Birth — 1960s Style — on ‘Mad Men’
If you watched the latest episode of Mad Men entitled, “The Fog” (my recap/review can be found here), you saw a dramatization of what it was like to give birth during the 1960s.
And it wasn’t pretty.
As Betty Draper gave birth to her third child, the medical staff — one nurse in particular – patronized her (mocked her for eating pineapple earlier that day), threatened her (when Betty said she was too tired to push the baby any longer the nurse said she’d better push or they’d go in and take the baby out), ignored her pleas for her husband, pinned her down, provided no comfort or encouragement, and drugged her so that she was in what they called “twilight” sleep where she was in and out of lucidity. During the stressful pushing stage, Betty’s mind wandered off to her own kitchen where she envisioned herself speaking with her deceased parents, including her father who died the week before. All in all, it was a miserable experience.
A Mad Men themed blog entitled Basket of Kisses had a great analysis of the way in which Betty was treated at the hospital. Many of the blog’s readers chimed in in the comments section and shared their experiences of giving birth during that period, when the men went to a solarium to drink and smoke, while the pregnant women were infantilized. It was a horrifying portrayal, to say the least.
Image credit: Carin Baer/AMC.
Author and columnist Meredith O'Brien gives you a peek behind the picket fences of modern day life and parenting in the 'burbs. With humor and candor, it's her take on real parenting in the real world.
