"there was absolutely no empathy given to any of the women in the ward where all the NICU mums were"

A mother’s experience of Oxford University Hospitals Maternity Services in 2023:

My story is from 2023 with the birth of my first and only baby. My pregnancy itself was very easy, I was only sick the one time and everything went as smoothly as it could until my due date arrived.

I was due on the 21st June 2023, the week following this I had 6 failed stretch and sweeps, this should really have been an inkling into what was to come but I just thought my little boy was just not ready.

I had conflicting results from the midwives at my own GP practice, Wallingford baby unit and MAU, all 3 told me different measurements of dilation. Wallingford said my waters were bulging, my own midwife said they weren't but I was 1cm dilated and MAU said it was all false. I didn't know who to believe.

Finally I was booked for an induction on 2nd July. My husband, mother and I arrived at the induction ward at 8:30pm as instructed to be told there were no delivery suites available and I was going to have to wait. This didn't bother me too much as I'd already waited this long, but we were then told only 1 person was allowed to stay with me.

I was fuming, not once had anyone ever advised me of this rule, I refused. I'd been told I was allowed 2 people with me and the 2 people I'd brought with me were staying with me. They argued back to say well they would not provide another chair and we had to make do with the bed and 1 chair. This meant the 3 of us were taking turns in standing, eventually my mum told me to get some sleep as it was nearly midnight and we still had not heard or seen a soul since arriving.

10 hours after arriving we were finally told a delivery suite had become available, it was just a normal suite not at the spires as I had requested. They had said none of the Spires rooms were available but I found out later on from a nurse on level 5 (had worked with her previously, the only nurse who was kind to me the whole stay) that all 3 Spires rooms were available but because I'm larger they made the decision that my birth was going to be traumatic so did not want me taking up the rooms which are for "easy" births.

So, we finally made it down to the delivery suites by this point it was now 7am on 3rd July. I'd been told straight away that they were going to break my waters, again I was fine with this and was happy for them to proceed. 3 hours later the midwife asked if the student she had with her could try to break them, sure I'm all up for teaching and leaning but I was advised she had done this many times and it would not be a problem.

After 20 minutes I had to get her to stop, I was in agony, the elder midwife then blamed me for having a thick amniotic sack, something that was completely out of my control. She then managed to break it on the 2nd try, finally my waters were broken. They said they would give it an hour, see if anything progressed, if not they would put me on the pitocin, I asked for 2 hours as I really did not want to go on the pitocin or get a cannula for that matter. I don't have a fear of needles but I've never had good experiences with cannulas being put in or taken out.

So 12pm came and I still had not progressed past 1cm dilated and at this point the midwives kept having trouble seeing on the monitor babies heart rate or when I was contracting so they kept constantly moving me into different positions which was increasingly uncomfortable.

As I had not progressed I didn't have a choice they started the pitocin. This was when I was told they always adjust the pitocin up by doubles so you start at 2 then up to 4 then 8 and so on until you get to 16 they then go to 24 and then to 32 with 32 being the highest. We started at 4 not 2 to my surprise but they advised it should speed things along. It definitely did, my contractions were now getting very strong and painful, but the midwives were still unable to properly see all of the contractions so kept having to ask me if I was even contracting.

It got frustrating very quickly.

Nothing of note really happened in the next 8 hours apart from the pitocin being upped to 32 by 8pm. This was when the midwives advised they wanted to put the heart rate tracker on my babies head, I had heard that this tracker was not a clip as previously advised but as little metal spiral that is actually put into your babies head.

I asked for an explanation and they explicitly told me that no, it was a clip and it would do no harm to my baby, so of course I allowed it, so his heart rate could be monitored. I now know they lied to me and it is as suggested, it's a metal coil that is screwed into the head of your baby. 10pm arrived, I'd been on 32 on the pitocin for 2 hours now and was only 4cm dilated, they told me they were going to leave it another 2 hours even after I'd said I was in too much pain and couldn't go any further, I got shouted at to either carry on or have an epidural there was nothing else they could do for me.

So finally, just before midnight I'd had enough and asked to see the anaesthesiologist to either have an epidural or an elected caesarean. I then spoke to the surgeon and anaesthesiologist together who both advised because I was bigger there were more risks involved, I must've asked near on 30 plus questions but they were amazing and answered every single one.

