Pages from the Diary of a Married, Black, Corporate, Breastfeeding New Mom.
By: Calista Tucker
Tags: Breastfeeding, Black Women, Corporate Culture, Motherhood, Diversity

Maternity leave is not a leave at all.

“Congratulations you just had a baby!” Truly this is an amazing gift from God especially since the same weekend, the year prior, we miscarried. I believe this is why my son came two weeks late — I carried him for 42 weeks — to show he is our angel on earth.

With all the joy and excitement, reality kicks back in, — girl, you gotta go back to work- and in my case only 3 weeks after my son came home from the hospital. You heard it right, only three weeks! I was only given six weeks of leave. I relocated to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, 5 months pregnant, starting a new corporate job, and no Family and Medical Leave or PTO accrued. Experiencing prodromal labor for almost two weeks before delivering, I had to make a choice; work until the last possible minute or use time from my six week leave before I actually gave birth. So, choose between bearing the pain now or the pain of having even less time with my baby before returning to work.

After birth, my son was in the NICU for 16 days with Necrotizing Enterocolitis, or NEC, a serious disease that affects the intestines typical of premature infants and babies who are formula fed instead of breastfed. So I spent my first few weeks of motherhood power pumping, spending 14 hour days in the hospital, and researching my sons conditions with my husband to try to get him home as quickly as possible. For some, maternity leave is not a leave at all. To that corporate working, Black, Breastfeeding mom…for me (the first to breastfeed in my husband’s and my family) the first week back to work was mayhem.

Imagine, your first day returning, having someone knock at the lactation room door after you spent 10 minutes setting up pumping equipment! The lactation rooms had to be booked in advance for 30 minutes at a time. After calling Human Resources weeks before returning to work, being engorged all day, and not to mention the pump stopped working twice, I was only able to pump once that day. Having to use pumping rooms at work while on the computer, and going off site at times to find the rooms full, made my breasts scream for help. This left me feeling hopeless. I’m missing a meal for my child. Trying to figure out when I can “make it up” to have enough food for the next day. I had to eliminate soy, dairy, eggs, shellfish and nuts out of my diet because my son had blood in his stool and he also didn’t respond well to formula. I nursed my son to sleep around 9:30 PM only to do another few hours of work. I had to wake up twice during the night to nurse as my husband snapped photos of me falling asleep while feeding baby boy. Waking up at 6:00 AM to do it all over again. So hearing “he needs rice cereal…” and having to defend how food made from me is fuel for my little one, was upsetting to say the least.

Let’s not forget, my son was also born with an extra digit on each hand-one fell off while home and the other had to be surgically removed at 10 weeks old. I had to leave the hospital after his surgery to go to a work recruiting event. I missed consulting appts, first vaccinations and his bi-weekly regular checkups because “if I was out of the office for longer than 2 hours, I had to take a PTO day.” I developed Mastitis (inflammation of the mammary glands) resulting in having a fever of 104.8. My manager wouldn’t approve of me being out of the office for these appointments despite me being salaried and working a 50–60 hour micromanaged stressful work week. Did anyone think how would I manage my own postpartum visits along with my child’s? I only accumulated one week of PTO and had to use it during my six week Short Term Disability Leave; because being pregnant is not a form of human creation, it’s an illness we treat. Well, at least that’s how my leave paperwork made me feel. I was also put on a performance review the day after I returned from Maternity Leave. Talk about a whirlwind.

Working black mothers really need to be valued and celebrated. As a married woman to a husband who is second to none, and having a mother in law who moved from Georgia to help care for our beloved son while we worked, the management of a corporate mom is beyond stressful. My husband really had to take over household duties of cleaning, cooking dinner and washing my clothes because time just wouldn’t allow. Even with support organizations like Healthy Start Center for Urban Breastfeeding, Pittsburgh Black Breastfeeding Circle, Pittsburgh Brown Mommas & New Moms Coffee, my experience was still a daily challenge.

My son is the essence of strength; be brave and be strong, little one. He is truly a testimony and has passed every test that has come his way. With all he has gone through in his little life, he manages to smile through it all.

Be sensitive the next time you only ask about the baby- Call a mom and ask “how are you doing?” Take that working mom out for lunch, don’t ask her “when do you want a second child” as her life in this space is managing 10 full-time jobs.

Calista Tucker

Married, Black, Corporate, Breastfeeding New Mom

A perspective that isn’t typically heard, but needs to be shared.