The MamasteFit Podcast Episode 142 – Roxanne’s Postpartum Prep Essentials

Gina: Welcome to The MamasteFit Podcast. In this episode, Roxanne is going to be sharing what she is doing to prepare for the postpartum because we need to do more than just prepare for birth and plan for birth- we also need to consider a much longer timeframe that comes after we give birth.

When this episode comes out, Roxanne may or may not still be pregnant, so if you were curious on whether or not she had her baby head to our Instagram page, we probably announced it there. If you don’t see an announcement, and we still have Bumpies, she’s still pregnant.

So Roxanne, what are you doing to prepare for the postpartum, or, I guess how have your prior postpartums gone that has impacted your preparation this time?

Roxanne: Yes. So postpartum is usually pretty rough for me, physically, as well as sometimes mentally, depending on the postpartum we talk about. So, I usually try to prepare a little bit more for postpartum.

My first one, didn’t really do much prep other than get pads and stuff. And that was pretty rough, especially with breastfeeding. Breastfeeding was really tough for me the first time. My daughter had a tongue tie and all of that kind of stuff. So that whole journey was hard. And then I had prolapse probably because I went TV shopping at three days postpartum- not the smartest idea, don’t recommend.

And then my second one was rough because I was alone in a new city, on the other side of the country, and had no support outside of the first four weeks. So mentally that was tough. And then my son also had colic, so that has adjusted my postpartum prep based off of that one.

And then my last one was like the perfect postpartum, so like I am just going to try to repeat that. And also hopefully this baby repeats what Joan did.

Gina: Oh, you also had a hemorrhage.

Roxanne: I did have a hemorrhage so that, that would, be a plus if unimproved for this one would be not a hemorrhage.

Gina: Which I think impacted you a lot longer than you were maybe anticipating.

Roxanne: Yeah. It… I do, I listened to Joan’s birth story podcast recently and I think we recorded her birth story like a month or five weeks, maybe postpartum, and I still looked very pale. And I was like, “Man.” And it took me a month to shower without feeling like I needed help.

Gina: You were unwell.

Roxanne: I was unwell. I was unwell.

So, I have done different things this pregnancy to prepare me for postpartum. One of them is iron supplementation, and eating iron rich foods- which I’ve just been craving. My husband was like, “What do you wanna eat for dinner?” the other day, and I was like, “Steak.”

Gina: “Steak!”

Roxanne: I want steak and potatoes. And he’s like, “Who are you?” I don’t crave steak, but I was like, I want meat. Give me red meat. All of it.

Gina: All the iron.

Roxanne: Steak. Seaweed. Fun fact though, my friend, just realized she has, this like genetic- potentially it hasn’t been diagnosed, but like we’re pretty positive if you’re listening to this- where she like holds on to too much iron. And so she has too much iron, that could cause a lot of, wreak havoc on your body. But as women, we have menstrual cycles every month, so that’s how you get rid of the excess iron. And so once you go into menopause, a lot of these, that’s when a lot of people are diagnosed with this condition, because you’re no longer having the monthly cycle, so the iron just builds up in your system.

Gina: Interesting. I did not know that.

Roxanne: That’s just a fun, fun fact of iron. Too much is also not good. Too little, too much- you need the perfect amount of iron in your body. But yes, so I’ve been supplementing with iron and we did do a blood test at my 28 week visit when I had my gestational diabetes screen to test like how much my like hemoglobin and such are. I was anemic last time. At this time, excellent. Hemoglobin and hematocrit.

Gina: Last time is in your last pregnancy?

Roxanne: My last pregnancy, yeah. This time, excellent. So, that is setting me up for success. So the steak and potatoes that I’ve been craving, beneficial. As well as my iron supplementation that I did- I do just take a little bit now I don’t take like the full amount that I was taking earlier, along with the vitamin D. So hopefully I don’t hemorrhage. Fingers crossed. Because that’ll really set me up for success, where I’m not just taking 49 naps a day, ’cause that’s, that is what I did with Joan. I would, Gina would text me and she’d be like, “Okay, what are you doing today?” And I’d say, “Oh, I’m, going to do this.” I just woke up from a four hour nap. But Joan would let me take the four hour naps! So, angel. I just need another Joan baby.

Gina: I was trying not to be frustrated with you, ’cause I feel like all my postpartums, I’m like spewing out content.

Roxanne: She was so committed in her postpartum life and I was just like, (snoring).

Gina: I also feel like I, I really need to emphasize this time of sharing. Just yeah, it’s a very vital moment in a lot of people’s lives.

Roxanne: If I had energy, and wasn’t short of breath from just walking from my bed to the bathroom… I was like, I would use the toilet, and I’d be like (gasping for breath).

Gina: Oh my gosh.

Roxanne: So rough. But I was like, “I’m fine, guys. I feel fine.”

Gina: Do you?

Roxanne: I did not feel fine. I did not feel fine.

Gina: So we’re all hoping that you don’t hemorrage this time.

Roxanne: So hopefully I don’t hemorrhage. But, I think now that I know, if I do hemorrhage, a blood transfusion would probably help be beneficial, and help me in the postpartum recovery. The last one I was like, “I’m going to be fine. I’m going to recover, J-OK, and like a week I’ll be good as new.” I, it was not a week.

Gina: What’s J-OK?

Roxanne: A-OK…

Gina: You said J. Anyways.

Roxanne: Whatever. It’s A-OK. I’ll be A-OK.

Gina: I was like, what is this new acronym mean? I’m Just Okay.

Roxanne: I wanna be just okay.

Gina: I’m JUST okay.

Roxanne: That’s what JOK means. Just okay.

So I think like, prenatally and nutrition wise, that is helping set me up for postpartum, probably the best, for just feeling great.

But I do have prolapse, so I have plans to still go postpartum, pelvic floor pt, check in on that. I have my bloomers from Love Steady, ready to go- not that I’m like planning lots of activity, but it just helps support me just enough that I, if I need to walk to the bathroom, I’ll feel like my organs are not falling out. I do hear people tell me that they don’t feel like their organs are falling out after they have babies, and I’m like, maybe that’ll be me this time and we’ll see. I would love to know what that feels like, so, I would love that experience this time, but, probably not.

Gina: I personally don’t feel that my organs are falling out, but my legs and my body is really sore.

Roxanne: Yeah.

Gina: After I give birth.

