4th Trimester
Following up on our article last week regarding the new designation of a 4thtrimester for new mothers, we were surprised to see an article from NPR talking about the very same thing.
‘4th Trimester’ Problems Can Have Long-Term Effects On A Mom’s Health
By Lauren Bavis
NPR.org, January 24, 2019
Melody Lynch-Kimery had a fairly routine pregnancy. But when she got to the hospital for delivery, she says, things quickly turned frightening.
After an emergency cesarean section, Lynch-Kimery hemorrhaged; she heard later she’d lost about half the blood in her body.
“I just kept thinking ‘I’m not going to die. I’m not going to die. I’m not going to let you let me die,’ ” she says.
After that traumatic experience, Lynch-Kimery spent a week in the hospital. She went home with her newborn daughter, Sawyer, thinking her delivery complications were resolved.
Then, about three months later, she started to feel pain in her lower abdomen.
“Just randomly, one day I started to have a lot of burning,” she remembers. “Just a lot of cramping — a lot of pain around my scar area.”
She spent months seeing doctors and researching her symptoms online. The pain, she eventually learned, was likely caused by abdominal adhesions — scar tissue beneath and around her C-section incision.