10 Direct and Truthful Tips for Postpartum Bliss

I recently gave birth to a baby boy! Yes! Thank you. Baby Owen Raine Bettger was born by vbac at 5:40pm on Jan 8. It was an incredible experience which I intend to share in a later blog post but for now here are 10 (direct and real) tips for postpartum bliss.

1. Have a meal train set up, have house help set up, have shows and movies ready to go, have snacks prepared ahead of time, pack your bag, your partner's bag and you're other kids bags.
2. Get together the following items: "padcicles": frozen maxi pads soaked in healing tea - camomile and comfy are great Tucks brand medicated pads Dermablast pain relieving spray A peri spray bottle Sitz bath salts comfy pants and snap front shirts
3. Sleep, sleep, sleep, hydrate and carbo load in the weeks leading up to your due date. Exercise and eat well in the months leading up to your due date.
4. Mentally prepare for the hardest work of your life. Know that you can do it! But, also know how you will deal with strong strong sensation (aka pain). Take classes on how to birth - your pranamaya and yoga practice will only take you so far. If you want to birth your child naturally without drugs be sure to know i.e. really educate yourself on how to manage pain. Side note: I labored naturally without drugs with my first born, my cervix swelled and I had a c-section. With my second, I labored with an epidural, dilated and effaced with no issue and had a vbac. The vbac was by far the superior birth experience. It was the hardest work of my life.
5. Have pictures taken and journal about your birth experience soon after birth. You may not remember anything.
6. Consider a 40 day sacred time to heal and bond with baby. During this time let the housework and things - even diaper changing to others (preparing and asking for help ahead of time helps a lot), your job then is to heal, rest and feed the baby.
7. Forget about a birth plan. One nurse said that "a birth plan is just a recipe for a c-section" - this was true for me.
8. Smoothies! (Pre-package and freeze smoothie ingredients).
9. If you use a smart phone, get the Total Baby app to track baby's rhythms this will help ease the family into a schedule. I believe in a fluid schedule for sanity.
10. Get a gadget called Baby Plus (in your 2nd trimester). It's a learning tool, but I think it's a magical spell for easy babies.

I am just a Yoga teacher.

A beautiful and poignant article by a seasoned yoga teacher and mama, Amy Cushing.

I arrive early and roll out my mat.

I greet wide-eyed new students with a smile and laugh with those who return week after week.

I don’t wear Lululemon or Donna Karan sweat pants or own a Manduka mat. Not that I would mind, there’s simply no room for expensive style in our family budget.

I do still treasure my eight-year-old Be Present crops adorned with an embroidered pink orchid. Those are quality. They were purchased when being carefree was more the way of life.

I am not skinny or incredibly bendy and I cannot float from crow to handstand to plank. But I can do each individually, slowly and mindfully, and can show you how to improve your own practice.

Is that a fat roll you see as I demonstrate parsvakonasana? Yes. Maybe two, in fact; a product of carrying two babies and having little time for myself these days. I’ll work on finding a washboard ab or two once the kids don’t need me so much. I’m OK with it. Are you?

And wrinkles? No those aren’t wrinkles, they’re imprints of a life lived.

I could care less about your pedicure. My own 10-minute home pedi isn’t the best either. I’m more interested in the position of your foot.

I note your shoulder scar, your curved spine, your swollen knee—not to judge your appearance, but to give you a safe practice.

I may see and hear things that are personal. And they will stay that way.

Some days I may look a bit tired, likely from being up all night with one of my children or trying to fit 30 hours into a 24-hour day. Please, bear with me. I have arrived to give my best and I will do just that.

I may laugh at my fumbled words or missteps; it is part of who I am.

I can help you feel a little better, breathe a little easier and guide you toward a meditation practice, but I won’t promote a guru.

I don’t have a guru. I don’t want a guru.

But I have great teachers who have inspired me on my path. I hold them close to my heart and they are a part of the practice I share with you.

Despite a decade of practice, my yoga journey is a continuing lesson. Each day I learn more of the wisdom that surrounds it. I will do my best to always be a student as well as a teacher.

I am just a yoga teacher who teaches at the local studio up the street.

I may not be cover model flawless or the vision of yoga teacher perfection, but I am a teacher.

And that’s perfect enough for me.

 Source: Elephant Journal article written by Amy Cushing Posted on Facebook by Portland Yoga Teacher Sarah Robinette 

Food loving and mindfully prepared tastes better and satisfies longer.

After an awesome summer of fresh-from-the-Earth food that requires only a little bit of a chop here and there and a strong desire to keep the oven in the off position due to the heat, I am so loving firing up the range and cooking! I love to make my time in the kitchen preparing foods a sort of meditation, prayerful time of intention and loving preparation.

In the book, 3 Bowls: Vegetarian Recipes from an American Zen Buddhist Monastery, Seppo Ed Farrey and Myochi Nancy O'Hara outline 5 Principles of Mindful Cooking. These principles apply to my raw food friends as well. 

Before selecting the recipes you wish to prepare, consider those you will be feeding and what they might enjoy. Then bring all your attention to the food. Food lovingly and mindfully prepared tastes better and satisfies longer.

FIRST. Consider the time you have allotted to cook and wisely choose the recipes you wish to prepare, with your time constraints in mind. Rushing only serves to undermine mindfulness. SECOND. Before you begin, check to make sure you have on hand all the needed ingredients or workable substitutes. THIRD. Wash, chop, sift, and stir. Think only of washing, chopping, sifting, and stirring. Breath and be mindful of each slice of the knife, of each swift of the spoon, of the magical process of cooking. FOURTH. Before throwing anything away, consider whether it might have a use. For example, save vegetable remains to make soup stock or use them as compost* to feed your garden. FIFTH. Keep it simple. Relax and enjoy the process of cooking, and the miracles that are born from your efforts. Sometimes we get so carried away that we can't stop, and with all good intentions, we make more food than anyone could possible eat at one sitting. If you want to make four or five different dishes for one meal, remind yourself that three are plenty.

Try this totally awesome recipe. I had it this morning, prepared as instructed above. It blew my mind.

Oatmeal with Sweet Potato and Apricots

2 cups rolled oats 1 medium sweet potato, peeled and grated 4 dried apricots, chopped (or a handful of raisins) 3/4 tsp sea salt 1 tsp vanilla extract yogurt and honey to taste

In a larger saucepan, bring 5 1/2 cups of water to a boil. Stir in oats, sweet potato, apricots (or raisins), and salt and return to a boil. Reduce heat to low, cover, and simmer, stirring occasionally, for 20 minutes. Stir in the vanilla. Serve with a few spoonfuls of yogurt and honey stirred in.

Bonus: Brendan, my two year old loved it!

*The city of Portland composts!