Devastating trauma caused by hospitals sending new mums home too soon: Mental breakdown, life-threatening illness and the terror of having another child...

Three years after giving birth to her first child, Sarah Rose is haunted by the traumatic events that followed.

Discharged from hospital a mere 16 hours after baby Jack's delivery, what followed was a shocking sequence of events - including a failed operation and various intrusive medical procedures - that left her a 'hysterical mess' who was later diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder.

'It was horrific,' says Sarah. 'I was robbed of those precious early memories of motherhood and left incapable of caring for my son.

Mary-Kate Williamson, 27,  above, from Watford, was so unhappy with her care she asked to leave after giving birth to daughter Isabelle in March 2014. She believes staff should have realised she was in no fit state 

'If I had just been kept in a bit longer and checked more thoroughly, this would never have happened. It is hard not to feel angry.'

Sarah is far from alone in feeling she was pushed out of hospital far too early. Research last week revealed that new mothers are sent home more quickly in Britain than nearly any other country. On average, they spend only a day-and-a-half in maternity units - the briefest stay for any developed nation.

Experts warn that short stays could mean that potentially fatal illnesses are missed and new mothers lose out on the support needed to avoid post-natal depression.

The research is the latest in a catalogue of concerns about maternity care. Health trusts are buckling under the pressure of staff and cash shortages.

Last month, the NHS announced a radical shake-up of care, including offering mothers-to-be £3,000 birth budgets to encourage them to have home deliveries. That is presumably to free up space in over-subscribed maternity wards - four out of ten of which closed last year.

Increased immigration - a quarter of Britain's babies are born to foreign mothers - combined with a rise in older and overweight mums who are more likely to have problematic births, has left hospitals struggling to cope. And it seems their response is to discharge women as quickly as possible.

During labour, Mary-Kate was found to have a prolapsed cord - where the umbilical cord emerges from the womb before the baby's head, pressing on the baby and potentially cutting off their oxygen supply

Sarah, 32, is one of many victims of the chaotic system. The school support worker was taken to Croydon University Hospital after she went into labour in November 2012.

After 33 hours, baby Jack had still not made an appearance and his heart rate had dropped dangerously low. To speed things up, Sarah was given an episiotomy - a common procedure in which the opening to the vagina is cut.

After the birth, a midwife stitched up the wound, but by the next morning Sarah was in agony and bleeding heavily.

She recalls: 'I was in so much pain I could barely move. Another midwife examined me and said they had 'missed a stitch'. She said it would heal naturally.'

Sarah was discharged - still in agony - that morning, but two days later she awoke to find her bedsheets drenched in blood.

'I was terrified,' she says. An out-of-hours GP said her stitches had burst and the wound had become infected.

She was rushed into surgery for an emergency caesarean under general anaesthetic. 'Afterwards, I was so exhausted I couldn't get out of bed without help - but there was none,' says Mary-Kate, 27, right before giving birth to her daughter, who is engaged to landscape gardener Michael, 26

Sarah's partner, Paul, 35, a sales manager, rushed her back to the labour ward. After a two-hour wait, she was told again the wound would be 'fine' without further stitches and sent home with antibiotics. 

'In tears, I told them that wasn't good enough and they agreed to refer me to the hospital's perineal clinic the next day,' she says.

There, Sarah suffered a breakdown.

'I was so upset I could barely breathe. I was crying in pain, couldn't sit down for long enough to breastfeed and felt like a failure for not being able to look after my baby. Yet they still refused to do anything, saying it would heal itself.'

It was three weeks before the hospital finally agreed to re-cut and re-stitch the wound under general anaesthetic.

Rendered immobile afterwards and with Paul's paternity leave over, Sarah had to send Jack to stay for a week with her mother-in-law, 100 miles away in Norwich.

She said: 'I asked to see a breastfeeding specialist who never turned up, and the member of staff who delivered the painkilling drugs was always an hour late. I was told I had to move from my electric bed designed for women who'd had a caesarean because others needed it. I was in agony'

'I was forced to stop breastfeeding and was terrified Jack would forget who I was. My doctor diagnosed me with post-traumatic stress disorder and prescribed antidepressants.'

Two weeks later, the stitches burst again. This time, because the wound was smaller, doctors prescribed weekly applications of silver nitrate sticks - devices used to burn superficial skin tissue, which allowed the episiotomy wound to heal more quickly.

'The sessions were so painful I would scream in agony,' says Sarah.

It was four months before the wound healed properly - and at least six months before she and Paul were able to make love again.

Three years on, Sarah admits it still sometimes hurts to sit down - and to have sex. And though she is terrified at the prospect of enduring birth again, she didn't want Jack to be an only child and is six months pregnant.

She has registered with a different hospital and is receiving counselling to prepare her for the birth.

Despite her ordeal, she didn't make a formal complaint to the hospital because it would be 'too traumatic to relive it'.

Three days after giving birth Mary-Kate demanded to be discharged. She says staff did not stop her

'Had they done one more check-up this would never have happened,' says Sarah. 'Perhaps the hospital was understaffed. Perhaps the midwives were too busy to look after me - or maybe they just didn't care.'

A spokesperson for the NHS Trust concerned told the Mail: 'We do not discharge women if they are not well enough to go home. As a result, women tend to stay with us for longer than average.

'All of our women receive care at home by our community midwives and their local GP, with additional support from the medical team in hospital if required.

'If Sarah would like to get in touch with us we would be very willing to look into her case.'

Sarah's experience is a far cry from the days when new mothers recuperated in hospital for a week after a normal birth and up to a month after a Caesarean section.

