Preparing for the fourth trimester

It is true what they say that nothing can prepare you for motherhood. However I believe that it’s also true that there is a LOT you can do to prepare YOURSELF for motherhood. 

I have found the transition into motherhood really smooth and blissful. EXHAUSTING! UNENDING!! But also filled with spaciousness and ease and JOY.

I have been criticised online for sharing how much I have enjoyed my transition into motherhood and how easy and joyful I have found it. So before I get into this post I wanted to make it clear that this is not a judgement on any other mothers/parents who have found this season of life challenging! There are a MYRIAD of different experiences within motherhood – this is just ONE. (From ONE person on the internet!) This is just what is true for ME. It does not make your experience any less, or make anyone any less of a loving parent.

I wanted to share some tools, practices and exercises that I believe have truly helped me in this big life transition. This is not to say that my experience has been filled with ease and bliss BECAUSE of these things (I am in a massively privileged position – both in my access and accessibility to healthcare and services as well as a financially privileged position to not be reliant on my income). And we are also lucky to have a settled baby who generally sleeps quite well. (GENERALLY, ha lol!)

There are so many different factors at play in the transition into motherhood so these practices I’m sharing are not to guarantee that your experience will be blissful and filled with ease if you do them, and it is also not to say that if you are finding motherhood challenging it is because you perhaps DIDN’T do these things! Sometimes you can do “all the work” and still have rough days where you are up to your elbows in shit and vomit . (In fact, most days I am up to my elbows in shit and vomit.) Also though, this kind of preparation certainly does no harm! (And there is a lot to be said about mental wellbeing/mindset.)

Because there are so many different life circumstances, emotions and experiences in the mothering journey some of these tools and practices may not relate or resonate for you at all. I will do my best to caveat all these practices so that your experience is represented, but – if for any reason you find this post triggering or upsetting, please set yourself a loving boundary and close the page! At the end of the day, these are just MY experiences and what has worked for me – this is just ONE set of opinions from one person on the internet! Again, there are a myriad of experiences in the motherhood journey. Please note: I will be using the term “mother” to refer to primary care givers, sometimes I use “mother” to describe biological mother.

So here are some of my top tips to make the transition into motherhood as smooth and joyful as possible.

1. IF YOU ARE THE BIOLOGICAL MOTHER, MAKE EVIDENCED BASED CHOICES TO PUT YOURSELF IN A POSITION OF GREATEST POTENTIAL FOR THE MOST STRAIGHTFORWARD BIRTH EXPERIENCE YOU CAN.
There are so many different ways to birth a baby. Because so much of what I believe contributes to a smooth transition into motherhood is about focusing on, nourishing and supporting the MOTHER as best as possible, I believe that ideally a birth where there is as minimal recovery for the mother as possible is such a good starting point. This is often (but not always) a birth with as little intervention as possible. My top tip is to DO THE RESEARCH in your area and make evidence based choices for your birth location and preferences. If you have elected for a caesarean birth or have an unscheduled caesarean birth, then I think it is even more important to think about some of the other tips I am sharing in terms of rest and recovery. 

Sometimes too, we can have “our ideal birth” in our head – and things on the day (or night! Or before!) don’t quite go to plan. It is important to know deeply that this is not a failure and I think in these cases, where perhaps we felt disempowered or let down by our birth experience that it is crucial to have some kind of birth processing. (See tip 2 and 3!) 

2. SEEK AN ACTIVE BIRTH-STORY LISTENER
No matter how it happens, birth is a MASSIVE experience – physically, emotionally, hormonally and spiritually. Unless we have been in some kind of physical assault, birth is possibly the most vulnerable experience we will ever move through. I was very lucky to have had an incredibly positive birth experience (read here)- where I felt empowered, calm, fearless and like a superhuman birth-warrior!

Even though I had a super positive birth experience, I still spent two sessions (of more than two hours each!) with my doula Natalie Meddings, post birth “de-briefing” and processing the entire thing. I think the NEED to process your birth story is absolutely critical. Not in a talking-about-it with your friends kind of way, where people are interjecting and adding their own advice, stories, opinions or ‘things-you-should-have-done’, but sharing it with an ACTIVE LISTENER. This is someone who receives your story fully and validates your feelings and emotions in it. It is not someone who is trying to fix or change your experience, but someone who helps the experience land safely for you in some way in your body. They help bring congruence to the events no matter how they unfolded. And ESPECIALLY crucial if you had an experience that felt overwhelming, frightening, filled with anxiety, unease or trauma. Emily Carson, who I did a preparing for the fourth trimester course with (highly recommended)- is an active birth story listener if you would like to seek her out.

