New York Times: "Black Mothers Respond to Our Cover Story on Maternal Mortality"

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Credit...LaToya Ruby Frazier for The New York Times. By The New York Times Magazine
April 19, 2018

In last week’s cover story for the magazine, Linda Villarosa wrote masterfully about how the intertwined crisis of black infant and maternal mortality is related not to the genetics of race but to the lived experience of being a black woman in this country. We asked readers to share their stories of struggling to receive proper prenatal and postnatal care, and hundreds of people responded. Below is a selection of some of the stories.

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‘We Often Feel Lonely on This Birth Path’​​
​Image Credit...Courtesy of Crystal Marie McDaniels

​As soon as I learned I was pregnant back in September, it was like a switch turned on, and I started seeing story after story about the risks associated with childbirth and motherhood for black women. It felt like a cruel trick. I knew for me to remain calm and confident throughout the process, I would need to seek a health care provider who would provide warm, focused and passionate care. That is how I ended up at a birthing center. I saw an OB for screenings, but my primary prenatal care has been provided by a licensed midwife practitioner and her staff. The level of attention and detail is so much more pronounced with her versus with our doctor visits.
We are not anti-science, or anti-drugs, or anti-medicine. We also know that receiving care through a birthing center is a privilege all cannot afford. However, in light of what we know, and the care often experienced by black women in formal health care institutions, we feel we have no choice but to go this route.

The sad part is, in all of our childbirth-education classes and from what we can tell, of all the patients at the birthing center, we are the only black family. We often feel lonely on this birth path. I am 31 weeks pregnant, and we shall see what the future holds.

Crystal Marie McDaniels, Los Angeles
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I Had to Diagnose My Own Life-Threatening Brain Bleed 
Image Credit...Courtesy of Joneigh Khaldun  

I am a black woman, an emergency-department physician, and the director of the Detroit Health Department. I am also the survivor of a life-threatening postpartum complication — a brain bleed (bilateral subdural hematomas) that was delayed in diagnosis, three weeks after I delivered my first child 11 years ago.
I originally had planned a natural labor and enlisted a doula, but after a day and a half of labor, I failed to progress and ended up having a C-section. After the delivery, I had excruciating headaches and told both my OB and my anesthesiologist several times. I felt brushed off and did not know what to do. It was not until I told one of my fellow residents about the pain I was experiencing that I went into my own ER where I worked and received a CT scan that diagnosed my life-threatening brain bleed.
I ended up having an urgent surgery on a Sunday afternoon to save my life. This experience has made me a better physician, and it is why I have committed myself to improving the lives of mothers and babies in my work in Detroit. Dr. Joneigh Khaldun, Detroit

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‘I Felt Dismissed Throughout My Postnatal Care’
Image Credit...Courtesy of Whitney Polk  

I’m a black first-time mom and also a Ph.D. student in education at Harvard University. I gave birth in November 2017 to a beautiful baby girl. My pregnancy was tough throughout. I complained about my heart rate and shortness of breath toward the end of my pregnancy, but my health care providers chalked up my condition to regular pregnancy symptoms. My heart rate remained high during and after labor. I felt dismissed throughout my postnatal care, and even after I was sent home, I felt that I could barely breathe or carry my baby.

I saw my primary-care physician and my nurse practitioner, who told me that I was fine and that I needed anxiety medication. The next day, I was admitted to the hospital for postpartum pre-eclampsia. An echo of my heart revealed dilation and a reduced ejection fraction. I saw a cardiologist for a few weeks after discharge and thought I was getting better with blood-pressure medication, until I began to experience severe, crushing chest pain and shortness of breath.
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After weeks of feeling as if I were going to die, I emailed a cardiologist I found through a peri-partum cardiomyopathy Facebook group. If I didn’t have my Harvard email address, I often wonder if he would have emailed me so quickly. But he did. An MRI led to a diagnosis of peri-partum cardiomyopathy — a type of pregnancy-induced heart failure. I am receiving better care now, but it’s been hard physically and psychologically.
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​Whitney Polk, Salem, Mass.

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‘The Psychological Weight of Three Generations of Black Women Lives in My Womb’ 
Image Credit...Photograph by Noah Fecks

The first six months of my pregnancy were smooth sailing: zero morning sickness, no diabetes and my nursery to-do list had many check marks. My husband of 11 years was supportive and grounded in his duties as a new father to be. But one week after a cherry-blossom-themed baby-shower luncheon, I got the news that my daughter no longer had a heartbeat. Flower-essence treatments, reiki sessions, acupuncture and a birth doula didn’t save the life of Lulu Mika, stillborn at seven months (May 8, 2017). She was 3 pounds. I held her but couldn’t stand to see her face.

My OB-GYN of 10 years was super-attentive, but at a loss for the medical language of what cut my daughter’s life short. The autopsy showed nothing. My follow-up postnatal treatments included many talks with her about managing myself and the pros and cons of jumping back into work. I didn’t have the luxury of taking a complete pause while working through a broken heart, nor did I have family members to help me navigate the emotional tunnel ahead.

Luckily, I had a circle of friends who held me up in big and small ways, with weeklong getaways, french-fry dates, bouts of absences, phone calls (not text messages), Rancho Gordo beans deliveries, flowers, cards and showing up at my apartment with wine. Mostly, women of color who understood the definition of “push through it.” In the beginning, I wanted to die, but I tucked that feeling away; I’m lucky the thought faded. This nuclear group understood that being a black career woman doesn’t allow much room to mourn. They knew the unspoken rule of protecting the lineage narrative or never speaking the trauma of the women closest to us. It’s silence that contributes to the demise of black women and our babies. After counseling and many days of reflection, my eyes were open to the multitude of unhealthful societal structures that were riding my back while carrying a child. I realized that the psychological weight of three generations of black women lives in my womb.
​Nicole A. Taylor, Brooklyn, New York

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‘You Would Have Thought I Was a Mute From Mars’ 
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Credit...Courtesy of Deidre Johnson 

​I am a mother of two sons. After each of their births, I ended up in the hospital with postpartum eclampsia and HELLP syndrome — serious complications of high blood pressure. Both times it was a struggle to get doctors to even pay attention to my symptoms. When I first noticed that my blood pressure was elevated, I was told, “You people usually have higher blood pressure.” The first time, but for the presence of my father who called an OB-GYN friend in California, I would be dead. The second was even more frustrating and surreal, because I was in a different hospital for high-risk pregnancies in the same system, and I still was not listened to until my family threatened litigation. I am an African-American woman with degrees from Princeton and Yale. I still remember every conscious moment of both experiences. The second time, I was even using their language to describe my vascular headache, asking why they were not checking my urine for protein, requesting a magnesium drip because that saved me the first time. You would have thought I was a mute from Mars. It was the most frustrating experience of my life.
Deidre Johnson, Denver

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