Birth story on Yahoo - some negative comments

[seoladair]

A mum has written about her experience of a traumatic birth. I'm shocked by the number of posters telling her not to make such a fuss. No-one should belittle another person's trauma.

See here:
uk.lifestyle.yahoo.com/baby-didnt-read-birthplan-133800782.html

Oh that's a tough one. Does it really qualify as trauma when it is a straightforward (somewhat quick) birth with both parent and child healthy?

Isn't that a textbook birth?

My sense from reading it is that the mum didn't like not being in control?

trauma is trauma..

birth can be a very shocking experience regardless of the physical goings-on.

really it's a matter of how you feel about it.

But we can't quantify trauma. Some people are stronger than others, mentally, physically or both. By telling her in effect to "man up", people are just not taking on board the fact that she feels traumatised.

She uses the word trauma, and says that her heart races 10 months on at the thought of the birth, and that it has made her question whether she wants more children. She says she has written the article to encourage other mums to trust their instincts. Perhaps it's also therapy for her; if so, I do hope she doesn't read the nasty comments. Someone has referred to her as a "stupid cow" ; so unnecessary. I just wish people could be more compassionate...

sorry Edless, x-post!

I am not sure I agree.

If it were anything else, falling over, breaking a bone, pulling a muscle etc and it was called trauma, don't you think people would call it over-reaction?

giving birth is never going to be anything like falling over. unless you fall over a newborn baby.....

And does that mean that trauma incorporating medical complications, life or death situations is the same?

The problem I think is the mixture of psychological trauma (which the mum clearly suffered) and medical trauma (which the mum clearly didn't suffer).

But that suggests that it's fine to belittle psychological trauma, but not medical trauma. (Oneliein I'm not suggesting you're belittling her; I'm referring to the Yahoo poster who called her a stupid cow, and others).

Here's another charming comment....
"Sounds like a totally neurotic self centred mother! The only point of childbirth is to deliver a healthy baby! The rest is hysterical indulgence".

The woman was scared witless by the unpredictablity of her birth.
It must have been terrifying for her being in the second stage of labour and the midwives not allowing her into the unit.

I think often when people react to something that doesn't appear outwardly traumatic to others as though it were a major trauma it is because it somehow triggers old or even half-forgotten traumas. Until I gave birth I had really repressed a lot of incidents from my past that underlie my obsessive need for control and have led to a recent diagnosis of OCD. After the birth which was not entirely straightforward (baby got stuck, EMCS, but all fairly routine in so far as the hospital were concerned and no rescusc or PPH, good wound healing etc) I went into an anxiety state and can't remember the first 72 hours. At all. I don't even think it has necessarily much to do with strength. I have a long-standing history of abuse that I just never let myself think about at all and the loss of control in labour brought back some very, very unpleasant and out of control feelings indeed. Yet I couldn't have told you this until this year, nearly five years after my first birth.. but the first year I have had counselling. I was so repressed and in denial that I never made the connection, my mind just went somewhere else and I became obsessive-compulsive instead.

Don't know if it's like that for this woman of course but God, aren't some people just SO venomous to strangers with no real reason? What is THAT about?

to highlight how daft this it:

the lady down the road had a textbook VB in 2 hours. It was traumatic - here's how it went

1. the student MW couldn't find FHB
2. the senior MW told her to get on her back so she could find FHB (putting her in agony) when she said she thought she was about to give birth she was told 'don't be so stupid'
3. she was then left unattended without FHB being found
4. she gave birth unattended
5. she realised baby was not breathing and pulled the emergency pull cord.
6. baby was resus by MW on return and spent 12 weeks in SCBU at a different hospital - mother had to go in separate ambulance.

it is very plain that this birth becomes traumatic well before 5) as she was being treated like crap whilst in pain, and being terrified by the (justified) fear her child was not alright.

Surely if you decide to post such a personal story on the internet, open to all, open to comments, you would expect at least a few negative responses?

But if she were to post her story online, the macho mum brigade would rock up and tell her how pathetic she was being. Awful.

ItsAllgoing - yes, that's true. I just wonder whether internet nastiness reflects how people really think, or whether the experience of sitting at a computer makes people lose their compassion filters.

Oh, goodness, Edless, that sounds awful for that poor woman. How is the baby now?

ItsAllGoing - you are so right

I hate to say it, because I am sure I will get shot down, but I do think "Oh FFS, get on with your life"

baby is 7 years old and doing ok at school :) no lasting effect though her mum just spent ages waiting for her to walk talk etc (without that confidence it would be alright)

Oh, good, I do like a happy ending!

I'd say screaming in agony and being ignored and dismissed by medical staff would be traumatising. But birth is an area where so
much vile judgement and misogyny is exercised. And so much of it from women. I always wonder why the commenters telling women like this to get over it, get on with it, get a life etc etc have so much time and motivation to stop and pass comment in that way.

Traumatic birth? I wouldn't exactly say having contractions for 36 hrs prior to going to the hospital was a quick birth.
If she thought that was a traumatic birth, I wonder what she would of made of my 2nd with ds, passed out 4 times during labour, was constantly vomiting, ds2's heart kept slowing down then stopping, got to 9cm agony, back to back, then ended up with a emcs and my baby in scbu, all ok now, but was awful.

It's not a competition... .

I read the story but not the comments (don't really want to see nastiness right now). The thing I can say is that not being believed and being told things aren't happening when they are can be quite traumatic. I'm only finding out now, but apparently that happened with my Mum: she laboured for only 2 hrs and when she felt the urge to push they didn't believe her. A few more things going on (accidentally got an extra augmentation shot - apparently one was standard practice back then, not enough time for any pain relief, etc), but few I think anyone would go "oh, no, that's truly horrible" about. But my Mum is clearly still still disturbed by these events nearly 39 years later. She gets really agitated and upset when she talks about it and I think it's one of the things driving her obsessively bugging me (and upsetting me) as the birth draws imminent.

Also, I'm one who believes pain/trauma is not something that can be compared across people, and sometimes even across events for the same person. If something worse could have happened or has happened to others, that does not in any way mean the feelings of the person at hand are "not real" or "not worthy" in any way.

Fruitybread - "But birth is an area where so
much vile judgement and misogyny is exercised. And so much of it from women."
Well said.

That story could well have been mine, except I did end up having an unplanned homebirth, without any pain relief, baby delivered by my husband whilst the paramedics were stuck in traffic! And apart from the shock, I was in no way traumatised. This was just over two weeks ago.

But, everybody is different and everyone has different limitations, levels of resilience and have different ways of coping with stress, and people need to understand that before belittling someone else's experiences!

I was also not believed when I rang the hospital in labour and was told not to come in as I'd 'probably' be sent home, and that 'if my contractions only started an hour ago, I doubt they are now 90 seconds apart'!!! I'm going to make a formal complaint; I consider myself as extremely fortunate that the birth went smoothly and the baby is perfectly fine, but could easily have not have been.