Naima B. Robert – Mommy Matters Selfcare for the Post Partum Period Afra Said
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Welcome to session 3 of the Muslimah,
self care conference. This session is especially for
all our mommies,
mommies to be,
new moms, moms of several,
with Afra Saeed, who is a postpartum doula.
And I'm not gonna waste any of her
precious time or yours. I'm gonna hand it
over to you straight away, Afra Saeed. Tell
us about why mommy matters.
I'm so excited and honored to be here.
I wanna start off with a quote,
and,
it says, the mother needs to be mothered
so she can learn how to mother her
own baby. When the mother is supported,
baby thrives.
And your relationship her relationships around her thrive,
and then the community thrives. And I want
you to just think about that quote for
a second,
or a minute, and really think about what
comes to mind when you think about that.
Can you relate to that? Do you can
you feel, you know, that that is something
that you have
you've heard or you have been through or
you,
you you actually believe in.
So,
I'll start off. I can't see any,
I can't see anything in the chat so
far, so I'm just gonna start off. But
I want you to think about that code.
It's a really important one, and I might
pay copy and paste it into the chat
as well.
And I feel like it should be the
baseline of motherhood
for everybody.
Okay. So my name is Afra, Afra Saeed.
You might know me as Through Mama's Eyes.
I used to be Through Mama's Eyes for
the longest time on Instagram. I just recently
changed it to my name earlier this year.
I'm a mother of 3 kids.
They are almost 7, 5, and almost 3.
So I had kids back to back.
I'm based in Southern California.
I'm a doula.
I've been blogging for the last, like, 6,
7 years about motherhood.
And, basically, I use my platform to talk
about my experiences in motherhood,
and the things that I have had to
overcome to reach the point that I am
in today.
I
my, you know, my goal with the work
that I do is to help mothers reduce
overwhelm that they go through.
I want them to have a beautiful,
meaningful
experience in motherhood and that journey. I want
to help them fill those gaps, you know,
those gaps where you just don't know who
to turn to, you don't know who to
talk to, there's that overwhelm. You
you feel like Google is just, like,
just overwhelming,
and you need someone that you can rely
on. And,
that's where I come in.
And I want to support, women,
through
pregnancy,
birth, and postpartum. And even as a mother
of 3 right now,
mothers that are like me as well.
So, the reason why I got into this
work, I wanted to talk a little bit
about that because that ties into this talk
and
my experience with self care and
my experience with learning how to self take
care of myself.
I,
as you can tell from what I said,
I've had 3 kids back to back. So,
they're all about 20 to 24 months apart,
which is very close, together.
I had 3 c sections, after very long
labors,
so they were all traumatic births.
I,
experienced a lot of, post,
postpartum,
depression and
anxiety.
And,
and what you call now postnatal depletion, and
I'm gonna go into that. And the postnatal
depletion is the effects of all of the
all of what we will talk about that
comes into
motherhood and, lack of self care.
I,
because I live so far away from my
family, I had lack of support.
I had no no plan to take care
of myself.
All I had a plan was to get
into motherhood, take care of my baby, make
sure my babies are taken care of,
fed, take care of my family. I just
became this machine.
I became the supermom that we talk about,
you know, where I did everything.
But
there was so much lacking,
you know,
so much lacking. So and in so much
lacking in what I was giving
because I was unfulfilled and I was not
really taking care of myself.
And that's where that quote comes into play
where you have to mother yourself,
and you obviously, with, you know, your support
around you.
Because if you don't take care of yourself,
you can't take of take care of everyone.
You know? Like, they say that quote, you
know, happy mother, happy life, you know,
or happy wife, happy husband, or happy wife.
Okay. So what is postnatal depletion? And then
I'm gonna go into,
self care in a bit.
You might notice me going back and forth.
I have notes, a lot of notes, and
I'm gonna just take, you know, things, in
from there.
So,
basically, depletion is, you know, when you reach
a point where you just can't kind of
do it anymore. You're depleted. Depleted means you're
just tired. You've not taken care of yourself,
whether it's from pregnancy onwards. Or before pregnancy,
you could have been this, workaholic like I
was,
and really didn't take care of yourself. And
then you enter motherhood, and then you wonder
why you're so tired, why you're so, irritable,
why you're so you know, there's a whole
list. I'm gonna go through them right now.
Because nobody really tells us. Right? You know?
Nobody told me all of this. No. Everyone
just told me how to take care of
the baby, what to buy for the baby,
what products I should get,
that, you know, you you should breastfeed, and
these are the tips for breastfeeding.
And that's it. You know, what where I
should put my baby, I should sleep with
them, not sleep with them, and all of
that stuff. There wasn't,
anything about
me and how I was going to thrive
after that, you know,
and how hard that transition would be. And
it would and it's okay for that transition
to be hard for not not only, like,
for a few months, but for years. It's
okay for that to be hard, because everyone
tells you, like, you know, you have a
healthy baby, say
But, you know, yes,
but what about me? You know? You are
in a manner too, not only your baby.
Right?
Nobody tells us about, you know, the imbalances
that will come from having a baby, all
the hormone imbalances.
And I'm sure it'll go into, like, the
nutrition aspect of, you know, just for for
mothers and for women in general.
How, you know, things like your periods will
become worse, after motherhood. And this is not,
this is all general information, so some of
you might be
might not have experienced this. Some of you
might experience this. It just really depends on
your basically, your track record, how you've taken
care of yourself up to the point of
having your baby and, in motherhood.
So, yeah,
you know, we really have to take extra
care of ourselves so that we can take
extra care of our family.
And
I really believe that,
that's what has shaped me so far.
I haven't been the best mom that I've,
that I wanted to be, but I know
now
how I can help myself or how I
have been able to help myself recently, and
that's the things that I'm gonna share with
you. So just to go into post naledepletion,
have you guys ever heard of post naledepletion?
What is your you know, what are your
thoughts? What do you think post naledepletion is
in your,
from your experience
or from things that you might have heard?
Even if you're a mom of 5.
Never heard of it before. Yeah.
Okay.
Alright.
So I'm gonna ask you a bunch of
questions, and you can write down yes or
no or frequently, sometimes,
never, and tell me, and then we're gonna
add up a score. Okay?
Have you
ever had,
any health issues,
that started after during or after pregnancy?
Have you had any digestive issues that have
probably worsened after having kids? Do you experience
fatigue?
Do you experience oblong?
Do you,
fall asleep when you put your kids to
sleep?
Do you, are you easily startled? Like, do
you get triggered to, like, your kids' noises
and and just a lot of sound and
light?
Are you a light sleeper? Do you experience
brain fog? Are you experiencing,
do you have a healthy libido
after after having kids?
Are you struggling with just the basics of
taking care of yourself? You know? Just basics
like
grooming yourself. So, you know, things like,
waxing, for example, or, taking care of your
nails,
your face.
Do you have lack of confidence and low
self esteem?
No matter how much you do for yourself,
do you feel like, you know, you just
don't ever have time and you have lack
of support?
Do you feel, like, any sense of shame
or guilt,
around your role as a mother? So these
are the kind of questions that will
explain whether you have postnatal depletion or you
might have a little bit of it or
you don't maybe you probably don't have any
of it.
If your score is really high, if you
answered, like, yes for almost everything, then you
possibly have it.
And if you said no to a lot
of it, then you most likely don't have
it, which is good.
