Episode 45: Postpartum GPS

Postpartum planning – Helping your clients set their course for postpartum success.

Birth planning is a common discussion between doulas and clients. However, postpartum planning is just as essential to growing families.

Some clients will hire a postpartum doula before their baby is born. Others will seek postpartum care once their baby has arrived. As postpartum doulas, our goal is to help families explore their preferences and options. What feels right when making decisions about how they will care for their babies? What are their parenting philosophies?

Teaching a newborn care class is a great way to help growing families become aware of the many benefits of postpartum care. It can also help them to explore the parenting philosophies that feel most natural to them. In addition, it allows them to become informed about the many decisions they may need to make about the care of their baby after birth.

The first step to supporting postpartum families is to identify their starting point. Where are their areas of concern? Do they have any concerns about common topics like infant feeding, sleeping, sibling care, etc?

For the clients who hire a postpartum doula before birth, helping them explore their options and preferences for how their baby will be cared for immediately after birth is essential. How do you identify where the client’s starting point may be? How do they feel about immediate newborn tests and procedures and what are their preferences for each?

Helping clients establish a routine that addresses daily and weekly tasks such as cleaning, shopping, and other routine tasks is an essential part of postpartum planning. For many clients having a plan in place will allow them to more fully relax and tend to the critical self-care needs that often fall by the wayside by trying to “do it all.”

Come join us as we discuss the many facets of helping our clients navigate the postpartum period and establish their own Postpartum GPS.