When the Baby Arrives, Who Looks After Mum? Why Maternity Care Needs to Nurture Mums Too

Having a baby is one of those times in life when you might expect to feel incredibly looked after.

You’ve spent months attending appointments. Your blood pressure has been checked, your bump measured, your baby monitored and questions asked about how you’re feeling.

Then you give birth.

And for some mums, it can suddenly feel as though all of that attention moves from you to your baby.

Of course our babies need looking after. But somewhere along the way, are we forgetting that Mummas need nurture too?

It’s something I’ve been thinking about a lot recently, particularly after hearing mums talk about their experiences of maternity care and postnatal support.

There are wonderful midwives, maternity support workers and healthcare professionals working incredibly hard within our maternity services. This isn’t about blaming the people providing care.

It’s about asking whether the system gives them enough time and resources to provide the care that mums actually need.

And whether, once our babies arrive, we are really looking after Mum too.

What does good maternity care look like after birth?

So much preparation for having a baby focuses on pregnancy and birth.

We learn about contractions, birth plans, pain relief and what to pack in the hospital bag.

But what about afterwards?

After birth, a mum might be recovering from major abdominal surgery following a C-section, stitches, blood loss, exhaustion or a traumatic birth experience.

At the same time, she may be learning how to feed her baby, functioning on very little sleep and experiencing an enormous physical and emotional change.

That feels like a time when care should become more nurturing, not less.

Yet when I recently asked mums about their experiences, some told me they had felt forgotten.

One mum described having an emergency C-section and then struggling to feed her baby. She didn't know what she was supposed to do and remembers being told off for not feeding him before he was put onto her breast.

That response really stayed with me because I had a very similar experience after having my own baby.

I didn't need someone to assume I knew what I was doing.

I needed someone to show me.

Postnatal support shouldn't depend on whether a mum asks for help

There can be an enormous difference between help technically being available and a mum actually feeling able to access it.

After giving birth, we can be exhausted, overwhelmed, sore, frightened or simply unsure of what is normal.

Some mums will confidently press the buzzer and say, "I need help."

Others won't.

That shouldn't mean their needs disappear.

One of the things I keep coming back to with Super Mumma is this:

A mum shouldn't have to be confident, articulate or willing to shout loudly for her experience to matter.

Some mums will shout.

Some will whisper.

Our maternity services need to be able to hear both.

Are mums leaving hospital before they feel ready?

Another response I received was simply:

"I wish I wasn't discharged so quickly."

That sentence says so much.

Going home with your baby can be wonderful, but it can also be terrifying.

Suddenly the call button has gone. There isn't a midwife down the corridor. You're at home with this tiny person, possibly recovering physically yourself, and you're expected to know what to do.

Another mum told me that the midwives caring for her were great, but they were short on time.

And I think that's an important distinction.

When mums don't receive the support they need, it doesn't necessarily mean that individual midwives don't care.

Sometimes the people working within maternity services are trying to provide compassionate care within a system where their time is stretched incredibly thinly.

If we want better maternity care, we also have to talk about whether the people providing it have the capacity to actually give mums that care.

Birth debriefs and being able to understand what happened

One mum told me that having a birth debrief helped her.

I think there is something really important in that.

Birth can happen incredibly quickly. Decisions may be made while you're frightened, exhausted or in pain. Afterwards, you can be left trying to piece together what actually happened.

Being able to talk through your birth experience can give you an opportunity to ask questions and understand the decisions that were made.

And perhaps that is part of nurturing mums too.

Not assuming that because Mum and baby are physically home, everything is fine.

Not assuming that a difficult birth simply becomes something a woman should move on from.

Giving mums space to talk about what happened to them.

Maternal mental health doesn't end when you leave the maternity ward

We also need to remember that postnatal care isn't only about physical recovery.

Becoming a mum can bring an enormous emotional adjustment.

There can be anxiety, intrusive thoughts, low mood, overwhelm, feeding worries, sleep deprivation and the pressure of suddenly being responsible for another human being.

For some women, this will include perinatal or postnatal mental health problems that need professional support.

That is another reason why listening matters.

A postnatal check shouldn't just be about whether a wound has healed or whether the baby is gaining weight.

We need to be asking:

How is Mum?

And we need enough time to hear the real answer.

Better maternity care starts with listening

I don't pretend to have all the answers about how we improve maternity services.

But I do think we need to keep listening to the people using them.

Not just through statistics, reports and complaints procedures, but through the everyday experiences of mums.

What made you feel safe?

What made you feel frightened?

When did you feel cared for?

When did you feel forgotten?

What support would have made a difference?

Because if the same experiences keep appearing in conversations between mums, they're worth listening to.

And listening has to lead somewhere.

If women continually share their experiences but never see anything change, eventually we risk them wondering what the point of speaking up is.

Mummas need nurture too

Perhaps that's the simplest way I can put it.

We don't stop needing care when our baby arrives.

We don't suddenly know how to feed them, settle them or understand every cry simply because we've given birth.

We don't stop being frightened because we've been discharged from hospital.

And our physical and emotional recovery doesn't stop because maternity care has moved onto its next patient.

Babies need nurturing.

Mummas do too.

So I'd love to hear from you.

Did you feel looked after after giving birth?

What did your maternity care get right? What support made a difference? And if you didn't feel supported, what do you wish someone had done differently?

Because the more we talk Mumma to Mumma, the more we can understand what mothers actually need.

And every Mumma deserves to be heard.