Emotional symptoms that might come from having postnatal
depletion is, you know, I mentioned,
you know, having hormonal changes, which affect your,
emotions.
Loss of sleep obviously affects
that, reduced support,
poor prep for postpartum,
having, a lot of social pressure to do
things that you just aren't able to do,
anxiety, reduced libido,
isolation,
you know, and a lot of anger sometimes
because of resentment that builds up,
less of trust.
Yeah. And just a lot of that. You
know? Those are things that come up. Those
are symptoms of having
I could go on. There's a whole list,
but,
yeah, those are symptoms of,
postnatal depletion. Alright, sis. Can I just jump
in for a second?
Sure.
Ladies,
can we wake up, please? This chap is
just dead and buried. What is going on?
This is a yes or no question. If
it's a yes, type yes, please. If it's
a no, type no. But let's, Safra, know
what y'all dealing with because,
I'm not used to seeing you guys not
actually commenting in the chat. Oh, you're writing
in your notebook. Okay, Sarah. Then don't let
my notebook.
But please let's, I think, Afrah, if you
want them to to, to say yes or
no in the chat, then please just give
the list really slowly and tell them Okay.
Sorry. Moments in the chat so that they
know. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Alright. So if
do you want me to repeat it, or
should we just juggle over the question? Yeah.
Just, like, take us through it nice and
slowly and, and, yeah, let's, let's let's let
people you know, if it is them, then
let them put their hand up and say,
Okay. So,
I'd love you to just put it in
the chat. So it's a yes or no.
So have you experienced,
digestive issues after you have a baby?
Do you have,
fatigue? Have you experienced a lot of fatigue?
And some people know it as, adrenal fatigue.
Do you fall asleep with your kids when
you put them to bed at, like, 7
or 8 o'clock, and then you're just like,
wait. I wake up at 11 or at
12, and you're just you've lost that whole
evening.
Do you are you overwhelmed?
Are you easily startled or triggered by, little
things?
A lot of yeses.
Do you feel like you are a, light
sleeper? So you just wake up feeling like
you just didn't get enough sleep no matter
how much you slept.
Do you have anxiety?
Do you have, issues with your libido?
Are you experiencing what is known as brain
fog?
So you just can't seem to get, you
know, you can't seem to think straight. And
if you try to do work, you can't
do it.
Do you struggle with just basic things, taking
care of yourself,
you know, just grooming yourself?
Do you have lack of confidence and self
esteem?
Do you feel like no matter what, no
matter how much support you get, you still
feel like something is not right? You know?
Do you have a sense of shame, guilt
around different things in your role as a
mother?
So,
yeah, there's a a lot of yeses here,
and so,
that would indicate that you likely have postnatal
depletion.
And even if you don't have postnatal depletion,
these are still things that need to be
addressed. So I just wanna say that
if you said yes, I there's nothing wrong
with you. A lot of moms and a
lot of women in general, with anything, you
just feel ashamed for the things that you
that might be wrong with you because
society has placed this pressure on us where,
you know, you have to be this perfect
mom that you have to love your baby,
you have to you cannot like you have
to love motherhood.
You have to be on top of things
all the time, and, unfortunately, that's not the
reality of things. So,
having these feelings,
these emotions, whether you've experienced hormonal changes, you've,
you can't sleep or you,
have no support and you have anxiety,
all of these things, whether you have a
lot of anger, sadness,
you know, you just kind of fluctuate a
lot.
These are, you know, these are things that
happen. These are real, and there's nothing to
be ashamed of. So I just want to
point that out in case people are not,
putting them in the chat because of that.
There's nothing wrong with you. You're all amazing,
mothers, and these are just things that are,
the effects of motherhood and possibly lack of
self care and,
lack of support that we can
help ourselves with and, you know, fix over
time.
Anger. Yes.
I can relate to that too.
If you have a lot of hormonal issues,
you're going to have you're gonna a lot
of anger. If you have a lot of
resentment, you might experience so resentment could come
up with things like you don't get help
around the house a lot, and then you
feel resentful towards your partner or you feel
resentful towards your,
your,
kids sometimes because no matter what you do,
they don't listen, for example. So you just
have that resentment, like, you know, why won't
anyone listen to me? Or why does my
husband leave these socks everywhere all the time?
Or why can't he just pick up the
kids when they're crying? Why do I have
to run to them? So,
there's, yeah, there's a lot.
And,
this book that, I got a lot of
free, you can learn a lot about postnatal
depletion is called postnatal depletion.
It's available on Amazon and everywhere. It's a
really good book. I'll try and post a
link in I don't know if I can
get that, but it's called postnatal depletion.
And it I feel like it is a
must read for any new mother.
So if you can get that, I would
really highly suggest you reading it. You can
get the audiobook too. I love listening to
audio, so it's great.
Because the more you read, the more you're
aware of what's happening when you're growing a
baby, what will happen during birth, what will
happen postpartum, and why you need to take
care of yourself and why it's so important
to do those things and the implications on
your body.
Okay.
I wanted to add one more thing here.
People might be wondering because you've not heard
postnatal depletion, but you've heard of postpartum depression,
and you've heard of baby blues, and you've
heard of postpartum anxiety, for example. So those
are things that also,
lead to postnatal depletion because let's say you
had the baby blues, you had postpartum depression,
you had postpartum anxiety,
and then it kind of fades on and
off, but then you had other symptoms that
came along. You never took care of it,
so then that means and what will
the result of all of that will be
postnatal depletion. So that's why it's important to
kind of tackle it in the beginning, when
you realize it.
Okay. So let's talk about how we can
overcome this, right,
and where it starts.
So if you are already a mom, it
will start where you are. But if you
are not a mom and you're pregnant or
trying to get pregnant, it starts there.
Please take care of yourself.
Please,
you know, watch your diet, like,
during pregnancy.
Take care of yourself during pregnancy. So things
like, self care would be things like,
movement, like exercise,
yoga,
journaling, taking time to really visualize
what,
having a baby will be like, what your
what your birth will be like because birth
as well is very important. But
it's it's kind of like the key to
how your motherhood your motherhood experience is going
to be. Because sometimes when you have a
traumatic birth experience,
it results in you, like, obviously holding on
to a lot of birth trauma.
And if you are someone who yes. That
is the book, by us doctor Oscar. He's
from Australia.
If you are someone who's experienced birth trauma,
I'd love to like, please post it in
the chat.
So and if you're pregnant, I'd love to
know what are what is your top, like,
what is your top thing for taking care
of yourself,
in pregnancy? Please post in the chat as
well.
So, for pregnancy care,
diet is really important.
You know, having,
nutritious foods, like, with fatty acids,
having a,
good,
I
lost the word,
Vitamin.
Yep. The, prenatal vitamins.
A lots of movement,
journaling,
exercising,
meditation.
Do you guys has anyone here tried meditation?
Please post in the chat. I'm gonna say
that because I'm I want because it's like
I'm talking to the the
laptop.
Okay. So,
what is your experience with meditation?
I'd love to know how you
how you feel after meditation.
For anxiety and depression.
Okay. Yes. Yes. It's really,
it's really important. And there's lots of meditations
where you can prepare for your birth that
way. You can visualize your birth, and,
you can visualize your postpartum period. You there
are meditations for,
breastfeeding as well. So there's a lot of
meditations out there. Okay. So, and then the
other thing during your pregnancy that you can
do is,
planning your birth,
and advocating for yourself throughout your pregnancy. And
we'll talk about that in
the postpartum plan and how you can do
that in your planning.
