The Way It Was: and Where We Are Now

By Barbara M. Sobey, RN, CCE, former IBCLC

About the Book

Barbara Sobey was always curious as to how women gave birth and cared for their babies centuries ago, or on wagon trains heading west with little water available. Having had babies 29 years apart, she lived through many changes in birth and infant care herself and decided to.

Today, mothers automatically expect their partner will be with them for the birth and baby will room-in. It was the last generation of women in the 1980s and 1990s who fought for those rights.

Barbara is now eighty years old. In many small ways she was involved with aiding those changes in childbirth to occur. There is still more to do in humanizing birth, but she leaves that up to the current generation.

About the Author

Barbara M. Sobey, RN, CCE, former IBCLC, attended a LaLeche League meeting the first Tuesday in May 1965, an organization that gives support and practical advice on breastfeeding. It was a meeting that changed so many things in her life. She became a Leader herself and

Barbara’s experience as a LaLeche Leader prepared her to take the Lactation Consultant exam in 1986. She recertified every five years until 1996. As an International Board-Certified Lactation Consultant and RN, Barbara was able to work for thirty years as a hospital lactation consultant. Because of a speech that she gave at a La Leche League conference, she was asked to speak at a Metropolitan New York Childbirth conference, which encouraged her to become a childbirth instructor. Her children became involved with 4-H, which resulted in Barbara becoming a leader for 25 years. She has had a busy life, but her biggest satisfaction is her family. She always wanted a dozen children. The Lord blessed her with fifteen babies, but he took back two and her oldest son at the age of 31. Thus he left her with twelve very precious people, and she wishes she could go back in time to when her house was full of noise and laughter.

Barbara now spends her time at more age-appropriate activities. She works at her church thrift shop and crochets Afghans that she donates to a local hospital at Christmas for those who have no family. After raising thirteen children, Barbara has been blessed with 21 great-grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dorrance Publishing Company
• Release date: Oct 2, 2023
• ISBN: 9798888127827

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The contents of this work, including, but not limited to, the accuracy of events, people, and places depicted; opinions expressed; permission to use previously published materials included; and any advice given or actions advocated are solely the responsibility of the author, who assumes all liability for said work and indemnifies the publisher against any claims stemming from publication of the work.

All Rights Reserved

Copyright © 2023 by Barbara M Sobey, RN, CCE, former IBCLC

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted, downloaded, distributed, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, including photocopying and recording, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented without permission in writing from the publisher.

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Over fifty years ago, my Aunt Gertrude urged me to write a book. This is not the kind of book she had in mind. She wanted me to write on the antics of raising a large family. Maybe someday I’ll get to that, but I doubt it. It took me fifteen years to complete this book.

A midwife friend, Susan Brockman, often sat on my front porch listening to the birth stories of couples who came to my home for childbirth classes. Susan urged me to write a book about those stories, but those stories belong to those women and are not mine to share with the world. Those women should write their own stories of how they fought for their right to birth as they dreamed.

My daughter, Cindy, read the beginning of this book a few years ago and kept encouraging me to finish it.

My hardworking husband, Pete, probably thought I would never finish this book. But he always thought that over the years I would change my mind about having a dozen kids.

This book is dedicated to the Lord, who blessed me with this wonderful family.

Why?

Why spend fifteen years writing this down? I’ve often wondered how women managed giving birth and caring for their babies a century or two ago. Women traveling west in covered wagons, how did they wash their babies or wash diapers without water readily available? That is just a sample of the questions I have about the past.

And then I thought about the changes in how women gave birth and cared for their babies in 1960, when I gave birth to my first child. My last child born in 1989, yes, 29 years later, was a totally different experience than my first. Many of the changes that occurred regarding birth have made it a more natural event rather than treating birth as a medical event. I also want women to understand that they have choices. Unless they have a medical problem, this is their body and birth experience.

My second reason for bothering to record all this is, when I mention to people that I have thirteen children, they all make the same comment: You can’t afford to do that today. I believe you can.

I was seventeen and Pete nineteen when we married in 1960. Neither of our parents were in a position to financially help us. We were on our own. I had a high school diploma and Pete had just finished two years of college. His goal was to get a degree in engineering. My goal was to become an architect, live in a round house, and have a dozen children. It took Pete several years of going to school at night to get his degree in engineering. When he finished, it was my turn. I had just had our fifth baby and by the time I earned my degree we had nine children. I did not become an architect; I became a nurse, childbirth instructor (CCE), and lactation consultant (IBCLC). Neither of those last two professions existed when I graduated from high school. We do not live in a round house, but we do go around in circles in our 100+-year-old house. Do we have a dozen children? I gave birth to fifteen, but the Lord took back two baby boys shortly after birth and our oldest son at the age of 31. Thus, we do have a dozen living children.

Did we have an easy life? No, but I wish I could live every one of those busy, crazy days over again.

Holly

December 8, 1960

In 1960, like most women pregnant with their first child, I was both curious and anxious as to what birth would be like. A trip to the library resulted in just one book on childbirth. Can you imagine that? There are probably hundreds of books on childbirth now. Although it was a huge book, the kind of information that I was looking for was not there. A good part of the book was devoted to making maternity and baby clothes. It even had a chapter on how to convert your husband’s shirts to wear as smocks and after the birth convert them back to fit him. The only real information on birth was how your husband would kiss you goodbye at the labor room door. End of book.

