Postpartum Recovery in a Tea Cup

When my son’s Papa was a young monk in his rural Thai village, he learned

to gather wild and cultivated herbs for his Abbot’s daily tea. Luang

Pau (roughly “Great Father”) taught him the medicinal uses of the local herbs. Each day the Abbot drank one cup of tea which the young monks made from lemongrass, kaffir lime skin and phrai (a Thai ginger). It was his daily health tonic.

After my son was born in Chiang Mai, my Thai family made this same tea for me. For the first ten days at home with our newborn, they kept our little pot replenished with fresh herbs and brought me a cup of tea three times a day. It was astringent, bitter and lemony in a pleasant sort of way. Because it had the sanction of Luang Pau and my husband’s grandmother Khun Yai, a midwife and massage therapist about whom I have written before, I happily submitted.

On the second day, I was sitting in our front room chatting with a Thai massage student about options for study in our little school (newborn in arms), when I realized I was sweating. Now, in hot season in

Thailand, even in the more moderate northern climate of Chiang Mai, you sweat every day. After a few years, you get used to it – even come to like it (miss it, actually).

You are always a little damp, but your skin glows and is beautifully clear. And, you conscientiously hydrate with water and a squirt of fresh lime. (In modestly posh cafes that tourists frequent, a fresh orchid is likely to rest on the rim of your glass. Heaven.)

On that particular day, day two home from the hospital, I noticed tiny beads of sweat on the backs of my fingers. I asked our student if she were unusually hot. Not particularly. It was hot, mind you, but I was a tad more than damp. I have never sweated like that before or since.

I asked my family if it was the tea. Indeed, this concoction is a diaphoretic (it

makes you sweat!) and diuretic. In small doses, as with the Abbott’s one cup per day, it is a natural anti-inflammatory, blood purifier and can control high blood pressure.

At three cups a day, the tea eliminated the fluid of pregnancy, which my body no longer needed. Mind you, I hydrated carefully, ate good food, rested (really rested thanks to my beautiful family), and breast fed my son, all of which helped me recover and thrive as a new mama.

Ten days after my son was born, I and my little Thai family all trundled off to the hospital in a song tau (pick-up truck taxi) for our first check with the obstetrician. I and the little guy were doing great, and I had lost all of my baby weight. When I see photos of myself from that time, it is remarkable how clear and bright my skin and eyes are. Radiant new mama with a generous dose of Thai herbs!

Here’s Why It Worked

Lemongrass is a diuretic, an anti-inflammatory, and induces perspiration. The ethnic Hill-Tribes who live in the mountainous north of Thailand also use it as a tonic for sore muscles (had those, yup!).

Kaffir lime skin is bitter tasting and used as a blood tonic. After birth, it supports blood building. It is also given to women to promote regular

menstruation, and it is this uterine support that assists the natural process of clearing the uterus after delivery.

Phrai is used by some Hill-Tribes to help new mothers recover after childbirth because it supports uterine function, in the same way as kaffir lime skin. It is also used to treat injury to internal organs and can be used topically as an antiseptic.

Last fall, back here in the Hudson Valley of New York, I cooked up a pot of herbal tea with lemongrass from my garden and the skin of a kaffir lime which I found on a visit to the city (yay!). Sadly, phrai is impossible to come by here, so I did without.

I expected the same result as my postpartum experience, but no. My tea was very bitter without the gingery phrai, and no sweating to speak of. At first, I was puzzled. Without excess fluid in my body to begin with, however I had no need for a big sweat. Hmm… interesting compared to my first experience.

In the next post, a Thai herbal bath for the new mama.

Here are Parts One and Two of this series on Thai Medicine for the New Mama, if you missed them!

When I was pregnant with my son in Thailand, the subject of heat, high heat, came up often. Hot season is a lucky time to have a baby, I was told. No worries keeping your little one warm. I found this perplexing. I am from central Maine. All of my baby pictures are taken in snow banks (the light is better there!). In Thai summer with days in the upper 90’s fahrenheit, I was worried about how to keep the little bean cool.

When I arrived in the hospital to give birth, heat (or a lack of cold) came up

again. When my mouth got dry during delivery, I asked for ice chips. I am sure I got that out of a movie, or something. Dr. Udom, my fabulous obstetrician, and the attending nurses (all dressed in Pepto-Bismol pink) looked at me quizzically. I repeated it in Thai language. Still not getting through, I dropped it, having other fish to fry at that moment.

Some time later a cup of room temperature water appeared. That will do just fine, I thought.

After he was born, we settled into our room to rest (and watch the World Cup on TV!). Not much of a soccer fan, I relaxed and waiting patiently for ice packs. Clearly, I had not fully converted to the theory of heat. I would never have guessed that I would want to ice …, but I really, really did. Ice packs didn’t come. I inquired after some. The very kindly nurse looked at me quizzically, and then advised warm water.

I made do with warm water.

Before we left the hospital the next morning, having had two beautiful Thai meals and plenty of visitors, Dr. Udom came to our room. His advice? Rest. No cold foods and no cold drinks for a month. No cold water in the shower (which in Thailand is worth specifying). And come back for a check in ten days.

