Postpartum visitors? How to help them help you!
The struggle I had with getting help after baby was born was that I had to delegate the help I was offered. This requires you to know how long it’s been since the floor has been mopped, what groceries you have in the fridge, or how many clean onesies are left. And that “mental load” almost makes it as easy to do the work yourself after your visitors leave. Now that I’m on the other side of it, I have the following strategies to suggest. I hope they improve these interactions during your postpartum period. There are a few printables at the bottom of the post to help!
Meal Train. The easiest way for your community to support you is with food (or Uber Eats?). There is nothing wrong with setting this up for yourself, but if you feel uncomfortable, ask a relative or friend to set one up for you. If someone offers to do this, don’t turn them down! Meal Train has the option for people to send money, not just drop off food, so it will still work even if your village is spread out. A dinner delivery was a life saver as I was adjusting to the exhaustion of having a newborn!
Have a cleaning checklist. I have linked a few Word documents for you to download below. They feature daily, weekly, and monthly tasks, broken down by zones in your home. The kitchen has a lot of tasks so it has its own full page checklist. You can modify these documents as needed for your home. My recommendation is to print and laminate lists, then put them on your fridge with a dry erase marker. Any time a guest comes to see the baby, you can refer them to the list without telling them what to do. IE: “How can you help, you ask? Umm… there’s a list on the fridge!”
Set up a zone with cleaning supplies. Because everyone uses different products in their home, it’s helpful to preemptively write out how you do your cleaning. Leave the instructions with your cleaning supplies in a drop zone like the laundry room. (I created a cheat sheet showing what tools and products were used in which situations; you can download it to take a look, but you’ll need to make your own version since my methods are surely different than yours).
Overnight guests get the bed-and-breakfast treatment: you provide the bed, they make you breakfast! Having people to stay during postpartum should make everything run more smoothly, so provide an info sheet with the wifi password, the general flow of your daily routine (or other relevant info), and the cleanup expectations before they leave (like an AirBNB). Some examples are: stripping the bed, wiping down the bathroom and taking out the trash, and vacuuming.
Download the printables here! There is a .doc and a .pdf in case you have font issues with Word.
Household Cleaning Schedule: (Word Version) (PDF Version)
Kitchen Cleaning Schedule: (Word Version) (PDF Version)
Cleaning Instruction Sheet: (Word Version) (PDF Version)
Guest Room Info Sheet: (Word Version) (PDF Version)
