How do you recover from an emotional cesarean scar?

[Aquababe]

Everytime I think about my cs I feel sad. This is at least once every day when the scar causes me a bit of discomfort.

My dd was born by emergency cs after I was induced. I failed to progress past 3cm and she became distressed. I feel really dissappointed that I wasn't able to give birth in the calm and natural way I wanted. (waterbirth)
I also feel that things weren't explained very well to me. They didn't really explain to me or my dh what was going on let alone give me a choice. I also feel their refusal to call my dh the first 2 times I asked and their insistance that I lay on my back (so they could constantly monitor me) was probably the reason my dd got distressed as my bp would have been through the roof.

By not having a natural birth I feel that I let my dd down, my body down & myself down.
When I see my tummy I just want to cry. prior to my dd's birth my stomach didn't have very bad strech marks, but after they'd rummaged there's so many including big red splodgeythings. I don't feel like the same woman I used to be. I was one of those short t-shirt girls as although my tummy wasn't flat it was nice now it's revolting. (Thank God for tankini's )

We've started discussing when we should try for baby no 2. I know that I want another child not too far in age, but my dh says that he is dreading going through another similar situation.

I've been to the doctor regarding my scar as I was quite worried about it hurting at one point he checked me out and told me I was fine medically just said to wait 2 years before baby & that I shouldn't be returning to Aikido (martial art) for a while.
(incidentally when they say 2yrs does that mean from birth to conception or birth to birth?)
I just feel that my life is so on it's head since dd some of that I love, but some makes me so sad.

Has anyone else had this?
What did you do to get over it?

the whole point of the exercise is to establish why you are feeling traumatised
on the whole, women who;ve had a great birth experience do not debriefing

all the things that happened, including the ones you have just mentioned when put together add up to an unpleasant and horrible experience

they should not be defensive with you, you need answers, so you can put this behind you , and move on , and the pain lessens, and can start to try for another baby

be honest and open about how you feel, you won;t be the first or the last to do this

*do not need debriefing!

thanks have just finished drafting my questions and got my husband to read through it, but he keeps getting quite cranky about it as he doesn't understand properly.

which bit does he not understand..? the need to ask the questions, the questions themselves, or the trauma part?

He tries to answer the questions himself with his view of what happened. I think he thinks I'm over reacting by taking up the hospitals time.

well, it is not really up to him to decide that you are taking up their time, they have patient liasion and debriefing services, for this reason...

his POV is different to yours, as you were going through it , rather than observing it....please don;t be put off...this is important for you and for you to deal with before you get pregnant again..

hi

Just wanted to add my own experience cos some of what you've said i can really relate to.

I had a v traumatic emergency c'setion and terrible recovery with dd1. My scar hurt for 18mths and I also thought I had no stretchmarks but they saw that i had horrific ones after the birth.

My husband understood that i had an awful time but just thought i was massively overreacting a year later when i was still going on about it. He was like yours, like he was fed up talking about it and couldn't see the point of writing complaining etc. I honestly thought that the only person who understood (and still does) is my mum who had a traumatic birth with my older brother. She used to hug me and cry with me over the bad feelings I had over the birth.

I ended up having a sit down chat with hubby saying 'i don't need you to fix this, i just need you to be behind me and support me if i want to talk about it and take it further. I know it doesn't help you to talk about it but it helps me - so please just accept it' - it really helped and we stopped getting wound up with each other about the different approaches we had to it.

If you feel you need answers or need to talk then do it and chase it and carry on asking. A good organisation is AIMS - they have a great website and answer emails - very sympathetic.

On a positive note, I had a planned c'section in Jan (couldn't bear the chance of another emergency one) at a different hospital and it was a fantastic experience. I had a great recovery and am now running 3/4 miles 4 times a week with no problems with scar. (bearing in mind i could still hardly walk 3 mths after my 1st baby)

So just wanted to say that there is every chance that you'll have a great experience 2nd time AND rather than concentrating on the birth think how amazing it is that your body has managed to grow a beautiful baby all on its own.

Good Luck

Thanks dancing Tina.Have just done a simliar chat with my dh and have now sent the email. hopefully they'll be able to give me some answers.

it's comforting to know I'm not alone with the scar pain as so many of my friends had no pain or discomfort at all any more. I thought there might have been something that went wrong when they stitched it.