Isabelle Nougier-Gallen, France
Photography: @camilleelisa_photographie
Introduction
Can you give me a little background on yourself?
I was born and raised in France 39 years ago. My father was in the army, we moved a lot in France and were always far from our family who lived in Nantes. I had my Business School Master degree in Rouen (Normandy), worked a bit in Paris and escaped as soon as possible far from it to live now in Alsace, in the countryside near Strasbourg and the German border. I live quite a “normal” life with my husband (my first love for 20 years now). I’m a Mom of a tribe of boys of 8, 3 and a half years old and I’m expecting my third son by the end of this year. I used to work in Marketing for an international Chocolate group for more than a decade but I changed careers 3 years ago to live my highest value, a mindful and balanced life. As my second son was diagnosed with a unique and unknown chromosomal deletion, I passed a degree in digital marketing to be able to work from home and to take care of him. I created my small business and I’m now an eco-friendly digital storyteller for small entrepreneurs and teach in a Design school. My family and I live the average life with tax bills to pay, a loan to refund for our bicentenary house, a lot of housework to do in it, 8 hens to carry for, some responsibilities in our sport associations or school institutions. We are vegetarian, eating organic products and fruits and vegetables from our garden when we are lucky. We teach our children how to take care of our environment, respect the traditions and others, believe in life and enjoy it to live in kindness with every living soul. Like any mother, I have wonderful moments with my boys and some crises, especially with my eldest who is diagnosed as a HP child and my youngest who is also autistic. I am madly in love with my man and sometimes absolutely furious against him (usually for silly things). I try to lose weight (especially after each pregnancy), to find some time to paint my illuminations and do yoga. I struggle to have the household done, the fridge full, the closets filled with matching socks and good size clothes. I also blog about kindness at pimpyourbestlife.earth as it is my life mission and write some blog posts for Your Zen Mama & Lovewell.
Pregnancy
Can you share a little bit about your pregnancy(ies) and the type of prenatal care that you received.
I wasn’t sure of my desire to become a parent until my gynecologist told me I have sterility issues. I was married for 2 years (and 8 years in love with my husband) when diagnosed with polycystic ovary syndrome. As I am a conflicted person, I decided becoming a mother was the most important thing in my life. It is funny how when something is out of reach, you want it at all costs and with any doubts. It took me 4 years to be pregnant after unsuccessful monitoring and medications to boost my ovaries. I gave up and fell pregnant naturally. I lived this pregnancy as my personal miracle. In France, we are lucky enough to have universal and mandatory health insurance so almost everyone delivers their baby at hospital. You can choose between private or public hospital but your medical journey is processed and dictated by the national health insurance. You have 3 mandatory ultrasound scans and 8 appointments paid off with a midwife. I did these appointments with 2 other mums and my husband and we “learned” about what was supposed to happen for birth, how to take care of a baby, what to buy, how to get organized etc. Every month, I went to my gynecologist to check everything was fine with my health and the baby. I didn’t realize at the time but my first pregnancy was quite easy. I was healthy, baby too and I could work while enjoying my growing belly. Then we tried to get pregnant and it didn’t work, again. It took us 4 years to get pregnant with an artificial insemination. I disliked the shots. It made me nervous, angry and overweight. It wasn’t easy to schedule all the monitoring appointments with my job as I used to travel a lot at the time. But we were blessed it worked at the first attempt. This pregnancy wasn’t easy. When I was 2 months pregnant, I thought I’d lost the baby with a small placental abruption. But my son held on. At 3 months of pregnancy, I had a lot of contractions so I had to stop working. I had to be very careful. I was diagnosed with hypothyroid and pregnancy diabetes. I was monitored every month and on a very strict diet. Despite that, we missed my baby who went ill in utero and all the other symptoms we discovered at his birth. This time, I went to my 7 midwife appointments with 2 other mums