3. GRIEVE THE THINGS YOU NEED TO GRIEVE
This sounds like a very odd thing to put in a “preparing for baby” post, because we are so conditioned to believe that because we have a healthy baby we MUST feel joyful. Of COURSE we can be incredibly grateful if we are fortunate enough to have a healthy baby but we are ALSO allowed to feel sad for if things did not go our way, or unexpected things came up. Do NOT brush over your grief with the adage of “…at least you have a healthy baby”. Perhaps too, grief may be associated with a baby who has health challenges. Or grieving “the old life” you are losing in some ways. I truly believe that unprocessed emotion sits in the body and morphs into things like resentment and depression. (Gabor Mate – When the body says NO, and Bessel van der Kalk – The Body keeps the Score are two great resources on this). Over time these resentments held in the body, may be misdirected towards your child. There is a lot we can do to process these emotions no matter how long ago they arise from!

I was CONVINCED we were having a boy. So much so that in my head I had already plotted out the next 18 years of our lives – where Warren was on his fishing trips with his adult son. When our baby arrived and we discovered she was a girl, I was absolutely shocked. Shocked in a way that I actually didn’t really initially recognise this baby girl as my child! Warren and I needed to have time to grieve the son we thought we were having – we spoke about it at length in the first few weeks. The emotions we felt, the connection or disconnection we felt to our baby girl, what we felt we had lost. This in NO WAY takes away or is in competition with the absolute JOY, delight and LOVE we have experienced through having a baby girl! Those two things can sit side by side. Learning to hold two seemingly opposing emotions at the same time is certainly a skill that is brought to the forefront in motherhood. This is your first learning opportunity! Really give yourself time and space to feel any sadness or grieving you may be experiencing for WHATEVER reason!

You can feel the different energy around this through the use of language. When someone says “You had a really traumatic birth BUT AT LEAST you have a healthy baby” that ‘BUT AT LEAST’ actually diminishes and invalidates the feelings associated with the traumatic birth. When someone rather says, “You had a really traumatic birth AND ALSO you have a healthy baby” – that does not invalidate or negate the feelings around the traumatic birth. Both can sit side-by-side in their entirety. Maturity (as it is described in “Hold onto your kids” by Gabor Mate and Dr Gordon Neufeld is the ability to hold more than one emotion simultaneously.)

4. SINK INTO THE PROFOUND IDENTITY SHIFT AS EARLY AS POSSIBLE
I would argue that probably the most overwhelming (and often unidentified) things about motherhood is the profound identity shift that occurs. During my Path of Love Experience, I experienced a similar type of profound identity shift (although completely unrelated to Motherhood). When you go through a big identity shift that is truly embodied, there is often a period where you feel absolutely lost. I remember on Path of Love when I had this personal massive identity shift (unrelated to motherhood), that I felt so lost and overwhelmed and like I was scattered about with no place to land – so much so, that when the rest of the group was doing a fun dance exercise I had to break away in a state of stress/overwhelm/anxiety and go over to my group leader – and he had to physically remove me from the room and ask me basic questions like “What is your name? Where do you live? Where are you from?” So that I could recover some sense of myself and my identity. This is an extreme example, but not so far removed from the experience of shifting into the identity of mother. Sometimes this identity shift comes slowly piece by piece so that you have time to assimilate it all. Other times, you may experience it as a powerful all-in-one identity overhaul – and (from personal experience!) that overhaul can be EXTREMELY overwhelming, discombobulating and filled with anxiety.

NOW, imagine you are trying to process this massive identity shift on TOP of keeping a newborn baby alive (which you’ve possibly NEVER done before) at the same time as being chronically and severely sleep deprived and not even knowing day from night. It is an absolute recipe for disaster. 
I truly believe that the more of this identity shift you can explore deeply before baby arrives, the smoother and more filled with ease your experience of early motherhood will be. Because you will have already dealt with the HUGE work of identity overhaul, which leaves you with “just” (ha) having to look after your baby and survive on pretty-much-zero sleep. 

How do you prepare yourself for the massive identity shift that will take place?
During pregnancy I was fortunate enough to be part of Emily Carson’s 4 week long “preparing for the fourth trimester” which I feel really opened up a doorway through which to explore these concepts. (She’s now made the course 5 weeks long! And I can highly recommend it!). These concepts also came up in exploring the concept of “The Mother archetype” through yoga practices that I attended with Nadia Raafat. Self reflection and journaling (and perhaps discussing with any partners) is really helpful in this process too – 

What does it mean to you to be a mother?
What does the mother archetype represent for you?
What will you be sacrificing as you move into motherhood? (This may also be linked to the grieving processes above).
What is important for you to remain connected to as you make this transition?
What will you take from your own experience of being mothered as a child?
What will you adjust/leave behind?
What are the expectations you have of yourself as a mother? (Are they realistic?)
What are the expectations you have of your partner? (Are they realistic?)
What will your needs be in motherhood? 
Where do you feel all this in your body? How does it land?
Any other journaling and reflection that comes up for you in this line of enquiry will be really valuable. This is only a very small starting point!

