What is Birth Trauma?
Lets Talk About Birth Trauma
Birth trauma is still not talked about enough between friends, social media, news and even the medical profession. It can be confusing to understand what birth trauma is let alone what help there is out there to support those who may have experienced a traumatic birth. Birth trauma has somewhat become a label and actually sometimes we may have experienced a difficult or distressing birth and may not want to use that label but we are still feeling heavy emotions linked to our birth along with some physical and mental symptoms of the impact our birth experience.
You don’t have to use the word trauma if you don’t want to. It does not take away the feelings and emotions you may be feeling after the birth of your child. Trauma is just a label, you may have felt your birth was difficult or distressing and however you describe it that is OK. The Birth Trauma Association (BTA) defines birth trauma as a shorthand term for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Around 20-30% of women and birthing people describe their birth as traumatic 1 and studies suggest that between 1.5-5% may experience PTSD following birth.
Birth can be a beautiful, empowering and transformative experience for some and for others it may be traumatic, distressing or a scary experience which can result in feelings of pain, anger, grief. This could as a result of interventions, birth plans changing, feelings of fear, not feeling listened to, heard or supported and even loss of control during birth. For some, they may have imagined how their birth would feel and look; however this may have not have turned out the way they imaged which can contribute to the trauma itself.
“I was feeling quite traumatised after the birth of my 3rd child during the Covid pandemic.”
The Symptoms of Birth Trauma
Birth is an individual and unique experience as well as the emotions and feelings and symptoms we may experience as a result of a traumatic, difficult or distressing birth. Our brain works really hard to keep us protected all the time. When experience a traumatic event it triggers a part of the brain which is our emotion centre to trigger our fight or flight response which in turns becomes hyper aroused and shuts down all other brain functions. This means that our brain is not able to process and file this experience as a memory in the past like it would with other experiences or events.
All the feelings and emotions we felt during the experience become biologically linked that memory/ experience and this experience becomes what I like to describe as stuck in our brain. We may then be triggered back to our experience by something such as a conversation, a photo or even a word and we may then experience all those feelings and emotions that we felt during that experience which then re-traumatises us and further encoding our emotion centre even more and it goes round and round in a cycle each time we are triggered.
Not everyone will experience the same symptoms or feelings and it will be individual for each person but some symptoms may feel like but not limited to:
Tearfulness
Flashbacks of the memory or event
Anxiety / panic
Hyper-vigilance
Irritability
Trouble sleeping
Relationship changes
Intrusive thoughts
Anger
Numbness
Difficulty bonding
Birth Trauma is not limited to Birth
We often focus on that label of “birth trauma” however it is not limited to just birth nor is it limited to the person giving birth. We may also experience trauma during pregnancy or postnatal period and it is not limited to birth itself.
These may come in the form of but not limited to:
A difficult Pregnancy
Pregnancy Loss
NICU or hospital stay
A postnatal journey
Breast/chest feeding experienced
Any experience that you may have experienced as difficult or traumatic.
Sometimes partners experience birth trauma from witnessing their partner experience a traumatic birth. According to studies, between 0% to 8% of men attending their child’s birth may have experience PTSD symptoms depending on the symptoms being measured.
How can you heal & move forward?
Sometimes we may need a little time to heal and sometimes we may need some support to help us heal and move forward. Living with these symptoms day to day can be really difficult, painful and exhausting and no-one should have to feel like that. Often we may feel alone and unable to explain how we feel; I have experienced this myself first hand which is why I trained in 3 Step Rewind Process to help and support others in healing and moving forward from their birth experience.
Support may come in the form of:
Talking to someone, a friend or someone you trust in a safe and open space
Talking to your GP or Midwife and finding out your options for support.
Support Groups both local or online
Talking to a therapist that is trained in trauma.
Seeking support from a 3 Step Rewind Practitioner who specialises in birth trauma
Support from online resources such as:
Experiencing a birth trauma or any other traumatic pregnancy or postnatal experience can sometimes make us feel alone, lost and scared but please know that you are not alone, take each day as it comes and know there lots of support out there to help you heal. Whether it is a traumatic or difficult birth, pregnancy or postnatal experience, The 3 Step Rewind Process can help you to process your experience and help to ease and lift those feelings, helping you to move forward.
If you would like to find out more about how the 3 Step Rewind can support you please get in touch or click the link below to find out more.
“Kerry melted away all of those feelings of anger, hurt and frustration that i still held onto about my treatment during birth and left me with all the warm and loving memories of meeting my daughter for the first time. I am so glad that I found Kerry and the re-wind process, it’s helped me so much to be able to move on. I highly recommend for anyone else struggling.”
Sources:
Creedy et al. 2000; Soet et al. 2003; Maggioni et al. 2006; Ayers et al. 2009
Wijma et al. 1997; Creedy et al. 2000; Czarnocka and Slade 2000; Ayers and Pickering 2001; Soet et al. 2003; Maggioni et al. 2006; White et al. 2006