March 19, 2024 By Tiffani Simmons
At the time of my son's birth, I was an Assistant Attorney General at the Office of the Attorney General of the State of New York. I had been a practicing attorney for over 12 years and it was my second pregnancy. What I didn't know at that time, was that I had been "weathering" for a long time. Weathering is the theory that the accumulation of the everyday stress of navigating racial inequities, microaggressions, injustices, etc. over time internalizes into the body of black women causing accelerated aging, which can happen way before she becomes a mother, and leads to the pattern of racial disparities in maternal health and birth outcomes that increase with maternal age. So, we see more black moms developing pregnancy, birth and postpartum complications; delivering prematurely; and suffering from perinatal mood and anxiety disorders.
I had a routine prenatal appointment at 27 weeks, where my blood pressure was slightly elevated, the midwife I had seen that day was pretty c...
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