This post is by Sarah Powers, Happiest Home contributor and Managing Editor, and blogger at Powers of Mine.
When I was pregnant the first time, I read the BabyCenter emails that came into my inbox weekly. Sometimes I cheated and went to the website a few days ahead of time to see what fruit or vegetable my fetus would most resemble next. But I tried to wait for the emails, feeling accomplished as each pregnant week passed by.
Those emails always had two sections, titled something like “What’s happening with your baby” and “What’s happening with your body”. The first, obviously, talked about fetal developments (she has fingernails! he can hear me!), and the second had information about my body during pregnancy. I read them both with interest – the baby stuff was exciting, if hard to conceptualize, and the information about my body and its various crazy symptoms was genuinely interesting to me.
After the baby was born, I continued to get emails. Your one-week-old, your two-week-old, and so on. The emails told me when I could expect the first social smiles, how to tell if baby was getting enough milk, and what to expect at our next pediatrician’s appointment.
If there was a second part, a “What’s happening with your body” section, I must have skipped it. At this point the baby was real and right in front of me, and my body was no longer the sacred vessel it had been during pregnancy. So despite BabyCenter’s best intentions to keep me informed about my postpartum self, I pretty much ignored their efforts; accordingly, I was pretty naive about even the most common postpartum symptoms.
Looking back, I wish I’d paid a bit more attention to the emails. I wish my doctor and the hospital nurses had been a little more explicit with what to expect. Most of all, though, I wish a girlfriend had taken me aside and said “Look, you’re going to be an emotional and physical train wreck for several weeks. It’s normal, okay?”
Maybe we don’t talk about postpartum symptoms because they’re not so glamorous and kind of embarrassing; or maybe it’s because the babies are so darn cute that we forget to bring it up. Maybe we’re just too tired. But whatever the reason, I don’t think the postpartum period gets as much attention as it deserves. Everyone’s postpartum experience is different, of course, but I thought I’d share four symptoms that rocked my world a bit (and not in the dreamy way that a new baby did) the first time around.
(You all know I’m not a doctor, right? These are my personal experiences, each of which I did discuss with my own doctor to make sure they were a normal part of postpartum recovery. Please, pretty please, if you’re having symptoms you’re worried about, talk to your doctor. OK, moving on.)
1) The Baby Blues
I had heard of postpartum depression, and I do credit my healthcare providers for educating me on the warning signs to look for. What no one ever told me, though, is that many women who don’t experience full postpartum depression do go through some intense hormonal “baby blues” in the weeks following delivery.
The baby blues caught me completely off guard. I have never been all that emotionally volatile; PMS doesn’t make me moody, pregnancy didn’t make me weepy, and I have never experienced clinical depression. So when I found myself just crippled with a sadness I couldn’t explain, despite an overall happiness I knew was there somewhere, it scared me. It set in three days after delivery like a wall of fog and it lifted about 3 weeks later (a timeline that is pretty typical for the postpartum blues).
What’s interesting is that my second and third babies brought a much milder case of the blues with them, something my doctor told me could be explained simply by the fact that I knew what to expect. Go figure.
2) Hair Loss
People love to tell you how wonderful and thick pregnancy hair is. I would give up those marginally more luscious locks in a heartbeat if it meant skipping my all-time least favorite postpartum symptom: hair loss.
Mine begins about two months after delivery and lasts for a good four months. Hair in the shower, hair on the back of my shirt. Hair in the baby’s mouth, diaper, crib, and wrapped around her chubby fingers. Hair knotted in clumps around the elastics I use to keep it up.
And then? The hair that grows back is short and fuzzy and, in my case, increasingly gray. So even when the hair loss subsides, I deal with random shorter-than-the-rest-of-my-hair hair for many months to come. It’s like the gift that keeps on giving.
3) Extreme Hunger
Eating a lot when you’re pregnant is kind of awesome. You feel celebratory, justified, indulgent. Then you have a baby and lose the luxury of having both hands free to prepare food at will and suddenly all you want to do is eat a giant sandwich and a huge pile of french fries. Every two hours.
No? Just me?
