Kate Hudson calls C-Sections lazy. Internet explodes.
Hell hath no fury like a mother scorned. Or unintentionally insulted by Kate Hudson.
ICYMI, the actress has been getting a lot of heat this week after a quote from a Cosmopolitan interview hit social media. In it, Hudson finishes the sentence ‘the laziest thing I’ve ever done is…’ with ‘Have a C-section!’
OK Kate. I like you. I enjoy pretty much every film you’ve ever put your face into. I quote How to Lose A Guy in 10 Days with worrying frequency. At one stage of my life I watched Almost Famous every darn day. You even rubbed my belly at the Glamour Awards when it was full of baby and I was so ruddy excited about it that I wrote this blog. But girl, that wasn’t cool.
Since I’m LTTP* as usual (classic lazy C-section mum), I won’t bore you by listing all the reasons this is anything ranging from mildly annoying to downright insulting, but I do want to just explain why women, particularly those who have experienced a C-section, find this infuriating.
*Late to the party, in case my mum is reading this. HEY MUM.
@Fabletics was super excited to order when Kate Hudson said this about C-sections in @Cosmopolitan and now I won’t be. Shame on you. pic.twitter.com/Rds7syIDDW
— Sarah Reviews Stuff (@Sarah4Reviews) September 4, 2017
//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
Possible reasons people found Kate Hudson’s ‘lazy’ remark irritating…
A lot of C-section mums (*raises hand*) feel, amongst a whole range of post-birth emotions, huge guilt for not ‘successfully’ giving birth. In time this passes, but there’s so much press around natural birthing, hynobirthing, active labour, hell, breathing your baby out in one long golden breath, that if you do end up having your baby sliced out of you while you’re numb from the waist down, you feel ashamed.
Just as people (again, *raises hand*, sorry) bang on about breastfeeding to an extent of making non-breastfeeding mums feel inadequate, people gleefully share their natural, easy, beautiful birth stories with such enthusiasm that you bury your dirty C-section secret deeper away in your mind, resulting not only in unwanted and unnecessary feelings of guilt and shame, but tarring what should be remembered as one of the most beautiful moments of your life.
Oh, yes, Kate. While we’re on the subject of C-section regret, let’s remember that not everyone chooses to deliver their babies in this way. Some people go through painful procedures to try and have their babies manipulated into the correct birthing position only to be advised by doctors that it would be safer for mother and baby to have a C-section. Others** have their waters break early, get admitted late for an induction due to an over-busy maternity unit, labour painfully and unnaturally on a hormone drip for 12 hours, get to 9cm, only to have an unresponsive baby who needs to be born immediately cut out of them in incredibly stressful circumstances roughly 50 hours after the ordeal began. (Was actually quite tired after that. Didn’t have time to be #lazy, though, had a baby to look after.)
**Yep, me, did you get that?
Last point, Kate. The old C-section recovery. Not fun. I’ve heard that elective C-sections can have a smooth(er) recovery. But it’s still major surgery. We’re talking at least a day of feet up, catheter-in time. An array of pain medication that is absolutely necessary, for days or weeks after the op. Lying next to your brand-new, beautiful baby and listening to them scream, but not being able to reach out for them because you’ll tear your stitches, or because you’re still numb.
Oh yes, actually tearing your stitches open, twice, and suffering from subsequent infection because it turns out you can’t lay still and rest throughout the duration of your recovery, because your baby needs feeding, changing, holding, and there’s nobody there to pass them to you.
No, at not one stage of this time did what I was doing feel ‘lazy’.
I don’t really have an issue with Kate’s interview. It was a throwaway comment and I’m sure she didn’t mean to cause offence. But it’s casual birth-shaming comments like this that add to the stress, trauma and emotional ordeals that many C-section mums, including myself, suffer after their birth.
It’s been two years next Monday since I experienced it, and I’m finally able to look back at the birth of my beautiful boy without feeling trauma, stress and remorse. Passing comments like this can have a seriously negative effect on mothers experiencing post-traumatic stress, PND, or simply mourning the perfect birth they never had.
So, if you have just had a C-section, congratulations on the birth of your beautiful baby, and well done for making the best choice you had available to you, whatever your circumstances. Maybe some mums do opt for a C-section because they’re just too damn lazy to push a baby out. I’ve, or thought I had, never met one. But if Kate Hudson says that’s why she did it, I guess I have. I’m not sure the NHS would see it as a good reason for major abdominal surgery. But if it’s good enough for Kate, it’s worth asking, right?
