Did anyone else never heal from birth?

[SparklyPlayer]

Baby is 5 months old. I had an awful forceps delivery and didn’t ever heal. The episiotomy is still an open wound and is now chronic, this means I’ll never be able to properly do physio etc.. The damage to my pelvic floor area is extremely severe. My body has been completely destroyed.

I know that this is me now, and I need to come to terms with it. Prior to the birth I was really fit and healthy.

I wondered if anyone else had experienced this and also never healed from birth, particularly if you are a few years down the line. Obviously my life now looks very different to how I had planned/imagined. how did you cope with going from being healthy to being very disabled? I will never be able to do normal things with my child, like running around and playing or swimming. I will need to stop lifting my child as soon as she can walk. Did this impact your child? Were you able to work again? What job could
you do? Did you lose your house? I’m a solo parent with no family support. How did you come to terms with never being able to have more children?

Oh, I'm so sorry for you. That sounds so tough. Have you researched into anything that can be done surgically ? Doctors can be rubbish at getting you the help you truly need. In my own case, my DC had horrendous asthma, and I only found out through being hospitalised with a major sudden attack myself that there is a tablet that helps it so much. He suffered for years when he could have been helped, and I just didn't know. You really have to advocate for yourself sometimes with the GP and others, specialists

Thanks for the reply. I have researched and unfortunately there doesn’t seem to be any surgical solution (there’s just a a lot about how there is no treatment or cure for pelvic floor issues because they primarily effect women). Everything says physio. I’ve never heard of anyone else’s episiotomy becoming chronic, but that’s what’s happened.

I’ve accepted there’s no hope for improvement, treatment or cure,
but I’m just wondering if anyone else has any positive stories or stories of hope/having a good life in this state.

there are support groups for birth injuries, but they are all very negative and full of very depressed women whose lives have also been ruined. These women have universally given up work as a result of their issues but all are lucky enough to have a partner who can support the household financially.

i would just like to hear if anyone has lived a good life with these issues.

I had terrible birth injuries similar to how you are describing. Do not let them fob you off saying there’s nothing that can be done. I had surgery to clean and restitch my tear/episiotomy wound as it wasn’t healing properly after three months, and within a week of the surgery I was feeling better. Insist on referral to gynaecology - you should not have to live in pain with an open wound

If you have an episiotomy that has never healed, you can get a surgical fix. You may need to be persistent, but please don't rely on the internet, get a referral. My friend has had very badly repaired tears twice after Labour and has had them fixed (ie undone and restiched) - in one case she had to go private, but her vagina now works fine and she lives a normal life.

Thank you, that gives me some hope. The NHS won’t do anything, my GP refuses to see me, says that only the nurse looks at postnatal stitches. The nurse just says do pelvic floor exercises.

I have also seen a gynae privately,
she burned off some of the worst scar tissue around part of it (which is healed but has horrific scar tissue) but didn’t help the big open part of the wound.

No one has mentioned that further surgery would be possible so this gives me some hope.

Even if the episiotomy does eventually improve, it doesn’t solve the pelvic floor issues. I have 0 function in the front muscles and very very weak function in the back. I could start physio properly if it was to heal, but I’ve not heard of physio helping in cases that are this severe. That’s why I’m now trying to accept that this is me forever and wondering what my life looks like.

Would you be able to see a physiotherapist that specialises in women's health and pelvic floor issues? Even if they can't do anything yet as the wound is open they might be able to direct you to other helpful healthcare professionals that won't fob you off. So sorry that you're going through this.

Honestly if you can afford it or have private healthcare I’d pay to go back to the gynaecologist and ask for surgical repair. They absolutely can repair and restitch for you. My problem was that the wound had started to heal too quickly from the inside out so it was never going to close up on its own, and it was absolute agony. I can’t believe they are leaving you to suffer like this when there are definitely things that can be done. Your pelvic floor won’t be able to heal while you have an open wound so park that worry for now and get the wound recut and restitched.

Just to add, the nhs were rubbish for me too, and I ended up going privately. The surgeon completely opened it all up again, cleared the scar tissue and restitched it properly. A week or so of feeling sore and I was so much better than before when it had felt like sitting on a shard of glass.

Thanks all. I’m lucky and do have private healthcare. I’ve seen a brilliant women’s physio who has been very supportive and agrees that more needs to be done to heal the open wound and that it is abnormal that the wound is still open.

I have seen a few gynaes and colorectal surgeons privately, none of whom seem to be able to do much beyond agreeing that it’s not healed and saying it should heal at some point (no timeline given), doing tests that all confirm I have no pelvic floor function and saying physio may or may not help (I think in fairness the private sector is now fairly overwhelmed as there isn’t a functioning NHS at the moment, it definitely seems much busier than when I first used it about 8 years ago, wait times are now quite long). It is helpful to hear that surgery is possible, but no one has suggested this to me as an option.

This is why I’m trying to accept that this is me now. I can’t do physio properly (all I can do is the NHS Squeezy app, but everyone agrees I definitely need something much much more intense than that, as I can’t engage the muscles at all). I can’t have anything more intense unless the wound heals. No one seems to be able to do anything about the wound. It also seems very unlikely that physio will even work, even assuming the wound
does heal one way or another, it just looks and feels far far too damaged. Some of the doctors have been more optimistic than others about room for improvement. I am on more of an acceptance journey at this point and looking to see if anyone has lived a good life with these type of injuries.