To ask DP to forgive me for DS's birth?

[CulturalBear]

Have posted a few times about moderately crap DS birth.

Nutshell - waters broke, on drip 40 hours later, needed forceps/episiotomy, later abandoned on recovery ward (with naked baby) by hospital staff and DP for 4-5hours. DS largely fine, I was largely fine.

A year and a bit on, and it still bothers me.

Someone IRL recently told me the usual 'all that matters' is that DS is fine and I need to let it go - and asked what I needed to do that.

It occurred to me around DS's first birthday that I need DP to forgive me. He has never given me any praise or credit around the birth or year since - never said well done or that he's proud of me, or that I'm a good mum or even thank you for the things I do - all normal things a dad might say to his partner.

He is basically Spock when it comes to feelings - he logics the shit out of them so they don't trouble him.

But I believe that him not saying these things implies he feels ashamed of me. I think that if I could get him to express forgiveness for screwing up or letting him/DS down, then I might be able to let go this over-riding sense of failure I've had since.

For the record, I 100% do not judge the way that anyone else gives birth - it's bloody hard work and requires a huge amount of effort however it happens - I just wish I, personally, had done better. I have never been given a reason for needing the interventions other than 'he was a bit stuck'.

Ideally DS would tell me he forgives me - but I'm not sure I could wait 18+ years!

Would I be unreasonable to ask DP to forgive me? If not, how do I go about it?

Also, hugs.

Hello,
I can understand how you feel about the forgiveness part. I had a traumatic delivery that resulted in PTSD and PND. I felt I was to blame for how the delivery went as I had an epidural. My thinking was completely irrational but I couldn't process the memories and felt like a failure.
I had medication, EMDR therapy, counselling and finally a debrief in November (4 years after the birth!). It took a while but now fine and 7 months pregnant.
I don't think having your DH forgive you will resolve the way that you feel as you need to forgive yourself and realise you did great and you are not to blame for how your baby was delivered. I would really recommend a debrief with a supervisor of midwives as you will then know why everything happened and that nothing was your fault.

Is it possible you are actually very angry about your DP and hospital staff treating you this way, and have taken it on yourself so to speak?

Is it possible you are actually very angry about your DP and hospital staff treating you this way, and have taken it on yourself so to speak?

Is it possible you are actually very angry about your DP and hospital staff treating you this way, and have taken it on yourself so to speak?

OP, there is also an excellent Facebook group called Birth Trauma Association.

Gosh OP. I could have written lots of your post.

DP was exactly the same, he was actually a reasonable dad but a terrible partner for a long time after the birth. After about 9 months I told him exactly how he was making me feel. Turns out he hadn't apologised because he knew he was failing me, was hating being a dad and regretting it, and was so consumed by bitterness and tiredness. He was doing that thing of feeling ashamed and taking it out on the person he knew he was treating badly. He actually couldn't address his behaviour, he didn't have the emotional resources. By behaviour I don't mean abuse or anything, he did loads around the home etc, he was just permanently grumpy.

He tells me he loves me every day, but has never been a waxing lyric type DP. I realised that, following the trauma of the birth, I really needed him to have a temporary personality transplant, I needed posts on FB about my achievement, I needed to know he thought I'd done brilliantly.

We've ironed it all out now. I did have PND and PTSD. DP had behaved like a self absorbed teenager. I don't have qualms about ADs so took them and it really helped.

I think you need to take him to task and tell him exactly how you feel. Be clear. Demand an apology. Only then can you set it behind you and move on.

Why do you need forgiveness. Are you safe?

I am safe. I just want to be freed from the guilt and the blame.

DP is my only real-life connection to what happened - he's the only other person who can accurately judge what happened.

I can only assume he is embarrassed or ashamed of me or blames me until he tells me otherwise.

I know he spectacularly under performed on the day - I do feel let down by his me-first attitude. But I can't call him on that when I let him down, too!

I don't think you are being rational at all (not an unreasonable response). What do you think you could have done differently? Would you judge a friend or anyone else on this thread who has had a similar birth for letting their DH down?

Why do you think your DH is embarrassed or ashamed of you or blames you? Do you think that makes any sense.

It is ok to think irrationally, but if you can't challenge those thoughts yourself then you need help to do so.

I'm confused, why would you need forgiveness? Surely the hospital was at fault for leaving you in corridor for example, it wasn't your fault about that?

I feel there is a maelstrom of emotions that have been bottled up for a while as a result of your DH being emotionally unavailable, and this need to be forgiven is an irrational manifestation of this emotional turmoil. You both need outside professional help to come to terms with a trauma that cannot be spoken of within your couple. As many said, you are victim of circumstances beyond your control and you coped the very best anyone could have done. Be kind to yourself. Your baby needs his mother in good mental and physical shape. Get the help you deserve.

OP, what you are saying is indeed irrational and you've made a rather large conclusion with very little evidence of it.

You really do need to talk this through.

By the way, your husband not praising you says everything about him: huge shortcomings in basic emotional intelligence. I do not know of any man who wouldn't praise his wife for the wonderful feat of giving birth!

Also it may well be that he doesn't want to talk about the day as he himself is embarrassed about what happened with him.

But you didn't let him down! In what way did you let him down?

You really do need to talk to someone OP. The only person you need to forgive here is yourself.

I am sorry if this has been said already, I haven't read the whole thread but you do not need your husband's forgiveness you need answers.