Buying maternity clothes in 1960 was difficult. Manufacturers of maternity clothes seemed to believe that all pregnant women wore at least a size ten. Maternity dresses and tops were huge and made you looked like you were wearing a tent. I was only a size 5. I made most of my maternity tops. Maternity pants were made with a large semicircle cut out in front for your expanding belly and a ribbon on each side to tie above your belly to hold them up.

Baby clothes were much simpler and definitely less expensive. I bought most of my baby clothes in John’s Bargain Store, a chain store similar to the dollar stores of today. Onesies were not yet invented. I bought undershirts, four for a dollar. These did not have snaps. They overlapped in front and were closed with ties. I bought several dozen cloth diapers and rubber pants to cover them. The rubber pants were probably four or five for a dollar. Disposable baby wipes did not exist. I bought lots of washcloths to wipe my future baby’s bottom with. On top of these, babies wore kimonos. These were little flannel robes that tied at the neckline and waist. They were probably three for a dollar. I personalized these by embroidering small animals on them. Even the few dressy clothes babies wore were made of soft fabrics, not like the infant jeans and tutus you see today’s newborns leaving the hospital wearing. It is hard to imagine that the babies of the middle of the twentieth century required so little compared to what the baby of the twenty-first-century needs.

A friend, Peggy, gave me a baby shower. This was not the huge elaborate affairs that expectant mothers of today get. It was a gathering of about ten friends in her basement. There was no such thing as a baby registry. The gifts were small, but very appreciated articles of clothing for the baby.

During my pregnancy, my mother kept asking me when I was going to get a chest x-ray. During her pregnancies it was required to have one before being admitted to the hospital to give birth. I asked my doctor if I needed one and he said it was no longer required since TB was not as common as it had been.

I was due on December 8th. On December 7th, I had an appointment with one of the doctors. It was a large group obstetrical practice. I am not sure how many doctors were in the practice. I don’t think I saw any of them more than once. After an internal exam, I was told that I would be at least three weeks late. He never explained what he based this on, but I assumed that when he did the internal exam he found no sign of effacement, the thinning of the cervix. Holly was born less than 24 hours later. This was one of my first lessons in childbirth: NO ONE CAN PREDICT THE EXACT DAY YOUR BABY WILL BE BORN, unless you have a scheduled cesarean section or you are induced.

Labor started in the middle of the night. I woke up at about 2 A.M. wondering what I was feeling. When we realized this was it, that these were contractions, we scurried to get dressed as if I was going to give birth any moment.

We were living with my parents at the time. My mother heard us and gave me one last piece of wisdom. She told me THIS WOULD BE THE WORST EXPERIENCE OF MY LIFE. Not exactly an encouraging statement to make to someone who was already petrified. Pete played the part of the excited first-time father to a tee. We sped to the hospital going through all red lights. Pete did just what the book said; he kissed me goodbye at the labor room door.

Although I remember being in terrible pain, I remember being even more frightened. After being examined and shaved, I was given a hospital gown. I was not given an IV. I think IVs became standard procedure sometime in the 1970s. I was then taken into a dark labor ward. There were six to eight beds in the room. There were no lights on. Women were screaming. I was left alone. FEAR, that is my memory of this birth, not pain, although I was in pain. I was alone, in a dark room, with women all around me screaming. I can still hear their animal-like screams. It is a sound I will never forget. Occasionally, someone would come in with a flashlight to do an internal exam. Eventually, I was given an injection of something and that was the last thing I remember. Holly was born at 8:15 A.M. Several hours later, I woke up. They told me I had a baby girl. Pete came in. He kept his distance. He said I smelled of ether, which made him feel sick.

I do not remember when I held my baby girl for the first time. Babies were only brought out to mothers three times a day: 10 A.M., 2 P.M., and 6 P.M. They came swaddled and you were not to undo their blankets. I had considered breastfeeding, although I don’t know where I got the idea from. I knew no one who was or had breastfed. Of course, there were no books on the subject and when I mentioned it to my mother she said breastfeeding was disgusting. I was given a pill that I was told would dry up my milk.

In the early 1960s, it was a common practice to keep a mother in the hospital for five days for a vaginal birth and ten to fourteen for a cesarean. Cesareans were almost unheard of in the 1960s. In fact, the first time I heard of this procedure was in the hospital. One of my roommates had a cesarean. On the third day, after a vaginal birth you were permitted to shower.

Visiting hours were kept to two one-hour sessions per day, at 2 P.M. and 6 P.M., and visitors had to obtain a pass. Usually, you could have only two visitors at a time and that included the new father. Babies were kept in the nursery and viewed through a glass window. Usually, baby viewing was limited to fifteen minutes and then a curtain would be drawn. The new dad never got to hold his baby until you left the hospital.

Flowers were discouraged. They believed they robbed a room of oxygen. Every night the nurses had to take the flowers out of the rooms and put them in the hall and in the morning bring them back in the room.

For a first baby, being in labor just over six hours is considered an easy labor. It could have been in a different environment, but the sounds of those animal-like screams will be with me for the rest of my life. I wonder if I became one of them.

We went home on the fifth day. I held Holly in the front seat of the car. I don’t know if seatbelts existed at that time. We didn’t have them in our car. Car seats did exist but were designed for the baby that could sit up and they were not very safe. The car seats had large, inverted U-shaped hooks that loosely hooked over the front seat. I wonder how many babies