Roxanne: Just like I feel a lot of pressure just in my, well, vagina. It’s probably an exaggeration…

Gina: I definitely feel sore.

Roxanne: …to say my organs falling out.

Gina: But I do remember your last postpartum….

Roxanne: It doesn’t feel great.

Gina: …I tried to explain to you that it could just be pelvic floor tension and if we do some stuff to help release the tension, it’ll help. And you got really mad at me.

Roxanne: Well, yeah, no, ’cause I was actually prolapsing out of my vagina with things, so it could also just be my prolapse.

Gina: But then I feel like the pelvic floor PT told you it was tension that could also help you.

Roxanne: But it also was my prolapse. Gina tries to gaslight me into thinking it’s just tension, but sometimes it could actually just be prolapse symptoms. But fun fact, in my last appointment with Hayley, we were talking about some feeling, like some symptoms that I was having, and it could actually be not tension related at all, it’s just my veins can be inflamed in my vagina leading to all of my symptoms. So we’re going to explore that postpartum. It’s like varicose veins, but like in your vagina, that is leading to a lot of my symptoms that I have even outside of pregnancy and postpartum.

Gina: That is interesting.

Roxanne: It could not be necessarily prolapse, but it could be like inflamed veins. So that’s going to be a fun journey.

Gina: Yeah.

Roxanne: I’m excited.

Gina: I wanna clarify that I wasn’t gaslighting you. I accepted that you had symptoms and I was trying to give you movements to find relief, and you were like, “Fuck you!” And I was like, “Okay. I’ll no longer give you advice on how we could resolve this pain that you have.”

Roxanne: It wasn’t pain!

Gina: Or this discomfort you were having.

Roxanne: It wasn’t pain. It was pressure in my butt hole and vagina.

Gina: So you have your bloomers ready, you have pelvic floor PT lined up. What other things do you have lined up for the postpartum to help support?

Roxanne: My mom is going to cook lots of meals. I did, I will get like the meat and all of the, she has all the seaweed and all of that we need for the soups, I just have to get some meat. So that is on my to-do list this week to buy just a bunch of red meat for the soup. As well as we get our weekly meal subscriptions, so I just planned out and picked the items on the menu for postpartum, for things that I actually would like, not just that sound good. Things that would be like steaks and iron rich foods.

I have all of my items that I need postpartum, so like the diapers and the peri-balms, and all of those things in my bathroom, along with, I found my little sitz bath basin and some sitz bath stuff to do all of those things as well, just in case.

Gina: I’ve never done a sitz bath.

Roxanne: You’ve never? You’ve done a sitz bath.

Gina: It was like I took a bath.

Roxanne: That’s a sitz bath.

Gina: Wow. I’ve always seen it on the toilet and I never really understood that.

Roxanne: Yeah. It’s just ’cause not everybody has a bath and not everyone wants to fill up a bath with water.

Gina: So do you like sit inside the thing on the toilet?

Roxanne: You just, you sit it on top of the toilet, and you fill that with warm water and whatever you want in it. You can also just do warm water, you don’t have to put any herbs in it, and you just sit there for 5 to 10 minutes. It’s for your butt and perineum.

Gina: I think the logistics of it is confusing for me.

Roxanne: Like a sitz bath?

Gina: Yeah.

Roxanne: The basin has a little hole on the back, so you just pour it into your toilet and flush it, and then you just disinfect the little basin. Versus, filling up an entire bath with like…

Gina: I don’t sit through my toilet seat when I sit on the toilet. So like, how does, I think I need to see it on a toilet to understand like how it actually works.

Roxanne: I dunno how you own one. You own a sitz bath.

Gina: I’ve never used it.

Roxanne: So you own it, you just didn’t look at it or put it on your toilet. So it’s not, it’s just like the basin that where the water is, it just, that’s what goes into the toilet. And then you fill it up and it’s not like you’re sitting in the toilet, you’re sitting like on the normal toilet seat, just like where you sit on the normal toilet seat, your vagina and butthole is partially in the hole.

Gina: I guess I, I don’t see that, like, I don’t realize that, and I’m like, “How are people sitting in it? Are they squishing themselves inside their…” Yeah, anyways, I need to…

Roxanne: your hole in your toilet is not like small enough that it’s literally just a hole that you just happen to pee through. Your butt sinks in, that’s why you get like the little ring on your butt if you sit on the toilet for a long period of time, because you are, like, sinking in.

Gina: Yeah. For me, the logistics of the sitz bath on the toilet has always confused me.

Roxanne: No.

Gina: I just need to like see it.

Roxanne: You need to just do it. See, I’m going to, we’re going to do a sitz bath tutorial with Gina so that she can see what this feels like.

Gina: I’m like, how does the water touch you? I don’t understand.

Roxanne: Because your butt sinks into the hole! You don’t, it’s not like when you sit down, like when you sit in this chair, your vagina’s touching the chair, your butt hole’s touching the chair.

Gina: Yeah, but…

Roxanne: So it’s the same thing.

Gina: But the water would have to be like really high. Like, almost to the seat.

Roxanne: Yeah, and that’s why there’s that hole in the back, so that when you sit down, if there is excess water, it just flows out into the toilet.

Gina: I’m going to have to just do this at home.

Roxanne: Yeah. So we’re going to. Stay tuned for Gina’s Sitz Bath Reveal.

Gina: My experience.

Roxanne: Yeah. It’s, they’re pretty great.

Gina: I guess I, I did do it in like the actual bathtub.

Roxanne: You did it in the actual bathtub.

Gina: And out mom got really mad with the 85 herbs.

Roxanne: Oh yeah. There were so many flowers. So, don’t recommend putting flowers in your sitz baths.

Gina: It was very pretty though.

Roxanne: It was very pretty for Instagram. But it wasn’t in actuality great, because how do you… you would need like a special drain attachment. Just put it all into one of those little baggies, they’re like tea bags pretty much, and then you put that in your water.

Gina: That’s what I should’ve done.

Roxanne: For like the herbs, like healing herbs. I did find all of my like vaginal herbs from the wifeys at the Monterey Birth Center. So I will make some tea for my vagina. Vagina tea.

Gina: To drink, or to sit in?

Roxanne: To sit in.

Gina: Okay.

Roxanne: Yeah. Not to drink.

Gina: I’m assuming you could probably drink it.

Roxanne: You probably could consume it.

