Melbourne Postpartum Services

Melbourne Postpartum Services Evidence-informed, wholehearted postpartum support for families in Melbourne.

Personalised, in-home and virtual care helping parents feel calm, confident, and supported in the newborn stage — without rigid routines or pressure to be perfect.

01/09/2026

Early motherhood can make your whole world feel like it has narrowed down to what somebody else needs from you next.

And when you’ve been in that mode for long enough, it can be surprisingly hard to answer a simple question like: What do I need?

Not what does the baby need. Not what needs washing. Not what should I be doing better. What do I need to feel more like myself again?

This is something we work through with mums all the time. Not by handing you another self-care checklist or telling you to “make time for yourself” as though you haven’t already thought of that.

We look at what has actually been lost or squeezed out in this season.
Space. Rest. Confidence. Connection. Purpose. Movement. A sense that your life still belongs to you as well.

Then we work out, gently and realistically, what needs to change around you so there is room for some of that to return.

Sometimes that means more practical support.
Sometimes it means learning to ask for what you need without drowning in guilt.
Sometimes it means reconnecting with your values and figuring out who you want to be in this season, rather than trying to become the woman you were before.

And sometimes it begins with having one place where you can say:
“I love my baby. And I don’t feel like myself.”
without anyone trying to fix it, minimise it, or make you feel ungrateful.

From there, we can start getting curious about what has been lost, what still matters to you, what support is missing, and what small things might help you feel more like a whole person again.
Not a different mother.
Not the old you.
Just more of you in the life you are living now.
That is often where things start to shift.

There were stretches of early motherhood where I felt like I was mostly just… doing.Feed the baby. Do the washing. Make ...
31/08/2026

There were stretches of early motherhood where I felt like I was mostly just… doing.

Feed the baby. Do the washing. Make the food. Settle the baby. Clean. Clean again. Wake up and do it again.

And you do it because it needs doing. Sometimes while exhausted. Sometimes overwhelmed. Sometimes while your own mental health feels pretty shaky underneath it all. You still get up. You still mother.

I think what helped me over time was realising I didn’t need every day to feel exciting, productive or deeply fulfilling. Most lives aren’t made up of huge defining moments. They’re made up of a lot of ordinary Tuesdays.

So the question became less, “How do I make motherhood feel amazing?”
And more: WHO DO I WANT TO BE while I’m living this life?

What matters to me? What are the values I want threaded through our home, my relationships, my work, the way I care for myself, and the way I raise my children?

Then it becomes smaller. Maybe connection matters, so I send the message instead of waiting until I feel less tired. Maybe creativity matters, so I make something badly for half an hour. Maybe learning matters, so I listen to something interesting while I walk with the pram.

Maybe kindness matters, and today living that value looks like speaking to myself with a little more compassion when I’m absolutely spent.

None of these things look particularly impressive from the outside. But that’s kind of the point. A meaningful life isn’t only built in the seasons where we are achieving big things, climbing career ladders, travelling, studying or reinventing ourselves.
Sometimes it is built very quietly.

Through hundreds of small choices made inside days that can feel remarkably similar to the one before. And I think part of finding ourselves in motherhood is learning to notice: This matters to me. This is how I want to live. And today, in this very ordinary little way, I did.

Let me know I'm not alone in this. How are you living out your values during this notoriously busy period of life?

What if your baby isn’t difficult… but we’ve been taught to see them that way?I’ve been reading The Discontented Little ...
30/08/2026

What if your baby isn’t difficult… but we’ve been taught to see them that way?
I’ve been reading The Discontented Little Baby Book by Dr Pamela Douglas, and there’s a lot in it that has had me stopping and thinking.

Especially about how quickly we can turn normal newborn behaviour into a problem to solve.

The frequent feeding.
The contact naps.
The waking.
The crying.
The baby who seems impossible to settle.

It’s so easy, especially when you’re exhausted, to think:
“What am I doing wrong?”

But babies are developing rapidly.

Their nervous systems are immature.

They communicate through their behaviour because they don’t have another way to tell us what they need.

And sometimes what looks like a “sleep problem” or a “settling problem” is simply a baby being a baby.

That doesn’t mean you have to struggle through it.

And it definitely doesn’t mean you should ignore something that doesn’t feel right.