I get crazy-ravenous in the first few months of nursing a new baby. I also have intense cravings for certain foods, usually those in the cheese, deep-fried, and chocolate food groups. Mostly, I see this as a not-too-awful symptom – I really enjoy food, and I know my body needs the extra calories while I’m nursing. But when I’m rushed and busy caring for small people, it can be hard to keep up with the appetite and make sure I’m putting halfway decent nutrients into my system as well. I’ve learned to feed myself first – before the kids – and to keep high-protein snacks and meals around at all times.
4) Night Sweats & Chills
Night sweats are pretty common in the weeks following delivery (common, and yet I’m pretty sure I’d never heard of them when I had my first baby). Less common are the temperature fluctuations that can sometimes accompany the sweats (or just happen all on their own).
With my second and third babies I experienced nighttime chills in addition to the whole waking-up-soaked-in-sweat thing. I would shiver in bed no matter how many fleece layers I had on. The first couple of times it happened I was sure I had a fever and was coming down with something, because the chills felt very similar to the kind you get with the flu. But no fever, no illness. Just shivering cold.
I’ve also heard of women having hot flashes during postpartum recovery. My doctor told me that there isn’t a lot of research on body temperature fluctuation being tied to postpartum hormones, but it is commonly reported, if not scientifically proven.
(If you had hot flashes or chills or other temperature malfunctions during the postpartum period, I’d love to hear it. This seems to have been my most uncommon symptom…)
I’d love to hear from you. Did postpartum symptoms take you by surprise? Did you have any less-common ones you’d care to share? Do you loathe postpartum hair loss like I do?
I had all of those 4 symptoms, the chills too! I cspent many nights drenched in sweat or shivering cold or alternating between the two!
Carla, good to hear! As if the nights aren’t rough enough in the beginning, right? This last time I took to going to bed in 2 layers of PJs PLUS my warm bathrobe. 🙂
I’m 2 months post partum from twins. My worst symptom is my hot flashes. It’s 3 degrees where I live and I spend my life drenched in sweat! It’s so embarrassing !! Any advice on how to deal? Thanks
I am currently experiencing the night sweats and chills. I thought I had an infection, but no fever accompanying these symptoms. My baby will be one month old (already) in a few days. I didn’t experience this with my first pregnancy 2.5 years ago. Good to know I am not alone. It kinda freaked me out!
I am also going through night sweat and chills. Its very hard to sleep. . And due to this confusion i got cold.
I searched “postpartum cold and hot flashes” and found this. I have had to take freezing cold showers some nights and some nights had every blanket in the house over me.
Yes, yes, yes! My biggest postpartum challenge was body issues–wanting so badly to snap back into shape but at the same time knowing how unrealistic that expectation was…especially when trying to snap back into work routines asap as well.
Naomi, I hear you. I think a lot of moms feel that way. Thanks for sharing.
I had BIG TIME night sweats and was so thrown off guard by this post partum symptom. I never heard about it during pregnancy, never heard my friends talk about it, don’t remember reading it anywhere etc. I would wake up and have to change tshirts during the night because my shirt was that soaked!!
Brittnie, I am quite sure no one told me about it either. SO crazy (and yet, so common and normal 🙂 )
I just mentioned to my husband today how much of my hair was falling out. He nonchalantly said it happens to all women. Well, not me!
I just had our fourth baby and this was the first time I woke up FREEZING one night. It was during the first week home. I couldn’t move, couldn’t get out of bed. I tried calling my husband on his cell from my bed (he was in the other room), but it rang on his nightstand! I laid there wondering what I was going to do and he magically walked in….I said I’m freezing to death and he got my a wool blanket and another blanket on top. I slept like that for the first few weeks.
Susan, that’s exactly what happened the first time I had the chills, too! I had to text my husband from upstairs and make him lie in bed with me so the body heat would warm me up. Crazy!
