The birth of a new baby should be a time of joy and celebration, and yet more and more women are finding it a time of lasting trauma and heartbreak.
Talk to mothers today and you will discover that many of them had, or know someone who has had, an appalling experience giving birth in an NHS maternity ward. And I’m not just talking about those tragic cases where women die from hemorrhage or serious complications occur during childbirth that leave the baby disabled.
Too often staff see women in maternity wards as an irritation, something that gets in the way of the service running smoothly, forgetting that the service is there to provide care.
In their most nervous and vulnerable moments, these patients are treated with contempt, their concerns dismissed and their pain ignored by rude and disinterested midwives and doctors.
A damning report published last week into maternity services means we can no longer dismiss poor care as rare.
The UK’s first parliamentary inquiry into birth trauma found that maternity services are of “surprisingly poor quality” and that good care was “the exception rather than the rule”.
On the contrary, it seems endemic. The UK’s first parliamentary inquiry into birth trauma found that maternity services are of “surprisingly poor quality” and that good care was “the exception rather than the rule”.
She heard testimony from more than 1,300 women, including new mothers who had been left lying on blood-soaked sheets for hours and others scolded by midwives for soiling themselves.
A woman pregnant with twins who went into premature labor at 19 weeks was told by a consultant to stop being angry after losing her first baby.
The woman told the report: “Her words were, ‘Anyway, the baby was dead a long time ago, so you should stop worrying about it and let’s try to save the other one.'” The second baby also died. I read the findings with growing anger and despair.
My own friends have told me about the terrible care they received when giving birth in NHS hospitals. One, a doctor, was scolded for arriving too early despite being sure she was in the final stages of labor.
The midwife did not examine her and physically pushed her out of the door. She came home, took a bath and realized that she could feel the baby’s head. She got into a taxi and, while she was walking to the hospital, she fell to the ground and gave birth to her baby in the hallway.
The same midwife then had the audacity to angrily reprimand her for the disorder in the hallway. Another friend, also a doctor, was told she would need a hysterectomy or die after the midwife failed to deliver the placenta and she began bleeding profusely. My friend, despite being scared and distraught, insisted that someone older attend, who quickly delivered the placenta and stopped the bleeding within minutes.
How did we allow the system to become so broken that the miracle of birth is now fraught with danger and fear?
In my role, I visited maternity wards to check on the mental wellbeing of patients and spoke to many new mothers who were left severely traumatized by their experiences.
The most common complaint was being in agony for hours and being denied the pain relief they asked for. The emotional impact of this can be profound. An earlier report by NHS watchdog the Care Quality Commission (CQC) found that one in four women reported being left alone during childbirth while anxious, and almost half said they did not receive enough support after delivery.
All of this happens despite the fact that we know that anxious or stressed women are more likely to have complications during childbirth and develop postpartum depression.
Going private is prohibitively expensive, so it’s not an option for most people. And besides, it’s not necessarily safer. Many private maternity units lack the resources to deal with complex emergencies, so if something goes wrong for mother or baby, they usually get a blue light from the NHS anyway.
Despite the crisis in maternity care, I also have a lot of sympathy for the staff working in these conditions, who are stretched thin and unable to give each woman the care she needs.
This is why I often advise my friends and family to hire a doula if they are giving birth in an NHS hospital – a non-medical professional who helps the pregnant woman and advocates for her before, during and after childbirth.
Of course, they shouldn’t be necessary; No mother-to-be should be forced to pay for someone to defend her rights and ensure that she receives half-decent care.
How did we allow the system to become so broken that the miracle of birth is now fraught with danger and fear?
In the UK, 44 percent of adults look at their phone every hour, more than the French and Americans. We often scold young people for being glued to a cell phone, but with so many parents behaving badly, it’s no wonder children copy them.
Weight loss should not be judged
American singer Kelly Clarkson has finally admitted that weight-loss injections helped her with her dramatic physical transformation, after previously insisting it was simply the result of a low-carb diet and walking.
It’s not just celebrities who are insincere. I have been surprised to see how many people dare not tell their friends or family that they are using products like Ozempic and Wegovy.
American singer Kelly Clarkson has finally admitted that weight loss injections helped her with her dramatic physical transformation.
They feel a sense of failure and shame when seeking medical help, a feeling often fueled by the attitudes of some doctors. There is a feeling that people have to “suffer” to lose weight and that beatings are “cheating.” We don’t apply this logic elsewhere: no one says the same about nicotine replacement therapy for smokers.
These medications offer real hope to those who have struggled with their weight for years. We know the devastating effects of obesity. Enough of the sentence. We should congratulate anyone who is motivated to lose weight, regardless of how they do it.
I work near University College London and walked past the pro-Palestinian camp in the main courtyard garden.
A friend who is a teacher there said how surprised she was that so many of those supporting the movement were LGBT+ and women, despite Hamas’ terrible human rights record for these groups.
My friend is a staunch feminist and, although she is shocked by the horrors happening in Gaza, she understands that the war is a response to the absolutely barbaric attack that took place on October 7. There is something especially strange about the ‘Queers For Palestine’ movement. and I can only assume that there is considerable cognitive dissonance: the psychological term for the process by which people reconcile inconsistencies in their logic.
How can they be vehemently pro-LGBT+ and women’s rights and at the same time show apparent support for a regime run by murderous, gay-hating misogynists? It requires extraordinary mental gymnastics to square the circle, and as with all cognitive dissonance, part of this involves consciously ignoring or dismissing inconvenient facts to maintain your illogical position. They deflect and rely on rhetoric and ideology and look for information that supports, rather than contradicts, their argument.
It must surely help that they never have to deal personally with Hamas hate.
Dr. Max prescribes… Moving book by a psychiatrist
Lifting the lid on life as a psychiatrist, Benji Waterhouse’s You Don’t Have to Be Crazy to Work Here manages to walk a fine line between being funny but also moving and, at times, incredibly sad. A love letter to both psychiatry and the patients we care for, where the author’s humanity and devotion shine.
Benji Waterhouse’s You Don’t Have to Be Angry to Work Here manages to walk a fine line between being funny but also moving and, at times, incredibly sad.
