In today’s therapy session we discusssed how one of my significant anxieties around a 3rd labour is if I have a stop start labour (apparently common in 3rd labours) and getting sent home or not being listened to and admitted on my terms.
This stems from fact that when I was in labour with Munchkin the doors to the labour ward were all locked and barred, we were ringing and banging and no-one was coming to let us in. We were phoning the labour ward. We were only locked out for 10 minutes but it felt like forever. It was the moment I started to panic and from then on things were not calm and completely panic stricken and out of control. It all went wrong and down hill from there.
With my second labour when my waters broke and I rang the labour ward, the midwife on duty was very nice but I got a strong sense of “and if we don’t think you are in established labour we will send you home again” (she might have said words to that effect). Which caused a twinge of anxiety that I still remember (but all was fine as I was admitted and gave birth hours later!).
Now I appreciate home may be the best place for many women to stay in early labour, and labour wards can be very busy places which can’t be overrun with people “not far enough along”, but I am also very scared about not being listened too and sent home (despite history of reasonably fast labour 3-4 hours) and giving birth without healthcare or giving birth in a hospital carpark like my friend Glosswitch did!
So I figure best thing to do to help me with this particular anxiety is talk it through with the lovely supervisor of midwives (who me and husband are meeting on 1st Sept to go through my birthplan and revisit the birth suite) and make a plan that works for me and fits within hospital protocols (if it means setting up a tent on the grassy area just outside the delivery suite that’s fine!).
childbirthptsdandme 