Postpartum Meal Delivery with Restorative Roots
We are so excited to announce that we are partnering with Restorative Roots, an organic postpartum meal delivery service.
Flow of Life believes that the postpartum time is sacred, and anything we can do to make time for healing, reconnecting with yourself, and connecting with your baby is a powerful tool.
At Restorative Roots, each meal is made to replenish, restore, and energize you with every bite. Real ingredients, lovingly prepared, and tailored for the unique needs of new mamas.
For this blog post, we wanted to share the story of one of the co-founders, Holly. Here is her postpartum story, and the origins of Restorative Roots, in her own words:
When I got pregnant with my son in 2016, I did a TON of research for pregnancy and birth. Eric and I were well down the holistic nutrition and health rabbit hole so we researched everything.
Our research helped us land on a birth center with a midwife for our birth, as well as a doula and the hypnobabies birth prep. I was so well versed in what to eat, the exercises, how to prepare for birth, and how to cope with labor…but I did literally ZERO prep for postpartum. And it wasn't because I was like “oh, no i'm good… I don't need to prepare for that, I'll be fine.” … I just didn't even consider it!
My midwife really stressed the importance of resting after birth for the first few weeks and let me know I’d have a volleyball sized wound inside me from the placenta. But other than that, no one talked to me about postpartum nutrition or other healing practices. Luckily, I feel that the narrative around postpartum is changing and being talked about a LOT more than it was 8 years ago.
After the birth I ate a lot of cold smoothies, salads, raw veggies…things I thought were “healthy”, along with well-intentioned junk food that people brought by. The story I told myself was “hey, that birth was really hard, I deserve to enjoy some yummy food!” Turns out maybe that wasn’t the greatest idea…
For the first MONTH I was chronically constipated. It was horrible. I was literally scared every time I had to poop for a month. And while my body “healed quickly” and my uterus shrunk back down to size quickly, I just felt BLAH all the time… physically and emotionally… but I just thought, “Well hey, this must be normal for postpartum. Everyone says how hard it is.”
About 8 or 9 months later, I was at a moms groups, and someone mentioned the book The First 40 Days. If you are pregnant, this is a MANDATORY READ. The book outlines the traditional Chinese medicine approach to postpartum which talks about how the body needs to heal and needs warm, soft, easy to digest foods like soups and stews…and I was like OMG… this makes SO MUCH SENSE…but you don't know what you don't know, right? I thought back to those early days postpartum and how I would have loved a warm steamy soup.
So when I got pregnant with my second at the end of 2019, I was SO excited to do it all differently… to have my redemption postpartum. I read The 40 Days cover to cover, scoured pinterest and created a whole menu. I invited over a few different friends on different days who helped me prep over 60 meals to store in my deep freezer for after birth. YOU GUYS… WHAT A NIGHT AND DAY DIFFERENCE. I cannot tell you how much better I felt, and how much easier of a postpartum this was even with a three year old running around the house. I had NO digestive problems, and everything including my mood felt so much brighter. At every meal I felt like I was being wrapped in this warm hug...and everything just felt so safe…like it was all going to be ok… just like ahhhh….
So when my daughter was about 9 months old, my husband's friend reached and told me she was struggling with postpartum, and I was like, LET ME COOK SOME FOOD FOR YOU! She offered to venmo me, but i was like… “honestly, the joy that it brings me to nourish you with these meals is all I need… i know how good this is going to make you feel.” I then cooked for a few more friends having their 2nd and 3rd babies, and they all felt the same way I did! That’s when I was like…ok…this needs to be a business!!! I created a menu, an instagram, and we started cooking out of our home! Things grew quickly, and we now have a great team and commercial kitchen and ship nationwide!
Interested in exploring the delivery options at Restorative Roots? Check out their site here!
