A traumatic event is an event that causes an individual experience intense feelings of terror, horror, helplessness or hopelessness. For some this event can be something that occurs during childbirth, whether it be feelings of being dismissed by caregivers, unnecessary interventions, lack of communication from staff. Physical injury to mother or baby, uncontrollability of the events,, admission to special care or NICU, fear of unnecessary procedures, premature birth.… anything that leaves a mother experiencing feelings of helplessness, hopelessness, terror or horror in any aspect of her birth.

Trauma itself is a psychological, emotional, physiological response to an event or an experience that is deeply distressing or disturbing for that individual. It is a state of high arousal in which normal coping mechanisms are overwhelmed in response to the perception of threat. Trauma involves PERCEIVED threat.

If a mother or father perceives any part of the birth as threatening the safety of the mother or her baby, a state of high arousal may ensue.

In normal everyday events, our brain receives information from the outside world via our senses, this moves toward the amygdala to blend up and distribute to other areas of the brain. One of these is the thalamus, and the other is the pre-fontal cortex. It’s the thalamus’s job to sense imminent threat, and if threat is sensed, it sends an instant message other areas of the brain to recruit the stress hormone system and the SNS (sympathetic nervous system) to orchestrate a whole body response (fight, flight or freeze). Cortisol release increases, heart rate increases, blood pressure rises, all preparing the body to respond. Very soon after the thalamus receives this information, the pre-fontal cortex does too. It acts as the overseer, objectively and rationally looking at the situation unfolding. If it detects that there is in fact NO real threat, or when the danger has passed, it communicates to the amygdala to calm down, returning the body to its normal state.

In the case of a mother or father affected by birth trauma, this can be very different. Certain areas of the brain can be physiologically changed. The amygdala can begin to misinterpret whether a situation is dangerous or safe. The pre-fontal cortex that allows us to objectively view situations/thoughts/feelings may be inhibited, engaging the body’s flight/fight/freeze response when it is not needed. Emotional, survival mode remains on, without a real threat of danger. In trauma, the critical balance between these areas of the brain shifts dramatically, making it harder for an individual to control how they manage emotions. The body is quite literally misinterpreting information, sensing danger and reacting. Mothers may begin to be hypervigilant about their baby’s safety within the home. They may dissociate and withdraw from what is going on around them, including their baby. Become intolerant to loud noises, enraged by small frustrations, freezing with touch because everything is sensed as a threat. Postnatal depression, postnatal anxiety, PTSD. All coping mechanisms for dealing with trauma.