I think you have to treat every woman on an individual basis, and that it also depends on the stage of labour that the woman is at when you become involved in her care.

If I start to look after a woman while she is still relatively early on in her labour, I will ask about her pregnancy and her previous experiences of birth, as this can often help me to provide better care for her in labour. I've often found that where a woman has had a previous traumatic experience, it relates to a particular aspect of her care - such as 'no-one told me what was going on' or 'no-one listened' or 'the room was suddenly full of people I didn't know and no-one told me why', which is easy to tackle sensitively - you'd be surprised how many people who are traumatised by a previous birth experience feel this way because of lack of information or lack of control, rather than because of what actually happened. It can also useful to talk about the labour when the woman has had a previous NND, because you are acknowledging her previous baby and previous experience, many women who experience a stillbirth report it hard to cope because people don't want to talk to them about it.

When I take over the care of a woman who is already is established labour, the time for long conversations is usually past, and I would care for the woman as any other labouring woman. I think if I was aware that someone had had a previous traumatic time, I would go out of my way to keep things as calm as possible, but I tend to do this anyway, with low lighting etc.

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Love Dory xxx
Just keep swimmin', just keep swimmin'....

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