Meet the Wagga Wagga women exposing Australia’s birth trauma crisis

The mirage room at the Wagga Wagga RSL club is usually a pretty relaxed place. It typically hosts end-of-year functions for local soccer teams, Rotary Club meetings, and the annual Women in Business Wagga Wagga Catwalk to Carnival fashion show.

But when the NSW parliamentary inquiry into birth trauma held its most recent hearing on Tuesday, the atmosphere was suffocatingly formal. Seated at a long table in the centre of the mirage room, hemmed in on all sides by politicians, parliamentary staff, microphones, TV cameras and members of the public, women who have given birth at Wagga Wagga Base Hospital and other healthcare facilities in the Murrumbidgee Local Health District (LHD) spoke about the worst experiences of their lives.

Last year, 30 such women filed a joint complaint with the Health Care Complaints Commission (HCCC) detailing their experiences of birth trauma and obstetric violence before, during and after giving birth at Murrumbidgee LHD healthcare facilities.

Alongside efforts from similar groups of women in the Illawarra and across the state, growing media attention and public anger culminated in an inquiry in June. Advocates believe NSW is the first jurisdiction in the world to hold an inquiry into birth trauma.

Since that group complaint, the inquiry has received more than 4,000 submissions. The vast majority are anonymous testimonials from women whose birthing experience was turned from one of hope and anticipation into a living nightmare.

One witness, speaking anonymously because she was scared her daughter would see her testimony when she’s older, spoke off the cuff without a prepared written statement. She said she was discharged when she was five centimetres dilated, laboured at home alone for five days, and was afraid she would “give birth on the side of the road” on the way back to the hospital.

For her, however, the most traumatic experience came after her baby was born.

“The midwife grabbed my daughter, as I was bleeding heavily, and walked out of the room. About an hour went past and she returned, laughing that she had just given my baby to another woman. She had no tags on. She thought it was funny.

“I still look at my daughter and think: ‘I’m not sure’. No mother should ever have to fear that her baby is not hers. My girl’s going to grow up and have to go through birth. I don’t want my children to have children. Not in Australia.”

Despite all having experienced birth trauma or obstetric violence, witnesses took pains to give examples of healthcare staff supporting and advocating for them. One mother, Carmel Biddle, related how an obstetrician’s apology had allowed her to “heal” following the birth of her twins, during which the doctor had tried to take over the birth.

“He was quite an older obstetrician — I’m sure he’d seen many twins’ births — but it was literally the first time he’d ever seen a mother-led twin birth, a natural twin delivery with literally no interventions. He felt out of his depth and he was sorry that he didn’t trust me; I looked very young,” Biddle said. “It was an honest apology and it just made a huge difference.”

Sasha lives in the area, but she didn’t know about the original HCCC complaints until she read about them in the news. Her submission to the inquiry detailed how a midwife had continued with a painful pelvic exam even after Sasha had repeatedly told her to stop.

“Not only did she violate my trust, but she went against my consent and physically harmed me,” Sasha says.

Sasha said the midwife pressured her into a C-section, telling her to make a decision quickly because the surgeons were “knocking off at 3pm”.

Her concern that her C-section wound had become infected was ignored by medical staff until four weeks postpartum, when the stench of it was so strong it “filled the room”. Sasha had contracted necrosis and sepsis requiring another hospital stay.

Sasha did not attend the inquiry, as she is due to give birth to her second child. Her hopes for the inquiry process are very similar to those of the women who gave evidence, and those in many of the submissions.

“I want my story to be heard and to be taken seriously,” she says. “Hopefully that will mean better outcomes for all women in a maternity setting moving forward.”

“I don’t want anyone else to go through what I did.”

Speaking at the hearing, Murrumbidgee LHD CEO Jill Ludford offered an apology to women who had experienced birth trauma in the LHD’s care.

“I acknowledge the courage of the women who have bravely come forward to share their personal stories through this inquiry and the impact that birth trauma has had on their lives,” Ludford said.

“We are committed to listening and learning from what each person is telling us to build woman-centred maternity services that support holistic trauma-informed care.”

Do any of these testimonies resonate with you? Let us know by writing to letters@crikey.com.au. Please include your full name to be considered for publication. We reserve the right to edit for length and clarity.