Yuesao and Confinement Centers: Is It Crazy to Tackle Postpartum on My Own?

In China, there is a well-established tradition for post-partum confinement known as 坐月子 zuò yuè zi or ‘sit the month’. The exact nature of zuo yue zi varies from region to region and family to family, but it is basically a set of dietary and lifestyle restrictions that a new mother should follow for a whole month after giving birth to their child, designed to allow her body to rest and recover, and restore the natural balance of qi or life-force in the body. Yet among my network, the term zuo yue zi is more likely to make a woman cringe rather than be filled with the warm fuzzy feeling of having just delivered a bundle of joy.

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? Scan the QR code to reply to our poll, or leave a comment in the comment section below.

KEEP READING: Moms in Mixed-Culture Marriages Talk About Birth and Beyond

Photos: Unsplash