Birth Trauma and
Perinatal Therapy
Sydney
Specialist birth trauma and perinatal mental health therapy with Chauncey Sjostedt, PACFA certified Gestalt Therapist and registered midwife of 13 years. I understand birth from both the clinical and emotional side, and bring both to every session.
PACFA Certified Practicing Member #29367 · 13 Years as a Registered Midwife
Why I specialise
in birth trauma
13 Years as a Midwife, I Understand the Clinical Side
Before training as a therapist, I spent 13 years as a registered midwife. During that time I supported people through straightforward births and through emergency situations: cord prolapses, postpartum haemorrhages, babies who needed resuscitation, parents receiving news they were not prepared for. I have sat with people in the most frightening and the most transformative moments of their lives.
This means I do not need clinical context explained to me. I already understand what an emergency caesarean feels like from inside the theatre. I know what a NICU admission involves and what it takes from the people going through it. I understand the physiology of birth, the realities of obstetric intervention and the culture of maternity care in Australia. This clinical knowledge changes what is possible in a therapy session.
As a Therapist, I Hold the Emotional Side
My midwifery background gives me clinical context. My psychotherapy training gives me the tools to work with what that experience left behind. The combination is rare. Most therapists who support people with birth trauma have not attended births. Most midwives are not trained therapists. I bring both.
I work with the full emotional and psychological complexity of birth: the fear, the grief, the loss of control, the shame, the love, the complicated feelings about the baby, the body, the system and the self. There is no experience I have not encountered, and none that I will ask you to minimise.
What is
birth trauma?
Birth trauma is not defined by what happened clinically. It is defined by how the experience was received by the person going through it. A birth can be medically straightforward and still be experienced as traumatic. A birth can involve serious clinical complications and not be experienced as traumatic. What matters is whether the experience overwhelmed your capacity to cope, and whether it left a lasting impact on how you feel about your body, your baby, your partner, or yourself.
Below are some of the most common presentations, though this list is not exhaustive. Many people experience a combination of several of these, and your experience does not need to match any category exactly to be valid.
Traumatic Birth Experience
Intrusive memories of the birth, nightmares, flashbacks, emotional numbing or hypervigilance around birth-related content. These are signs that the birth experience registered as traumatic for your nervous system, regardless of what others have told you about it.
Emergency Interventions
Emergency caesarean sections, instrumental deliveries using forceps or vacuum, unexpected blood loss, or rapid escalation of care can all leave lasting psychological impact. The speed and intensity of these situations often means people have no time to process what is happening, leaving it unprocessed in the body and mind.
Loss of Control or Autonomy
Feeling that decisions were made without your consent or understanding, that you were not listened to, or that your body was treated as a medical object rather than a person's experience. This is one of the most commonly reported sources of birth trauma and one of the least acknowledged by the healthcare system.
Not Being Heard or Believed
Many people who experienced a traumatic birth are told that everything went well, that the baby is healthy and that is what matters. Being dismissed in this way compounds the original experience and can leave people questioning their own perception. If you were told your birth was fine but you do not feel fine, your experience is real and deserves space.
NICU and Separation from Baby
When a baby requires intensive care, the separation from the baby immediately after birth, the fear, the uncertainty and the particular grief of watching your baby through glass or wires can be profoundly traumatic. The relief when the baby is well does not automatically resolve the trauma of what the parent went through.
Birth That Did Not Go to Plan
Sometimes grief and trauma arise not from an emergency but from the gap between what was hoped for and what actually happened. A planned home birth that transferred to hospital, a planned caesarean that was scheduled away, or a natural birth that required intervention can all bring genuine loss alongside the joy of a healthy baby.
Perinatal mental
health support
Perinatal mental health refers to psychological wellbeing across the period of fertility, pregnancy, birth and the first year postpartum. This is a time of profound physiological, relational and identity change, and it is a period when mental health vulnerabilities can emerge or intensify. Support during this time can make a significant difference.
