Both of my children were born in America.

No complications. Standard births. Two nights in the hospital each time. Home with a healthy baby.

Each birth cost us $6,000 out of pocket.

That was our 20%. After insurance covered its 80%. With what was considered genuinely good healthcare coverage. The kind people feel lucky to have.

I have been thinking about this number since we moved to France. About how normal it felt at the time. About how we just...paid it. The way you pay for things that cost what they cost because you don't know they don't have to cost that.

I didn't really know that was American until I left.

The full post - on everything else I didn't know was American until I left - is up now: onceuponacastle.substac…