I guess I was lucky and had wonderfully supportive nurses and Doctors for all 3 of my births. I sis have one older nurse who was a little short with me because I was heading home in under 24 hours. She thought I was crazy and was putting my child at risk.

With my first child I experienced something like this after having a traumatic birth and been told oh come on get up and have a shower now your not sick your only had a baby hurry up

naively did not realize this.

I don’t remember having any issues but feel for when who do. It shouldn’t be still happening.

This is sad. We can give all the training to medical staff at any stage of their learning, but ultimately it comes down to the personality of the medical staff. If they are caring people, it will show.

So sorry to the women that these things have happened to, so terrible.

I felt violated with the Midwife who was so aggressive in trying to get my baby to latch on to breastfeed, we were both so distressed and it did traumatise me. I questioned her behaviour and ended up with another midwife.

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  • • mom93821 replied
    • 13 Dec 2022 , 7:16 am

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  Well done, as tough as it is, people have to be challenged. I did the same and challenged.

This breaks my heart. I hope these obstetricians have been or will be reprimanded. Its a stressful time and you don’t need any abuse during labour.

I don’t have a negative experience during birth, but do have a negative experience when I miscarried. Reality is that interrelational skills are very important when providing quality care

I had to be extremely firm and have a loud voice and be heard.

I found that the midwives and female nurses were actually worse than the male doctors.

I have to count myself lucky that I had a relatively smooth child birth, I know what things might have been required at the time (forceps, vacuum delivery, episiotomy, etc), I dont recall being asked if they could do the episiotomy at the time, I had a lot of drugs in my system and was violently ill every contraction due to the pain but I do recall saying just do what needs to be done to get bubs out safely. My after birth care was wonderful and just an amazingly supportive experience, which i believe everyone should have the right to expect.

So sad that in this day and age we are still having to push for women’s rights around birthing; if there’s one area we should all put our judgements aside and stand together, this is that area.

This is shocking! Child birth is already such an extreme event without the added trauma of this. I am so thankful that I had the more beautiful care team around me for my entire pregnancy and birth. I don’t think I could have gotten through without them! All women deserve the most positive experience possible when welcoming their precious babe into the world.

I never had any problem with the doctor and staff when my boys were born. Mine was due to a miscarriage at 16 weeks. The doctor said it was my fault because I kept working. I told him what I did in my job, making beds and hanging out sheets but he said it was fine. He literally told me I killed my baby and didn’t deserve to have any.

After reading this article it bought back some memories from my daughters birth and how the doctor dismissed my concerns or questions during labour and I felt really powerless. Thankfully someone must have said something as he came in and eventually apologised for not answering my questions before I was rushed to theatre. I feel for every woman who has experienced disrespectful behaviour.

As a Midwife this breaks me to read, our job is to advocate for women. To be their voice when they can’t do it themselves and ensure they have true informed consent on everything, true informed consent/choice means to have no coercion at all- I remember years ago a Dr telling me to go back in that room (birth suite 4) and tell that woman her baby will die if she doesn’t (agree to dr decision), I looked at tht Dr and said “you are not allowed in my room”, the woman ended up having an unassisted normal birth.
We need to empower women, women already don’t trust their bodies will do what they are designed to do and come with anxiety that halt labour processing as it should.
If there is anything I can say to any woman doubting their body’s ability to give birth is … please trust the process and listen to your body, your body is design to grow life, give birth and then feed your baby… you got this

I found the staff to be mostly amazing. However I was quite traumatised by a couple of the nurses in the special care nursery. I was so vulnerable after the prem birth of our first daughter. I felt very powerless.

Speechless from reading this but I’ve had a good experience so far

This is terrible to read. I was so lucky. All for of my births were amazing and the staff were all wonderful.