Back in May, when the baby was about three months old, I had my first doctor’s appointment in years—the first appointment that was really for my whole body, my non-pregnant self. I hadn't gotten myself a new primary doctor after moving cities the year before. I was getting plenty of care throughout my pregnancy, I figured.
But the postpartum madness was affecting my body is strange ways, and a mysterious, red, raised, and very painful bump appeared on my shoulder one morning. Because I didn’t have a primary care physician and it wasn’t an obstetric or gynecological issue, nobody would see me: I had to have an telehealth visit with urgent care. Even though I was overwhelmed with recovering from my cesarean and caring for a newborn, that motivated me to get established as a patient in the family practice wing of the medical center where I’d been such a frequent visitor for the past year.
My obligatory new-patient meeting was mostly a long intake conversation. Dr. Nicole, let’s call her, asked me some questions about how motherhood was going, and I told her, probably, that it was great except for the life-sapping exhaustion. She said to me: “Make sure you take some time for yourself. Get out of the house. Even if you do nothing. Give the baby to your husband, drive out by the river and just sit in the car for an hour.”
I nodded dutifully. I wanted to convey: Duh! Already doing it! Though at best, I was going out into the garden to pop seedlings into my raised beds or pull weeds. It was wonderful, but it wasn’t much distance. Especially since I took the baby monitor, blinking its little lights and transmitting the urgent fuzz of our white noise machine, clipped to my waistband.
I must not have been convincing. “And when you’re going,” she added, “don’t be like, ‘Oh are you sure it’s okay?’ Just hand him the baby and go.”
This came to mind this morning—four months later—as I got out of the shower, preparing to steal away head out for my new Sunday routine of taking a few hours to write at a coffeeshop. This woman had never met me, but she supposed I might need encouragement, or maybe permission, and, moreover, coaching on the best language and mindset with which to make this simple request.
I was irritated, because she was both right and wrong. I’ve worked over the years to get comfortable asking for what I need, but it can still be an effort. I bristled because it was irritating to be diagnosed with a gendered weakness, being too meek, too polite. Did she think that I thought I had some magical powers of nurturing that my husband lacked? I did not. He was a natural, a capable, dependable, co-equal parent from the beginning. Except for the times I thought he was completely deranged and incompetent—you know, changing a diaper differently than I would—I mostly thought he was as good or better than I was at the newborn thing.
Midwives and nurses had also made comments to me along the lines of, “Forget about the dishes for a few days,” “Don’t worry about cooking dinner just yet,” “Try to resist the urge to be cleaning the house.” I was just glad my husband wasn’t allowed at most of my appointments, because it would have been embarrassing for him to guffaw. Not only do I not feel the need to live up to a domestic goddess, spotless-house ideal, but because I still fear I don’t live up to the ideal of a basically respectful housemate who does her dishes in a timely fashion.
What strikes me now is not what this unsolicited advice said about me, my psychology, or my family, because these people barely knew me, but how pervasive the exhaustion and unmet-need-for-support must be if this advice is being doled out as an essential prescription to any new mother. And then there’s the bitter irony of how the responsibility to resolve this issue falls on the aching shoulders of these same overwhelmed women.
I can appreciate the intention to be supportive. There is so much pressure on women about mothering, relatioships, and domesticity. From the subtle cultural cues, like commercials for cleaning products always being about moms cleaning up, to the structural forces like a lack of paternity leave, women are constantly set up with unfair expectations. And the inequality in how much work gets done by wives versus husbands in the heterosexually-oriented home is well documented.
It’s great that all my skilled, devoted, and empathetic caregivers are trying to push back against the gender imbalance, to offer preventive counsel and counter-messaging. But women becoming more assertive, or setting better boundaries, is only one half of the equation. It’s less than half, actually, because it still requires women to take on another task, that of constructing an equal division of labor in their household. Things would truly be more equal if the expectations and responsibilities were closer to balanced from the outset. But how much longer will it take until we get there, if this idea is being fed to families only through one side?
Who is giving this advice to the fathers?