Before the birth of my first child, I had never been around a new baby. I had also never seen a woman in labour, so I wasn’t remotely prepared for my own. My first came close to an emergency caesarean, because after six hours of pushing I still had not gotten my daughter out. When she was finally born, weighing over nine pounds, I felt overwhelming gratitude for the women who had stayed by my side through it. I will always remember one particular midwife with short-cropped grey hair and a barking voice, who coached me through the contractions like an unrelenting PE teacher. Without her, I don’t know if I could have done it. In her commanding presence I was part of a team, and we had won a great victory together. But when the night shift ended, she left without saying goodbye. To her, it was just another night shift. But for me it was the greatest achievement I had ever accomplished. In the mighty struggle of childbirth, a bond of kinship had formed between me and that midwife. When she left, I felt bereft.
In the recent past, that bond would have lasted longer, and it likely would have been with women I already knew well. Up until the era of hospital births, when a woman went into labour, other women living nearby would flock to her—mothers, sisters, aunts, friends, neighbours—all helping her through labour and its aftermath. As Jenni Nuttall points out in her excellent book on the history of women’s words, Mother Tongue (2023), there is an old East Anglian term for this gathering of women to the birthing room —nidgeting—and it is exactly what a new mother needs.
Nidgeting begins during labour and only ends when the new mother is capable of completing everyday tasks on her own. Her companions take over the washing, cooking, and care of other small children, and crucially, hold the baby so the mother can sleep. This is also where the word ‘gossip’ originates, meaning ‘God sibs’, or God relations. Contrary to gossip’s modern negative connotation, this communion of women once fulfilled an essential role for each other.
Today, a new mother is generally expected to take on the gossips’ burdens by herself. In the days after giving birth, I could hardly get off the sofa; cooking dinner and doing the laundry were almost insurmountable tasks. When my husband’s paternity leave ended and he returned to the office, I was left alone at home with a baby I had no idea how to care for.
My second child was born just before the 2020 lockdown, and it was five months before I saw anyone outside our immediate family. I sank into a deep depression, and I believe a large part of that was because I could not see other women. Gossips and nidgeters are as important for the spirits as they are for the practical tasks of caring for a baby. Without them, I floundered.
Nidgeters are as important for the spirits as they are for the practical tasks of caring for a baby. Without them, I floundered.
Our third child was born seven months ago, and the days and months since have been some of the happiest of my life. Since covid, my husband and I have made many new friends in our small village. We have been surrounded by nidgeters who dropped off home-cooked meals, with no expectation of being hosted. They would stay for a glass of champagne and then be off, promising to visit again with more food.
My third baby was a caesarean birth, and I was laid up at home for several weeks to recuperate. I wasn’t able to attend church for six weeks, and when I finally returned, now with my new baby, it felt fitting to mark the occasion with the other parishioners. This we did through the old Anglican ceremony of churching. Historically, the women who nidgeted the new mother accompanied her to her churching. The liturgy for churching appears in the Book of Common Prayer as a short ceremony which takes place at the beginning of the usual service. Mother and child kneel before the priest and he blesses them while speaking these words: ‘the snares of death compassed me round about: and the pains of hell gat hold upon me. I found trouble and heaviness, and I called upon the name of the Lord…I was in misery, and he helped me.’ The ceremony as a whole is called, ‘The Thanksgiving of a Woman and Child after Child-birth’, and it ends with the congregation thanking God for the mother and baby’s safe deliverance from the ‘great danger’ of childbirth. Our rector was thrilled to perform the service for us, because it was the first time he had done so. It was also the first instance that anyone in the parish could remember occurring since the 1950s.
Churching was once commonplace in Anglican parishes, but it fell out of favour after the second wave of feminism. For the modern woman, it seems to imply that a mother has been tainted by childbirth, and so must be purified. Yet this is not what the words of the ceremony say. Thankfully I escaped the snares of death during childbearing, but I had found heaviness; and certainly, misery and pain. But my baby and I had made it through. My husband and I were touched that the parish celebrated this with us, and grateful beyond words for the family and friends who nidgeted us. The first weeks after my third child’s birth were immeasurably happier and more manageable than the ones spent in covid isolation. I had not known how important it was to spend time in other people’s company after a birth until I was denied the opportunity in 2020.
Lately, three more of my friends have become pregnant, and two weeks ago, one mother who nidgeted me gave birth to her third child as well. Now I can return the favour.
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