Milwaukee Film, a non-profit arts organization, is hosting its first-ever symposium on pregnancy-related mortality among Black women. The March 26 event is called "Black Birth: A Black Maternal Health Symposium."
In the United States, 700 womendie every year from complications due to pregnancy, according to the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention. Black women are three times more likely than white women to die of pregnancy-related causes. In Wisconsin, Black women are five times more likely.
Milwaukee Film has curated conversations around Black maternal health care for several years during its film festivals. And this symposium uses visual storytelling to spark conversation on the topic, bringing together healthcare providers, advocates and community members.
The event’s keynote speaker is actress and mom of two Christina Elmore. Elmore says Black birthing people being able to have choice and agency in their birthing experiences has always mattered to her, but her own experience becoming pregnant and delivering two babies heightened that awareness.
"And I know that it's so real for so many Black women because the outcomes just are very skewed and we are not having great success. So to be included in the conversation on how we got here, how we fix it, and how we find ease, peace, joy in birthing — it's really important to me as a mother, but just as person."
Elmore also talks about navigating pregnancy as a Black woman when simply being Black is a risk.
"You're anxious about how you feel, you're anxious about the pregnancy in general, there's so many unknowns. And I remember during the course of my first pregnancy I would go to my midwife and go to my OB and they’d be like, 'OK we're going to take this test,' and I always, you know, I'm a prepared patient, I would have a lot of questions, 'OK so why this one? Why am I at risk for X, Y and Z that we need to take this test?' And almost always the answer was that I was at higher risk just by nature of being Black."
She says she started experiencing anxiety and noticed her blood pressure would go up any time she was in the doctor's office, but it'd be fine if she was at home. "I was so anxious about all these tests and all these outcomes that are skewed just by nature of me being a Black person and it was scary and so that kind of anxiety coupled with already your fears and your anxieties around having a kid, it causes you to be at elevated risk too. So my blood pressure was up because I was anxious and I was anxious because of these tests and these tests were testing me because I was at risk to have higher blood pressure anyway."
But Elmore says she recognizes how blessed she was that her pregnancies and births were uncomplicated for the most part.
"But I know so many other women who had to have so many further interventions because we're at such higher risk for so many things and it can cause a lot of extra anxiety that you wouldn't have had were you just a white person, which is crazy."
When thinking about her appearance at Milwaukee Film's Black Maternal Health Symposium, Elmore says she doesn't necessarily have one message she's trying to drive home, but she's hoping to talk about the joys of Black birthing experiences, not just the disparities.
"I hope we also talk about the things that we are uniquely positioned to do as Black birthing mothers. That I was able to have a room full of Black women as I birthed my baby and that also, we are also about community, and we care. A part of our cultural experience is that we care about who's gonna come over and who's gonna be there helping us at, you know, when we get home from the hospital or from wherever you birth."
Elmore adds, "So I hope we talk about too the wonderful rich amazing unique things that we get as Black birthing people even as we discuss how to make that experience possible and better for more and more women."
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