Gina: I don’t know.

Roxanne: It’s just tea. I don’t actually, I don’t, I’m not going to try it.

Gina: You don’t plan to consume it?

Roxanne: Yeah, I don’t plan to consume it. No, I’m going to either put it in my peri-bottles or sit in it. Yeah.

Other things that I have….

Gina: That is a good idea, too- instead of just warm water, you can put your herbs inside a peri bottle.

Roxanne: Yeah, yeah.

Gina: As well.

Roxanne: You just make your little tea for your perineum.

Gina: So what are the things do you have prepped for your vulva?

Roxanne: For my vulva, I have the diapers, or disposable underwear, whichever one sounds better to you. Diapers.

Gina: Yeah, matching, Mommy and Me.

Roxanne: Me and my baby are wearing diapers together.

I have perineal sprays, like herbal ones from like tincture type fancy ones, and then just like the Earth Mama one. I don’t have any balms, so I guess if I tear, I’ll instacart some balms, or Amazon some balms, I don’t think Instacart’s going to bring ’em to me, but Amazon it from Earth Mama. ‘Cause that’s the one I’ve used with my first, was the balm for my second degree tear.

I have my tux pads. I am anticipating some constipation or hemorrhoids, just ’cause of who I am as a person.

Gina: Are you stressed?

Roxanne: I’m going to be, I’m going to be honest, I usually deal with hemorrhoids, postpartum. I think it’s mostly from just sitting in the bed though. Last time I laid in the bed a lot because I was, (pretends to be dead) so that probably didn’t help my posterior pelvic floor. But I also pushed for a little bit because there’s a lot of people staring at my butthole. I didn’t want them to see my whole starfish, so I probably clenched a little bit, and that led to a little bit of hemorrhoids. And I didn’t really have it with Colin, so hopefully I won’t have any hemorrhoids, but I am going to be prepared with tux pads and all of those things.

Gina: I think this is another one of those things that I, if I have experienced it, I have blocked it from my memory.

Roxanne: Yeah.

Gina: I don’t know if I’ve ever had a hemorrhoid.

Roxanne: Probably not.

Gina: I might have, I don’t know.

Roxanne: I’ve had hemorrhoids like my entire life.

Gina: I might have not known that’s what it was.

Roxanne: From adulthood, because I probably have a chronically, I do, not probably, I do have a chronically tight posterior pelvic floor, and I’ve always had this issue since college.

Gina: So, tux pads.

Roxanne: And then I do have suppositories just in case I need those, and colace, all the things. I should, I am going to get some more magnesium ’cause that also can help with constipation as well. That’s like a little bit more natural than just colace. I think Magnesium is just a really great supplement in general for overall health.

Gina: For me when I was pooping postpartum, ’cause sometimes that can be scary….

Roxanne: Yeah!

Gina: I would actually externally splint. I would take like toilet paper and kind of press it against the perineum and like vaginal opening, just to provide some external support and that made it feel like my organs were not falling out as I was trying to poop and stuff.

Roxanne: Yeah, and external or internal support for that can be helpful if you didn’t tear, like you can do it internally as well. And that was like a technique that I think one of my pelvic floor PTs showed me in prep for postpartum, if I did have constipation. So I do have that in like my mental toolkit, but I don’t have like special splinting wipes or anything.

But I do have my bidet!

Gina: I know.

Roxanne: That I’m very excited about, to try this postpartum, ’cause I didn’t, we did not have it installed yet, I don’t think, last time when I had Joan.

Gina: No.

Roxanne: Because I also just, our bathroom was literally just completed the day that I gave birth, they finished, they went to the house and set up the bathroom.

Gina: The bidets we used to have were like…

Roxanne: Assaulting.

Gina: Yeah. It was the first version of the TUSHY.

Roxanne: Stabbing your butthole.

Gina: The TUSHY Classic, like 1.0, which was like assault. Like it, you could only…

Roxanne: Even if you went on like the lowest, like as soon as you turned it on, it was a fire hose of pressure.

Gina: I was like Googling it.

Roxanne: Maybe it’s our water pressure in our home a little bit.

Gina: No, because the reviews were like, “This was assaulting me” and I was like, how are people using this? I don’t understand.

Roxanne: I love a good bidet.

Gina: But they have upgraded it. So their Classic 3.0 now, is actually like a gentle, like it is a reasonable clean. But we have the ones with the heated seats and the remotes and it has a front and a back cleanser and a butt dryer. Very fancy, but also very nice.

Roxanne: It’s a cozy poo.

Gina: It is.

Roxanne: I do really like it. I didn’t, I, our mom had a bidet when we stayed with her when our house was under construction and it had the heated seat. And I was like, “This is nice.”

Gina: But all my kids use the toilet ’cause they like the heated seat.

Roxanne: “We don’t need a heated seat.” And then after being there for a few months, ’cause our like four week timeline turned into five months- I am so sorry, Mom, that we lived with you for so long- but five months of using a heated toilet with a bidet, I was like, “We need one. We need one now.”

Gina: Of course. Dad would text me and be like, “Roxanne!” And I’m like, “You guys have been around each other too much. You need some space from each other.”

Roxanne: I would just stay upstairs because that’s where I would go. I would go to my room, like I was in freaking high school. But no, the bidet, pretty clutch part I’m excited about for postpartum, and we have it on like multiple toilets. But I still have my peri bottles prepped just in case. I do have three peri bottles, ’cause one is ne never enough. It’s just doesn’t hold enough water.

Gina: You can have one…

Roxanne: I do have a Bodily one. The Bodily one is like the largest capacity, so I do find usually one of those is fine. But then I can have my fancy herbal peri bottles. That’s really all I have prepped.

Gina: I typical find having this stuff ahead of time is super helpful, ’cause even with two day shipping with Amazon….

Roxanne: Yeah.

Gina: That’s still a period of time where it’s like crucial.

Roxanne: It’s still two days that you’re waiting to get your relief, especially if it’s like discomfort, like perineal discomfort or hemorrhoids. Ugh. Who wants to deal with hemorrhoids?

Gina: I also have a whole YouTube video where I filmed when I was like three days postpartum of what my peri care looked like, and I share all of the items that I used as well that will link to this video, or to this podcast episode. So if you want to see what it looks like. Then you can check that out as well. We will film another one with Roxanne in January pending how she’s feeling. that’ll be like an update on her personal thing. But because this is going to come out before we release any of those videos, you can check out my postpartum perineal care.

