Handling visitors, family, and help during the postpartum time I work with a lot of women (and talk to a lot of friends) who struggle with deciding how to handle visitors after their baby is born. This is everything from oodles of well-meaning friends who want to pop by to both families wanting to stay at the house to neighbors who continuously drop off food. For many, these acts of visiting and kindness are the support and care and attention that moms need. But in other cases, it is not a the more the merrier sentiment for the mom. For many women, I hear them exhaustedly reflect that they did feel helped, but they also felt like they had to host and entertain, just like they would normally....but without a fresh newborn to care for. Its not necessarily the pressure to cook or clean or prepare, but just the mental and emotional energy it takes to want to connect, look a certain way, or as one mom told me recently, just have to always put a smile on my face and a bra on. It can be hard to let go of the impulse to have it together. I am certainly not saying that there is a right and wrong way to have or not have visitors. People are only trying to love and serve. I am saying that it is highly personal and something that women have to try their darndest to be honest about - both with themselves, their partner, and the visitors themselves. The postpartum time is not a time to be a martyr. You will already be making sacrifices for your baby - and THAT is your job as a new mommy. To try to take care of you and your baby. If youre feeling that you may want to have a live-in babymoon with just your little growing family, then do that. If it feels helpful to have family intermittently and friends in between for meals and company, go for it. If you want it to look like your annual summer family reunion with cousins you barely remember, have at it! This is a personal decision, and one that takes some thought and time, but mainly a whole big heaping spoonful of honesty. And if you do have lots and lots of folks come by in any given capacity, let them - no, ASK THEM - to love on you. Dont be bashful about asking for a meal or something you might need from the drug store. Ask for diapers or ice cream, or whatever. If someone comes by and you are so tired you cant see straight, feel free to tell them youre grateful they stopped by and you have about 10 minutes til you have to hit the hay, or let your partner say hi while youre napping and call them later to catch up and thank them. People who want to love on you will understand what you need. I wonder if some of the confusion comes from generational/tradition gaps? In our parents generation, for example, breastfeeding was going through a phase of not cool. Formula was en vogue and babies often (immediately after birth) slept away from the new parents, so it was easier for visitors to care for the baby. But now, with more new moms trying to breastfeed, bed share or room in, and a focus on skin-to-skin/kangaroo care, there is possibly less for others to do for the newborn. The focus from others should be then for the mother. But from what I hear, this is not always what is understood from well-meaning visitors, particularly in American culture. Its something that could just take a bit of time to change, but we can help it along by, with gratitude, asking for some TLC from those who love us! Point being: plan ahead for visitors and be honest about what you want. Make a list of what would be helpful when people come by. Set up a takethemameal account (or have a good friend do it!) Say no when you need to. Moms are not always well-prepared for the postpartum time beyond breastfeeding. Healthcare practitioners and birth workers should be taking more time to talk about postnatal healing, and one of those issues is how to have people help and love and support - in the way that each individual woman needs.
Posted on: Thu, 17 Jul 2014 11:13:28 +0000
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