Now that I’ve given birth, there are always two things that remind me of Labor Day: Holiday of workers (yay!) and childbirth.
Labor Day celebrations in our country traces back to 1903, where a rally was staged to fight economic rights. To this day, labor groups batlle the same battle–higher wages, lower prices, more jobs, less taxes. Year in, year out, nothing has changed. So today, everyone gets this day off to celebrate the success of each labourer and thank the Lord they have work no matter how difficult, risky, whatever it may be.
Now my own labor. I can clearly remember those nine grueling and life-threatening hours of labor. I was wide awake the whole time, even a couple of hours after, before I finally dozed off. If I can remember right, the midwife told me if I wasn’t feeling sleepy at all, since they injected something that was supposed to make me sleep. Nope, it was not epidural (read: normal, no drug birth, yeah, beat that!). My husband was with me during labor, except for the delivery where it wasn not allowed by the hospital. I find it crazy, but probably it had something to do with the hospital’s religion. And because of that unwritten rule that men weren’t allowed, I spent day one with a stranger aka my daughter alone with her, breastfed her, calling the nurses via intercom to assist in changing diapers.
That was my Labor Day almost three years ago. And well, okay, I shall celebrate it today, along with workers who celebrate the labor they do in their own jobs.
Happy Labor Day!