My daughter was born on a snowy Saturday morning. We were released from the hospital Monday, and as is the case for most new mothers in the U.S., my husband returned to work the very next day, leaving me alone to care for our newborn daughter and our two- and four-year-old sons. At three days postpartum, my bones ached as I stepped out of the car and onto the frozen pavement of the parking lot at my doctor’s office. My deflated uterus contracted under the strain of the baby’s car seat; I braced myself against the car to keep from slipping on the icy ground. For a moment I thought I might not make it the 25 yards from the parking lot to the door. I remembered the hospital’s recommendation not to lift anything heavy for a few weeks, and almost laughed. If only that were possible.
My labor had been induced due to high blood pressure and pre-eclampsia, which hadn’t resolved by the time I left the hospital after the baby was born. Puzzled, the doctor asked me to return to the clinic a few days later to recheck my vitals. When I arrived, my toddler jumped eagerly from the car, beaming with a frenetic energy that my combined six hours of sleep over the last three days couldn’t match. My heart was pounding in my ears as he ran ahead of me in the parking lot of the clinic, my broken body too heavy and tired to keep up with him. I arrived at the nurse’s station gasping and shouting at him between breaths.
Unsurprisingly, my blood pressure had not returned to normal and the nurse asked me to repeat the journey again in two days for yet another checkup. There was talk of bedrest, anti-convulsive medication, and the possibility that I wouldn’t be allowed to continue breastfeeding my three-day-old baby. The nurse looked into my wild, tearful eyes and urged me to get more rest. I laughed out loud this time, hoisted my limp toddler onto one hip, slung the baby carrier over my opposite arm for balance, and dragged our tired bodies out of the exam room so that we didn’t all collapse in a heap on the floor.
I wanted to be angry at my husband for leaving us so soon, angry at the doctors for making me come into the office days after my baby was born, and angry at my own body for betraying me at a time when I needed it to be nothing less than super human. Instead, I sat nursing my squalling infant and watching my son put everything within a ten foot radius in his mouth, and reflected on how different the postpartum experience is in the U.S. compared to the rest of the developed world.
When people find out my first son was born in the United Kingdom, the first question they ask is how was it different giving birth in the UK compared to the United States. While there were a few notable differences in labor and delivery, for me, the most glaring discrepancies are in what happened afterward: the quality and accessibility of postpartum care. Britain’s National Healthcare System provides everyone living in the country with the same level of support, even moms on student visas like I was. Additionally, in the UK and throughout most of Europe, fathers and domestic partners are entitled to at least two weeks of paid parental leave, allowing them time to bond with their newborns and care for their wives as they recover from the harrowing experience of childbirth.
Then again, had my daughter been born in the UK, there would have been no need for me to haul my newborn out in the cold weather, expose her to countless germs, and risk rupturing my own stitches simply to check my blood pressure. For two weeks after my son was born in the UK, he and I were assigned a team of local midwives who would visit us at home whenever we required a checkup. There was no need to book appointments with a pediatrician or schlep a carseat around town every time my son had a rash or a cold. If I had a question about my health or the health of the baby, I could call the midwives 24 hours a day for a phone consultation, or ask them for a home visit during working hours. When I had difficulty breastfeeding my newborn, I simply called the midwives, and a lactation consultant arrived at my home the next morning and stayed for several hours and multiple nursing sessions. I never even had to put on a bra or leave the house.
After two weeks, my husband returned to work and I was discharged from the midwives’ care, but my support system was not entirely disbanded. My son was assigned a specially-trained nurse, called a health visitor, who would look after his well-being for the next five years. At first, his health visitor dropped by our house several times a week, then gradually spaced her visits further apart until she only checked in every few months. However, she was available by phone or text message whenever I had a first-time-mom moment of panic or insecurity.
When my son was six months old, I called her crying because he’d started violently resisting breastfeeding. She knocked on my door two hours later just to check him over and reassure me that he was happy, healthy, and chubby as a cherub. Her words of encouragement put my mind at ease and probably kept me from banging down my pediatrician’s door in a blind panic at 2am. So too studies have shown that when a new mother has adequate support and help during the perinatal period, she is less likely to suffer physical and mental health complications such as postpartum depression.
The stress of trying to “do it all” takes its toll on new mothers, and having a support network built into the medical system relieves some of that pressure. When my daughter was born in the US, the responsibility of caring for three children under five years old, running the household, cooking meals, and getting all four of us to various appointments throughout the week drained me of every ounce of healing energy I had left after labor and delivery. I was drowning, so of course my body was locked in a fight or flight response. I needed help to come to me, and the American healthcare system wasn’t delivering.
