Gentle First Year: The Essential Guide to Mother and Baby Wellbeing in the First Twelve Months. Karen MacLeod Swan

ease all your muscles and heal your perineum really quickly. If you prefer, you can infuse some camomile tea bags in a teapot and pour the lot – including the teabags – into the bath. Birth utilizes a lot of nervous energy, and camomile is renowned for its soothing effect on the nervous system. It is also very good for repairing damaged local tissues.

      Drink two litres of water a day. This will encourage milk production.

      Add lemon or cranberry juice to your drinking water. This will alkalinize your urine, helping to prevent cystitis, which is very common in the first few days after birth.

      Toilet trips. You will find you are going to the toilet a lot. This is because your body is shedding up to five litres of extra fluid from your blood volume that was required during the pregnancy.

      Light reflexology. From day one, ask your partner to massage your feet, working especially on the tops of the feet where the tendons are. This pertains to the breast reflexes and encourages good milk let-down.

      Take Lactors. This is a homeopathic remedy I source from a 96-year-old homeopath in India. It helps create better quality milk that can calm irritable babies. Available to order from our website www.gentlebirthmethod.com (see Resources for details).

      Feeding. Feed yourself and your baby on demand!

      Diet. Be vigilant in following a low-fibre diet but with the addition of gentle greens like steamed runner beans and okra for the first few weeks, to protect from constipation. The strain of pushing when constipated can cause pressure on fresh episiotomy or Caesarean scars. Prunes and figs and cooked beetroot can really help in loosening your bowels to help you eliminate easily. You may have been prescribed lactulose by your doctor but this can only do so much – make diet your main priority. Remember the fish soup for non-vegetarians and other calcium-rich foods. For both vegetarians and non-vegetarians, pear compote and my favourite postnatal pudding, kallie, provide additional sources of natural calcium (see recipe Recipe for Raagi Kallie).