It means having someone who can help you understand what’s going on, work out what’s within the range of normal, and support you when you need more help.

Because you deserve support too.

If you’re looking for postpartum support, we’re fully booked for October and have only 2 spots left for November.

Send us a DM if you’d like to chat about what support could look like for you.

And if you’re enjoying these book notes, follow along. I’ll be sharing more of what I’m reading and how it connects with real life with a baby.

29/08/2026

You’re not less capable since becoming a mum.

You’ve just been measuring capability by the wrong things.

Because motherhood can make you look at the woman you were before and think…
Where did she go?

But maybe she didn’t go anywhere.

Maybe your brain has been busy remembering everything, anticipating everyone’s needs, carrying the mental load and functioning on broken sleep.

That is capability too.

It just doesn’t look like the version we’re taught to value.

So if you’ve been wondering why you don’t feel like yourself anymore…

Maybe you haven’t lost yourself.

Maybe you’ve become capable in ways nobody ever taught you to recognise.

And I think more mothers deserve to know that.

28/08/2026

Funny how quickly things can change.

This morning, I looked at the sky and thought, perfect.

Winter Melbourne had delivered sunshine, blue skies and the kind of weather that made getting the washing out feel like a small win.

A few hours later, I was standing outside bringing it all back in.

It wasn't dry.

But the situation had changed.

And sometimes motherhood feels exactly like that.

You make the plan.

You think you've found the thing that's going to work.

Maybe it's the routine.
The feeding approach.
The sleep plan.
The way you thought you'd balance your baby, your family and yourself.

And for a while, it does.

Then something changes.

Your baby changes.
Your family changes.
You change.

And suddenly, the thing that looked like the best way forward isn't working anymore.

That doesn't mean you got it wrong.

It means you're paying attention.

Sometimes the best thing you can do is stop trying to make the original plan work and bring the washing in.

Even when it isn't dry.

Even when it wasn't what you had planned.

Because motherhood isn't about getting everything right the first time.

It's knowing when the weather has changed, and being willing to change with it.

For years, “mum brain” has been treated like a joke about becoming forgetful, scattered or less capable.But that is not ...
25/08/2026

For years, “mum brain” has been treated like a joke about becoming forgetful, scattered or less capable.

But that is not the whole story.

Pregnancy and postpartum involve real neurological change. Your brain is adapting to an entirely new level of noticing, learning, attunement and responsiveness.

I wish I had understood that sooner. Because when mothers only hear the “deficit” version, it is easy to start believing: “I’m not as capable anymore.” “I’ve lost myself.” “My brain doesn’t work like it used to.”

Sometimes what we need is not another productivity tip. We need context.

Motherhood changes the brain. And many of those changes are strengths we have never been taught to value.

One of the loneliest parts of early motherhood can be feeling like you have to carefully edit how you talk about it. Bec...
24/08/2026

One of the loneliest parts of early motherhood can be feeling like you have to carefully edit how you talk about it. Because if you say you’re struggling, will someone wonder if you’re coping? If you say you need space, will they think you don’t want to be with your baby? If you admit that you miss parts of your old life, will somebody remind you how lucky you are?

So we soften it. We add, “but obviously I love them.” We explain ourselves before anyone has even questioned us. We make sure everyone knows we’re grateful before we allow ourselves to say that something is hard. And slowly, mothers can learn that only certain parts of their experience are safe to say out loud.

I think we need to get much better at listening to, accepting and holding the complexity, both for ourselves and the parents we know and love.

A parent can desperately want her baby and still find parenting overwhelming.
I was deeply in love with my bubba still need some time when nobody touched me ( and still do!)

A mumma can be grateful and lonely. She can love the person she is becoming and still mourn parts of the life she gave away to have this new one.

None of those truths need to cancel the others.

When mothers have somewhere safe to tell the whole truth, we can actually work with what is happening. We don’t support mothers by requiring them to focus only on gratitude while they struggle. We support them by making enough room for the WHOLE story. And sometimes being able to say, “I love this, and this is really hard,” is where the shame finally starts to loosen.

The mums who worry most about getting parenting “right” are often the ones who care deeply, read widely, reflect constan...
21/08/2026

The mums who worry most about getting parenting “right” are often the ones who care deeply, read widely, reflect constantly… and end up carrying an enormous amount of pressure.