At home with our newborn, my ex-husband and sister-in-law knew exactly how to care for me. We would use heat. My ex-husband recently explained it to me this way. In the past after giving birth, a Thai mother would sleep in a small tent with a fire in order to sweat. The heat and the sweat would clear the unneeded fluid of pregnancy from her body, release toxins and kill bacteria. He described it as purifying, like a Thai sauna.

The Thai family into which I married has a long tradition of practicing Thai medicine. My ex-husband’s grandmother, Khun Yai delivered scores of babies as the only mid-wife and massage therapist in their village, a

settlement which sprang up in the dust of a ruby strip mine, where even children worked sifting the dirt for gems. The rubies are long gone and with them the jobs. The village is now mostly old women, their children and grandchildren moved away to Bangkok.

This photo of Khun Yai was taken in her last year. She was 81. Though her health was declining, it was a year of great joy. Her second grandson ordained as a monk, and her first grandchild was born.

The family remember Khun Yai packing a small sack and walking to the house of women in late pregnancy to prepare for birth. She lived with mother and child until they were ready to get on without her. She prepared food to support birth and lactation. She collected and blended Thai herbs in teas and herbal baths, and she prepared a fire in a small tent where the new mother could rest and sweat, purifying her body after giving birth.

Khun Yai began to learn massage when she was only ten years old. Her own mother and grandmother had been mau nuat pan boran, roughly translated as doctors of ancient massage. I suspect her family, in the female line, have been practicing massage since the beginning of time. As a teenager, she trained in a local hospital in massage and midwifery, which was an honor for her family. Her grandchildren like to say that her father agreed to let her study, even though the hospital uniform skirt was a bit too short. In my mind’s eye, I see her in a simple skirt of early 1940’s vintage, while the women of her village wore ankle length sarongs.

Khun Yai was too feeble to make the trip to us, but she guided us through the weeks following my son’s birth. Dr. Udom respectfully recommended that Khun Yai would know exactly what we needed. In that way, I had the best of traditional Thai medicine in the care of a Western trained doctor.

As you might imagine, I did not sleep in a small tent by a fire in front of our

little urban house in Chiang Mai. Because we were in the city, my family used Thai herbs, in a tea and an herbal bath, to increase my internal heat and promote a gloriously detoxifying sweat. That combined with the high heat of Thai summer were incredibly healing for me.

When I returned to see Dr. Udom ten days after giving birth, I had lost all of the 25 pounds I gained in pregnancy. My son was nursing well. I was resting and well fed with food supporting milk production. I was sleepy as all get out, but well on the way to recovering, deeply grateful for the care of my Thai family.

More on the Thai herbs we used in my next post on Thai medicine for the New Mama! 

My son was born in Chiang Mai on the very day he was expected, or a week early, depending on how you look at it.

His father’s best friend Phra Maha Soontorn, a Buddhist monk since the age of five, knew long before we did that our child would be a boy, that he would be born on a Sunday, and he chose his name accordingly. Arriya, which means “loyal follower of the Buddha” or “good person,” again depending on who you ask.

Thai people consider the day of the week on which you were born to be your “birth day.” When my Thai friends ask my birth day, I tell them I am a Monday, not some day in June.

Traditionally, monks are consulted to name a newborn. They select a name drawn from the letters of the child’s birth day. In Thailand, birth days are seen like signs of the zodiac. They determine your tendencies, your character. To be named in sync with your birth day, is therefore supportive of your true nature (and lucky!). I have even watched a monk remove a dog- eared “naming your baby” book from his satchel with a grin to demonstrate that picking a good baby name is part of the cycle of days for a monk.

Our son was born on wan athit, or Sunday, and Phra Maha Soontorn chose his name before he was born. Before.

Before we knew if our little bundle was a boy or a girl, Phra Maha Soontorn paid us an all too rare visit. As I knelt on the floor listening to him speak with my Thai family, I understood most but not all of what he was saying. Then, he turned to me and in English, a language he doesn’t speak, and he said, “boy.”

I nodded respectfully thinking, “Yeah. Yeah, all you monks want it to be a boy.” Neither I nor my ex-husband really understood that he was telling us it was a boy. Telling us. (I knew from the day before I boarded the plane to fly to Thailand and join my future husband that it would be a boy, because I had seen it in one of the clearest dreams of my life. Even though he would not be born for another 18 months.)

After an ultrasound at six months, we knew without doubt that our little bean was, indeed, a boy. We called family and friends. We called Phra Maha Soontorn. He told my ex-husband, “I know. I told you already.”

As my due date grew nearer, we heard again from Phra Maha Soontorn. This time with a name. A Sunday name. Okay. We’ll see, I think.

A week short of my due date, our son was born. On a Sunday with a beautiful full moon, the day on which Thai people go to the Temple to honor the teachings of the Buddha. We gave him the middle name Arriya.

Phra Maha Soontorn also made sure to tell me, through my ex-husband, that boys born on the Buddha day do not belong to us. They belong to the Temple. We are only keeping them for awhile.

We’ll see, I think. We’ll see.

This little story is the beginning of a series about Thai herbal medicine and the long tradition of caring for women after birth.

I am deeply grateful to have lived in Thailand while pregnant, giving birth, and caring for our son in the first year of his life. An entire community of family and friends supported me with their deep knowledge of Thai herbs and Thai food as medicine. Their generosity and loving kindness gave both son and mum an extraordinarily good start on a new life.