Mother left with life-long injuries after giving birth breaks ‘silence’ in bid to help others

Published

1 year ago

March 18, 2024

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When Gill Castle became pregnant with her first child in 2011, she was over the moon. She had a healthy, straightforward pregnancy, but her labour was traumatic.

“I remember saying to my mum, I have gone into hospital perfectly healthy, a working police officer, and I have come out disabled, without my job,” Gill reflects.

“All I wanted was a baby.”

Warning – this report contains graphic content including descriptions of injuries

Gill’s son was premature and got stuck in the birthing canal. As his heart rate dropped, medics used forceps to save his life.

But “in doing so, they unfortunately also really significantly damaged me…”, says Gill.

As a result of the complicated delivery, Gill was left with a severe tear.

“I had a hole between my rectum and my vagina. So I was pooing out of my vagina,” Gill explains.

“Ultimately seven days after the birth, I was fitted with an emergency colostomy, which is a stoma, which I still have. Subsequently, I lost my job as a police officer due to my really severe mental health problems.”

Gill has chosen to share these details because she says she is “sick of the silence” surrounding women’s health, and is among the contributors to the very first all-party parliamentary inquiry into birth trauma.

The inquiry, led by Stafford MP Theo Clarke, was set up to address the fact that around 30,000 women each year in the UK will experience birth trauma.

Birth trauma is defined as having suffered physical or emotional distress during or after delivery. It’s so severe for some that around one in 20 women also develop PTSD.

It’s a subject that’s very personal to Ms Clarke, who shared her very own birth trauma story in parliament earlier in the year.

She was taken for urgent surgery after bleeding heavily from a tear.

“I actually thought it was really important to share my story,” said Ms Clarke.

“I ended up setting up a national inquiry into birth trauma in parliament because, firstly, I was really shocked to discover there hadn’t been one before,” she added.

Since sharing her story, Ms Clarke says “hundreds of mothers across the UK” wrote into her office to share their experiences, which has helped shape the issues explored in the inquiry.

“It was very clear to me there was a huge problem with disparities in access to services for those people who had either psychological or physical trauma, like myself.

“What I really hope is this inquiry will come up with practical recommendations for the prime minister, and say ‘this is what mums are telling us they need’.”

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Ms Clarke hopes that by sharing her story and hearing thousands of others, it will raise awareness of the trauma some women experience after birth.

This is a focus of MASIC, a charity which supports women who have experienced physical birthing injuries and says such injuries are sometimes missed during birth, and dismissed after.

“There is a real postcode lottery of care,” says Chloe Oliver, chief executive of MASIC.

“The waiting list might be quite long to see pelvic health and physio specialists, and all the time you are trying to look after a baby whilst having really upsetting symptoms.”

MASIC is currently collating data to try to establish the emotional and financial “cost of injuries” relating to birth trauma. Not just the cost to the NHS, but the personal cost to families too.

“It impacts on your family relationships, your work life, you may not be able to go back to the job you had before you were pregnant. You know, your life completely changes and you have to live with that,” says Ms Oliver.

A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said: “We are committed to making the NHS the safest place in the world to give birth, and that’s why birth trauma support is among the top priorities for the Women’s Health Strategy in 2024.

“We’re increasing investment in maternity services to £186m per year from next month, to grow the maternity workforce and improve maternity and neonatal services across England. On top of that, an extra nearly £35m was announced at the Spring Budget to improve maternity safety.”

UK

Yellow warning for thunderstorms issued for large parts of England and Wales

Published

7 hours ago

June 6, 2025

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Yellow warning for thunderstorms issued for large parts of England and Wales

A yellow warning for thunderstorms has been issued for large parts of England and Wales on Saturday.

The Met Office warning covers most of southern England, parts of the Midlands and most of south Wales between 9am until 6pm on Saturday.

People in the affected areas are being warned heavy showers and thunderstorms may lead to some disruption to transport services.

Find out the forecast for your area

Delays to train services are possible and some short-term losses of power are also likely.

The UK’s weather agency said 10 to 15mm of rain could fall in less than an hour, while some places could see 30 to 40mm of rain over several hours from successive showers and thunderstorms.

It has also warned of frequent lightning, hail and strong gusty winds.

Met Office Chief Meteorologist Dan Suri said most places in the warning areas will be hit by showers, although not all will see storms.

“In this case, it’s difficult to predict where exactly thunderstorms will hit because they are small and fast changing,” he said.

The wet weather comes days after the Met Office said the UK had its warmest spring on record – and its driest for 50 years.

Provisional figures showed spring temperatures surpassed the long-term average by 1.4C – with a mean temperature of 9.5C (49.1F). That beat the previous warmest spring recorded in 2024.

Temperature records were broken in all four nations in the UK – with 1.64C above the long-term average in Northern Ireland, 1.56C above average in Scotland, 1.39C in Wales and 1.35C in England.