5. HAVE THE DIFFICULT CONVERSATIONS (before baby arrives!)
When you dive deeply into this identity work there will for SURE be conversations that  need to be had – perhaps with your partner if you have one, or with your own parents. My top recommendation is to have these conversations BEFORE the baby arrives. As again, trying to find the time to have a deep heart-to-heart once baby is here can be very limited (unless you’re having the conversation at 2:43am!) and ALSO these kinds of conversations (which can be triggering) are best had when you are not low on sleep with a nervous system that is slightly frayed.
What challenges do you expect to face? What systems can you put in place to overcome these challenges? How will you know when and how to ask for help? How best can your partner be of support to you? Talk it ALL out. BEFORE – if possible!

Whenever I “invite” (force) Warren into these kinds of conversations I need to give him at least 3 days warning so that he can think about and prepare his answers. Maybe there is a conversation around the family dynamics that you need to have with your own parents? Or some expectations that you need to be clear on with your partner? These conversations can feel really hard to have – but I can guarantee you, they are 100x harder to have when you are in the thick of it and sleep deprived! 

Whatever conversation is sitting on your heart – have it out before baby arrives.

I also attended a “preparing for the post partum period” session with Gabi from Mama Circle and she guided us with some great questions and topics to dive into – similar to the questions above. Warren and I spoke extensively about these things: our needs, expectations, support systems, expected challenges. The one conversation that we hadn’t had was around sex in the postpartum period. What are his expectations? What are my expectations? How will we know when we feel ready? What will be the challenges for us? How do we manage those challenges? What is important to us about this? This conversation was sitting on my chest right up until Logan was born. And in fact, the day before she was born we had this exact conversation (whilst we were out foraging for things to make a Christmas wreath!) I am pretty convinced that having this conversation “cleared” something from my heart and mind and contributed to the baby coming. Logan arrived the very next day!

So far, personally, the most challenging thing about having a baby has been very little to do with actually having a baby and far more to do with the dynamic shift in the relationship between Warren and I – in that previously, Warren was pretty much my sole focus and now I have a tiny baby that needs my focus and attention in a very all-encompassing way. Navigating that shift (and the time/energy required to keep that husband/wife relationship strong) has been the most challenging for us so far – and it has really helped to keep these lines of communication open.

6. SET REALISTIC EXPECTATIONS.
One of the books that I would also always recommend is “What mothers do especially when it looks like nothing” by Naomi Stadlen. It is a collection of snippets of experiences of motherhood which range on the full spectrum of just about every topic. For example, in some of the snippets of bonding some mothers share that they “fell in love with their babies the instant they saw them”, other mothers share that they felt “a complete disconnect from their babies and didn’t learn to love them until they were several months down the line”. The power of reading this full spectrum is that it normalises every experience. I fully went into motherhood with the expectation that I would possibly not love my child in the beginning. I don’t say that to be callous – I say it to be extremely realistic. The massive irony of this is that when we allow the possibility of this experience, when we give it a seat at the table – it has less pull over us. We are not trying to RESIST it in anyway. If we do arrive in motherhood and we don’t feel an instant connection to our baby and we internally think, “I SHOULD be connected to my baby! I SHOULD love my baby right now! WHY DON’T I? I must be a ‘bad mother’!?” Then we start trying to RESIST those feelings of disconnection  and it creates a layer of shame and guilt on TOP of the original experience. And then we get ourselves involved in what Brene Brown calls “The Shame Cycle”. 

I was fortunate to feel a strong connection early on (which I think is also influenced by the birth experience (with the natural cascade of hormones present) and more NB the birth PROCESSING) AND ALSO I did feel a huge disconnect over the fact that our baby was not a boy! 

When we can think about the emotions of early motherhood as we would do a meditation experience – we simply watch the emotion as it arises, acknowledge it, perhaps label it and then allow it to pass. 

I had this experience on night 3 (when the milk came in!) in which I felt overwhelmed. Up to this point, (and I’m 9 months in) it has been the only time where I have felt overwhelmed and had I not been able to pause, acknowledge and label that emotion as “overwhelm” I can see how it could massively spiral someone out of control. It was the middle of the night, I was up feeding (running on zero sleep), my boobs were rock hard and my nipples felt like they were on fire. Suddenly I had this feeling of everything being too much for my body – in that moment, I was able to pause, take a few deep breaths, label this as “overwhelm” and just let myself sit with the feeling of overwhelm. Because of this process it only lasted a few minutes and was very fleeting. I was able to bring myself back to ground, back to my body, back to my breath and allow that feeling to process and pass. 

If you are unable to process these big emotions on your own, or if they feel bigger than your capacity to handle them, definitely seek professional and medical help. That is absolutely critical.

