Enjoying that birthday cake...
Sunday, September 13, 2009
Saturday, September 5, 2009
"You Should Be Grateful" essay
This is a great essay written by Gretchen Humphries about the line that all mothers get from people when they talk about their c-sections. I especially resonated with this paragraph:
Then I began to realize how evil it is to tell a woman who’s experienced a physically or emotionally traumatic birth that she should be grateful because when you say that, she hears that she isn’t grateful enough for the precious baby she’s been given. And that cuts to the quick. She may already be wondering what was wrong with her that she couldn’t have a normal birth and now you’ve told her that she doesn’t love her child enough. It is evil to say "all that matters is a healthy baby" because you are saying that her pain, her damage doesn’t matter. You are telling her that not only is her body broken, but so is her mind. That if she is physically healthy, that’s all that matters, and to be concerned with anything else is somehow wrong. That the means to the end doesn’t matter, she is expendable.
I was never able to put that feeling into words, but Gretchen has done a wonderful job of articulating these feelings that all of us mothers who have had tramautic births have felt but not been able to put into words. Be sure to read the whole essay.
Then I began to realize how evil it is to tell a woman who’s experienced a physically or emotionally traumatic birth that she should be grateful because when you say that, she hears that she isn’t grateful enough for the precious baby she’s been given. And that cuts to the quick. She may already be wondering what was wrong with her that she couldn’t have a normal birth and now you’ve told her that she doesn’t love her child enough. It is evil to say "all that matters is a healthy baby" because you are saying that her pain, her damage doesn’t matter. You are telling her that not only is her body broken, but so is her mind. That if she is physically healthy, that’s all that matters, and to be concerned with anything else is somehow wrong. That the means to the end doesn’t matter, she is expendable.
I was never able to put that feeling into words, but Gretchen has done a wonderful job of articulating these feelings that all of us mothers who have had tramautic births have felt but not been able to put into words. Be sure to read the whole essay.
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