The Birth of a Mom

Four thousand.

Children. Families. Lives.

Four thousand.

An estimated four thousand children every year are born in the US with clubbed feet, making it one of the most common birth defects.

It's so common, and yet, no one talks about it.

I had heard of clubfoot, and had a vague idea of what clubfoot looked like. I had no idea how it was treated or what it meant for the life of a child born with it.

Until late one night at the end of July eight years ago, my premature son was placed in my arms for the first time. He was so tiny, so sweet.

And his feet were nearly backwards.

Clubfoot can often be detected during routine ultrasounds, which will usually result in a more in-depth exam to confirm. Sometimes, this isn't possible.

I gave birth to my son two months before he was actually due. During the seven months of pregnancy I did experience, the doctors had not caught that my son had this deformity.

I was 20 years old. I had never had a child before, and I knew very little of clubfoot. I trusted the pediatrician on call the night my son was born.

When I asked him why my son's feet didn't look right, I trusted him when he told me it was just the way my boy was positioned. He would be okay.

He never ran tests. He didn't confirm that there was nothing structurally wrong with my son. He sent a premature, medically needy child home with inexperienced parents the same way he would have sent home a full-term, healthy newborn.

Except that our son was not a full-term, healthy newborn. He was a weak, oxygen starved preemie with a birth defect.

No tests. No calls. No follow-ups aside from what he would have given to a full-term baby. He had "no concerns."

Except that my son's feet never got better.

When he was five months old, I finally got a new pediatrician to listen to my concerns about his definitely not normal feet. He sent us to a pediatric orthopedist.

That orthopedist tore into me as though it were my fault another doctor had reassured us our son was fine. He "couldn't believe" I hadn't sought help sooner. I was irresponsible. I was the reason my son's feet were so horrible. I would be lucky if my son ever walked.

Because my son's feet weren't the only problem. My son had lower leg and hip deformities as well.

I cried in his office. I cried on the way home. I cried myself to sleep that night.

In the saga that is my son's life, this wouldn't be the last time I sat in a doctor's office and was blamed for what was "wrong" with my child. It wouldn't be the last time I had to beg for help for him. It wouldn't be the last time I cried myself to sleep.

It was, however, the first time I realized that the doctors didn't always know what they were doing. It was the first time I had ever realized that I would have to fight them to get the help I knew my son needed. That day was the first time I realized I was my child's voice, and I had to be louder than all the other voices in the room if I wanted to be heard and taken seriously.

I was young. I looked young. I was 20, but I looked 15. My relationship had failed shortly after our son was born. In that office, I know I must have looked like another teenage mother with no support system, and my son probably looked like another neglected baby whose parents probably shouldn't have had him.

My fight for my son started in that cold, unwelcoming office.

They say the day a child is born is the day a mother is also born.

In all technicalities, yes, I became a mother the day my son was born.

But I became his MOM the day I sat in that office and realized I would have to fight for him.