And then, obviously,
having a post,
postnasal
or postpartum plan.
Okay. So,
designing your postpartum plan. Has anyone here ever
made a postpartum plan? And this is not
your birth plan, but it is your postpartum
plan, like, how your postpartum period is gonna
go.
Anyone else? No. Takiyah says no.
No. I never thought about it.
I'm gonna wait a few seconds to see
how many noes come through.
No.
I didn't either. So
I did not have a plan postpartum for
all 3 of my babies.
I,
just kind of winged it, went into it,
and,
yeah, the results of that were not great.
So,
when you're making your postpartum plan, and this
is where you I want you to take
notes, but I will,
I can I will send this to you
guys,
later? So I will provide my email after
the presentation, and then I will you can
I can send this to you over email?
So I don't want you to, if you
don't want to take notes as well, I
can send this to you, basically. That's what
I'm saying.
Okay.
So when you design your postpartum plan, you
want to think about,
several things.
One of the main important things obviously is
your needs. Your needs. Not the baby, not
your family, not how, you know, you're gonna
take care of the baby and everything, but
your needs. What do you need postpartum
to thrive?
What food do you need?
How are you going to,
how are you going to experience love in
that period of time? Are you gonna be
in how how are you gonna have companionship?
You have to think about you have to
incorporate
nature
and movement. Okay? And when I say movement,
I mean, you know, exercise walks and different
things. I will put that in there as
well. And then, obviously, consider all your family,
your friends around you, and and all of
this will go into how your needs will
be supported in the postpartum period.
So I'm gonna go into a couple of
things and why these things are important. So
why is rest important? So in our culture,
I think a lot of cultures,
removing the western culture,
resting for, you know, that first 40 days
is
is very important. Right? It is a, and
if you have,
done that, I would love to hear if
you have. Please post it in the chat
because that always gets me excited to hear
when women have actually,
really rested during those 6 weeks after birth.
And for some women, it could be for
some cultures, it could be up to 60
days, and it could be as low as
20 days or as low as 1 week
in our western culture right now.
Because you wanna remember,
resting is important because you wanna rest to
recover. You don't wanna rest so that you
can do the next thing in 5 minute
in 5 minutes. You wanna
rest to recover from birth so that you
can be the best mom that you want
to be. Right?
You wanna give your mind, your body, your
soul time to heal. You know? And, yes,
we do have to heal from birth. We
do have to heal from
becoming this new person that we are becoming
because we don't get time to do that.
We just have to we are just thrown
into this
new thing called motherhood, and we're just expected
to just roll with it and keep going,
you know, just drive.
But when you,
you obviously
take care of a car when you drive.
Right? You have to take care of the
engine. You have to do all these things
to really take make sure the tires are
full. You have to the air in the
tires are full. You have to make sure,
there is gas in the car and all
of those things. Right? So there's a lot
of elements that go into you, thriving in
motherhood.
And this will obviously help you in your
long term health. You know?
Food.
A lot of people
don't realize I think now it's becoming very,
very,
you know, popular having,
like, food that will, help your uterus heal,
eliminate blood,
and build your strength
and warm food.
I,
my experience with that as well.
But my mom with my first and my
third, she did visit me. So my I
don't have any family in the US. My
family is back in Africa,
in the UK, between, like, Africa and the
UK and in the Middle East. So all
over the world.
So,
my mom would always say, like, you know,
she brought all these things when I had
my first baby, and I did not have
any of them. I was just so, like,
why do I need to have this? Why
are you not letting me,
have cold water? Why are you not letting
me have,
you know, what I want to eat? Like,
you know,
she said, you know, she would keep pushing
me. Keep yourself warm. Wear socks. Don't let
your hair be wet when you come out
of the bathroom. Make sure that it's dry.
You don't wanna have any chills. You need
your body to be warm the whole time
during recovery. It's so important. So if you've
ever heard that or if you hear that,
know that it's actually important because you want
your body and your uterus,
to heal. And the best way it will
heal is by having warm foods,
warm drinks,
and keeping warm.
Being pampered, love.
So
we again, the supermom mentality and just, like,
jumping into motherhood and doing everything, especially when
you have,
kids that are already at home and taking
care of them. When I had my c
section,
with my 3rd,
I had to go back in to get
my my my I had an,
basically, the scar opened, the incision,
because I was not really taking care of
myself. I wasn't resting. I wasn't sleeping. My
my kids had colic, my boys especially. So
I wasn't sleeping. I was just waking up
all the time to cry to tend to
crying, and I was crying.
It was a mess though.
You know, we really need to be pampered,
and we really need to be taken care
of.
And I I know that a lot of
you will probably think, well, I don't have
anyone to pamper me. I don't have, my
parents here. I don't have
someone there. So there are ways that you
can
either hire or you can make it happen
for yourself. Okay?
That could be through either hiring a masseuse
or steaming at home. I'll talk more about
that later.
Binding. Have you heard of belly binding? Has
anyone had any belly binding done before?
Belly binding is,
basically the,
traditional cultural method to what we do, what
we buy off Amazon.
Basically, the,
now I forget the name, but,
the
oh my god. Can someone help me, please?
Oh, it's the
Do you know what I'm talking about? It's,
the girdles. Yes. The girdles. Not a baby
wearing thing. The girdles that we put on
ourselves to,
shape it for our bellies.
Yes. A girdle. Exactly.
So,
there's a lot of benefits to doing it
with belly binding versus the girdle because it
basically just squeezes all your muscles together, and
it's not healthier. It's not healthy to do
it that way.
And yeah. Because there's lots of other ceremonies
and things that you could do to be
pampered. You could hire a doula, postpartum doula
who does these services. You could hire someone
who just does you could go somewhere to
do things like that, and you could just
pamper yourself. You have you could include this
in your plan. K?
Companionship. What's the difference between belly binding and
using a girdle? So,
the girdle, basically, it compresses your muscles
too fast, too soon.
And so that's not good for your uterus
and,
for your, obviously, your womb.
But when you have the belly binding,
it does it very gradually.
So with the belly binding,
you will notice that you'll put it on,
and as time goes along, you'll have to
tighten it as your your belly,
goes in. So it kind of gives you
that natural,
slow pace of of, helping your belly,
rather than and there's also a paste that
you put with spices and herbs that you
kind of roll over your, belly to nurture,
the uterus as well.
So
there's lots of,
you know, natural benefits to using that. I
used a girdle. I didn't know about belly
binding either.
And, yeah, with the girdle, like, within a
few weeks, it gets loose and then you
can't use it again. Right? But that's the
yes. To help yeah. Exactly. That is the
goal of it.
Yeah. And then I wanna talk about companionship.
So,
because I mentioned that that was one of
the things that you we should incorporate into
your plan. So,
you know how we have a lot of
people who visit us, and then after 1
or 2 weeks, you just never hear from
them. They just come visit you, and then
you just never hear from them. They never
text you. They never call,
and you are left with that
stress to entertain, to,
entertain visitors, to
take care of them while they're visiting all
the time. And this is constant in your
postpartum. I remember when I had, my first
baby and I went home,
it was my first c section.
The birth was traumatic. I did not expect
it to go the way that it did.
