Having your baby can be a time of great excitement and happiness but it can also bring with it a feeling of real lows. The baby blues can happen a few days after having your baby. Our hormones are raging, our bodies have gone through the intense and sometimes over whelming experience of giving birth, this combined with a lack of sleep, can make achieving the simplest of tasks hard work. You may feel weepy irritable, anxious and/or depressed.
Quite often during this time we forget to take care of ourselves, even more so if we have other children to look after. At a time when our bodies have been through such change, we put ourselves last. Looking after ourselves ensures that we can care for our little ones effectively. This is not a luxury as some may view it, but a necessity. Without a healthy, happy and engaged mum, the family unit can struggle to function.
The emotions we feel after having a baby can ignite our sympathetic nervous system (our fight, flight and/or freeze response). When the sympathetic nervous system is triggered you find yourself living in a constant state of high alert, which is not only emotionally but physically exhausting.
Reflexology is a wonderful therapy to have during this time. A reflexologist will work the areas of your feet that can help induce relaxation, balance the bodies hormones and help to cleanse the body of any toxins. This can enable your mind and body to switch off the sympathetic nervous system allowing our parasympathetic nervous system (responsible for homeostasis, rest and digestion) to take over. It can provide the balancing, harmonising and restorative qualities a woman needs after the birth of her baby.
Reflexology can give your mind/body the space and time to recover, by providing some much needed rest bite – ultimately resulting in a recharged, re energised you!
If you find that the low feelings you are experiencing do not subside a month after having your baby it is important that you contact your GP, as this could be a sign of Post Natal Depression. In many cases PND does not become apparent for the first few weeks after having your baby (unlike the baby blues) but the symptoms can last for months and may get progressively worse if help is not sought.
Do not suffer in silence, seek the help and support you need .
A version of this article originally appeared on Baby Reflex website.
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