Introducing the ‘Golden Month
At the Blossom Tree Clinic we would like to introduce you to a beautiful, potent post-partum practice - poetically called the ‘Golden Month’, which encompasses a 4-6 week period of special care for the Mother and her new baby. The goal of this practice is deep rest and appropriate nutrition to help the mother to recover from birth, 9 months of pregnancy and provide the necessary nurture for her newborn, compensating for the lost energy and blood of this period. This investment of effort helps set the mother and baby up to flourish through the challenges of early babyhood and beyond.
This cultural tradition is a mainstay of family life in many parts of Asia. It has two main components; a rallying of womenfolk to attend to the Mother and baby’s need and a highly-targeted, sophisticated program of nutrition which adapts to the evolving needs of the post-partum body. Typically the women closest to the new mother will be part of her army of support, including aunties, sisters and the Mother-in-law. This is not the domain of the Men. I remember when I worked in Thailand, one of my Thai colleagues was having a baby. I was blown away to find out that to support her concentrated care, her husband was to spend the first month of their baby’s life staying at a monastery -presumably so as not to get under the feet of the women who had important work to do!
In this tradition food is most definitely medicine during the post-partum period, it is carefully selected and prepared to nourish post-natal energy and blood, to aid healing and restore depleted nutrients. It recognises the heightened nutritional needs of the recovering body and the extra demand of breastfeeding.
Here are 7 golden rules in diet for the Golden Month:
Choose easily digestible foods
Select the best quality ingredients to ensure maximum nutritional benefit
Incorporate blood building foods; i.e. rich in iron and minerals
Ensure adequate hydration though herbal teas and food
Eat gently cook or warm foods
Moderate intake of salt
Utlilise brown ginger, black sesame oil and rice wine
Foods typically prepared during this period include soups, stews and congees. Some of the special ingredients found in post-natal recipes include:
Black Sesame seeds - for strengthening the Blood, lactation and a remedy for constipation
Red Dates and Goji berries - for warming and increasing circulation, conferring good vitamins and antioxidants
Ginger - very warming
Black vinegar - for warming and good for circulation, contains lots of amino acids which are good for bodily repair and tissue growth
Seaweed - for replenishing depleted minerals
If you would like to explore this subject in more depth and discover lots of appropriate recipes we recommend this wonderful book; The First Forty Days by Hung Ou.
Unfortunately we have lost these traditions in the West and not surprisingly a lot of women struggle during this time. So if you are pregnant, I would love you to think about who could be in your army of support. For many women geographically, it’s not realistic for our closest female relatives to be on hand in this way so we need to think creatively and be brave enough to reach out to our community for support. And if you are not pregnant is their a woman in your community expecting a baby who you could offer some post-natal support to? For example, I know I have both loved having a MealTrain after giving birth and get so much pleasure contributing to the MealTrain of my post-partum friends.
The Blossom Tree Clinic is an Acupuncture and Chinese Medicine Clinic in Totnes Dartington. If you would like to book in with one of our practitioners please head to our BOOKING PAGE
Acupuncture in Totnes - Acupuncture Pregnancy - Acupuncture Children- Acupuncture postnatal care