10
Loading video...
By Jack Beresford
Senior Reporter
0
Share
Newsweek is a Trust Project member
See more of our trusted coverage when you search.Prefer Newsweek on Googleto see more of our trusted coverage when you search.
A mom-of-three has shared footage to social media of the moment her epidural failed with agonizing results.
Sara Martinez from San Diego, California, still finds it difficult to watch back the video her boyfriend recorded on his phone.
"It makes me cringe because I remember the pain I felt in that moment," Martinez told Newsweek. "It was traumatic. It was worth it for my baby girl but still super traumatizing."
Read More on Family & Parenting
Epidurals are one of the most commonly used methods of pain management for women in labor. The American Society of Anesthesiologists estimates more than 60 percent of women in labor choose to have an epidural.
It is one of the safest and most effective tools in managing the pain of childbirth—but things can still sometimes go wrong.
Martinez had already been partially induced in an effort to "speed up" what would prove to be a 12-hour labor when she was given the epidural.
An epidural involves the injection of painkilling medication into the epidural space in the spine using a sizable needle. When done correctly, it can help ease some of the pain of childbirth.
However, as the video Martinez's partner filmed shows, things didn't work out that way for her. The clip, which Martinez subsequently shared to her TikTok @strictlyy222prettyy, captures her screams. Her accompanying caption made it clear: "I felt everything."
"The pain was horrible," she said. "It felt like a bunch of pressure and my back was on fire from the messed up epidural. They had accidentally punctured my dural sac [the protective membrane that surrounds the spinal cord] twice."
Martinez, who gave birth in August, said she would later learn that failed epidurals of this kind are rare and, had things gone seriously wrong, she could have ended up paralyzed. Thankfully that wasn't the case here, with Martinez being told the epidural failed due to the "anatomy" of her back.
"It had something to do with the spaces between [the disks]," she said, suggesting her spine was not aligned in the way doctors had expected.
...
While the failed epidural was excruciating, Martinez knew she had "no choice but to continue" giving birth without it and face labor pains without the pain meds she had received the previous time round.
"My failed epidural caused me to still have to feel everything and if anything worse," she said. "My daughter is my third baby, my son before her was a perfect birth with no complications, the epidural worked perfectly. But with my daughter the story wasn't the same."
Martinez does not mince words: the birth was difficult. "I just thank God for getting me through it because I genuinely thought I was going to die," she said. "My vitals kept dropping and so did my baby's."
Ultimately her daughter arrived happy and healthy, but the difficulties continued for Martinez. "I couldn't move around for about two weeks because of my spine. Every time I sat up my headache was excruciating and my neck and back were sore and tender," she said. "Honestly if it wasn't for my boyfriend I would've struggled to move around for my children."
Martinez chose to share the video documenting her experience because she feels "failed epidurals are not spoken about enough." Her video has been watched 19.8 million times, with many viewers sharing similar stories and messages of support.
One commented: "My nurse told me to stop screaming because I was scaring all the other patients. I had epidural twice didn't work."
Another wrote: "My epidural failed during my C-section." A third, meanwhile, said: "You don't know how brave you are, both for going through that and posting! I hope you're both okay."
Martinez still experiences back pain. She doesn't know if it will get better but hopes other moms-to-be can glean some valuable lessons from her experience.
"Always have a birth plan together to be prepared just in case a situation like mine happens," she said.
View 0 Comments
Submit Correction
View Editorial & AI Guidelines