I’m 3 months post partum and didn’t have chills until my baby was 2 months….but I don’t have a fever and I have it on and off! What is this
Love this post – there is so much that NOBODY tells moms about the postpartum period. I actually wrote an entire book about postpartum self-care (not sure if it’s still in print but you can get it on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Everything-Health-Guide-Postpartum-Care/dp/B001QCX1S4)
There is just so much you don’t know, or that is told in passing, or in vague terms, or too late to be prepared (like just as you’re leaving the hospital and you’re realizing your pre-pregnancy pants are NO WAY NO HOW GONNA FIT.)
A big one for me was bleeding. So much of the information I got was just not correct for me – bleeding for a few days, then tapering off? HA! I had bleeding for a good, solid 6 weeks after each baby. Not as heavy as a period throughout, but heavy at first and actual bleeding, not discharge. Turns out that’s my version of “normal.” Twice, I also had what seemed like a period at 8 weeks, soon after my PP bleeding stopped. I was exclusively, round-the-clock nursing and confused…until my midwife told me that sometimes a “scab” that’s covering the area where your placenta attached to the uterus can break away around that time frame, and cause bleeding that seems like a light period. I had NO. Idea.
PS – the information I got about post-surgery recovery symptoms was the same, btw. Vague, overly general, left a lot out and came too late. (I really need to know how long I need to go without lifting things BEFORE I have surgery so I can plan for my groceries and such!)
I didn’t know about that book! 🙂 And really good info on the bleeding, too – I think that is probably one that has a wide range of “normal”, right? I know c-section bleeding is a lot less (because they literally take out your uterus and rinse it out before they put it back in. I KNOW.).
No they don’t!! Really?? They take out the uterus?? I had no idea they did that to me twice!
Also I never heard of the sweats and chills…but had all the other symptoms. The weird thing was that blues were worse with my 2nd baby, and also breastfeeding was so much harder! I did not expect that at all.
This bleeding thing just happened to me! And I got freaked out about having my period already and getting pregnant again before getting on birth control (long story short, we moved and had to get insurance figured out so my 6 week appt. is more like a 3 month appt.) I will have to ask about that though because nothing has happened since.
And amen on the hair loss. Liquid Plummer is on my shopping list this week because the shower drains so slowly.
My (breastfed) daughter is 11 months today and I am still SO HUNGRY! I could eat constantly. This is very inconvenient with a almost one year old and toddler. Difficult to cook, and they always want to steal my food! Enjoyed this post 🙂
Thanks, Katelyn! Hope you enjoyed a big meal today, too. 😉
I enjoyed nursing hunger because my pregnancy hunger always had a touch of nausea with it. I didn’t get postpartum chills but yes on the night sweats and horrible hair loss.
Vicki, ME TOO! This most recent pregnancy I was full-blown morning sickness nauseous around the clock until about 25 weeks, and then even when it improved I still had on-and-off nausea, lots of food aversions, indigestion, etc. So when my postpartum hunger kicked I was like, “WOW! I forgot how much I LOVE FOOD!” 🙂
I have 3 kids; my first was a c-section, my second a VBAC, and my third a c-section. Ironically, both c-sections were due to breech babies. I had great pregnancies with no complications. However, after my second, I had the blues and felt like I did not know what I was doing which is ironic because this was my second time around. I developed severe headaches which were diagnosed as cluster migraines due to hormone changes. The headaches and the blues went away by my second week post-partum.
My third birth went great and I was up walking that night post surgery. However, the one thing that not one of the books mentioned to me about c-sections was that the nurses actually press hard on your abdomen after surgery to avoid blood clots. That was a shock especially after my first born. I yelled at the nurse and basically called her a lunatic! At least I knew to expect that for my second c.
But what I never expected after my third child was born was that women can get pre-eclampsia post partum. That was what I had and almost died from it because I had no idea. It was 4 days after the birth and 1 day since I was released from the hospital that I came down with headaches. I thought no big deal just those hormones. But these headaches were relentless and pounded my head. I could not relax, I felt all wired. I went 2 more days like this until the nurse from my OB office called to check on me. When I told her my head was killing me, she told me to go to the hospital right away. I thought she was nuts telling me to leave a newborn and my two other kids to get my blood pressure checked. But I went. Long story short, I had to be admitted twice overnight. I could see the look of fear on my husband and the nurses faces when my blood pressure was so high, that the machine errored out. I had to ultimately go on blood pressure medication for a month. But that was a scare and I would hate for any mother to go through that. So if you have headaches anytime during or after pregnancy, please get your BP checked! It could save your life.
