Bridget Lynch has been a midwife and midwifery activist for more than 35 years. She is the Past President of the International Confederation of Midwives, where she led the development of global standards for the education and regulation of midwives worldwide. She is a Past-President of the Association of Ontario Midwives and a founding Board Member of the Canadian Association of Midwives. Bridget is an Assistant Professor in the Midwifery Education Program at McMaster University, and was formerly the Head of the Division of Midwifery at three Toronto hospitals. During her career as a midwife, the time following birth has been her focus, both in her research and midwifery practice. Bridget has served many families from different cultures and learned from them about various postpartum practices. She has incorporated her research and experience into her goal, which is to help parents make the early days and weeks after birth a peaceful and happy time for the whole family. She has presented on this topic at conferences in North America, Australia and Europe.
Until the early decades of the 20th century the time following childbirth was known as the ‘lying-in’ time in North America. This was a specified time and space wherein mothers were supported to be with their newborns without household or social responsibilities. The lying-in was the domain of women and was protected by midwives. While versions of lying-in have been practiced historically in societies around the world, today the observance of a protected time and space following childbirth has all but disappeared within the biomedical model of maternity care in Western societies. We now describe the time following birth as ‘the postpartum’, a medical term which has served to relegate this time to secondary status after the birth. Ironically and poignantly, ‘the postpartum’, indicates not only a loss of status of the time following birth, it is now synonymous with maternal depression.
This presentation will review the common historical and cross-cultural aspects of care following childbirth prior to medicalization. It will raise questions for midwifery care and research and challenge midwives to examine if our care following birth is truly ‘woman-centred’.
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