These women weren't aware of the inquiry into ACT maternity services until it was too late to make submissions. Now, they are sharing their harrowing stories.

Warning: This story contains content some people may find distressing.

'She burnt both of his feet'

Like more than a dozen women the ABC spoke to, mother-of-three Claire Pearce said she was not aware of an ACT Legislative Assembly committee examining the care, and sometimes mistreatment, of mothers and newborns at Canberra's public hospitals.

Ms Pearce said she learned about the maternity inquiry too late to make a submission, and that it was advertised improperly. She was concerned that she, and many like her, were not given an adequate chance to have their say.

But the committee has resisted calls to reopen submissions, and women like Ms Pearce have warned its recommendations could be meaningless due to its poor community engagement.

Ms Pearce said her troubles began during her four-day labour when staff called her "lazy" and blamed her for causing the delivery to take so long.

"You have this faith that the people who know will look after you," she said.

"You think because they're delivering babies all the time there'd be a certain level of empathy and care."

She said no one had checked her baby's position and noticed that he was posterior, which was the source of her pain and inability to move.

After an emergency caesarean delivery, hospital staff took her newborn's blood for testing.

"At one point, he had nine [needle] holes in one foot and 13 in the other. I mean, they had to do the tests, I understand that," she said.

Staff then used a heat pack to promote the baby's blood flow but Ms Pearce said it was scalding hot and left on his legs for too long.

"He was screaming and extremely distressed," she said.

"She actually burnt both of his feet and he had bandages up to his calves because of the burns."

Her son was jaundice and dehydrated. As a result, he was moved to the neonatal intensive care unit, where Ms Pearce visited to try to breastfeed him. But he was uninterested in her milk.

She eventually discovered he was being fed formula mistakenly. When she told staff, she said that a syringe — to her horror — was put in a feeding tube to pull the formula back out of the newborn.

But she said the worst problem was the lack of communication, which meant it was days before she knew the extent of the birth's trauma.

"I didn't know until there was a handover and I was half asleep," she said.

"A nurse was talking to another nurse, saying, 'This lady has second-degree, almost third-degree tearing, she's had an episiotomy, she's had post-partum infections, this and this and this, and we're giving her this medication for this issue.'

"I just said, 'Excuse me, are you talking about me?' No one had actually given me a debrief or anything."

Birth on a bathroom floor

A first-time mother told the ABC she felt contractions, phoned Canberra Hospital and was told to come to the maternity ward. But when she arrived, despite her high-risk pregnancy, she said staff insisted she go home because her cervix was not dilated enough.

She refused because she felt she was close to giving birth. And she said it was good that she ignored the advice.

"If I had decided to leave, I'm pretty sure I would've had the baby in the car or at home," she said.

Her labour progressed rapidly and she said the birth took place largely unassisted in a hospital bathroom.

Staff were only present for the final few minutes.

"When the waters broke and the baby was coming out, nobody was there. I had to ask my husband to call them. He had to go three times," she said.

"I was very lucky my husband was there. He could see the baby coming."

The woman said she was on her hands and knees and her husband placed a towel on the bathroom floor in case the baby fell onto the ground.

But she said she knew she was also meant to have had intravenous antibiotics four hours before going into labour to help stop her baby contracting a bacterial infection from her vagina.

"I was in the bathroom and on the floor when the baby was coming out. I couldn't move from there," she said.

"I didn't know if I had to push. But I knew he shouldn't go through because there was a risk for him without the antibiotics."

After the stressful bathroom-floor delivery, the new mother said she felt further ignored by staff. She was "in the bed with all the blood and everything for four hours after having the baby".

She stayed three days to ensure her baby had not contracted an infection and said the care in that time drastically improved.

Though, when she reflected on the experience, she wondered if she was originally disregarded because of her ethnicity.

"I keep maybe thinking that, if I was an Australian lady, that might not have happened … I just don't know why I was ignored," she said.

'No one gave me any information'

Sarah Wilson said she suppressed the memory of her son's birth for months. When she eventually sought help, she was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder and anxiety.

"I wasn't cared for properly and I don't think my baby was either," she said.

"I felt like I didn't know what was going on. It was all out of my control.

"No one gave me any information about the baby being stuck, so I felt like I didn't get a choice in what steps they would take."

After 44 hours of labour, Ms Wilson thought her son would be delivered via emergency caesarean.

But she said staff decided to use forceps without consulting her.

