How planning for your postpartum can impact your breastfeeding goals
- Charlotte - The Smart Doula
- Jan 7
- 8 min read
Updated: Jan 16
So… you are coming to the end of your pregnancy, you’ve done all the classes, printed your birth plan and packed your hospital bag. You are prepared!
What if I told you that you are probably missing a big piece of the puzzle, a post-partum plan!
What is postpartum?
Postpartum is defined as ‘following childbirth’.
In the UK we often refer to it as the ‘fourth trimester’.
The fourth trimester is the first 12 weeks after your baby is born, the term was ‘coined’ by a US paediatrician who explained that in the first 12 weeks out babies are still developing as though they are still in the womb.
They have spent the last nine months, warm, fed constantly (so not experiencing hunger), suspended in fluid so always feeling held and next to the sound of your heart beat.
This is what they expect for the following 12 weeks!
Biologically humans are defined as ‘carry mammals’.
Along with monkeys and marsupials like kangaroos this defines the expected behaviours and features of our postpartum.
Carry mammals give birth to premature young that are totally dependant on their parents, their young need frequent feeds with low sugar low fat milk, and spend the majority of their time being carried.
Unlike follow mammals whose babies can follow them around soon after birth, and nest or cache mammals who leave their babies in nests or burrows and return to them infrequently!
In lots of cultures around the world the first 40 days are a protected postpartum period, in the UK we have widely lost this in favour of ‘bounce back’ culture.
In some cultures there are specific jobs for women who support women during this time, some are even government funded!
Why you should embrace your postpartum.
‘Doing it all’ whilst looking after our ‘carry mammal’ babies can be exhausting, and set us up to fail many of the goals we set ourselves.
In particular breastfeeding thrives in a restful postpartum, whilst establishing breastfeeding and trying to do it all can be very difficult.
The World Health Organization recommends exclusively breastfeeding for the first 6 months of life!
Breast milk is a wonderful first food for your baby.
So if your goal is exclusive breastfeeding, you need to make that a part of your postpartum plan!
Skin to Skin in the fourth trimester.
I’m sure you have already heard about the benefits of skin-to-skin in the golden hour after birth, in fact in one study, the rate of breastfeeding within 60 minutes of birth was 56% for those who had 30 minutes of skin to skin, 71% for those who had 60 minutes, and 72% for those who had 90 minutes.
Skin to skin contact helps regulate our babies breathing and temperature as well as providing both mum and baby with a spike in the love hormone oxytocin.
That hormone helps us with bonding and helps regulate our stress hormones.
In fact daily skin-to skin has been linked to improved maternal mental health and to improving postpartum healing.
The more time we are able to spend with our babies’ skin to skin, the calmer both mother and baby feel, plus it can make dealing with all that cluster feeding much easier if you aren’t constantly having to remove your clothes and bra!
Spending time skin to skin can make it much easier to notice and respond to babies hunger cues, making responsive feeding the norm and helping your baby to stimulate your supply.
The World Health Organisation recommends breastfeeding on demand (as often as the child wants, day and night).
Breastfeeding in this way allows your baby ‘to put in their order’ for the milk for the coming days, avoiding things like low milk supply.
If you are out and about it can be easy to miss those early cues meaning baby is already getting frustrated when you go to feed them.
Additionally working out how to latch a baby can be a mini-course on its own, and it is much more difficult if you are out and about, feeling observed, without any of your comfy cushions!
Breastfeeding education
So you’ve probably been to an in person group course, it might have had one session on breastfeeding if you are lucky!
But if it is your goal to breastfeed I think you need to go a little deeper during your pregnancy to really set yourself up for success in your postpartum.
There are plenty of amazing books written by board certified lactation consultants which cover normal newborn behaviours and feeding patterns in the fourth trimester as well as trouble shooting tips.
Talk to your friends and family about their breastfeeding journeys!
Seek out local support groups and attend in pregnancy.
Rest, Recovery and Nutrition.
Now I am not going to discuss the ‘dinner plate sized wound’ in your uterus, because this is a myth and we don’t need an ‘excuse’ to rest.
You have just grown a whole human for nine months and then birthed one, you should take all the rest you deserve!
If you experienced trauma in your birth emotionally or physically, or lost a significant amount of blood you may find that your milk takes longer to transition from colostrum to milk.