Roxanne: Yeah, because mine will probably have some more hemorrhoid care than Gina’s did.

Gina: Because my butt hole is perfect, and I have never had hemorrhoids, ever, ’cause my pelvic floor is amazing.

So let’s talk about other things that you’re prepping. ‘Cause breastfeeding for me, with my first was one of the things where I was overnight shipping things to find relief from. And then I, ended up having like very smooth breastfeeding journeys from that first one, ’cause I had all of the stuff prepped, I was not messing around after that. So what were, what are some things that you’re prepping specifically for breastfeeding?

Roxanne: Since all my kids pretty much have tongue ties, always, I mean I’m, I don’t know for sure, but pretty sure.

Gina: Good likelihood.

Roxanne: Pretty high probability. I usually will try to have lactation and a dentist lined up, which I still need to reach out to them. That is the one thing about the holidays that is sucky is because people like take vacation. So rude. So sometimes they don’t take like new clients or like they’re just not doing visits. So I do need to reach out, that is on my to-do list this week ’cause I realized that I have not reached out. ‘Cause our old, like the last dentist that we saw for Joan’s, she closed her business ’cause she wanted a better work life balance, and I respect it. But now who’s going to do my tongue tie release for my baby if he needs it? So I have to find a new dentist in the area and then find out like cost and stuff. ‘Cause with her, she just billed our insurance and I paid like nothing out of pocket. I probably did, I just blacked it out. But I need to find somebody as well as a lactation consultant for like pre-baby body work beforehand and like just assessing and doing all of that. Which my midwife, her birth assistant is an I-B-C-L-C, so I know that she’ll be coming to the house for at least the first two weeks if I need assistance. But having, like I know we have one like local who’s like pretty well versed in tongue ties and oral restrictions that I have used with my other kids that I feel confident if I need, she will assist. But, maybe she’s busy ’cause she’s on vacation when I have my baby! But then I need, I, that, that is the big things that I need.

And with the tongue tie, like I obviously know like certain exercises just from having three of them, but I am prepared for nipple damage with my silverettes. And then I just use like coconut oil, because it’s just easier than all the nipple balms in the world, they’re all great, and I don’t think there’s one that’s like better than the other, necessarily. I did use Earth Mama like a ton with my first, but I do, I’ll probably just use coconut oil this time ’cause I already have it. And then a ton of pats, ’cause I have weak nipple sphincters, apparently, which, nothing I can do about it. I can’t strengthen the sphincters apparently. But that just means that I leak milk very easily. I will soak an entire bath towel with milk, overnight.

Gina: Let’s take a break from this week’s episode to talk about our podcast sponsor, Needed. Needed is a nutrition company that specializes in optimizing nourishment for the perinatal timeframe that both Roxanne and I personally utilize to help support our pregnancies, our postpartums, we’ll probably take it for the rest of our lives. And so we highly recommend them to you, and we only recommend brands that we personally use and love.

Roxanne: Something that I’ve been incorporating into my third trimester routine is Needed’s sleep and relaxation support, which is just, I add it to hot water before going to bed, and I find that it helps me sleep better. I don’t wake up in the middle of the night when I do find that I take it. And insomnia in third trimester can be very common, so I find that’s helping me get a little bit more sleep. I don’t have any data to back this up From my Oura Ring or anything, but I find that the magnesium in it and the chamomile in it helps me fall asleep easier. And I think just drinking warm things in general makes me have a little routine before going to bed, and it tastes pretty good.

Gina: I did use it in my third trimester with my last pregnancy because my solution for pregnancy insomnia was play Candy Crush, so I made it to like level like 700.

Roxanne: Oh damn.

Gina: In my, third trimester ’cause I was struggling to sleep. But the night that I did take the sleep and relaxation support, I did feel like I was actually able to go to sleep instead of staying up till 3:00 AM, crushing candy.

Roxanne: So if you would like to try something for more restful sleep and not Candy Crush, the Sleep and Relaxation Sport has been a big fan for both of us and even my husband used it for a little while and he has pretty bad insomnia. So anecdotally, three people, Team Sleep and Relaxation Support. And you can head to thisisneeded.com and use code MAMASTEPOD to get 20% off your own sleep and relaxation support.

Gina: These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration.

Roxanne: This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any diseases.

Gina: So this is why I bought that little vacuum that we talked about in your birth prep podcast episode, was because during my postpartums, I’ve leaked all over my mattresses.

Roxanne: Oh.

Gina: And so I bought it to clean my mattresses of this like residue milk.

Roxanne: I shouldn’t use that.

Gina: That I could not get out.

Roxanne: From my children just peeing in their bed.

Gina: Yeah, probably pee, too, ’cause I also sleep with all my children as they’re learning to potty train.

Roxanne: I’m going to need to borrow your little vacuum, or just send me the link.

Gina: So that’s, my project today is I’m going to go home and vacuum my mattresses clean of all my residue milk. So I will lend it to you postpartum and I- or I’ll do it for you, you don’t need to be vacuuming your mattress.

Roxanne: No. No.

Gina: Two days postpartum.

Roxanne: Maybe I’m going to be nesting and vacuuming my children’s mattresses prior to birth.

Gina: Yeah, you’re welcome.

Roxanne: But I do, since I leak so much, I have the pads that I’m just going to put in my bra to walk around in, as well as I have I a plethora, I don’t know how I’ve accumulated so many of just like the milk collectors that you put in the bra to collect the milk, so that I’m potentially, maybe this baby will take a bottle.

Gina: Between the two of us, for eight years of pregnancies and births, we have either bought them or people have sent them to us.

Roxanne: I’ve tried like almost every brand milk collectors.

Gina: I don’t really, the only one I ever really use is the Haakaa thing, but they do have a ladybug one that’s a little bit more, it fits in the bra.

Roxanne: I do the ladybug over the Haakaa, ’cause with the Haakaa it did give me more of an overproduction of milk. So I can easily make too much milk, which doesn’t sound like a bad problem until you start to get milk, like, clogged ducks from like your baby not being able to empty the milk that I have created for them because I told my body my baby needed more milk than it actually drinks. Which I was like, what is the issue here? My baby doesn’t drink six ounces in one sitting.

Gina: Now we have a niece that you could donate your milk to.

