What does a postpartum professional do? A look into their job description
Let me start by saying this title may be slightly misleading - there’s no ‘one size fits all’ job description for a postpartum professional. The offering of every postpartum carer differs slightly, and every motherhood journey is different. I’ve trained thousands of professional postpartum carers, and it always surprises me how different they all are!
Technicalities aside, the overarching purpose of a postpartum professional is to help women step into the role of ‘new mother’ with confidence and satisfaction. As non-medical professionals, we provide emotional and physical support during this life-changing transition.
If you’re curious about becoming a postpartum professional, let’s delve deeper into what this job title actually means.
Read: More About the History and Meaning of the Word Doula Here.
Doulas Versus Postpartum Doulas
When I first started, I would typically get one of two responses when I’d say I’m a doula: people either have never heard of the word before and say, “Oh, a jeweller! How Lovely.” Or they ask, “How many births have you been to?” I don’t make jewellery, and I’ve never been to a birth.
Read: Three Ways To Explain What You Do As A Postpartum Doula
It’s safe to say many people are still unfamiliar with the work doulas do - let alone the different types of doulas that exist.
As the name suggests, a postpartum doula accompanies the mother after the birth of the child. We work alongside women after childbirth, supporting them to navigate this new stage of life. I also like to refer to postpartum carers as ‘postpartum education and care professionals’ or simply ‘postpartum professionals’. You can also switch out the word postpartum for postnatal and it means the same thing.
A postpartum professional or doula differs from a birth doula, who provides support and assistance before and during labour and childbirth. There are also doulas for death, abortion, grief and loss.
What Does A Postpartum Professional Do?
How long is a piece of string? The work of a postpartum professional is varied and fluid, making it all the more magical. Their sole purpose is to support women and caregivers during the motherhood journey; some like to say that postpartum carers ‘mother the mother’.
In the past, the community would come together to support new mothers. Now many of us live in nuclear families and culturally don’t have much understanding of women’s needs after childbirth. Sadly many new parents feel isolated, overwhelmed and exhausted.
We support new parents to bond with their baby and spend time together. We help parents deeply understand their child’s personality and temperament and feel confident in their unique parenting style. We provide companionship and emotional support to mothers by actively listening, providing a shoulder to cry on, and simply sharing a cup of tea and laughter.
Emotional support is a given with every visit and the number of sessions varies depending on the mother’s needs. Some postpartum professionals visit for a few hours during the day, whilst others work overnight.
Branching out beyond emotional support, a postpartum professional helps navigate parenting decisions by providing evidence-based information about basic baby care and normal breastfeeding. Of course, we will always make referrals where appropriate, preventing longer-term problems. An excellent postpartum professional will have a ‘little book’ of resources, professionals, and hotlines to ensure families get timely and accurate support,
Postpartum support affects not only the mother and baby but the whole family. Having a baby is a big transition for everyone, from partners to siblings and extended family. A postpartum professional is well-versed in navigating family dynamics and will use this understanding to support positive communication. A postpartum doula can also assist if the mother needs help setting boundaries or managing visitors.
We also seek to create sustainable support systems around the mother; after all, an entire community would come together to support new mothers in the past. Nowadays, we can try our best to recreate this magic and build a community by connecting the new parent with fellow families, classes and groups. It takes a village to raise a mother, and part of our job as postpartum professionals is to build the villages we’ve lost.
A Look into a Postpartum Professional’s Job Description
There are many facets to a postpartum professional’s role. After all, our purpose is to bring comfort and joy to new mothers, and this can look different for everyone.
For example, some postpartum professional services include massage, breastfeeding support, baby massage instruction, food preparation, and building your ‘village,’ to name a few.
I like to think of a buffet - various services are available depending on the client and how she’s feeling on any given day. One client might want her postpartum carer to cook loads of food, but another will be better supported with a massage. Some clients will want both, and others will want one thing on one day and another on the next! We do what brings our clients peace and joy.
Likewise, one postpartum professional might love cooking but not offer massage, whilst another doesn’t cook but is very well-trained and experienced in breastfeeding support. It’s important to find the right postpartum professional for you.
However, generally, a postpartum professional’s services encompass…
Providing a listening ear. Never underestimate the power of active and intentional listening. A postpartum doula knows that the mother’s mental and emotional load is high. We listen without judgment and want you to feel seen and heard.
Answering questions. A postpartum professional is knowledgeable in normal newborn behaviour and appearance and normal postpartum healing. However, we are not medical professionals, meaning we can’t diagnose medical or mental health issues. We can reassure families when things are normal and refer to a relevant professional when things seem unusual.
Understanding your new identity. When a baby is born, so is a mother, and the birth of a mother can be more intense than childbirth. This involves changes in the brain, hormones, family dynamics and roles in society. Navigating all of this can be overwhelming, especially when people expect you to bounce back to normal. Postpartum professionals can support you through this as a rite of passage.
Giving information about postpartum recovery. From new kinds of neck and shoulder pain to breast health, living in a body that just gave birth takes a whole lot of adjusting. Postpartum doulas are trained to know when things like pain, bleeding or mental health are out of the ordinary and where to go for more support.
Debrief before and after medical visits or appointments. It’s common to get information overload and decision fatigue as a new parent. Parents might feel like they have a thousand questions to ask the paediatrician, only to forget them as soon as the appointment begins! A postpartum professional can help organise these thoughts and make the most of these appointments. Postpartum professionals can help you understand the risks and benefits related to decisions you need to make and prevent you from feeling overwhelmed.
