Mum diagnosed with PTSD after eighty hour labour

A UK Mother who endured an eighty hour labour was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder and battled to accept her daughter.

Annie Meier, 35, from London, gave birth to daughter Bea four years ago, and thought she felt prepared for giving birth and welcoming her first child.

But what happened during labour was totally not what she had prepared for.

‘I must have been sent home four or five times,’ Annie told FEMAIL. ‘One doctor said: “You’ll probably be in labour in another five days”.

‘By the time I was three centimetres dilated they allowed me to stay, but by that point I’d been in labour a good 50 hours or so and I was exhausted.

‘I couldn’t sleep as I was having contractions every minute and I kept getting sick. I couldn’t keep anything down, including water.’

Annie was finally more than eight centimetres dilated, and told it would soon be time to deliver the baby, but within an hour her cervix tightened again, and she went back to being three centimetres dilated.

She was rushed to theatre for an emergency Caesarean.

‘I was really relieved at that point,’ Annie recalls. ‘But once Bea was born, I felt guilty from the moment she arrived.

‘I had not slept for around four or five nights. I knew I was meant to feel this amazing sense of elation and overwhelming love, but I just wanted her taken away so I could go to sleep.

‘That’s where the sense of guilt came from.’

Annie lost two litres of blood and had suffered internal bleeding.

‘From the moment she was born, Bea was really alert,’ Annie said.

‘She just started screaming. The nurses gave her formula because they thought she was just really hungry, but it didn’t help.

‘A few times I fell asleep with her on me because I was so exhausted. People had to come and wake me up.’
‘I just felt numb,’ she recalls. ‘I took the attitude of: “I’ve got to get through this”.

‘If we wanted to sit and eat dinner, I had to leave her to scream.

‘So I just detached myself so that it didn’t affect my emotional state, and I detached myself from her and we didn’t build a bond.

‘Most of the time I just wanted to run out the door and leave her. I didn’t get any help or support.’

‘I couldn’t get the birth out of my head. I’d recite it to people over and over again,’ she said.

‘I think I couldn’t get over the fact I’d nearly died. Nobody had said it directly at the hospital, but with the haemorrhage I knew that if I hadn’t gone for the Caesarean things could have turned out very differently.
‘I’d always felt in control of my life and now I felt really vulnerable.

‘But overall I was still feeling numb. I didn’t have the time or space to break down and cry over it.

‘It was just a case of deal with the baby and get through the days.’

She recalled one occasion when she went out for a jog at 9pm just for the sake of getting out of the house.

‘I had never felt such an urge to run off into the night,’ she explained. ‘The only thing that stopped me was that I knew my husband would be worried about me.

‘I just wanted to escape and wanted space, but also felt really guilty for feeling that way.’

When Bea was two years old, Annie realised she wasn’t getting any better and said to her husband that she ‘didn’t feel right’.

‘He replied to me: “It’s like a veil of grey has been drawn over you”,’ she recalled.

‘And he was right, it was like I didn’t exist anymore. I had no love for my life left.’

Annie realised something was badly wrong, so she sought counselling through private healthcare.

One day, when her therapist was showing her some notes, Annie saw that she’d written down that she was suffering from PTSD as a result of her traumatic birth.

She saw a specialist in Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing therapy (EMDR), which helped her unlock the traumatic memories stored in her brain.

‘The therapist was moving their fingers in front of my eyes as I thought about the birth to replace the memories in my brain.

‘I’m not entirely sure how it works, but it did. After two sessions I felt a bit different and after five I was done.’

‘It’s a slow process and you have to give it time,’ she explained. ‘But I’ve started to enjoy her instead of seeing motherhood as a gruelling task.’

Did you or someone you know suffer a similar experience to Annie? Share your story below.

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23 Comments

- - meedee said
  - 05 Jan 2022
    2:30 pm
Good Lord…..Some of us woman really do go through the wringer.

- - june11 said
  - 12 Jan 2016
    7:31 pm
What on earth were the midwives and other staff thinking an doing?? This is the sort of thing that may have happened when Mums had home births and there was no options available. Worse still some Mums died during childbirth or a little later, and there was a lot more stillbirths. This reeks of incompetence and malpractice to me.

- - rachelvk said
  - 30 Dec 2015
    8:40 pm
What an ordeal. Glad to see she has received the help she needed and can move on.

- - gofunkit said
  - 29 Dec 2015
    2:41 pm
Glad you were able to get the help that was needed. Thankyou for sharing your story.

- - pakeko said
  - 28 Dec 2015
    8:37 pm
Wow what a road the mum has traveled, pleased she was able to get help to move forward

- - mom134803 said
  - 28 Dec 2015
    2:45 am
80 hours !! My goodness gracious…poor mumma !! I can so imagine the trauma and confusion ! Glad she got help and could give it all a place. Hope that all who struggle with feelings like this search & find recognition and help !!

