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The research carried out in the last years outlined that childbirth could be considered as a sufficient stressor for the insurgence of posttraumatic stress (PTS) symptoms with important consequences for the child care.

In a longitudinal perspective, this study focused on PTS symptoms after childbirth to understand their impact on maternal parenting stress and children’s adjustment. First, we investigated whether childbirth-related PTS symptoms, at 87 h and 3 months postpartum, were associated with parenting stress and children’s adjustment at 18 months. Second, we explored, at 18 months, the predictive effects of postpartum PTS symptoms on children’s adjustment and verified the mediational effect of parenting stress this association.

Eighty-eight women participated and completed the …