Should NEW mothers lock themselves away for a month?
Under relentless pressure to get their lives back to normal just days after giving birth, modern women are turning to an ancient practice to save their sanity. So . . .
SNAP back into your skinny jeans. Have the home ready for cooing visitors round the clock. Appear poised and preened for all those pictures. And don’t neglect the new addition’s perfectly pressed, colour-coordinated wardrobe.
With the birth of a new baby comes a litany of duties for the modern mother. And the more children you have, the quicker you are expected to return to your perfectly ordered former life — never mind the emotional and physical disruption a newborn can bring.
There is no better example of the increasing expectations on new mums than Kate Middleton. Not only did she appear immaculately coiffed on the steps of the hospital a mere seven hours after having her third child, Prince Louis, but it recently emerged she did the school run with Prince George the following morning.
Then there are the growing number of women proud to have gone back to work just a few days after giving birth, determined to juggle motherhood with a fastpaced career from the very start.
Prime Time co-host Miriam O’Callaghan took just ten days off work when she gave
birth to her twin daughters Georgia and Jessica, while fashion designer Roksanda Ilincic worked from her hospital bed after the birth of her first child, and was back to work a week later.
But the truth is that many women feel utterly swamped by the difficulty of returning to ‘normal’ in a matter of a few days, with a tiny baby in tow.
One of them is Steph Douglas, 37, who felt intense pressure to conform to today’s supermother standards after having her first child, Buster.
Within days of his birth she was out food shopping for the family, meeting up with friends she met at prenatal classes to try to cement her new friendship group and accommodating a steady stream of visitors.
The days and weeks following her second child Mabel’s birth were equally fraught — and left her exhausted and miserable.
SO THE third time around, with the birth of Frank, she decided to take a completely different approach. While researching how best to recuperate, she came across a concept known as ‘postpartum confinement’.
Beginning immediately after the birth, it lasts for at least one month and involves bed rest, banning visitors and focusing on nothing but yourself and your new baby.
It might sound extreme, but some form of confinement after birth is the norm in a number of countries. In China and Japan it’s known as ‘sitting the month’, while in Latin America it lasts 40 days and is called la cuarentena, or quarantine.
Lorna Marsh, of the parenting website babycentre.co.uk, says new mums are becoming more confident about their true needs post-birth.
‘More women feel confident about setting their own pace after giving birth, and anecdotally we are aware of the increasing numbers who are adopting the less extreme principles of confinement, namely rest and recuperation,’ she explains.
‘There’s more advice and community support for new mums now so they’re more informed when it comes to making up their own minds about what to do after having a baby, rather than feeling pressure to conform to any perceived norms. If they have the luxury of staying in bed with their baby, they don’t feel guilty doing so.
‘We’re aware that women used to spend much longer in hospital after giving birth. But now that we’re better informed about having babies, it enables women to go home sooner — often within hours — providing there are no complications.’
This struck a chord with Steph, who decided it was the perfect antidote to the stress-inducing approach. So, after Frank was born eight months ago, it was out with housework and hosting, and in with bed rest and skin-to-skin cuddles, said to improve the bond between mother and baby.
Instead of fretting about regaining her figure, she enjoyed nourishing meals cooked by friends (and left on the doorstep so as not to disturb her).
Rather than ferrying three children around, she left the house as little as possible and her husband took over the childcare.
She took naps whenever she could and, although she runs her own gift business, Don’t Buy Her Flowers, and usually checks work emails constantly, she put a team of staff in place to manage her company. She kept up this regime for a month, and its benefits astounded her.
In the Far East and South America, confinements have long been considered essential to recovery from pregnancy and birth, with women effectively quarantined at home for between 30 and 40 days.
More extreme versions advocate not washing your hair and avoiding exposure to cold air or water. A woman’s mother or mother-in-law will often care for her — although many also hire a special confinement nanny.
Psychologist Dr Stella Acquarone points out that there are similarities between ‘confinement’ and the gentler postpartum rest period that our own mothers would have known.
As recently as the 1970s, she explains, women typically spent up to ten days in hospital after a birth, giving them time to recover under the eyes of nursing staff.
Today, with beds in high demand and HSE maternity resources dwindling, many mums are discharged within hours of giving birth.
‘It’s time we introduced this type of care at home after having a baby,’ Dr Acquarone explains. ‘New mums must give themselves permission to rest and relax with their baby instead of having a hectic schedule.
‘It would be lovely to see the nurturing side of confinement being taken more seriously, encouraging women to ask for the space and help they need to recover, adjust and bond with their baby.’ On the other hand, some experts urge caution about confinement, stressing that each mother must choose what’s right for her. Lorna Marsh, says it’s completely unnecessary to avoid washing or exercise for a month or more after having a baby. ‘In fact, it may be detrimental to the new mum’s mental well-being,’ she says. ‘It’s important to retain your identity and sense of self when you’re a new mum, and getting back to a simple, everyday personal routine helps with this, not to mention getting out and about, with or without your newborn. ‘Exercise is also important to help you get your strength and energy back, and can ease symptoms of depression.’ Yet Steph Douglas says trying to do too much had left her miserable after Buster’s birth seven years ago. She remembers ‘sitting on the sofa crying because I felt overwhelmed by the pressure I’d put on myself to be up and about immediately’.
She adds: ‘People would tell me to sleep when he slept, but I had too much to do. I felt I should be out and “back to normal”, as other new mothers seemed to be.
‘It didn’t occur to me to turn visitors away. These days, we’re led to believe we’re not meant to be vulnerable after birth; that you can just pick up your life as before. Yet your hormones have gone haywire. Although in some ways you feel amazing, you feel broken, too.’