- - curlytops said
  - 06 Dec 2015
    9:26 pm
So relieved to read that she got help and it worked. There is an enormous expectation of what a mother should feel.

- - mom94125 said
  - 03 Dec 2015
    3:33 pm
yeah it is great that she got help. it is a slow process but hopefully she will continue on her journey. i can’t imagine what she went through!

- - tracey1901 said
  - 28 Nov 2015
    12:38 am
I am really saddened to hear when what is supposed to be such a natural process turns out so horribly. My deepest, heartfelt condolences go to this poor lady and her family. But, I also have to express my extreme thanks to MOMs for reporting on this very real matter as for the past 24 years I have strongly believed that I too, have been suffering from PTSD from the birth of my first child, yet as so little information can be found on this even being a possibility and after being laughed at several times, I have had to just deal with it, albeit not very well the greater majority of the time, so even after all these years I am still deeply haunted by my first birthing experience which was also repeated again with the birth of my second child. Even just writing this comment has brought me to tears as I regretfully recall all the pain, anguish and emotional trauma that I experienced all those years ago. So once again MOMs thank you for showing me that maybe I’m not that crazy afterall and if there are any other Mums reading this who feel they too may be experiencing PTSD or any mental health concerns for that matter, then I urge you to please seek help so you can begin the healing process as soon as possible so this doesn’t continue to destroy any more of your precious life.

- - ella12 said
  - 25 Nov 2015
    4:07 pm
Talk about dramatic, oh my goodness. 0-:

- - rovermum said
  - 25 Nov 2015
    11:45 am
Reading this is enlightening and so understandable really. We often thing PTSD is only relevant to huge trauma. What is more traumatic to our body than giving birth. In hindsight, I believe I could have suffered PTSD also. Thanks for sharing.

- - mum4107 said
  - 25 Nov 2015
    5:31 am
I can’t believe they let this poor lady’s Labour go on for so long

- - mom134803 said
  - 25 Nov 2015
    3:56 am
My goodness me, an eighty hour lasting child labour !! I can imagine this mum has PTSD !! I don’t understand why they waited so long with the C-Section. Glad to read that the therapy has effect and that she feels much better.

- - pplover2013 said
  - 24 Nov 2015
    10:17 pm
What a great story to share! My heart breaks for this beautiful Mum because I can understand her pain and dispair. Although my labour didn’t go as long as Annie’s I also had a horrendous time with the birth of my 1st born. I too ended up with huge blood loss and time in ICU after 2 emergency surgeries. I still rerun the whole delivery through my head 4 years later and wonder about all those what ifs. I feel a real sense of acknowledgement and acceptance that others also had a tough time and that it’s ok to accept that things don’t always turn out as expected.

- - mom101628 said
  - 24 Nov 2015
    9:18 pm
No wonder she had depression – so would anyone. So pleased she was finally able to get some help and get close to her daughter.

- - mom160421 said
  - 24 Nov 2015
    9:16 pm
How could her health care team have let the labour go on for so long? How could she, or her husband let the labour go on for so long? Surely someone should have had the sense to call for a c section much sooner. I feel so sorry for her – what an ordeal.

- - The"Hood"Club said
  - 24 Nov 2015
    8:19 pm
I had a 3 day labour with my first which was horrendous until the last 8 hours. I’m glad I delivered naturally in the end but sometimes I just think give the poor girl a c section – yes it’s a big op but when the mother is ill as cannot eat and exhausted its just dangerous for both parties and totally unfair on the mother – the pain you can go through at 3cm can be worse than fully dilated, mine was! Really feel for women who had long labours – my second was 2 hours start to finish – just a slight difference.

- - mom90758 said
  - 24 Nov 2015
    3:03 pm
What an experience! 80 hours! Never heard such a thing before. I can understand why she suffered PTSD.
- cherz replied
  
  24 Nov 2015 , 3:54 pm
  You can say that again ..poor woman I am left wondering how the hell the hospital let this go on for so long.
  So pleased to read she finally got some help and is starting to recover (or recover as best she can).
  Sending all my wishes for happier times and good health to them all.
  - mom90758 replied
    
    25 Nov 2015 , 11:25 am
    
    You are right. They didn’t take enough care of her. I hope she will eventually be able to recover!
- - mom165081 said
  - 24 Nov 2015
    2:51 pm
How horrible for this family – first the trauma of the birth, and then being unable to attach with baby and be the caring mother she wanted to be (as do we all). I am so glad she finally managed to find someone who was able to help her move forward. PTSD sufferers require expert help and assistance, no matter how the disorder is triggered.

- - robyn_smithwick said
  - 24 Nov 2015
    1:18 pm
That is a very long abnormal labour. A lot of women have 1st stage for quite a while in various forms eg cramps, backache , niggles and feeling just plain lousy! 2nd stage is the real teeth and hand gripping part.