Maternity benefit

“ Some light is thrown upon the ultimate destination of the maternity benefit in many cases by a letter written to "The Times" in July last by Miss Margaret Bondfield, the well-known woman trade unionist leader, who cites the following cases:—
"A woman having been confined, her husband went to claim the maternity benefit to which he was entitled. ”

“ There have been several recent cases in the same Union in which women have come into the lying-in wards for their confinement, where, of course, they received every medical care and attention, and where they are encouraged to stay till they are entirely convalescent, and have then gone out and claimed maternity benefit either themselves or through their husbands before they were really fit to go. It should be noted that, where the husband is an insured person, he usually regards the maternity benefit as his by right. ”

“ Happily, the present-day obstetrician, who assumes the care of an expectant mother, does so with confidence and optimism because of the available knowledge upon which he may draw for her benefit. Progress in the various branches of medicine and nursing is steadily pointing the way toward greater and more effective safeguards for the maternity patient and her baby. ”

“ Modern ingenuity also designs many comforts for the prospective mother, not the least of which is maternity raiment, including corsets and adjustable gowns. Why do not women avail themselves of all these aids? Largely because they are not educated for motherhood.
Medical science, through sanitation and hygiene, has lightened the mother’s burden in rearing her baby. ”

“ Statistics and physicians from their observation agree in this, that the bearing of children by normal women, so far from being injurious to health, is as healthful, stimulating, and invigorating a function as the blooming of a flower, or the shedding of fruit, and a mother is no worse for the experience of maternity than is the plant or the tree for the fruit it bears. ”

“ Still, I feel that if more could be done to teach them how to care for their own health before the birth of the little ones we should have healthier and stronger children. How it can be done without hurting the mothers’ feelings is a very difficult problem, but I suffered so much before my first baby was born that perhaps I feel most strongly on the need of our sisters knowing how best to care for themselves. I am so glad the Maternity Scheme is being taken up so much more by Health Committees now since the Guild have worked for it. ”

“ But the evils of excessive birth control are very real. There is first the individual—every woman is better in body and mind for child bearing—the periodic completion of the maternal cycle brings out the best, preserves youth and maintains vital contact with life. Maternity gives to woman her most beautiful attributes. ”

“ Let me say to the woman who is pregnant for the first time, the experiences of the pregnant state should cause you no fear, worry, or anxiety. Giving birth to a baby is a perfectly natural, normal procedure, and if you are in reasonable health—if your physician tells you you are a fairly normal woman—then you can dismiss further thought of danger and go on your way rejoicing. For thousands of years maternity has been women's exclusive profession and no doubt will continue to be many ages hence. ”

“ On the other hand, when maternity is accepted as a privilege, and love instead of bitterness reigns in the prospective mother’s heart, the babe is born tranquil, normal, healthy. Returning to the phrase, efficiency in motherhood, it is good business to bear normal children.
In this day, the woman who frets, rebels and weeps during pregnancy commands little sympathy and practical help from her husband and family. ”

“ Then pregnancy by every true woman will be desired, and instead of being a period of disease, suffering and direful forebodings, will become a period of health, exalted pleasure and holiest anticipations. Motherhood will be deemed the choicest of earth's blessings; women will rejoice in a glad maternity and for any self-denial will be compensated by healthy, happy, buoyant, grateful children. ”

“ Preparation for motherhood must rise above the practical instruction in the care and feeding of infants which leads to efficiency. It requires a certain mental and spiritual adjustment of the woman to the environment and conditions of maternity. She who is obsessed by the fear of physical suffering which motherhood may entail, who regards the coming of a child as the end of her individual career, her social life, her personal pleasures, will be neither efficient nor joyous. ”

“ I am never sick from beginning to end. The most difficult thing at the time is securing a woman who is able and willing to do housework, and look after the woman at the same time; that to me is one of the greatest problems in the Maternity Scheme to-day. If something could be done to organise such women, then it would mean much. A midwife simply goes and [172] washes the baby and sees to the mother once a day for a week, but when the mother gets up, she often has more loss, and therefore feels her weakness.
Wife’s allowance 18s. to 30s.; six children, one still-born. ”

“ One is that the advantage to motherhood cannot be proved: the other, that it is not the uses of maternity to which she is specialized, but the uses of sex-indulgence. So far from the economic dependence of women working in the interests of motherhood, it is the steadily acting cause of a pathological maternity and a decreasing birth-rate. ”

“ In fact, by virtue of the deep significance of the states of pregnancy and motherhood, and the long period of time through which they continue, it is scarcely possible for them not to produce a mental effect of some sort upon the average woman. Sometimes this effect is a very happy one; but all too often it is quite the reverse. It is safe to say that the majority of maternity patients are passing through deep waters, and the nurse’s usefulness to these charges will be greatly broadened if she has at least some understanding of the cause and character of these mental sufferings. ”

“ For the birth itself, the mother should be in experienced hands, preferably those of a highly trained and certified midwife or maternity nurse such as Queen Charlotte’s or the London Hospital supplies, one who is experienced in all that has to be done in normal, healthy circumstances, and who can detect at once any necessity for specialized help. ”