7. ATTEND MOTHERS CIRCLES
I would argue that a “mothers circle” is slightly different from “catching-up-with-your-mom-friends-for-tea”. However, if you don’t have any mothers circles near you or don’t feel like you’d want to attend one then catching up with your mom-friends-for-tea is a great second option! In my observations and experience, mothers circles, (unlike catching up with your mom friends) have clear topics and frameworks in which to explore experiences and more importantly emotions within motherhood. Catching-up-with-your-mom-friends is also extremely valuable – but within these catch-ups (generally!) we tend to focus a lot more on what we are DOING – “What time do you put Lucy to sleep? Are you expressing milk after every feed? Do you use white noise or a dummy? Where is she sleeping right now?” These are all super valuable questions and conversation points, but they are slightly different from Mother’s Circles in which the EXPERIENCE and EMOTION of the mother is shared on different topics. 

So for example if we think about the topic of sleep a “catch-up-with-mom-friends” conversation might go like this: “I put Lucy to sleep at 8am for a nap, I use white noise and a dummy.” “Oh that’s interesting, I put Luke to sleep at 9:30am he doesn’t take a dummy, but I stay and pat him to sleep. Then we go for a walk in the pram in the afternoon for our afternoon nap.”
A mother’s circle conversation on sleep might look like this: “I feel overwhelmed that I have to stay with Luke patting him to sleep for so long.” “I am anxious about having Lucy in the bed with us, and am feeling very exhausted with our sleep routine.” 

They are similar, but slightly different – mother’s circles tend to be more intimate and vulnerable. (Depending on how well you know your mom-friends!).

I attended two mothers circles (online) whilst pregnant run by my doula Natalie Meddings. One on the topic of sleep and the other on the topic of “the first few days”. Attending these mothers circles also helped to create really realistic expectations, which I think is very important.

I was also fortunate enough to join an NCT group and it also helped show me the difference between the two types of circles. During the NCT course our leader spoke about “the first few days” in a very “baby arrives, this is what happens, then the milk comes in, then on day 5 you do this test, then on day 7 the nappies change… etc”. Whereas in the mothers circles on the same topic it is approached through the experience and emotion of mothers who are in it. “When the baby arrived I felt overwhelmed with both relief and joy… on day three I felt really overwhelmed and anxious…”. It’s important to cultivate space for both of these type of conversations. And especially space for your emotions and experiences to be validated and shared.

8. GO SLOW. THEN ADD SOME MORE REST ON TOP OF THAT.
Unless you have been on medicated bed rest, I am sure you can not conceive of the type of slow I am talking about! However you birth, it is a massive physical experience and if you haven’t birthed your baby the physical toll will come too in the form of sleepless nights! It is a LOT on the body. The first forty days book (which I really recommend) has the phrasing “5 days in the bed, 5 days on the bed, 5 days around the bed”. I have to be honest, it is surprisingly hard work staying on rest for that long! I only managed 3 days in the bed (only getting up to go to the bathroom and back!) And yes – I had my meals brought to me in bed like The Queen! (See “the village” below). Day 5 was the first day that I actually went downstairs at all! (And I felt like I needed to go downstairs because it was Christmas! Ha). 

The first forty days concept comes from quite a few Asian cultures where the belief is that the way you approach the first forty days post birth sets you up for the next 40 years of motherhood and so it is pretty much ‘forbidden’ for new mothers to leave the house for the first forty days. Whether it really does set you up for the next 40 years I’m not sure – but it is something that I really took to heart! In many ways I think that for this specific reason it was a real blessing for us to have had our baby during the peak of lockdown – where everyone was pretty much ‘not going out’ or socialising anyway. Not only did I not have to “say no” to people wanting to come and visit, but I never felt like the world was moving on without me or that I was missing out. I have spoken to a lot of new mothers and also second time mothers who have had their babies in peak lockdown and they have shared similar feelings around this. (Of course this is not true for everyone’s experience – and we were exceptionally lucky to have my parents in a support bubble in the house with us.) My self enquiry on this is that if we were ever blessed to have another baby – would I be able to create the same kind of “lockdown conditions” without a global pandemic?! What does that look like? How would I implement it? These are some things that you might like to think about too if you are wanting to give yourself true space to rest and recover.

This piece is huge on self worth and boundary setting. Are we able to say NO when something does not feel like an “ABSOLUTE HELL YES!” Example: “No, sorry aunt Gertrude, we are not having extended family visits right now. I will let you know when you can come for tea – we are looking forward to seeing you then.” How are we able to protect and conserve our own energy and resources as we make this huge transition? SO often, so much of our self worth is tied into the things we DO – how much we can get done, how busy we are and basically how go-go-go our lives are (from work to socialising to events to dates etc). Having a baby in many ways does call for a slowing down, and if we have forever connected our sense of worth with our ability of “getting-shit-done” being a new mom can take a huge toll on your sense of worthiness. 

