Upset 😢😢

[luisa778]

Hi, I was wondering has anyone ever had a bad experience with any midwives, their attitude and just overall treatment of you during or after your pregnancy? I had a really bad experience with one in particular after my son was born and it has affected me really badly now, almost five months after he was born. Has anyone been through anything similar? Thanks

I broke my coccyx too but no one would listen too me, midwife just kept saying “it’s normal to have pain after giving birth, stop making a fuss”, once the shift changed a lovely midwife came and gave me a rubber glove full of ice to place on my coccyx, it was like heaven.

Kezza8, exactly the same thing happened to me with my first. I was told not to even try to lift my baby but when I tried to get help I was nothing but a lazy nuisance.

There were some lovely people involved in our care but the majority of the midwives were absolute monsters - belittling my pain when they knew we were back to back. Instead of telling me they chose to mock me. I was subjected to internal examinations without lube and once with out consent, pain meds were witheld. After they sent my husband home, 2 of them came into my room, commented on how distressed I was and then shut the door on me leaving me alone and sobbing. I was asked to undress in a public area and when I refused I was told my baby would be at risk if I didn't. I have never been so scared and they seemed quite happy about it.Vile, vile people who messed me up for a long time.

I did a debrief, which did help at lot. There was some disiplinary action and retraining but the worst one lied her way out of it. I really hope karma doesn't exist as I would hate anyone, even those foul women, to suffer enough to pay off what they did to me and my baby.

This one comment pops back to me: about a week after DC was born, after several extremely serious life-threatening postnatal complications which involved returning to hospital and surgery, a HV said to me very seriously (like I was doing something wrong): "You look tired. You should get some sleep." As if I was simply staying up late partying!
Problem is when you get comments like that you are so stunned by the idiocy of them that you can't even respond properly!

Yes. I wrote a complaint about her. She was absolutely vile to me.

My sister had a horrible one.

She refused a extra pillow (silly i know, but she was very uncomfortable)

Babies heart beat was all over the place on the monitor and because i kept going out to ask if baby was ok, she got annoyed with me, said she had lots of women to see to (understood that) but right then, i was just worried about my nephews heart beat

She said my sister wasnt in active labour because she hadnt "gone into herself" which i knew she was, she refused to examine her to see how far she had gone, she said dad doesnt have to be called yet as shes hours away from giving birth.....
Well i called dad, and he just about made it...

I was there, as the induction was taking ages and i had sent dad home for abit if rest....

Luckly my sister doesnt remember much

Yes one of the midwives on my ward had this horrible, rude nasty attitude. Luckily we didnt have much to do with each other and i had a straightforward birth but i did wonder how she affected others, and why shes a midwife when she evidently loathes people so much?

I wont bore you with my sorry tale but I do wonder why the awful ones went into the profession? Did they enjoy it at first and then became disillusioned? Job wasn't what they thought it would be? Why do it if you can't be kind?

@eggsandwich
I know it's no consolation at all, but sometimes the expression 'ugly' can also mean 'cross or bad tempered'. I've come across this before in another situation where there was a row going on in a restaurant and the Italian waiter referred to the customer's 'ugly wife' !! - whereas it was lost in translation and he meant 'angry/annoyed/cross wife'. My grandmother also used to use the word 'ugly' meaning cross, as in 'oh you're ugly today'. Just my take on it, but certainly not nice!

I had lovely midwives throughout and despite some complications look at my labour relatively fondly... the only negative was one midwife who told me my daughter had blood in her nappy because I wasn’t feeding her enough! I was distraught, I was a FTM who was trying to breastfeed and so thought it mustn’t be working. I was later told by a different midwife that the blood was normal and my daughter only lost 1.5% of her body weight after the first five days of breastfeeding which is much lower than the tolerated 10%! Overall however, my midwives were great - it is sad to read so many people have had negative experiences for such an important time in their lives.

Yes. A midwife fed my baby formula without my permission. Longer story than that but she was totally out of order. I told her so there and then. I later complained and part of their response made me feel worse. They brought up the fact I refused to hold my baby as soon as she was born. I had a really awful labour, emergency c section and felt like I was going to be sick and pass out, so you know I didn't feel safe holding a newborn. Formula incident was a few days later, so irrelevant to my complaint. 3.5 years later and I'm still mad. So complain, but be mindful it might actually make you feel worse. :(

Also, OP, I had my 2nd baby in a different hospital and it was like chalk and cheese. They were lovely. Almost exactly the same circumstances but just a completely different approach and it was very healing.

My oldest child’s labour and birth was ruined by one spiteful bitch. I wrote a letter of complaint a few months after the birth, setting out how I was left for hours, had to ask so many times for a sick bowl that eventually I was sick in the bath water etc.

My letter ran to 7 sides and I was only in hospital for half a day.

It was an MLU low risk unit and they had so many baby deaths the following year it got shut down. I think they had about 50 births a year but they had 6 deaths.

Oh, and the fabricated notes! They decided i wasn’t in labour (until about 20 mins before the end) then spent ages making up notes. “When do you think active labour started, Irene?” “When did she come in?” “6.30am” “Oh, put 7”. I was totally ignored until 10am!

What is the point of this thread. I'm sure 99% of midwives are absolutely lovely. You have had a bad experience but I'm not sure a Midwife bashing thread is the answer really!

I had just gas and air with baby no 3 and delivered kneeling on the floor, elbows on DH's lap. We took in our own chair as it was the right height!

Midwives kept trying to get me up onto the bed and eventually said, "If you're going to deliver from there, we'll have to kneel, too!" Well, yes.

Suddenly the pillows they wouldn't put down for my knees came out by the half dozen for theirs.

