One of the biggest predictors of whether or not a family does well in postpartum is postpartum expectations
I know that many are told when they are pregnant “Oh you wait till the baby is born…” “sleep now because you will never sleep again” or other very unhelpful doom statements but how many of us are actually given an accurate picture of what postpartum is like? Not many is the answer, in case you were wondering.
So I’m going to share with you my experience and I hope that others will find it helpful. During pregnancy, I had paid no real attention to postpartum. I made some frozen meals, cleaned the house, got the baby stuff in order and that was that. I assumed that I would have my baby and then everything would go back to normal. My husband and I had heard all of the doom statements but as they came with no real advice, we ignored them. I did not have an understanding of postpartum recovery, nor of the amount of help I would need. So when anyone asked, we always said, “Nope, we’re good, thanks”. My postpartum expectations were completely out of wack.
My birthing time came and I had an amazing home birth for my son
I also had really serious postpartum hemorrhaging after he was born. I had to go to the hospital to see if I needed a blood transfusion. Because of that, my midwife came to check on me every day for a week after he was born. This was amazing medical care. You know what was not amazing? Everything else. One day after my son was born, we needed to go grocery shopping. I decided (in my 24 hour labor, massive blood loss state) that I needed to go and do this. It never even occurred to me to ask for help or have the groceries delivered. So with the help of my also very tired, stressed husband, we loaded up our newborn and went to the grocery store. It was awful, painful, and very stressful. This sums up most of the newborn time for me. Nursing was hard, getting him to sleep more then 30 minutes was hard, he didn’t want to be put down ever, etc. you get the idea.
Here what would have helped me – Having a postpartum plan
This would have helped a ton (my next post will go in to this more). Being told that yes you will have this amazing high after birth that lasts a few days but you still need to rest, rest, rest. No mater how you birth, you need to recover afterwards. Having your placenta encapsulated can help with your recovery but rest is still needed. Your baby will most likely only want you, for the next month at least. Newborns want lots of skin to skin. There will be no schedule, no normal, and almost constant nursing (If you are doing that). The “no normal” is normal so don’t fight it. You need to plan on at least a month and up to 6 months of this. Every time you think there is normal, growth happens and your life changes. Now I will say there are those lovely “perfect” babies that sleep great, eat great, blah, blah, blah, but you don’t know which kind of baby you will get so best to be prepared. Also know that those “hard” babies are just more sensitive and there is nothing wrong with your parenting skills.
A doula can help you make a realistic postpartum plan that works for your family. I provide this as part of my second prenatal visit. If you are in the Tacoma WA area and want to learn more click HERE. My next post will be a deep dive in to how to prepare for postpartum.
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