Becoming a new mom is a beautiful and transformative journey, but it also comes with its unique set of challenges. As you embrace the joy and wonder of motherhood, it's crucial to remember that taking care of yourself is just as important as caring for your little one. In this blog post, we're excited to share 10 self-care ideas for new moms â practical ways to nurture your physical and emotional well-being during those early days of motherhood. We understand the demands and joys of this incredible journey, and we're here to support you every step of the way.
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Welcome to a new series about birth workers in Utah. If you’re new here, hi there, I’m Jessica Esplin and I’m a traveling newborn portrait photographer in Utah County. In this series it’s my goal to interview people that work with pregnant, birthing, and new mothers to learn about their services and how they help their clients. For our next post, we interviewed Anna Burch of Prenatal Insights, based in Spanish Fork. She's a lactation consultant that serves nursing parents in Utah County. I was able to photograph a lactation consultation with Anna and after listening to her I wish I had Anna to help me when my babies were still nursing; then she could tell me how to overcome our challenges we experienced such as latching with a newborn, overcoming a nursing strike, and learning about tongue or lip ties. Tell me about yourself and your business. My name is Anna Burch. I am a Registered Nurse, Lactation Consultant (IBCLC), Educator of Infant Massage (CEIM), and mom of 3 (including twins). I started my lactation Consulting private practice in 2017 serving mamas all over Utah County through in-person classes and in-home consultations. I have since expanded my private practice to include online courses, virtual consultations, and added several more Lactation Consultants in order to support even more mamas throughout Utah, Salt Lake, Juab, and Wasatch Counties. What inspired you to start working in your field? As a Registered Nurse I worked in an OBGYN office and noticed a lack of breastfeeding knowledge from the staff. At that time I hadn't had children and didn't know much about breastfeeding either. I decided that I wanted to learn more and be able to bridge that gap. I started learning, then had my own child and breastfeeding experience, and desired to share what I learned and support mamas throughout their breastfeeding journey's as well. What is your philosophy on breastfeeding and how do you support the breastfeeding parent? Support and education are key when it comes to breastfeeding. Breastfeeding is natural, however, it does not always come naturally to mom or baby. I believe that by educating mamas before their baby comes and cultivating confidence in their bodies ability to breastfeed that it helps them even more throughout their breastfeeding journey. Whether mom had prenatal breastfeeding education or not, they may still have difficulties with breastfeeding. We offer in-home and virtual consultations to help mamas from the beginning to the end of their breastfeeding journey, however long that may be. Through education and support we provide parents with the information they need to figure out what is best for them and their baby. Do you have any resources you can offer or recommend to help the breastfeeding parent? My website has a lot of great information for breastfeeding parents. If you are pregnant and preparing to breastfeed my online or in-person courses are great to feel confident and prepared for breastfeeding. If you are breastfeeding and have questions or concerns that aren't answered through our blog you can schedule a consultation with someone on our team to get 1:1 support (this may even be covered by your insurance). Click here for my online course. How can hiring a lactation consultant help a new parent? Hiring a Lactation Consultant can help a new parent to feel supported, get their questions/concerns answered, feel validated, and ultimately help them meet their breastfeeding goals. We are able to assess mom, baby, watch a feeding, assess how much milk baby was able to drink, assess pumping, help with bottle feeding, and then create a personalized care plan to work towards moms breastfeeding/pumping goals. You can schedule a consult with us by clicking here. How can I prepare for breastfeeding before my baby is born? Preparation and education are great before baby comes. Taking a Breastfeeding Basics Course is so helpful in giving you the information that you need in order to feel comfortable and confident in those early hours with baby. Reading books, reading blog posts, talking to friends/family members that have breastfed (avoiding the horror stories that everyone seems to love to share), and meeting with a lactation consultant 1:1 before baby comes can all be really helpful in helping you feel prepared to breastfeed. What are some common breastfeeding positions, and how do I know which one to use? There are a lot of different breastfeeding positions that you can use. The 5 most common positions are cradle, cross-cradle, football, laid-back, and side-lying. Play around with them and find what works best for you and baby and that is they "best" position for you. I recommend getting comfortable