Last night may have been Hollywood’s biggest night, but the one thing you didn’t see at The Oscars was a postpartum ad that was rejected for being “too graphic” at the night’s events.
Frida Mom, a brand dedicated to postpartum preparedness for new moms, took to social media on Friday revealing that ABC and the Academy had banned their advertisement from airing during Sunday’s awards ceremony.
“The ad you’re about to watch was rejected by ABC & the Oscars from airing during this year’s award show,” the company wrote on Instagram, sharing the commercial. “It’s not ‘violent, political’ or sexual in nature. Our ad is not ‘religious or lewd’ and does not portray ‘guns or ammunition.’ ‘Feminine hygiene & hemorrhoid relief’ are also banned subjects.”
The 60-second clip shows a brand new mom being woken up in the middle of the night by her newborn baby. She struggles to get out of bed—her postpartum belly exposed.
After comforting her crying baby, the mom makes her way to the bathroom—slowly, and visibly in pain. She sits down on the toilet and begins to change the pads in her mesh panties—among other things that come along with HEALING postpartum.
“It’s just a new mom, home with her baby and her new body for the first time,” Frida Mom explained. “Yet it was rejected. And we wonder why new moms feel unprepared.”
In a statement to Health.com, the company said their clip violated the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ guidelines for being “too graphic with partial nudity and product demonstration.”
Need I remind everyone of the over-sexualized halftime show that was forced upon us just a week ago?
One of my best friends sent me the video over the weekend, livid that it was rejected by the media.
“It’s 100% accurate, and so sad that women aren’t more informed and prepared for what comes AFTER baby gets here,” she said, “especially considering what the media DOES allow.”
Being 4-weeks postpartum herself, my friend IS this mom in this ad. She left the hospital swollen and in pain, with a handful of witch-hazel and some pads. She had an allergic reaction to the stitches where she tore, and spends more time attached to her hemorrhoid pillow than even her new baby.
Nobody prepared her for the healing process. No doctor or nurse was concerned with the sheer unknown of what she was heading home to.
That’s why Frida Mom exists, and that’s why we need more of this in the media. Becoming a new mom has it’s bliss. But it isn’t all bliss. In fact, it comes with a lot of pain—both physically and mentally— confusion, and SO many questions.
You don’t just get a new baby. You get a new body—one that is still the same shell of your old self, but new and ever-changing in so many ways.
The ad has been viewed millions of times across all platforms, garnering support from moms everywhere.
Busy Philipps even weighed-in on the emotional ad, calling for postpartum experiences to be normalized.
“I legit teared up when I just watched it,” she wrote on Instagram. “I DO believe so strongly that the more we can NORMALIZE A WOMAN’S BODILY EXPERIENCE IN MEDIA, the better off our culture and society will be. AND YES THAT MEANS ADS TOO.”
Philipps called out double standards on air, noting that many viewers “probably don’t even flinch when an Erectile Disfunction ad comes on but THIS AD IS REJECTED?!”
“I think this is an incredible piece of advertising that accurately represents something millions of women know intimately,” she added. “And I’m so (expletive) sick of living in a society where the act of simply BEING A WOMAN is rejected by the gatekeepers of media. Well. Shame on them and NOT on us for simply being human women.”
We need to do more than just prepare moms for the sleepless nights. That’s inevitable. That’s a given. That’s no longer helpful.
Frida Mom is paving the way for new moms in preparing them for postpartum. And ladies, thank God someone is