After the birth, she said staff pressured her relentlessly to breastfeed and forced her baby on her until her "nipples were split open and bleeding".

However, her newborn was unable to feed due to a lip and tongue tie, which she said staff also failed to diagnose.

She claimed much of the hospital care was impersonal — merely ticking boxes — and she was sent home too early, before she was able to care for her son.

"We got discharged two-and-a-half days afterwards … I'd been in labour for 44 hours, I hadn't slept in three days, my baby couldn't latch on, I couldn't feed," she said.

"I think a lot of it is the perception that we just have to get the baby out in one piece. I don't think a thought goes to the mother who is going through that experience."

'I have no sensation down there'

One mother told the ABC she was left with "permanent nerve damage" and "loss of sensation" in her vagina after a vacuum-assisted delivery. She said the potential complications were never explained to her and she was left to look up her condition afterwards.

"It's a side-effect, it can happen, but it wasn't explained. It was just 'we're going to do this'," she said.

"I have virtually no sensation down there anymore, and there is nothing I can do about that. So sexually, there's nothing and that's a huge deal to me.

"It's an awful thing to know that, for the rest of your life, it's not going to get any better."

The mother, who asked not to be named, returned to Calvary Public Hospital for the birth of her second baby, where she said she again haemorrhaged and had second-degree tearing.

This time, she said she was stitched up by a student doctor who told her she was "as good as new".

Months later, she said she felt something was very wrong and sought medical advice elsewhere. She said she was told the stitching was done improperly and left unstitched in parts, resulting in a deficient perineum.

The mother said she was disappointed the inquiry into maternity services in Canberra would not hear about her experience.

She said she wanted to ensure that its recommendations were meaningful.

"If you want a real inquiry, you need to give people the opportunity to hear about it," she said.

Do you want to share your story? Email roy.tahlia@abc.net.au



'I attempted suicide after two weeks'

One Canberra mother said she felt like she was "on fire" during induced labour. After the birth she said she fell through the cracks and nearly lost her life.

The woman told the ABC a midwife had diagnosed her with postnatal depression when she was discharged, but she said follow-up care stopped after a fortnight.

The mother said she felt like a failure after the birth for being unable to keep her sex drive, house clean, child quiet and marriage healthy.

"I did attempt suicide shortly after the two weeks of the midwife was up because I felt nothing for my child beyond caring for her needs and nothing for myself," she said.

Her depression was prolonged. She tried to take her life again a year later.

But she said that, by then, she had connected with a mothers' group and was aware of a postnatal depression service. She called Lifeline.

She said she received amazing care from the service and help from other mothers. After ongoing treatment, she was mentally well enough to connect with her baby, and look after herself and her one-year-old daughter.

She hopes sharing her story will help improve follow-up care for mothers diagnosed with postnatal depression.

'Surgery was pushed on me'

Another mother said staff at Canberra Hospital left her feeling "violated, small and disrespected".

The woman, who works in hospitals, said every interaction she had with staff during her pregnancy and delivery "was a fight". She believed this was because she was over 40 years old and wanted a vaginal birth after caesarean section (VBAC).

"I had done my research and attended a VBAC class the hospital runs. But despite this, I had staff pressuring me to have a c-section all the way through," she said.

The mother said she had no continuity of care and "never saw the same member of staff twice". This left her stressed; she felt she needed to convince staff constantly that she "really was going to try for a VBAC".

She said her birth plan was "basically ignored" and "surgery was pushed on [her]" at every opportunity.

"I felt like staff read each point and made an effort to ensure it didn't happen," she said,

"My voice wasn't heard and no one was trying to help me."

Following the publication of this story, the health, ageing and community services committee released a statement saying it would accept late submissions to its inquiry.

More information on the inquiry and the committee is available on the ACT Legislative Assembly's website.

Canberra Health Services did not respond directly to the questions put to it by the ABC.

In a statement, Canberra Health Services said hospitals and clinical staff strove to provide "the best possible birthing services" and to do so in a "compassionate and supportive way".

The statement said Canberra Health Services welcomed the inquiry and the "conversation in the community" on the ways it could improve maternity services.

"While the feedback in relation to patients' experience of treatment in ACT public maternity services is overwhelmingly positive, what we have heard through the inquiry is that this is not everyone's experience," it said.

"Canberra Health Services acknowledge there is further work to do to ensure consistent access to the best care and support for women and families.

"We actively seek and welcome feedback from patients directly and encourage all women to share their experiences so we can continue to work in partnership to improve."

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