Birth Trauma is in the Eye of the Beholder

www.youtube.com/watch?v=2dsCmWZ0V_UCheryl Beck (2018) shares that up to 45% of new mothers have reported experiencing birth trauma and adds that “birth trauma is in the eye of the beholder.” Indeed, if a birthing person experiences or perceives that they and/or their baby were in danger of injury or death during childbirth, their birth can be defined as traumatic–psychologically, physically, or both (even if others present may have perceived it as routine.) Common themes present in those who have shared traumatic birth narratives include:

1. Perception of lack of caring or respect
2. Poor communication
3. Feelings of powerlessness and lack of control

UK based art therapist Susan Hogan (2008) explores how perceptions of control/consent and biochemical factors can impact experience. She asserts, “women’s expectations of maintaining control over their own bodies and an important symbolic event [childbirth]… are frequently bulldozed. The incredible anger women feel after having had a ‘bad’ birth is not always mitigated by the presence of a healthy child.  Some women are simply too exhausted or traumatized to be able to enjoy their infant…” Unwanted medical interventions can also stir up similar feelings of violation as being sexually assaulted, especially for those with a trauma history. A recent episode of the mini-series “Fleishman is in Trouble” reinforced this phenomenon when featuring an incident of obstetric violence that contributed to a new mother’s traumatic birth experience, and subsequently her struggle with a perinatal mood and anxiety disorder and difficulty connecting with both her newborn and herself in the mother role.
     Art-making and creative processing can provide a symbolic container of overwhelming experiences, helping with the reconstruction of fragmented memories and emotional responses. Wolf & King (2020) summarize how art therapy “facilitates the organization and integration of traumatic memories, reactivates positive emotions, serves as a vehicle for exposure and externalization of difficult content, and reduces heightened arousal responses.” Art therapist Swan-Foster (2020) poignantly asks, “What if we viewed pregnancy and birth through a lens of cultural humility and feminism that honors a woman’s desire to have control of herself throughout pregnancy and birth while holding the knowledge that these experiences may be out of control and traumatic?” As trauma is so often stored in the body or in the mind as imagery, art therapy helps to navigate between these polarities and honors the “gray” area of personal experience. Learn more and experience how intuitive artmaking and creative processing can help perinatal professionals and birthing folk creatively cope with trauma experiences at the upcoming virtual conference "Healing Traumatic Birth: Tools and Techniques from Psychodrama, Dance, and the Expressive Arts" via PATTCH.


Post by Sharon Itkoff Nacache ATR-BC LCAT LPAT PMH-C
Original photo by Patricia Prudente via Unsplash

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