Mother’s Needs

• Bleeding: Massage your uterus by applying as much pressure that you can bear. The first few days are like a heavy period. Call your midwife or doctor if you are soaking more than two pads in one hour, or your if discharge has any foul odor, if you have a temperature and/or any uterine tenderness. Bleeding diminishes daily going from red to pink to brown to clear. Try standing for a while to expel some clots.
• Breast and Nursing: Call your midwife or doctor if you feel achy with flu-like symptoms, or a warm, red lump appears on your breast. These signs together with sore nipples might progress to breast engorgement later on.
• Contraception: Birth control pills are especially not recommendedfor nursing mothers. Intercourse is fine when your perineum is healed which usually takes six weeks or more for most mothers. Use plenty of lubrication like K-Y jelly. Try other means of expressing affection. Nursing does not guarantee protection especially after the six weeks for some and three months for some which coincide with the time their menstruation return. Full time breastfeeding (without supplementation) for about eighteen months provides protection for some mothers. At eight weeks you can get fitted for a diaphragm or a cervical cap. I do not recommend the IUD but learn more about it and its risks.
• Voiding and Urination: You should urinate a large amount within a few hours after birth. You should have a bowel movement within three days. Eat warm cooked foods rich in fiber. Drink lots of fluids and prune juice.
• Perineum or the pelvic floor muscles can be exercised to return muscle tone. Do this in sitting, standing or lying position with legs slightly apart. Close and draw up around the back passage as though preventing a bowel action then repeat around the front two passages as though preventing the flow of urine. Some natural births have perineal tears. The following suggestions can help hasten the healing of your perineum:
• Apply dried cold sanitary pads soaked in three tablespoons of witch hazel astringent and an equal amount of herbal solution containing comfrey leaf/root, uva ursi, golden seal, sage, myrrh, and salt.
• Drinking liquids every hour or 30 minutes after birth.
• Standing for a while hours after birth.
• Bathe with the postpartum herbal formula soaking in the tub.
• Keep your legs together.
• Expose your skin to air and sun for 15-20 minutes in the morning and afternoon.
• Take in iron, vitamin C, E and protein.
• Eat foods that will not constipate; drink prune juice.
• Relax, sleep to strengthen the immune system.
• Uterus: Your uterus should feel like a firm grapefruit. Massage it if it feels soft. Nursing the baby helps the uterus contract, which also is stimulated by the release of the oxytocin hormone.

Postpartum Herbs

Emotional Helpers: catnip, lemon balm, hops, camomile, valerian, skullcap, comfrey, peach, red raspberry, sweet woodruff, cedar, marjoram, sweet grass, sage

Afterpains: blue cohosh, crampbark, hops

Tears: comfrey (external), plantain

Infections: echinacea, elderberry, yarrow, crampbark

Uterine tone: red raspberry

Blood and energy builders: alfalfa, dandelion

Excess bleeding: yarrow, nettles, shepperd’s purse

Herbal Tea for Mom when baby has:

Colic: peppermint, fennel, wild geranium, spearmint, catnip, anise, chamomile, rosemary, dill, thyme, bay leaf, peppermint, ginger, valerian, sassafras

Jaundice: catnip, dandelion, chicory, yellow dock, parsley, elderberry, St. John’s wort, alfalfa, wild yam, bayberry, plantain

Baby’s Needs

Cord care: Keep the stump clean, dry and out of the diaper. Swab with alcohol and golden seal herb powder each diaper change. Some mothers noted that the cord shrivels and drops off faster within 3 to 4 days with the use of golden seal herb powder. Call a doctor when there is bleeding, pus or foul odor.

Eyes: Let your midwife or doctor know if there is any discharge from the eyes. Baby sees best at about 12 to 18 inches.

Hormones: It is normal for some babies to get engorged breasts and genitals discharge a few drops of milk while some girls have a slight bloody discharge from the vagina due to mother’s hormones.

Jaundice: This is a yellow coloring in the baby’s skin and eyes that can occur a few days after birth, a normal breakdown of baby’s excess red blood cells. Place the baby in a sunny window for 5 to 15 minutes with eyes covered. Call the doctor when the yellowing appears on the first day. Don’t forget to nurse the baby every 2 to 3 hours to help clear up the excretion of excess red cells.