But the real drama was when I was in the final stages and making admittedly bovine noises, like a tennis champion. I got told I was scaring a poor 16 year old in earlier stage labour, so I tried really hard to throttle back on the row. Delivered 4.56kg dd2 successfully. That's 10lbs on old money.

Next day, you guessed it, I enquired how the 16 year old had got on and received blank looks: she didn't exist! It was the midwives who didn't like a noisy mum but they weren't honest enough to say so.

Not a midwife, but a consultant.
My DS was a big baby (10lb!) and had shoulder dystocia during birth (his shoulders got stuck behind my pelvis) it was traumatic for both of us.

When I became pregnant with DD1 I was told she would be bigger than my son so would not let me go much over 40 weeks.
I had her at 40+5, she was actually only 8lb 🙄 but I had retained products and was really poorly afterwards and nearly admitted to hospital for a D&C.

Became pregnant with DD3 4 years later and was classed as high risk and so saw my consultant regularly (who was lovely) and he said he wanted to offer me an elective C sec because of the previous problems, but to go back at 36 weeks to discuss and if I chose against a C sec he would look to induce me at 37weeks.

Went to my appointment at 36 weeks after a pretty horrendous pregnancy and was looking forward to a light at the end of the tunnel!
Walked in and had a different - female - consultant. She looked at my notes and said "why are you here exactly?" I explained the situation and she said "I'm not putting you forward for a c section and you're not being induced at 37 weeks. I'll book you in for an induction at 40 weeks" she was so blunt and matter-of-fact, I burst into tears. She said to my husband in front of me "I can't talk to her when she's in this state"!! And then said "you're lucky I'm putting you down for a 40 week induction and not leaving you to go to 42 weeks"
I got up and walked out. I was absolutely distraught from the way she spoke to me and the thought of going through any problems like before.

Got to 2 days before my due date and my waters went. Got to hospital, and labouur was slow but really painful. Then in walks 'the' consultant! I actually said "you're having a fucking laugh" when she walked in 🙈 she proceeded to tell me "you're only 5cm. You're not dealing with the pain very well are you?"
She then said she wanted to examine me. She was so rough and caused me so much pain that I was crying and saying 'stop stop' and she wouldn't. In the end my mum shouted at her to stop. She then practically forced me to have an epidural, which I said from the beginning that I didn't want. (I'm not joking or exaggerating here) she actually got me to sign the paperwork mid contraction.
Had the epidural, and it failed.
Happy ending, I now have a beautiful 8 year old daughter but have been suffering horrendous migraines ever since which I swear is a result of the failed epidural I was forced to have.

My midwives after begged me to put in a complaint but I just wanted to forget about the whole experience. I wish I had as she should not have been allowed to treat anyone like that.

Well as someone expecting their first I’m now absolutely terrified

The "point" if this thread, as well as supporting the OP is that many women find it cathartic to share traumatic experiences. Too many women don't have the opportunity to debrief after a difficult labour, particularly one where everyone ends up healthy because one is just meant to be grateful. I had some shocking care, and complained to the trust. I also insisted on an elective Cs the next time because I refused to put my trust in midwives again.

I can't watch shows like OBEM because I'm so effing jealous of the good care and compassion and pain relief they receive.

OP. A complaint letter and a meeting where you debrief can help you move forward. Good luck x

Yes, 15 years ago with first child. I don't want to go into it too much because it is distressing to me, but she withheld medication (gave me paracetamol instead of the prescribed medication), put my baby on the other side of the (single) room repeatedly - as she was aware I was in pain and struggled to walk due to deep tearing and being without my meds, blamed my struggles with breastfeeding (that she refused to provide me help with) for baby being jaundiced - I was later told by paediatrician that it was due to difficult birth and bruising.

The biggest thing was making me hobble to the other end of the ward to queue to collect my lunch (I spent 4 days on ward after birth due to my tearing), so that she could have a nurse bottle feed my baby in my absence. I had made it absolutely clear that I wanted to breastfeed but struggled and was given zero help with it. The baby had latched on and was feeding intermittently, but not enough so she sent me away to do that behind my back.

I did nothing to warrant her treatment of me, but looking back realise my abusive partner (now ex) probably did or said something that she didn't like and she took it out on me - an already vulnerable patient.

I would recommend trying PALS, so that you can get closure.

minesagin37 the point of this thread was to look for advice and to find out if anyone had had any kind of similar experiences with the care they received during or after pregnancy. I know that there are many lovely midwives, no one is saying that there isn't but it's hardly my fault that so many people have had bad experiences...

Yes. With my first pregnancy one midwife was vile. She didn't listen to me and I became really ill as a result...she listened then.
Luckily she was a minority of one among a large crowd of wonderful midwives I have dealt with.
It took me a long long time to get over my traumatic first birth, but I can't blame her as she was only a small part of it.
Luckily second time around was a piece of cake.

This thread breaks my heart. for all of you.

I had a rude and dismissive midwife during my first birth, she couldn't get me out of the delivery room quick enough after Dd was born, and another one up on postnatal after when I asked for help with breastfeeding, midwife just shoved my DD's head into my boob and walked off.

My second birth was so different, the staff were lovely.

Yep, the midwife on the night shift when I'd had my dd, 14 years ago. I had no idea how the whole pressing the buzzer system worked, was all so alien to me and not explained, She was there and I pressed the buzzer, she spoke to me like utter crap for pressing it and not just shouting her. She also said, very loudly so that most new mums on the ward heard, "I don't know what on earth these mums will do when they get in to the real world" we were all new mums, on our first few nights of having a new born, without a bloody clue what to do, she brought be to tears with her impatience and intolerance (obviously lots of hormones flying around too!) total bitch who gave midwives a bad name!