I had a really interesting experience with this as I had told myself that I wanted to really honour the first forty days in this way of totally slowing down and staying home. In 42 days I left the house a total of 3 times. (Once for Logan’s hearing test, once for choosing some supplies so my dad could build us an office and another time that I can’t remember what for – but it was definitely 3 times!). The first ten days I found it (relatively) easy to “rest”, but I can tell for sure that around day 10 I felt a little voice in my head say, “You’re fine! You had an easy birth! You need to get up and get moving and get on with DOING stuff!” It was so interesting to me to notice this little voice when it came up and I realised that to my mind, my level of self-worth was equivalent to 10 days. “Right, you’ve had your 10 days of rest, now get back at it!”. I really had to anchor deep into myself and force myself to override my inbuilt pattern of “get-shit-done-achieve-all-the-things” and continue to slow down again and perhaps acknowledge the massive feelings of guilt that comes with it. I am SO glad that I did though. It is of course a massive privilege to be able to slow down – so what I will say is that if you are privileged to be able to slow down – DON’T WASTE IT! (See below also on the village)

On Emily Carson’s Preparing for the fourth trimester course – there were moms on the course who were second and even third time mothers. This was so interesting to me as I thought, “I wonder why they are here? Surely they know what to expect as they have done this all before?!” And so in one of the group circles, I asked them why they were on this “preparing for the post partum period” when they have done it all before – what came up for many of them – on reflecting on their previous postpartum experiences was that they didn’t take enough time to enjoy their babies, or slow down, or say no to thousands of people wanting to visit or rushing back into things too quickly. I really took this in as when Logan is grown up I don’t want to have the thought of “oh I wish I had just slowed down and taken it all in a bit more.”

The slowing down is HARD when we are hardwired to believe doing = worth. So in what ways are you able to cultivate worthiness from a place within rather than from what you can DO or achieve? As one of the books mentioned above a LOT of motherhood looks like there is not a lot of “DOING”, which can make it feel strange because it’s extremely full on!

9. CALL ON THE VILLAGE.
It is a MASSIVE privilege to be able to slow down, I completely recognise that! Sometimes mothers DO need to get back to work, or CHOOSE to go back to work, or there may be other children that need looking after, or you may be the one also in charge of taking care of the house or business! (I really think that it’s not MOTHERING that is difficult, it’s MODERN LIFE that is difficult, which comes out in mothering!) This is where “the village” becomes so incredibly important. Something that I heard from a friend which I did and found very useful (even though I didn’t end up using it!) was to write a physical list of people who I could call on for different things. Maybe you have a mom-friend with older kids who wouldn’t mind looking after your older kids, write her name on the list – with her ‘intended role’ next to it. Maybe you have some single friends who could do a grocery trip for you – write their names on a list with “groceries” next to it. Maybe you have a couple who wouldn’t mind cooking a meal for you – write their names on a list. Or a trusted mom-friend who you could ring for advice. When we start to actually plot down how many people there are around us that we could call on – neighbours, family, friends it is very reassuring!

Include on this list both paid and unpaid help and resources! Post natal doulas, lactation consultants, midwives, instagram communities, facebook groups, maids, friends, family, neighbours, nursery aftercare, teachers. Even if you never have to use any of these resources having them all written down on a list (perhaps even with contact info too) is a huge mental relief and an easy go-to for if the need does arise.

Even though my parents were staying with us, we still had Natalie as part of our post partum doula care – and to have an extra loving, nurturing soul around to make you a hot soup and homemade crackers for dinner and to bring round delicious cakes for tea when it’s raining and miserable outside is something you didn’t know you actually NEED. (IF you are in london, HIRE. THIS. WOMAN.)

10. BE SPECIFIC AND GRANULAR IN ASKING FOR WHAT YOU NEED.
I recently heard the phrase “asking for help is a sign of maturity.” And this really rings true for motherhood.

It is one thing to ‘ask for/receive help’ and another thing entirely to ‘REALLY ask for/receive help’. 
‘Receiving help’ goes like this – 

“Hi Sue I know you’ve just had a baby – I’d love to help you, please let me know what you need?”
”Thanks Pam – I so appreciate it! I will definitely let you know what I need! Thank you SO much!”

‘REALLY receiving help’ goes like this – 

“Hi Sue I know you’ve just had a baby – I’d love to help you, please let me know what you need?”
”Thanks Pam – I so appreciate it! I would LOVE you to make me this chicken bone broth – it’s on page 42 of this recipe book – we don’t have anything planned for tomorrow night dinner and I have heard that collagen in bone broth is really important post natal! Thank you SO much!”

This is the exact same conversation I had with my parents while they were staying with us, except the recipe was not on page 42, it was on page 86. Asking specifically for our needs to be met is actually a very intimate thing (which for the large majority of us, makes it a very difficult thing to do). “Mom, it would be SO helpful if you could please make my bed for me! Thank you SO much, I SO appreciate it!” We are exposing something of ourselves and trusting someone else with our needs. 