The problem is not the learning. The problem is what happens when all that knowledge turns into hypervigilance. When every missed cue feels significant. Every short response feels loaded. Every hard bedtime gets mentally reviewed. Every moment of needing space becomes evidence that maybe you are not the mum you thought you would be.

And then the inner critic steps in disguised as accountability. That part matters.

Because healthy reflection sounds like:
“That didn’t feel good. What was going on for me? What did my child need? Is there anything I want to repair or try differently next time?”

Self-attack sounds like: “You should know better.” “You’ve damaged this.” “You’re failing.”

***They are not the same thing***

One keeps us open enough to learn. The other floods us with shame, chips away at confidence and can make even ordinary parenting moments feel frighteningly high stakes.

This is something I see often in thoughtful, conscientious mothers. And the work is rarely about giving them another ten parenting strategies. It is usually about helping them: understand what is actually happening underneath the fear, separate useful responsibility from unnecessary self-blame, build confidence in their own judgement, and learn how to repair without punishing themselves.

Because secure, connected parenting was never meant to require perfect parenting.
And if you are reading this thinking, “I do this all the time” — this is absolutely something that can be worked through. You do not have to keep parenting with a running commentary in your head telling you that every imperfect moment means something terrible.

20/08/2026

This is something I think about a lot in postpartum support. Because often, the problem isn’t that anyone has given bad advice
The lactation consultant may be looking at feeding, the MCHN may be thinking about weight gain, the GP may be looking at development or wanting to find a fix for the tears running down your face.
And each person may be absolutely right within the part of the picture they are looking at, BUT the parent is the one who has to take all of those pieces home and somehow make them fit together.
That is a very different job.
Especially when you’re exhausted, worried, recovering, learning your baby and already wondering whether you’re getting any of this right.
I think one of the most valuable things we can do for new parents is not simply add another opinion to the pile. It’s help them zoom out a little. Or to normalise and sit with them in the very real and rawness of life at this time. It's giving them permission to not try and follow all of the well meaning advice all at the same time and ask themselves what feels manageable for MY family?
Sometimes support isn’t about having another answer.
It’s helping someone find some clarity amongst all the answers they already have.

Something I keep coming back to in our work is how strange the expectation is that once you become a parent, you’re some...
19/08/2026

Something I keep coming back to in our work is how strange the expectation is that once you become a parent, you’re somehow meant to just know how to do it.
Yes, there are instincts. And yes, over time you get incredibly good at reading your own baby in a way nobody else can. But I don’t think that’s the whole story.

I’ve been looking after babies and children since I was a teenager, I’ve been a parent myself for more than 9 years, and my work now means I spend a lot of time alongside families right in those early weeks and months.

And one thing I see again and again is just how quickly parenthood can make really capable people feel like they have absolutely no idea what they’re doing. Which actually makes sense.

Most of us have never been this sleep deprived before. We’ve never been responsible for another tiny human 24 hours a day. We’ve never had to make this many decisions about something we care this deeply about, while also having ten different people telling us ten different ways we should be doing it.

And then there’s another whole layer that I think we talk about less.
You’re not only learning your baby. You’re learning yourself as a parent.
What kind of parent do I want to be when things are hard? What actually matters to me? Which bits of advice fit our family and which don’t? Can I hold a boundary when someone else thinks I’m doing it wrong? What happens when I react in a way I’m not proud of? Can I change my mind? Can I try something, realise it isn’t working and do something different without deciding that means I’ve failed?

I still come across new stages with my own kids where I think, well, I haven’t had to deal with this before. The difference now is that I have much more confidence that I’ll work it out. Not necessarily immediately. Not perfectly. And sometimes with help.
But I trust myself more to notice what’s happening, think about what my child needs, come back to the values I want to parent by, make a decision and adjust when I need to.

I think THAT is much closer to what parental confidence actually looks like. Not “I always know what to do.” More like, “I trust myself to keep learning how I want to do this.”

Address

Melbourne
Melbourne

Website

Alerts

Be the first to know and let us send you an email when Melbourne Postpartum Services posts news and promotions. Your email address will not be used for any other purpose, and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Contact The Business

Send a message to Melbourne Postpartum Services:

Shortcuts

Share

Category