The Nursing Mother

The doctor said: I used to visit Mrs. Suad every day during the first week after the birth of her baby. The baby was growing well and regaining the weight it had had at birth — about four kilos — and its mother felt a continual improvement in her health, and kept asking me insistently: When may I begin moving about the house? For I have learned from a friend of mine that she was up and about five days after her delivery.

And my answer was: There are doctors who say there is no objection to the nursing mother's leaving her bed as soon as possible, but I say: why not give the nursing mother the chance to rest from the strain of childbirth, if that can be managed? There is Mrs. Suad's mother, or some of her relatives, who can take upon themselves the household work, while the mother — the baby's mother — devotes herself, in her bed, to the care of her baby.

It is best that the nursing mother remain ten days in bed, and then begin to move about gradually. As for the exercise she needs: she should breathe deeply and move her hands, feet, and legs; then she should exercise the inner abdominal muscles, drawing them inward as she breathes in and relaxing them as she breathes out. This kind of exercise is very useful for the nursing mother.

Then, on the fourth day after delivery, she should take up an exercise known as the bicycle movement — that is, lying with the face upward and imitating the motion of a bicycle. This exercise is tiring at first, but it strengthens the muscles.

Finally, the nursing mother should take up the arm exercise: raising her arms above her head and lowering them gradually to her sides. This exercise is very useful for the muscles of the chest.

The mother grows anxious about her milk, for she yields nothing in the first three days after delivery, and it seems to her that her milk has stopped. The truth is that the nursing mother yields no milk in the first three days — as if nature intended the baby to take no milk in those days.

The nursing mother's milk is usually preceded by a substance called colostrum, and the baby should be nursed on it, so as to draw from it its nutritive matter.

When the baby is born, its intestines are filled with a sticky substance called meconium, and the baby's digestive apparatus cannot perform its natural function so long as this substance remains in the baby's intestines. Accordingly, half a teaspoon of salt is put into a vessel holding about two large cups of water; it is boiled, then left until it is lukewarm. During the first three days of the baby's life it sucks a little of this water, and from the fourth day on it is given a teaspoonful of it once every four hours. The benefit of this water is that it cleanses the intestines of the meconium, over and above its benefit as a nourishing substance.

The nursing mother should accustom the baby to the breast: on the first day the baby is put, every four hours, for one minute at each breast; on the second day it nurses for two minutes; on the third day, three minutes, and so on... By this method the mother avoids the soreness that afflicts the breast, and the baby grows accustomed to regular nursing.

Then the nursing mother should wipe the nursing place with a diluted antiseptic, and dry it before nursing the baby; she should also not wash the nursing place but dry it with care, and put upon it no kind of cream, or perfume, or alcohol.

When the baby takes to regular nursing, it sucks at each feeding all the milk, and only a little remains in the breast. The nursing mother should rid herself of this remainder by pressing it out after every feeding, for this remainder leads to the blocking of the ducts, so that the baby takes to sucking hard, and the result is the formation of air in its stomach, and it wants to bring it up. The easiest way to help the baby do this is for the mother to hold the baby between her hands, bending it downward a little, with her left hand under its belly, and to pat with her right hand upon its back until it is rid of the air.

The doctor said: Yesterday I called on Mrs. Suad and found her troubled. I asked her the cause of this trouble, and she said: hardly had the baby nursed for a minute or two when it suddenly stopped nursing and sank into a deep sleep. I wondered at the matter, and soon I noticed that the mother had wrapped her baby in a shawl over its woolen jacket; so I advised her to take off the shawl and undo the jacket — and behold, the baby woke again and threw itself into nursing with a great appetite.

And today I visited Mrs. Suad, and she said to me, with vexation plain upon her face: But why has my baby's weight fallen below its weight on the day it was born?.. I answered her: Babies lose weight during the first days after their birth; they regain this weight after a period of time, and exceed it, if they receive the necessary care and regimen.