Roxanne: Yeah I could donate my milk to a baby.

Gina: So we went and visited our brother last week, and I am still breastfeeding, and so Zoe didn’t come with us on the trip, and so I had to pump some of the milk out. I usually have to pump like once or twice a day, like when I’m gone from her just for like my comfort. But, Zoe does not take bottles, so even if I saved the milk and brought it home, she’s not going to drink it. And it just sits in my fridge or my freezer I have little stacks of milk. So I had finished pumping my little manual pump and I had it on the table, and our brother, they have a baby who’s three months old and they do like a combo of like formula with breast milk for her. And he sees this bottle of milk and he’s like, “Ka-Ching!” and he was like, “Ah. What are you going to do with that? Like, what are you going to do with without milk?” And I could see like the wheels turning in his head where he is thinking, “We could feed that to my baby,” and I was like, you know what? I didn’t even think about that, because I didn’t know if that was weird for you or not. Like for Roxanne I know it’s not weird.

Roxanne: No.

Gina: But this isn’t… this is my brother, our brother’s, baby, but it’s like his wife is the one that gave birth to her. And I feel like there’s a different connection. So I was like, if I had even considered this, I would have actually sterilized this bottle or this pump before and I would’ve given you this milk to use for her.

But I could see his wheels returning and when I was like, “I was just going to dump it on the sink,” you could, I could just see him like, “What?” So you could save the milk for her?

Roxanne: If they wanted, I could give them all of my extra milk that I pump. because I do, I have the fortunate ability to tell my body to make more milk very easily, like by just pumping more often. I know that this is not everybody’s experience, but like when I pump, I can tell my body to make more milk- in the early days of postpartum.

Gina: Yeah.

Roxanne: After a while, like my babies will choose to feed on one boob over the other, and the other boob just shrivels up, and then I have uneven, because they just like the right boob milk and apparently don’t like the left boob milk. I don’t know why. So with my oldest, I pumped and she took a bottle because I went back to work like very, part-time, PRN, but I would pump when I was at work, and so even if she didn’t latch off that side, I would pump. And so I had even boobs. But then with the other two, they didn’t take bottles. So I was like, “Why the fuck am I going to pump if you’re not even going to drink it?” So then this apparently learned this booby doesn’t make good milkies for them, this one does. So then I was just very uneven for a very long time, but maybe I could just pump on the side and then they can have that milk.

Gina: It was to the point where we would have to film content with Roxanne, like, angled.

Roxanne: Somebody one time mentioned, “Oh, it looks like Roxanne forgot to feed from one side.” No, that’s just, that was just me. Let’s not booby shame people.

Gina: Yeah.

Roxanne: It was like a cup sized difference.

Gina: More. It was more.

Roxanne: It was very noticeably different. But I have talked to people who- it’s not just me, it wasn’t just my experience- other people’s babies were also doing that, and they’re like, “I produce no milk.” And someone was like, “Just pump a bunch on that side,” but at this point it’s 9 to 12 months postpartum, like it’s too late now.

Gina: Now that could be something you incorporate in your preparation. Force that baby to drink the left!

Roxanne: But it’s also like in the middle of the night when, which is when your body signals to make more milk.

Gina: Do you think it’s based on the position that you like to sleep in at night?

Roxanne: It’s the position, but it’s also in the middle of the night when I’m like half asleep, I’m just like (pretends to be asleep), and then if I’m on my left side, like that’s the side that the edge of the bed is on, and I’m like, I don’t want you to roll out bed.

Gina: So maybe it’s not their preference, it’s your sleeping preferences.

Roxanne: It’s my sleeping preference. But also like when they got old enough, they would only go to this side, pull the shirt up and gimme the booby.

But that is what I’m preparing for this time, hopefully to avoid raisin and full melon, with pumping. I did not order a pump though this time, even though our insurance covers it because I have my Eufy pump. But I have thought about, maybe I need an updated Spectra, I don’t know.

Gina: I order them every pregnancy ’cause it’s included and I don’t ever use ’em.

Roxanne: I know, but like maybe I should just order a new pump, ’cause our insurance covers it. I don’t know. I’ll figure it out. If anyone has pump recommendations, I’ll try it with my insurance money. I will need to get the bags though. So our insurance does cover like 90 bags a month or so, it’s like an obnoxious amount of bags. But I will be going back to work eventually at the birth center so I will need to pump, even though this baby may or may not take a bottle.

Gina: Which, I mean if you’re going to be gone for 12 hours, I would hope so.

Roxanne: I hope so, too. Or else I’m just going to have to pay someone to hang out with me and my baby at a birth, which, not ideal. I hope he just takes a bottle.

I’m going to implement a bottle, I think, though- ’cause I didn’t do this with the other ones, I waited until too long, I think. I’m going to implement a bottle earlier, which is what I did with Lily. She started taking a bottle, probably like we did, like one bottle a day, starting around two weeks, two or three weeks, and I’m wondering if that’s why she was able to take a bottle. Versus the other two, I didn’t start until like later on. I don’t know if that makes a difference, but someone told me that one time and I’m like, okay, I’ll try it. I’ll try it. Anything to get a baby to take a bottle.

But yeah, so I have all my booby stuff, my vagina stuff, and then I will probably increase my therapy amount, just in case, to check in. ‘Cause right now I just do it like once a month, just to check in how I’m doing mentally. Might go more often. And it’s just virtual so I don’t have to drive there, she’ll just call me and we’ll just talk on the phone for a little bit to check in, make sure I’m not mentally spiraling.

Gina: Unwell.

Roxanne: But, I do also know the first three months postpartum I’m going to have a ton of support, and then everyone goes back to their like day jobs, for lack of a better word, at three months. And that’s usually when more people have issues postpartum. So I’m going to continue into postpartum, maybe discuss increasing my medication. We’ll see how I do mentally. Maybe no hemorrhage, that’ll just set me up for like complete success, no anxiety. Wonder what that’s like!

Gina: The normal amount of anxiety is none.

Roxanne: It’s none! What?

Gina: But is that true? Is that true? Is normal, or ideal?

Roxanne: I think it’s like anxiety, though, it’s a spectrum. So like anxiety that’s affecting your daily life to where you’re not doing things, maybe.

Gina: I feel like I have met a total of zero people that have no anxiety.