And I got home. I was in so
much pain,
and I had not taken my meds. I
remember going into the bathroom while my father-in-law
and his wife and my mother were in
the living room. My husband had gone out
to get my meds,
because you'd have to take it every 4
hours, and I just broke down crying. I
was just crying so hard that they heard
me in the living room, and they came
to the bathroom to ask me what's going
on. Are you okay?
And I said, I'm fine. I'm fine. You
know, the typical thing that we do as
women, I'm fine. I'm okay.
But you're not fine.
And I just remember my father in law's
wife when I came out just coming to
me and giving me this big hug, and
I just broke down crying even more. And
it just made me feel better. You know?
You want people like that who are going
to come and actually support you
when they visit you, not people who will
come and then tell you it's okay. You're
fine. You had a c section.
You know,
as long as you and your baby are
healthy. You know? Yes. It's in Allah's it's
Allah's will and that was what Allah planned
for us.
However,
no. It's not that baby and mom are
healthy so all is good and dandy. No.
You know? You have to,
you want people around you who are going
to actually,
nurture you and help you. You know?
You need you need basically, you need the
company of supportive people who will take care
of you, who will ask you how are
you doing, what do you need.
So you want those people around you, and
you wanna set those boundaries and say no
when you don't want these people to,
be around you that first few you know,
I'm I'm sure you've heard of did any
of you have,
boundaries after you had the baby? So
telling people that you don't want to,
you don't want visitors for the 1st 2
weeks. I'm sure you've heard some people do
that. Right?
Has anyone done that? If you have, post
in the chat. I'm gonna be so proud
of you. No.
My husband did that for me. That's amazing.
That's amazing. And that's that's also really crucial,
that connection with your spouse and speaking to
them and asking
and having that discussion with them before you
have the baby.
So,
and then the other thing is I'm sorry.
There's an issue with the lighting. Okay. Another
thing is so I mentioned nature. Right? Nature
and movement. So,
you want to do things like maybe set
your, if you're nursing your baby, have,
nurse them where you can maybe look outside
look outside the window,
look at nature, or get some fresh air,
set up a bath for yourself. You know?
I'll I'll talk about more about this as
well in in a I'll give you a
whole list of things that you can do
at home.
And a bath is only if you haven't
had a c section, by the way.
I'm sure most moms would not feel okay
doing that.
I had no visitors
telling people, yes.
It is hard. It is hard.
But,
you know, there are ways that you can
do that to possibly, like, avoid it. If
you can't do it, then just having a
really good self care plan or maybe a
limit where how many people can visit you
or just maybe the other thing is organizing
a large gathering
after 2 weeks and saying that inviting everyone
prior and telling them that they're come welcome
to come and see you and the baby
in 2 weeks. So that will give you
time to kind of mentally adjust your motherhood
and, not that you will be adjusted in
2 weeks, but it gives you that time
not to have people at your door every
single day.
That we want coming around are people coming
around
to bring food
and do housework, and that's it. And not
Yeah. Not making you do the housework.
Yeah. Yeah. I just wanted to say, the
reason I dropped that comment in there is
because, obviously,
you know, it is it's it's part of
this whole conversation about self care, which is
about boundaries,
which is something that many, many women struggle
with
setting boundaries
because our boundaries can make other people feel
uncomfortable.
Right? Yeah. And they people feel
that they have the right
to expect certain things from us. And when
we say, no, this is my boundary, obviously,
it's not always welcome. So could you just
speak to that, please, Afrah?
Yes. Who are thinking, oh, that sounds amazing,
but I could never do that because
my auntie, my cousin, my friend, oh, oh,
this is what would be saying this and
they'll be saying that. And, you know, we've
never done that and I've never heard of
that being done. Could you just just quickly
touch on that for anybody who is thinking,
oh, don't know how that would go down.
You know? I I yeah.
Yeah. So,
you know, as amazing as it sounds,
to have, you know, someone come over and,
you know, help you, you might not have
that. Right?
So you want that peer to peer support.
Right? So
setting those boundaries is only going to
give you that strength, right, in motherhood. And,
also, being able to say no,
is is very important. And
having the strength to say no, especially as
a first time mom. I feel like a
second and a third time mom might know
this better and be like, okay. I don't
want this to happen again or I don't
want that to happen again.
But,
as a first time mom, you're not gonna
know that, and you're not gonna know what
you actually
what you need because,
you know, in the sense that
you know, it's almost like you have to
experience it to know it. Right? So,
you
this is this is what the experiences that
we have and the, the things that we
can advise you to do, right, as as
mothers and as people who and as professionals
who see, the effects
of not setting those boundaries.
And the boundaries will come in,
I think, setting a plan. So, like, let's
say it's your family or somewhat your husband's
family. Having an appointed person, let's say your
mom or your,
if you have parents around you, maybe your
mom or your sister or someone in your
family to kind of take care of all
of that and kind of help you avoid
that. You might have that extreme circumstance where
your mom is like, nope. They have to
come and visit. This is our culture. This
is our tradition. There's no way. You don't
want to reach a point where you're like
your mom is, like, disowning you or something
like that. You know, that's just an extreme,
but you want to set those boundaries before,
and you wanna talk about it before you
have the baby, not after.
So you can start talking about this months
before you have the baby and talk to
your parents, talk to your,
friends, talk to your, husband,
your in laws. If you're you don't want
to talk to them, ask your husband to
talk to them, but try to set these
boundaries from before.
And it's only a couple of weeks,
and,
you know, there's something that just came to
my mind. But,
when I,
had my first baby, right, and after
my mom left and everything,
I remember her commenting on me and my
sister, and she said, I think that I
wanna come to visit you after a couple
of weeks. I don't want I want to
be there in the 1st couple of weeks,
but you guys are really, like, you know,
hormonal and mean and, like, you're just not
yourself.
And that's the other thing. Right? You're not
going to be yourself,
at that time.
You have a lot of hormones. You have
baby blues. You're exhausted.
You're tired. And,
being around people
is just going to, like, exacerbate that and
make it worse.
So,
you know, I'm glad my mom realized it
on her own, And,
she still came the with my 3rd, but
she did she did vow never to come
again if we had a baby until we've
kind of had our own alone time for
a couple of weeks. And and I think
that's important. You know? People have to realize
that, yes, that's, you know and that's part
of yes. But just like Naima said, it's
part of making the plan. And that's why
we have to make this plan, I believe,
because it's
crucial to let people know. This is the
plan. This is it's just like your birth
plan. Right? You go into birth with a
plan.
Well, a lot of people do. Some people
don't. But if you go into birth with
a plan, why didn't why aren't you going
into birth into motherhood with a plan?
Because that is the rest of your life.
Right? That is the rest of your journey.
Birth is just the you know, some people
are
a few hours, and some people could take
2, 3 days. So,
you wanna have the plan after what's gonna
happen after you leave that hospital.
Okay. Let's now let's get to the plan.
I was just crying. Seriously, I was just
crying all the time on October. I felt
very scared that my child would get hurt
for some reason.
Yes. And that's part of postpartum anxiety,
and depression sometimes, mostly,
anxiety
where you could you couldn't sleep. And so
those are symptoms. So, you know, there's a
difference between,
baby blues and feeling these extreme feelings where
you're worried so worried about your children that
they're going to
either that they're going to something's gonna happen
to them or that you might harm them
because of your feelings or,
you're just you can't sleep at night because
you don't know what's happening to them. So
that's when you know that you need to
speak to somebody at that time, whether it's
a friend. And then if you notice that
the feelings keep going on, you need to
speak to someone a professional. And, again,
that is
that is okay,
to speak to someone.