We explored this concept in a Core Energetics course that I was on (pre-baby), it is crazy how difficult it is to really ask specifically for your needs to be met. (We often think we are doing it, but we are not! And this creates it’s own set of frustrations and irritations in your head!) I also know that being on the receiving end of someone asking you for something extremely specific and granular makes your giving actions very clear, direct and therefore MUCH more powerfully received. It is such a wonderful opportunity to show and receive love and kindness. (Again, do we feel worthy of RECEIVING love in this way- tied to our sense of worthiness?)

Why it is important for you to be extremely specific and granular with what you need is because (surprise) other people are not inside your head. 

This came up for us in the early months. Warren is an extremely hands-on husband and father (BONUS PRO-TIP: GET YOURSELF ONE OF THOSE) – he does a lot of the washing, cooking, bed-making, nappy-changing, bin cleaning, house-cleaning etc. In SPITE of Warren doing ALL these amazing things to help with general life with a newborn, we would get into bed at night and when Logan woke up in the middle of the night (for the second, third or fourth time!) I would be sitting up feeding her in the dark, and I would sense Warren awake, and him turning over and falling back asleep. For some reason this really annoyed me and if I had been in this situation 7 years ago, I would have let this annoyance silently fester inside me, not saying anything, until it became something much bigger piled on with any other silent annoyances {multiplied by lack of sleep} and it would have eventually *had* to bubble over into bickering or snapping at him! 

Before I spoke to Warren about this, I had to work out what my specific NEED is in that situation – and for me it was simply recognition and acknowledgement that I am awake feeding our baby (at all hours!). When I spoke to him I acknowledged him and all the hard work he was doing around the house to help. I explained that in the middle of the night, if he is awake whilst I am feeding, I really need him to recognise me. That recognition does not need to even be verbal – simply finding my hand and giving it a squeeze was enough! I cannot tell you how much this transformed the way I felt about the whole thing. Identifying your needs (and then asking for them!) is hard work (I think women generally are notoriously poor at asking for our needs to be met!) it’s also hard work because sometimes our needs don’t even make that much sense! I am pretty sure Warren was thinking, “OMF you crazy woman – I am washing, hanging, cleaning, tidying, cooking and all you want is a hand squeeze at 3am?!”. Yes, that IS what I want and what I need right now. And it made an absolute world of difference to have that need met. It also makes a world of difference to the person who is trying to offer help/support to you – because they may be doing ALL these amazing things but it is not landing for you because it is not meeting your current unmet NEED.

Anyway, bottom line – start being comfortable with asking specifically for what it is that you need and want. 

11. PREPARE YOURSELF PRACTICALLY.
In pregnancy, you will no doubt get sent (or find) a “list” of all the things you need to “prepare for the baby”. You know the lists – the ones that say, 5 baby vests, 6 muslins, 3 baby grows, etc. Whilst I think these lists are very useful, I also think we spend WAY too much time preparing the wrong things – which I actually think can create a real false sense of readiness. When we focus purely on the things we need to buy to “be ready” and don’t do enough preparation of the massive identity shift and how to prepare our inner emotional landscape – we can arrive in motherhood with suddenly a HUGE influx of new and massive feelings which can make us feel overwhelmed and unprepared and we start thinking, “but I shouldn’t be feeling like this – I HAVE THE 6 MUSLINS?!?!” 

In fact, it’s my hope that posts such as THIS are the things that are shared between friends as a ‘preparing for baby’ list – rather than a numbered list of nappies and wet wipes. 

So when I say, “prepare yourself practically” – I’m not meaning it in the sense of “buy the 6 muslins and make sure your nursery is kitted” I’m meaning more in the sense of, practical things like – “what would it REALLY look like financially for me to truly slow down and rest?” How can I practically facilitate true rest for myself? Maybe it’s saving each month during pregnancy so that you can afford to buy nutritious local homemade ready-meals for the first 3 months or that you can spend on cleaning services for your house. I mean obviously you need some clothes for your child, but I can guarantee that your baby will NOT know the difference between whether they have 6 baby grows or 12, or whether the babygrow is new or pre-loved, but they will feel the difference to have a mother who is feeling nourished, grounded and rested as much as possible. So my advice on the “practical lists” is find a practical list you like, then slash it by HALF and spend that saved money on things like cleaning services, food services, post natal care, post partum doulas etc. Or simply TREATING YOURSELF – see below.

12. HONOUR YOURSELF
I decided early in pregnancy that in the post partum period I was going to treat myself like a QUEEN! I even had the idea to wrap up 40 presents for myself and gift them to myself one every day for the first forty days – I only thought about this late so only ended up with wrapped up fluffy socks – but the idea was there! And part of my “practical planning” for this period was to save a separate pot of money in an account called “MOTHER LOVE” – this, I decided, was money that I would not spend on baby “things” or “general maternity leave” (I saved separate accounts for both of those!). This is money that I was ONLY using to splurge on lovely things for myself!  