and allowing baby to find the breast and latch (by themselves or with a little help). That seems to be the most comfortable and effective position for both mom and baby. The most important thing is that baby feels stable with their pelvis, chest, and chin touching moms body and their ear, shoulder, and hip in-line. This helps baby feel stable, comfortable, and wakes up their innate breastfeeding instincts. What are some common causes of nipple pain during breastfeeding, and how can I prevent or treat it? The most common cause of nipple pain during breastfeeding is a shallow latch. Helping baby to get a deeper latch (wide angle of the mouth, chin touching the breast, lips flared out) will help to get the nipple farther into baby's mouth where it won't be compressed. Do not "bear through it." If you are having pain each time baby breastfeeds then you need help from a Lactation Consultant (IBCLC) that can assess what is causing the pain and can create a personalized care plan to help you and baby breastfeed without pain. For more help visit my blog. How can I maintain my milk supply, especially if my baby is not latching well? If baby is not latching well, and therefore not removing milk effectively, you can hand-express or pump to remove milk. Breastmilk supply is a demand-driven process. The more milk you remove the more milk your body will make. If you are worried about low supply, remove more milk and/or stimulate your breasts more to increase milk production. What are some common breastfeeding myths or misconceptions that I should be aware of? The most common myth is that "breastfeeding is painful." Breastfeeding should not be painful, even in those early days. If it is painful then something is wrong and you should get help. In the early days/weeks, your nipples may be more sensitive and you may feel pulling, pressure, or tugging sensations. However, you should never have toe-curling, eye-cringing pain with breastfeeding. Can I breastfeed if I have had breast surgery or nipple piercings? Yes! I have seen many women breastfeed after having breast surgery or nipple piercings. You can find Anna on her website Prenatal Insights, Instagram, and Facebook. Thanks so much for collaborating!
If you would like to be featured here or if you'd like to recommend one of your favorite birth workers in Utah County to be featured please send me a message on Instagram @jesplinphoto.
Check out my latest form of new parent advice! I've created a very comprehensive guide all about self care for new moms. I've been there (times four) and I know how hard it is to maintain good mental health. That's why I've put in all of my best tips and tricks for good self care. You'll find practical ideas for self care, why it's important for your mental health, as well as other mental health help ideas such as good nutrition and physical health. I hope you'll enjoy it and that it will improve you're mental health! Thanks!
Welcome to a new series about birth workers in Utah. If you’re new here, hi there, I’m Jessica Esplin and I’m a traveling newborn portrait photographer in Utah County. In this series it’s my goal to interview people that work with pregnant, birthing, and new mothers to learn about their services and how they help their clients. For our first post, I had the pleasure of interviewing Stephanie Sorensen of Bhava Birth, located in Orem. We had a great conversation at her business location in Orem about her work as a Doula, Childbirth Educator, and Prenatal Yoga teacher. She strongly believes in the mind-body connection and teaches her clients to focus on that to help them have a better birth experience and more healing postpartum both physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. Can you tell me a little bit about your business Bhava Birth? Bhava is a Sanskrit word that means “to give birth,” “mindful intent,” as well as “becoming.” In the Buddhist tradition “bhava” is what they explain as the gap between each cycle of life, death, and rebirth. They believe that if there wasn't this gap of bhava, of becoming something better, then we would just be stuck in a vicious cycle. There needs to be some kind of growth or expansion that elevates us into a higher level of existing. I love applying that very literally to the rebirth that we experience as we give birth. I believe birth is a powerful opportunity for growth, healing, and expansion. All of my services are really centered in that theme. I do a lot of educating. I created the Bhava Birth course rooted in the principles of mindfulness, meditation, and yoga. And we explore more of the psychological side of birth, the emotional preparation, the mindset, and how to work with fear as opposed to trying to give birth without it. I offer a lot of private sessions, as well. I offer Thai yoga and Yoga Nidra for somatic release. Personal mentoring, in-person or over zoom. I also have doula services available for birth and postpartum. How did you get started? What inspired you to start this business? When I was only 10 years old, I watched my sister give birth to my nephew and I can definitely say that was a pivotal experience for me that showed me what women go through to bring a child into the world. I would also say that some of my own healing life experiences, inadvertently, were very