Steph assumed it would be easier when she had her second child, Mabel, in September 2012. She also wanted to keep life as normal as possible for her then 21-month old son.
Within days of the birth, she was doing the nursery run and dashing around the park. Her husband Mark, 38, helped as much as he could while juggling parenting with his job in finance.
He had only two weeks’ paid paternity leave, during which he focused on Buster, giving Steph time to tend to Mabel. Then Steph was left to handle them both.
‘By Christmas I was shattered,’ says Steph. ‘I went to my GP feeling weepy, angry and anxious. He told me I needed to go home and try to calm everything down.’
She was determined things would be different after Frank was born. ‘I’d read about confinement practices, and although the extreme versions — such as not washing — weren’t for me, I adopted other elements,’ she explains. After being discharged from hospital, Steph spent a week in bed followed by a week on the sofa.
‘I banned visitors, other than our own parents, for a few weeks and started napping whenever Frank was asleep. It’s amazing how a little sleep suddenly gives you perspective and helps you feel more rational.
‘The older children were in school so Mark did the school run. When work commitments meant he couldn’t, I asked fellow parents at school if someone could drop the kids home, and people were more than willing to help.’
Steph says her confinement ‘made a huge difference to my experience of having a newborn. It also meant I had more energy for the older two kids, rather than expending what little I had on visitors.
‘It gave us all much-needed time to adapt to life as a family of five.
‘Taking things more slowly meant if I started to wobble — feeling tired or blue, what I now understand are normal feelings in that first year — I would look after myself rather than completely burning out.’
Some mothers might fear friends
‘Last time around, I was weepy, angry and anxious. So after I had Frank, I banned visitors, ditched the school run and let friends cook for me’
and relatives would be offended at not being allowed to visit. But Steph found everyone understood why she was ‘pulling up the drawbridge. In fact so many said they wished they’d done the same, because their first months with a newborn were an exhausted blur.’
Of course, not every new mother is lucky enough to have a partner, parent or other relative able to offer this sort of help.
The idea of a relaxed confinement period is a distant dream to single mothers living far from family, while many more couples would not be able to afford for a father to take even a few days’ unpaid leave beyond the statutory amount.
But for those who can get help, it may make all the difference.
Hayley Weston, 42, went into confinement after the birth of her youngest child, in response to burning out after her first was born.
‘After a horrendous birth and complications first time round, I was in hospital for two weeks and was then so desperate to get out and see people that I rushed my recovery and ended up with shingles,’ says Hayley, who lives with her husband Dan, 41, a software engineer, and their children Raphael, three, and Leia, 18 months. ‘Ahead of having Leia, Dan and I discussed what we should do to aid my recovery and I came across the idea of postpartum confinement online.’ While Hayley’s husband ran the house, took their son to nursery, shopped and cooked — juggling this around his work — she concentrated on breastfeeding their daughter and recovering in bed. ‘I’d have a warm bath every morning and endless skin-to-skin cuddles with my baby,’ she explains. For a month we only allowed my lactation consultant and close family members to visit. I ate lots of fruit, vegetables and fresh fish to nourish my body.’ Hayley says it certainly helped her recover more quickly and was a major factor in being able to breastfeed successfully. ‘I watched hours of Netflix and read novels during those first five weeks,’ she reflects. Confinement, however, is not for everyone. Chloe Leung, 30, a human resources officer who lives with her husband Jeffrey, 33, a customer services manager, and their son Theodore, one, said she was climbing the walls by the end. Admittedly her 30-day confinement was a more traditional version implemented by her mother, who’d flown over from Hong Kong for the birth of her grandchild. ‘I didn’t do anything for a month other than lie down and feed my baby,’ Chloe recalls. ‘Mum insisted I didn’t wash my hair because the Chinese believe it increases the risk of colds. But after two weeks using dry shampoo I couldn’t stand it, and began washing it every two to three days.’ Chloe ate mostly rice and steamed chicken for a month, washed down with boiled water and ginger — which she also used for bathing. She didn’t leave the house — not even to stand on the balcony of her apartment for a breath of air, lest she should catch cold. ‘Jeffrey was at work, so he just went along with it,’ Chloe adds. ‘But as soon as day 31 arrived, Mum flew back to Hong Kong and we escaped to Scotland for a break. I was so glad it was over. I was grateful of resting for the first two weeks, but a month was too long to stay indoors and not see friends.’
LORNA MARSH says no mother should feel pressured to stay inside: ‘The most important thing is for a new mum to be comfortable and happy, and that means different things for different women.’
Sarah Cooke, 35, who owns jewellery company Halia Rose, followed a relaxed version of confinement after having her two children while living in Singapore.
‘We’d lived there for three years by the time I had my first baby in 2013, so I knew about the confinement period and liked the idea,’ says Sarah, who lives with her husband Richard, 35.
‘After a horrendous 54-hour labour with Henry, now four, I was in hospital for five days.
‘With no family in Singapore, I needed to get well quickly for my and Henry’s sake.
‘I’ve always been health-conscious and sporty and never expected giving birth to hit me the way it did, so the nourishing confinement food in particular made sense to me.’
Sarah’s diet consisted of rice, vegetables, fish, poultry, fruit and rehydrating soups, which she says made her feel good and boosted her breast milk. ‘I didn’t leave home either,’ she adds.
‘I followed the same confinement principles after having my daughter Amelia in 2015. It was fundamental to my recovery and being able to bond with and breastfeed my baby.’
In an increasingly fast-paced world, taking a month to recover might seem contrary — but perhaps that’s just what new mums need.