I remember when I went to my first
postpartum visit,
6 weeks, the lady said,
do you have postpartum did you have any
postpartum depression? I was like, no. I'm fine.
You know? I didn't tell her about all
the days that I was crying through the
night because my son wouldn't stop crying.
All the arguments I was having with my
husband over, like,
you know,
people visiting maybe or just things like that.
All the times I was crying breastfeeding,
the feelings of hopelessness
and loneliness and all of that. I didn't
talk to her about that because I thought,
hey. I'm supposed to get through this. I
I can't tell her I had postpartum depression.
It's not
okay. You know? And I want you to
know that it is okay to talk to
someone about it because these things happen, and,
you know, it is all part of this
process.
These things happen and, you know, it is
all part of this process.
And it's okay to address it and get
help for it and not necessarily
if you don't want to,
have medical treatment for it. You there's so
many other ways that you can help yourself,
and we'll go over some practical tips that
you can do. I just wanna address this
comment
by Sarah. Does it carry, though?
Does it carry through? Because my son is
5 years old, and I still feel the
same.
So, yes, you might just have anxiety that
has carried on, and you might want to,
address that and just talk to someone about
it.
You might need to just,
do more self care or more meditation or
things to just curb the anxiety.
So, yes,
it is possible that things go through. So
I am 7 years into motherhood in, like,
in in,
November, And I still experience a lot of
the things that I have talked to you
about. I'm still working through all of this
because
I only
was made aware of it. Like, probably,
I would say,
around the time my
second baby was born and she was around
1,
I literally like, my periods were so bad.
And they're actually still bad, but they're not
as bad as they are. So I'm still
working through those hormonal issues. But,
my anxiety and my it was all so
bad. And the first thing the doctor told
me was, I can give you some depression
that is not I can give you some
medication for depression. There was no, like, do
you have support? How can I help you?
What can we do? It was just,
you know, I I'm just gonna prescribe some
medication for you. So
this is why,
you know, sometimes
the doctors that we speak to are just
useless,
and it's important to speak to, someone like
either a therapist or if you have a
coach,
or a peer that you can speak to
that can advise you on the right thing
or, like, if you have a doula as
well.
And if you had a doula before, you
would you would have to go through all
of this with her. She would talk about
all of this with you.
Okay. So let's, like, set up a practical
plan, right,
that you can
put in. Again, I can send this to
you if you would like.
So with the visitors, we talked about that
and setting those boundaries and and,
was really, like,
in helping the people that, like allowing those
people that will actually nurture you and support
you, to be around you. We want that
peer support and that emotional support.
Hiring a doula is really important,
whether it's for birth and postpartum. You could
because normally and let me talk to you
about what a doula is. I don't think
I ever even talked about that. So if
you don't know what a doula is and
if you have had a doula, please say,
please type,
d in the chat.
So a doula is basically a coach,
or someone that is,
going to support you and your partner,
during the birth process and the pregnancy process.
So,
anytime you have an issue, you call her
and ask her, like, you know, this happened
at my appointment or I'm feeling this or
what can I do, how can I prepare
for the birth? All of this will be
covered in your time during your prenatal appointments
with your doula.
She helps you have, she helps you at
the hospital and helps you at home during
your labor. Obviously, now with COVID, things are
very different, and we are having
doulas do more virtual services, or there are
doulas who are providing services with people who
are comfortable having them around. Okay? They will
sometimes just wear masks both at home or
in the hospital if they're allowed. Doulas weren't
allowed in the hospitals for the longest time.
And now it it's it seems like they
might be and some hospitals are allowing them
as a support person.
And I even heard actually one person who
had their doula instead of their husband because
their husband was going to be better off
staying at home taking care of the babies,
and she had her doula help her during
her birth.
So, it really depends on what your goals
are with that, but a doula can help
you with whatever goals, whatever aspirations, anything you
have for your birth and postpartum
and your pregnancy.
Even if you have a c section,
you can have a c section doula because
c sections are traumatic sometimes, and you want
to have someone to support you. You wanna
create a plan with them.
You could even,
speak to someone,
who you can speak to a doula who
just does consults, so that would be something
that I could do as well. I,
I started that because I felt like people
had a lot of questions,
but they didn't necessarily wanna hire a doula.
They felt like they had the support from
their mom or sister at the hospital. So
you can have, like, consults with me, like,
an hour or 2 hours or however many
hours over your pregnancy, even your birth or
postpartum
to talk through things, make a plan,
and even just maybe have a call to
just create your postpartum plan. Prenatal too. Yes.
And breastfeeding, you could have, and I will
talk about that actually.
Having a breastfeeding plan. So,
that's something again. You know, we don't we
are not told to have a breastfeeding plan.
Right?
Buying the necessary things that you need for
breast feeding. I didn't know that I would
have cracked * and bleeding * and painful
breastfeeding. I just thought baby would latch on.
You'd feed. Everything would be good. But, no,
it wasn't like that. It was a hard
journey the 1st couple of weeks, and it
was because
there was a latch problem.
Some babies will have tongue tongue tie or
lip tie,
and there are things that you can do
to help that.
And, you know, some people don't even buy
a pump before they have the baby because
they're like, I'm not gonna pump. I'm just
gonna breastfeed. But then sometimes you actually do
need that pump. So having those things in
advance, having access to a lactation consultant or
someone who is a breastfeeding educator,
and your doula can help you with that
too. I can I do that too? I
can help you with that help moms with
that too. I didn't know that what cooling
pads were, for example. These are just examples
for breastfeeding things that you could buy. I
bought cooling pads after I had my,
my cracked * and and it helped so
much soothe that pain because I had the
cream that everyone talked about. You need that
cream, but the cream wasn't enough.
Snacks, lactation snacks, you know, or food that
are they're going to encourage you with your,
lactation.
And then sometimes,
I wanna address something with breastfeeding as well.
You might have issues with breastfeeding. Right? And
then you
might be told that, okay. You know, you're
not getting any milk. Baby is crying. Just
forget about that and supplement with formula.
Yes. You could supplement with formula, but you
need to address what the issue is with
the breastfeeding. And that's where they're, like, having
access to a consultant or someone you can
speak to and having that in your plan.
Someone you know, okay. I'm gonna call this
person if I have issues with breastfeeding, or
I'm gonna go to the hospital and make
an appointment with the lactation consultant that I
saw.
You might have, low prolactin, which is a
hormone that helps you
produce best milk. So you might need to,
address that as well.
So that's with breastfeeding.
And then
in your plan, as well,
not in your plan, but
preparing for postpartum. You wanna have some classes.
You wanna do some classes.
You wanna do, childbirth,
how your childbirth education, and you want to
also put a plan in for
parenting.
You wanna know you wanna learn about parenting,
I feel, because if you you could learn
about it early postpartum or you could learn
about it before.
I feel that a lot of people go
into parenting
with the
tools or with whatever that they whatever that
they are equipped with from where they from
where they came from. So the way their
parents raised them,
the way you have your mom's habits or
your dad's habits, the way they parented you,
those are not necessarily sometimes the right ways
to parent, those traditional ways.
And we don't know that until we
we get into issues where our kids are
having behavioral issues or things like that. So
this is not something that is typically mentioned,
but it is important to have,
someone that you can speak to, a peer,
a parenting peer, or,
someone or a class that you can take,
in your post early postpartum.
