Welcome to the United States where healthy and functional families don’t matter.
In the past few weeks, we’ve begun to have some hope that our government will finally see mothers as valuable and imperative parts of the workforce. We started to hear whisperings of paid maternity leave being added to Biden's almost $2 trillion American Families Plan.
Men gathered together to make decisions that don’t affect them in the least.
And the women, whose lives would see the most impact from those decisions, were left with the fall out.
Paid maternity leave was wiped off the table in favor of things like getting a check for $12,500 if you buy an electric car...you just have to be wealthy enough to afford it.
Currently there’s ZERO federal paid family leave. Some states and companies choose to pay for it, but that still leaves millions of Americans with nothing.
“Sure,” you might think, “that sucks. But it’s not like everywhere else in the world is doing any better.”
Not so much.
The United States is a part of a group called the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development which brings together 37 democracies with market based economies in the hopes of “collaborat[ing] to develop policy standards to promote sustainable economic growth. The OECD provides a setting where governments can compare experiences, seek answers to common challenges, identify good practices, and develop high standards for economic policy.”
Of those 37 countries, we are the only country that doesn’t offer ANY maternity leave. On average, that group of countries pays for 18 weeks of leave...with some offering allowances up to 58! Most of those countries also have paid leave for fathers as well.
We don’t stand out just in that group either. We are the only developed country IN THE WORLD that doesn’t offer paid leave to our citizens. Of countries in the United Nations, the only countries that are left without it are the United States and Papua New Guinea. And even they’re working to make it possible.
In 1993, our government tried to throw us a bone with the Family and Medical Leave Act that allows employees to take 12 weeks of unpaid leave without risk of losing their jobs. Which seems like they were trying to do something to help mothers. But in reality, there were tons of exclusions that made it really difficult for most to actually take advantage of those 12 weeks at home caring for their brand new baby...without any income.
Sounds like a dream vacation, doesn’t it?
Currently, about 77% of workers have no paid family leave and low-income workers are even less likely to have access to paid leave.
So yeah, were we excited for our four measly weeks of time to be at home healing, bonding, and recovering? Kinda. I mean, we want to be grateful, I guess. But come oooonnn. Four weeks in and of itself is kind of ridiculous.
Most women haven’t even stopped bleeding or even been cleared for picking anything heavier than their baby up by the time four weeks rolls around. For those who choose to breastfeed, it barely feels “normal” at this point. And more likely it feels painful and exhausting--so you definitely want to change things up and have to start pumping at work in the bathroom.
As a pediatrician, I see moms every single day who are STRUGGLING physically and mentally. Postpartum depression and anxiety, sleep deprivation, loss of identity. It all comes together in this “perfect” storm to create an environment where there’s not a single possibility of being able to function at their job.
At four weeks, new moms are still running on fumes with babies giving them (if they’re lucky) 2-3 hour spurts of sleep. Lawmaking Men of The World, have you ever had to do your job when you’ve been woken just as you’ve started to fall asleep...every night for weeks on end? And THEN show up for work as your best self all the while people are expecting you to be the same person you were a year ago?
I’m going to guess that’s a no.
So why is this a big deal? Why should this matter to each and every American? Aside from the fact that you should care about your fellow humans, we’re doing a disservice to both women AND the companies they work for when they’re required to come back too soon after having a baby.
Women are trying to do all things 100% - show back up to work, be the best new mom - all at once. And when they do that, something suffers. And it’s usually their mental and physical well-being. Women can’t do it all in that newborn stage (or in any stage!) and they shouldn’t have to.
Women won’t be as effective when they return too early. They won’t be as productive and it is just plain bad for business. They’ll be better performers and employees when they’ve been given the time and space and have mentally and physically recovered. The American Psychiatric Association reports that employees with unresolved depression experience a 35% reduction in productivity, contributing to a loss to the U.S. economy of $210.5 billion a year in absenteeism, reduced productivity, and medical costs.
Add on top of that the stigma around depression and anxiety in general. PLUS the idea of having to appear like you’ve got everything together as a new mom and really not wanting to disrupt the status quo by asking for help with postpartum depression.
And where are the women in government? Why don’t we hear their voices? We heard from women like Nancy Pelosi and Democratic Senator Patty Murray telling us that they were fighting for paid leave, but I wish we could amplify their messages times a million.
Oftentimes, I think it’s because women in government probably have more money and resources than most...so it’s not a problem for them. Childcare and time off isn’t an issue. Their reality is not the reality of most Americans.
Don’t even get me started on men in government being able to take 2 months of paternity leave when there is a crisis of epic proportions going on in their department that’s affecting the entire country. You think a woman in corporate America would’ve been able to do the same?
I’m sure a lot of you are feeling the same way I am with the news of paid family leave falling out of the democratic bill. While 12 weeks didn’t seem a lot to many of us, especially when we compare it to the rest of the developed world, what it did do was provide hope and promise that things were at least moving in the right direction.
I want you to know that together we can make a change. We’ll keep fighting for what’s right with regards to paid family leave. We will not give up the fight. We tasted hope and that’s not something we cannot and will not let slide.
What can you do to help get the bill reinstated? Fill in this form (less than one minute) to email your member of congress here:
I know first-hand that working mom life is hard, but I also know it doesn’t have to be impossible.
Trust me. The best way to get unstuck isn’t to work harder. It’s to use a framework that gets real results, no matter what area you need to tackle first.