In records dating back to 1884, the Met Office said eight of the 10 warmest springs had occurred since 2000 – and the three warmest had been since 2017, in a sign of the changing climate.

Conditions were also incredibly dry this spring, with an average of 128.2mm of rain falling in the UK across March, April and May – the lowest spring total since 1974, which saw 123.2mm.

UK

Body found in wooded area in search for missing teenager Cole Cooper

Published

8 hours ago

June 6, 2025

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Body found in wooded area in search for missing teenager Cole Cooper

A body has been found in the search for a teenager who went missing in early May.

Cole Cooper, 19, was last seen by a school friend on Wednesday 7 May, in the village of Longcroft near Falkirk, in central Scotland.

Mr Cooper was reported missing by his family on Friday 9 May.

Police Scotland said the body was discovered in a wooded area near Kilsyth Road in Banknock on Friday afternoon.

“Formal identification has yet to take place however the family of missing man Cole Cooper, 19, has been informed,” the force said in a statement. “Enquiries remain ongoing to establish the full circumstances.”

Speaking to Sky News Breakfast earlier this week, his brother Connor said their family felt “lost” and described his sibling’s disappearance as “hell… for all of us”.

He described him going missing as “very much out of character” and that “even if his brother wanted some space or alone time” he would have notified family or friends beforehand – and would never “put his younger siblings through this”.

His mother Wendy Stewart described the situation as “total heartache” and was afraid he may have been “picked up by a car” and come to harm.

“Is it actually happening?” she said. “I have been wanting to wake up and it’s just been a big nightmare.”

After police got involved in the search, they visited more than 220 properties and trawled through around 1,000 hours of CCTV footage in a bid to find Mr Cooper.

Specialist resources from across the country were mobilised, including a helicopter and drones from the air support unit, as well as officers from the dive and marine unit.

The force previously indicated there was no suggestion of any criminality.

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UK

Bargain Hunt expert Oghenochuko Ojiri jailed after failing to report sale of artworks to ‘Hezbollah financier’

Published

10 hours ago

June 6, 2025

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Bargain Hunt expert Oghenochuko Ojiri jailed after failing to report sale of artworks to 'Hezbollah financier'

An expert on TV show Bargain Hunt has been jailed for two and a half years after failing to report the sale of artworks to a man suspected of financing Hezbollah.

Oghenochuko Ojiri, who has also appeared on another BBC programme Antiques Road Trip, sold around £140,000 worth of art to Nazem Ahmad over a 14-month period between October 2020 and December 2021, the Old Bailey heard.

Art dealer Ojiri, 53, who is known as Ochuko, admitted eight counts in May of failing to make a disclosure during the course of business within the regulated sector, contrary to section 21A of the Terrorism Act 2000.

Lebanese businessman and diamond dealer Ahmad was described in court as a “prominent financier” for Hezbollah, a proscribed terrorist group in the UK.

Prosecutor Lyndon Harris said Ahmad has an extensive art collection worth tens of millions of pounds, including works by Pablo Picasso and Andy Warhol, many of which are displayed in his penthouse in Beirut.

Ojiri, who owned the Ramp Gallery, which was later renamed the Ojiri Gallery, sent a message to a contact saying, “I can’t risk selling directly to him,” after Ahmad was sanctioned in the US, the court heard.

But Mr Harris said “that’s exactly what he did” when he sold artworks, which were sent to Dubai, the UAE and Beirut.

Ojiri’s barrister Kevin Irwin said he was arrested on 18 April 2023 in Wrexham while filming a BBC show and his “humiliation is complete” as he appeared for sentencing.

Ahmad was sanctioned on the same day in the UK and officers later seized artworks held in two warehouses in the country, including a Picasso and a Warhol, valued at almost £1m.

‘Shameful fall from grace’

Sentencing Ojiri to two years and six months in prison, with an additional year on extended licence, the judge, Mrs Justice Cheema-Grubb, told him: “You knew about Ahmad’s suspected involvement in financing terrorism and the way the art market can be exploited by someone like him”.

She said Ojiri, from Brent, north London, viewed his offences as a “shameful fall from grace of a public personality and role model for those from an ethnic minority, in the arts and antique sector”.

“Your hard work, talent and charisma have brought you a great deal of success,” the judge said.

“You knew you shouldn’t be dealing with this man. I don’t accept you were naive, rather it benefitted you to close your eyes to what you believed he was.

“You knew it was your duty to alert the authorities but you elected to balance the financial profit and commercial success of your business against Ahmad’s dark side.”

Commander Dominic Murphy, head of the Metropolitan Police’s counter terrorism command, said the prosecution was the “first of its kind” and should serve as a warning to art dealers.

“Oghenochuko Ojiri wilfully obscured the fact he knew he was selling artwork to Nazem Ahmad, someone who has been sanctioned by the UK and US treasury and described as a funder of the proscribed terrorist group Hezbollah,” he said.