Being Pregnant in Japan (A JET ALT Perspective...)

Now that the cat's out of the bag (heh), I thought I'll try to write about my experience of being pregnant in Japan, especially from an ALT perspective. I remember how I tried to find information on the internet even before I was pregnant, to give me an idea what might be in store if the stork did decide to put us on its list of up-coming visits, just to realize there was little to none. The only thing I was able to find (and thank goodness for this little piece of treasure!) was a blog called "industrious ants." In her "Made in Japan" series, Martine writes about her situation in great detail and it has provided me with amazing information! If you're generally interested in this topic, please check out her blog first. Don't worry, I'll wait... (^.~)

Done? OK... So about being a pregnant ALT in Japan. Where can I start? I guess first and foremost I should mention the conditions of pregnancy in my situation. What the JET General Information Handbook (GIH) says about pregnancy has been pretty spot on for me so far, so give that a look too if you can. For everyone else, here's what this means:

I was very lucky that a fellow ALT in my area knew an English-speaking OB/GYN doctor in Fukuyama, so I was able to get confirmation of the pregnancy pretty soon after I did my home test. I even got an ultrasound!

August 6th - The first time I saw you...

At this time I wasn't far along enough to get the official confirmation I needed to register myself being pregnant at City Hall, but I only needed to wait another 10 days for that. Once I had the confirmation from the doctor, I headed to City Hall to get my boshi techo or "Mother and Child Health Handbook," which is something I need to have every time I go to the doctor while I'm pregnant and later with my child until she or he turns 6 years old. (Luckily my City Hall had an English/Japanese version of this book. YAAAY!!!) I also received a book full of coupons that made all further visits to my OB doctor free. (Visits would cost around ￥2000-3000 otherwise.) 

Once doctor visits were settled, the next thing I wanted to find out about was maternity leave. Though DH doesn't work and will stay with the baby, I wanted to make sure I would be able to take some time off, hopefully without any fear of a terminated contract and being sent home. After talking with my supervisor and the big boss of my contracting organization, I was very happy to realize that their first concern was to make sure I was OK, and it seemed that as long as I wanted to stay, they won't send me home. I also found out that, according to my contract, I get 6 weeks of maternity leave before the birth and 8 weeks after, with the understanding that any extra days that the baby is "late" are freebies. While the maternity leave is unpaid, the National Health Insurance (NHI) does do a sort of partial "reimbursement" for that time, but only about a month after I return to work. What this comes down to is that I better darn make sure we saved up enough to get through 3 and a half+ months worth of no-income, paying rent, bills, for food, and any baby-related stuff, including whatever extra we might still need to pay after the NHI's payment for the birth (shussan ikuji ichijikin) kicks in. The Shussan Ikuji Ichijikin is a fixed payment of ￥420,000, which (as I understand it) can generally either go straight to the hospital/birth center or to my bank account, and usually covers the most basic birth and hospital stay. If I want a private room or something else extra that raises the bill though, that's on me to pay. Fair enough, I guess, or at least it's something I can work with and make due. These are the basic conditions I have to deal with while being pregnant in Japan.

Now I'd like to mention a few interesting things I learned on my own. Let's start with the positive ones:

• A typical OB appointment (so far) includes checking my weight and blood pressure by a nurse, then an ultrasound and internal examination by the doctor, who takes all kinds of measurements. Notice the ultrasound is done by the doctor, not a specialist, so I can talk about what I see and the results right away, which is really convenient and fun.
• The idea of men in Japan not accompanying their partners to any of the OB appointments really is nothing new, and I was nervous about whether or not DH was allowed to come with me to mine. So it was a very pleasant surprise when I found out that it was no problem at all, and he could come and be in the room during the ultrasounds.
• Speaking (some more) of ultrasounds and pleasant surprises, at our first hospital (I'll explain in another post), we received an ultrasound picture of our baby every time we had an appointment. This was really nice, since as far as I've heard, in the US, parents only get some around the 22nd week, and that's it, unless there's cause for concern.
• I also got the go-ahead for eating sushi from my doctor (she practically laughed herself silly, when I mentioned how women in the US are banned from eating raw fish), which was really good, as that was one of the very few things I was able to tolerate once morning sickness started up. Of course, I stayed away from high-mercury fish like tuna nonetheless, but there was no ban on salmon!
• After some research I found out that Japan is one of the best countries to give birth in for several reasons. For one, Japan is #3 (according to the United Nations) and #4 (according to the CIA World Factbook) best in the world on the List of Infant Mortality Rates. The infant mortality rate (IMR) is the number of deaths of infants under one year old per 1,000 live births. On these lists, Canada is #24 and #36 respectively, the UK is #25 and #32, and the US is #34 and #46.
  Another reason (at least for me) is how even the hospitals in Japan are much more geared towards natural birth, instead of pumping mothers full of drugs (both PIT and EPI). People here seem to believe birth to be a natural process, something the body knows how to take care of in its own time and way... or at least that was the viewpoint of my hospital. They told me right away that if I wanted an epidural (which they thought all foreign women do), I'd have to go to a different/bigger hospital. That was not something I was interested in, so I stayed put.
  Finally, the last reason (again, for me) Japan seems pretty great about having a baby is the 3-5 days of hospital stay, which from what I heard from a few different people is pretty comfortable/full of pampering. Though I can't personally confirm these last two reasons, it just seems much more inviting than the hospitals I've seen/births I attended back in NYC.
• Being pregnant in Japan also meant I got treated super special when we flew back to NYC for the holidays. We were able to pre-board both our planes, and the cabin attendants kept checking in on me (but not intrusively), making sure I was comfortable and happy. This meant getting water refills without asking and quite a few bananas (fresh fruit on a plane O.O)! (^.^)v  They also gave us a tiny wooden airplane toy for the baby. YAAAY!

As for the not completely positive things:

• Japan is really careful when it comes to pregnant women. No, I mean REALLY careful. As in, when I tried to join a gym so I could swim during my pregnancy (one of the safest exercises there is for pregnant women), I was turned away. That was quite upsetting until my then-doctor told me to try YMCA. I did, and after some negotiations, I was able to sign up and allowed to swim until a month before my due date. Some of the interesting things the manager asked me before I could fill out the paperwork was "Will there be someone who will come with me to help me into and out of the pool, making sure I don't slip?" or "Are you sure, as the water might be too cold, especially during the winter?" or "Please come and talk to me once a month about your condition, and tell me the doctor still allows you to swim." He also almost had a heart-attack, when I told him I'm still working and will continue to do so until my maternity leave kicks in mid-February. (This was after I chose the "evening time" for my swimming and explained my reasoning.)
• Continuing with the "theme," it kind of threw me off guard how worried all my fellow Japanese teachers look and sound when they hear that I was/am/will continue biking to work while pregnant. Telling them that I don't really have much of a choice doesn't calm them down either. (Forget about me telling them I actually seek out exercise, like swimming...) While this constant worrying and fretting was nice and sweet initially, it's starting to become a bit.... well, old. It makes me feel like I'm a Faberge Egg, that needs to be locked up at home and protected.

So there you have it: my so-far experience of being pregnant in Japan. It has been a pretty positive experience until now, so much so, that if the last three months turn out to be more or less the same, I would seriously consider slipping in our next baby before we leave Japan for good. Only time will tell.