I'm an American living in Spain. Both my husband and I had 4 months of paid parental leave, which helped us ease into parenthood.

• I have lived in Spain for almost seven years and gave birth to my first child here.
• Spain provides four months of fully paid maternity and paternity leave.

I've been living in Spain for almost seven years, and my husband is Spanish.

When I first got pregnant with my son, people asked me if I was going to have the baby in the US. After some consideration, I realized that in Spain, I would receive four months of fully paid maternity leave, and so would my husband.

That — along with free healthcare — was reason enough to give birth in Spain.

Benefits for self-employed workers eased the financial strain

Salaried parents receive the equivalent of their salary for four straight months. As a self-employed parent, I was initially devastated to learn I would get a much smaller payment. However, I was still entitled to benefits in Spain, receiving about $1,200 a month during my maternity leave.

While this was less than my regular monthly earnings, at least it's something. Two self-employed friends in Colorado spent months saving up to get them through maternity leave despite the state's new family medical leave program. While I worked more in the last month of pregnancy, the payments eased the pressure.

Parents have the option to divide up their leave. My husband and I took the first two months together; he worked months three and four, and now he's taking the next two to care for our son while I go back to work. That means six full months without childcare. My husband receives his full salary during each month of paternity leave.

The process for receiving benefits is simple

While Spanish bureaucracy moves at a snail's pace, this is one of the exceptions. As a self-employed worker, the only thing I had to do was send my son's birth certificate to my accountant. My friends in the US spoke of a complicated system of multiple enrollment forms and applications, with each state having its own guidelines. A friend in California had to enroll in benefits before she was even pregnant in order to receive them.

There's no question as to whether a parent will take their full leave, with the exception of some self-employed business owners. My European clients were very understanding and have already taken me back on. I spoke with one father in the US who felt he couldn't leave his law job for more than two weeks of paid vacation time. Despite US law protecting parents for 12 weeks, he felt guilty about leaving his clients stranded. In Spain, leave is accepted and expected.

My body could heal, and I felt less alone

My body took weeks to heal from birth. With my partner there to handle the physical tasks of caring for a newborn, as well as basic to-dos (cleaning the bathroom, for example), I could focus on recovery.

During the night, he could get up and hand me the baby without the anxiety of waking up early for work. I felt supported during night feedings; there was camaraderie in the collective exhaustion — though sleepy, we felt united.

I also had time and money to go to multiple pelvic floor therapy appointments. There was less financial strain to do what I needed to take care of myself.

Breastfeeding has not been easy. I never imagined feeding a small human would feel like a full-time job. Four months of paid leave allowed me to focus solely on figuring out how to get calories into the new little creature.