pregnant with their second baby too. We mainly talked about how to get organized with 2 kids and did some meditation. It was soothing. And we tried for almost 4 years to get pregnant again. This time, we tried 5 unsuccessful artificial inseminations. We decided to go for an IVF and it was a very traumatic experience. I did almost all the secondary effects. Once again, we are very lucky in France it doesn’t cost anything to the parents to get an IVF. You have to respect the criteria but it is all paid off by the national health insurance. The counterpart is you can’t choose and there is only one hospital in the area you can go. And honestly, it is like a baby factory without humanity. On my husband's birthday, I was supposed to receive the embryo but something went wrong at the hospital and they decided to freeze the only 2 surviving embryos. We were devastated. 3 days later, we learned my second son was disabled, just before Christmas. Then Covid19 happened and we had no news from the hospital. We worked on my son’s diagnosis and the geneticist asked us to wait for genetic results before doing anything more for another pregnancy. 18 months later, she cleared us to go on with our pregnancy project. We were lucky enough the embryo transfer worked at once and now I’m expecting our third baby boy. This pregnancy is harder because I’m more tired than before. Having a disabled 18 kg kid is quite exhausting, especially when you are working alone with your own business. I’m still suffering from pregnancy diabetes and I’m on a very strict diet and monitored every two weeks. If I can have some midwife appointments, I won’t have them as I don’t have enough time for it and since “I know everything there is to know with a 3rd baby”. Now, I’m on my last month and I am monitored twice a week, while suffering water retention. Quite usual but not funny to deal with. (If you want to know more I’ve written my infertility journey here https://pimpyourbestlife.earth/en/infertility-mpa-cmco/ and every week I blog my pregnancy journal there too https://pimpyourbestlife.earth/en/parenting-with-kindness/)
Can you share some of the ways that you prepared both physically and psychologically for birth.
For my first pregnancy I was terrified by the delivery. All my life, I’ve heard horrific stories from my mother and later from my friends and colleagues. I was so traumatized the midwife had to keep me at the end of the sessions to help me calm down. I tried to do prenatal meditation to help me. The midwife at the clinic was a man and he was so calm and kind he really helped me not to be afraid of the hospital anymore. 3 of my older colleagues went home on an afternoon to share their own birthing stories and it helped me to realize it was possible for a mother to enjoy the birth and not live it as a painful and humiliating moment. But what helped me most was a French TV reality show my colleagues asked me to watch. It is called Baby boom and the production films in a hospital maternity ward with all the births happening there from the moment the mother enters the hospital to the end of her stay. It was raw, authentic, with all kinds of personal stories, with easy or painful birth and it was just what I needed to be ready. For my second pregnancy, it was a bit different. I was very focused on my failed breastfeeding and how to manage the birth with an older son. My aunt went from Nantes to spend some quality time with me and chatting with her was really soothing. As I couldn’t work at this time, I was on my own and this baby was mainly mine. I wasn’t afraid anymore, just focused on my diabetes, treatments and personal organization to welcome this new little boy. This third pregnancy is really different. I’m so busy with my business and my second son’s treatments it is really hard for me to focus much on this baby. That’s why I’ve been posting weekly my pregnancy journal on my blog. To be sure I have this writing moment 100% dedicated to this baby. This time, I’m most focused on my postpartum as I know it is where I need to be more prepared. I’ve read The Zen Mama Guide, attended a cycle of conferences on nutrition, breastfeeding and alternative birth preparations. One of my customers is Doula (which is not that common in France) and coaching her on her activity and services is another way for me to prepare myself. I’ve also consulted a lactation specialist to try another way to breastfeed. And I’ve tried to connect to Mum communities to see how other Mums in the world live and prepare themselves for their pregnancies. That’s how I’ve discovered the Atlas of Motherhood!
Birth
Can you share about your birth (births).
