joy-noblick

What a Postpartum Doula Actually Does (and Why You Might Need One)

Fri, 14 Oct 2022 20:26:40 GMT

What a Postpartum Doula Actually Does (and Why You Might Need One)

There is a good chance you have heard the word doula and pictured someone in a delivery room holding someone's hand through contractions. That is a birth doula. Wonderful people. Not what I do.

A postpartum doula shows up after the baby is here. When the hospital has sent you home with a tiny human and a packet of papers and genuinely wished you good luck. When the excitement of the first few days starts to settle into the reality of round the clock feeding, zero sleep, and a body that is recovering from something pretty significant.

That is when I walk through your door.

So what does a postpartum doula actually do?

The honest answer is that it looks different for every family. But at its core, postpartum doula support is about filling the gap between what new parents need and what they are actually getting.

In practical terms that might look like taking the baby so you can sleep for a few hours. Sitting with you while you figure out breastfeeding for the fourth time that morning. Answering the question you forgot to ask your OB. Helping you figure out why your baby makes that sound at 2am and whether it is something to worry about. Spoiler: it usually is not.

A postpartum doula is part newborn care specialist, part lactation support, part educator, and part just a really calm person who has seen a lot and does not panic easily. For families in those foggy early weeks, that combination is worth more than most people realize until they are in it.

Is a postpartum doula the same as a night nurse?

Not exactly. A night nurse typically focuses on caring for the baby overnight. A postpartum doula supports the whole family. That includes the recovering parent, the partner who is also exhausted and trying to figure out their new role, the older sibling who suddenly does not know where they fit, and yes, the baby too.

The goal is never to take over. It is to build your confidence so that when the support ends, you feel ready.

Do I actually need one?

That depends on your situation. Some families have a strong support system nearby. If that is you, that is genuinely wonderful.

But a lot of families do not. Or they have people around who mean well but cannot actually answer a question about infant feeding or explain what a wake window is or tell you whether what you are feeling is the baby blues or something that needs more attention.

That is where a postpartum doula earns her place.

What about sleep?

Sleep comes up in almost every postpartum conversation I have. Newborn sleep is confusing, exhausting, and nothing like what most parents expected. As a certified pediatric sleep consultant in addition to my postpartum doula work, I support families from the newborn stage all the way through the preschool years. Some families come to me for postpartum support and naturally continue with sleep consulting as their baby grows. Others find me specifically because sleep has become a crisis and they need a plan.

Either way, there is help available.

A note on finding the right support

If you are expecting or newly postpartum in Hunterdon County, Warren County, or Somerset County in New Jersey, postpartum doula support is more accessible than most people realize. A free discovery call is usually the best place to start. It costs nothing and gives you a chance to ask questions and figure out whether this kind of support makes sense for your family.

If you are not quite there yet but want to start preparing, my guide Feel Confident Bringing Your Baby Home: Even If You Haven't Read A Single Baby Book is packed with everything you need to know about those first weeks, including product recommendations to help you set up your home before baby arrives.

And if your newborn's sleep is already keeping you up at night before they even arrive, Stop Fighting Your Newborn's Sleep: What Actually Works in Weeks 1-8: No Sleep Training Required walks you through what is actually normal in the first eight weeks and what you can do to make it easier.

If you want free support to start, grab my free newborn sleep shaping guide and get a head start on understanding your baby's sleep before they even arrive.

Joy Noblick is a DONA International Certified Postpartum Doula, Newborn Care Specialist, Lactation Specialist, and Certified Pediatric Sleep Consultant serving families in Hunterdon, Warren, and Somerset Counties, NJ. Find her at doulabyjoy.com or on Instagram @doulabyjoy.

Why Your Newborn Has Their Days and Nights Mixed Up (and What To Do About It)

Fri, 14 Oct 2022 20:26:40 GMT

Why Your Newborn Has Their Days and Nights Mixed Up (and What To Do About It)

You just brought your baby home. It is 3am and they are wide awake, kicking their little legs, completely delighted with life. Then 10am rolls around and they are out cold and completely impossible to wake up. You are exhausted, confused, and starting to wonder if your baby missed some kind of memo.

They did not. This is completely normal and there is actually a really good reason it happens.

Why newborns get their days and nights mixed up

Inside the womb, your baby had no concept of daytime or nighttime. They were warm, fed, and rocked to sleep by your movements all day long. When you were up and moving around during the day, the motion actually lulled them to sleep. When you stopped moving at night and settled in to rest, they woke up and got active.

So your newborn is not doing anything wrong. They are just running on the only schedule they have ever known.

Here is the thing most people do not realize: newborns are not born with a working internal clock. The part of the brain that regulates the sleep-wake cycle, body temperature, and melatonin production is not fully developed yet. Most babies do not begin showing recognizable day and night patterns until somewhere around 6 to 12 weeks of age, and more consolidated nighttime sleep typically does not emerge until closer to 3 to 4 months.

In other words, this is a stage. Not a sign that something is wrong. Not a reflection of your parenting. Just your baby's biology catching up with the outside world.

You are their guide through this. And that is a role you are already stepping into just by showing up every night even when it is hard.

So what can you actually do about it?

The good news is that there are some gentle, simple things you can start doing right away to help your newborn begin sorting out the difference between day and night. Nothing complicated. Nothing that requires letting your baby cry or following a rigid schedule at two weeks old.

