Apr 11Liked by Molly Dickens, Karen Sheffield-Abdullah
I always think of Tressie Cottom's essay on how doctors treated her as incompetent and never took her bleeding and pain seriously when she was pregnant until she lost the baby.
The just plain negligence is so heartbreaking, and she details how she was treated as incompetent as soon as she was in a medical setting due to her race--and it also raises questions about whether she was looked at as "worthy" of medical care and attention. I think about what could happen to my own Black biracial daughter if she ever decides to have a baby. There's so much more work we need to do in this space. Thanks for your attention and research.
Whoa. I’ve seen Arlene Geronimus speak so I was familiar with weathering. Seeing weathering framed in this way, especially in reference to the intersections of race and gender, something I have understood for years, helped me become clearer about my experience with 6-years of infertility before I had my son (with my husband) and my failure to progress in labor with my daughter sixteen years earlier when I had her alone at only twenty. This is why we say rising tides lift all boats. Because working on improving birth equity for Black perinatal people will help all perinatal people and outcomes for all infants.
This is such an important conversation! Thank you for working on this.
I always think of Tressie Cottom's essay on how doctors treated her as incompetent and never took her bleeding and pain seriously when she was pregnant until she lost the baby.
The just plain negligence is so heartbreaking, and she details how she was treated as incompetent as soon as she was in a medical setting due to her race--and it also raises questions about whether she was looked at as "worthy" of medical care and attention. I think about what could happen to my own Black biracial daughter if she ever decides to have a baby. There's so much more work we need to do in this space. Thanks for your attention and research.
Tressie's essay: https://time.com/5494404/tressie-mcmillan-cottom-thick-pregnancy-competent/
Whoa. I’ve seen Arlene Geronimus speak so I was familiar with weathering. Seeing weathering framed in this way, especially in reference to the intersections of race and gender, something I have understood for years, helped me become clearer about my experience with 6-years of infertility before I had my son (with my husband) and my failure to progress in labor with my daughter sixteen years earlier when I had her alone at only twenty. This is why we say rising tides lift all boats. Because working on improving birth equity for Black perinatal people will help all perinatal people and outcomes for all infants.