Having a baby in the United States is expensive, but when Vanessa Taylor prepared an invoice for her husband for the cost of childbirth, it wasn’t just about the medical expenses. In addition to charging him for the ultrasounds and co-pays, she calculated how much her husband owes her for her emotional labor, postpartum recovery, and “pain and suffering,” among other things. After going through everything she did throughout her pregnancy and postpartum, the TikToker concluded that her husband should pay her $175,000 — and a lot of social media users believe she’s actually undercharging him for her labor.
First, she decided to charge her husband for ‘incubation and housing.’
In a video shared on TikTok and Instagram, Vanessa explained that this “includes a fully furnished womb with 24/7 temperature control,” which she priced at $8,000 for nine months, resulting in a total of $72,000. The next item she listed was perhaps the most obvious: medical expenses throughout her pregnancy, including co-pays, labs, and ultrasounds. She estimated that this cost about $5,000.
She went on to explain that she would charge her husband for discomfort she experienced while pregnant as well as during childbirth. “Then we have pain and suffering, both physical and emotional,” Vanessa said. “So, this includes stuff like morning sickness, heartburn, swelling, food aversions, and unsolicited advice from strangers. That’s priced at $20,000.”
The list continued.
Vanessa’s list also included “convenience and handling fees,” which refers to “inconveniences like grocery carrying, shoe tying, [and] sleep position adjustments throughout the pregnancy.” She priced this at $3,000. “Then we have the delivery fee, which includes pushing, sweating, and minor trauma,” she continued in the clip. “That’s priced at $10,000.”
Her husband, however, owes her even more than that for the delivery because she “did it without any medication or epidural,” resulting in a $5,000 “unmedicated labor premium” for him. Additionally, even while she was in pain, she continued to provide emotional labor for her family, so she made sure to charge her husband for that as well.
“We have an emotional labor surcharge, managing everyone else’s feelings while in pain,” she said in the TikTok. “I was in pain for quite some time. That’s priced at $2,000.”
Then came the postpartum expenses.
Of course, pregnancy and childbirth are a lot of work, but the work didn’t end there, so Vanessa made sure to include the labor she did and the challenges she faced postpartum. “We have immediate postpartum recovery services, so this is emotional regulation, physical healing for myself, diaper and newborn duty for the baby,” she said in her video. “That’s priced at $3,000, priced quite fairly if you ask me.”
She also included a “sleepless night subscription plan,” joking that “this is a postpartum trial period, which includes a minimum of 30 nights of interrupted sleep for me.” For this, she decided to charge $500 per night for a total of 30 nights, bringing the total to $15,000.
“Then we have a liquid gold premium, so this is nourishment at the expense of engorgement and very painful nipples,” she added. “That’s priceless, but we’ll charge it at a flat fee of about $40,000 for up to 12 months of service.”
This means her husband owes her about $175,000, but he’s still in debt from her previous pregnancies.
@thetaylor_fam My husband is forever indebted to me for our 4 children in 5 years! #motherhood #childbirth #marriagehumor #newbaby #newbornbaby ♬ original sound – Vanessa Taylor
Vanessa made it clear there would be “no discounts,” but she acknowledged that her husband would probably struggle to come up with the money for her most recent pregnancy. “He’s still paying off the charges from the previous births,” she explained in the clip. “We’ve had four babies in five years, so it looks like he’s gonna be forever indebted to me.”
Though the video was clearly a joke, other moms were totally on board and actually told Vanessa that she should’ve charged more.
“You’re UNDERCHARGING, know your worth,” one person commented on Instagram.
Another wrote, “You need to UP your feee for pain and suffering!”
A third person added, “You went light on that unmediated labor premium, sis. Multiply by 5.”
Some other moms joked that if they did the same thing, their husbands would owe them a lot more than $175,000. “My husband owes me $1.4 million based on this,” one mom joked.
