"Without them I would have really struggled"

At 41+3 i was induced using the cooks balloon, two days later after a long labour, an infection and a previous c section scar rupture which resulted in an emergency section my baby was placed in SCBU.

Over the next few weeks, there were further complications including sever jaundice, tongue tie, ductal thrush, challenges breastfeeding, cracked nipples and my toddler who was very distressed.

Even after getting home, I was really struggling to cope with what we had been through and would experience intrusive thoughts about my birth experience taking over my day to day life, uncontrollable cry, distress and the inability to talk about what i had experienced, overprotection of my children and horrid nightmares that would prevent me from sleeping.

It was suggested to me by a midwife that I should speak to someone. My health visitor then referred to the Perinatal Mental Health Team. Donna was incredible from the minute she got in touch. My husband came with me to some appointments and some I attended just myself and my baby. Donna always listened with such care.

She allowed us time to talk through what had happened and then went back through our badger notes (of which there were hundreds) to put together a timeline of what had happened. This meant that we could match our thoughts with what had been recorded. This helped us to understand why some things had happened the way they did and it allowed us to see where we still had question about what and why certain things had happened.

When it came to our debrief Donna offered to be there. This was an incredible support as she was able to help us convey our questions to the consultants, help us interpret their responses (often quite medical) and offer support when at times I was too emotional to even express what I wanted to say. Donna always checked with us what our thoughts and feeling were and made us feel like these were valid.

There were further investigations into my birth experience which results in policy changes, mostly in connection to the cooks balloon. Knowing that the policy changes could help some mums to be in the future does help me move forward from this experience.

Without Donnas support I would have been unable to ask these challenging questions and I believe would have felt much more anger, disappointment and fear about my birth experience.

Donna also referred me to Doug who again was very kind, listened and could offer explanations as to why I may be feeling or responding as I was. He suggested that I try EMDR therapy, he explained in detail what it was and how it worked. I was keen to try it there and then and I am delighted that it had such a positive effect on me so instantly.

It was not pleasant having to revisit my birth experience thoughts and feelings however with this therapy and Dougs lifelike / practical explanations of why my thoughts were making me response in the way i was, it gave me a greater understand and brought control of my thoughts and feelings back to me. I am quite amazed to say that I only needed two sessions with Doug. I cannot thank Donna and Doug enough for all their help and support.

Without them I would have really struggled to move past those intrusive thoughts and as a result would not have been able to enjoy my children as much as I can now. Thank you.