These are 4 of the most common birthing side effects that no-one talks about

Recently we had an amazing chat with Sophie Walker, founder of the Australian Birth Stories Podcast on our own One Fine Baby podcast, the ‘Cold Coffee, Hot Mess’ Podcast (have you listened yet? You definitely should!)

Anyway, the chat was amazing. It highlighted so many of the decisions we go through as birthing parents. Public or private? Vaginal birth of caesarean? The options are endless, and the journey there? A minefield.

With so much to wade through, it’s up to us to do our due diligence and obtain the knowledge, as generally, 15 minutes with a GP won’t arm you with everything you need to advocate for yourself and your dream birth.

Yes, I said ‘dream birth. Before recording this podcast, this was a term I was not familiar with. I assumed everyone just did whatever they could to ‘survive’ their birthing story, and though a rare few found it an enlightening experience, I had no idea so many more than I realised got to experience that.

So, aside from the fact that birth can be amazing, there were also a few other things I’ve realised since our chat are incredibly common, but far less talked about.

What are they? Let me tell you:

1. Prolapse

Did you know, it’s not normal to pee a little bit when you sneeze, cough, or jump on the trampoline? Many women suffer with this post-birth and write it off as completely normal. It’s not completely normal. Uterine prolapse occurs when weakened or damaged muscles and connective tissues such as ligaments allow the uterus to drop into the vagina.

Anal and vaginal prolapse are two potential side effects of birthing that so many people suffer with, but very rarely talk about. The scale for prolapse is large, so it can be hard to determine whether you just need to say a women’s physiotherapist, or at the other end of the spectrum, require surgery.

2. Epidurals can slow down labour

Many people don’t realise going into the birth that having an epidural can actually slow down the birth. There is nothing wrong with this of course, but it means the pace you’ve been experiencing can come to a grinding halt. This can feel a little disarming in the moment, because it can delay things extensively.

3. Infection

There are many reasons infection can occur during birth - and while not all of them are serious, they do require monitoring and intervention from doctors and midwives if necessary. In my person circumstance, my daughter released a meconium poo during birth, which caused a minor infection for me. I began to feel very cold, and couldn’t get warm, so the doctors had to intervene to bring my daughter into the world faster.

4. Poop!

Speaking of poop, it’s something you should expect to happen during the birthing process. Weirded out? Don’t be. It’s perfectly normal for so many women. When you’re pushing that hard for so long, it’s no wonder that you push out anything at all that could be ready to come out! The midwives and nurses are so well trained in this that you won’t even know it’s happened, they clean it up and get it out of there so fast - no-one even notices!