Tima’s* experience with motherhood was unlike anything she could have imagined. The Toronto-based new mom knew about the postpartum period and expected her body to change. What she didn’t anticipate was how simply giving birth could cause her to lose her mind. Tima couldn’t eat. She couldn’t sleep. “I thought the police were watching me with cameras,” she said. She saw police cars everywhere and even told police she knew they were out to kill her. Postpartum psychosis has been at the root of some high-profile tragedies involving mothers taking the lives of their children. But not everyone kno ..read more

After my first was born in 2019, I experienced the typical “baby blues” that up to 80 percent of moms struggle with. I’d find myself randomly crying during episodes of The Price is Right. So when I got pregnant with my second, I was prepared for the same experience—although I hoped for better, feeling confident about knowing what was coming this time around. After a challenging pregnancy, I was relieved to go into labour at 41 weeks and had a positive birth experience. In fact, so positive that we checked out of the hospital only eight hours after the baby was born and went out for breakfast ..read more

Becoming a parent can be a big and scary adjustment even when labour and delivery go smoothly, and it’s made all the more difficult for parents of babies in the neonatal intensive care unit (or NICU). Having spent time there herself, Sarah Pulley is trying to make the lives of NICU parents just a little easier by pampering them at her hospital hair salon. That’s right, Riley Children’s Health in Indiana has launched a “beauty bar” in one of the hospital’s two family rooms, offering hair services to the parents of NICU babies. Pulley, who owns the local salon Three Seventeen Hair Design, jumpe ..read more

I recently went through my phone to delete old photos, which is something I do every few weeks now since apparently hanging onto 11,357 live images of my children uses up so much storage space that I can no longer receive texts or phone calls⁠—or, more importantly, take 300 photos of my children at the trampoline park. This time I decided to do a deep dive of my selfies, figuring I could do without a few hundred pics of myself working with my kids in the background, or showing my sister that weird patch of eczema I get under my eye or trying to determine if my new “mom jeans” are trendy or a ..read more

I was an expat in Bangkok when I became pregnant with my first child. Like many first-time moms, I wanted a non-medicated birth: I hired a doula, coached my husband on pain relief techniques, and planned to breastfeed immediately following delivery. What I got was a failed induction followed by a C-section. My daughter was immediately whisked away to the nursery, while I was put under general anesthesia for reasons I still don’t understand.  Nauseous and woozy, I lay alone in recovery for hours before I finally got to hold my daughter. I wasn’t allowed to sit up or turn to the side for 2 ..read more

For starters, might we remind you that your body hosted an entire additional human for a very long time? So give yourself a break. Dermatologist Sam Hanna, medical director at Dermatology on Bloor in Toronto, says his patients sometimes express frustration over how their skin fared after pregnancy—dullness, hyperpigmentation and acne that could rival a teenager’s are common once the glow fades. “Be proud of what you did and recognize that what happened with your skin is recoverable,” he says, stressing that you didn’t do anything wrong (even if applying moisturizer a couple times a week summe ..read more

Six weeks after the birth of my first son, I lay on the exam table in my midwife’s cozy office for my final six-week postpartum check-up.  “This might sound odd,” I said, glancing at a boob-shaped ceramic mug sitting on the shelf, while Laura, my midwife, gave me a pap test. “But I’m really going to miss you.” Laura had been with me through nine months of pregnancy, 36 hours of labour, and a terrifying trip to emergency when my son was just three weeks old. Her guidance to follow my intuition that night likely saved his life. Saying goodbye was going to be tough—really tough.  ..read more

In the months after my second baby was born, I would often look back at the photos from the first time I held him. The nurse had just placed his warm, wriggly, wet body on my chest. I wasn’t scrolling through my phone because I wanted to relive the moment I laid eyes on him, but because I needed to look at his face and make sure it was the same baby I’d just put to bed. Yes, I’d reassure myself, there are his big, soft, squishy lips—the same ones the technicians cooed over in all my late-term ultrasounds. There are his slender fingers curled around the hospital blanket—the same fingers that n ..read more

You’ve taken a prenatal class, packed your hospital bag and installed the carseat. You’re all set and ready to meet your baby! But have you thought about what you’ll do when they actually get here? Just like creating a birth plan can help set you up for a positive birth experience, creating a postpartum plan can help ease your transition into parenthood. What is a postpartum plan? A postpartum plan is a set of preferences for the early weeks and months after your little one arrives, which can include decisions like parental leave, feeding, sleep, household chores, self-care and mental health ..read more

Now that I’m pregnant with my second child, I’ve had some time to reflect on the way I managed the newborn stage with my firstborn, and how I might want to do things a little differently this time around. There are many things I did that, in hindsight, I can now laugh at—and many other things that now make me realize that I should have reached out for more support.  1. I brought non-maternity clothes to change into at the hospital  Less than 24 hours after pushing out my eight-pound, four-ounce baby, I tried to squeeze into the non-maternity outfit I had packed in my hospital bag an ..read more