Roxanne: They have… they have anxious feelings, but maybe it’s not anxiety. ‘Cause I have met people that don’t have anxiety, but they do have depression.

Gina: Like a generalized anxiety disorder or something like that?

Roxanne: But, they have depression. But they’re like, “I would choose depression over anxiety.” But I don’t know.

Gina: I don’t know.

Roxanne: Let us know in the comments below.

Gina: I had postpartum OCD, which I always thought was just like, you like to make sure locks are closed?

Roxanne: No. OCD is not… that is like a very small portion.

Gina: That’s what I always thought it was because that’s what people joke as, “oh, I have OCD, I have to make sure my curling iron is unplugged.” No, OCD is like intrusive thoughts, where like you were like, “This crazy thing could potentially happen, therefore, I will…”

Roxanne: “Do all of these things to try to prevent it.”

Gina: “Have a panic attack.”

Roxanne: Yeah.

Gina: And be worried that someone’s going to throw my baby in the shark tank.

Roxanne: It’s a spectrum. There’s so many more, there’s so much more postpartum mood disorders than just postpartum depression. There’s postpartum depression, postpartum anxiety, postpartum bipolar, postpartum OCD, like so many. Postpartum psychosis! So, any feelings postpartum, it could be beneficial to seek therapy, just to talk about them and be reassured- normal, or maybe we need to continue talking about them.

Gina: Yeah.

Roxanne: Very common. It’s the number one.

Gina: So what other things do you have prepared for postpartum?

Roxanne: What other things do I have?

Gina: You got down there care, booby care, up here care- mental care.

Roxanne: Yeah. Stomach care, food. In my bed, I have a TV in my room and I have a list of TV shows that I’m going to watch, even though I mostly, probably just sleep. I do have some books lined up that I wanna read, and maybe read with my eyeballs instead of my earballs- probably not, but I have high hopes, but I have expectation management of those things. But what else do you do when you’re just like laying in bed for a little bit?

Gina: I don’t know. I did a lot of coloring and napping.

Roxanne: Oh, I do have some coloring books that I purchased for Christmas, and I originally purchased markers for my children, but they don’t know how to put caps on markers, so I took the ones that were expensive and bought them $5 markers.

Gina: That was a good choice.

Roxanne: So I have the fancy markers now for my coloring books. I did not buy any puzzles ’cause I was like, you have to sit or stand for a puzzle. I was like, oh, I should get puzzles, but I was like, that was dumb. Don’t get puzzles. That requires too much physical activity. So coloring might be better. I did look into crochet, like the little wools.

Gina: I feel like it’s a lot of mental…

Roxanne: Like the Woobles one, but I was like, that’s probably not what I wanna pick up postpartum, so I did stop myself. I did. I was realistic with my expectations. Coloring is more realistic, because that is something I can do mindlessly.

Gina: I think I mostly napped, colored, napped some more.

Roxanne: And then I do have things.

Gina: I ate food.

Roxanne: And I have things in my room for the mobility early postpartum program, which is just like a Pilates ball and a yoga block and maybe some bands. I think I put some bands in there so that I don’t have to walk to my garage to get them. It’s already available in my bedroom. Which I could use the block in labor, so I could still like that.

Gina: Maybe we can refilm the… so we have a free early postpartum recovery course, which is like breathing exercises, gentle mobility, some gentle core exercises starting around like week three, and then like a guide on walking postpartum. ‘Cause there is a tissue healing timeline that happens postpartum that is important to honor. So going back to the gym at three days postpartum, even though I’ve seen Instagram reels where people are like, “My fitness was really high and this is good for me,” there is a timeline of tissue healing that occurs, and when we rush that it could hinder our overall healing. Like, you may like heal, but you will probably hit some performance issues if you don’t take your time with this healing process. So we do have a free early postpartum recovery course that we’ll link in this video and podcast as well that’s free to join. You do have to give us your email. You do have to sign up for our newsletter, but you can unsubscribe. We did have one person that was like really upset that in order for us to email them a free guide, we then needed their email.

Roxanne: Yeah.

Gina: And she was like, “I feel like this was false advertising.” I was like, “It’s a free guide when you sign up for it.”

Roxanne: And it’s too large to send it like, via Instagram.

Gina: You can’t send it in an Instagram message. You cannot send files. But yeah, she’s like, “This is false advertising.” Okay. It’s a free guide.

Roxanne: But I do plan to do our free early postpartum because even when I didn’t feel the best for very long in my last postpartum, the days that I did do some gentle movement- ’cause I was on week one for a little bit longer, I was on week one for maybe three weeks…

Gina: Which is fine.

Roxanne: That’s what felt right. My body would feel better.

Gina: Oh, you’re telling me that the movements that I recommended helped you feel better in your body?

Roxanne: And my tailbone. It did not help my prolapse symptoms feel better. It did not help me poop. The Early Postpartum did not help me poop better.

Gina: Then I need to modify it.

Roxanne: Because I needed to splint to help me poop. But it did make my tailbone feel better, which pain-wise, no one likes a painful tailbone. But it did like my upper back too, though, not just my butt, my upper back, because this adorable little baby you’re just holding like this.

Gina: So in addition to our free Early Postpartum Recovery Course, we also have a YouTube series that is like what to expect each week of postpartum, too, that we filmed. I don’t think I was that week, I think it was a little bit past ’cause I was not coming, I was not coming here.

Roxanne: But we went over what to expect physically within your body, the changes that are happening during different periods of time postpartum, because your body is returning to a pre-pregnancy state, or a non-pregnant state, with different physiologic things. Like your lungs and your circulatory system and stuff.

Gina: Yeah, so it’s a four week series, the recovery course and the YouTube series where it’s like week 1, 2, 3, and then four through six, is what it is. ‘Cause typically by like the four to six week mark is when your tissue has entered a maturation phase, so it’s like more organized, it’s stronger, and it’s ready to start being progressively loaded at that point. Prior to that point, the tissue is healing, but it’s really disorganized and when you add load too early to it, it could cause the tissue to align un-optimally, and so we want to avoid that, and that’s why we don’t recommend going back to the gym until at earliest four weeks postpartum, potentially six weeks postpartum, because of the tissue healing timeline, regardless of your fitness level prenatally or pre-kids, by any means. ‘Cause all of our tissues are going to heal in a similar way. Now some folks maybe they enter it at three weeks or four weeks, but just the general recommendation is 4 to 6 weeks for a reason.

