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New Zealand Listener, Volume 7, Issue 182, 18 December 1942, Page 12

NO VISITORS ALLOWED

In A Moscow Maternity Home

(From a talk by

DOROTHY

GODFREY

in the BBC's Pacific Service)

‘ LTHOUGH my husband .and A I are both English; our son was born in Moscow in 1936. My husband is a radio engineer, and he worked for some years in the Soviet Union as a manager in a factory. We went to Moscow in the hard, difficult days of 1934, and we stayed seven years. after

that. About 1935 I remember Stalin using a phrase which became universally popular: "Life has become better, life has become happier." So I was glad when I knew I was to experience a special side of this better Soviet life. I was to test their maternity services. When I arrived at the maternity home, a _ nurse whisked me away through a

glass door; then I was examined, and they said: "Yes, you can stay." They gave me a shower and stripped me of all my clothes. They do that in most of their hospitals to avoid infection; relatives take away your clothes until the time you are to come out again, and you are left with just a tooth-brush, face-cloth and soap, and a hair-brush and comb. Then they give you a voluminous white nightgown, a dressing gown and slippers, and a white cloth to cover up your hair-they are very keen on your hair being tied up. After that, I was taken into what they call a "labour ward"; there were quite a dozen beds in there-in fact the place was so crowded that one or two women had to sit on stools. All the hospitals in Moscow were full at that time; there just wasn’t enough accommodation. Doctors and nurses were constantly in the ward, and when the time came, patients were moved to the "birth" room or, in rare cases, to the operating theatre. Bedside Telephone At long last, I was told I hada son. But my husband wasn’t allowed to see his small infant until we went out through the glass doors and met him in the hall again, 12 days later. In Soviet maternity homes no one, not even your husband, is allowed to come and see you -the idea being to avoid infection, and it seems successful! After my son’s birth, I was moved into a charming ward with pale-pink walls and big windows, and about eight other new mothers. There was a table beside each bed with a telephone and earphones for the radio. The first day I was quite excited about having a telephone by my bed, and thought it great fun. But by the next day, I got a little tired of its ringing, and by the time I was due to go out, I was really glad to get away from it. I didn’t miss having visitors-the day was so busy what with being washed and fed and baby’s feeding times. We only saw the babies at these times, when they were wheeled along the corridor in amusing long trolleys, each holding about two dozen identical cocoons. When my bundle was handed to me, I used to

hasten to reassure myself. by his nose or something that it was really my offspring. But there is really no danger of getting anyone else’s baby, as they all have their names on a band round their wrists and on a cord round their necks. Every day, the nursery doctor would come and report each child’s progress to its mother. The doctors were mostly women — and they were

always willing to discuss any point which worried you. Fruit and Flowers And then there was the exe citing period in the evening when visitors or relatives downstairs sent you up messages and fruit and flowers. They had to stay in the hall provided and wait for the nurse to take them a reply. And then the §talks-vou

know how Russian women talk-they tell you their whole history, and you naturally respond; and they were specially interested in me as I was a foreigner — why had I come to the Soviet Union, and what was it like in England? There was an Armenian woman-a vivacious, dark-skinned girl who was the wife of a young Armenian sent up to study at a Moscow University, She made the long journey with him, and was very proud to have had her blackhaired, black-eyed baby in Moscow, the Mecca of all the Soviet peoples. As soon as she could, she intended to put her baby in a day nursery and then go on with her studies, for she was a student, too. Every morning a physical training teacher came, and the patients allowed . by the doctor would be put. through special exercises in bed to tone up their muscles. The exercises were more strenuous each day as the patient grew stronger. In hospital we all had masks of muslin, and if we developed the slightest sign of a cough or cold we were told to put them on when feeding our babies. Occasionally in the afternoon a doctor would give a lecture in the ward on infant hygiene, and the mothers asked questions, Baby Care There are nurseries attached to most of the big factories where mothers can leave their children and go to feed them at intervals. Supposing there wasn’t a nursery at the factory, then they would go to the local district one, and for this they would be given special time off. Every time a child is born, a notice is sent to the local clinic telling them the history of the case and when the baby is going home, and the district nurse visits it and sees it is all right, and tells the mother of the arrangements for attending the clinic. When Jim was very small, I took him about once a week to the clinic, because I didn’t know anything about bringing up small children, and I did not always approve of the way the Russians who shared our (Continued on next page)

(Continued from previous page) flat, brought up theirs. For one thing, they nursed the children a great deal too much. Some of my neighbours used to be horrified when I put Jim out in the pram in the garden and left him maybe for two hours. I knew he was all right, but they would ring my bell and say "Your baby is crying." They called me very hard-hearted when I refused to pick him up, but after two or three months, they used. to come and say: "What a marvellous child he is, how quiet and contented by himself." I tried to explain to them that it was the initial training; but they found it hard to leave a child without responding to its lightest cry. Sleeping-Bag One day my son had the snuggest little .outfit sent him from Canada. Everyone on the boulevard admired. it, because they had never seen anything like it before. It had a little hood attached to a sort of sleeping-bag-pale blue fluffy woollen material, ornamented with. white bunnies. The doctor at the clinic saw it and was very much taken with it, because normally, Russian babies are wrapped in special little eiderdowns, and hands and toes sometimes come out of them. So when the warmer weather came, I gave it to the doctor, and she handed it over to the institute. Next winter I was very much intrigued when I saw these outfits in the shops and the children wearing them. Admittedly they hadn’t any bunnies on and were of more serviceable colours, but they did keep the children’s toes and fingers warm. It seems such 4 tiny point, but it does show how ' the Soviet health authorities are always on the look-out for the smallest item that will further the well-being of mother and child.