Best supplements for postpartum recovery: heal faster postpartum.

If you’re looking for ways to speed up postpartum healing and recovery, these are the most common nutrients and herbal medicine I recommend.

Postpartum recovery is not just the physical recovery from childbirth – it’s also helping the body recoverfrom pregnancy and the huge toll that it takes on the body.

By supplying nutrients specific for postpartum healing and decreasing inflammation, we are also giving support for our hormones and nervous system.

This works beautifully alongside my favourite nourishing herb for postpartum Mamas – Withania (Ashwaganda).

A nutrient dense diet is the most important thing for your recovery (which I’ve chatted about in this video here) but it is often necessary to add in supplements because many mums are entering into the postpartum period with depleted nutrient stores from pregnancy.

This is why I place a huge emphasis on a healing, nutrient dense diet for the fourth trimester (and beyond!) so we can boost those nutrient levels back up and you can have faster postpartum healing. 

Here are some nutrients and herbal medicine I recommend for postpartum Recovery:

Zinc – really important for any sort of healing! Particularly helpful if you’ve had a c-section or tearing during delivery. Zinc is helpful for lowering inflammation and promotes collagen building for accelerated recovery. It also plays a big role in our immune system, our sleep, our mental health, it’s amazing for anxiety (one of my go-tos with Postpartum Anxiety)

Vitamin C – works synergistablly with zinc with beautiful collagen producing elements, fights inflammation and amazing support for our stress response system by working on the adrenals.  Our adrenals burn through a lot of vitamin c under stress (even external stress like recovery, sleep deprivation etc) so vitamin c is great to help build the tone of the adrenals

Ashwagandha (Withania) – I always use this as part of a postpartum tonic I give my clients. It is anti-inflammatory, blood building and regulates the stress hormone cortisol which is important during early motherhood when we have many physical and mental demands the body can perceive as stress. It’s a very time honoured herb used across many traditional culutres as postpartum herb

DHA – I mention this a lot when I’m talking about support for postpartum and early motherhood because our body gives a lot to bub through pregnanxy and breastfeeding andit’s hard to get through dietary sources at the level we need. In our last trimester the baby takes 7g of fat from our body to their brain and most of that is DHA. It’s really important our own brain function, mental health and lowering inflammation.

Probiotics – These are important if you had to have antibiotics during or post childbirth. After my c-section I took two different ones –  a breastfeeding specific one Qiara, and a very High dose 7 day course to repopulate good gut flora (and if breastfeeding, is transferred through to baby).

Collagen – mix into protein shake, bake with it – it helps the body produce collagen which is important when we need tissue repair and possibly scar healing.

Alternatively you can do bone broth with gives us proline and glycine for the collagen building as well as all the lovely nutrients. But in summer you don’t necessarily feel like it so can sub for a collagen powder.

Little bonus nutrient that’s not specific to recovery but that all Mums need a good dose of is Magnesium. It’s a huge support to our stress response system, hormones, energy levels and mood.

Important nutrients to have checked postpartum:

Iron, B12, Vitamin D levels all need to be checked as these will impact you energy levels, mood, hormones and immune system!

You and your needs are unique!

Every mother will have different needs for their recovery postpartum, these are just some key supplements I’ve found work really well for postpartum health and recovery. Make sure you’re taking high quality supplements to get the benefits and chat to your Naturopath about which ones are best for your specific needs.

I’ve seen Mums have amazing physical recoveries, helped them out of postpartum anxiety and depression with the help of these natural therapies so I know they can make a huge difference for you too.

Michala xo