Story #74 - Postpartum Pandemic Stories - Jenn, Tel Aviv (ISRAEL) - On Having a Baby During COVID, Living Abroad, Support, Welcoming Grief & Truly Caring for Mothers
I met my husband at the University of Toronto. He has a degree in Philosophy of Physics, and I'm finishing a Ph.D. in History of Medicine. My dissertation is about the history of cancer in Canada in the 50s. It's interesting to research how illnesses were discussed back then, compared to today. For the most part, we share the same discourse, and I'm sure there were also people in 1950 who talked about injecting themselves with bleach to fight cancer...
In October of 2018, we moved to Israel for two years. My husband got a post-doc at the University of Tel Aviv, and after six months of being here, we decided to start our family. We were lucky it worked, and I got pregnant with our son.
I had him two weeks before they shut down the borders. On my last visit before he was born, they were already asking if I'd been to China or Italy. It had been on my mind far before because my parents, who are older, were supposed to come. We had been able to secure a direct flight from Toronto to Tel Aviv, so I had hopes COVID wouldn't affect them.
Their flight was on the Friday before Spring Break. Israel shut down its border on Thursday.
My son was ten days old.
Lenny was a big baby. And it was a difficult birth. I have more perspective now, but in the middle of it, it was a mess of a labor.
I'm sure every woman in Israel was giving birth that day. I was 5 cm when I went in, but they couldn't find a room for me. When I got to 8, I asked for the epidural, but the anesthesiologist kept missing, so my face went numb. It eventually worked and made my back labor much more bearable, but I still felt the contractions. It was the worst of both worlds: I had the pain, but couldn't move around anymore.
In Israel, after you hit 9cm, you have three hours to give birth. My labor had stalled, and they decided to give me Pitocin to accelerate the process. But the Pitocin got stuck in the tube, and my husband had to tell them that nothing was going into me. They injected saline water, which forced everything in at once, causing a 30 minutes contraction.
Nobody believed me when I told them this was happening, and they kept telling me to stop pushing. But I couldn't. His heart rate dropped because he had his cord wrapped around his neck, and it tightened with every push. They eventually had to use a vacuum and do an episiotomy.
He didn't cry right away when they put him on my chest for a split second, and then whisked him away to the NICU to monitor him.
He was healthy, thank goodness, but I didn't feel like I just had a baby. I ended up with a lot of stitches that take a while to heal. I'm almost two months in and still recovering from it.
My son was big, long, and beautiful. Hungry all the time. Luckily, he didn't have any problem latching.
We went to his pediatrician three days after he was born, but nothing since. If everything goes well, he'll be allowed to go in for his two-months checkup. It's scary to think we can't see our doctor in person if we have questions, especially during a pandemic. It's unclear who has the virus, but we also don't know what the symptoms are, especially in babies. I had him before the madness, but when he was five days old, he presented himself with wheezing and had trouble breathing. He wasn't crying when he would typically cry, and because it's our first baby, we didn't know what was normal or not.
Here, you can't just go to the hospital. You have to call your GP first, who then refers you; otherwise, you have to pay. So we called, and he told us to go to the ER at Tel Aviv Children's Hospital. He had no fever, so they told us to take him back home and watch him. Afterward, the country shut down, and it was impossible to see his pediatrician, so we will always wonder if he had it.
My in-laws, who are also from Canada, were able to fly in on March 10th. They had rented the apartment in front of ours for one month. But four days after their arrival, Israel asked every foreigner to go back to their countries. Canada started recalling it's citizens, and their health insurance company contacted them saying that it would be revoked if they did not come home. We then had to negociate with the landlord to get a refund on the apartment. All this when Lenny was only a couple of days old.
As much as I'm looking forward to seeing my family because it was a lot to deal with, I know it would have been incredibly stressful to have my parents here during this time. None of them are big travelers. I don't think they've been outside Canada since they got married. I was nervous they would change their minds, but my mom got a passport. She went to the bank and bought gifts for us. They were going to come, so it makes me very sad, especially knowing now that they'll never see Israel before we head back.
At the same time, my parents are smokers. My dad had a heart attack, battled with cancer, broke bones; he's resilient, but we don't want to risk it. It's a bummer, but it's also for the best.
Israel was quick to implement regulations, unlike Canada or the US. At first, we couldn't leave our house beyond one hundred meters. Now it's five hundred. The death toll [on 4.25.2020] is around 200 people for the country, which has a population of 8.8 million. But for the better or worst, they've been opening up more and more every day.
Maternity leave here is three months. I was supposed to go back to Canada for the whole summer in June because my sister is getting married, but I think it'll be canceled. In October, my husband is taking a new position in Germany, so we'll see how that goes.
If anything, this situation has strengthened my relationship with my husband. We were more prepared than most people because we've been working from home for the past eight years. We moved here from Canada, in a different language and geopolitical situation: our office has a bomb shelter, and sirens have gone on about rockets. We had to navigate a new healthcare system, understand Hebrew, and never be 100% certain of what's happening. Then we had our son; nothing can break us.
My struggles mostly come from the fact that it happened all at once. We'd made a big effort to build a community here. Our neighbors are friendly, but everyone is worried.
We went on a social-distanced walk with a friend the other day. It's getting better, but it's still hard. Although I'm physically and mentally feeling better, it was a lot to deal with. I didn't have a six-weeks checkup, which, in my case, worried me.
I was frustrated to have to be responsible, a couple of days postpartum, of sending my in-laws back home and fixing the landlord problems. I was upset my parents couldn't come and would be on the phone with my mom, who was crying, having to be there for her. Tel Aviv is so beautiful, and I had this vision of us with the stroller walking down the beach on the promenade. Now it's all been taken away.
I know we are lucky, but it doesn't mean it's not frustrating. This virus is affecting everybody's life. Here in the city, people spend time outside because the weather is beautiful most of the year. Lots of people are living with a million roommates because you never live inside. I can't imagine how they feel.
So many of my friends at home have small children. It's very intense here in Israel, but lots of them told me to just "enjoy my time" and my husband's help and presence. I've been told not to worry too much and to enjoy my position, unlike some of them who are stuck at home with toddlers. My husband, too, was told, "Stop worrying, you're so lucky. What are you doing anyway?"
That kind of comment bothers me because this wasn't my experience at all. It's stressful not to be able to reach your pediatrician or not having the support of your family. This is an experience that many moms have to go through, and these feelings are valid. It's not because we are indeed lucky that we're not struggling. Nothing is healing about comparing yourself and downplaying your emotions.
I spoke to a friend last week who also had a new baby. Her family is around, and I felt a bit envious of not being able to connect with mine. We had planned for a lot of support from our family until the end of April that never came.
It's okay that it's difficult. These are unique circumstances. I feel stronger now, but I want other women to know that it's okay not to be happy with a newborn during this time. Not being able to receive care as a woman is terrible, and this virus is overshadowing this fact.
COVID is dangerous, but not being able to receive care is very also scary.
This pandemic is once again threatening our rights because it questions what is deemed essential and non-essential. Ultimately, it undermines women's issues, like abortion and postpartum care.
Unfortunately, history repeats itself, but people have to understand that caring for women and mothers is not only essential: it's a priority.