In many cultures you are considered spiritually and physically ‘open’ during the first 40 days after birth, and therefore need to avoid ‘cold’, this includes going out and about and cold foods and drinks!
You are provided with warm nourishing foods such as soups and stews which replace fluids and essential nutrients, as well as energetically balancing out ‘the cold’.
Looking after yourself in this way (or being looked after ideally) is going to help your body recover and enable you to support the tiny human that you are still growing (now they are outside of your body!).
Ok we have established that you need to educate yourself in breastfeeding, plenty of skin to skin, rest and nourishing food / warmth… so how are you going to do this?
Creating a postpartum plan
There are plenty of templates available, I have one that I give to my Virtual Doula clients, but they all follow the same general structure of either 40 days or rest or the 5-5-5 rule.
I have chosen the 5-5-5 rule for my template as I think it is much easier for people to get their head around 15 days of rest than 40 days, but if you feel you would like to commit to 40 days go for it!
Five days in bed.
Yes, literally In bed.
For the first five days after you return home, you set yourself the goal of staying in bed, only getting up to go to the toilet, shower, and get changed (and that is optional!).
To do this you are going to need support especially if you have another child.
Your partner needs to take care of your other children and all housework tasks, your only job is to recover and feed baby (I would suggest calling someone in to help with nappy changes!).
You should have warm drinks on tap, and plenty of snacks at your bedside, plus nourishing meals, think breakfast in bed times three.
Sleeping when the baby sleeps is an actual reality when you are in a bed!
Visitors should be kept to a minimum, which is easy as you will only let people you are truly comfortable visit you whilst you are in bed!
Five days on bed.
For the next five days you are going to stay on the bed, you might get up, dressed, put on something that isn’t PJ’s and sit on the bed.
You might have some close family visitors that come and sit on the bed with you.
Meals are still brought to you, you might feel up to folding some washing, or not!
Other children may come into the bedroom to play with baby and help with their daily routine of changing nappies, you can read to them and play games on the bed.
Five days around the bed.
You are ready to head out into other rooms of the house, but making sure bed is still your basecamp and returning to it whenever you need.
You might sit and watch your children play, or sit and watch some TV on the sofa.
You are not taking over any of your responsibilities such as cooking or cleaning, you gave birth ten days ago!
You might have a short visit from family or friends, but it is kept short!
You might sit at the table to eat the meal that is prepared for you.
But how do you actually do it?
Here are some top tips to help you plan a successful fourth trimester:
Sit down with your partner to discuss expectations and write them down.
Prep nourishing warming foods that can be easily reheated by your partner.
Save some recipes for visitors or your partner to cook.
Set expectations with visitors about when and how long they can visit for before baby is born.
Create a list of things visitors can help with like bringing food, shopping or housework.
Set up a bedside snack and drink station so you can keep yourself satisfied without having to send your partner to the kitchen.
If you have other children set up some quiet toys and books they can play with in your bedroom.
Buy some postpartum recovery clothes that will help you be comfortable but not feel like you are living in PJ’s
Find sources of breastfeeding information and places you can access peer support and a certified lactation consultant, pin it on your fridge for if you need it.
What if I am in hospital for my postpartum?
There are still elements of your postpartum plan you can implement in hospital.
Breastfeeding mothers are entitled to food if they are in hospital with their children, but you may have to order in or have delivered more nutritious food.
Depending on your circumstances you may still be able to feed on demand, the health professionals in the hospital should be able to help you with this, specifically ask to be referred to the infant feeding team if possible. If you are unable to feed directly you should be provided with a hospital grade pump to help stimulate and protect your supply
In terms of rest you should request an adults bed to stay in (not a reclining chair!)
You can still do skin to skin depending on your or your babies medical needs and this should be supported by the staff as well.
How can a doula help with your postpartum?
Working with a Doula can provide your whole family with physical, practical and emotional support throughout your postpartum.
An in person doula can provide nourishing food and traditional herbal remedies and do things like massage and meditation with you.
A Virtual doula (like me!) can provide emotional support over the phone, as well as signpost to other resources such as breastfeeding support and physiotherapy!
Doulas are used to normal newborn infant behaviour so can help with the ‘is it normal that’ questions! Finding information when you don’t have the mental space to google it yourself.
You can check out my Virtual Doula packages on www.thesmartdoula.com , all of my Virtual Doula packages include a postpartum plan template and two weeks post partum support as standard!
