I had PTSD after my traumatic birth with my twins. Now, I wasn’t officially diagnosed by a medical professional. The reason why is because I didn’t tell anyone about my symptoms.
I was too scared to visit my doctors and go through the same flashbacks and triggers from my birth trauma. So I suffered in silence and kept it to myself. It took me over a year to overcome these symptoms on my own.
But I knew I had develop PTSD based on the symptoms that I am going to share with you today. I thank God it went away after a year or so. But that brings me to an important point. That is that if you are experiencing these symptoms for more than a month, it’s safe to say to seek a doctor because you are most likely experiencing PTSD.
Now, if you are experiencing any of these symptoms after birth, I will definitely recommend speaking with a medical professional so that they can help you the best way possible!
Now, what is PTSD?
PTSD stands for post traumatic stress disorder and it is defined as “is a mental health condition that’s triggered by a terrifying event — either experiencing it or witnessing it” (source)
Now the event I’m writing about is birth trauma.
I want to share the common symptoms that you may experience and I experienced almost all of it!
5 Ways to know you have PTSD after Birth Trauma
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1.Intrusive thoughts
So this means experiencing flashbacks of the traumatic birth that you experienced. This may come up out of nowhere and it can bring up other triggers like anxiety, fears and pain. Intrusive thoughts can come up as nightmares as well. So it’s having nightmares about your birth. Your actual birth or other scary things happening during your birth.
Read these books:
More Than a Healthy Baby: Finding Strength and Growth After Birth Trauma
Heal Your Birth Story: …releasing the unexpected
2.Your Mood is impacted
You may feel anxious after the fact and may even experience anxiety attacks. I know that I did and it was horrible.You may also experience guilt and anger because you went through it. You may feel like “why me”. If your baby experienced umbilical cord wrapped around the neck or something else that affected your baby, you may feel guilty. That it’s your fault. Feeling depressed is another mood symptom that you may experience as a result of PTSD from birth trauma.
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3.Avoidance
Avoidance just means that you are avoiding either thinking about your birth by not talking about it. Just burying it in the very back of your mind and thoughts. You are avoiding the triggers caused by your trauma. So you avoid going to the hospital, or going to your doctor’s appointments and in some cases avoiding your baby!
Because you associate your baby with your birth and so in many cases mom doesn’t feel a connection until later on. In actually avoided going to the hospital or talking about my birth. In some cases you also avoid your family, friends and anyone who is pregnant!
Read this next:
5 POWERFUL WAYS TO OVERCOME ANXIETY FROM BIRTH TRAUMA
8 SIGNS YOU’RE TOTALLY READY FOR BABY #2
4. High alert
When you’re in high alert after a traumatic birth you are overflowing in fear and worry. Constantly! It’s real and I’ve experienced this almost everyday for a whole year after my birth trauma. It was terrible and not fun at all. So, you’re also worrying about being in danger. The constant thought of something is dangerous and also you are losing sleep. Anxiety is on full mode and sleep is on 0%. Because you’re constantly worrying about something bad happening, you are fearing the worst and it makes you stuck.
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5.Blaming game
I wouldn’t say this is a symptom per say but it is something to look out for after birth trauma. Many moms start blaming themselves for what happened to them, even though they didn’t have any control of the outcome. You think it’s your fault that you put your baby through a bad experience during or after birth. You blame yourself for what happend to you and so you live in guilt. In many cases you may feel like your doctors have failed you and so you blame them as well. I know that I did, I was so angry at my doctor that I never went to her again. I had to heal first and got another doctor.
The truth is it’s not your fault mama. There was nothing you could have done to prevent this. I want you to know that it’s okay to have these feelings but I also want you to release it to the universe because it’s not serving you.
You got this mama!
Make sure to check out my birth trauma coaching program where you work with me 1:1 to help you overcome birth trauma and THRIVE despite of it! Unlimited support from a mama who have been there too! You do not need to suffer alone. There is light after that painful dark tunnel.
I hope this information about PTSD after birth trauma can help you understand a little bit more about this topic.
sources:https://youtu.be/lmNO7QUeYLE