Roxanne: Knowing that individual timelines, like being open to that experience, but also being open to the experience that it might be longer than four to six weeks for different people.

Gina: Yeah. It’s also okay to just chill for a month. It’ll be okay.

Roxanne: As much as your body might want to move.

Gina: I did start getting some FOMO, probably like two, three weeks.

Roxanne: Gina got FOMO real quick. I think I had to tell her to stop vacuuming her house one time. I had to take the vacuum from her.

Gina: Last time I had my book launched, too.

Roxanne: Yeah.

Gina: At like, three weeks postpartum.

Roxanne: Yeah. But she was, she tried to vacuum her home at two weeks postpartum. ’cause it was messy, and I was like, please sit the fuck down.

Gina: That was like my third birth, I think, or my second.

Roxanne: I don’t remember which one it was. But regardless, she was trying to vacuum and I had to take the vacuum from her and vacuum for her, and then tell her to go lay down.

Gina: I do get FOMO.

Roxanne: It’s hard. It is hard to not do anything, but you also don’t have to just lay in bed for a month without moving.

Gina: But you also need the support. And so I think that’s something that’s a little unique about our situations, which sometimes makes these like episodes where we’re sharing, like what we’re doing a little difficult, is ’cause our husbands get paternity leave with the military and it’s.. 12 weeks now?

Roxanne: Like they, they get 12 weeks that they can use, over two years now.

Gina: Yeah. So I don’t think my husband has used all of his, but he did take at least a month.

Roxanne: My husband, I took, he took seven weeks.

Gina: I think he took a month or six weeks after.

Roxanne: He took seven weeks after Joan and that was because you guys went to Korea, so he took an extra week because he went to Korea.

Gina: Yeah. This time I am not taking our mom away from you in the middle of your postpartum. You’re welcome.

Roxanne: Which, that was like a month after, or month, or six weeks after, so it’s…. she needed to go to Korea. I think she enjoyed it, but.

Gina: But I also took them on 14 other vacations.

Roxanne: Yeah. Don’t, yeah, Gina. Gina took a staycation like an hour away, took both of our parents with her. But it’s fine, ’cause like my husband is there and he’s not useless!

Gina: I went to Great Wolf Lodge. I went to the mountains to do a mushroom farm tour.

Roxanne: That was actually, honestly, I was really jealous about.

Gina: That was really cool.

Roxanne: I was like, I want to go on a mushroom farm tour.

Gina: I was forging for mushrooms with our mom, and learning how to grow them.

Roxanne: And eat them and cook them. And I’m like, that sounds really cool, as I am laying in bed with my newborn baby and half finished…

Gina: If anyone should have had FOMO, it should have been you, with all the trips I was taking.

Roxanne: But I was dying and recovering.

Gina: I was like, my husband was deployed and so I was like, I’m going to do all of these vacations then to entertain my children in his absence, but also take Roxanne’s support away.

Roxanne: Yeah.

Gina: As I was just, I guess your husband was there, and he’s not useless, so.

Roxanne: He was, yeah, he’s not useless. He’s a very helpful father and husband and partner. All of the titles. He’s very helpful in postpartum. ‘Cause I think after my second, for sure, mentally, he’s like, “Oh, you need help. We need support.” So he did take a specific job so that he’s not pulling me away from my family at four months postpartum, I’m able to stay here and not be sad alone in another state.

Gina: But, additionally, you get maternity leave.

Roxanne: I do get maternity leave.

Gina: With MamasteFit.

Roxanne: I mean, I still have to work, but also… yeah.

Gina: If you can’t, I’m not going to fire you.

Roxanne: No, she’s not.

Gina: Maybe.

Roxanne: Maybe in February she’ll fire me.

Gina: Maybe. We’ll see. We’ll see.

Roxanne: We’ll see how long Roxanne stays a part of MamasteFit.

Gina: I was like, if this bitch takes another nap today, I swear to God.

Roxanne: I didn’t plan! It wasn’t like, I’m going to nap right now. It was literally, I would be on my phone and then I would wake up and be like, “What? What happened? What happened? What time is it? What year is it? Oh, damnit, I took another nap today. God damnit!” I would text you to, “I’m going to do this today.” “I just woke up,” four hours later. I’m so sorry. I am useless as I’m trying to just breathe oxygen.

Gina: But it was also my own fault, I wasn’t there to do it.

Roxanne: Yeah, she was on too many vacations!

Gina: I just assumed that you were going to create some content at a week postpartum.

Roxanne: Because, I couldn’t even breathe.

Gina: How silly of me.

Roxanne: I know. But it’s, we’ve learned from that experience, and we’ll do different things. This one, hopefully avoid a postpartum hemorrhage so that I can walk to the bathroom without passing out.

Gina: Stay tuned to see if there’s anything new that we realized that we should have prepped for postpartum, for Roxanne.

Roxanne: Yeah.

Gina: Or if it is a smooth experience.

Roxanne: I feel like we’ve got very good plans for birth and postpartum. I am excited for it, and being in a little tiny baby bubble before returning back to work.

Gina: For me, like the first day postpartum, or first, like two or three days are like the worst, ’cause I’m just like sore and achy and crampy. And then it’s like really nice ’cause you’re in a little newborn bubble, and I don’t want it to end, where I’m like, oh, I really like just being waited on and people just bringing me food in bed.

Roxanne: I know that is really nice.

Gina: And snuggling with my baby all day.

Roxanne: That is something that I might get is a tray, like a eating in bed tray, now that you just mentioned eating in bed. ‘Cause I don’t have a little table. We were just using my kids’ like floor table.

Gina: Oh. I was just, I just had a tray and I would just put it on my lap.

Roxanne: I don’t even have a tray.

Gina: Oh.

Roxanne: So maybe I need to add that to my Amazon list.

Gina: Maybe Halmeoni will bring you one.

Roxanne: Yeah, she does have 5,000 trays.

Gina: Because you know where all my trays come from?

Roxanne: Halmeoni.

Gina: Mom. I am a child, adult.

Roxanne: My mom gives Gina everything. To include all of her kitchen.

Gina: All of her attention.

Roxanne: Yeah, all of her attention.

Gina: But Roxanne is about to steal her.

Roxanne: I know, I’m taking the childcare for just a small period. And then my mom will return back to Gina because she loves her kitchen more than she likes my kitchen, and her own kitchen. Gina’s kitchen is very nice.

