I stayed in for 3 days and yes, it was painful to pull myself up and out of bed but it wasn’t too bad. The scar healed well and had started to fade when I got pregnant again. With my baby boy, the anxiety and worries had eased slightly, though that might have been something to do with a new job and a demanding but highly amusing toddler. I was offered a caesarean at 39 weeks plus one and this time I discharged myself after 24 hours; the stitches were taut and I felt fine. The scar didn’t heal quite so well this time and it is a bit lumpy which is probably in part because I was lifting his older sister when I was told not to. It is still a bit numb around the scar and yes, there is a bit of an overhang of tummy.
People judge me when I tell them about my elective “choice” but I don’t worry about that – my kids are healthy and as far as I am concerned I had a great experience of childbirth.
Anon
themselves while I was having a spinal anaesthetic. I lay down but at an angle leaning down to the left as that takes the pressure off a major artery. The curtain went up and I was watching the clock. Someone had told me that having a c-section was like someone rummaging around in your stomach or it’s like doing the washing up in your tummy. I didn’t feel anything like that. I do remember something pouring across my tummy which could have been blood or could have been iodine. My husband was there with me the whole time dressed in scrubs.
Soon enough my baby girl was out with a full head of black hair and wide open eyes. They checked her over, wrapped her up and placed her on my chest. It didn’t seem real. Unfortunately I was feeling sick which is a side effect of the drugs so my husband took our little girl while I retched and was stitched up. I was breast feeding in recovery and then suddenly desperate for a Kit-Kat that my mum ran off to find!
One thing for me was that I didn’t have the huge rush of emotion that most mums seem to have when they meet their baby for the first time. I think that’s to do with the fact that I didn’t have the hormonal changes someone in labour has. But in the middle of the night 15 hours later when it was just me and my little girl – that’s when I got it and all was right with the world.
Read more about tokophobia:
Experience: I am afraid of pregnancy, The Guardian, 17 April 2015
Tokophobia: The women who are afraid of pregnancy and childbirth, The Independent, 5 January 2017