In August of 2020, I set out to document the raw daily life of new mothers during the first 12 weeks postpartum.
Why? After the birth of my second child in 2018, I was hearing over and over from other new mothers that they simply felt unseen in the early days of after having a baby.
And I felt it too.
What is "Postpartum" anyways?
So what's the problem?
Throughout pregnancy, mothers will have approximately 15 prenatal appointments.
After their baby is born, mothers have only 1, at 6 weeks postpartum.
Pregnancy is so visible. I wondered, what happens when all the work of motherhood isn't so easy to see anymore?
Women feel invisible during postpartum
The work that they do throughout each day, and their struggles are often unseen. What's worse, they can't see themselves as the center of their story. And that can be really isolating. I wanted to use visual storytelling to help these women. But I needed to do a little research to figure out how.
Research Methods
In my secondary research I wanted to see...
How other family documentarians were telling family stories, and what visual elements were present.
I conducted informational interviews
With the goal of understanding how women could really benefit from this project
I asked questions like
I found from my research
I found that moms wanted their invisible work to be seen and celebrated, and they wanted to see themselves as the center of the story.
Even more than that, mothers wanted to help other women in postpartum to feel less alone. They wanted to share their stories in hopes it would help someone else through early motherhood
My solution?
To photograph 1-3 mothers during the first 12 weeks of postpartum in their own homes, and share the photos, along with quotes, from the mothers (motherhood feels like) to help them feel seen.
I also wanted to share with others so they see their experience reflected back to them.
The goal was to create connection and the modern village.
I began plotting how I would execute this project
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Moodboard
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Applications for participants
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Participant interviews
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Scheduling shoots
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Survey for quote capture
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Planning Sharing on IG
How did I want this project to look and feel
I began accepting applications
At first just 3.
Then 21 more mothers.
Each story was so unique and touching, I couldn't pick just 1 (or even 3) like I originally planned.
So I called each of them...
And we talked about their stories, their experience with documentary photography, what they hoped to gain, and what they hoped to give by sharing their story.
I also got into the knitty-gritty with them about what it might feel like to be photographed in such a raw and vulnerable way.
Almost all of them wanted to be a part of the project
So I started scheduling each of their in-home photo sessions, organizing their quotes and finally photographing them.
The positive impact was undeniable
What I learned
I learned so much about the impact of honest and vulnerable storytelling during this project.
I also got a lot of on-the-job experience in adaptability, adjusting to small spaces and difficult lighting of people's homes.
More than anything, I learned how passionate I am about making a positive impact in people's lives.