My first birth came as a shock. I went to my gynecologist a few days before Christmas and she told me everything was fine and I’ll see her the first week of January. At night, after an evening at the cinema, I woke up feeling weird and felt something was unusual. And just like that my water broke. I jumped, tried (and failed) to wake up my husband. As we were 3 weeks before the due date, I wasn’t ready. The suitcase wasn’t ready at all (nor the baby bedroom for a fact) so I spent an hour climbing up and down the stairs to gather my stuff. I had no contractions so I wasn’t in a hurry to leave for the hospital. I even took some time to eat breakfast as I knew I wouldn't be allowed at the hospital to eat or drink anything. My finally awakened husband lost his calm and hurried me in the car just as my first contractions arrived. We live in the countryside so we had 25 minutes to drive to get to the hospital. When I went into the maternity ward I was 6 cm dilated. It was high time! Unexpectedly I was quite calm and almost joking about the situation. When the midwife told me I was ready for the epidural, the anesthetist came and it was the most painful part of my delivery. I was shocked and didn’t expect that. The epidural was heavily dosed and I couldn’t move at all. After that, the cervical dilation slowed. Then the midwife disagreed with my gynecologist on how to deliver the baby. He was in a posterior position and couldn’t rotate by himself. The midwife saw he was too big so she asked for me to be prepared for a caesarian section. My gynecologist disagreed and asked me to push… to realize he was too big indeed. She gave me an episiotomy but it wasn’t enough either so she had to use suckers while I was pushing like a madwoman. My poor little boy came to the world screaming, his head burned and distorted by the forceps. It wasn’t an easy birth but I was happy and serene enough to overpass it immediately. For my second son, it was quite different. For all my pregnancy, I had to slow down and lie down to avoid him coming too early. I didn’t expect him to come at term. A week before the due date, I went to my gynecologist to check and something odd and painful happened during the examination. After the appointment, I joined my husband for lunch at a restaurant and I felt bad. I realized I was soaking and I was losing blood. I went directly to the hospital (this time I had my suitcase in my car all the time) even though driving wasn’t very easy. When I arrived, the midwife told me one of my water was cracked and I had to stay at the maternity ward to be monitored every two hours. That’s what I did for 24h. Nothing happened. No contractions. The medical protocol is very strict so after 24h you have no choice. They induce you in labor. It took me 6 hours after that to work. And it wasn’t pleasant at all. The pain and the contractions arrived at once and you don’t have time to breathe. It is nonstop. I don’t know how they succeeded in putting the epidural as I couldn’t walk, couldn’t stand and was shaking like a leaf. I only remember how blissful it seemed to be able to breath and talk again. In 2 hours it was done. My little boy was born. I remember saying “Already?” when the midwife gave him to me. I had pushed only twice. For my third delivery, I decided to change and I’m giving birth at the University hospital. In fact, I didn’t have much choice as in France, it’s very hard to find a nursing center or to deliver your baby at home. Being diabetic, my pregnancy is marked “at risk” so it is forbidden for a midwife to deliver me anywhere but a hospital. At least, I know, despite my diabetes, the University hospital won’t induce the birth as easily as in the private clinic I was in. I’ll tell you in a few weeks (5 ?) what kind of birth was this third!
What have you found the attitudes towards birth to be in your country? Relaxed? More medical-based?
Unfortunately; I’d say birth has become a very medical-based situation. As I’ve explained earlier, since we have universal and mandatory health insurance, almost everyone delivers their baby at the hospital. We all have to follow the medical process dictated by the national health insurance and except from choosing in which hospital or clinic you want to go that’s more or less the only alternative. At least, it was for my 2 first sons. When you go to your midwife appointments, you have only two choices: epidural or natural delivery and whether you want to breastfeed or not. The birth project you have to write is usually more for you as for the nurses (none read it for my births) and that’s all. Birthing at home is the exception and it’s quite hard to find a midwife who accepts to deliver you at home, because of all the restrictions, the insurance conditions. Birth centers were allowed again a few years ago but where we live we have to drive 70 kms to reach it. Doula are not very well-known and having them for delivery is not always easy with the hospital staff (especially now with Covid19). So, yes, I’d say birth has become a medical-based act, where the women have been disempowered but the medical staff. We don’t have many choices; we don’t even know we have some! It has been hidden in the hospital since the 50’s as an act of progress, natural birthing being too animal and “against women's freedom and independence”. For example, at school, it is not teached and it is not appropriate to talk about birth as it is considered as an intimate and personal taboo. That’s something Doctor Michel Odent has been struggling for many decades, but mostly in the UK rather than in France! But things are moving slowly. Women are seeking empowerment in birth and want to regain choices on their body, the way they live their femininity and maternity. It is quite new and it will take a long time but the seed is definitely there.
