Woman's Selfie Goes Viral For A Good Reason: "This Is What 24 Hours Postpartum Looks Like"

"This is what 24 hours postpartum looks like. Baby in sling. Skin to skin. Adult diapers. And a rosy glow. My body feels like it ran a marathon and my heart is wide open from yesterday's travels. Birth opens us like an earthquake opens the earth and I am still in the intimate, fragile throes of that opening. I feel raw. Emotional. Different. I feel like I'm on the undulating surface of the rippling ocean being tossed back and forth between happiness, gratitude, melancholy, and grief. 25 hours ago I held life within and 24 hours ago I surged and transformed allowing life to flow through me, into my waiting hands. The emptiness in my womb brings a heavy feeling crashing into reality but then this new little life whimpers, searching for the breast with soft rooting, and I feel whole again. I am still processing the beautiful transition my whole family has traveled through and I am in complete awe of our strength as humans, women, and mothers. This time is simply unlike any other. #fourthtrimester"

This is the caption that accompanied Erica Andrews' Instagram photo last week, which shows her holding Silas Ambrose, her 13-day old baby.

This was her fifth birth, so she's familiar with what it feels like. But this time, she said she was "called to share this image" with other mothers.

"This is my last baby, and I was feeling very emotional knowing that was the last time I would look and feel this way. So often the BIG feelings and changes we go through as new mothers are overlooked, brushed aside, or misunderstood completely. I shared the image to my Instagram feed to journal about my feelings (it's how I navigate the world, with words.) It was only my intention to show the beauty I felt at that very moment," Andrews told TODAY Parents.

In the photo, Andrews showed the tumult mothers often feel just out of childbirth in a gritty, vulnerable way, including the disposable mesh underwear new mothers know so well, her cluttered bathroom sink, and, underneath her baby's head, her still-protruding postpartum belly.

The image and her words resonated with other women and it's been shared around Facebook.

Andrews believes new mothers could use with better support in those first few days of what she calls the "fourth trimester."

"New mamas need exactly what their new babies need...love, warmth, food, and security. It is unrealistic to expect us to just fall back into normalcy," she says. "We need time to process that big changes, to move through the sheer happiness, the unexpected grief, the feeling of your heart being stretched bigger than it ever has been.

"All a new mama needs is for those nearest her to hold her space and to love her, you don't need to understand, you just have to be willing to be there for her as she figures it out for herself."

Source.