Birth is one of the most incredible experiences known to humanity, the hours of labor leading up to those first few precious moments where you get to meet the baby you’ve been creating for nine months. It’s just indescribable. Following a natural or cesarean birth, it’s crucial you give your body time to heal. Should you have experienced any difficulties in your labor, you may want to contact a spinal anesthesia malpractice lawyer. 

Rest, rest, and more rest. Now it’s easy to say, but make sure you factor in time to catch up on sleep and give your body time to heal. As you would with any type of surgery, make sure to rest in bed wherever possible. Easier said than done with a newborn in tow but take any opportunity you can get!

Use a Sitz bath. This is a shallow bath you take multiple times a day to ease the soreness following birth and reduce swelling. 

Eat healthily to replenish your body’s energy stores and contribute to faster recovery time. By eating plenty of fruit and vegetables, as well as making sure you’re getting enough protein and fiber, your body will be in a better position to heal quicker and get you feeling better faster. 

Ask for help and take it when it’s offered. Following birth, you’re going to have a lot of visitors who will want to see the new baby, so take advantage of this situation and ask for assistance in the early days. Few people will turn down the opportunity to take the baby in their stroller for a walk for half an hour so you can rest. 

Reduce your expectations. Your house won’t look perfect, the dishes may need doing, and the garbage may need to take out, but don’t put pressure on yourself to maintain an ideal home. It may feel all you’re doing is feeding, sleeping, and caring for your baby, and that is entirely okay.

Limit your activity. Follow your doctor’s advice on how much activity you should be doing. Each birth is different so that recovery will vary immensely from one woman to the next, but be sure to follow the advice you were given after birth strictly, in order to recover thoroughly. 

Clocks go out the window. Some brilliant advice for adapting to being parents of a newborn is to accept that time is no longer a concept; if your baby is awake from 2 am to 6 am, treat these hours now as daytime and factor the hours back in during the day to catch up on sleep. 

Check your emotions. Baby blues post-birth are really common, whether it’s the dramatic hormonal change, the lack of sleep, or the demands for caring for a new baby, the newborn days are emotional. However, should the over or underwhelming emotions still be affecting you months down the line, consider discussing your emotional state with a doctor. 

In just a few short weeks, your body reverses the changes it made over nine months, so take things slowly and give yourself some credit.