Why You Should Protect Your Immunity After Giving Birth
Imagine you’re playing a sport and you fall awkwardly and twist your ankle. You might see your ankle swelling up, becoming red and hurting. This is inflammation - signs that your immune system is kicking into action to start the healing process.
Inflammation in the body - whether from a sprained ankle, an attack from a virus or due to by-products of every day processes - is completely normal. It happens when there is some sort of repairing or rebuilding happening the body, and it occurs all the time. Inflammation itself is not bad; it’s vital to ensure the immune system works properly.
But too much inflammation is bad, which can happen due to poor sleep, stress, too much sugar, not enough sun, under-exercising, or over-exertion during exercise. During pregnancy, the immune system is suppressed so as not to reject the ‘foreign’ baby. In a normal pregnancy, we have low-grade inflammation throughout the whole body. This functions to prepare the body for pregnancy and childbirth:
It ensures the body doesn’t reject baby
It helps prepare the pelvis for delivery
It allows breast tissue development
It increases blood vessels to placenta and nutrient delivery to baby
As you near childbirth, the immune system returns at full force, having been dampened down for almost 9 months. The inflammation that results helps with a proper labour response.
Having the right amount of inflammation during pregnancy is critical - not enough and the placenta might not grow properly which could lead to miscarriage; too much and complications could occur such as premature labour or pre-eclampsia.
Matters can be exacerbated if there is pre-existing inflammation before pregnancy, such as gut issues, poor diet, hormonal imbalance or medical issues. The added inflammation that occurs in pregnancy means your body struggles to deal with it all.
Gut and immunity
Around 70% of your immune system resides in the gut - it is the key for healing. Your diet during pregnancy and whether you took medication can have a profound effect on your gut microbiome. Antibiotics, anti-reflux medication, antihistamines and anti-inflammatories (such as ibuprofen) are all associated with changes in gut bacteria - both yours and your baby’s.
That’s not to say that you mustn’t take medication during pregnancy - if you need to, then please do. But knowing how it can affect your gut bacteria can give you an appreciation of the need to mitigate the effects. To minimise disruption from antibiotics:
Only take when it is absolutely necessary, and finish the full course
Take probiotics before, during and after your course of antibiotics
Include plenty of fibre in your diet - aim for 30 different plant foods a week
Probiotics in the last month of pregnancy can help rebalance your microbiome in preparation for giving birth and breastfeeding. It has been found that certain gut bacteria travels up from your gut into your breastmilk, so it’s important to have a good balance of bacteria in the gut.
Childbirth and the immune system
During a natural vaginal birth, blood loss averages around 500ml, roughly vs what is taken during blood donation. A C-section could result in almost double that, with around 1 litre of blood being lost. This means that your body has to deal with an amount of wound healing and skin repair in the aftermath of childbirth, even with the most straightforward births. In addition, replenishing nutrients lost during pregnancy and childbirth is key to ensuring the immune system is working properly again.
“half of women who develop autoimmune disease do so in the first year after pregnancy”
Supporting the immune system and managing inflammation is key. Women are more susceptible to autoimmune conditions, likely due to a more responsive immune system compared to men. However, the huge hormonal shifts that occur during and after pregnancy also puts women at greater risk of autoimmune conditions. In fact, ‘half of women who develop autoimmune disease do so in the first year after pregnancy’ according to Dr Jenna Macciochi, in her book Immunity. The fluctuations in hormones over a relatively short period of times drives the immune system haywire.
The most common autoimmune conditions women develop centres around the thyroid and the gut. In addition, allergies such as asthma and hay fever can also become more common post-pregnancy.
While hormones are the main potential cause, other factors play a part - stress levels, poor sleep, what you’re eating and exercise further drive hormonal imbalance and immune system dysregulation.
Postnatal healing
Immediately after giving birth is the most important time to focus on rest and healing. Just like you would properly rest and recuperate after running a marathon, so too do you need to recover after giving birth. Traditional cultures enforce anything between a week to 6 weeks of proper rest.
With my clients, I focus on the 1000 days from conception to age 2. Worldwide this is seen as the most critical time of development for the child, but I believe it’s important to also focus on the mother’s mental, emotional, physical and social wellbeing during these 1000 days. How well-nourished a woman is during pregnancy informs how well she recovers, recuperates and eventually restores her sense of wellbeing and ability to embrace motherhood.
For wound healing and skin repair, the most important nutrients include:
Vitamin C - an integral component of the collagen than makes up joints, ligaments and skin
Vitamin E - vital for wound healing, promoting hormonal balance and for closing scars
Iron - replenishing stores after birth is vital due to the amount of blood that can be lost. The body’s ability to use iron is influenced by a good balance of healthy bacteria in the body.
Zinc - supports the immune system and hormone production. Low zinc levels can be a factor in mood health.
To support the immune system and manage inflammation, I recommend the following to my clients:
Focus on warm, nourishing, easy-to-digest food. This supports the gut and is comforting, especially during the winter months.
Reduce raw or cold food for the first few weeks. These can be harder to digest; your body will probably naturally tell you that it prefers warm food.
Eat bone broths, soups and stews. Liquid food can help rehydrate and replenish lost electrolytes from childbirth, and the protein is vital for rebuilding cells and enzymes. Bone broth and slow-cooked food is also a good source of collagen, to help with skin repair.
Include warming spices such as ginger and turmeric in cooking. These have been used in traditional cultures to support the immune system, reduce inflammation and heal scar tissue
Supporting the immune system is an area that is hugely undervalued in the postnatal phase. While new mums get regular visits from midwives and health visitors, the focus tends to be on the baby rather than how the mum is healing. Looking after your immunity is not something to do just when you get that first scratchy throat - you want to be eating, moving and living in a way that supports good health all the time, and even more so when you’re healing and repairing from birth. The good news is, taking basic steps to rest, hydrate, eat well, say yes to support and no to extra demands will get you most of the way there in the early days.