Postpartum
Can you share any information about your postpartum experience?
For my first son, the only thing about postpartum was you can be heavily depressed. That’s what we call in France “baby blues” and we talked about it very quickly in my birthing preparation. But, it came as a shock. I failed to breastfeed my baby (as milk came only 7 days after the birth) and I tried to pump while giving him the bottle. Honestly I have almost no memories of my first month of postpartum. I remember being in a fog, crying a lot, and a phone call I made to a friend where I shouted at her I didn’t understand why bothering to carry a child if it was to live that way afterward. I was isolated, lost, with too few visits and no resources to help.
For my second son, it was hard too. He was birthed with abnormalities and I was very guilty about it. My husband wasn’t around much to care for our eldest son and – again- my milk didn’t come before a week. When I came back home after 5 days at the clinic, my eldest son had chickenpox so the baby and I were in quarantine for 10 days in a part of the house. I was left alone again with the baby, my failing breastfeeding, pumping and giving him bottle as I tried to understand what was happening. Once again isolation and lack of comfort were very hard. I had too few visits and I couldn’t find any comfort.
It was only 2 months after giving birth to my second baby, I learned about the fourth trimester, the golden months and what a village could do. It came from Australian and American communities (nothing in French). It was too late for me but it opened my eyes to another way to live maternity and I’ve discovered so many parenting resources, advices on every field (nutrition, communication, mental health…)
So this time, I’m much more prepared. I documented myself, I hired a Doula to help me postpartum, ask for housing help, stored nutritious snacks and meals to help me not to collapse this time. I still don’t have a big village but I’m aware of what my needs are.
What do you personally believe are the most important things in aiding postpartum recovery both mentally and emotionally?
From my personal experience, first being aware of what is postpartum and what are your needs. Facing and dealing with your own fears and accepting your limitations is another step. Communicating these needs to your partner, friends, family is important too since they don’t have any idea of what you are expecting from them or craving. To sum it up, staying prepared is the key. As I’m quite isolated where I live, I know I won’t have a lot of visits or people to help me. That’s why I’ve searched for a Doula, postnatal care like the Rebozo and extra-help at home. I’m still connected to the amazing communities through social media to have a safe place to share or comfort myself. And as I was blogging my pregnancy journal, I’d like to share my postpartum journal too.
Breastfeeding
Can you share your breastfeeding journey?
It has been a very difficult journey.
If parenting wasn’t an evident life choice for me, breastfeeding was! Surrounded by mothers breastfeeding their child, I was sure it was my solution to really feel like a mother. For my first son, I was confident. I knew it wouldn’t be easy but it was natural so, what could be the problem? As you know his birth was painful and his first days were hard. Feeding wasn’t a happy time. At the hospital, each midwife gave me their advice and kept contradicting each other. Back home, my son went on losing weight. My midwife asked me to express my milk and we realized I had none! Besides, he didn’t know how to suckle my breast. For 15 days I expressed my milk with few results and I was deeply depressed. Finally, my son was bottle fed and blossomed fantastically. I was resentful of the topic, feeling guilty. I tried to find excuses. Maybe I didn’t try enough? For my second son, I was as ready as possible: books, breast pump, midwife… In the delivery room, I began feeding him. When I realized something wasn’t right, I called the breastfeeding consultant and we began to help the milk to come, the baby to suckle. Sadly, I came back home without milk production and we had to feed him with bottles. 6 days later, the milk rose at last but it was too late. I tried everything: different position, nipple protectors... and realized it wasn’t going to happen. Again. I expressed my milk and gave it to him in bottles. It was a lot of work, expressing every two hours while feeding him every two other hours. I was exhausted but held on… for a month. In the end, the milk was scarce, too light and my baby was hungry. It was very hard to stop. I cried a lot, felt guilty, useless, angry. I remember telling my husband: “why on earth do I have such big boobs if they are only to decorate ?!”.
