"Emergency C-Section experience affected my mental health"

Last year I attended Ayrshire Maternity unit after my waters breaking the previous day. After around three hours hooked up to a monitor I was examined and the midwife laughed and said "looks like you've wet yourself, you're not having a baby today" to me.

As a 29 year old, I am well aware of the difference between wetting myself and fluid gushing from my vagina, but I took her word for it and got ready to go home. As I was leaving I was told under no circumstances to come back to the unit until I had seen my obstetrician (appointment scheduled for the following morning). This was my first baby so I didn't know any better! Hindsight is a beautiful thing.

Later in the evening my contractions became unbearable, they were three minutes apart, so strong I was physically crying and I could not sleep, however I waiting until the following morning as per their instructions, where my partner had to physically carry me into Ayrshire central. The midwives took one look at me and ushered me back to the car and told me to go directly to AMU. Once there I was examined and around 6cm dilated and eventually put in a room. By this point I was exhausted and in agony. I was given gas and air and begged..begged.. for an epidural.

The epidural was sited, I calmed down and managed to regain some composure. Once examined it was established my baby was back to back and breech, however they wanted to get her to turn on her own and tried to encourage this. At various points through the day the baby's head was pricked with something to take a sample to check for her becoming distressed however she was fine.

After hours of no luck being able to turn her, I was advised by a doctor to start pushing. At this point I was pleading and crying for her just to section me as I did not feel remotely ready to push and I just knew she would never be born naturally. I feel the doctor dismissed me on numerous occasions despite being me being worked into a state.

After pushing for a while my baby got jammed, and it was then the doctors decision to take me to theatre to turn her using forceps.

I was wheeled to theatre, placed on the table and the obstetrician came in, took one look at me and said I needed to be sectioned now.  At this point I just knew this was going to go badly.

The c-section started fairly quickly, I was awake throughout. The feelings were what I anticipated, lots of pulling and tugging. I was being sick throughout as I had hyperemesis through pregnancy so why stop now eh?

The next minute I feel a pulling so severe I almost got moved off the table, I then started to feel a fair amount of pain and was aware that my baby was out. As she was being checked over the obstetrician put their head over the partition and was instructing the anaesthetist to "put me under" to which I was begging him not to. I could actually feel life draining out of me at this point, which sounds dramatic. My girl was placed in my partners arms for a moment and I told them under no circumstances to place me under as I genuinely felt like I would die and if I was, I was going to die looking at my partner and our baby.

The next few hours of surgery are a blur as I was fed morphine constantly through my drip, all I remember are the bright lights, people rushing around and an alarm going off with a tannoy asking for blood. I can remember a lot of slapping noises and I know now this was blood soaked material.

When I was eventually being wheeled from the theatre I asked the doctor (who had my blood on their face) where my daughter was, I was told that she was being checked over by her paediatrics ,y baby may have broken both her legs... I will never ever get that doctors face or those words out of my mind for as long as I live.

The obs and anaesthetist came to visit me in high dependency the following day to discuss "what went wrong" during my section. The conclusion was that due to my pushing my daughter had become lodged in the birth canal due to being inverted and was dying, the obs then had to pull her out by her hips/thighs. In doing so my diaphragm was ruptured, punctured my bowel and tore my uterus.

I have no lasting damage to my bowel and diaphragm however I was told I would not be able to carry a child to full term due to the damage my uterus suffered.

I was understandably kept in hospital for a while and during this time I was immobile, still being extremely sick and trying to breastfeed my newborn. The midwives in the ward were so impatient and rude when I had to buzz to have my baby lifted to me. On one occasion one of the midwives roughly grabbed my breast and practically rammed it down my daughters throat. On another, I was extremely sick on the floor trying to make it to the bathroom and the midwife's exact words were "oh for gods sake, could you not have made it to the toilet?"

Due to this whole ordeal I found it difficult to bond with my daughter. It was four months before I felt any form of connection with her whatsoever, and thankfully I can now say I love her with all my heart.

I have since been diagnosed with PTSD with severe anxiety and postnatal depression. I started a course of CBT last year and a few weeks ago I had to be placed on antidepressants as my mood was so low I genuinely felt I could not go on.

I am mortified beyond belief that this has happened to me and don't have anyone to talk to with it as no one would understand. I feel like a complete failure as a mother and my mental health is so fragile. I go to work every single day with a mask on, pretending to be a happy, together person and when I come home I am a horror. My relationship with my partner is suffering because of this.

Please, if anyone, anywhere can help me make sense of this I would greatly appreciate it.