My ‘Cuarentena’ Experience: Staying home for 40 days after my baby was born

When my daughter was 41 days old, I buckled her into her car seat. I checked that the straps were perfectly fitting over her shoulders. I shut the door, got in the driver’s seat and then continued down the road. We left the house together for the very first time since she was born.

I had spent the last 40 days at my home with my newborn. 

I didn’t cook. I didn’t clean. I laid in bed with my little one. 

Everything else could wait. I was enjoying my cuarentena. It was something I had never done before. 

When my midwife told me about her recommendations for my postpartum period, she suggested a “cuarentena.” She explained that it was a practice in Latin American cultures, and it involved the new mom staying at home for the 40 days following the birth of her baby. 

It was meant to be a period of rest. No cooking. No cleaning. No errands. It is a time for bonding with your new baby. 

I probably said something like, “you had me at no cooking.” 

Though this would be my first home birth and my first cuarentena, this was not my first baby. I already had three children. If I had never had a baby before I would have rolled my eyes at the suggestion, but having already experienced childbirth, 40 days of healing sounded amazing. 

My fourth baby was born happy and healthy at home in the middle of the night in early September. The first few days felt like one long evening and one long dawn at the same time. And then a week passed, two and then, three. Staying home felt natural and easy. 

What typically brings a new mom out of the house are doctor’s appointments but with homebirth, all of my postpartum care was also at home. My midwife visited frequently throughout the 40 days, checking in on me and my baby. My husband brought me tea and water and plates of lasagna, which were dropped off at the front door by friends. When he went to work, my parents came by to help. 

As I approached the forty-day mark I didn’t feel like time was moving too fast. With all of the other babies, their first weeks and months seemed to fly by. I was sleep-deprived and distracted, barely making sense of the days and nights. The passing of time seemed only to be marked by needing to move up in diaper sizes.

This was very different. I felt so present and so aware of this time we were getting together. 

I never packed a diaper bag or looked for a private area to nurse or had to change a sanitary pad in a public restroom. I just snuggled and read books and kissed my baby’s forehead every 10 minutes. 

We were a cozy milky mess sipping on soup and snuggling in muslin blankets all day. The “cuarentena” set up boundaries that I otherwise wouldn’t have been able to make. 

They loved climbing into bed with me and snuggling with their newest littlest sister.

The truth was that my baby had only just arrived. Life was new enough without all of the hub bub beyond our home. It was the perfect way to ease her into the world.

As for the older siblings, it seemed to give them a deeper appreciation for this time in their new sister’s life, and their own. They got to slow down in their own way, in order to meet their new sister where she was. 

It was a lesson in understanding for them as well. Before the “cuarentena” began, I worried that it would be too hard on my older children. I thought them seeing me in bed all day, not taking them to school, or making them meals would somehow be negative. 

I was wrong. 

My older daughters were 8, 5, and 2. They weren’t at all sad or scared by my needing to be in bed. They were surprisingly patient and downright giddy every time they walked into the bedroom to say hello. They loved climbing into bed with me and snuggling with their newest littlest sister. They welcomed the slower pace. It was a chance for them to adjust to this big change without any distractions. 

My only other fear was what it would mean financially. My husband worked half as much as he normally would, but we would be spending just as much money as ever. 

In hindsight, this is one area I would have prepared for more. It isn’t fun emerging from your cuarentena to realize your bank account is overdrawn. The truth is, we were worse off financially after the forty days but it was worth it. It wasn’t ideal. But I had just gone through childbirth, and then fully healed over the course of forty dreamy days. An experience I wasn’t able to have with our other three children. We would find a way to make it work. 

I realize, of course, that a “cuarentena” is not feasible for the majority of new moms in the US. Having experienced it now for myself, I think something needs to change so that more moms have this same opportunity. A mother and her newborn deserve an unbothered 40 days of rest and healing, at the very least. 

I know that I made my experience sound all flowery and perfect but the first 40 days after birth brings a whole bundle of challenges for a new mother. There’s bleeding, establishing your milk supply if you’re breastfeeding, healing from the birth, and those are just the ones that are to be expected. The postpartum period is a vulnerable time, both physically and emotionally. 

Society needs to start acknowledging the uniqueness of those first weeks of motherhood. Because a supported, respected postpartum period should not be an elitist, privileged concept for the few that can afford it. It should be a priority for all.