If you have time before you have your
baby, even better because you can absorb all
that information without having a crying baby and
without being so,
sleep deprived.
Next thing is having a postpartum,
kit, a heal for healing, like, actual healing
for your body.
And I mentioned before a bath, a sitz
bath,
having a bath binder.
Sometimes,
if you prefer not to buy a binder,
you can get a girdle.
I would highly suggest a belly binder. There
is someone who sells them on it. It's
Muslim sister on Instagram, and she's amazing. She's
also a doula too.
Having cold packs for, and for for,
down there when you are so sore if
you had a normal delivery.
Spray bottles.
And these are things that are very commonly
suggested as your list of things to take
to the hospital. So I know that a
lot of women do prepare for this.
And then steaming, vaginal steaming. How many of
you have heard of vaginal steaming?
If you have, put a v.
Sarah has. I love Sarah's answer. She knows
what she has.
That's amazing.
Amazing. Yay. So
vaginal steaming is,
good for you don't only have to do
it postpartum. You can do it throughout motherhood.
You can do it pre
pre baby as well,
and even during pregnancy. So there but you
need to have,
if you're doing it with herbs, you need
to have the right herbs for that. And,
again, there's there are people who sell that
online, and they help for if you do
them during pregnancy, they help your uterus and
you,
prepare for labor.
And then when postpartum, they help you with,
like, eliminating all the all the dark you
know, that that dark blood that you get
after birth. So just eliminating all of that
and, you know, it it helps you heal
even faster.
And and other benefits of steaming are if
you have infections, painful periods,
if you are trying to get pregnant and
you're struggling for fertility,
that's also there are some herbs for that
too.
Yes. You can get a a binder from
the hospital too, but my personal experience with
those binders, I did not like them, but
you could, use those too as well if
you'd like.
Massages postpartum.
My mom gave me a few massages, but
I didn't really do much after that.
Those are really important, especially, like, if you
have c section scars. There are specific massages
that you can do to,
to heal that incision area
and to actually reduce the scar tissue that
you get from, c sections. And did you
know
that when you,
have a c section and then you have
another baby, that scar tissue could prevent you
from having a normal delivery after that,
if you haven't, like, really massaged that tissue
and taken care of it and broken it
down. I did not know that. And to
date, I actually
truly believe that my scar tissue because of
accumulative
c sections has been one of the reasons
why my babies were never in optimal position
for
for
for birth.
Acupuncture.
Has anyone done acupuncture before
pregnancy or during pregnancy to help them go
into labor or to help them relax during
the pregnancy?
So acupuncture is a,
an amazing natural method of balancing everything in
your body,
and it's
I I used to love it because it
would help me sleep. I did it, weeks
leading up to the my births
to help everything get into place and help
my hormones and help your body,
just to prepare for,
birth.
You can do it postpartum as well for
to,
help your hormones, help your anxiety.
I actually just started doing acupuncture,
and that's my form one of my forms
of self care right now, actually.
I love it. So these are things you
can incorporate later as well as even if
you're a mom of,
like, 5, 6 years. You know?
And then having chiropractic adjustments, those are things
that you should have in your plan,
to kind of get your body back into
place because when you especially if you have
a natural birth,
all the the effects of labor, sometimes people
have really bad hip pain,
back pain from,
from,
epidurals or just from the labor,
and,
it can
sorry. Fiber.
Does it help do do you mean acupuncture
or adjustments?
Acupuncture?
I believe it can. Yes.
I believe it can.
So, yeah, those are things that you can
do to heal your body, like, physically.
And then you can also, in your pet
plan, have essentials for your home and for
your baby.
Now I wanna talk about one thing here.
A lot of people focus on getting all
these, like or if they have baby showers,
for example, they'll get, like,
3
baby swings or, like, 2 different strollers or
all of these things. It's fine. You know,
if you can afford it and if if
you love it,
go for it. However,
how important are those things when you have
your baby? Right? How important are having, like,
so many different things when you have your
baby?
If you collectively, if you look at,
the normal purchases and the normal
the normal,
investments that people make before people have babies,
the things that you actually don't need and
that you realize, hey. I didn't need this.
I'm gonna sell this, or I'm gonna give
it to somebody else.
It's nice, but if you can give it
to somebody else who actually needs it, but,
you could use that money towards
acupuncture,
a postpartum massage,
belly binder, steaming,
you know, all those things,
food,
buying having a food,
train or, like, ordering food if you can't
have a food train for someone delivering food
delivering food to you. So all those things,
I I truly believe getting what you really
need is important and focusing on
even putting down a, request for a postpartum
doula, asking your friends to put put money
together. See, that's what I really want. I
don't I can take care of the other
material things, but I want someone to help
me take care of my birth, my pregnancy,
and my emotional needs postpartum.
And there's nothing wrong with that. I've had
people, message me and ask me if I
would take if I can issue gift cards
or if they can pay for me to
have a service for their friend. And, obviously,
you want to you know, there will be
technical issue technical things that need to go
into the planning of that. You want to
obviously connect with your doula, but that's you
having that voucher or the money to be
able to do that is an amazing gift.
Then,
I was gonna talk about nutrition.
So having a meal plan,
having,
a meal train set up, or having a
meal service set up. So some people freeze
food before the baby, so they get maybe
either help or they just all the energy
that they have in that last trimester. They
get a lot of food. They prep and
they freeze it. That's amazing if you can
do that. If you can't,
have a meal train set up for the
first I had it set up for the
first, 2 to 3 weeks for
my
second and third baby,
because I truly just couldn't cope. It was
just too hard, and there's nothing wrong with
asking for that.
Sometimes you might have this amazing friend that
just says, do you want me to set
this up for you and you say yes,
or they just set it up for you
when you have the baby and people just
deliver food to your door and leave it
outside.
Honestly,
just not having to worry about food just
like Naima was saying, it is the best
thing ever.
Because you the last thing you wanna do
is step in the kitchen when you have
a crying baby and trying to cook and
while you're holding a newborn. You know?
You wanna have a space where you can
go.
We had no idea what a meal train
is. I know it's amazing. So if you
have another baby, Hiba, or if you have
a friend who's having a baby,
please set it up. So meal trains are
basically that's the term that's used for it,
but it's basically,
something that you set up to have, someone
deliver food. So one person will set up
this excel sheet or there are website that
are called Meal Train.
You can, set it up. Everyone will put
a date. So they'll, it's basically, like, they'll
put their name and they'll put the meal
that they're going to deliver.
And they basically just either deliver at the
doorstep, leave it there, or they knock on
the door and they give it to the
mom and they come and see the mom.
It just depends on the comfort level if
you know.
It's amazing. If you can set it up
for a friend,
I truly believe it's the best gift. It
doesn't cost any money.
People will cook from home. I mean, what
is more amazing than having a home cooked
meal brought to you when you've just had
a baby. Right?
Yeah. You can just set that out too.
Yeah. It is pretty cool.
Having a space for yourself postpartum. So some
people will have, like, a, a chair or
something in their nursery. Some some people don't.
I don't have never had that space, so,
I never really had a spot to go.
Just on the sofa. But having a space
for yourself where you can maybe feed the
baby at that time, look outside if it's
by, by a window
or a place that you can sit and
just rest if you want to read a
book.
Just your own space, basically, that's for you,
you know, as a mom. And then one
other important thing is having support groups.
