselves as if this is the very worse thing that can happen!

Your experiences were very similar to mine - first in hospital and then others at home. I don't like hospitals and tense up when in them, which caused (I think) my first labour to stall for several painful hours. I wasn't that impressed by some of the staff and I felt I was expected to get with their routine whether I needed it or not.

The home births were calm and controlled, with midwives I knew and who had confidence in me. The babies were big, but because I was able to move and could do what my body needed me to do, that wasn't a problem.

I was very lucky that I lived in an area where home birth was seen as an entirely acceptable option and was supported by excellent community midwives who were in turn supported by a hospital consultant who had faith in their abilities and judgement. Women - both expectant and birthing mothers and skilled obstetric professionals - were actually listened to, and it made all the difference.

Brilliant! It's outrageous that tearing isn't addressed more. I have a short perineum after a year wasn't repaired properly and a prolapse I can't get physio for on the NHS (simply no pathway to refer me according to my GP). It's utter shit.

Yes, as I say, I have two children and still feel like this. My DH works in healthcare so he does the bulk of the kids medical appointments (of which there are a fair few for DC2 as they have some additional physical needs) as I feel I normally just get ignored. DC2 is under a couple of clinics long term but I still get "is this your first"...no it isn't, that's how we could clearly see their development wasn't usual. It it had been my first I may not have noticed there were any issues.

Tbf, average literacy age in my area is something like 10. I certainly didn't know what perineum or rectum meant at that age. So I do think lay language is necessary but the best approach is to use both, so people can learn the correct language if they don't already know it.

100%. I thought it was absolutely ridiculous none of the coursework in my antenatal class just said, “this is going to be the most painful thing you may have ever experienced.”

It feels so juvenile and ridiculous. Also refusing to use actual medical phrases. We are adults, you don’t need to say “back passage” when you can say perineum or rectum.

When I had my children over a decade ago, I lived near a hospital and had one induced birth there, and 2 home water births with the community midwifery team. Thankfully my pregnancies were all uncomplicated, with the exception of Firstborn not particularly wanting to get started on the journey out.

The experiences were chalk and cheese. The hospital was lonely, painful, and scary and the post-birth experience stressful. The nurses on the post natal ward were brusque and quick to offer formula, to the fury of the midwives who complained that mothers were all coming in planning to breastfeed and all going out started on bottle feeding.

At home, I had a midwife turn up when I called, and a second arrive when I was going into Stage 2. Afterwards I lay on my sofa with my newborn while my husband rushed out to get pizza. The lack of advanced pain relief - which I'd needed in hospital - I'd not needed at home at all. I have realised that I need to pace and crawl and bend over a birthing ball to get through Stage 1, not lie mostly tethered to a bed by fetal monitoring machines.

Everything that happens in a hospital is about how the hospital functions, not what the patient needs. By qualifying for a home birth I was able to sidestep some of that and make my births more about what I needed, and I am so grateful they were uncomplicated amd to the community midwives for being able to do their jobs properly in the home birth system. I have no idea if home births are still as protected as they used to be, though.

A very good article. I genuinely don't know anyone who didn't feel traumatised by their birth, even without experiencing 'major' complications. I know lots of people who felt they were dying, me included. I don't think it matters if a complication is temporary - the rushing in of people to help, the fear for your baby, how you feel in the moment etc. all go on to generate a sense of trauma that persists long beyond the moment. Of course, the author's experience goes a lot beyond that and I felt so sad and angry for her reading the article. I also got a sense of how ridiculous our whole attitude towards childbirth is. How many women and babies used to die in childbirth? Now we gaslight women into thinking that because it is natural, our bodies will know what to do and with a bit of an oxytocin boost (string of fairylights and soft music perhaps) the baby will walk out. This evidently doesn't happen! We are not prepared for the sudden onset of labour which is nothing like we have experienced before and cannot be stopped once it is started, nor are we prepared for the experience of the unfamiliar hospital, the interventions, the strangers around us, the vulnerability, and the loss of dignity that all come with a normal birth, let alone the complications that can occur.

Every time I had a question for my midwife, I was asked why I was asking - "why are you asking medical questions when pregnancy isn't medical?" Our antenatal course leader brushed over tears / instruments / sections - "this only happens if you're unlucky". In reality, of a class of 9: 2 sections planned for medical need, 3 emergency sections (I was one), at least 2 forceps, and some significant tearing in all of the mothers who gave birth vaginally. Refusing to talk about these things does not mean they don't happen, it just means that mothers have to carry the fear and guilt and pain and trauma on their own.

Also, what is it with poor c-section care here? Almost every person I know or am acquainted with has an infected c-section incision at some point. What the actual hell is going on?

I know it can happen and does happen in the US, but it seems like it happens constantly.

Like you, my son also needed physio for torticollis. I suspect this was related to his birth since he was “stuck” and not progressing for a few minutes and the midwife didn’t do an episiotomy quickly.

People think the transition from women being the patient to being ignored happens once the baby arrives, but I think it happens much earlier. As long as the baby “looks okay” via monitoring, we tend to be ignored.

I had an emergency c-section with my first after eighteen hours of labour. He was a big baby and was two weeks over due.

My experience for my dc2 birth was very similar to Hannah's. I had forceps rather than a ventouse but ended up with a 4th degree tear too. I also had the added complication that my bladder stopped working. This was only noticed when I stood up to have a shower, the day after the birth, and I flooded the floor. My bladder had overflowed. I then had a catheter fitted and had it in place for 3 weeks post birth. I was terrified the catheter would be permanent. My wound also got infected and started to breakdown.

My baby had bruising to her face after delivery. She also had to have physio on her neck for the first six months but I was not told if this was connected to her delivery.

It makes me sad and angry that other women are having to go through the same thing. I was made to feel that I shouldn't complain as my baby and I survived, so I have pushed my feelings down.

This was such a hard read. Post-natal care in this country is a joke. I’ve spoken about this before but my son was six weeks premature and we were sent home despite him showing clear signs of lethargy. We had to be readmitted less than two days later because he suffered desats, had suspected meningitis, and had such severe jaundice he almost needed a blood transfusion.

I will never forget when I begged a midwife to look at him once more because he was so quiet and was told “he’s just a chill baby.”