Emergency CSection - how do you cope physically & mentally?

[ViVee]

Hi,

I was a few days overdue last week & made an appointment to discuss my options. I'm 40 yrs old & didn't want to go too far past term, but I also had my heart set on a home birth.

We decided I would be induced at term+8 & to put my mind at rest, they monitored the baby's heart beat.

It averaged 180-190 & the consultant decided that the baby had to come out asap, I would be having a csection within the next 15 minutes.
I had gone to my appointment still thinking a homebirth was a possibility, 2 hours later my beautiful, healthy baby son was born.

I was quite ill afterwards, so was unable to be with him that night. We are both ok & home now. The shock has just hit me & I'm finding it really difficult. When will I feel more like me? The midwives said it takes a while, but realistically, how long is that?

I would really appreciate any advice, but probably wont be able to read until tomorrow.

Poor you. It is a shock and not a great experience.

The only advice I can give you is that if issues remain a few months later then to seek some support to talk it through. It took me far longer because I didn't and nearly resulted in the breakdown of my marriage.

That said, I have friends who got over it relatively quickly.

Physically I was over it within about 4-6 weeks.

Hi
I had an emergency section after planning a home birth. I found I felt fine after because I was just glad we were safe but then after a while I started to feel a 'failure'. I think I came very close to pnd. If I am completely honest it took me a long time to get to the stage of accepting it and being grateful that the help I needed to safely deliver my ds was available to me.

Be kind to yourself and congratulations on your lovely baby

Forgot to say I had the best hv ever and I wish I had listened to her! She said it was important to understand how you give birth is only one small part of being a mum and looking back I know she was right. She also said it takes at least six weeks to mentally adjust to being a family.

First of all, congratulations on the birth of your son and glad that you are both safe and well and back home :)

Physically - rest as much as possible, get your other half to do everything round the house and just concentrate on recovering and feeding your baby, everything else can wait. This goes for visitors sometimes too - if you're not up to it, send them away or keep their time brief! Staying in jammies will help with that :) Everyone's different but you may be feeling mostly back to normal in a few weeks, however, still take it easy and don't do stuff like hoovering and anything else involving stretching.

Mentally - that can be the hard part, and again everyone's different. Some people accept it and move on ok quickly, some don't. Personally, I had an EMCS last summer and for a few weeks I was dispappointed that I had it, was shocked that I had felt so helpless and incapacitated etc, and coupled with a few other issues I developed pnd, which I'm only now getting counselling for. You said that you are finding it really difficult and don't feel like yourself. My advice is to speak to someone (other than just the MW) if you can about all this and don't let it fester. Perhaps you could even look into the birth trauma organisation? (try google) - I've seen other people on MN find them helpful. But don't bottle it up.

Hi ViVee, your thread title caught my eye as it brought back my own memories. I 'laboured' for 15 hours with DS but the time between the decision to perform a EMCS and his arrival was just over 6 minutes.

I was 'low' for a few weeks, largely (I think) because I had totally different expectations- I didn't even have a stitch with DD. Your body is visibly changed, and you are recovering from a major operation at a time when your hormones are all over the place.

I eventually spoke to a few friends who helped me put it in perspective- we were both ok which was the important thing.

Previous posters have given good advice. Go easy on yourself and congratulations

sounds like my first labour/section
Took a few weeks to settle down. Be gentle with yourself. Not only do you have a wonderful/demanding baby to deal with you also have to recover from a major operation.
Those hormones are a nuisance whether you labour naturally or have a section.
Take all offers of help

I was 32 weeks with twins, had a scan and discovered that one twin had died, so had to have an EMCS the next morning.

In my case, obviousiy the trauma of the EMCS wasn't the biggest factor. DTD2 was quite prem and in NICU, obviously I had the post mortmem, other medical exams, funeral arrangements etc. to make. On top of this, we were homeless at the time, as we have moved but totally renovating, so had to hire a holiday cottage, then stay with friends, then move into a virtually uninhabitable house.

It took only about a week to feel physically a lot better.

The emotional side of things didn't hit me until the house was a bit sorted and DD started to sleep a little. I found I had time to stop and think, and cry.
I wouldn't advocate keeping yourself too busy to think about things, but making sure you don't have too long to wallow is a good thing, IMO. Take your time, and try, if you can, to look at the positives of your situation. Hold your baby and think of how much of a miracle that EMCS really was, as it prevented anything awful happening.

HTH, sorry if it makes things worse. :)

I understand completely how you must feel and being separated from the baby the first night wouldn't have helped matters.

I was one of those naive women who wrote a birth plan asking for no pain relief and expecting everything to go well but in reality both of my labours were horrendous each resulting in EMCS and it has taken me a long time to recover mentally each time from the trauma. The second time I had to have a general so didn't even get to meet the baby until some time afterwards and I still struggle with that 4 years later.

However what has got me through was accepting that EMCS was absolutely necessary to deliver my babies safely into the world. A safe delivery and healthy baby is really all that matters.

