Speaker 1: (00:00)
In the Black Infant Health program, that program is addressing infant mortality and there’s, you know, very high rates of infant mortality and so in that program you provide a lot of education around what a healthy family looks like.
Narrator: (00:15)
The program is located within the Fillmore in San Francisco and is under the umbrella of West Side Community Services. The program works specifically with black mothers who are four times more likely to die from pregnancy related causes compared to white mothers during the prenatal phase. The mothers meet at Black Infant Health once a week for 10 weeks. Then upon having the baby, we’ll meet for another 10 weeks to progress through postpartum.
Speaker 2: (00:42)
There was a young lady who came into the program who found out she was pregnant, didn’t necessarily have the support of her child’s father and really just needed a support outside of her family to kind of get through and process the news of her having a baby. To process all the changes that her body was going through in her early months of pregnancy or through her first trimester. I believe she joined Black Infant Health during her second. And so she came into the program and you know, she was really down a lot during her pregnancy because she didn’t have the support of the partner. So it’s like, okay, now I’m getting ready to be a single mom. And you know, unfortunately we’ve had more of those than not. And so being able to come into a group where she was supported by, you know, 10 other women going through the same exact things that she was as far as like her, you know, development for her body as far as emotionally, mentally, just all the things that you go through during pregnancy when your body’s changing, when your hormones are out of control, being able to just come and have that support.
Speaker 2: (01:43)
So it was really encouraging to see her make her way every week to come and participate in that and to see how every week she would get better and she would be happier if she will feel more excited about having her baby as opposed to when she first kinda came in. She’s like, what the heck am I doing? How did I get myself in this situation? And so it was really encouraging to see that. And the relationship that she developed with the staff was, I mean amazing because they were able to support her even after she had the baby. Even after her postpartum classes. Do you know she kept in contact, continues to keep in contact with the program and loves and supports the program. She sends referrals, she does all those things. So she finished prenatal right, which is a 10 week class and she had her baby, she comes back to postpartum and she’s basically reunited with a lot of the moms that she was in prenatal with because with the prenatal classes sometimes they’re around the same due dates, but sometime you may get a mom that’s 10 weeks in a group with the mom that’s you know, 30 weeks or 29 weeks.
Speaker 2: (02:47)
They’re not going to be in the same postpartum group cause their babies are so far apart. But she was able to actually reunited her postpartum group with a lot of her same moms that she came in with and something. Now you’re going through a different type of bonding because now for the most part we’re new mommy’s, there were some that had children already, but now you’re going through a new process. You know you’re talking about immunizations and you’re talking about, oh my gosh, I don’t, I don’t get any sleep and you’re talking about all those things itself. It was just really good for her to have that support. I feel like the support of that group really helped her to not spiral into a depression because I feel like that’s where she was headed at a few points in the, in the program. But I feel like she’s doing really well.
Speaker 2: (03:23)
So once you graduate, after postpartum, we have different things. We have breastfeeding groups, different activities that we try to do to engage the alumni with programs like Black Infant Health. Our biggest marketing is our moms. You hear moms say, oh my gosh, I went through this program it’s great. This is what they did for me. Then, you know, we’re flooded at the door by moms who were like, oh my friend So and so did the program or my cousin or my sister. We try to make sure that we do our best to stay connected, um, mainly by like events that we throw that alumni can come and participate, bring your kids. We just started walking like a fitness thing. We had a baby closet where we invited a lot of the alumni to come in. They were able to go home with clothes for their baby. We had a Christmas party for all of our participants and alumni, which was really great. We did some games. We have like a photo booth. So just think of different fun ways to, to try to keep them engaged.
Speaker 1: So when you’re in a program like black infant health or any of our other programs, we look at what happens in the relationship. So with that mother that’s pregnant, you have the opportunity to shape a whole new generation of people.