Not sure if I belong here...

[aliss]

I feel sort of lost on this board sometimes because my son was injured during the birth and still has complications from it - but he doesn't seem to fit in to any other category.

He was born with shoulder dystocia - basically, the shoulder impacts the mother's bone when the head is coming out and the baby gets stuck. Most babies are pulled out fine. Other complications are clavicle (collarbone) fractures, erb's palsy (the impacted arm), cerebral palsy, and death from oxygen deprivation.

He had the least serious of the major complications - multiple clavicle fractures (these are actually intentional to avoid the other complications). We've been through hell with feeding issues, frequent pain associated to his left arm (severe colic too), traumatic fear of things that remind him of this pain (he screeches in fear when he sees my breast - we attempted breastfeeding which impacted his fractures even moreso) etc. We are even putting him through physical therapy for it, cranial osteopathy, we've spent thousands on trying to fix this.

The good part is that this is believed to be temporary. I'm not sure how long though - our doctors said 5-7 days and we are going on over 4 months.

Hope you don't mind. I guess I need a place where other people understand what it is like to deal with something that isn't common. I still remember seeing his first x-rays, the student x-ray tech looking at it in horror and whispering, and thinking "WHY him? What did he ever do to deserve this?".

 

[Emmea12uk]

You poor thing. It is truely awful to see them in pain and not be able to help. It must all be so traumatic for you. I really hope that in time he forgets his pain. They are pretty resilient little things and it is unlike a newborn to remember and associate anything with pain. Hugs to you xx

 

[angelstardust]

Sounds horrible for you both!

All I can say is that all the pain you are going through now will be worth it in a few years time. You do eventually make peace with it and move on.

Beyond that... I have hugs.

 

[kelzyboo]

It's awful what you and your son are going through, hopefully it is temporary but it doesn't make you feel any better does it x

Don't really know anythings about it so i'm just sending Hugs, and keeping my fingers crossed it works out in the end.

Take care, you will always be listened to if you ever need a good old rant on here, think most of us have gone through a "Why my child?" phase but just writing it here seems to help me and everyone's so friendly and supportive, no one is ever judged hope this helps you too xx

 

[aliss]

Thanks very much ladies, everyone has different backgrounds & stories. I'm still going through the "why my child" phase which sometimes I also feel guilty about as I know it could have been much worse. I guess I flip flop between anger and guilt. His injury was a combination of medical malpractice (improper induction(s) and improper monitoring), a labour that lasted 3 days, and fetal size. I still have a lot of anger towards the hospital as I told them that things were "not right" with the effect of the induction and I was consistently ignored.

 

[siobhan89]

my daughter was born this way to she had a shoulder dystocia birth , her arm was broken and a fratured clavicle and dislocated shoulder ....her arms recovered really well though now were dealing with the problem of erbs palsy as her other arm was distroyed to .She was starved of oxygen or 9 minutes was born basically dead but they brought her back so to speak so we were very lucky in that respect .....only thing is becasue she got stuck and the oxygen she lost she could potentially be "brain damaged" she spent about 7 days on a morphine dip becasue the pain was immense for her , thankfully babys bones heal really quick ....its horrible going into hospital knowing your baby is perfect inside you and thinking nothing will go wrong i felt well out of my depth with all the problems and future care she has to have but it does get better and you come to terms with it ...at the minute she just acting like a normal baby no signs of any brain damage which is really good

 

[aliss]

my daughter was born this way to she had a shoulder dystocia birth , her arm was broken and a fratured clavicle and dislocated shoulder ....her arms recovered really well though now were dealing with the problem of erbs palsy as her other arm was distroyed to .She was starved of oxygen or 9 minutes was born basically dead but they brought her back so to speak so we were very lucky in that respect .....only thing is becasue she got stuck and the oxygen she lost she could potentially be "brain damaged" she spent about 7 days on a morphine dip becasue the pain was immense for her , thankfully babys bones heal really quick ....its horrible going into hospital knowing your baby is perfect inside you and thinking nothing will go wrong i felt well out of my depth with all the problems and future care she has to have but it does get better and you come to terms with it ...at the minute she just acting like a normal baby no signs of any brain damage which is really good

Wow, I think you are the first mom here who I saw had SD with complications too. I'm sorry your baby girl's SD complications were so severe. She sure seems like a little fighter!!!! Glad to hear she is doing great.

