PTSD post birth

[Goingfishing]

what has Everyone done to help get over traumatic birth and post birth experience. I want to avoid antidepressants.

When you were diagnosed with PTSD what was the recommendation?

I find therapy helpful for complex PTSD, o was recommended anti depressants but chose not to take them, just have the therapy.

You can have a birth debrief at the hospital.

My birth was 16 weeks ago, I talk to my partner about it a lot, I like talking about it as there's a lot I can't remember and it helps me to understand it more. I don't have PTSD though, I just had a traumatic birth.

I hope you're okay.

I haven’t officially been diagnosed but my partner has said I have it and a friend who is a doctor has suggested I have it and to speak to my gp but I don’t want to as I don’t want antidepressants. I have read my hospital notes of my birth and understand why everything happened

You need to speak to a professional

I have read my hospital notes of my birth and understand why everything happened

That's good news. PTSD often happens when you don't know what went on and your mind is working overtime to try and figure out how to stop it happening again. Maybe see if you can talk to the staff on duty at the time?

Thank you I actually don’t want to go back to the hospital ward as it’s full of so many bad memories but maybe going will help

Three step rewind.

I thought it sounded like nonsense but i was utterly desperate.
It was transformative

Going back to the hospital i found horrendous. Therapy did very little, ditto medication

three step rewind allowed me to move forward in a way i didnt think possible.

Thank you I will take a look I hold a lot of resentment for my family or friends who didn’t help me after. I could barely walk or move baby came early self employed partner hadn’t planned on being off work until later on so he was out every day after my birth he regrets this and feels awful about it but we really had no choice at the time. My mum said it was good for me to be thrown in at the deep end and it would do me good to learn to cope on my own. I feel angry towards my partner and family I can’t get over it I was so unwell I should have been in bed resting but I wasn’t. I also knew my parter had to pop out in the middle of the day for work as we needed this money. I kept telling him I was ok as he wasn’t wanting to leave me home alone but I didn’t want his company to fail. No one was there for me post birth and no one failed to realise how bad it was for me as I kept trying to keep up appearances

meds, counselling and having a copy of my notes to read and keep really helped me.

Thank you I’m also just really bitter about all the woman who had good births and are able to pump and breastfeed. We have decided for now that we will only have 1 child but because of how I feel I want another so I can breastfeed and have the birth I wanted which is crazy.

Sounds like you're (quite rightly) more angry and upset and the lack of care you got from your partner, family and friends after the birth as you were about the care you received at the hospital, but it's easier to rant about strangers than those around you. Would that be the case?

No my birth definitely gives me nightmares

Then you do need to get some help to process that, either from the hospital or another source you feel more comfortable with. I did a quick Google - attached the first few hits (obvs you need to do a tad more research!).

I had horrendous dreams mostly about my children being taken / kidnaped while i was doing inappropriate/shameful things that indicated i was a terrible mother and human.

Eg i was in charge of the children and then got blind drunk / took drugs /had sex with a stranger and the children were taken from me.

I would wake feeling all the emotions and like a wretched undeserving POS who was responsible for my babies stay in nicu when
really i was utterly failed by medical professionals