Gina: It is a very nice kitchen.

Roxanne: It’s very open.

Gina: We just bought her a portable TV that has a stand.

Roxanne: Stop it! For your house?

Gina: For our house, so that when she’s like washing dishes, she can watch her shows right next to it. When she’s doing laundry, she has her tv.

Roxanne: Oh, see, I do my own laundry

Gina: When she’s hanging out somewhere, she can watch her tv.

Roxanne: We just have, she can attach her phone to any tv.

Gina: Yeah. But if there’s a room without a tv.

Roxanne: There’s no room without a TV in my home. Every room has a tv. The laundry room doesn’t.

Gina: The laundry room doesn’t have a TV, Roxanne!

Roxanne: The laundry room does not have a tv, but we, you’re just in the laundry room to put the clothes in the washer and dry.

Gina: And then your kitchen doesn’t have a tv.

Roxanne: The kitchen is connected to the living room.

Gina: So is my living room, ,but my children are watching their Mickey Mouse.

Roxanne: That’s why they have TVs in their bedrooms so they can watch their Mickey Mouse in their bedrooms, or K-Pop Demon Hunters, or Frozen, or whatever they’re into in the moment. They did watch Stranger Things, maybe not the best parenting decision.

Gina: The Flower Monster.

Roxanne: My daughter, Joan, loves it. She goes, “I wanna watch Mommy Monsters.” She’s like, “Let’s watch Mommy Monsters.”

Gina: If anyone is in London and would like us to come teach a workshop there…

Roxanne: I wanna watch the play!

Gina: We want to watch the Stranger Things Play that’s there.

Roxanne: The prequel play.

Gina: The prequel play. So if you live in London and you’re like, “You know who I would love to learn from? Gina, and maybe Roxanne…”

Roxanne: Please, also Roxanne! Or at least see the baby! June, July our schedule is open.

Gina: We’ll bring the baby.

Roxanne: June, July, even September. Maybe August?

Gina: We’re booking in June and beyond. We have ulterior motives. We want to see the Stranger Things play.

Roxanne: We would like to see the foreshadow play, because I’ve heard great things, and I would love the, I would love to watch it. It looks really cool.

Gina: But I would like to make it a business trip. So, if you live in London…

Roxanne: Message us.

Gina: Or even Paris area, I would love to go to Paris.

Roxanne: Oh, Disneyland. Yeah. We could just take a short, I think there’s a train that takes you to London from Paris. I just might have made that up.

Gina: I don’t know.

Roxanne: Postpartum though, prepared, I feel. If there’s something that obviously we think of after I’ve experienced postpartum, we’ll add it in later. Stay tuned for any updates on my postpartum prep, and if I did not prep something. If there’s something that you think I should prep, let me know in the comments, even though this might come out when I’m already postpartum, so.

Gina: You never know. It might be too late.

Roxanne: It might be too late.

Gina: We can only hope.

Roxanne: Yeah. But I feel like I’ve got all the things.

Gina: I think this comes out like a few days after the first labor prediction, December 20th. This comes out like the 31st or something, I think.

Roxanne: Oh, New Year’s Eve. Okay.

Gina: We will see. Stay tuned.

Roxanne: I will probably still be pregnant.

Gina: Stay tuned. If you’re wondering, did Roxanne give birth or not yet?

Roxanne: Check Instagram.

Gina: Check Instagram.

Roxanne: Or join our newsletter.

Gina: Join our newsletter as well.

Roxanne: And you can just be notified.

Gina: Thank you so much for joining us.

If you want more support during your postpartum, check out our online prenatal, or not our online prenatal program!

Roxanne: Check out our prenatal program for postpartum, for your future pregnancy.

Gina: No, check out our postpartum fitness programs. We have our early recovery program, which is free. The intent of it is to help you feel good at that first month postpartum, and also encourage you to join our full postpartum fitness program. Our postpartum fitness program has two options within it, so you can get full follow along videos for the first 24 workouts, in addition to self-paced workouts, so you can pick whichever one you want, and it’s all included in one program.

If you’re like, “I don’t want the full program, I just want like those first 24 workouts, but I only have 15 minutes to work out,” you can join our mini program, which is those 24 workouts split up into three workouts each. So it, I think it ends up being 72 workouts that you can just move through over however long you want, 12 to 20 weeks, however long it takes you.

But if you want the full program, we have that on our website. It’s just the Full Postpartum Program. If you just want the mini, just the Mini Postpartum Program. And then we also have follow along tracks, depending on what your sport preferences are. So if you just want general fitness, just the full return to fitness program’s going to be a good option. If you want to get back to running, we have our running with strength program in addition to our return to marathon program that I did to train for a marathon in two months. Do not recommend. Maybe we need a Hyrox.

Roxanne: Yeah, we need a Hyrox postpartum program now. We were supposed to train for this marathon together. We also have a return to Olympic Weightlifting, so our CrossFit athletes that are wanting to get back to the barbell and to the platform, we have that program. And then our Return to Duty for our military service members and first responders. So there’s different tracks that you can grab, they all have the same first 24 workouts, which is our foundation program, and then they move on to your return to sport program.

We have worked with in-person postpartum clients to help them get back to all these different sports. We have tested them with in-person clients, so they’re not just programs that we wrote based on our own postpartum recovery and articles that we read, we have developed them based on what we have seen actually work with clients in person. We’ve gotten online feedback from our programs as well. We’ve trained hundreds of in-person clients, thousands of online clients, and we also have our pelvic floor PTs review our programs as well. And so you’re getting a lot of experience and expertise helping us to develop these programs, and so it’s going to be really hard to beat the expertise that we have with the program that we offer. So check them out on our website at mamastefit.com, and use code STORY10 to get 10% off any of our online offerings.

And depending on when you listen to this, if the little baby boy has just recently been born, there’ll probably be a sale. We always do a birth sale. So if that has not happened yet, stay tuned. If it has happened and you missed it, STORY10, use code story 10 get 10% off. Sorry, but yeah.

Gina: And this podcast is sponsored by Needed. Needed is a nutrition company that we’ve utilized in our pregnancies, postpartum, that focus is on the perinatal timeframe. And if you wanna check them out, head to thisisneeded.com and use code MAMASTEPOD to get 20% off your first order.