Picture this scenario. You’re a first time mom, you’ve been working up to the last minute, you’ve just bought a new house and plan to move in two months, you think you’ve bought everything you need for your new life with baby and then he arrives two weeks early. After a gruelling 20 hour labor with an epidural and multiple tears, you come home and find it extremely painful to breastfeed and your baby doesn’t stop crying half the night and you can’t figure out why? Then come the onslaught of phone calls, the advice from everyone and his mother and night after night of dreadful sleep combined with raging hormones and aching breasts. What’s a girl to do????

You are not alone

First of all, I want you to know that the majority of women in varying degrees go through a thoroughly overwhelming and exhausting postpartum period. That is why I created this site. Precisely for these times because the focus seems to all fall on the baby but we women need help. A lot of help. Whether you have been mellow during your pregnancy or not, whether you ate the right things or not, whether your baby is crying or not, whether you have an easy time breastfeeding or not, whether you had a really painful birthing experience or not (and I don’t know anyone who says giving birth isn’t painful), the point is, most women get through this period ultimately feeling stronger, wiser and 100% more equipped and more whipped up into shape for a lifetime of motherhood. You are very much not alone. When you tell people about your pain, your exhaustion, they can all empathize, but somehow no one can really help you.

The Learning Curve

This brings me to the second point, you are going through a MASSIVE learning curve. I frequently went around feeling entirely introverted and overwhelmed. That is because on every level you are physically, emotionally and spritually going through profound change. It’s hard to explain. It’s definitely hard to talk about it. And then of course, you don’t always want to share your thoughts with someone else because they might give you yet another opinion, which is not yours and right now, you are trying to figure everything out. Remember when I quoted Elizabeth Davis a few weeks ago… in the first two weeks you are processing your birthing experience, facing a new reality with a baby, healing and recovering, dealing with immense fatigue and hunger, trying to take control, learning to feed your baby…. it’s a lot.

You Still Need Help

Most people seem to think a woman get’s through the first week and then that’s it. For some reason, including myself before I had children, people feel the need to descend upon you the moment you have just gone through the most major experience of your life. Actually, it would be nice if they could just spread themselves over the next few weeks and months. Still, there should always be a few people on tap to help you through these first few weeks of RECOVERY. Think of it like an operation if that will make you pay attention to what your body has gone through. Ideally you will be padding around in your pyjamas as long as you want, with someone to help you with cooking and cleaning for at least the first two weeks and it would be really great to continue having the cleaner come in at leat once a week and someone else to bring a few meals. You should also be reaching out to your girlfriends who have been through this first phase to talk about the hormone situation. I remember with my first pregnancy I did not stop crying every day about something. One day I just cried about how terrible the world was and how could I have brought such a beautiful child into the world. Yes it all gets a bit irrational and the ensuing weeks and months of exhaution and hormones can take its toll and your family and friends need to be around to help out, listen to you.

I am not saying all this to scare mothers, but rather make mothers really wake up and realize that the postpartum period is as profound as pregnancy. There are some women who jump right back into shape but all that advice about listening to your body and needs during pregnancy is well directed to the postpartum period too. I know we all tend to push ourselves, especially if we have other children or need to run a business and furnish a house too. But it’s worth taking some time out to just try and adjust to your new reality, I found even feeling like a pro with one baby under my belt that the adjustment period was significant and only now, six months later do I feel like I am coming out of an extreme period of mothering.

If you take away one thought away from everything I have just said, make it is this….the postpartum period, which for many women can be months, is truly the fourth trimester. Give yourself a break and make sure to get some shut-eye when the baby naps.

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September 11th, 2007 | Permalink