Antenatal Anxiety and Depression
Anxiety and depression during pregnancy are more common than most people realise and are often underdiagnosed because focus tends to be on the physical aspects of the pregnancy. Fear of birth, fear of the responsibility ahead, complicated feelings about the pregnancy, relationship strain and previous pregnancy loss can all contribute to significant antenatal distress.
Postpartum Anxiety and Depression
The postpartum period brings dramatic hormonal changes alongside sleep deprivation, identity upheaval and the enormous demands of caring for a new baby. Postpartum anxiety and depression are both significantly underreported. Many people feel ashamed of not feeling the way they expected to feel. There is no shame in struggling. This period is genuinely hard and you deserve support through it.
Postnatal PTSD
Post-traumatic stress following birth is a recognised clinical condition that is still frequently missed by GPs and maternal health nurses. Symptoms include intrusive memories of the birth, nightmares, avoidance of reminders, emotional numbing and hypervigilance. It can significantly affect bonding with the baby and recovery from birth. Specific trauma-informed therapy makes a real difference.
Adjustment to Parenthood
Becoming a parent is one of the biggest identity transitions a person can go through, and it is rarely as straightforward as anticipated. Relationship strain, grief for the freedom of the previous life, exhaustion, isolation, and the gap between the parent you imagined you would be and the one you feel you are can all benefit from a dedicated space to be examined without judgment.
Identity Shift, Who Am I Now?
Becoming a parent often involves a profound reorganisation of identity. The self before parenthood, the professional identity, the sexual self, the person in a relationship rather than a parenting unit: all of these can feel suddenly uncertain or lost. People sometimes describe feeling that they no longer know who they are outside of being a parent, or that who they were before has been eclipsed. This is not weakness. It is a genuine psychological transition that deserves proper space and unhurried support. Gestalt therapy is particularly well suited to navigating these kinds of identity shifts because it works with who you actually are, not who you think you should be.
Not just for
the birthing person
The cultural narrative around birth is often focused on the baby's health as the sole measure of a good outcome. This leaves many people without a framework for understanding their own distress. If you are told the baby is healthy and therefore you should feel grateful, but you do not feel okay, that disconnect is itself part of what needs space in therapy.
Birth and the perinatal period affect everyone in the family, not only the person who gave birth. Partners, co-parents, non-birthing parents in same-sex couples, adoptive parents, and others involved in the family dynamic can all carry significant psychological weight from this period that deserves proper support.
Support for Partners
Partners who witnessed a frightening birth, who feared for the birthing person's life or the baby's life, or who felt helpless during a difficult labour can develop genuine trauma responses. Partners' distress is often minimised because the focus is on the person who gave birth. I offer a space in which partners' experiences are taken seriously and given proper attention.
This includes all partners regardless of gender or the structure of the relationship.
Support for All Family Structures
My practice is inclusive of all family structures: same-sex couples, single parents, donor-conceived families, blended families and others. The perinatal experience is shaped differently by each of these contexts and I have the knowledge and experience to hold that complexity without defaulting to assumptions about what a family looks like.
I am a proud member of the LGBTQ+ community and my practice is deeply affirming.
Birth debriefing
A birth debrief is a supported conversation in which you go through your birth experience in detail: what happened, what you were told, what you understood, what you felt, and what has stayed with you. It is an opportunity to ask the clinical questions you may not have felt able to ask at the time, and to begin making sense of the experience.
Unlike a clinical debrief arranged through a hospital, a therapeutic birth debrief with me draws on 13 years of midwifery knowledge alongside psychotherapy training. I can hold both the clinical realities and the emotional and psychological dimensions of what happened simultaneously. This is what makes it different.
A birth debrief does not change what happened, but it can change your relationship to it. Many people find that being able to go through their birth experience with someone who genuinely understands both sides allows something to settle that has not been able to settle before. It can be a standalone session or the beginning of longer-term work, depending on what feels right.
Book a birth debrief sessionHow I work with
birth trauma
I do not use a standardised protocol for birth trauma work. Every person's experience is different and the approach needs to match what is actually present. The pace is always guided by your nervous system's capacity, never by a fixed agenda. Every person's experience is different and the approach needs to match what is actually present, not a predetermined framework. What I bring is a combination of clinical knowledge, psychotherapy training and genuine presence. The aim is always to support your nervous system to process and integrate rather than to push through.
