To make the sitting month sustainable for us We’ve had to really simplify the menu. My private chef (Aka mother in law) is doing all of the sitting month foods for me and feeding the rest of my family. She is a saint. I also live in a remote area with access to one small grocery store. I am unable to buy snow peas, bean sprouts, choy sum etc from my store. Emily has been very helpful in offering up advice on ingredient substitutions or skipping some recipes entirely. In the name of simplifying, We haven’t been making very many of the desert teas or soups. Some nights my chef cooks a large batch of a sitting month meal and my entire family eats it for dinner. This has been a helpful time saver and it’s been fun to try new foods as a family that we plan to cook even after the sitting month ends. My chef has doubled many of the dinner/lunch recipes so I always have food that is ready to eat and available in the fridge. This also means she doesn’t have to cook sitting month meals everyday in addition to cooking for the rest of my family. She has also done this with breakfast items and it’s been so helpful. There is always breakfast ready in the fridge regardless of what time I wake up. I am enjoying the congee/porridge breakfast’s. They feel great on my tummy. We have also found that cooking items in the morning makes the process smoother. Afternoon/evening hours are too chaotic. My chef makes my bitter tea, meals etc in the mornings. I am enjoying the sitting month and feeling nourished. My body feels great! I am so surprised at how well I have felt doing this. My other 4 postpartum experiences were rugged. I also felt like it took so long for my body to heal. I am not feeling this way at all about this recovery. I am tired from the newborn stage and lack of sleep. But my body feels like it’s healing well and I feel great. Full disclosure: resting has been a challenge for me. I have definitely overdone it on physical activity a few times and notice it right away. We’ve had many doctor’s visits for my baby that have gotten in the way of rest and have consumed time. It would have been nice to stay home more. I also have a business to help run and have had to prioritize work over rest at times.

Thank you, Emily. Congratulations McKell! I hope you and baby are both feeling well and I hope you have been able to get some sleep 😅 I am loving the sitting month so far. It’s been a blessing to me. This is my 5th child. I have struggled with terrible anxiety postpartum with all of my babies. It affects my sleep. The best way I can describe it is a dark churning pit in my stomach that won’t ease. It becomes worse when I try to nap or sleep at night. Because it affects my sleep it just compounds and becomes worse. It’s a terrible experience. I was so scared to have another baby and experience this. I did have some anxiety postpartum with this baby. It lasted until she was 5 days old. She is now 11 days old. I worked with Emily (body code sessions) on the anxiety and did the homework she gave me. That helped immensely. I also think the nutritional foods are making a big difference and staying warm. I didn’t follow the meal plan on Christmas. Instead, I lived it up and ate candy, baked goods and a Christmas feast with my family. By the end of the night, the anxiety was back. I really think it’s because I wasn’t eating the sitting month foods. We’ve adapted the sitting month menu to make it work for us. My mother in law is doing all of the cooking for me. There are a lot of great choices listed for each day’s meals. My children are on winter break, so my mother in law is very busy with caring for them and cooking meals for them in addition to me. We have been picking one or two of the meal plan items to make each day and then I eat them for more than one meal. We’ve also found that making a big batch of the breakfast items makes the morning easier. I can eat the leftovers for a few breakfasts and she doesn’t have to cook so much each day. We’ve had a few meals (haven’t tried the entire menu yet, so the list will likely grow) that I want to make for my family after the sitting month is over. They are so yummy! Week one of the bitter teas was a bit rough. So. Bitter! 😅 tea 2 and 3 are far more mild and I appreciate that. I just keep reminding myself that this is medicine to help my body recover. This is not a ‘sip on me and enjoy the flavor’ type of tea 😂