My baby’s cord was tied round her neck – but cold way I was treated after left me traumatised, says Kristina Rihanoff
THOUSANDS suffer PTSD after going through difficult births, according to a new report.
Today, mums tell Alex Lloyd and Kate Skelton how they were let down by poor maternity care.
After more than 19 hours of excruciating contractions, dancer Kristina Rihanoff was relieved to finally have baby daughter Mila in her arms.
But the former Strictly professional also felt shattered by a birth that was terrifying and incredibly painful.
“It was a very long and exhausting labour because she had the cord tied around her neck,” recalls Kristina, 46, who is engaged to Mila’s dad, retired rugby player Ben Cohen, 45.
“I was pushing for hours without pain relief and my body sort of went into shock, I had a high temperature.
“The doctors said I might need a caesarean but she ended up being delivered using forceps.
Bleeding heavily
“I just wanted her to be safe and was so glad she was, but the trauma came with what happened afterwards.”
Kristina had needed a small cut called an episiotomy to help deliver Mila in June 2016, which required stitches.
“It was hot weather, I was run down and they did not heal well,” she says.
“I couldn’t sleep, I was in pain and got an infection. But I felt like nobody really wanted to help.
“It was emotionally difficult, I was crying all the time.
“I had no reassurance about whether the cord being around Mila’s neck had done long-term damage.
“Worrying about it kept me awake at night when I really needed to rest.”
Sadly, Kristina’s story isn’t unique.
An estimated 30,000 women a year in the UK suffer such negative experiences giving birth that they develop post-traumatic stress disorder.
Others suffer life-changing injuries, postnatal depression or become too scared to have further children.
Tory MP Theo Clarke was one of them.
Following a “terrifying” 40-hour labour at Royal Stoke University Hospital in Staffordshire in August 2022, she underwent a two-hour operation without general anaesthetic to repair a tear.
She spent a week in hospital recovering, and the lack of aftercare spurred her to make an emotional speech in Parliament in October 2022.
It was the trigger for a landmark birth trauma inquiry earlier this year, which heard heart-wrenching testimony from 1,300 women about being left lying in blood-soaked sheets, denied pain relief and feeling suicidal.
The findings were published yesterday with a cross-party committee of MPs calling for an overhaul of maternity services, including recruitment of more midwives, antenatal classes offered by every NHS trust and universal access to maternal mental health services.
The report, called Listen To Mum, also recommends installing a new maternity care commissioner, separate six-week postnatal check-ups for all mothers, digitised health records and national access to Birth Reflections services, offering a safe space to discuss what happened.
Further measures include extending the time limit for medical negligence litigation relating to childbirth from three to five years and tackling inequalities in maternity care for black and Asian women.
Theo, 38, MP for Stafford, says: “My birth experience opened my eyes.
“I spent 40 hours in labour, had a third-degree tear, haemorrhaged and started to bleed heavily.
“I got rushed into emergency theatre, was separated from my daughter and the experience was hugely traumatising.”
Theo, who was able to access counselling through a perinatal mental health charity, says it wasn’t until she spoke in Parliament that she realised the scale of the problem.
She says: “It quickly became clear there was a national, systemic problem with poor aftercare for mothers. It’s a real postcode lottery.”
Among those who gave evidence was Siri Ahir, 29, from Stourbridge, West Mids, who delivered her daughter Athena, with partner Ryan, 30, a senior buyer, eight months ago.
Siri, a counsellor, was induced at 37 weeks because her baby was too small but was left lying in her broken waters for eight hours and even told off by a midwife for vomiting.
She had an emergency C-section. “No one told us what was going on, we didn’t know if she would be OK,” she says. “Afterwards I felt pressure to breastfeed when I was sick, dizzy and couldn’t feel my legs.”
It has taken Siri months to recover from the “horrendous” experience.
“It was hard to bond and I have flashbacks to the birth,” she says.
“There was a lack of communication, a lack of care. I felt like an inconvenience.
“I always wanted two children, but because of my experience, I will not have another baby, which is sad.”
Stacey Hewitt, 33, also spoke to MPs about her March 2020 birth, which left her with flashbacks after she lost more than four pints of blood.
‘I felt like a failure’
The home stylist from Newcastle, who lives with civil servant partner Dan, 34, had a high-risk pregnancy due to epilepsy and was a week overdue when she went to hospital for an induction.
She says: “I didn’t feel like they wanted me there and I found the midwives dismissive and patronising.”
At one point, a doctor giving Stacey an internal examination took a phone call with her other hand.
Stacey was taken to theatre for the delivery of her baby by forceps, but she suffered an injury and haemorrhaged.
She says: “I remember two people arguing over how much blood to give me. It was scary.
“Afterwards, I was struggling to sleep and feeling unwell. No one came to help me take a shower.”
It took Stacey a long time to recognise she was suffering with PTSD.
She says: “I couldn’t stop thinking about the birth, my mental health would spiral. I felt like a failure.”
Stacey has had counselling and eye movement desensitisation and reprocessing to help cope with the trauma.
She says: “It wasn’t just my birth that caused the PTSD, it was the lack of aftercare on the postnatal ward.”
Dr Kim Thomas, CEO of the Birth Trauma Association and author of the report, hopes it will be a “wake-up call” for policymakers and the NHS.
She says: “Birth trauma affects their relationship with their partner, their ability to bond with their baby and, in many cases, their ability to work.”
Theo Clarke is encouraged that the Secretary of State for Health, Victoria Atkins, and NHS England chief executive Amanda Pritchard say the report’s 12 proposals will be adopted in full.
But change isn’t just about more money. “It’s partly about culture,” says Theo.
“After coming out of surgery, my daughter was screaming and when I pressed the buzzer for help, a nurse came in and said ‘not my baby, not my problem’. That is not acceptable.”
