I am a first-time expecting mom in my second trimester, so my husband and I have been talking about this whole zuo yue zi business a lot lately. How seriously should we take it? Some traditional Chinese zuo yue zi practices
include not washing your hair for a month, constantly drinking hot
water, and a special diet of what sounds like extremely bland soups. In
this day and age, are these practices still necessary to help a new mom
recover?
Then there’s the practicality side of it. Nowadays there are ayis who specialize in helping mothers through the zuo yue zi, called 月嫂, yuè sǎo. Unlike your regular ayi who cleans and cooks, a yuesao
is a trained professional whose sole job is to look after the baby and
mom 24-hours a day. She doesn’t clean your apartment, and while she will
cook a special for the new mom, she’s not lifting a finger for anyone
else in the family. The perks of having a yuesao are is that
there’s someone who’s extremely experienced with newborns with you at
all times. For first time parents who are concerned about everything
from food to diaper changes to basic ways of holding their new bundle of
joy, it can be reassuring to have someone guide you through the
process.
Call me an introvert, but it takes me a while to warm up to someone,
so the idea of having a complete strange live with us for an entire
month is quite stressful. And what about moms with language barriers?
Most yuesaos don’t speak English so having a stranger with whom
you have trouble communicating with live in your home, asking you to do
and eat things you’ve never seen before sounds utterly confusing.
Some Beijing expat moms that I spoke to confess that their yuesao
experience ended shortly after a week or two, as the cultural
difference simply became too much to handle. On the other hand, there
have also been new moms who’ve become too depend on their yuesao,
to the extent that they even attempted to ask them to stay with the
family after their one month contract is up, as their full time ayi.
“I think it’s a very personal thing based on individual feelings and circumstances. I have friends who’ve had yuesaos, ones who have gone to a yuezi
center, and ones like me that had neither.” Says Sharon Shi, a British
mom who gave birth to her twins in Beijing. “It was busy, but we
expected it to be busy. I was lucky to have a husband at home, help from
my in-laws and some friends and family from the UK who came for a week
or two each. It took a while to find what worked best for us, and that
kept evolving. At times we were very tired, but it was how we wanted our
beginning of parenthood and family life to be. For me, I wouldn’t have
wanted a stranger around but I totally get and respect that others view
it differently and appreciate the guidance and support by a
professional.”
If the idea of having a yuesao living in your home fulltime puts you off, there’s always the option of spending the month in a confinement center or 月子中心 yuè zi zhōngxīn.
While the name might give you flashbacks of quarantine hotels and all
the nightmare stores that came with it, post-partum confinement centers
are more like relaxing resorts than anything else, with hotel-like
suites, meals, and round the clock care provided by medical
professionals. Babies and moms are both well taken care of, and new moms
spend their days learning new techniques on baby care, self-care, and
enjoying long relaxing massages that help their postpartum bodies
recover. These centers don’t come cheap though: a 28 day stay in one of
the high-end confinement centers can cost you over RMB 98,000, and
they’re not covered by insurance.
So after all that COVID-19 quarantine business do I really want to
pay so much money to feel like I’m being quarantined again? Hmm. Maybe
not.
While the idea of entering a confinement center or hiring a yuesao
is a major part of baby planning in China, is it really that necessary?
Are all women in China (expats and locals alike) shelling out top RMBs
so soon after delivery? No.
There are plenty of first-time expat moms who made it through this
special period without additional professional assistance at all: some
sought the assistance of their in-laws while others read up and confided
in their girlfriends for advice and support. It all depends on how much
you’re ready to take on and your lifestyle.
So parents. Did you have any assistance with the first month after giving birth? Cast your vote, or leave a
comment in the comment section below.
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