Paris (AFP)
Lying about the reasons for going back and forth to the toilet or hiding behind the computer to take a nap: in the professional environment, a microcosm of modesty, the condition of women in early pregnancy remains a taboo sometimes fraught with consequences.
"I don't know a woman who was comfortable announcing her pregnancy at work," says Judith Aquien, author of "Three Months in Silence", where she paints a grim picture of what women experience at the start of their pregnancy, especially at work, where guilty remarks and inappropriate innuendos can be omnipresent.
"We are faced with a system that has never been deconstructed, which is not adapted and which is discriminatory. This is one of the main reasons why women hide their pregnancy during the first trimester", she criticizes.
This inadequacy and this silence, the deputy Paula Forteza (non-registered, ex-LREM), pregnant, speaks about it in a plea published on July 26 and which found a resounding echo on social networks.
Contacted by AFP, she recounts the concerns of those around her when she disclosed her pregnancy before the famous so-called "three-month" ultrasound, from which the risks of miscarriage are more limited.
"+ Be careful, in the professional context it can harm you, your colleagues will think that you are less efficient and the competition will set in +", reports the elected representative.
But for her, it's a relief after having suffered a miscarriage on my own in 2019. "And that will prevent me from lying at work when I have to cancel an appointment because I'm too tired ... has already fallen asleep in the hemicycle and it was humiliating, "says Ms. Forteza.
Indeed, the woman's body undergoes very strong hormonal changes during the first trimester of pregnancy (fatigue, nausea, vomiting, skin problems, digestive, genital and urinary disorders ...), bothersome on a daily basis.
- "Do not tell about your private life" -
And the "intrusive" remarks of colleagues do not help.
"Since we do not yet see that a woman is pregnant, we think her symptoms are whims," she interprets.
It is this observation that pushes women to hide their pregnancy, especially for fear of a miscarriage.
“My gynecologist advised me to keep my pregnancy a secret in the first trimester because of the risk of miscarriage and the difficulty in dealing with grief for some women. I got scared, so I did. ", testifies Annie, mother of a one-year-old girl.
One in four women experiences at least one miscarriage in her lifetime.
It is to avoid the trouble of having to warn those around you of complications that an injunction to conceal the pregnancy for the first three months exists.
But this silence makes dealing with anxiety even more difficult.
Pregnancy "touches the realm of the intimate, a subject that makes everyone uncomfortable," analyzes MP Paula Forteza.
"You internalize the fact that you shouldn't say it because you grow up hearing that you shouldn't tell your colleagues about your private life. It's a taboo that everyone maintains, even us women" , illustrates Sophie Espié, mother and director of public affairs in an industrial group.
- Depressive symptoms -
For Alix Barcet, mother of a 5-year-old boy who stopped working because the fatigue of the first three months put a brake on her self-entrepreneurial ambitions, "society needs women to have children. but she is not ready to accompany them as it should so that they do it properly ".
Between 10 and 16% of women experience prenatal depression, and 86% experience depressive symptoms that are neither monitored nor treated, warns Céline, midwife coordinator of the Paris Perinatal Health Network (RSPP).
She adds that these depressions can lead in the long term to postpartum depression which, in some cases, leads to suicide.
During the first trimester of her pregnancy, Paule felt very bad about herself.
"I was moping because I told myself that it was not for me. No one had told me that it was so violent having a child and that it could turn into a nightmare," she confesses. -she, finally mother of two children.
"We should work to make the life of women in early pregnancy easier," said Paula Forteza, who offers several ideas in this direction, ranging from 100% financial support from the first dates, to a right teleworking, including the installation of rest rooms in the workplace.
© 2021 AFP