Birth trauma requires a particular kind of care. The nervous system remembers frightening experiences in ways that verbal narrative alone cannot reach. I draw on three interconnected approaches to work with birth trauma effectively.
Gestalt, Present-Moment Processing
Gestalt therapy invites us to be present with what is actually here rather than talking about it from a distance. With birth trauma this might mean allowing yourself to be with a memory, an emotion or a physical sensation that has been kept at arm's length since the birth. The aim is not to relive the trauma but to be present with it in a way that allows it to be metabolised rather than stored.
Somatic, Where the Body Holds the Story
Birth trauma is held in the body. The body that went through labour, surgery, intervention or fear has its own memory of the experience. Drawing on Somatic Experiencing, I work with how the body carries the birth story, tracking sensations, noticing where things are held, and supporting the nervous system to process and release what has been stored. Learn more on the somatic therapy page.
Trauma-Informed, Safety First
All of my work is trauma-informed, and this matters particularly in birth trauma work. I pace the sessions carefully, check in regularly about what is manageable, and never push faster than your nervous system can safely go. The relationship between us is the foundation of the work, and building safety and trust comes before anything else. Learn more on the trauma-informed therapy page.
Connected support areas
Sessions are 50 minutes, one-to-one, and available in person in Surry Hills on Saturdays or online on Wednesday afternoons (Glebe) and Saturday mornings (Surry Hills). You do not need a GP referral or a Mental Health Care Plan. I respond to all enquiries within 48 hours and offer a free introductory call before the first session if you would find that helpful.
Birth trauma and perinatal mental health often intersect with grief, overwhelming emotions, identity and complex family dynamics. The following pages explore these related areas in more depth.
Common questions
Questions about birth trauma therapy and perinatal support. More on the full FAQ page.
Book a session
-
Birth trauma refers to distressing or frightening experiences during pregnancy, labour, birth or the immediate postpartum period. It does not require a dramatic emergency to be real. If your birth experience left you with intrusive memories, nightmares, avoidance of reminders, hypervigilance, emotional numbing or a sense of shame or failure, these are signs that your nervous system experienced the birth as traumatic, regardless of what the clinical notes say or what others have told you.
-
Yes. Partners can be profoundly affected by witnessing a frightening or traumatic birth. Their experience is often minimised because the focus is understandably on the birthing person. But witnessing someone you love in pain or danger, feeling helpless, or fearing for their life or the baby's life can leave a real psychological impact that deserves proper support. I welcome partners into this work regardless of gender or the structure of the relationship.
-
A birth debrief is a supported conversation in which you go through your birth experience in detail, with space to ask questions, express what you felt, and begin to make sense of what happened. Unlike a clinical debrief from a hospital, a therapeutic debrief with me draws on 13 years of midwifery knowledge and psychotherapy training to hold both the clinical and emotional dimensions simultaneously. Many people find that being able to revisit the birth with someone who genuinely understands both sides allows something to settle that has not settled before.
-
Perinatal mental health support specifically addresses the psychological experiences of fertility, pregnancy, birth, postpartum adjustment and early parenthood. It requires a therapist who understands the physiological, hormonal and relational context of this period and the particular vulnerabilities it brings. My 13 years as a midwife means I bring a depth of clinical and personal understanding to this work that is rare in a therapy setting.
-
There is no wrong time. Some people seek support in the weeks immediately following a difficult birth. Others come months or years later, sometimes triggered by a subsequent pregnancy, a friend's birth story or an anniversary. Birth trauma does not have an expiry date. If it is still affecting you, it is worth addressing regardless of how much time has passed. The body and mind hold onto unprocessed experiences until they are given proper space.
Take the first step
towards feeling better
Book a session in person in Surry Hills on Saturday mornings, or online via secure video on Wednesday afternoons (Glebe) and Saturday mornings (Surry Hills). Sessions are 50 minutes. No GP referral or Mental Health Care Plan required. A free introductory call is available before the first session. I respond to all enquiries within 48 hours.