Out of this pot, I have so far spent on a ‘CLOSING CEREMONY’ with Laura Swann – this is three post natal sessions including womb and body massage, sound bath, energy healing, birth story processing, and ‘tying’ the body back together with rebozo type cloths a practice originating from South America. I absolutely LOVED my time with Laura and I truly think that every post-natal woman needs something as nourishing as this in her life. 

I have also spent on a 3 week long art course with Masterpeace, which I did in the evenings via zoom. I’m a big believer in creativity to nourish the heart and soul and it was important for me to block out this time for myself  – where Warren took the baby and I was free to work through a portraiture class. 

As a slightly lesser spending I have also had my toes and nails done which I love doing! I still have some budget left in this pot and I intend to use it on some massage or something else that might come up! Even though I feel my initial “40 days” period is over, it’s important for me not to just tip the remaining money back into my “general pot” but rather to keep this idea of nourishing myself at the front and centre of my entire motherhood experience. I hope it inspires you to think about practical planning in this way too.

13. MAKE PEACE WITH YOUR BODY.
Ooh, here’s another piece of hard work – making peace with your body. This is specifically for biological mothers, but useful advice for anyone really! Maybe you had a pregnancy that went really well and you loved being pregnant, or maybe you had a pregnancy that made you feel shit and you couldn’t wait for it to be over! Either way whether you loved it or not your body changes during pregnancy, during birth and during the post partum period. 

I was really lucky to have a pregnancy that was very straightforward. Apart from the “first trimester of doom” I loved being pregnant and had a newfound respect and reverence for my body. I made a vow to myself during pregnancy, that I would love my post-natal body just as much as my pregnant body – it’s the same body after all!
For me, this had meant embracing the new softness and spaciousness in my body, not rushing (or feeling the need to) rush back to hardcore exercise. After the first forty days (where I pretty much stayed on “rest”!) I started doing some short slow walks as way of moving my body. Prior to this I was doing some Pelvic floor and deep core breathing (which I paired with feeding so that I would a) remember and b) get a lot of opportunity to practice it!).

We have to remember that life is incredibly seasonal. I look at some of my mom friends who have children who are now 3 years, 5 years – who are going out and smashing some really sweaty, delicious workouts at the gym. Instead of feeling like “dang! I need to be getting back to the gym asap” I think to myself “wow – life is so seasonal, and I’m enjoying this season I am in right now – filled with gentle walks and slow days and rest and I look forward to the next season of higher energy when it comes.”

If exercising is something that fills up your cup and supports your mental health then that is absolutely your choice to get back to it – (with of course exercise appropriate to your load-bearing capacity) HOWEVER I would caveat that to say that: Exercise – yes! But NEVER at the cost of your rest.

14. KNOW YOUR PARENTING VALUES
There are approximately one million decisions to be made in early mothering and those choices can be overwhelming. One way to really reduce the decision overwhelm is to KNOW and be VERY clear with your parenting values right from the beginning. 

A lot of my parenting values have been informed by “The book you wish your parents had read” by Philippa Perry and “Our Babies, Ourselves” by Meredith Small. I only read “Hold onto your kids” co-authored by Gabor Mate and Dr Gordon Neufeld once Logan had actually arrived – but it also reaffirms the values that are important to me as a parent. 

Knowing your values makes your decision making process much easier. And also – when you are anchored deeply into values that are important to you – then it’s very difficult to feel judged by others. You could make parenting decisions that are different to everyone else you know, but when those decisions are in full alignment with your core values you will feel solid, stable and grounded in them, no matter what. 

Again, there are many different ways to parent and knowing your values helps to navigate those pathways. Taking sleep as an example – if you are someone who highly values independence (both for you to be independent of your child and your child to be independent of you) then you may adopt strategies which force children to become as independent as possible as quickly as possible. In terms of sleeping – that might mean putting them in their own room as soon as possible, not bringing baby into your bed/bedroom, allowing them to settle/cry without you etc. If on the other hand you value secure attachment, then you might keep baby near to you for longer (bed/bedroom), you may offer physical support and comfort as a way of settling them. When you are deeply connected to your values then the decisions you make in parenting will feel GOOD in your body, as you are living in alignment with what is true for YOU. And which will then be the right decisions for YOU and YOUR family. (NOTE: THE BODY IS ALWAYS our strongest litmus test for what is true/good for us). If something does not feel good in your body, it is worth reevaluating your values around that thing. 

15. GRATITUDE AND MEDITATION:
I almost didn’t put this on the list because it may seem quite fluffy compared to all the other tools that I’ve mentioned so far! BUT I do think they have a powerful impact on your mindset and headspace. (Which, in a world of motherhood -where there is NOT a lot of things you can control – your mindset and headspace are two things which you CAN!)

