How to begin your postpartum care

“Month ten” – Postpartum care

In Chinese medicine, the month after baby is born is still considered an intimate extension of your pregnancy. It is easy for everyone around you to focus primarily on the new baby during this time, and although that may be a welcome aspect of your support, in order for baby to best be taken care of right now, you need to be the focus of care and nurturing. A healthy mom is fundamental for a healthy baby—after all, baby benefits from your resources. This postpartum time should emphasize nourishing and replenishing you, and by extension, baby will be getting all the nourishment he needs.

The main lifestyle focus for you should be rest and bonding with your infant and incorporating nutritious food, such as a daily dose of postpartum bone broth, for your recovery and continued stamina.

Postpartum bone broth recipe

Ingredients

1 pound organic chicken or beef bones from your local health-food store or butcher (you can also just put a whole, uncooked chicken in the pot and use the meat for a plethora of dishes)

3 carrots, scrubbed and chopped

3 celery stalks, chopped

2 inches of fresh ginger root, chopped

1 onion, peeled and halved

1 lemon, washed and halved

Whole head of fresh garlic, peeled and smashed

Generous tablespoon of sea salt

A palmful of both goji berries and Chinese red dates (also called Jujube)

Water to fill stockpot

1 bunch parsley, chopped

2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar

1 tablespoon coconut oil

Directions

In a large pot, add the coconut oil and brown the bones on all sides over medium-high heat. Add everything else but the parsley, and fill stockpot almost full with water. Bring to a boil, and then reduce to a simmer for eight hours up to overnight (it will only get richer), periodically skimming the fat off the top. Add parsley, then turn off the heat. Strain the solids out through a colander and discard or reincorporate carrots and celery and chicken pieces (if you’ve used a whole chicken) into the soup.

The broth can be sipped as-is, or used as a base for other soups and recipes in this book and beyond. If you’re not going to use the stock within a few days, freeze it.

General postpartum care support tips

Get sleep

I can’t say enough about how great a postpartum doula is for the first week. If you can get a little sleep, your overall coping skills and bonding ability will probably improve greatly.

Receive massage

Nurturing touch can be very replenishing after birth. See if you can find someone who can come to your house.

Navigate mood

It’s normal to feel overtaxed. Just keep an eye on it and make sure it doesn’t get incapacitating. You can enlist a therapist or a psychiatrist to give you support and help you assess the possible need for breastfeeding-safe medication.

Tell your story

Find a forum, either in person or online, to share your birth story. This can be a very therapeutic way to process your experience.

The aftermath

Now that you’ve concluded your pregnancy journey, the support you need is just beginning. Keep drawing on all the ways you’ve learned to care for during your pregnancy, and don’t hesitate to seek out resources during your postpartum period, or as I call it, the aftermath.

By Caylie See

Caylie is a long-time licensed practitioner of Chinese medicine, specializing in the spectrum of women’s health and the Founder of Integrative Fertility, which works in collaboration with reproductive endocrinology centers. She’s also an avid researcher with a swathe of publications in peer-reviewed journals as well as the author of The Field Guide to Pregnancy: research, recipes and remedies for navigating new territory. Where once she liked to travel, she now disavows going beyond a 10-mile radius with her toddler (she really tried). Luckily, there’s no shortage of wild and curated Bay Area escapades within that perimeter! She’s about health, but isn’t past making a tipsy Cointreau clementine marmalade.