Wöchnerin

Wöchnerin (in former times also “Kindbetterin”) is called a nut/mother in the first weeks after the birth. The name is derived from the older “Sechswöchnerin”.

In one period of 6-8 weeks after the birth of a child the body of the nut/mother must recover from the pregnancy and relieving and change over hormoneal. The Gebärmutter regresses and its wound heals, whereby the “week river “withdraws. Because the woman needs thereby much peace and is usually mentally unstable, this time “childbed “is also called. It is the natural time to adjust itself to the new situation and the baby.

The legal maternity protection time, in which a strict work prohibition applies to young mothers, amounts to in most states 6-8 weeks. The loss of wages is replaced either by the health insurance company or by the family fund, and there is the right to special medical support. For the time after an abortion or an abortion comparable regulations exist.

In this time the risk of the child bed fever - a bacterial infection of the Gebärmutter and neighbouring organs - exists, which by increased hygiene is to be prevented. It has similar symptoms as a blood poisoning and was in former times the cause of many deaths. Only around 1850 the Viennese recognized physician Ignaz roll-points (“rescuers of the mothers”) the cause and fought for better hygiene in the hospitals and frequent disinfection of the treating physicians.

Also healing one knows complaints possibly. Dam tear and/or. Dam cut make. For the well-being of a Wöchnerin not only the midwife can contribute substantially, but also the understanding and suitable handling of the child father with it. This applies also to the later quiet time - in that the relationship by paternal jealousy on the newborn child to be loaded can.

In the earlier customs meaning was attached to cleanliness and the sympathy, but not necessarily the hygiene. Thus one attributed a special meaning to the broom in old Rome, and the midwives swept the house with a gesegneten broom swelled the birth house, in order to hold bad influences from the newborn child and the Wöchnerin.

In the medical sense a longer sexual abstention SAMness is required, those in some religions (e.g. in the Judentum and Islam) is concretely recommended.

See also: Nut/mother and child, maternity insurance, impurity, discharge