On this Labor Day, I Have a Radical New Holiday Idea to Propose

I Have Something to Say Before my baby turned 1, I knew exactly who to celebrate. Me. By Enter your email to receive alerts for this author. Sign in or create an account to better manage your email preferences. Unsubscribe from email alerts Are you sure you want to unsubscribe from email alerts for Shannon Palus? Sept 07, 20265:45 AM Photo illustration by Slate. Photos by Kwangmoozaa/Adobe Stock, AlekseiAntropov/Getty Images Plus, and sUs_angel/Getty Images Plus. Sign up for the Slatest to get the most insightful analysis, criticism, and advice out there, delivered to your inbox daily. One of the most startling parts of giving birth, to me, was that it’s an enormous physical achievement, and yet, instead of celebrating and relaxing afterward, you are thrust directly into the most difficult job you’ve ever had. By the time I gave birth last year, I had in my life run 10 half-marathons, three official marathons, one marathon conducted alone on the streets of New York City in 2020, plus an ultramarathon (50k, five zero, in the woods of Florida). None of this came remotely close to the strain of pregnancy, a cesarean section, and the ensuing recovery process. And yet, after those other feats of human accomplishment, there were lazy days in bed, on the beach, and with various concoctions of alcohol. And—when you tell people that you have just run an ultramarathon, their jaws literally drop. Birth? Everyone is mostly just excited about the baby. (I was surprised that I actually appreciated the fact that all the nurses at the hospital call you “Mama” instead of your name. Just as a big race ends with a volunteer hanging a finish-line medal around my neck, it felt correct that they were anointing me with a new title.) The reality is that the baby is the most exciting and needful member of the family after the birth process wraps up. And while I do have a new appreciation for the concept of push presents, something I would have previously categorized as ridiculous and vain—there’s nothing like becoming a mom to reveal little nooks and crannies to one’s internalized misogyny—I don’t know that I would have appreciated, say, a ring or a bracelet; when you’re on the verge of changing hundreds of diapers and your hands are still swollen from pregnancy, it’s not an ideal time for new hardware. But now, a year later, with the baby in daycare and a considerably better handle on bodily fluids (the baby’s and mine!) I wanted to do something to properly and indulgently and self-focusedly celebrate. So, on the anniversary of the day that I went to the hospital to give birth, I booked a $300 massage. Whenever I splurged on a spa service somewhere fancy I used to wonder, Who books a 110-minute treatment? Now I have an answer: Me! Because I gave birth! The spa receptionist was so taken with the explanation when I was checking out that she gave me 10 percent off the bill. May I suggest that everyone celebrate “Hospital Day” a year out? For me, this day fell two days before my baby’s birthday; that is how long the process took. That will be the case, too, for many first-time moms, when labor often takes between 12 and 24 hours, and rarely seems to begin at a nice convenient time in the morning. But if the Hospital Day and your baby’s birthday are the same, “Hospital Day (observed)” works just as well. I think it’s important that the mom-celebration happens on a different day than the baby’s actual birthday, which, of course, the baby retains rightful ownership of. Hospital Day is an opportunity to reflect on making it through both the birth and the postpartum period. There’s no universal definition of how long “postpartum” is; one academic review found that various health organizations consider it to be as short as six weeks and up to as long as a year. As we are seeing now, there is very scary postpartum health stuff that can happen inside of that year. It is “a period of profound vulnerability,” as physician Sejal Hathi has put it, in an op-ed calling for more women to be provided with more healthcare during the full year after birth, rather than being discharged by their OB-GYN to fend for themselves after a six-week checkup. I think, at the personal level, we should: 1) just call it and say “postpartum” is a full year, and 2) specifically celebrate reaching the end of it, by celebrating our Hospital Days. (If you had a home birth, I hope it proceeded safely, and I assume you’re already on your own plane of existence where you don’t need me to come up with rituals.) What makes a good Hospital Day celebration is up to you, but at minimum, it hinges on taking the day off of work, having someone else take care of your child or children, and doing something incredibly indulgent. Self-care vendors of all kinds should offer official Hospital Day discounts, and every mom of a soon-to-be-1-year-old should wake up to Hospital Day flowers. We cannot immediately improve the entire system of postpartum care and support provided to mothers, and though I believe it is possible to get things to a better place, it will take more pushing than even the longest of labors. We certainly cannot force every citizen and lawmaker in America to see “childbirth” not as a routine obligation, but as the dangerous physical feat of human achievement and strength that it is. But, when Hospital Day comes around, whether it’s ours or that of a friend, wife, or loved one, we can go all out. Family Health Care Holidays Motherhood Parenting Pregnancy Parenthood