Ten years ago, Lauraine underwent a private hysterectomy for a suspected mass. She trusted the reassurance she was given. She trusted that she was in safe hands. But her bowel perforated and she became critically ill.
That moment changed the course of her life, as she explains: “I now live with three stoma bags, repeated hospitalisations, sepsis, and permanent damage to my bladder and eyes.”
The physical impact has been profound and lifelong. But like so many people affected by avoidable harm, what stayed with Lauraine just as deeply was what didn’t happen afterwards.
The answers never came. The explanations never arrived. The silence became its own form of harm. “What has hurt as much as the physical injuries is the lack of support, information, and honesty afterwards,” Lauraine recalls. “I often felt ignored, misled, and left to cope alone at my most vulnerable.”