It was then time to be examined again, I was still 4cm, this meant again I didn't have a choice it was going to be an emergency caesarean as they could not leave me on the pitocin and it was too long since my waters broke to try for natural. By this point I had come to terms with this and was happy to just stop the pitocin.

Just gone 1am we were gowned up and ready to go... nope got sent back someone had to go ahead of me. Maybe an hour later again got up to head down, nearly got to theatre this time but no, sent back again. This happened another 2 times before finally at 6am on 4th July we were taken into theatre.

To begin with everyone in the theatre were amazing and could not fault then that is until I was numb from the neck down, led on the table and they started tipping me to the right. I said to the nurse I'm going to fall off, she said don't be silly you're fine. I told her again I'm going to fall off, low and behold I nearly fell off the table and they had to straighten the table to get me back into position.

My little boy was born at 07:20 weighing 10lb 10oz. He wasn't breathing to begin with but was given the cpap and eventually was fine, I didn't want to hold him not that I could of I was shaking so violently and being sick even after having anti sickness medication. But he was here, finally.

The surgeon was amazing, I just wanted to get out of theatre so he was doing a play by play for me, telling me which layer he was sewing and how many was left. He made the end of that experience so much nicer than I believe it would have been if not for him. So we were moved up to ward 2 after this where I finally got to see my mum again, we had cuddles and took some photos.

I was told I had to be careful as I had lost 1.25 litres of blood and my heart rate was quite high, I was just happy the whole ordeal was over and I now had my gorgeous baby.

This is not where my story ends unfortunately, a little while later we realised my baby would not feed, we did not know why.

They had said his body temperature was low and he needed to be taken to be put in an incubator to warm him up, of course I agreed and my husband went with him as I was still numb at this point. It wasn't until a couple of hours later my husband came back with our little boy that I realised I was still in all my bloody gown and bed sheets, I asked immediately to get them changed as it smelt really bad, they changed then reluctantly but did it.

We tried feeding again but my baby was having none of it he really didn't have any energy. This is when they took him again as they said he should be feeding by now, again my husband went with him and we then find out he actually has pneumonia!

Straight away he was put on oxygen and had a feeding tube put in. I unfortunately did not know any of this until my husband came back up to me on ward 2 to tell me what was going on, this was now nearly 4pm so nearly 9 hours since he was born. I made the mistake of asking how he could have gotten pneumonia to be told it was congenital. I had no idea what that meant so asked one of the nurses to which she so bluntly advised meant I had given it to him. This absolutely devastated me.

I honestly cannot fault the NICU team they were amazing and looked after my baby as if he was one of their own. Level 5 on the other hand were the worst set of people I have ever had the pleasure to meet. They were so unsympathetic to the ladies whose babies were down in the NICU. I was having a lot of trouble walking upright after the c-section but they would not give me any pain killers other than paracetamol that did nothing, I eventually had to get my own pain relief which my husband brought in for me.

It then came time for the dreaded discharge talk, I didn't understand how they could be so horrible to anyone let alone women who had babies down in the NICU, this didn't seem to matter to them, they needed the bed.

I at this point was bawling but the nurse carried on saying I need to sort out going home because I couldn't stay, I asked about Ronald McDonald house and was told in no uncertain terms due to living so close (20 miles) they wouldn't take me. She left after this, left me bawling my eyes out thinking I was going to have to leave my baby who was still on oxygen and a feeding tube.

The lady in the bed next to me took me down to see our babies as the NICU has no time limits so I stayed down there with my baby until my husband turned up the next morning. We then spoke to the SSNAP ladies and the NICU staff who put together the forms needed, with their help we managed to get a room in the Ronald McDonald house.

As said above the only nurse on level 5 I enjoyed speaking with was the lady I had previously worked with. One of the SSNAP ladies actually come up with me to get my stuff and had a word with the ward sister to advise there was absolutely no empathy given to any of the women in the ward where all the NICU mums were.

Everything from here went smoothly, he had medicine, he got stronger every day and eventually just under 2 weeks later we were able to take our baby home.

I put in a complaint pretty much straight away and got just a generic we have passed this on to the necessary people reply.

Nothing has ever come of it, I also did the birth reflections meeting but it honestly did not help at all.

I hope telling my story will maybe give me a little bit of closure.