People that you can turn to, your friends,
your friend circle, joining support groups on Facebook.
There are loads of them. There's so many
mom support groups. Getting the right one is
really good. Or maybe even if you are
joining a official support group, like buying a
course or
or a, workshop,
you know, you could do it that way
too. But having that support is really important
because,
especially as a new mom,
you might,
and even as an experienced mom. So I
had recently been potty trained. Right? And I've
done it twice before.
And I posted somewhere about,
the trouble that I'm having not trouble, but
the struggle that I'm having posting, potty training
my youngest.
And I was so amazed to have so
many people tell me we've been through that
before. That is normal. And I'm like, wow.
I didn't realize that that was normal even
after I've potty trained 2 times before.
And it just gives you that ease, that
peace of mind. Your heart is set at
ease, and you are,
you just feel like I'm not alone in
this. There's other people going through this, and
I'm not alone.
Breastfeeding support. So I mentioned before having a
lactation consultant
or maybe you went to a you went
for a lactation,
breastfeeding class before,
your birth
and having access to a peer or doula
that can help you with breastfeeding as well.
So it's really important.
I truly believe that if a mom does
not have that support with breastfeeding, sometimes if
things go wrong and she doesn't have that
supportive,
affect her breastfeeding journey. You know, stress causes
low supply.
If you don't feed your baby for a
few, like, a long time, it can cause
your supply to dip. But even if you
don't feed your baby for, like, 10 days,
for example, you try and nothing is coming
out, some people will will just give up.
You know? But,
you know, I had a postpartum client, last
year that no matter how much she would
breastfeed,
her baby would cry. So what she did
was she supplemented and she breastfed and she
would pump. The poor woman did not sleep.
It was exhausting, but her goal was to
be able to breastfeed her child. And and
even if it was exhausting for her, that
was her goal and that was her what
she really wanted.
So,
you know,
you need people around you that are going
to say, I'll help you with that. Let's
let's create a plan. Let's let's see what's
the problem. Let's, like, try to figure it
out. Let's, like, you know, get to the
root issue. Why why isn't it working? Or
let keep keep going. Not like, I had
someone text me the other day, on Instagram.
She's actually a friend of mine.
And she mentioned,
you know, I'm having issues breastfeeding. This is
my 4th
child. I don't have time to sit for
an hour.
Can you help me,
find a good supplement formula?
So I I didn't tell her, here's the
supplement formula. I refused to do that. I
said, tell me what is the problem. What
is it what exactly is happening? She mentioned
baby was not sleeping. Baby was restless. She
was not sleeping.
And, you know, she was stressed,
and,
baby was just feeding too long. So I
talked to her about the latch. I talked
to her about maybe putting some essential oils
or some giving the baby a bath before
they,
feed or before they sleep,
using a swaddle to help them sleep longer
so that they are not,
like, startled by their hands and waking up
and not,
and then, you know, with babies, they'll just
wake up and look for feeding. And some
people will be like, okay. I'll just feed
you. And maybe they're just not looking to
be fed at that time. They're not really
hungry. They're just uncomfortable.
So because you're looking for those cues, right,
to breastfeed, so you could mistake the cues
and feed when you don't need to really
feed.
So,
yeah. So really getting to that root issue.
And
she said,
yes.
She actually,
slept better after using a swaddle. She,
felt so much better after having a bath,
and I used some lavender
essential oil. Obviously, not directly on the baby.
You dilute it with a lot of,
with a supplement oil like coconut oil.
Yep. Using a bouncer, that sometimes that can
help because you don't want to just be,
like, bouncing maybe all the time. So, yeah,
just having,
that support, someone who will give you those
suggestions.
And then having a plan for diaper changes
and night feedings.
A lot of people don't do this. Right?
You just go into motherhood, and then you
are expected you wake up the first couple
of nights. Your husband's gonna expect you to
wake up every single night and do everything
for the rest of motherhood.
But you need to as a mother, if
you have, if your husband is around, you
need to be like, I need you to
help me right now. Wake him up at
night.
Wake him up and tell him I need
your help right now. I need your help
with, I've just fed him or her, and
I I need to go to the bathroom.
Can you please change him so that, and
then I'll come back and put in baby
put baby to sleep. You know? You have
to ask. You have to have that plan
before. So don't ask after a couple of
times and the the, you know yes. And
burping it as well, is really important. But,
what I'm saying is having that conversation with
your spouse about it before
and setting those boundaries. Those are boundaries. And
that is also your self care because that
gives you more sleep. Right? That gives you
more rest. That gives you more support. That's
all self care for you.
And also,
loving yourself because if you're not going to
do that, then you are going to just
wear yourself out.
And then if you have kids,
if you have other older kids when you
come home, having,
a plan for what who is gonna take
care of them when you come home. Do
you have to do the school runs? Can
someone else take care of that for 5th
for the few weeks after you, have the
baby? Can your husband take care of that?
Can,
can you have, playdates with somebody? Can someone
come over and bring their child or take
your child and drop him off and have
him at someone's place to play, for example,
so to keep him occupied? Maybe new toys
for the baby. So having a plan for
that. You know? You don't wanna just enter
motherhood and be like, why is this baby
so,
you know, having so many tantrums? Why is
he so clingy? Why is, you know I
just need time to nurse. He's not letting
me nurse. You wanna have that plan before.
And, obviously, things might not go
as planned because babies are just unpredictable.
They will just,
do whatever they want at any time. But,
just having that plan, you know, for your
older kids as well. And then last but
not least,
having a plan with your partner.
So I talked about other things that you
would talk to your partner about, but really
sitting down with your partner, your husband,
and,
talking about what is going to happen when
you have that baby.
How things are going to be? What is
the expectation that you have of him? What
how much involvement you want your partner to
have?
Because,
I didn't do that, for example. Right? And
my mom came for 3 weeks. She helped
us. She cooked. She cleaned.
And,
I still took on a lot more than
I should have while she was here, and
my husband got used to that. He got
used to my mom helping, and he was
pretty helpful before we had the baby. Then
my mom leaves,
and
weeks pass, and I noticed my husband will
help with things a few things here and
there, but he's become super laid back. And
I had to have a talk with him
at one point, and I was like,
what is going on? Like, why aren't you
you used to help, and you're not helping.
So, you know, you don't wanna have the
conversation too late in the game.
It's good to have it whenever you need
to, but you want to plan it before.
So the expectations
are set. The boundaries are set before you
have a baby, and everyone knows, okay. This
is what I'm expected to do, and this
is what I agreed to do. In that
way, that will help you through motherhood because
once you have, like, 2 or 3 kids,
you
will have more breaks. Your husband will understand
that this is what you expect and what
you need
because we will go into motherhood and do
everything we want to. We're superwomen. We take
care of everything. And then one day, 2
years down the line, we're like, I can't
do this anymore. I'm so tired. You need
to help. You need to do this. And
your husband will be like, but wait a
minute. You did it for 2 years.
You were fine. You never said anything.
You know, and that's where that planning and
talking comes into place prior. It's really important
to have that in your plan with your
husband.
I wanna talk about a one more thing
before we end. I realize it's already an
hour past.
I wanna talk about some things that don't
cost anything. I've mentioned them before, but, like,
meditation,
walking in the grass, for example.
I don't know if any of you have
tried this for grounding, but walking in the
grass.
