A Famous Mother Shares Her Experience of New Motherhood

Even Hilary Clinton experienced the overwhelming stress and confusion that often comes with being a new mother. Here is an excerpt from an article written in the Boston Globe recently along with the link to the full article:

“This week, Clinton offered several policy proposals aimed at mothers, illustrating them with her own life story.
In Manchester on Tuesday, Clinton argued that parents struggling to balance work and family deserve more help from the government; she wants to expand paid family leave and make unpaid leave available to more workers.
She described being the first pregnant lawyer at her Arkansas law firm. "I kept getting more and more pregnant, and the lawyers just kept sort of walking down the hall looking away," she said.
Clinton also spoke about the stress of being a new mother, but acknowledged that she had more money and help than many women. "I once told Chelsea late one night when she was crying inconsolably, I said: 'Chelsea, you've never been a baby before and I've never been a mother before. We're just going to have to work to figure this out.' "

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2007/10/18/clinton_shows_femininity_to_court_key_constituency?mode=PF

Even New Mothers in Other Cultures Need More Support

Western culture is not very understanding of the major life and identity changes that occur when a woman becomes a mother for the very first time. When dealing with these major changes in her psyche and her personal life, a woman can easily become overwhelmed emotionally and need help dealing with the changes that are happening both inside and outside of her. The more support, education, and care she receives the easier her transition to motherhood will be, which in turn will affect her relationship with her baby. My fervent hope is that this country will eventually come to understand and validate the major life change that transitioning from an independent woman to a mother involves and support women in this life-altering endeavor rather than perpetuating the unrealistic myth of a fairy tale transition to motherhood.

In India the need for new mothers to receive care, support, and encouragement is being recognized. In an article dated October 10, 2007 there is a call to husbands to be more attentive after the birth of a woman’s first baby since she is more susceptible to “postpartum blues.” According to the author of the article, the typical Indian tradition is for a new mother to receive 40 days of rest where the woman’s extended family takes care of her so that she can get enough good food to eat, rest, and learn how to care for and nurture her baby. Sadly, this kind of extended care for a new mother in the U.S. is not the norm. In fact, it is not uncommon for a new mother to be sent home 48 hours after giving birth with no support system at all, even new mothers of twins and triplets (it's true!). This means that she must figure everything out for herself, as well as recover from the birth, try to meet her own needs for nourishment and rest, learn about newborns, AND care for her new baby 24 hours a day.

Here is the link to the article mentioned above:
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/India/Husbands_must_help_wives_through_motherhood_blues/articleshow/2444286.cms

Welcome to Motherhood: The first three months

Hi new moms and expectant moms,
The purpose of this blog is to help new moms and expectant moms cope with the reality of and stress of the first three months postpartum since becoming a mother for the first time. becoming a mother is not like putting on a new pair of shoes. It is a major transformation which begins during pregnancy and evolves over time. The first three months is one of the most difficult times in a woman's life as she struggles to learn how to be a mother and to deal with the major upheavals in her life that becoming a new mother has brought. In this blog I will be posting different ideas (hopefully every day) to validate you if you are already a new mom going through your first three months postpartum and to enlighten and prepare you if you are an expecting mom. i hope you find this blog useful! :)


Original post at New Mom Central.