Left in the Dark: Why You Didn’t Know Something Went Wrong During Birth

It is every mother’s worst fear to realize her child has been injured. What can make that hurt worse is realizing that you don’t know what happened, why it occurred, and feeling like you weren’t aware of it during birth.

Confusion, anger, and sadness can hit all at once as you try to make sense of what could have led to the injury. It is difficult to process missing something like this, but many mothers can leave the hospital not knowing a birth injury occurred until they see signs of it later.

There are many reasons parents may feel like they have been “left in the dark” about what went wrong during their child’s birth.

Reason #1: You Were Not Fully Informed

The sad truth is that things can go wrong during a birth, and the health care team may never tell you what occurred if they fear it will affect their jobs. A mother may not be alerted if the medical team failed to act when the baby’s heart rate was low for too long, interventions were delayed, or warning signs were missed.

Medical malpractice, or failing to meet the standard of care for a patient causing injury, occurs far too often. It can happen during labor, like if a doctor pulls too strongly on a baby in a moment of panic, causing nerves to tear (Erb’s palsy) or the clavicle bone to break.

A mother may have thought it was caught quickly, when the reality was the baby was in distress for hours, leading to an injury that does not make sense.

Unfortunately, poor decisions that affect lives happen far too often. This is why it is so important to not keep quiet if your child received a birth injury diagnosis and you believe important health information was withheld from you. The trusted nurses and lawyers on our team help families like yours seek justice and hold negligent healthcare workers accountable.

Reason #2: You Were Not Appropriately Informed

Most parents are not medical professionals and may not understand complex medical terms or jargon. If the medical team used language that was too complex to understand, you may not have been informed appropriately.

You also may not have been appropriately informed if you were made aware of a problem, but the medical team minimized the distress that occurred.

You may not have been aware of the severity of the distress if you were brought back to a C-section where you could not see what was happening with your newborn, or your baby may have been taken away to another area to be treated after birth for distress.

If the medical team did not inform you of all the treatments or warning signs your baby had after birth, you may not have been properly informed of the distress that led to a birth injury.

Reason #3: Labor and Delivery Can Be Overwhelming

Going through labor and giving birth can be a very intense experience. Even if everything goes well, the physical demands of birth create exhaustion and can limit your ability to retain everything that happened or was said to you.

Many births also involve medications that can make you drowsy. Some women are even put to sleep during traumatic C-sections, leaving a mother unaware of what happened while she was under the anesthesia medication. Even if a mother is awake and aware, emergencies can happen very quickly with a lot of interventions happening all at once.

Many mothers might not understand what a normal part of childbirth is and what is a warning sign that something is wrong. When you’re at the hospital, you trust the medical team to know what to do and make the safest decisions for you and your baby.

Signs of distress are often not common knowledge, so it can feel overwhelming when it’s all happening and challenging to take in the details of the situation.

After a birth, it is very important for the medical staff to let a mother know everything important that happened with her and her baby, and to make sure that she fully understands what was said.

It is not ideal to notify a mother of what happened when she is still recovering from an emergency or under the influence of narcotics.

A separate time for education and answering questions should always be given when the mother is in a mental state to be able to understand and retain what happened. If this was not done and you later discovered that your child was injured, this may explain why you did not actually know what occurred during the birth.

Reason #4: Symptoms Were Dismissed as Normal

It is so important for nurses and doctors to be aware of warning signs that something may not be okay with a newborn. Mild concerning changes might paint a picture of a problem that could be happening underneath the surface.

Some concerning symptoms can be dismissed as normal newborn behavior if the medical team is not vigilant enough to know the birth history and how the newborn has been acting.

Reporting baselines and any changes from nurse to nurse or nurse to physician is vital to helping catch problems a baby could be experiencing.

If symptoms were dismissed as normal and warnings were overlooked, this could be why you were unaware of an injury to your child.

As a nurse myself, knowing situations like this occur absolutely breaks my heart. The job of a medical professional is to know what concerns to look for.

In the hospital, this is not the parent’s responsibility. I am deeply sorry if your child’s medical team did not recognize and report warning signs that led to a birth injury being missed and untreated.

Reason #5: Some Injuries Aren’t Obvious Right After Birth

The last reason you may not have known that something went wrong with your child during labor, delivery, or post-birth is that some injuries are not obvious right after birth.

For children with cerebral palsy (CP), symptoms of this condition may not be present until months after birth when the child begins falling behind on important developmental milestones.

Cerebral palsy is not often diagnosed until the child is 1-2 years old. CP is caused by damage to the brain, often due to decreased blood or oxygen reaching the brain during labor.

Many circumstances can lead to this. If your baby was experiencing distress during or after birth, even if it was treated, the severity of the distress could have left lasting damage to the brain.

Get Legal Help for a Birth Gone Wrong

If a child isn’t diagnosed with a birth injury until months or years later, it can leave parents feeling confused and wondering why they didn’t know something went wrong during the birth.

Some reasons might be that you were not fully informed, not appropriately informed, or you were too overwhelmed with the labor and birth process to notice. It also could be that the medical staff dismissed warning signs as normal. Sometimes injuries aren’t obvious until much later.

Whatever the reason, it is incredibly frustrating to feel like you were left in the dark and unaware of something harmful that happened to your child.

When medical errors cause a lasting injury, it is important to raise awareness, hold those involved accountable, and make sure fewer parents have to learn what it feels like to be left in the dark.

If you feel like the medical team meant to keep your baby safe made negligent or harmful decisions that led to a birth injury, reach out to our team so we can help you seek justice and compensation to help your child get the right treatment they need.

Call us at (800) 914-1562 right now or fill out this form for a free case review.