Discuss baby product options. Unsurprisingly, shopping for babies isn’t the same as shopping for adults, and it’s hard to tell what is really necessary and what is simply a marketing gimmick. It’s now time for parents to discover their new favourite sunscreen, car seat, cot, mattress, feeding equipment - the list goes on! Thankfully, a postpartum professional will be up-to-date on the various options available and help parents decide what is safest and what will suit their family.
Offer resources and referrals. This is one of the most valuable services a postpartum support professional can offer. From cleaners to physical therapy and mothers groups, they can present options and resources tailored to new parents.
Breastfeeding and bottle feeding support. There is a limit to what new mothers can learn from reading and googling, meaning hands-on help is often invaluable. The tiniest of adjustments and moral support can make a world of difference. A postpartum professional can help you latch, talk through nipple concerns and care, provide breast pumping support, and more. A good postpartum professional can refer you to hotlines, groups and professionals for further support. Two in three mothers don’t meet their own breastfeeding goals, so it’s good to have support on hand if you plan to breastfeed.
Basic baby care. Simple baby care tasks can feel daunting at first! A postpartum support worker can smooth out all of these learning curves, from clipping your baby’s nails to bathing baby to fitting the pram into the car.
Giving the mother time to rest. This is an important one! If there is time left in a session, a postpartum professional can care for the newborn while the mother naps, showers, takes a bath, or enjoys a moment of peace and quiet. Uninterrupted ‘me time’ where possible is essential for recharging and refuelling.
Helping around the house. A postpartum professional can help with cooking wholesome meals or setting up the nursery or feeding chair. Basically, anything that will help relieve the mother’s mental load! Postpartum professional are often happy to fold laundry whilst chatting about boundaries or breastfeeding so you can get the best value out of your time together.
Group work & online support
Many postpartum professionals also offer:
Group work - in the form of support groups and educational classes. This might include mothers’ circles, mother blessings, baby massage classes or mums and bubs yoga classes.
Working online as a postpartum professional - More and more postpartum professionals are now working online, especially since the pandemic. This might include online breastfeeding consultations, postpartum planning courses, online mothers support groups and educational webinars. This can also make postpartum support more accessible for people with disabilities or people who live in remote areas.
A day in the life of a postpartum professional
If you’re still wondering what postpartum professionals actually do, let me direct you to one of my past blogs, ‘3 Videos of Beautiful Postpartum Care’. Three wonderful graduates of our course, Ria, Shelley and Naomi, take you through a day in their life, embodying our vision for the postpartum renaissance.
Why are postpartum support professionals important?
We always teach my students to work themselves out of a job… Counterproductive, I know. This is because I believe our ultimate goal is cultural change. I see postpartum professionals working towards a world where neighbours bring food, paid parental leave enables all parents to get involved, and mums no longer feel ashamed to ask for help.
With this focus, postpartum professionals can nurture parents into their new roles, building their confidence and restoring their strength so they no longer need a postpartum carer. The last thing we want is for mothers to become dependent on our services.
Is becoming a postpartum professional right for you?
As with all career paths, becoming a postpartum education and care professional comes with positives and negatives.
Let’s start with the negatives: if you pursue this calling, be prepared to face questioning in our culture about the value and validity of ‘women’s work’. It will be commonplace for people to ask what you actually do and assume you wouldn’t be paid. While this can be confronting, I encourage you to use this as an opportunity to gain the clearest possible understanding of your role and the innate importance of your work.
The other challenge in this industry is a lack of government-funded roles and employment opportunities. Most professional postpartum workers will set up their own business, which comes with its own challenges, including learning skills in other areas like marketing. The silver lining is that you get to be your own boss, choose your own hours and charge what you want. Being a business owner can be very rewarding if you are prepared to put in the effort.
Now for more positives. If you would like to change the way people experience the transition to parenthood, becoming a postpartum professional could be right up your alley. I view life as a postpartum professional as the perfect balance between stories and science, culture and evidence, woo-woo and data.
I believe mothers deserve to be respected and acknowledged AND pampered and nurtured. By instigating social and cultural change, we can slowly yet steadily chip away at the culture of mother-blaming and shaming.
Healthy, happy mothers create healthy, happy communities create a healthy, happy world! This is BIG work that is hugely rewarding.
These beliefs are just some of the reasons why I teach professional postpartum care in my online course Postpartum Education and Care Professional training available worldwide.
How to become a Postpartum Education and Care Professional
It feels surreal to say that I’ve trained over a thousand postpartum professionals in countries all over the world through my course, Postpartum Education and Care Professional training. When I began my journey as a postpartum doula about 15 years ago, most people in my town had no idea what that meant. There were no other postpartum doulas practising locally and no local training available. Thankfully, through my interest in Ayurveda and traditional Indian medicine, I unintentionally stumbled across this calling.
After completing five different trainings, I identified a gap in the available knowledge; none of them addressed how to support newborn mothers through this life transition beyond the basics of baby care and breastfeeding. I wanted to learn more about traditional postpartum care and rites of passage. I wanted to know about brain changes and hormones and shifts in identity. This led me to explore the postpartum journey through the lens of my own background in social justice and community development, and eventually create the Postpartum Education and Care Professional training.
Interested in training to become a Postpartum Education and Care Professional? Newborn Mothers offers one of the most comprehensive course for professionals on postpartum care in the world. The 12 modules of training provides world-leading and evidence-based postnatal education to professionals. It teaches you how to provide practical, emotional and informational support to new families. You can study online, worldwide, with a live class or in your own time. Check out our Postpartum Education and Care Professional training and join the postpartum renaissance!
In the meantime, I encourage you to continue exploring the world of postpartum professionals; together, we can change the way our society values and cares for families.