Sitting in the waiting room of my OB/GYN’s office that day, surrounded by expecting mothers, I was overwhelmed by the realization that many of them would be forced to return to work after only six weeks or risk losing their jobs. Those who stayed home might wind up so exhausted and isolated from solely caring for their babies that they would succumb to the darkness of postpartum depression. How can we call ourselves a civilized nation if we can’t even do something so basic as to care for mothers after the birth of a child? It’s time for the U.S. to catch up with the rest of the developed world and recognize that it is in everyone’s best interest to raise happy and healthy children, and the first step to achieving that is by giving mothers the time and help they need to heal properly after giving birth.
*This post originally appeared on Brain, Child Magazine
You make some excellent points! Considering that we spend the most in the world on health care,you would think the US system could provide better care!
I got lucky and did the the other way around — first son born in the U.S., second and third in Norway. I had no idea how inhumane our system was until I left the country. Even in sub-Saharan Africa, where surviving childbirth at all is not a given, working mothers get at least 3 months leave.
The strength of women knows no bounds,
Thank you so much for those post. It was really moving for me to read. I live in Canada, and after my second child I received much more care than you did and had the privilege of having daycare still in place for my first child, but even then I could relate to what you were describing so much. My daughter was born via emergency c-section (she came six days before the planned c-section) when my son was three years old. My husband was able to take two weeks to be home with me, which was amazing. And as I mentioned, my son was in full time daycare because we kept our spot since daycare is so hard to find. I didn’t have any support outside of that, except a nurse who came a handful of times to check up on me as part of their home visitation program (mostly to weigh the baby to make sure she was thriving). Even though I was so lucky to have so much more than you described, it was really really hard for me. I had been told not to lift anything heavier than my baby for three months, which was simply impossible. Often because of my husband’s shift work I was home alone with the two children for days at a time, except on the days when I managed to get my son to the daycare, which involved getting both children ready in the winter and driving to the daycare, where I would carry sometimes both of them into the daycare to drop off and then go home. It took me so long to get out the door in the morning that often two hours later it was time to pick him up again, and most days I debated if it was even worth it to do that because keeping him home was sometimes less physically challenging than getting him to daycare. And just like you mentioned, I had a hard time not being angry at my husband for this, even though it wasn’t in anyway his fault. It was really really really hard, and isolating. I ended up choosing to go back to work at four months instead of six because I felt post partum depression knocking pretty hard at the door. I was so lonely and isolated, but trying to connect with people socially was sometimes worse, especially because I didn’t want to weird them out with expressing the struggles I was having, and particularly because again I was facing hauling two kids off somewhere when I was supposed to be resting and not lifting. Like you, my blood pressure that was also very high at the end of my pregnancy did not go down, and even seven months later I’m still taking the blood pressure medication, and I have no doubt as to why. This is quite a rambly story, but I just wanted to say thank you for your post. Again, even though I am fortunate enough to be in Canada and have access to so much more than you did your third time around (and I was only dealing with two), I really could identify with so much of what you described, and I had more than a lot of people here do because at least I had daycare and my husband could take some time. Thank you for everything!
I agree wholeheartedly the only thing I would add is that it’s a touchy subject with new moms. Not only does mainstream healthcare make it difficult to get good postpartum care, new moms don’t always seem to know they deserve and can ask for more care, from healthcare professionals, family and friends. It is, unfortunately, so not a part of our culture that it has become a hard topic to broach without raised hackles.
I was very fortunate to have a birthing center with midwives who took care of me and my family similar to the way you describe your experience in the UK. Now it’s hard to watch friends go through the health care system, and not just go through, but cling to it and love their doctors as they do it. It’s a tough one, and it needs to be changed. Good work getting a conversation going!
I am a grandmother of three little girls and found your blog while doing research on a book I’m writing. I found your experience with your third childbirth disturbing and it brought back my experiences as a young mother. Some equally as harrowing. But I also recounted two very special friends of our stopping by after church on Sunday to tell us that they were expecting which was a complete shock! She would be 50 and he 58 when the babies were born. Yes, I said babies! She was pregnant with twins to be delivered to a 50 year old mother! Their 10 year old daughter was thrilled! She was expecting two baby dolls to play with! Well, oddly enough, this determined mom carried these two baby girls to full term and they weighed 6 lbs. each. But I knew that this new mom would not have to energy to take care of these two angels and the active and very busy 10 year old. I was working at the time and knew I would be of little help to my friend. So I got on the phone and summoned ladies from our church to be available to be there for her and the babies and the 10 year old. I had people scheduled to be there for two to four hours at a time, for weeks to help the mom get to feeling better and get organized to handle her new charges. The scheduling of eager helpers was easy and there were plenty of eager volunteers ready to help at the drop of a hat. So where the government can’t or won’t help, an army of older “moms” helped a desperate mom of twins.