'Childbirth left me terrified of sex': Few women ever discuss the mental and physical scars of traumatic births. Here, one brave mother breaks the taboo...



Lucy Wyatt, 34, from Essex, could not bear sex with husband John

Suffered horrific, painful births with children Henry and Emma

Had operations to correct double prolapse



The consultant was so curt and dismissive he made me feel as if my complaint was too trivial to warrant his attention.

'Plenty of women endure far worse than you and live with it,' he told me sharply. 'You can't expect your sex life to return to how it was. After all, you've had two children.'

I felt shocked, humiliated, horrified. I had not gone to hospital to grumble that I was too tired for sex, or didn't feel alluring in my best underwear any more.

I was there because childbirth had put an end to my sex life - completely.



Lucy Wyatt, 34, with her children Henry, three, and one-year-old Emma

For the 18 months after my daughter Emma was born in September 2011, I was not physically intimate with my husband John at all. The idea of sex appalled and terrified me.

In fact, sex had been practically non-existent since my son Henry was born two years before that. So much so it was nothing short of a miracle that Emma was conceived at all.

The reason? My horrific experiences of childbirth. Everything, it seemed, that could have gone wrong had gone wrong, on both occasions. I was a walking compendium of gynaecological disasters.

I suffered from such debilitating and embarrassing urinary incontinence, I was afraid to leave my home.

After Emma was born, I'd suffered a double prolapse - where the walls of the vagina and bowel become detached. It was horribly humiliating and painful - and definitely not a condition that puts a couple in the mood.

Small wonder, then, that I was terrified of the prospect of having sex with my beloved husband, John.

I might have accepted this accelerated decline into celibacy and physical decrepitude if I'd been 90. But I'm 34, and my husband 38, and we had enjoyed a happy sex life.

Yet I was made by the doctor to feel I was fussing needlessly; that to expect a resumption of my pre-baby sex life was as extravagant as it was selfish.

Lucy with her first child Henry when he was just born

Today, after extensive surgery, things in the bedroom are finally back on track. But nothing will ever erase those years of humiliation and pain I suffered. I am convinced millions of women have suffered similarly.

Online mothering forums are full of anonymous exchanges about sex lives and marriages ruined by the butchery of childbirth.

We know the exhaustion brought on by sleepless nights often delays the resumption of intimacy between parents. But what is much less well-documented is how much physical problems caused by childbirth can impact on a woman's sexual desires.

So why don't we talk about them? Because they are acutely embarrassing.

That is why I have decided to identify myself: I want to embolden other mothers to seek help and stand their ground as I did.

My trauma began when I had first child, Henry, in September 2009. Bringing him into the world was akin to a horror movie - I endured 36 hours in labour and countless stitches.

Back at our home in Essex, the pain from my stitches was excruciating. I couldn't sit down. Walking was agonising. Five weeks after Henry's birth, I could endure it no longer, and went to my GP.

She said that part of my vaginal wall had been incorrectly stitched outside my body.

'But you've had a baby. You can deal with pain. Just grip the side of the day-bed and I'll laser off the dead tissue,' she said blithely.

Now, I'm good at suffering in silence, but after the extraordinary pain of lasering I felt brutalised. I would recoil from John's touch, and couldn't imagine ever having sex again, let alone having another baby. When Henry was five months old, I sunk into a pit of depression. As a wife I felt inadequate and as a mother I believed I'd failed.

When Henry was five months old, I sunk into a pit of depression. As a wife I felt inadequate and as a mother I believed I'd failed.





One day I strapped Henry into his buggy and walked him to the park, where I remember looking at the lake and seeing a mother and child nearby.

I put the brake on the buggy and decided to leave Henry there. 'He'll be better off without me. The woman will see him and take him,' I thought as I walked purposefully away.

Then, thank goodness, a switch in my brain flipped. I walked back sharply to fetch Henry, then went straight to my GP's surgery. 'I need help,' I begged between sobs.

And it was then I began a course of counselling and antidepressants that signalled the slow haul back to normality.

Lucy and her husband John on their wedding day

Even so, the idea of having sex still appalled and scared me. John was endlessly understanding. But the longer I postponed intimacy, the more drab and unattractive I felt. I remember thinking that books on new parenthood never touched on the squeamish details of the disorders which can follow childbirth. We're led to believe the worst we should expect is a transitory spell of baby blues, after which mum and baby will bond.

But then, to my horror, I discovered that after this one encounter I was pregnant again. Fear and apprehension besieged me

It does not help, either, that celebrity magazines propagate the cruel myth that, weeks after giving birth, we snap back into shape and resume athletic sex lives.

It was 15 months before John and I attempted sex after Henry was born. John was gentle, and I was relieved that the experience was not as painful as I'd feared.

But then, to my horror, I discovered that after this one encounter I was pregnant again. Fear and apprehension besieged me.

I was right to be afraid; Emma's birth heralded a whole new set of disasters. For the last four months of the pregnancy, I had acute pelvic pain, and John and I did not have sex at all. I felt so inadequate as a wife, I even told John I'd understand if he had an affair.

John said he wouldn't dream of it. He reiterated his promise that he'd wait for as long as it took.

When Emma arrived, on September 9, 2011, the midwife was attentive and the birth relatively straightforward.

Lucy with Emma and Henry sitting in hospital on the day Emma was born

This time, however, I'd opted for an epidural. But that precipitated my problems with incontinence.

Soon after the birth, doctors told me I had suffered nerve damage which would be temporary. I was referred to a physiotherapist who gave me pelvic floor exercises, with limited success.

Irrationally, I'd even started blaming my baby daughter for the physical mess I found myself in



However, there was even worse to come: childbirth had also caused my uterus and my womb and bowel to prolapse. Nine months after my daughter was born, I was an incontinent prisoner in my home.

I lost interest in my appearance and put on weight. I was so frightened of sex, I even stopped being affectionate with John.

Irrationally, I'd even started blaming my baby daughter for the physical mess I found myself in. Finally, last year I could endure it no longer. I went to a different, female GP who was sympathetic and referred me to a gynaecologist.

It was he who told me, without a scintilla of understanding or kindness, that there is a price to pay for having kids, and this was it. I felt shocked, aggrieved; indignant. He made me feel as if my sex life was so inconsequential, I should not have troubled him about it.

Lucy Wyatt could not bear the thought of sex after her daughter Emma was born, and said she even started blaming her baby for what had happened

I said I wanted surgery to repair my prolapse and cure my incontinence. He countered that an operation could make it worse and might adversely affect my sex life.

But I had no sex life at all. How could it get any worse? I decided then I would have the operation, whatever the consequences.

I had the surgery in September last year. It was an uncomfortable experience but, four months later, John and I finally felt like a loving couple again.

The long-awaited event was unplanned. Henry and Emma were at nursery, when John and I decided to take a nap. Unexpectedly, we ended up making love.

John was tender and understanding. I remember being terrified it would hurt, then crying with relief and happiness when it didn't.

Nearly two months have elapsed and our lives have almost resumed their equilibrium. My incontinence has also improved markedly.

I have not resumed my job as a driving instructor, and intend, for the time being, to enjoy being a full-time mother at home in Clavering.