The worst was explaining myself to all the breastfeeding supporters who tried to help me. Some understood, others suggested, “it wasn’t for everybody”. The bottle's supporters didn’t help either, explaining how great it was not to breastfeed. It was my dream and it didn’t happen. I ached about this “personal failure”. But fortunately, I realized something else: my motherhood isn’t reduced to breastfeeding. I had a lot of other ways to be a great Mum for my sons. So, to other mums who deal with the same issue, this is not a PERSONAL failure. Even if breastfeeding is natural, this is not an easy experience. This is a team work and sometimes Mother Nature doesn’t help you with the timing or your baby isn’t ready for this. They are your partners and no matter how hard you try, sometimes it doesn’t happen. No matter what others tell you, they aren’t you. They aren’t in your body and can’t do anything more than giving advice. Don’t feel guilty and concentrate on all the other parts of your maternity: your baby needs you for everything else, your other children too and even your husband needs you! No matter what you think about you, you are as woman as everyone else and still a great mother who tries (again) to do her best! For this pregnancy, I’ve seen a lactation consultant and we have agreed to a very strict plan. I’m going to try only for a week with a lactation aid. If it works it will be amazing. If not, I’ll accept to bottle feed this baby. I really hope it will be that simple.
Do you think breastfeeding in public is socially accepted in your country?
It’s more and more accepted. In 8 years, I’ve seen people changing opinions on the topic. Of course, they’ll still stare if you breastfeed in the street or in a restaurant but there will be less drama than before from the young people. The most difficult to accept would be our parents’ generation since they have been told and raised in the idea that breastfeeding is not good for the mother's independence and are mainly bottle feeds supporters. But it works only for small babies. The older the baby is, the more fuss there is.
How long do babies typically breastfeed in your country?
Usually until the Mum comes back to work, so around 2/3 months. Some mums succeed in expressing their milk at home and can push to 6 months but it seems a common understanding that once the baby has some teeth or begins to eat something else than milk the mother has to stop breastfeed.
France
What is your favourite thing about being a mother and raising children in France?
We are lucky to live in a beautiful and peaceful country where all our basic needs are covered and so much more. We are at peace, won’t starve and can be supported when the worst happens. I’ve learned all that with my second son’s disability. I also love the fact I can raise my sons in the respect of others. Other sex, other cultures, other religions and other traditions. France is a very old country with multicultural identities and that’s a chance, especially since we live in a region with a different culture from where my husband and I were raised. I love that we can reconcile all these aspects in our parenting. I don’t think myself as a feminist but I also love and feel responsible to make my sons aware of the need to treat each other’s, men and women, as equals with their own specificities, especially since this is a struggle old from many centuries in France.
If you think the world could learn one thing about pregnancy, birth, & motherhood in France, what would it be?
You can make mistakes and change your mind. I think it is in the name of feminism and women emancipation in the last century that French women disempowered themselves of their own femininity. Because we wanted to be considered equal to men, we wanted to work and to be free of man’s power. We forgot who we are and what made us so special. We let medicine take the power in our pregnancies and birth, we accepted to dissolve our villages to be able to focus on our career. But being a modern woman is not being a man. It’s embracing who we are in every aspect of femininity. For me it’s being empowered in our choices to use medicine or not, to breastfeed or not, to use other women's wisdom or not or to be a mother or not. My generation has been transitioning to the strict feminist movement to a kinder and opened feminism. And the younger generation are even better at it since they don’t want to compromise their femininity with their own identity. And I think that’s the most sensible way to change mentalities.
What is one piece of advice you would like to give other mothers?
There isn’t one way to be a parent. Forget what you believe you know and embrace the situation as it is. You are growing as a parent at the same time your kids are growing. You’re evolving and you’ll adapt to them and to any situation. Being the parent of a disabled child helped me a lot to understand this. It liberated me to be a more spontaneous, observant, listening and intuitive Mum. Watching the world through your kids’ eyes will teach you so much more than reading books or listening to advice. Don’t underestimate yourself, you’ve got it, and you’ll always be the best parent your kids can have, even if you’re not at your best. And if you need comfort and support, just ask. That’s why the Atlas of Motherhood is amazing. It gathers mothers from all over the world, with different cultures and traditions and helps you not to feel alone or lost. Once again, parenting is not a highway. Enjoy the journey!