Postpartum Advice I'd Give You If I Wasn't Afraid To Hurt Your Feelings

1/ Sleep when the baby sleeps, for the love of god, the cleaning can wait woman you look exhausted (third time mum wisdom, fight me)

Welcome to Baby Brain, a space where I – Charlotte, hi! – write about family life with three small children – Poppet (m, 5 years), Pickle (m, 4 years) and Peach (f, 1 year.) Those are not their real names. These are real stories from our days.

1/ Sleep when the baby sleeps, for the love of god, the cleaning can wait woman you look exhausted (third time mum wisdom, fight me)

2/ Your doctor is wrong, that ab separation won’t fix itself

3/ No I mean, really, if your doctor told you that, don’t listen. Mine said the same thing and my abs are still so separated they may as well get a divorce

4/ Bounceback culture is pervasive and it will eat your soul if you pay too much attention to it – try to focus on what an amazing thing your body just did instead of how soon you can get back into your jeans. That jean cut is out of fashion now, anyway, so you may as well enjoy your joggers

5/ Maybe take a shower, though, brush your hair

6/ If you’re finding yourself regularly staring out of the window, wondering what happened to your life as you weep into a packet of biscuits, it might be more than ‘the baby blues’

7/ Or it might be that you haven’t left your house in three days and your baby has vomited all over you after every feed since they were born (just mine?) which is enough to make anyone feel bonkers. GO. OUT. SIDE.

8/ This is a make or break period in a lot of your relationships, some just might not make it

9/ Which is manageable (though sad) as long as your partner is pulling their weight, which they absolutely have to do – they’re just as responsible for that baby as you are, even if they “don’t have the boobs” or if “baby is just happier with you!”

10/ But the positive thing in all of this is that now you’re a mum you can stop wondering why mums hang out with mums (it’s because we get it), and go find yourself some mums to hang out with

11/ If you really, really want to breastfeed, you’re going to have to seek out professional help if things go wrong. Society is only on board with breast is best until things get complicated, and then it’s a full on formula love fest. There’s nothing wrong with formula if you want to use formula (I did), but you’re probably not going to get much support from the general population if you’d rather push on without it

12/ People are going to shame you whatever your feeding choices, though, so just crack on with what works for you

13/ Colic is just a word doctors use to get new mums out of their office. If your baby is crying a lot, there’s a reason, and it’s probably going to be down to you to work out what that reason is (sorry) (but also you’re welcome, because I’ve shared some reasons your baby might be crying, here, which could help!)

14/ A lot of people won’t like that you ‘take up space’ with your baby (prams on the pavement, children in cafes, needing help getting onto a train, etc). It sucks but you’ll get used to it, and they’re the ones in the wrong

15/ *Whispers* You might get more rest if you co-sleep 🤫

(Anything to add?)

Until next time 👩🏻‍🍼

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