Embrace postpartum parties, ditch baby showers

What is better than your close friends throwing you a party in anticipation of the coming of your newborn? According to some women, postpartum parties are way, way better than a baby shower. Their reasoning in this line is very sober and makes a lot of  sense.

For most mums-to-be, the real work begins after the birth of the child, not before. The worst part, they say, is the first six weeks which no baby shower prepares you for. When your baby wails non-stop, won’t latch and you are sleep-deprived, that is when you need real support from your friends and relatives. While the postpartum parties are not parties per se, it is a bit like forming a support system around the mother at a time that she no doubt needs people around her.

“While I was very grateful to have enough baby outfits to clothe practically the entire neighborhood, what I really needed in those first few weeks after having a baby was support. I needed all those gals who showed up to my baby shower to be there in the afternoon when my baby cried nonstop for four hours. I needed them there when I tried to latch him on in the dark and he turned away from me screaming. Ever since that experience, I have always felt that we all need to spend a little more time (A LOT, actually) focusing on new moms during those first postpartum weeks,” writer Wendy Wisner says in support of the postpartum party.

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It is a concept that Bust Magazine author Marisa Mendez Marthaller supports fully, stating that the energy, time and money that goes into prenatal fanfare should go toward helping new parents during the emotional and physical recovery of the first six weeks.

“This “party” wouldn’t look like one organized event, per say. It would be more like having your BFFs, close family members, or anyone would have been invited to your baby shower sign up to help you out during the first six weeks postpartum (or longer). So, that would mean things like sending in meals or organizing a “meal train”; pitching in with housework; coming over to hold the baby while you nap, shower, and eat a meal; or hiring a postpartum doula to help you out,” she explains.

We believe most mothers would agree.

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