Pan-NatalĀ® Care: From Preconception to Postpartum
Remember: this post is for informational purposes only and may not be the best fit for you and your personal situation. It shall not be construed as medical advice. The information and education provided here is not intended or implied to supplement or replace professional medical treatment, advice, and/or diagnosis. Always check with your own physician or medical professional before trying or implementing any information read here.
Have you heard the term generational wealth? It refers to the idea of creating a financial legacy that perpetuates wealth for future generations.
Well, I’m here to talk about generational health. That means you’re creating a legacy of wellness
for future generations. Your health ties to the health of your grandchildren and their grandchildren, and so on.
But to create that legacy, we have to change the stories we’ve received from the traditional medical system and reclaim the power in our healthcare. By doing this, we can support not only our own well-being, but that of our descendants.
My personal journey to that end is in serving individuals in the pan-natal™ stage of life. That is, I support people from preconception to postpartum. And, spoiler alert, postpartum is ALL of the time after you have a baby. It’s not six weeks or six months or even six years. It’s the rest of life after having a child.
If you’re wondering how functional nutrition can support you at any point during your pan-natal™ time, let’s connect. At Pivotal Origins, I serve people who are ready to feel well again and eager to experience fundamental changes. Reach out to see if we’re the right fit for your needs.
First, Let’s Get Clear on “Postpartum”
If you’ve given birth to a baby in a hospital, perhaps your story is similar to mine. Your delivery was a blur, and then you received minimal support for self-care and breastfeeding, and then you went home.
At your six-week postpartum visit, the doctor probably did a quick check to see how you were healing and told you it was ok to have sex again. Maybe they asked about your emotional state. And if you ventured to mention that you were feeling depressed or anxious, their response was to offer a prescription.
Are you freaking kidding me? That’s it? That’s the extent of postpartum care?
With my birth experience, it became glaringly obvious that the traditional American healthcare system does not have an accurate understanding of postpartum. It imposes an arbitrary six-week or six-month timeframe and sends parents on their way.
Don’t get me wrong. Modern medicine saves lives and delivers healthy babies. It does amazing things. But in the postpartum time of life, it’s not serving women well. Giving a mom the “all clear” six weeks after having a baby with no more support isn’t enough.
So let’s set the record straight. Postpartum begins the moment you become a parent and continues for the rest of your life.
The process of becoming a mother changes you forever, no matter how it happens. This is true for people who adopt and for parents who have babies they, tragically, never had the opportunity to meet. It leaves an imprint on your body for the rest of your life.
That is postpartum. You don’t just move past that because a doctor says your cervix has closed up properly.
The Pan-Natal® Understanding
My parenthood story didn’t start with the birth of my daughter. It began when I conceived my first child and then had a miscarriage. The shocking level of non-care I received when I went to urgent care laid the seeds for the work I do now.
Through my journey toward wellness and another pregnancy, which included removing mold toxicity from my body, I learned so much. And one of the most critical things I discovered was an enormous gap in terminology. Our current medical system has no word to cover the time from when you are able to conceive all the way through postpartum.
They recognize terms like prenatal, perinatal, and postnatal, but they are all separate. Everything has a compartment and a finite timeline. There was no word for a comprehensive and cohesive look at this entire span of life.
This was pretty much proof-positive to me that we were dropping the ball. Clearly, our system was allowing too many things to fall through the healthcare cracks when there wasn’t even a word for this extremely sacred and important time of life.
So I made one.
That story is how pan-natal™ came about. And in my functional nutrition work with people in this phase of life, I help them connect the dots in their healthcare.
Is Traditional Western Medicine Bad?
Heck no! I am not an anti-Western medicine practitioner. This system has developed incredible medications and technologies to help billions of people. And if my appendix bursts or my child is in an accident, I want that hospital and everything it can offer.
But in our system’s current state, insurance dictates what type of care a person gets. And that’s messed up. Your specific needs should determine your healthcare options, not the profit margins for shareholders.
So I’m not trying to replace my clients’ medical team. My role is to be a dynamic and supportive member of that team. I work to bring a comprehensive view of your health and wellness throughout the pan-natal® stage.
What does this look like in practice? It looks like:
- Appointments that allow us plenty of time to talk and discuss the support that would be beneficial to you. Average medical appointments are rarely more than 15-20 minutes. That’s simply not enough time in most instances. In fact, providers typically spend more time looking at health records than they do in actual face-to-face time with patients.
- Examining your traditional doctor-ordered lab results using optimal functional reference ranges. This study lets me dig into a deeper understanding of what your body is experiencing.
- Offering functional lab testing that can help uncover the root cause of imbalance or dysfunction.
- Educating you on your rights so that you can advocate for yourself with your providers.
- Reaching out to your current providers to collaborate and have everyone on the same page.
- Helping you reduce or eliminate the toxic burden in your body so that you can feel your best. Whether you are trying to conceive or had your last child decades ago, functional nutrition can support you.
Why “Pivotal Origins”?
At first, my business was very application-based. I would help clients meal-plan and understand nutrition labels and all the things. I offered grocery store and farmers market tours. It was cool, and I loved it.
But after my pregnancy and delivery experiences, I was ready to dig deeper. I went back to school and got my MS in Human Nutrition and Functional Medicine. I needed a name for the new work I was planning to do.
Pivotal indicates a thing that is “of crucial importance in relation to the development or success of something else.”
Origin is “the point or place where something begins, arises, or is derived.”
Voilà! Since my ultimate goal is to dig into the roots of dis-ease in the body while helping to transform the health and wellness of generations, Pivotal Origins speaks my truth. Think of how powerful it is that your good health when you conceive can impact the health of your great-grandchildren.
So, now you have a peek into my passion and my process. Are you ready to start building your generational health? I’d love to connect with you to see which program is the right fit. Let’s get started!