“ Practical suggestions have been generously contributed by other doctors, and by nurses, in this country and Canada, whose effective work is inspired by their belief that the future welfare of our race depends upon the care given to-day to maternity patients and their babies. ”

“ It cannot be subordinated to the tax on strength involved by manual or mental labor, or even strenuous social duties and amusements. The numerous experiments and observations which have been made during recent years in Maternity Hospitals, more especially in France, have shown conclusively that not only the present and future well-being of the mother and the ease of her confinement, but the fate of the child, are immensely influenced by rest during the last month of pregnancy. "Every working woman is entitled to rest during the last three months of her pregnancy." ”

“ I wrote to all national health service trusts, NHS foundation trusts and heads of midwifery in England asking them to review their practices for allowing representatives from private companies on maternity wards and to assure themselves that they are maintaining women’s dignity and respect shortly after the birth of a baby when they can be tired and vulnerable. ”

“ It, therefore, also realizes the duty of providing for the new being according to its best powers. The first object of its attention must, consequently, be the one that gives birth to the new being—the mother. A comfortable home; agreeable surroundings and provisions of all sorts, requisite to this stage of maternity; a careful nursing—such are the first requirements. The mother's breast must be preserved for the child as long as possible and necessary. This is obvious. Moleschott, Sonderegger, all hygienists and physicians are agreed that nothing can fully substitute the mother's nourishment. ”

“ Their need is care, which includes cleanliness in order to prevent infection; suitable food; fresh air and exercise; regular and sufficient rest and sleep; an equable body temperature; early treatment of complications and correction of physical defects. In short, each patient needs to be watched; needs clean care and to practice the approved principles of personal hygiene from the beginning of pregnancy. This without regard to race, color, creed, occupation, status, or location. It means all maternity patients and their babies the country over. ”

“ That may be seen by anyone who has read the letters from mothers lately published under the title of Maternity by the Women's Co-operative Guild; there is still far more misery caused by having too many babies than by having too few ”

“ Preventives are largely used. Race suicide, if you will, is the policy of the mothers of the future. Who shall blame us?
Two years later a fourth baby came. Varicose veins developed. I thought they were a necessary complement to childbirth. He was a giant of a boy and heavy to carry, and I just dragged about the housework, washing and cleaning until the time of his birth; but I looked forward to that nine days in bed longingly; to be still and rest was a luxury of luxuries. Economics became a greater strain than ever now that I had four children to care for. ”

“ It is useful to consider the different conditions under which the middle-class and the working-class woman becomes a mother. The middle-class wife from the first moment is within reach of medical advice which can alleviate distressing illness and confinements and often prevent future ill-health or death. During the months of pregnancy she is not called upon to work; she is well fed; she is able to take the necessary rest and exercise. At the time of the birth she will have the constant attendance of doctor and nurse, and she will remain in bed until she is well enough to get up. ”

“ All these considerations which refer to normal individuals, represent a series of hygienic laws regarding maternity, which may [Pg 174] be summed up as follows: excellence in procreation belongs to those mothers who have already attained the age at which the individual organism has completed its development, and before it has entered upon its involutive period; the mother must herself have a normal weight; the pregnancies must be separated by long intervals; and during the last weeks of pregnancy it is necessary that the mother should have the opportunity of complete rest. ”

“ It is important that treatment of a simple nature should be given with advice at maternity centres. Nourishment being often the treatment mothers most need, provision should be made for dinners for expectant and nursing mothers when ordered by the doctor. ”

“ How deplorably different are the duties of maternity as viewed by the large majority of human mothers only those of us who have spent years in the dispensaries for sick children, or have had other direct experience of the poor, can fully appreciate. The laborer must have his family near him because his home must be near his work. ”

“ There are the Municipal Maternity Hospitals, where care is free, or there is the Mutualité Maternelle, the self-supporting maternity club through which one may make arrangements for accouchement. There are free meals for mothers at the Cantines Maternelles, which are spread over Paris. Are there other children in the family, so that their care is a burden to the mother? She must not tire herself with the housework. ”

“ First, our administration has worked hard to make sure all women have access to prenatal care. We know when women get medical attention before a baby is born, that child is much more likely to be born healthy. And good health is the most precious gift we can offer a child or a family. ”

“ This makes us hope that before long good care during pregnancy, childbirth and young motherhood will be available to every woman in the land. But quite as earnestly do we also hope that every woman in the land who is looking forward to motherhood will seek this care. Certain it is that the expectant mother who does seek care, whether from a doctor in his office or through a prenatal clinic, is approaching her motherhood in the only way that is safe for herself and her baby. ”

“ Remember that your own physical condition and the health of the baby you will bring into the world depend largely upon your mental attitude. Cast out all fear of childbirth and all dread of maternal duties and sacrifices. Fretting, grieving, or rebellion will not purchase immunity from maternal duties. Rather it will increase them. The child will be born and laid in your arms to be fed, cared for, and reared, whether you weep or smile through the months of pregnancy. ”

“ Science wrangles over the rival importance of heredity and environment, but we women know what effects prenatal influence works in children. And, knowing this, what a mystery that we do not mold each thought and act in the interest of the children whose up-bringing will be our real life-work! How strange that mothers do not realize that the burden of maternal and domestic duties can be lightened by prenatal care and character molding.
Science has done much for the modern mother. ”