Coming home from the hospital after giving birth can be
super stressful. You’re plunged into a new routine, exhausted from birth, with
a new little one to care for. Now, try to function on three-hour chunks of
sleep (if you’re lucky). What if you, your partner and your baby could be
taken care of for a little longer?
Enter the postpartum retreat. Taking a nod from Korean
postpartum culture, postpartum retreats are popping up in the U.S. in major
cities like New York and Los Angeles.
One of the top retreats is Boram in Manhattan. Located near
Central Park and close to several Manhattan hospitals, Boram provides
24-hour-a-day care for both mother and baby. There’s lactation support for those
who need assistance with breastfeeding; a mother’s lounge filled with snacks,
books and other moms to chat with; and three healthy, filling meals a day. Experts
are available for support any time you need it, plus there are therapeutic
services available, like postnatal massages for moms. While parents can sleep
in a luxurious bed, babies are looked after in the fully monitored nursery.
Best of all, they’ve got all the basics you’ll need like diapers,
wipes, pumps, formula, swaddling blankets, feeding pillows and postnatal care
products (like nipple cream and peri bottles).
Need help giving a sponge bath to the baby? They’ve got
nurses to help you. Want to visit with all of your family and friends? Yep,
totally allowed. Need a foot rub or your breast pump cleaned? Done.
Of course, all of this pampering and care will cost you.
Stays start at $900 a night and are not covered by insurance. A minimum of five
nights is recommended, with average stays ranging from three days to 40.
This kind of retreat is so important as many new parents
don’t have extended family staying with them to help ease the transition or
visiting nurses like in the U.K. This pampered time gives parents a chance to
bond with their babies, recover physically and get some much-needed sleep in
the first hazy days of parenthood. Eventually, you will have to go home, but at
least the transition from hospital to home would be less bumpy.
More postnatal retreats are popping up all over the country.
Los Angeles residents have Pearl while New Yorkers will soon also have Ahma & Co, opening later this year. We have
a feeling we’ll be seeing even more once the word gets out that this is a thing
and fingers crossed there are lower-cost options available for moms of all
budgets.
We’re a little bit jealous we didn’t have this kind of stay
offered to us as new parents. Do you think they’ll be welcoming to tired moms
of teenagers who haven’t had a good night's sleep in over a decade?