- After a traumatic birth, I decided to become a midwife to help other women.
- 2004 was the year that I almost lost my job due to a birth I had attended. I still have PTSD.
- Lauren Crosby Medlicott shares the story of a midwife.
I became a midwife in 1999, deciding that the degree I’d been pursuing in architecture wasn’t something I felt passionately enough about — not like I did about the birth of a baby.
When I was 18 and had my first child, I realized I was meant for support and empowerment of mothers throughout the birth process.
After completing a three-year training program, I was qualified to become a midwife. I spent most of my time at the labor ward where I met vulnerable women and helped them through one of their most memorable experiences. Birth is one of the most amazing things in the world. I felt so fulfilled to be a part.
After five years of practice, I experienced a home birth that nearly ended my career as a midwife. I even had to go back to it when my grandchild was born. It made me realize how difficult my job was. Mothers and babies are literally in your control.
My birth changed everything
It was a cold night and my colleague was delivering a baby at a community home. I was called to assist her as a secondary Midwife.
It was an odd birth. It was freezing outside, and all the windows were open. The mother didn’t want us to help her, and her husband was very hostile towards me. I tried to talk to her as she went through labor. But she didn’t make any eye contact, talk to me, or let me use the handheld Doppler to check that the baby was OK — even though I continued to insist.
A normal physiological decrease in oxygen through the placenta occurs when a woman contracts quite strongly. While most babies can handle this, the purpose of a midwife attending home births is to detect any abnormalities as soon as possible. The mom said to me to run from her.
Just as the baby was about be born, she agreed to listen to my heart rate. It was shockingly low. We saw the baby’s top before we knew it and had the equipment ready to revive it. To get the baby out of her shaking mother, my colleague performed an episiotomy.
The baby arrived basically dead — white and floppy. I immediately started to resuscitate the baby, trying to raise his heart rate beyond the 40 beats per minutes it was pumping. The paramedics came to take the baby to the hospital, and as I left, I looked around the house — the blood, the cold, the shaking hands. All this was etched in my mind.
The baby died three days later.
I attended more home births to treat my PTSD.
The post-traumatic stress disorder that was caused by the event was unknowingly treated in the months that followed. According to the American Psychological Association (APA), PTSD can also be treated with “Exposed for a prolonged time” — instead of avoiding what triggers the trauma, you’re exposed to it to get over your triggers or fears.
Instead of fleeing home births, I asked to be allowed to continue them but only as an observer, with no responsibility for my life or death. This was so I could remind myself that homebirths can be positive.
That night haunted me, with flashbacks in slow-motion that were triggered by no particular thing. Even years later, I still feel panicked when I recall what happened and consider all that could have been done differently.
My daughter gave birth at home and asked me to be there as a support mother, not as a midwife. My daughter was in labor, so I waited in my living room. The midwife helped me.
“The baby is crashing through the pelvis and going to be born quickly, hence why the heart rate is low,”She told me. “I’ve called the paramedics just in case.”
My grandson was born lifeless and flat. He needed to be resuscitated. The case from years ago was resurrected like a nightmare and terrified me for those 20 minutes. But, my grandson did fine in the end.
I’m not a clinical midwife anymore. Instead, I am a teacher for the next generation. Despite the terrible PTSD I had, I was determined to continue my career. It’s impossible to ignore the miracles of life.
Editor’s note – The identity of the midwife is kept private to protect her patients’ privacy.