'Women could learn how to breastfeed and be taught how to bathe their newborns and change nappies,' says parenting expert Clare Byam-Cook.

Today, mothers can be discharged as soon as two hours after a natural birth and just one day after a caesarean.

Alison Edwards, senior lecturer in midwifery at Birmingham City University, warns that a caesarean is 'a major operation and carries a risk - it can lead to clots in legs and lungs and a risk of infection. We don't discharge women until we know they are OK'.

However, Rachael Short was sent home three days after a complex caesarean when she had her daughter Sienna, now two.

She believes her speedy dismissal from the Diana, Princess of Wales hospital in Grimsby in June 2013 contributed to her being re-admitted a week later with a serious infection.

Rachael, 31, says she lost so much blood after the birth that midwives weighed her blood-soaked sheets to see if she required a transfusion.

'I drifted out of consciousness, terrified,' she says. 'I still felt weak three days later, but when midwives said I was fit to go home, I believed them - why wouldn't I?'

At home, she started vomiting and suffered from chills and hot sweats. 'I thought I had a bug, but after a week of dangerously high blood pressure my GP said I was at risk of a heart attack and sent me back to hospital,' she says.

There, a scan revealed that Rachael had tissue from the placenta - known as 'retained product' - inside her womb. She was put on an intravenous antibiotic drip before undergoing an operation under general anaesthetic to remove it.

After giving birth, new mothers are usually transferred to a post-natal ward, where nurses are supposed to check their blood pressure, temperature and monitor how the womb is contracting. These rudimentary checks are meant to be repeated daily until the woman is allowed home. Above, Mary shortly after giving birth

As a single mother, Rachael was already vulnerable. 'Luckily, I had a loving family to look after my baby, but it was too painful for me even to cuddle her.'

Rachael remained in hospital for a week, after which her feelings of detachment grew until, when Sienna was four months, she was diagnosed with post-natal depression.

'My GP said it was as a direct result of the traumatic birth,' says Rachael. 'If I'd been kept in hospital for one more day, staff might have realised I was developing an infection.'

Northern Lincolnshire and Goole NHS Foundation Trust told the Mail: 'Ms Short made a formal complaint to us in 2013, which was fully investigated.

Within hours of arriving home she fell ill with crippling stomach pains and felt light-headed. Her vision was blurred and her blood pressure was dangerously high. Two weeks later, she developed even more intense, contraction-like pains in her abdomen. Above, with two-year-old Isabel

'In a very small number of cases, fragments of placenta can be retained in the womb and this might be detected only days or weeks after the birth, at which point it is treated as quickly as possible.'

Rachael does not accept this explanation. 'Their attitude seems to be 'these things happen,' ' she says. 'But they don't need to - not if every new mother is given the attention and time she needs in hospital.'

According to Alison Edwards, the 'massive shift' in maternity care 'is partly due to cost and lack of resources, but also because women often don't want to stay in hospital.'

Many are so unhappy with their care in inadequate maternity wards they mistakenly believe they are better off at home.

She went to the toilet and passed a solid object around three inches in diameter. 'I was terrified - I thought I was dying,' she says. Michael rushed her back to Watford General, where a maternity nurse said that the mass constituted of cells from her placenta that should have been removed during the caesarean

This was the case with mother of two Mary-Kate Williamson, who says she was so unhappy with her care at Watford General Hospital after giving birth to daughter Isabelle in March 2014 that she asked to leave. That said, she believes staff should have realised she was in no fit state to do so.

During labour, Mary-Kate was found to have a prolapsed cord - where the umbilical cord emerges from the womb before the baby's head, pressing on the baby and potentially cutting off their oxygen supply. She was rushed into surgery for an emergency caesarean under general anaesthetic.

'Afterwards, I was so exhausted I couldn't get out of bed without help - but there was none,' says Mary-Kate, 27, who is engaged to landscape gardener Michael, 26.

'I asked to see a breastfeeding specialist who never turned up, and the member of staff who delivered the painkilling drugs was always an hour late.

'I was told I had to move from my electric bed designed for women who'd had a caesarean because others needed it. I was in agony and shocked by the lack of support.'

A spokesperson for Watford General said they can't comment on individual cases, but told the Mail they are 'concerned' to hear of Mary-Kate's experience and prepared to investigate her claims

She also felt low on the priority list of the packed maternity ward: 'The teen mums and women who didn't speak English seemed to get most of the midwives' attention.'

Three days after giving birth Mary-Kate demanded to be discharged. 'I knew I wasn't thinking rationally, but I was so unhappy I just wanted to leave.'

After giving birth, new mothers are usually transferred to a post-natal ward, where nurses are supposed to check their blood pressure, temperature and monitor how the womb is contracting. These rudimentary checks are meant to be repeated daily until the woman is allowed home.

But Mary-Kate says: 'Staff didn't stop me leaving or do further checks before I was discharged.'

Within hours of arriving home she fell ill: 'I had crippling stomach pains and felt light-headed. My vision was blurred and, according to my community midwife, my blood pressure was dangerously high.'

Two weeks later, she developed even more intense, contraction-like pains in her abdomen. She went to the toilet and passed a solid object around three inches in diameter.

'I was terrified - I thought I was dying,' she says.

Michael rushed her back to Watford General, where a maternity nurse said that the mass constituted of cells from her placenta that should have been removed during the caesarean and had instead got infected.

A spokesperson for Watford General said they can't comment on individual cases, but told the Mail they are 'concerned' to hear of Mary-Kate's experience and prepared to investigate her claims.

For Mary-Kate, it is all too little too late: 'I should have been constantly monitored. Yes, I asked to leave - but as I have realised, in those first few days, mothers don't always know best.'