Ho-lee shit.

I have an unrepaired tear in my labia. I like to think of it as a battle scar, personally.

This was me. I ended up with many stitches all over my labia and a huge hematoma. I was in labor with my second and the nurse delared me at 10 cm. My husband could see I was a bit tense with no urge to push, but in that tranistion phase. He suggested I drop my jaw and my shoulders and breathe like the nurse in my first birth had me do. (I only had one stitch with that birth). The nurse this time pushed my hubby back and said, “let her push with her body” then they pushed my legs up and had me curl up and yelled at me to push. I pushed hard and out came my little girl. I tore in what the OB said was a sunburst tear. She kept commenting about all the blood and oh this is bad and that maybe she should have cut me. It took forever to stitch me up, and I was shaking on the stirrups. In six weeks I was still unhealed in places and had silver nitrate on the open scars. I didn’t realize I had a hole for a while…I was so swollen with the hematoma and sore after the birth. It was actually quite depressing to me since after my first birth the OB declared at my six week appointment that I still looked like I hadn’t had a baby at all. It was all such a mess. Had the nurse let me push naturally instead of forcing things, I would have had less tearing, I’m sure. My little girl only weighed 7 lbs 9 oz. She was a short, tiny thing.

Honestly, what did you expect the doctor to do about it at that point? Unless you were at the plastic surgeon’s office, which you weren’t.

The point isn’t that there was something the doctor should do, the point is A) it was a botched repair job, and B) that’s a really really weird thing to say about an injured body part.

I guess if a guy had surgery on his privates, and the stitches caused it to look strange after, we should tell him it’s a trophy… right?

Just doesn’t sound right. If the mother later decides to feel that way about it later, fine, but the doctor doesn’t get to decide that for her.