I had an emcs with my dd. I was told failure to progress was the reason. The midwife actually told me during labor I was doing a terrible job and I should relax. I felt terribly guilty for depriving my dp of the whole birth experience and cutting the cord, took all the too posh topbush comments on the chin but underneath I was devastated.

2 years ago we moved overseas so I had to apply for all our medical records. My dd was born with cord around her neck and agpar score of 4. If I had known the truth it would have saved me a lot of stress during my second pregnancy.

You are entitled to see your medical records ( not the notes they send home) and I believe most maternity departments offer a service where a midwife will take you through what happened. Insist on seeing your baby's records too as it is only from my dd records that I found the truth.

If you have a supportive hv I would start by asking if they know of a post birth service similar at your hospital.

Once you have answers you can hopefully start to move on. Don't let it hang over you onto future pregnancies none of it is your fault.

Part of the reason I feel like I let them down is because DP's last experience of delivery was very bad.

I didn't want him to have to face the memories of that time with his ex. I wanted this to be a happy memory to start our life as a family.

I wonder about all the decisions I made along the way. Should I have refused induction? Should I have insisted I went in earlier? Should I have made more of an effort to stay mobile in labour? Should I have asked for a different form of induction?

What if I actually wasn't pushing well (as I was told)? What if I was doing it wrong?

The debrief didn't actually answer any of those questions, although there was a suggestion I might have been better off if I hadn't been stuck on the bed - I wasn't even allowed to go to the loo!

I would never judge anyone else. But I feel it's important to accept responsibility for things. Bottom line me, or my body failed.

Part of the reason I feel like I let them down is because DP's last experience of delivery was very bad.

I didn't want him to have to face the memories of that time with his ex. I wanted this to be a happy memory to start our life as a family.

I wonder about all the decisions I made along the way. Should I have refused induction? Should I have insisted I went in earlier? Should I have made more of an effort to stay mobile in labour? Should I have asked for a different form of induction?

What if I actually wasn't pushing well (as I was told)? What if I was doing it wrong?

The debrief didn't actually answer any of those questions, although there was a suggestion I might have been better off if I hadn't been stuck on the bed - I wasn't even allowed to go to the loo!

I would never judge anyone else. But I feel it's important to accept responsibility for things. Bottom line me, or my body failed.

This is painful to read. On the one hand, I understand the feeling of failure, or trauma, of grief even for the birth you hoped for? On the other, others have said it better. You did well. You brought a child into this world, enduring pain and fear.

This was a First Birth. You are assuming perfect knowledge to make perfect decisions. You are a a degree of control over your body and your circumstances, including other people, to make decisions. I wish I could call you forward a few years to a point where the feeling if failure is gone and you look at your strapping child and feel bloody proud of your parenting and your relationship with them, despite the shaky beginnings.

I agree with what Oxford and charitygirl say about your husband.

And to be clearer, Id agree with charitygirl that a significant amount of your disappontment and inward turned anger is actually about your DH.

I do see that a lot of this could be displaced anger - but there is nothing I can do about that. The hospital offered an oops we forgot about you, sorry bout that. DP will never ever apologise for any real or imagined harm.

I keep thinking about writing a book for new dads on how to best support their partners but I can't - I realised it would just be a long list of 'don't do '

It also occurred to me that as most men are very different to mine, it would be literally unbelievable.

Least if I made it work, I could get some tangible positives out of this BS. Lol :)

Honestly you were a first time mum, you didn't fail your dh, the hospital failed you both.

They can't say you weren't pushing correctly, how the hell do they know. There are lots of reasons it may havebeven difficult, position of baby, position of cord, you were induced so baby possibly not ready to birth. I am sure there could be other factors too all nothing to do with your capability.

My second baby was cs too. Completely different experience though. Midwife was lovely kept telling me how amazing I was, totally fought my corner on some specific requests and afterwards the surgeon came to see me to tell me baby wrapped in cord again. No amount of walking, squatting or pushing would have got him out the normal way. Apparently my babies like to bungee jump.

If you look at my notes ( without the children's) they both say failure to progress. Ie my fault my bodys fault. I think a debrief probably wouldn't have offered me any more information.

I think you need some support .tk get through this. Speak to your hv or maybe to an independent midwife to get an independent perspective but please do not apologise for or accept responsibility for giving birth in a way you didn't plan.

Cultural - your DP sounds very intractable, is this part of the problem for you in this scenario?
Please though, refrain from apologising to him because he will either look at you blankly or throw it back in your face, but either way it will change nothing and then you will have taken all that guilt onto yourself and achieved absolutely zilch. :(

I like your idea about writing the book - but I do think you need to also go through the complaints procedure, and through some counselling (PTSD counselling is really what you need) to help resolve your feelings. I honestly don't think it's something you can do by yourself at the moment, especially as your thought processes seem to be misfiring somewhat.

It's OK to blame your DP for being an arse, btw. Even if he never accepts it, it's still absolutely ok for you to lay the blame at his door. Far better than you internalising it! As someone said upthread - you need to be honest about this situation.

And you know, your body did the best it could under the circumstances - yes they might not have been perfect but you and your body did the best you could at the time. As the saying goes, that's really all you can ask of yourself or anyone! Your DP, otoh, really did not do the best he could. He did the bare minimum. As for trying to make up for his previous birth experience, well I'm sorry, there comes a point where he has to realise that it's not all about HIM.

He does sound like a complete cock from just what you've said on this thread - is he, or does he have redeeming features?

and for you and do please try and get some counselling. You need it.