✨AMA✨ Endometriosis, infertility, IVF, pregnancy, birth, and motherhood in Japan! - ThreadSky

ishikawasachi.bsky.social • 2 days ago

✨AMA✨

Endometriosis, infertility, IVF, pregnancy, birth, and motherhood in Japan!

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I hope this is okay to ask: how hard was it to get an endo diagnosis here? I am looking at trying to get one myself and am feeling really anxious about it. 😱

ishikawasachi.bsky.social•2 days ago

Ngl, it was DIFFICULT. I’d been trying to convince my gyno that I had it, but he refused to believe me.

I only got approved for a lap when ultrasounds showed chocolate cysts in my ovaries, and when they sent the tissues to the lab, they confirmed the diagnosis!

ishikawasachi.bsky.social•2 days ago

Sadly, cysts means the endo is advanced (at least stage 3) so it was a very bittersweet moment…

christinedaae.bsky.social•2 days ago

Top things Japan does well AND needs to improve on for any of the above! You pick

ishikawasachi.bsky.social•2 days ago

Does well:
- legal maternity leave for up to one year (and can be extended)
- you stay in hospital for at least five days (vaginal delivery) or seven (c-sections)
- all medical care and meds for children are free
- vaccination rates are high

ishikawasachi.bsky.social•2 days ago

Needs to improve:
- accessibility to epidurals
- all pregnancy/delivery costs should be included in the NHI
- genetic testing and some vaccines (RSV, for example) should be covered by the NHI
- childcare should be more accessible (not just working parents)

savestheday.bsky.social•2 days ago

How much of pregnancy and delivery costs are not included in NHI (generally speaking?)

ishikawasachi.bsky.social•2 days ago

Technically, none of them!

You get vouchers that take up most of the cost for tests and checkups—but I’ve sometimes had to pay out of pocket from a few hundred yen to a few thousand.

ishikawasachi.bsky.social•2 days ago

We also get a 500K voucher for the birth, and some are fully covered by it, but I had to pay for the induction, epidural, and the room (I requested a private one, which are pricier).

So basically, the vouchers cover the bare, bare minimum 😅

markujiro.bsky.social•2 days ago

Do you think mixed-race kids have a moment in childhood like Black ppl in the US when they “realize” people see them differently

nakimushiart.bsky.social•2 days ago

If I may, yes we do and being mixed Black thanks to intersectionality it hits us harder than mixed people who aren’t Black and still closer to whiteness or european standards, which a lot of Asian countries unfortunately cater too..

markujiro.bsky.social•2 days ago

I’ve often felt that both white Americans and Japanese thought being white/Asian was additive rather than subtractive

nakimushiart.bsky.social•2 days ago

In the end it all boils down to colonial teachings and the globalization of white supremacy and anti-blackness pretty much

ishikawasachi.bsky.social•2 days ago

I can only speak for my own experience, where yes. I wasn’t aware I was “different”—I was *made* aware of it.

markujiro.bsky.social•2 days ago

I suppose the passive voice feels especially appropriate here?

ishikawasachi.bsky.social•2 days ago

Very much so!! (Again, I can only speak for my own experience!)

markujiro.bsky.social•2 days ago

I’m like (I assume) you are, caucasian and Asian, and I have not really had that experience. Which is an indirect way of saying I’m probably more white-passing than I thought.

markujiro.bsky.social•2 days ago

And I was raised in Southern CA, where everyone is from somewhere else, not Japan or Utah (where I am now) where there is a strong founding myth of the dominant ethnic group

ishikawasachi.bsky.social•2 days ago

Not caucasian, just white! (Family is nowhere near from the region of Caucasus)

But yeah, that’s why I make it clear to say that it’s my experience alone… I’m in that middle ground where I don’t look white enough to white people, nor Asian enough for Asian people 😂

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