My First Experience with Birth Trauma

My first experience with birth trauma ----

In that in between grey of early morning, I finished up packing and eagerly left with my fiance' of the time. His father drove us to the hospital. I was going to meet my baby girl that day. My sweet baby girl. Everything I had endured with my "fiance" would be worth it as soon as I met my baby girl, right?

My baby girl needed both parents, right?

I didn't exactly want to go to the hospital.

I was starting to read more on natural birth outside of a hospital but in a small town, at 40 weeks and 5 days I felt I had no other option but to go and be induced.

We were there by about six in the morning. Shortly there after, I was hooked up to pitocin. I was thankfully able to get up and move around for a bit which gave me a little bit of hope. However, once I had to go back to the room, my "partner" was not helpful. Nurses came in and out and upped the pitocin without asking or notifying me. (It is my body, shouldn't I be allowed to go with the flow of the contractions when I thought they felt steady enough for me to get through? I knew I was a first time mom, but didn't I matter in my own birthing experience?)

Hours went by treacherously, my "partner" spent a lot of time resting himself on his phone, I didn't know it then but he was busy speaking to other women. The pain increased and I was young and scared.

Thankfully, a good friend came by with crystals, good energy, and a great big hug. She had already had one sweet baby herself. She walked with me into the bathroom, and was present as I used hydrotherapy to help the contractions, she was present once I returned to the room. She did leave for a bit and came back before I had my baby.

At 11:12pm, my sweet baby girl was finally earthside. I couldn't feel my legs because of an epidural I didn't want but I felt her come earthside. She was whisked away and cleaned up, the vernix removed, measurements taken, and then handed to me.

She kept spitting up something black.

My friend was eagerly taking pictures for me to treasure.

I alerted a nurse and asked if they could help suction it out, wasn't that protocol?

A nurse gave me a bit of a dirty look but still took her then gave her back.

I was instructed as to how to do a football hold to begin breastfeeding.

She spat up a bit more and something was off but my worries were shrugged away by the "professionals". She spat up the black stuff once more before I latched her on and then I watched as her eyes rolled back and she turned blue. No one else seemed to notice. Why didn't they notice? I frantically alerted them that my daughter needed help. They took her from my arms and whisked her away. The professionals rushing out with my daughter.

No one said anything. But I could tell she wasn't breathing.

My friend asked where I wanted her. Crying I said I didn't know I just wanted someone in with my baby. I couldn't move my legs, I was cold, and nauseous because of the shift in hormones having just given birth.

My friend and my partner both left the room.

My partner returned to yell at me and inform me he was going out for a cigarette.

My friend returned because my partner had thrown a fit because she wasn't biologically related to my baby and soon she had to leave to go home to her own baby.

As soon as a nurse came in to give me an update on my daughter, I asked to see her and with shaky legs, I was helped to a wheelchair to go and see my daughter in the special nursery used before babies were taken to NICU in a bigger city.

Birth Trauma is real. It is valid.

If you have experienced birth trauma, I invite you to write about it. Your experience is valid. Your emotions are valid. I am so thankful for my sweet girl, if I knew better. I would have stayed home to have her and have had her without my then "partner".

You always have options.

Thank you for reading our story.