The Post Partum Visit: What the family needs

As time seems to be flying by and I can tell D-day is approaching (that's Delivery Day), I've had some time to think about what will happen after the birth, adjusting to a new way of living with baby in our world, and all the visitors to come.  I guess in a way we are lucky in that we recently moved many hours and states away from family and haven't made too many close friends yet here in Charlotte.  I'll tell you why this is a good thing for the first few months after the birth...

First, to sum it all up, I wanted to share these two fabulous posts from other natural moms on the post partum visit and how to be the best visitor you can be:

"HOW TO BE THE BEST POST PARTUM VISITOR IN 15 MINUTES OR LESS" by There Are No Ordinary Moments

"AFTER THE BIRTH, WHAT A FAMILY NEEDS" by Gloria Lemay, birth blog

I think these ladies did an excellent job summarizing what we new parents, and especially new mom and baby, need most from our visitors.  I personally am going to be focusing my first month with baby on our "Baby Moon," the time that we take together (basically in isolation) to get acquainted with our new life together, to learn our personalities, love on each other, and bond.  It is such an important foundation building time for every baby.  This time allows for plenty of skin-to-skin contact, meaning I (or in general, mom) won't be presentable for drop-in visitors.  And not to mention we'll be super tired as we adjust to this new life.  So what I meant about it being a good thing that we live far away from everyone we know is that we won't have a ton of unannounced visitors or people calling to come over and meet baby.

As a new mom, what we need from our visitors is a quick in-and-out visit.  While bringing food over is a nice gesture, I think we'd more appreciate it if you loaded the dishwasher or ran a pile of clothes thru the wash on your way out the door.  It's the little things that catch up on us fast.  I like how both of these ladies pointed that out in their articles.  So keep these words of advice in mind when visiting your new mama friends in the future!  It'll make mama so happy! :)