Focus on your wonderful new baby and enjoy every moment as those early weeks pass so quickly but don't forget to look after yourself too. Accept all offers of help and forget about the housework, easier said than done I know but visitors really won't mind making themselves a cup of tea and perhaps pushing a hoover around!

Good luck and congratulations!!

like emlu, i too was one of those naive women who thought that birth was actually about choices, and that I could just simply choose not to have any interventions etc. DS1 was a largish baby (4kg), we were 15 days overdue and I laboured for 37 hours before EMCS. Eventually caved in at 33 hrs begging for epidural, and was absolutely gutted that I could not cut the mustard, let my husband and baby down etc etc. DS1 whisked off to special care for a few days (nothing serious, just swallowed some meconium)...anyhow, still to this day I can not talk about that birth without feeling like a failure. DS2 was ELCS as I could not face going through all that again....so, focus on your baby, its awesome you have a healthy one, and remember some things just happen. its not your fault and in reality no one will ever know what did or didnt happen. enjoy the DC whilst it is small - those special times when your baby is super tiny go in a flash

Hi, not ignoring, but having a very low day,I will read through later. thank you for replying.

Hi ViVee

Your post took my right back.....I went in to be induced and after 15 minutes on the monitor (which showed a high heart rate) they prepped me for a c section and DC was born 40 minutes later.

I was stunned and in shock for quite some time - I really couldn't grasp what had happened and the only thing anyone said to me was 'the main thing is that you've got a healthy baby'. Of course that was the most important thing but I felt like there was nowhere to go with my feelings of confusion, failure and disappointment. Whilst these feelings might not be very rationale they are very strong, especially at a time when you're all over the place hormonally etc.

Overtime I've got some perspective - like other posters have said the birth is a tiny part of being a mum and you should be proud of your c-section and delivering a baby safely in to the world.

But go easy on yourself until you can accept your feelings - it's early days and as you can see from expereiences on here you are definitely not alone. Take care.

I have nothing but admiration for you - I have a planned CS in a couple of weeks and am in enough of a state about not having the natural birth I wanted and the prospect of surgery, but having everything happen so quickly must have been a horrible shock, never mind being unwell and separated from your baby for the first night. I really feel for you. I can completely understand why you feel like you do, it must have been horribly traumatic and is naturally going to take time to come to terms with. If you have a partner or close family around you, make sure that they know how you're feeling and get all the support and help you can.

vivee, as the posters are saying- be kind to yourself, you've been through alot, and it's still really early days. i'm 3 and a bit weeks on from my emergency section, and the change over the last week or so has been enormous. physically i'm feeling good, but that first ten days or so was just evil, and for me everything just felt so distorted whilst i was in so much pain, and in shock from what had happened. i'm 39, and was 13 days over with my first pregnancy, when i went into labour. i'd managed to miss the fact my waters had broken. monitoring showed our daughter's heart rate was dropping significantly and not recovering, so it was an emergency section for us. i had refused an earlier induction there was no suggestion at that point that there was a problem) and i felt enormously guilty that i may have put her life at risk through my actions. for me, i've found it absolutely necessary to talk about it - to anyone who will listen. anyway, just over three weeks on and i feel so much more myself - battle scared and wiser - about how little control we have over some things - but functioning again (albeit at a pretty low level), when just 2 weeks ago i couldn't imagine feeling 'normal' ever again. i feel like tempering everything with 'i don't want to tempt fate' - because i've suffered from depression in the past, and horrible antenatal depression for the first 5 months of the pregnancy, but despite everyone watching and waiting for it to return, all i'm feeling is knackered and very very much in love with our DD. Teary from time to time, but not the bleakness that comes with depression. So, all this blathering is simply to say, there's obviously no single route through any of this, but hang on in there, because the start is AWFUL. it WILL get better, sooner than you imagine.

Hi,

Your posts have really helped me start to put things into perspective. I'm on my own at the moment & it helps to read about other peoples experiences.

I realise how lucky I am that baby is safe & healthy, but I can't stop thinking about how close we came to, well, you know.

I was pretty wiped out by my EMCS . I had had an overnight labour in the run up to the cs (which was performed at 10am in the morning). The op was fine but recovery was hard-going.

TBH I did too much after the op, I had visitors, made cups of tea and generally tried to put a brave face on it when what I should have done was stayed in my pj's, ordered take-aways and stuck a 'no visitors' sign on my front door. I was feeling pretty fragile for a month at least, much better by 3 months though.

Don't forget you have had a major operation, with no warning, if someone had had their appendix out suddenly you would expect them to feel pretty battered - with a cs they also give you a baby to take home while you recover!

Please make sure you rest and have loads of help over the next few weeks. Learning how to look after a baby is tricky enough without having to recover from an op at the same time.

Emotionally I was fine with the cs, DS was ok and I was ok (once recovered) but I did go to a birth reflections session to go through my notes just to clarify how it all unfolded.

It's not a race to recover and get out and about with your baby (who, lets face it will probably sleep through any outings anyway). Hibernate and rest for now. ((hugs))