I delivered my first at Kings and had a shockingly bad experience.
- They inserted my catheter into my uterus instead of my vagina, draining the amniotic fluid instead of my bladder, putting both my daughter and I at serious risk. Despite me complaining about excruciating pain over and over again, this wasn't noticed for 18 hours until the catheter burst from pressure from my daughter's head.
- I was left at 10cm for 7 hours before they had me push, extremely dangerous. The doctor didn't want to let me push at all and I was only given 30 minutes to try before they insisted we move to c-section.
- After the c-section I wasn't told to eat only light meals and my digestive system went into shock and shut down. I was incredibly sick, vomiting uncontrollably, and the postnatal care staff just kept telling me it was gas and they wouldn't give me anything for the pain or take me seriously at all. Finally there was a shift change and the new midwife instantly called for a referral and suddenly it was an emergency and I was being rushed for care, after nearly 7 hours of torture and being ignored.
- After so many mistakes I developed extremely PPA and had to do intensive CBT and go on medication to try to process. Kings offered me a debrief and then just blew the appointment off, despite me following up. I still don't understand how so much of what happened was allowed to happen.
I'm going for an elective c-section this time as I am terrified to give birth again and want to maintain as much control and calm as possible. I don't want to go back to Kings, but I'm not hearing great things about any SE hospitals. Leaning towards Lewisham and looking for recent ELCS experiences there.