much connected to my own birth story. I am very struck by how significant each person's birth story is to who they are. When I became a mother I found myself on a wild journey, trying to figure out how to give birth in a way that felt smooth and supportive. My first birth was very rough and difficult and if I wanted to have more kids there just had to be a better way to do it. All of those things converged when I was in a yoga teacher training with my third pregnancy. That's when I started to feel like I was moving in a new direction with my life; moving out of karma and into dharma as we say in yoga. I had found all of these tools that were helping me integrate mind and body. Because my mind and body were very disconnected, my previous birth experiences reflected that. Yoga was giving me a very specific skill set to reintegrate. I wanted to share that in the birth community. I started off by teaching prenatal and postpartum yoga classes, then couples workshops, and then creating the full comprehensive course. I learned about doula work and started offering doula services and that's led me even deeper into postpartum work because now I offer a lot of one-on-one mentoring with my clients to help them process and really take advantage of this very short window of time that they're very open. Because when we're open physically, we're open emotionally. And so there's just so much opportunity for purging the things that are not working for you and becoming the very best version of yourself. What are the trainings or certifications you have? The very first training that I undertook was yoga teacher training. I'm currently working toward my 500 hours yoga certification. Next I started doula trainings and mindfulness courses. You can see all of my certifications on my website. I’ve done specialty postpartum training with belly binding, and postpartum ceremonies with Sariah Price. I've done “The Kintsugi Birth Story Listening" with Pam England. I’ve done Crisis Response for birth workers, Gender Affirming birth work, and a bereavement workshop. Can you talk about maybe a particularly challenging birth, and how you supported the mother and their partner? Every birth is hard and beautiful in its own unique way, right? One client that comes to mind had had twins for her first pregnancy, and that was a very difficult c-section. We connected for her second birth and she wanted a VBAC. We did a lot of preparatory work. She had had a horrible experience at the hospital and it was very traumatic to her. Her process led her to choosing a home birth with a very skilled midwife and felt that that would be the way to experience healing and have the birth that she wanted. I was very excited for the progress that she had made during her labor at home. And then very interesting labor patterns started and she stopped making progress. Things would be going really smoothly, and then she would kind of shut down. She said “I don't know why, but I just feel like I can't move forward.” We tried doing many different things to support her and help her work through any emotional blocks. But ultimately after an extensive labor, she made the decision to transfer to the hospital. And then, as soon as she received an epidural there, she fell asleep, her body rapidly progressed, and shortly thereafter her baby was born. It was a very interesting experience to process the birth with her on the other side of that. I've seen birth in every possible shade; I've seen home births, I've seen c-sections, and everything in between, and it’s broken down my biases. I no longer have this agenda that I feel my client has to give birth any specific way. My job is not to guarantee outcomes for my client, but instead to help it be a transformative experience for them. My client told me after that birth, “I had a hard time admitting that I really did feel the safest at the hospital and I couldn't reconcile that because the hospital experience had been so awful with that birth. And I just thought, ‘Well, it must all be bad.’” She tried the home birth, but honestly, she wasn't comfortable and her body knew it. As soon as she found her comfort zone, she could move forward with her VBAC and she did experience a really beautiful vaginal delivery. It just didn't play out the way that she thought or how she’d planned. And that's why it was so transformative for her. I learned so much about myself and it touched me as a doula. Birth is so much bigger than what we can put on paper, and you can't predict it and you can't control it and you're just supposed to free yourself up to the unscripted experience. On that note, how do you work with the medical professionals, Obstetricians, midwives, etc.? First and foremost, I try to help my clients find their perfect match. We call it “client-provider alignment.” When my clients are perfectly matched then there's actually very little required of me in terms of having to advocate with their provider because there's already a good synergy. I'm typically there as a support person, as an extra pair of hands or eyes. Very seldom have I had to confront a provider or to speak on my client's behalf. But occasionally that has happened: maybe something's happening so quickly and I can tell that my client hasn't been consulted about what's about to happen. In