Obstetric violence - legs forced open against my will

[NibliaBiblia]

When I was in labour with my daughter, the midwives spent twenty minutes trying to force my legs open to get me flat on my back with my legs up. There was no emergency. It was so they could get a better CTG reading. I physically resisted for as long as I could and verbally told them to stop. They didn't stop until I gave up. After that they did other things without my consent, but I did not they to stop them again.
I complained to the hospital and they have done nothing. I complained to the police and they told me there must have been an emergency. I've complained to the NMC and the CQC. I hope they will do something but it's a long process so I won't know for a long time.
The police used to say that domestic violence was a private matter. They used to say that if you got in the car/went into the apartment/were drinking then you must have agreed to it. I think this is exactly the same type of justification, applied to equally criminal behaviour.
I don't think my experience is abnormal. I think this is fairly routine. They thought that when I gave up that meant I consented.

I am so sorry this happened to you. The NHS is a complete shit show.

The police response “there must have been an emergency” is not, by itself, an adequate answer to an allegation that you repeatedly refused consent and was physically restrained.

You should ask the police to give you their response in writing. Then make a formal complaint.

No one forces medical professionals to do that job, they are compensated for their time and work with money. It's a choice to work at a hospital.

Unwell people literally have no choice whatsoever, they ethier get medical care, suffer, or die.

Do you realise that if a medical professional messes up they can physically and or mentally destroy a person for the rest of their life?

Have you read the Ockenden report cover to cover? I have. The 'care' offered by some midwives is appalling. It's not as simple as they're just trying to keep your baby alive.

What did you do as a midwife when you witnessed these assaults?

And it is blind faith that have enabled so many appalling scandals to happen.

This was within about ten minutes of me being fully dilated until about ten minutes before the vertex was visible (from my notes). Baby was born about fifteen minutes after that.
All within the last hour before birth.

Because the CTG was necessary to inform them if it was an emergency or not. That’s literally the purpose of monitoring. Your baby could’ve been in distress for 20 minutes and they’d have been none the wiser because they were too busy trying to cajole you into making a sensible decision. Can you really not appreciate why this was a time-critical call for them?
You say they didn’t call a consultant or anaesthetist- call them and say what? ‘Pop down to delivery suite and just hang about while NibliaBiblia decides she’s ready for her baby to be monitored’?

Not necessarily. It very much depends on the position of the baby. Besides, by OP's account they wanted her to lie down so they could get a proper heart rate reading for her baby. It's not clear they wanted her lying on her back for the whole labour.

Tears heal better than episiotomies actually.

The state of this thread, particularly @1986Massive on a feminist board - justifying assault, accusing a woman of lying and being mental ill, belittling her. Absolute shame on you.

What a white knight.

Bet he agrees you should get compo too.

Some tears heal better than episiotomies. An episiotomy is better than a 3rd degree tear involving the rectum, for example.

Note how the OP isn't giving any more details about the birth.

I strongly suspect this is because the events happened as she was giving biurth, i.e. as the baby was coming out. She was in pain and probably panicking, and the midwives were being stern with her and forceful to stop the baby dying.

The OP is trying to suggest she was lying there calmly and then the midwives came in and evily forced her legs apart and assualted her for no reason. That does not sound plausible or likely at all to me. I suspect this all happened around the time of baby;s birth and OP panicked (no judgement there, I did too it's agony!) and events happened quickly. And now OP is struggling with the trauma of birth and wanting to blame someone, so is trying to make it sound like a meaningless assault, that for some reason her husband watched for 20 minutes without saying anything, and that she didn't just get up and walk away from or ring the police then and there. She didn't, and her husband didn't do anythign I imagine because she was giving birth, and that's why the midwives were trying to open her legs and listen to baby!

I was physically resisting that while time. It took me a long time to gather myself enough to tell them to stop, so I only managed to actually say it once. I thought about the best words to use for a few contractions. I said "stop pulling at my legs". I know they heard me because they briefly paused, then they went straight back to it. I gave up pretty soon after that. I just couldn't keep resisting.

I'm trying to understand why they were forcing your legs open to do a CTG as that isn't standard and I can understand why you found it so distressing.

Do you or your husband have an idea what the midwives were trying to achieve by putting your legs in that position?

So that's probably why they were trying to open your legs then?

What do you think, now you are clear minded, would have happened if you hadn't opened your legs?

Because she was fully dilated and giving birth!?

Ive no idea if this is wrong or just midwives worrying that they need to get an important test done.
From the tales a friend who works in obstetrics tells me it appears that its a branch of medicine in which some women appear to think they know better than people who have trained for many years to look after them and keep their babies safe.
Not sure we would tell our heart,bowel. or any other branch of medicine how to administer a scan.

I agree with you. Women are now so hung up on bodily autonomy they truly believe that their decision is the one to be followed, even in an emergency. Coupled with the maternity scandals that have come to light lately, where women's feelings of something going wrong were ignored, this is a recipe for disaster. The midwives are damned if they do intervene and damned if they don't. They are short staffed (thank all the governments who have starved maternity services of funds) and the woman in the next room may be having an emergency but they can't get to her because the woman they are trying to help won't allow a routine monitoring so they can be sure she is okay before they leave.

I think it really depends, and you probably had to be there to really form an opinion. Obviously that makes it impossible for us to know whether OPs perspective on the situation is fair and accurate, but it's certainly plausible. There are horrible instances of medical professionals abusing their power to bully patients, just because they can. Its often only when someone happens to get it caught on film (or has similarly compelling evidence) that those patients get truly believed. There are probably many more instances of vulnerable patients interpreting normal events in a negative light and feeling wronged, but you can't just assume the latter is what happened here.

@NibliaBiblia it sounds really upsetting but is also such a grey area. I understand the comparison with a sexual assualt but it only goes so far as the motivation there would be purely personal gratification. In your case, the purpose of these examinations, even if carried out in a bullying way, is for the safety of you and your baby. I don't think there's much value pursuing this from a criminal perspective given what little evidence you have. There comes a point where you have to say that you've done what you thought was right, and now need to focus on your baby and your life and move on as best as possible. The hospital have the information from your perspective and hopefully that will help shape the experiences of other women more positively. That would be the route I personally would go down when you've done as much as you have, plus get some counselling to process all that's happened.

Or not fully dilated and the baby might be in distress. A CTG done from the baby's scalp is more reliable than a monitor on the mother's abdomen, which is presumably why the midwives wanted to do it. Not sure why they didn't explain this to OP, but they might have and she did not understand or thought that her consent to monitoring from the scalp was more important than making sure her baby wasn't in distress.

Its possible to do a CTG while kneeling or standing, or lying on one's side, from what I know. The midwife should've tried an alternative position and seen whether that worked acceptably before wasting twenty minutes traumatising OP by assaulting her, while the baby went unmonitored (despite OP being willing to be monitored).

I was not panicking, but I was in labour. I was in pain and not able to advocate for myself. That does not give them the right to spend twenty minutes attempting to force my legs open. It does not give them the right to force me onto me back.

If all you said was stop pulling my legs then might it have just seemed like you weren't physically able to get into the right position rather than actively resisting?

A labouring woman is generally not very agile and would they have just thought you couldn't turn over onto your back? If you never said you didn't want to be?

Also where was your husband?! He spent 20minutes watching people sexually assault you, prising your legs open whilst you were labouring and at your most vulnerable and did nothing? His only job at the birth is to advocate for you.