Arrive - settle in next to Mom, with a cup of hot nettles and honey.
Listen and talk - time for questions.
Midwife-y tasks, like measuring blood pressure and listening to baby's heartbeat.
Perform the Newborn Screens, for the Minnesota Department of Health.
Signature Lying-In massage.
Warm, salted, herby bath.
Fresh linens are placed on the bed.
In the kitchen: Sitz bath packets are prepared for the week and placenta is encapsulated.
Bedside table is tidied and stocked - things that Mom will need, within arm's reach.
Warm, herb-scented towels are wrapped around Mom.
Another cup of tea and some medicine.
​Mom and baby tucked back into bed, together.

Your body has done A LOT in the past weeks and months and will have some wounds that need to heal. Here is a peek into how to support your body while it does the important work of closing those wounds.

Bleeding

Expect to bleed, off and on, for six weeks after birth. Postpartum bleeding is typically the result of:

• the endometrium shedding what it no longer needs 
• the placental site
• any tears that occurred in or on your body during birth

​The appearance of your bleeding will evolve throughout your lying-in, from deep or bright red to pink/orange/brown and finally to thick, white and creamy.

Great job taking care of yourself and your baby, mamas - keep up the good work of healing!

Feeling exhausted, sad, missing our “before baby” lives and loving our baby harder than we thought it possible to love, are feelings that can exist side by side in our minds. We can feel the overwhelm and still love our baby like crazy. Life and emotions are not black and white things. We can love deeply, but also be deeply exhausted. We can feel so much love that we feel like our hearts are either going to run over or explode and at the same time feel deeply empty and overwhelmed. All of these jumbled feelings can stand side by side. They can all exist at once. And we can feel one way one minute and the complete opposite the next. We HAVE to create a safe space and community for ourselves. Ask yourself, who are your people? Who are your “I’m a hot-mess, I don’t even love this day”, people? Who are the people who can understand that you can love your children endlessly, but still not love everything about motherhood and parenting, people? Who do you trust to come into your home, take a look around, and roll up their sleeves because they know what needs to be done? Who will give you a hug, or brush your hair, or tuck you back into bed?
What if we told you that it is your responsibility to your baby to take care of yourself? It’s not a selfish thing to do. What if we said that building a tribe, a village, is actually part of your job. That it’s ok to ask for or need help. That it’s necessary to have a supportive community. That we as humans are built for connection, for interdependency. That because we are always giving, we must also receive. That if we don’t receive, our children, our families, our friends, all of our other work, will suffer. I mean, truly suffer. So, what if we said this is not a selfish desire, but a part of our job title as a parent. It is our job to create a framework, a network of people we feel we can receive from in a way that goes far beyond our physical needs of a clean house and meals. As new mamas we kind of need the same things our babies do. We need to lay our head on someone’s shoulder, have our backs rubbed, sleep deeply, and have someone bring us nourishing food and drinks. We need to be held. We need to not have all the responsibility of running a household. It’s really just the smallest window of time. We need to be able to depend on others during this time. ​

​Each year, in the United States, nearly one million women are reporting their experiences with postpartum depression (http://www.postpartumprogress.com/how-many-women-get-postpartum-depression-the-statistics-on-ppd).

Here, in the U.S. many women state  "lack of knowledge" as the reason not to start or continue breastfeeding (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK52688/).
​