Despite medical advancements, childbirth is a major cause of post-traumatic stress disorder – and yet nobody talks about it. Leah McLaren tells the harrowing story of the arrival of her second child – and her fight for treatment and support
The seconds that stretch between the act of giving birth and waiting to hear a baby cry are the most harrowing moments in an otherwise privileged life. My second son, Frank, didn’t cry.
Late last summer in a London hospital, he was born semi-conscious. His pulse was faint and he was floppy as a rag doll, a pale bluish grey in colour. There were angry red indents on his nose and skull that would later turn into deep purple bruises. According to his hospital notes his Apgar score at birth (on which 10 is hale and zero is non-responsive) was two. Just before emerging, Frank turned to the left and got stuck in the birth canal – no amount of pushing could make him budge. He was wrenched out of me, first ineffectively with a vacuum and then later, definitively, with a pair of giant metal salad tongs called forceps. The midwife briefly placed his limp little body on my chest and then scooped him up again and over to the opposite side of the room where the doctors began their work.
May 07, 2017 at 12:59PM
from Leah McLaren
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