those rare instances I will speak up and directly but simply say “My client needs to give consent before this happens,” or whatever the situation may be. Other than that, I don't have direct interaction with the providers. I'm hired separately and I don't work for any of these providers. I think that's a great place for doulas to be. I don't answer to anybody else but my client. As a doula, do you involve partners or other family members? I know there are sibling doulas (that pregnant people can hire). Yeah, sibling support is not something that I specialize in. But in regards to partners, maybe it's the other way around where partners involve me. I like to be clear with my clients on what their expectations of me are. And if the partner wants to be the go-to person, I want to make that happen and then I become the space holder. I become the doula to the partner and I say, “Hey, why don’t you try this or that?” I position myself based off of each family's dynamic. Sometimes I work for moms that are single and then I get to be very hands-on supportive. Other times there are partners that just want to dive all the way in, and we find a little balance that works for everybody. I know you said you were just starting to go into postpartum, but what are some common postpartum challenges that you help new moms overcome? One of the hardest things that I experienced as a postpartum mom was not having context. I felt that there had been a lot done to prepare me for birth. But suddenly the baby’s born, and that's where the narrative ends. And yet, that's when everything revs up—you go home and your body's not the same, you're not sleeping, your baby needs you 24 hours a day and I was completely side-swiped by how intense that process was. Giving context helps my clients. We do an extensive postpartum planning together to create a safe place so that your postpartum can actually feel like a sanctuary instead of like a prison. My private sessions take it a step further. I want to really take advantage of the time that my client is open and tender. And help them to clean themselves out and let things go that are ready to be let go so that they can actually heal, integrate, and step into parenthood on a firm path with confidence. My sessions do a lot with body, mindset, and emotions. Every postpartum person needs somebody to help them process through all of the things that come up. We want to normalize that experience, by just allowing this to be the messy cocoon stage, turn into soup, and then you can recombine into a creature of flight. First you unravel before you can actually be rebuilt and come back into life—but only with effectives support. Do you do any work with the newborn or is it mostly with the mothers? I would say very minimal with a newborn. When I'm there with my postpartum client, right after birth, I can definitely offer help and feedback with breastfeeding, any kind of early parenting feedback that they may be looking for. If I am their postpartum doula there may be times where I'm holding the baby for them, but other than that I refer out to other providers. What do you think are the biggest benefits of prenatal yoga? I think I’ll answer that question by looking at all parts of who we are—mentally, emotionally, physically, and spiritually. Physically is probably the one that's talked about the most; you're able to develop strength and flexibility in your ligaments and joints, which is such a gift to your birth process to have stamina where you need it most. It helps you to all around feel better in your body. Emotionally: Anytime I slow down, inevitably I start to tune into what's happening inside of my body and it creates this natural place for me to express and release those emotions that otherwise can get stuffed down. The more comfortable we are connecting with our emotional selves will lend itself to a much smoother birth experience. Mentally: Yoga was one of the most profound ways to experience a connection between my mind and my body. As soon as I started moving into breath practices and meditation, I realized that my brain was often very disjointed from what my body was doing. And I gave birth in that space with my first and it was very difficult because of that disconnection. Spiritually: Yoga fosters a really profound embodiment. You can experience a deeper connection with yourself and also with your baby. I felt that there were so many magical moments of meditation where I felt very spiritually enlivened or very connected with what was happening in my own womb. I think that's a really profound space for new parents to inhabit. How many times a week do you think mothers should practice prenatal yoga? Do you have a schedule? I definitely don't have a schedule but what I teach my clients, and have in my own life, is a ritual of yoga. Yoga is a way of living, not necessarily something that you “do.” You could be doing yoga all the time just by being mindful, connected, present, and breathing intentionally. And the more intentional you are about “doing yoga” it actually starts to become a ritual that you’re coming back to instinctively, and it doesn’t even need to be calendared because you’re living yoga. In my birth classes, we talk about ways to do that. It's through mindfulness, becoming aware of your