The feeling on your feet walking in grass,
I it it just feels like, you know,
just standing on, you know, on our beautiful,
Allah's creation is just amazing. Like, it just
grounds you and helps you feel,
you know, if you're having anxiety in that
moment, it takes it away.
So walking, taking breathing exercises during times that
you're feeling that anxiety,
of course,
talking to your friend, talking to your peer,
talking to your spouse,
voicing what you're feeling. You know? I had,
a friend of mine who told me postpartum,
she would just
cry
on her husband's shoulders, and,
you know, he would just tell her it's
okay. Everything will be fine. How many times
have you heard something like that happen? You
know? It was unheard of to me when
I when I heard her say that. You
know? And she was like, I just needed
to cry. I just needed because postpartum, they
need to understand that postpartum is you're going
to have these moments. You're gonna cry. You're
gonna laugh. You're gonna do different things. Like,
it's
that's what they say is baby blues. Like,
you're just up and down.
And, then next thing was, I mentioned all
the other things, but just incorporating. Those are
free things. You can take a sitz bath
at home. You can
steam at home. These are things you can
do that won't cost you anything. Right?
Take a walk with your baby regularly. Get
some fresh air. Go out into nature.
Do some yoga. Pull up a YouTube video.
Do some yoga. So this is all, like,
three things that you can do that
you can incorporate into your postpartum,
self care routine. Like, create a routine for
yourself from the beginning.
One of the last things I wanted to
say, like, pointers I wanted to say before
I end is,
you will notice that as as you become
a new mom in the postpartum period, you
feel like things are changing. Right? You are
just so like, what is happening to me?
I don't feel like the same person.
Everything has changed overnight. And and, yes, everything
will change overnight, but don't fight that new
I you know, it's almost like a new
identity. Right? You're finding yourself as a new
mother, this new, identity
over, like, after having a baby. So don't
fight that,
and just kind of, I I wanna say
roll with it, but just slowly
don't fight it, basically.
Don't give in to pressures. So if someone
says, you know, you can't do this, you
should do this, you shouldn't do this, everyone
is gonna have an opinion when you have
a baby. Everyone is gonna say, well, you
could have done this. You shouldn't have done
this, but,
don't give into those pressures.
Trust yourself.
You are the mom. You know what's best.
And sometimes you might not know what's best,
and you might need that advice and you
might ask for it, but don't, like, entertain
people who just want to
give you their opinion and, you know, just
stress you. Like
and sometimes you might love motherhood. Sometimes you
might hate it. And that's fine. One day,
you're gonna feel like I just can't stand.
Just need to get away from here. Other
days, you're just filled with love and just,
you know, you just can't even, like, deal
with it, and and that's okay.
Having compassion for yourself through all of this,
and that's where the self care ties in.
It's really important.
Not blaming yourself, and I'm telling you this
from experience.
If your baby is crying when you're breastfeeding
or after you're breastfeeding or even after your
baby's misbehaving as a toddler, it is not
your fault.
So a lot of us,
me, myself, I blame myself. I take it
on myself. I'm like, I'm a bad mom.
My baby's crying. I can't control them. I
can't do this. I can't,
you know it's not your fault. Baby is
crying.
Let them cry, and then you take care
of what what what their needs are in
that moment and then take care of that.
It we can't, like, take it on we
take a lot on ourselves, and we shouldn't
have to do that.
Being mindful, obviously, is, you know, obviously plays
a part in that.
Another important thing to know is, you know,
you want to process that birth experience postpartum.
So,
with your doula, if you have a doula,
you can talk through that. Before you have
another baby, talk through talk through someone or
just process and heal from that birth experience
because it might affect your birth,
later on.
And even though I've talked about fathers not
being too helpful,
there are fathers out there that are helpful,
and they're amazing.
They do whatever they can.
But, you know, I I don't know if
anyone knew this, but fathers also go through
postpartum blues. So
they
their world is also turned upside down. Like,
you know, there's this new baby in the
home. Their wife is not the same. They
can't have their wife's attention. They can't so
this is where you want to have your
plan before talking to your husband, how things
are gonna be. Like, do you wanna have
date nights? Is it that really important to
you both in setting that up and having
a support person, having some money aside for
your,
babysitter, for example?
It is okay to go on a date
night in your first,
you know, few months of, a postpartum. If
you're comfortable to do that, it's okay.
We have to prioritize. Like, I feel like
I can count on, like, 2 hands how
many times I went
on dates with my husband in the last
7 years. You know? So we have to
prioritize that relationship because it's that relationship that
brought the baby into the world. Right?
Yeah. So I'll leave you with one last
thing.
Before I take on questions or answer any
questions that have come in.
This is something I read, and I found
it really powerful.
It says, would you deprive your child of
eating healthy foods, moving their bodies, getting enough
rest, playing with friends, drawing, painting, reading, exploring,
signing.
I don't know what that means, but dancing
and spending quiet time alone.
Would you deprive your child of that? I
I can,
1000%
assume everyone's going to say, no. You're not
going to deprive your child of that. Right?
You wouldn't. So why would you deprive yourself
of that?
And why wouldn't you put that,
why wouldn't you take care of yourself and
allow yourself to do that? So when you
are in a position where you want to
just take give give give give,
think about yourself in that moment and ask
yourself, what do I need? And what am
I what am I feeling, and why am
I feeling in that? Why am I feeling,
like,
the way I'm feeling? Maybe I didn't give
myself x, y, and z today. What do
I need to get through the day 2?
Not only what do the husbands need or
what do the kids need, what does the
family need.
Put yourself,
first because if you're not okay, your family
won't be okay.
Being being caring for yourself is not selfish.
You know, you it's telling yourself that you
are worthy of having an amazing life just
like the life that you want to give
your kids as well.
So, yeah, that's
all I have for you today.
Thank you so much. That was a lot
of information that I got through.
So I definitely know that everybody is going
to be accessing the replay.
You guys can hop into the Facebook group
to watch it over again, pause,
you know, take a note,
write more stuff, whatever you need to do.
Inshallah.
And also you can follow, Afrah on, Instagram
and on social media. Did you say that
you had something for them, like a plan
template or something?
Yes. Yes. So I will put my email
down. Should I leave it in the group?
Yeah. Leave it in the group. That's the
best part. Put it in the Facebook group,
and you guys can contact me, and I
can send that to you if you need
it.
I also have a mother's meditation,
that a friend of mine and I created,
for mothers.
And we have I have affirmations on my
website too.
And if anyone is pregnant or in the
postpartum phase and would like a consult with
me, I am taking virtual consults at the
moment. So,
yeah, I would love to support you if
I you know, whatever way I can.
Perfect.
Sounds amazing. Okay, ladies. You heard it here
first. Please make dua for sister Afrah and
her family. Allow her to continue
to do the work that she's doing. And
every one of you that needs her help,
please do go to her
and, you know, make sure that you are
well supported and looked after at this very,
very special time in your life, Insha'Allah.
We are going to close it up now.
Afrah is in the Facebook group, so you
can go in there and you can tag
her if you want to share your takeaways,
etcetera.
Otherwise, I will see you,
in, just over an hour and a half,
for the next session. Is it? No. It's
it's in about 45 minutes. What am I
talking about? Okay. Great. For the next
session
ladies, thank you so much.
Thank you.
Move around a little bit. Get some fresh
air.
Have a coffee. Have a tea. We'll see
you back for the next, the final session
of the day.
Thank you so much, sis.
Thank you for having me. You're welcome. Everyone.