Jodie Turner-Smith Had a Home Birth Because of Systemic Racism

This past April, the Queen & Slim star and her husband Joshua Jackson welcomed a baby girl in the comfort of their home together. However, as Turner-Smith told British Vogue recently, their decision stemmed from well-founded concerns over the quality of care she would receive at a hospital given the high risk of pregnancy-related deaths for Black women in America.

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"We had already decided on a home birth because of concerns about negative birth outcomes for Black women in America," she said. "According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the risk of pregnancy-related deaths is more than three times greater for Black women than for white women, pointing, it seems to me, to systemic racism."

Additionally, Turner-Smith explained that Jackson was able to be present with her for the 4-day birthing process — something that wouldn't have been possible in a hospital during the pandemic.

"We never imagined that in the coming weeks, hospitals around the country would begin restricting who could be present in the birthing rooms, forcing mothers to deliver without the support person or people of their choice," she said. "Delivering at home ensured that I had what every single woman deserves to have: full agency in determining my birth support."

Not only that, but she then went on to share a touching anecdote about the intense labor to further illustrate how much it meant to have Jackson by her side throughout the entire process.

"[On the third day], I was fatigued and beginning to lose my resolve. Josh ran me a bath, and as I lay in it contracting, I talked to my body and I talked to my daughter," she recalled. "In that moment, he snapped a picture of me. An honest moment of family and togetherness — a husband supporting a wife, our baby still inside me, the sacred process of creating a family."

Read Turner-Smith's entire account, here.

Photo via Getty