You may not get a lot of time (or energy) in the early motherhood days to keep a gratitude journal so start one in pregnancy if you have the time/space! (Possibly easier if you don’t have any other children to look after!). For 10 months right up to the day Logan was born, I kept a gratitude journal. Every morning I wrote a list of 10 things I was grateful for. I did not miss a single day (which is something I am quite proud of in itself!) and I can honestly say that this practice had a profound positive impact on my mental health. (This gratitude list was done all the way through the pandemic year of 2020!). By the time our baby arrived, it really felt like my brain was wired in a different way. In a way that was SEEKING out joy and gratitude. I don’t have the time now (with a busy body 9 month old!) to write full gratitude lists every day, but when I do get a moment I rattle off a list as a little “gratitude-top-up” of that mental state that I cultivated. 

Here, here’s a list right now since I have a moment – 
1. I’m grateful for the sun that is shining today
2. I’m grateful for my hot cup of coffee
3. I’m grateful for my warm llama slippers
4. I’m grateful for friends popping over to our front door
5. I’m grateful for the community and support around me
6. I’m grateful to have a mother and father who are alive and well and so in love with their little granddaughter.
7. I’m grateful for a cheerful and happy baby
8. I’m grateful for modern technology and video chats
9. I’m grateful for new mom friends all around me
10. I’m grateful for the ability to read and for good books.

(I feel joyful just writing that!)

Meditation is something that goes very well hand in hand with gratitude. If you have never meditated, surprisingly the newborn phase is actually a PERFECT time to start. 

Feeding a newborn you will be awake at literally ALL hours of the night – it is (usually) dark and quiet* – this is the perfect time, when you are up perhaps alone, feeding a baby to simply sit and focus on your breath and the weight of the baby in your arms. Feeling your body, focusing on your breath is all that meditation really is and coming back to those things again and again when your mind begins to wander at 1am, or 2am or 3am or however many times you are up feeding, is a really good practice. 
*Of course, it’s only quiet at night provided your baby is not crying! However, meditation or simply focusing on your breath is actually also a VERY powerful tool for when your baby IS crying. 

When we focus on the breath, we regulate our nervous system – it’s this down-regulation that takes us from fight/freeze/flight mode into the parasympathetic mode of rest/digest/calm state. Babies have a nervous system that is entrained to the mother. This means that when a baby begins to escalate and a mother then escalates too – this may further escalate the baby. However when a baby begins to escalate (as it will as it’s a baby), and a mother is able to stay DE-escalated, then there is far greater likelihood of baby entraining to that down-regulated nervous system and settling. 

Mindset is also something that (even as a last resort!) can be very powerful. Because sometimes it just *does* take three hours to get your baby to sleep (WE HAVE ALL BEEN THERE!), but the difference in establishing a mindset that is one of acceptance versus resistance is paramount. There are things in newborn life that are completely out of your control (like 3 hour bedtimes, crying babies etc) but it is our REACTION to the situation which creates further stress and/or overwhelm on top of the situation or not. I love this concept best illustrated in the pic below

(this concept comes from someone I saw on instagram – I cannot remember where I saw it but please let me know if you do know so that I can credit it!). Feel free to replace “rain” with “baby-not-sleeping” or whatever is your current road block. Just like when it rains, sometimes there is nothing to “fix” it just is what it is. Make sure you set some of the other things in place as I’ve mentioned above, to help you BE with what is, for when those things feel torrential.

I will no doubt be adding to this list of tools and ideas over time as I reflect further, but I would like to get it published now as it’s taken me almost 6 months to write this post! Which is a lovely jumping off point for the one of the last tips I have – which is giving yourself some grace in this period. Giving yourself grace for the blog posts that take 6 months to write, to the emails you have never replied to, the messages and WhatsApp’s you take weeks to respond to, the connections you lose, the carpets that don’t get vacuumed, the workouts that are not done and the projects that are put on pause. This is a time where there is such huge transitions happening as you bring new life into this world and we only have capacity for so much energetic output at any given time. A baby NEEDS to take priority in this time, so giving yourself grace for all the things that temporarily fall by the wayside is crucial. Life is so seasonal and what you root down in this season will pave the way for what is to come next. 

I hope this post has provided some inspiration and ideas for planning and preparing for the fourth trimester. I’ve included a reference list below of books, resources and tools that I’ve found particularly useful in my journey – perhaps they will help you too! If you know of any expecting parents who might benefit from some of these tools please do share this post with them!

You can follow more of our journey at @indieyogalife

Useful Resources:
Natalie Meddings – Birth doula, including pre and post natal doula care.
Emily Carson – Preparing for the fourth trimester online course & active birth story listener.
Gabi Mama.Circle – Post natal support and mothers support
Nadia Rafaat – mother archetype yoga practices. 
Laura Swann – closing ceremonies

Some of the other books I’ve mentioned can be found in this blog post.