Copied from Facebook, please get proper rest mama's!
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We are told we need to rest in the postpartum, but so many birthing Moms arent told WHY. And sometimes it's the WHY that makes the difference between deep rest and deep regret.
The average diameter of a placenta is 22cm/8.6 inches.
You could say that it's the size of a side dinner plate, an average watermelon🍉 paper plate or a soccer ball ⚽️ for reference. It's also the size of the average placenta that we have just grown for 9 months.
After we birth the placenta, we are left with a wound inside of our uterus where the placenta was attached. If we had this wound on the outside, say on our back or chest, EVERYONE would be telling us to rest and they would help us! Also, the placenta is an organ, that we just expelled from our body, if we had lost a kidney or an appendix, 40 days of recovering would be pretty minimal and probably unheard of. Our doctors and family would expect us to rest longer....
The wound site from the placenta is one of the main reasons for postpartum bleeding/lochia 🩸We lose about 1/10 of our blood supply from this open wound! So whether you had a c-section birth or vaginal, everyone has this bleeding wound.
It takes on average 6 weeks for this wound to heal. And this is just an average, because it depends on how much we rest, the nourishment we receive from food and support. So mothers who receive less may take longer, and mothers who prepare and set themselves up may heal quicker.
The longer the wound site is left open, the higher risk we have for infection and hemorrhage, even if you had a safe vaginal delivery or zero complications from birth. But because this is an internal aka hidden healing part of the postpartum recovery we don't always take it seriously. And neither does our community.
After birth we are hormonal, exhausted, emotionally vulnerable, learning to feed our baby AND our body is working hard to heal this huge wound. It's a lot. Do yourself a favor and REST and ask for help!
If you are a partner or friend or family member, take this information in, SUPPORT is what they need ✌🏻