The Exploration or The Challenge of Being Cared For

In the simplest terms, this exploration is a question of how I will allow other people (my husband, the grandmothers, a doula or two, and a few friends) to completely care for me for a minimum of 42 days after the birth of my baby. Really think about this for a moment. 42 days of having all my meals prepared fresh daily (no frozen casseroles, no leftovers), freshly prepared handmade teas, my body massaged and oiled, errands ran, house cleaned, music played for me, being read to, and when asked, I
will be left alone to meditate, pray or do whatever else strikes my fancy - all while taking care of a newborn and re-establishing family norms. You see, my family has decided to go into the perinatal phase with the guiding principle:

Mom takes care of the baby and everyone else takes care of mom.

Nourishing, delicious, healing, nurturing foods and teas
for me and baby's well being.

Ayurveda is a 5000 year old form of healing hailing from India. The modality is quite similar to Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM). If you've read Deepak Chopra's national bestseller Perfect Health, you got a sneak peak into Ayurveda. The Ayurvedic system has a saying regarding postpartum well being, "42 days for 42 years." The sentiment of this saying is that the 42 days following childbirth will influence the well-being of the mother for the next 42 years (I'll go into this more later). No, I don't have a source for that, and I don't believe there are any peer-reviewed papers that have addressed the 42 years part, but we do know a lot about how postpartum care effects the entire family - mom, significant other (SO), baby, work, and household. Do a Google search on "postpartum." What do you get? Link after link after link about postpartum depression and not "how awesome can postpartum be!" There's got to be a better way. By jove I think there may be!

As for why I chose the Ayurvedic approach, well, first of all it's an approach that I don't have to guess at. There are resources available that I have convenient, cost effective access to. Secondly, it largely resonates with my palate (nom nom nom). Most importantly, it makes intuitive and logical sense to me. The idea of taking time for myself in this way, at this time, feels essential and life affirming. I want to focus on my baby and be the strongest person I can be for our life together. I want to be the best I can for my husband, and yes, I do mean sexually amongst other things. If I leave holes in the foundation of my body and/or psyche, how does that serve anyone? Somewhere deep in me, I know, this is going to make a tremendous difference. And lastly, I believe my family deserves this, I deserve this.

Resources

The guide book and recipe book that I am using for this exploration come from the Sacred Window School for Maternal and Newborn Health. You can find them here for $12.

Rock on, mommy!

For consultation and loving guidance I have an amazing friend Andrea Shuman who co-owns Ahara Rasa Ayurvedic Center in Portland, Oregon. She taught me how to say "shatavari" properly.

At the time of this writing I am interviewing doulas. There are no practicing Ayurdoulas in the greater Portland metro area, and so I'm looking for a doula that is comfortable with the cooking and the body work. I'll have some posts later about who I selected, why, cost, and other things.

Y'know, the more I think about this, the more it starts to sound like a celebration!