Skin and Bathing

The baby’s skin should be moist and healthy looking. Baby’s skin is extremely sensitive. Bathe the baby once or twice a week without using soap during the first months. Some mothers uses mild baby soap and massage the baby with calendula oil before each bath. Hold the baby with one hand under her/his armpit clasping the upper arm and supporting the base of the head. Apply olive oil during the first week when cleaning the baby’s buttocks to prevent meconium from adhering to the skin and causing excoriation.

Urine and stools

New babies should be “dampening” diapers at 24 hours, lightly wetting 3-4 diapers a day at 48-72 hours and soaking 5-6 diapers a day by about four days. Using cotton diapers would help enable mom to check if the diapers have been dampened or not.

Look for baby’s stools to change colors from black-green to mustard yellow which occurs when the baby is getting breast milk. The black-green meconium stools are the sterile contents of the intestinal tract. It is composed of swallowed vernex (the lanolin-like cream on a newborn’s skin) and amniotic fluid and is totally free of bacteria and has absolutely no odor. Only after ingesting milk does the new infant have the normal bacterial flora of the human alimentary canal.

The stool of the breast-fed infant is naturally softer than that of the infant fed cow’s milk. From about the 4th to the 6th day of life, the stools go through a transitional stage in which they are rather loose and greenish yellow and contain mucus. Although the stools of artificially fed infants tend to be firmer than those of breast-fed infants, loose stools may result from artificial feeding. In the first two week or so of life, overfeeding is likely to cause loose, frequent stools. Constipation is practically unknown in breast-fed infants receiving an adequate amount of milk.

Warmth and sleep

When putting the baby to sleep, the natural way to mother is to use the healing power of touch or massage, make skin to skin contact. Let the baby feel your heartbeat as you make sure that the baby is positioned comfortably. Sleeping with the baby during the early months of life outside the womb attunes mom to the baby’s needs. Newborns need to be fed and changed constantly. They sleep well when the mom attends to baby’s needs at every moment. They feel the sense of security in the arms of their moms and listen to the soothing voice with admiration. A comforting bliss for both mom and baby will follow. Some moms are surprised that they don’t even have to rock or burp the baby who sleeps on its side after breastfeeding. Seeing the face of the mom before a nap helps babies fall asleep and go to sleep again when touched by the mother.

When do you call your doctor or midwife

• temperature of 100° or higher
• excessive bleeding
• foul odor in your discharge
• breastfeeding problems

When death happens

Death and life are events that we welcome with intense emotions, fulfillment and resolve. Birth has unknowns just as life has unknowns too.

“My nine-month old son (second son) died of crib death. My doctor was so surprised since the baby was very healthy. I learned from later studies how the other part of the brain responsible for breathing did not function at the time of death which we call SIDS. It took me five years to finally decide of having another baby not as a replacement from the lost one but as a different unique individual. I believe that death and life are natural events and only God can bring the power of healing when we allow healing to take place. We should not bear the blame.” Mother of one son who have experienced accidental abortions twice and still trying to have another baby to care and nurse with.

At this stage of postpartum, we as mothers are encouraged to reach out to other women and men for support, companionship and care. This is the time when our hormonal system suddenly drops down after delivering a baby. It is our bodies telling us that it is temporary and it is tha body’s natural way of balancing the systems in our body. Take chamomile or catnip tea whose calming effect can bring relief at these times.

Circumcision is a decision that should be left to the child.

Family sleeping together is for the baby to slowly adjust to his/her environment.  Sharing bed is an old tradition in the Far East. By necessity, a big family of six children shares bed usually on the floor with a mat. Until the children reaches the age of about five to six years old.

” My second child shared bed with us until he was three years of age. I can feel the contrasting differences between him and his brother who did not share bed with us. He is so loving to me and we know each other’s feelings. He was so attached to me that he cried when I left him and his brother for work abroad.” Nurse, mother of two, Philippines

Further Reading:

The Billings Method: Every Woman’s Guide to Her Reproductive System by Evelyn Billings

Your Fertility Signals by Merryl Winstein

A Book for Midwives by Susan Klein

References:

Nelson Textbook of Pediatrics. Behrman. Kliegman. Arvin. W.B. Saunders Company. 1996