Birth trauma

TW - c section/resuscitation

I’m 3 weeks post partum and I keep having flashbacks to my labour and it’s causing me distress. I laboured for about 17 hours on gas and air, then baby got stuck in my pelvis due to cervical lip being present. I ended up having an emergency c section and baby needed to resuscitated by a lot of doctors. I also then had a haemorrhage and almost slipped out of consciousness myself.

We are both absolutely fine now, and I know people go through difficult births all the time so I’m not looking for any sympathy, I was just wondering if others are having trouble dealing with it mentally and if there’s anything you did to make it better. I feel like I didn’t get enough information from the doctors/midwives about what went wrong and why, so I’m doing my own research online but it would’ve been nice to have this explained to me a bit more clearly at the hospital. The general response I got from the midwives was along the lines of “these things happen” or “lots of babies get stuck.” I have looked into whether my hospital has a “birth afterthoughts” service but I don’t think they do, and I’ve now been discharged from midwife care.

It makes me tear up when I think about it, and it’s genuinely made me question if I want any more children in future. I was certain that I do want another child one day, but the thought of going through labour again fills me with the most intense fear.