breath, honoring what your body might be needing in that moment. Is your body wanting you to get on the mat and stretch? Then do that. Is your body wanting you to go for a walk? Does it want a nourishing meal or a hot bath? To me, that's still yoga. It’s about yoking all of the parts of yourself to work together. Coming into union. And listening to the subtle cues of the body. It’s such a beautiful preparation. With all of that said, yes, practice yoga as much as you can on your yoga mat. If you could do it three times a week or only once a week you'd see benefits. I don't think anyone needs more pressure or rigid expectations during pregnancy. But as often as you can experience mind-body connection and to release tension and emotions in your body, that's only going to make your birth and postpartum smoother. How are partners involved in these different classes and courses that you offer? I designed my childbirth course for couples. I definitely have plenty of single parents that attend as well. But I really want both parties to feel involved because they're both going to be involved in the parenting process. Yes, birth very specifically affects the one giving birth, but the partner is also experiencing their own rite of passage. And I want them to feel celebrated. I want them to feel valued and needed. A big part of the in person retreat is allowing partners a lot of opportunities for hands-on comfort measures of how they can assist in the labor space. But also I don't let them off the hook; I think practicing mindfulness and meditation and yoga equally applies to the partner. What can the partner be doing to prepare themselves for parenthood? One of the greatest things the partner brings into the labor space is their emotional presence. A lot of partners don't know what that is, or how to do that. And we practice together. We talk about what it means to put down your cell phone, to make eye contact, to have hands-on touch, to not try to “save” their loved one from the experience of birth. But to basically say, “I believe in you and I'm going to support you and be at your side.” It's challenging for the partner to take the support role especially in a culture that's conditioned them to be the hero, to be the knight in shining armor. In birth (and probably life, too, haha!) we don't need you to do that. We actually want you to show up and walk side by side with your partner. She just needs a companion. Somebody to witness her, somebody to remind her of how amazing she is. And there's nobody better than a committed, intimate partner to fulfill that role. Is there anything that I haven't asked that you think our readers need to know? I think the only thing I didn't mention is that I now offer advanced trainings for doulas that are already trained. They can come and have an immersive experience in mindfulness and deep self-care for a more sustainable career. And I'm also training brand new doulas, those who are just stepping into the work of either birth or postpartum doula work. So that's a new phase of Bhava Birth, the next chapter in my birth work. Thank you very much. It was great talking together!
It was great, thank you! You can find Stephanie on her website Bhava Birth, Instagram, and Facebook. Thanks so much for collaborating! If you would like to be featured here or if you'd like to recommend one of your favorite birth workers in Utah County to be featured please send me a message on Instagram @jesplinphoto. Dads play an important role in the lives of their newborns, and there are many ways they can get more involved with their new baby. Here are a few ways dads can get more involved with their new baby: Bond with baby during skin-to-skin time: Dads can bond with their newborns by holding them close during skin-to-skin time. This can help the baby to feel safe and secure, and can also help dad to feel more connected to his new baby. Help with feedings: Dads can help with feedings by preparing bottles or helping to position the baby for breastfeeding. This can also be an opportunity for dad to bond with the baby. Change diapers: Dads can help with diaper changes, which can be a great way to get hands-on experience with caring for the baby. Take turns with baby care: Dads can take turns with baby care, such as taking the baby for a walk or a drive, to give mom a break. Help with baby's bath time: Dads can help with baby's bath time, which can be a great way to bond with the baby and make memories. Read to the baby: Dads can read to the baby, which can help to promote language development and create a bonding experience. Play with the baby: Dads can play with the baby, which can help to promote physical and emotional development. Take time to bond with the baby: Dads can take time to bond with the baby by cuddling, singing, and talking to the baby.
Take an active role in the baby's development: Dads can take an active role in the baby's development by attending parenting classes and staying informed about the baby's milestones. Show your love and support for your partner: Dads can also show their love and support for their partner by being understanding and helpful during this time, helping with tasks around the house, and making sure mom is taking care of herself, as well. |
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