Kate Mara was "really scared" about having a caesarean section.
Kate Mara
The 36-year-old actress and her husband Jamie Bell welcomed a daughter into the world last month and though she's delighted to be a mother, the former 'House of Cards' star has admitted she felt "disappointed and devastated" after she needed the emergency procedure in hospital after three days of labour, instead of a natural birth at home like she'd planned.
Kate was induced when she was 36 weeks pregnant because she was suffering from Cholestasis, a liver disease that can occur in late pregnancy and potentially harm the unborn baby, but she then needed the emergency c-section after developing a fever following an epidural.
Speaking on Dr. Berlin's 'Informed Pregnancy Podcast', she said: "I know a lot of people that have had c-sections that are not planned, that they don't want to have happen. And most of those people, most of my friends, have said, 'I just wanted the baby out. I was actually asking for a c-section.' But to me, it was [not like that].
"I kept really calm for most of those three days but right before I went in for the c-section, that's when I sort of [felt] the devastation of it and the disappointment of not being able to experience a birth any way that I had hoped.
"[I was] really scared. It was more that I was so scared to have the c-section, to have this surgery.
"I was genuinely terrified of what that meant and what could happen and all of these things, and then of course just being tired made me that much more scared, I think."
And Kate admitted her fears made her loved ones worry she had had a "premonition" that the surgery wouldn't go well.
She added: "I was just super sad. I remember that moment very clearly because I burst out crying and was like, 'I'm scared.'
"My mom was there and my husband was there and my mom thought, 'Oh, God.' She didn't tell me this at the time but afterward, once we were all safe and the baby was out, she thought I was having some sort of premonition that something was going to go wrong. She thinks I'm sort of witchy like that, which I can be."
Luckily, the procedure went well despite the actress experiencing "terrible shakes" from the pre-surgery medication, her "eyes rolling back" and excess bleeding afterwards that meant she required a blood transfusion.
She recalled: "I was like, 'When am I going to stop shaking?'
"I thought my teeth were going to pop out, my jaw was clenched so tight from the shakes, and then I thought, 'I definitely can't hold her because I can't move.' My arms were locked.
"My husband brought her over to me and he kind of held her on my chest and it was amazing, but it was not at all what I imagined it would be. I could barely keep my eyes open to look at her."
However, the 'Shooter' star "wouldn't do anything differently" because her daughter arrived safely.
She said: "We really did do everything in our power to make it as peaceful and natural and easy for our baby to come out as possible."
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