Sydney mum who suffered horrific birth injury struggles to lose baby weight
By Jo Abi|
Amy Maree says she was 'broken' following birth of her first child 11 months ago.
"I noticed all my photos during that time are just of the baby. I didn't want to be in any photos. I just felt gross, I didn't feel like me," Amy, 38-year-old says.
"Then COVID hit in March when she was only five months old and I hadn't lost any weight. I still weighed the same as when I gave birth.
"I had always been fit and healthy and thought muscle memory would take care of it."
Added to her stress was the battle to breastfeed her daughter Alinta กช a process which, by the way, isn't as simple and easy as many assume. More often it is difficult and sometimes painful.
"I was a walking mess and felt shame and then I hurt my wrist and needed a cortisone injection and couldn't move my arm," Amy says.
"I was trying to enjoy my gorgeous child, but I was stuck at home and it was a really s---ty, s---ty time for me."
It took a long time before Amy felt she could focus on returning to peak physical health, choosing a program she had done before called Maxine's Challenge.
Her husband Scott, 40, signed up too, determined to support his wife in any and every way he could.
"I did it way back in 2013, way before we tried IVF, and it was amazing. When it popped up on Facebook again, I remembered how good I felt after the first time," she says.
Amy couldn't follow the exercise program at first due to serious birth injuries and was only able to take gentle walks, so she focused on food.
"I cut out alcohol and ate heaps of whole foods and cooked everything," she says.
"In 12 weeks I lost seven kilos, and it has been such a huge confidence boost. I'm not back to my pre-pregnancy weight but now I feel like I will get [my fitness] back."
A "horrendous" birth
Amy says she was a physical "mess" after giving birth, the "horrendous" experience leaving her wrecked and raw and with months of recovery ahead of her.
"I'd always been fit. My brother is a personal trainer and we'd always been into sport growing up, so I continued to exercise throughout my whole pregnancy up to 38-weeks," Amy says.
Towards the end of her pregnancy, she focused on gentle stretching designed to assist with labour.
"I didn't gain too much weight during pregnancy initially but in the last few weeks I blew out, swelling like a balloon, so towards the end it was really, really tough."
Her labour kicked off during a late-term scan, and Amy and Scott's daughter was born unresponsive after hours.
Amy recalls the baby kept going into distress, which is when a foetus is not receiving adequate oxygen during pregnancy or labour, leading to her having an episiotomy, an incision made in the perineum กช the tissue between the vaginal opening and the anus. Alinta's delivery was aided by forceps.
"She had a severely bruised face, was in a lot of distress and was non-responsive," Amy says.
"They took her behind a curtain for resuscitation and we were listening to them work on her. It was really intense."
Amy says hearing her daughter's first cry was "such a relief".
However, that relief was quickly replaced with the intense pain and discomfort of what her body had just been through.
"I felt horrendous. I remember the next day I could feel my pelvic floor [a group of muscles and ligaments that support the bladder, uterus and bowel] had gone," she says.
"Multiple people had messaged me [before giving birth] to get postpartum adult nappies, and they were the best thing in the entire world. Literally every pregnant person I meet will give it as a gift."
When her obstetrician made his rounds to talk the couple through what had happened, Amy told him she felt "broken", like "something was wrong".
"He said, 'No, no, you just had a baby'," she recalls.
"I had no clue about how long it would take to recover. I had a prolapse involving my bladder and bowel."
Amy still needs to use a pessary, a device placed into the vagina to support the uterus or bladder and rectum to keep everything in place, when she exercises.
Surgery only has a 50 per cent success rate, she explains, so she opted for continued physiotherapy and exercise as soon as she was allowed.
Amy has always shared her journey openly on Instagram, both through IVF and now through her slow recovery.
"The main think I want to tell people is to ignore those mothers of social media who are prancing around in a 'cossie' after having a baby," Amy says.
"Find people with similar experiences to yours so you don't feel like some freak, so you know what you are experiencing is completely normal."
Amy is back at the gym now that they have reopened, and does what she can.
"The instructors know about my injuries, so if something impacts my wrist or pelvis they give me a different exercise to do," she says.
It took five years, eight IVF attempts and two miscarriages for Amy and Scott to become parents กช and their daughter Alinta, 11 months, hasn't disappointed.
"She's so funny and really loud," the proud mum tells 9Honey.
"She sings and she screams and she's super vocal. It feels like she's Italian, this loud little old soul with a good personality."
