The pain after a C-section, Wendy learned, was not just pain. It was a wall. It turned every movement into a negotiation between will and flesh. Her abdomen felt stapled to the bed. Laughing was impossible. Coughing felt like betrayal. Rolling to stand required planning, bracing, prayer, and the sort of concentration people reserve for bomb disposal. She had expected soreness. She had not expected to feel like her body had been disassembled and reattached by someone who disliked her.
The nurses were kind. Mitchell was tireless. But hospital kindness ended at discharge, and Mitchell had already burned much of his available time off during Wendy’s bed rest late in the pregnancy. The economy did not care about childbirth. Rent did not care. Electric bills did not care. He had a few days, then he had to return to work or risk creating a second emergency.
The conversation about help should have been simple. It was not.
They considered a postpartum doula, then saw the rates and quietly closed the tab. Friends offered to stop by, but friends had jobs, children, obligations, lives. Wendy’s mother had, months earlier, offered a solution in a tone so eager Wendy had nearly cried from relief.