What it is
Cuarentena. Latin American postpartum. 40 days rest. Faja. La cuarentena is the forty days after birth. It is kept across Mexico, Central and South America, and the Caribbean. The mother stays home, rests, and eats warm food. Her mother, sisters, comadres, and sometimes a partera care for her. The reason given: the body is open after birth and must be closed, warmed, and kept safe.
What's typical
Common rules: no heavy lifting or housework, few visitors, warm food and drinks, no 'cold' foods or cold air, a faja or rebozo around the belly, and no sex until the forty days end. Foods vary by region: caldo de pollo, atole, tortillas, beans, manzanilla tea. Some families end the forty days with a cerrada, a closing of the bones with a rebozo.
What's known
ACOG's guidance matches much of the cuarentena: rest, limits on lifting, and waiting on sex until healing is checked. Studies of Latina mothers link it to more family support and less depression. In the US it is often cut short by work.
What helps
- Ask the women in your family what their cuarentena looked like, and what they would keep.
- Keep the warm foods and the rest, even in pieces.
- If you want a faja, wear it loose enough to breathe and take it off to sleep.
When to call someone
- Nowheavy bleeding, fever of 100.4 or higher with chills, or chest pain. Call your provider.
- Todaya faja that causes pain, numbness, or downward pressure in the pelvis.
- At your next visittell your provider about your cuarentena so advice on activity and sex fits.
Who helps
Tools: Postpartum Prep Checklist
Related
- Belly bindingNourishment and Traditions
- Warming foods and why so many cultures insist on themNourishment and Traditions
- The first 40 daysSupport, Home, and Village
- Postpartum traditions around the worldNourishment and Traditions
- Sex after birth: when, pain, dryness, desirePostpartum: Your Body
What mothers here say
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Experiences and questions are their authors' own, not reviewed advice. The topic's steward lists the ones that help most in a credited digest once there is one. Unusual experiences stay, with a note.
Sources
- Heng Ou (author) — The First Forty Days: The Essential Art of Nourishing the New Mother
- American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists — Optimizing postpartum care committee opinion
Sources are named, not yet linked. The steward verifies each one and adds the link.
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