Did you have labour complications that resulted in the SD or was it a very straightforward labour???

 

[siobhan89]

i was induced due to a liver problem was in hospital for about 3 days started with the tablets then on the third day i got my waters broke...Im not sure weather what happened to olivia could have been avoided or not but i know there was problems with me throught my labour like high blood pressure , tempature etc ...and it wasnt untill i went into hospital that someone mentioned i was having a big baby , and i kept saying to them are you sure ill be able to deliver ok , i just had this feeling , plus my pelvis was in a lot of pain through my labour and they kept saying its a contraction and i knew it wasnt but they kept ijnoringme , i guess i was right ...i think my case is a mixture of them doing what they had to do to get her out and medical negligence casue i was lead to believe that only one of her shoulders got stuck which was the arm that was broken , so really she shouldnt have the erbs palsy


so has your babys arm not repaired properly yet ?

 

[aliss]

Interesting, I found some similarities too. I was also induced (GBS+ waters leaked for a few days) and it took 3(!) times for them to break the waters properly. I also stated things weren't right during my contractions (I didn't feel a thing even though I had zero pain meds), my labour was nearly 4 days long. Apparently prolonged induction is a contributing factor. Does sound like some negligence as both arms should not be injured?? Is the erb's palsy on the non-impacted side? I think it could also be a case of them panicking as well, as it's quite the emergency, especially with oxygen starvation for such a long time.

His arm is doing okay, he still experiences some pain from time to time, I find he has a lot of emotional trauma associated to that and feeding. He screams at the sight of the breast, he fears it. Originally they did not think there was anything wrong with the shoulder (???) so he was forced onto the breast, injuring him further. No pain meds. It wasn't until the next day that they realized something was wrong and then the OBGYN sent in a pediatrician to confirm the fractures. Unbelievable as they KNEW they did it intentionally when it happened.

 

[siobhan89]

unbelievable!! so they knew they fractured his arm and still forced him on ya so to speak without checking him over ...what a load of idiots...olivia was in there constant care for 9 days yet it was me who found the erbs palsy in her arm when she was released to me , and im sure there supposed to do a head to toe check , yes it was the opposite arm that didnt get stuck thats got the erbs palsy

have you tried searching on the internet about shoulder dystocia births ive read a couple of other peoples storys its nice to know there people who understand this kind of birth and your not alone

have you made a complaint or anything

 

[aliss]

I can't believe you were the one to find erb's, that is one of the first things they check for after an SD delivery!! Yes I've read a few online, yours is def one of the more severe ones although thank god both of us still have our LO's as death can certainly result.

I haven't made a complaint, I think I'm just starting to come to terms with it now as it really affected me badly, the first few months were a living hell as he would cry 20 hours a day (it's like he didn't have the concept of anything but pain). I think it was a big factor in PND. How bout you?

 

[Newt]

OMG poor babies, and poor mums, I cannt imagine what it must be like to go through this. You're all so brave

 

[siobhan89]

No i havnt made a complaint , ive been told to make a claim but im not sure ..i think ill wait and see if she is affected when she is older if she ends up with learning difficulties then i might take it further because i want her to live a comfortable life dont wnat her stuck on benfifits cause she cant get a job or anything

Yeah id had her for about 10 mins and i noticed it , id also been given the news that day that she had an abnormal mri scan so it was a lot to take in with everything else
Thank god she is ok and alive but on other hand im always gonna be worried if she making her milestones and worry about her future etc , i always wanted about 3 or 4 kids but im not sure now id be terrorfied if i got pregnant again , becasue of the risk that sort of birth casues the baby , i think the only reason i got strong about it was because i read other people storys and looked on the bright side i guess

is your lil one having some sort of therapy then ?