A few things that can help:

During the day, let the light in. Natural light is one of the most powerful cues your baby's developing brain uses to set their internal clock. Open the blinds, go outside if you can, and keep daytime awake periods bright and stimulating even if those awake windows are only 45 minutes long.

Keep nights calm and boring on purpose. Dim the lights for nighttime feeds, keep your voice quiet, and avoid stimulating play in the overnight hours. Your baby does not need to know what time it is, but your job is to make sure nothing about that environment says party time.

Watch those wake windows. Newborns can only handle very short periods of wakefulness before they become overtired, and an overtired newborn is much harder to settle. In the early weeks we are talking 45 minutes to an hour at most before sleep is needed again.

These are just a few pieces of the puzzle.

Want the full picture?

If you want a clear, week by week breakdown of what newborn sleep actually looks like in the first eight weeks and how to gently start shaping it from day one, my free newborn sleep shaping guide walks you through exactly that.

No sleep training. No cry it out. Just practical, evidence based guidance that helps you understand what is normal, what to expect as your baby grows, and how to set the foundation for better sleep down the road.

CLICK HERE for your free guide: First 8 Weeks Sleep Shaping Roadmap

What the First Week Home With a Newborn Actually Looks Like

Fri, 14 Oct 2022 20:26:40 GMT

What the First Week Home With a Newborn Actually Looks Like

Nobody really prepares you for the first week home with a newborn. Not your OB, not your childbirth class, not the well meaning friends who told you to sleep when the baby sleeps. You walk through your front door with this tiny person and suddenly everything you thought you knew goes right out the window.

If you are still pregnant and reading this, good. You are already one step ahead. If you are in the middle of that first week right now and you Googled this at 4am, you are exactly where you are supposed to be and you are doing better than you think.

Let's talk about what is actually normal.

The first few days are a blur and that is okay

The first 48 to 72 hours at home are a lot. Your body is recovering from something significant regardless of how your baby arrived. Your hormones are shifting in ways that can make you feel like a completely different person from one hour to the next. Your baby is adjusting to being on the outside of your body for the very first time.

Everything feels enormous because it is enormous. That does not mean you are not handling it.

Most newborns lose a small amount of weight in the first few days before your milk comes in or your supply regulates. They sleep in short stretches, wake frequently to feed, and have no concept whatsoever of day or night. This is not a problem you need to fix. This is just what newborns do.

Feeding will take up most of your day and that is normal too

Whether you are breastfeeding, formula feeding, or doing some combination of both, feeding a newborn is basically a part time job in those first weeks. Newborns typically feed every 2 to 3 hours around the clock, sometimes more. That is 8 to 12 feeds in a 24 hour period.

If breastfeeding feels hard, that is not a sign you are doing it wrong. It is a skill that takes time for both you and your baby to figure out. Most feeding challenges in the early days are completely normal and very fixable with the right support.

Give yourself permission to ask for help. It is not a sign of failure. It is a sign of someone who wants things to go well.

You will wonder if something is wrong approximately one thousand times

The sounds newborns make. The faces they pull. The way they startle for no reason in the middle of a dead sleep. The color of the diaper contents. All of it will make you Google things at 2am that you probably should not Google at 2am.

Here is what I tell every family I work with: most of what you are worried about is completely normal. Newborns are noisy, unpredictable, and nothing like what the books described. That does not mean something is wrong. It means you have a newborn.

Trust your instincts. If something feels genuinely off, call your pediatrician. That is what they are there for.

The emotional part is real

Around day 3 or 4 many parents hit a wall. The adrenaline of birth and those first exciting days starts to wear off. The milk comes in. The sleep deprivation kicks in for real. The visitors slow down. And suddenly the weight of this new responsibility lands differently.

If you find yourself crying and you are not entirely sure why, that is the baby blues and it is incredibly common. It typically peaks around day 3 to 5 and starts to lift within the first two weeks. If it does not lift, or if it feels like more than just tearfulness, please reach out to your provider. Postpartum mood disorders are common, treatable, and nothing to push through alone.

Every single phase is just that. A phase.

The sleepless nights, the cluster feeding, the days where you cannot put the baby down for more than four minutes without them screaming, the moments where you wonder if you made a terrible mistake and then immediately feel guilty for thinking that.

All of it is a phase.

It gets easier. Not because the baby stops needing you, but because you get better at this. Every single day you are learning your baby and your baby is learning you. You are building something together even when it does not feel like it.

You are not failing. You are not behind. You are not doing it wrong.

You are killing it. And you deserve to give yourself a little credit for that.

Take a break. Seriously.

Put the baby down somewhere safe and go outside for ten minutes. Eat something while it is still warm. Let someone else hold the baby while you shower. Rest is not a reward you earn after you have done everything perfectly. It is a necessity and you are allowed to prioritize it.

Asking for help is not weakness. It is wisdom.

Before your baby arrives, a little preparation goes a long way

If you are still expecting, the best thing you can do right now is get your home and your head ready before baby arrives. Setting up your postpartum recovery space, knowing what to stock, understanding what those first weeks will actually look like, that kind of preparation makes a real difference when you are in the thick of it and running on no sleep.

My guide Feel Confident Bringing Your Baby Home: Even If You Haven't Read a Single Baby Book walks you through exactly that. It covers everything from setting up your home before baby arrives to product recommendations that actually make those early weeks easier.

And if you want to get a head start on understanding your newborn's sleep before exhaustion sets in, grab my free newborn sleep shaping guide too.

CLICK HERE for your FREE guide: The First 8 Weeks Sleep Shaping Roadmap