Before giving birth to her daughter in June 2021, Valérie Roberts had heard very little about the fourth trimester. Just like the 14 mothers (including several well-known personalities) who testify in his book, moreover.
Our first question can therefore only be the following: what do we mean by “fourth trimester”? “On paper, it’s the first three months after giving birth. […] The truth is that the fourth trimester, for many women, will last longer,” replies the author.
“It’s a moment when you give birth to your child. You have to understand who he is, but above all, what you are becoming,” she continues.
PHOTO MARCO CAMPANOZZI, THE PRESS
Lory Zephyr, psychologist
“The fourth trimester overlaps with the concept of matrescence,” says psychologist Lory Zephyr. A term formed from the contraction of the words “maternity” and “adolescence” which refers to the period of adaptation of women to their new role as mother.
This moment marked by both physical and psychological upheavals “can last, according to some authors, 2 to 3 years after pregnancy”. “It’s a long process,” underlines the expert.
A process during which new mothers experience a whirlwind of emotions that we don’t talk about enough, Valérie Roberts firmly believes.
“We must warn future mothers”
Becoming a mother is often idealized, underline our two interlocutors. “Motherhood should be something magical, wonderful. We put on rose-colored glasses. […] But at the start, it’s not true that it’s easy,” says the host and cultural columnist who can be heard on CKOI and 98.5.
According to her, it is essential to prepare future mothers for the emotional roller coaster they will experience after the birth of their baby.
An observation echoed by many women interviewed in Postpartum: the ups and downs of the fourth trimester. “I would have liked to have been told that it was mentally that I was going to be completely disoriented,” confides, for example, the comedian Katherine Levac. “We must warn future mothers,” she adds, a few paragraphs later.
“A gray area”
In Living better with our child (the famous guide distributed to parents in hospitals), we address the baby blues, which occurs within three weeks of giving birth, and postpartum depression, but the spectrum of challenges a new mother can go through is so much greater. Between women who adapt very easily to their new role and those who experience depression, there is “a gray area that we never talk about,” argues Valérie Roberts.
Her fourth trimester, for example, was synonymous with anxiety.
I had never experienced anxiety in my entire life. […] And there I found myself having anxiety attacks in my shower. Shaking, breaking out in a cold sweat, not understanding my body, my head, not knowing what was happening.
Valérie Roberts, author and radio host
More than two years later, talking about this period is still difficult for her.
With the help of a psychologist, she managed to understand why she was experiencing anxiety. “I was afraid that my daughter would die,” she confides. And she is not the first to be paralyzed by this fear. “The fear of death, the safety of children, these are really issues that mothers talk to me about a lot,” confirms Lory Zephyr, who specializes in maternal mental health.
Various testimonies
Through the 14 testimonies in the book, Valérie Roberts wanted to show different, darker aspects of motherhood.
For example, Léane Labrèche-Dor addresses constant guilt, singer-songwriter Eli Rose talks about the pressure of breastfeeding, Mélanie Boulay, from the duo Les vins Boulay, talks about the feeling of not feeling competent.
Valérie Robert also experienced this feeling of not being good enough. “I felt so stupid,” she says, without filter.
At the time, if she had been able to read testimonies from mothers who had experienced the same thing, she is convinced that she would have gone through the first months of her daughter’s life more peacefully.
In this sense, she hopes that her book will allow new mothers to feel less alone, and those around them to better support them.
The following
While Postpartum: the ups and downs of the fourth trimester arrives on booksellers’ shelves, Valérie Roberts wants to “go even further”. She will soon launch a podcast show on the fourth trimester, in which she will interview different experts. An example ? In one of the first episodes, she will speak with an endocrinologist to better understand the drop in hormones experienced after childbirth and its repercussions.
Because, according to Valérie Roberts, the more we talk about the fourth trimester, the more we will reduce the pressure that mothers put on their shoulders.
Postpartum: the ups and downs of the fourth trimester
Trecarré
192 pages