Wow, Anne, what a story. Thanks so much for sharing – I had no idea that was possible. So thankful you went in when you did!
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So glad I found your site and this post!! I just had my second baby a little over three weeks ago and have experienced three of these quite extremely. I haven’t lost any hair yet but I know it’s coming. The baby blues were worse this time around than with my first one, so much so that I made my husband hold my hand all night in bed while I cried and cried. The hunger has been crazy, but I’m enjoying the appetite and yummy foods since I’m nursing. As for the chills and night sweats, WOW they are way worse than my first baby too. I have been unbelievably freezing wearing several layers, yet sweating so much I am drenched in the morning – and it’s July and we have no air conditioning! Thanks for sharing, good to know other women experience the same thing!
I had similar experience. The childbirth class I took didn’t mention anything besides depression. I did tear alot during delivery and it took months to heal, which I had no idea would happen.
It started a few weeks ago. My hair is thin on top and I have some almost bald spots in front at the hair line. I didn’t remember this with my son, but it has been nine years. It comes out in clumps, in the shower, on my brush. I find it all over the baby, her stuff my stuff, and on my poor hubby. I also nurse, and am so sleep deprived. I have heard it is normal, but goodness, I could make a wig for someone else. I was also told by a doctor that it could be related to the new stress on our bodies, along with hormones. I hope to have my beautiful hair back soon.
I’m so glad I stumbled on this blog! I am currently in the bathtub whilst my precious 7 day old is patiently waiting for me across the room. I was trying to nap when she was napping but was shaking so hard from unexplainable chills! The hot bath won’t completely subdue it either. I, too, wish I was better educated from my physician of all postpartum “wonders” you go through. I am actually probably naively looking forward to the hair loss as my hair was already thick and became unmanageable! Thanks for the article! I’m gonna put my phone down and submerse in the hot water a little longer. 🙂
I had hot flashes followed by teeth-chattering chills about 2-3 days after my son was born. No one EVER mentioned this could happen. The temp swings were dramatic! Even though this was nearly 16 years ago, I remember it like it was yesterday. Fortunately they were very short lived and stopped when my milk came in. But MAN what a surprise that was!
I can relate to three of these symptoms…hair loss, extreeeeeeeme hunger, and night sweats with chills. Bizarrely, the symptom that I was actually expecting to encounter was the only one that I haven’t yet experienced…the postpartum blues.
Night Sweats with chills – I had this for the first three weeks postpartum. I thoroughly recommend sleeping in SPORTS clothes, that are designed to wick sweat away. This will keep you a little bit drier, and therefore, a little bit warmer. I hope this helps!
OMG!! I seriously thought something was wrong with just me! I just had blood work done yesterday to check my thyroid. I had my fourth child 5 months ago now. For the past 2 months now my hair has been falling out in huge clumps! I find it everywhere! I’m afraid that I am going to end up bald at this rate. I sweat excessively all day and all night long. My skin is really dry as well. My TSH came back completely normal. When will this all end?? Can someone tell me how long these symptoms lasted for them? I need to see the light at the end if the tunnel.
Yes! I’m a first time Mom with a four month old baby. I’ve been sweating uncontrollably almost all day long for the past I’d say six weeks. Maybe it started before that but I don’t remember it being so bad that I had to Google it. I gained a lot more weight than I wanted to and my mother-in-law said to me after I had mentioned to her I’m so sweaty all the time she said “maybe it’s because you’re heavier now I remember when I was heavy I had boob sweat and crotch sweat and I was sweaty all the time so maybe it has something to do with that ” and I was thinking nooo because I’ve been a little heavier before and I never had this problem this is completely different. They are major hot flashes, I’m really embarrassed. I feel so uncomfortable I don’t want to get close to my husband right now. Anything natural i can take or do to combat this horrible symptom? When will it stop? Will it last the whole time I’m breastfeeding?