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Empowered Postpartum Wellness: A Practical Guide to Recover After Birth, Build Mental Resilience, and Redefine Self-Care for a Thriving Mom Life
Empowered Postpartum Wellness is a heartfelt guide designed to help new mothers navigate the murky and often unspoken waters of postpartum recovery. Jade Padlan, a registered nurse and mother herself, takes readers on a compassionate journey through the physical, emotional, and psychological transformations that accompany the transition to motherhood. The book is divided into clear sections covering everything from healing after birth and nutrition to the mental load of parenting and relationship dynamics post-baby. It offers both science-backed insight and tender, lived wisdom, all wrapped in a conversational, no-nonsense tone. Padlan’s central message is clear: caring for yourself is not selfish—it’s essential.
Reading this book felt like being lovingly shaken awake. Padlan ditches the glossy Instagram version of new motherhood and speaks to the version of you who is leaking milk, emotionally overloaded, and wondering who she’s become. Her voice is steady, reassuring, and—most importantly—real. What struck me most was how often I found myself nodding along, thinking, “Why hasn’t anyone said this before?” From explaining why the first two weeks are pure survival mode, to helping redefine what self-care really means when you’re a mom, Padlan manages to educate without lecturing and support without smothering.
There were parts where I teared up, not because the book was sad, but because it made me feel seen. That’s rare in parenting books. The chapters on building a “mom village” and setting boundaries with visitors post-birth hit home in a big way. They reminded me of my own lonely early days after delivery—how isolating it felt, even when I wasn’t technically “alone.” Padlan’s tips aren’t just practical; they’re empowering. She teaches you how to be the advocate for the version of yourself that’s still emerging, even when you don’t feel particularly strong. Her anecdotes are vulnerable and brave, which makes her advice all the more trustworthy.
This book is a gem, especially for expectant mothers and those in the thick of the postpartum haze. I’d also recommend it to partners and support people—anyone who wants to truly show up for a new mom. If you want a guide that speaks your language, acknowledges the hard stuff, and helps you come out the other side more whole, then Empowered Postpartum Wellness is absolutely worth your time.
Pages: 254 | ASIN : B0F6NY53D4
Never Too Late
No Woman Left Behind is part personal memoir, global health crusade, and all heart, following your journey from an ad executive to an advocate for women suffering from obstetric fistula, a childbirth injury that is almost entirely preventable. Why was this an important book for you to write?
The day a woman gives birth is the day she is most likely to die or be seriously injured, particularly in the poorest parts of our world. It’s easy to forget that in a place as prosperous as the US where most women have safe childbirth experiences in hospitals. I believe that no woman should suffer a life of incontinent misery and isolation simply for trying to bring a child into the world. While fistula ruins the lives of too many women, it doesn’t have to. Most women can be cured with a single surgery. Our biggest obstacle to getting more of the one million women with the injury treated is lack of awareness of their plight. My goal in writing No Woman Left Behind was to create awareness and encourage more people to step up to help women they will likely never meet get their lives back.
What were some ideas that were important for you to share in this book?
I wanted people to know that they have the power to help too often forgotten women get a new shot at a healthy and productive life. We all live in challenging times; the world is filled with many intractable problems, but fistula isn’t one of them. We know what works to help women.
Another idea that I wanted to share is that it is never too late to create a new professional path for yourself. In my 20s I was working on “Madison Avenue,” using wily strategies to get people to buy stuff they may neither want nor need. The work was draining and ultimately unfulfilling. I left that behind, to find work that spoke to my heart. I hope that others may see themself in my journey.
Can you share with readers more about the Fistula Foundation’s Love-a-Sister program?
Our Love-a-Sister program provides the opportunity for donors to sponsor a surgery for a woman, that on average costs just $633. They can give one donation of that amount or give monthly to eventually fund a surgery. Most of fistula patients are indigent so our donors big-hearted generosity provides surgery for women who would often otherwise go without.
What do you hope is one thing readers take away from your story?
Our tagline is “Help Give a Woman a New Life.” I hope people will be motivated to help, and perhaps at the same time, gain increased gratitude for the many blessings those of us living in a developed country like the United States often take for granted, like safe hospital-based childbirth.
Author Links: GoodReads | X (Twitter) | Facebook | Website | No Woman Left Behind | Amazon
The day a woman gives birth is also the day she is most likely to die or suffer severe injury—a sobering reality that comes into sharp focus when Kate Grant visits the Addis Ababa Fistula Hospital in Ethiopia’s capital. There, she sees row after row of beds occupied by young women afflicted with obstetric fistula, a childbirth injury that leaves them incontinent and too often shunned by their communities, modern- day lepers. She soon learns that surgery is the only way to end their suffering.
In No Woman Left Behind, Grant recounts her decision to abandon a promising advertising career, and the ups and downs of building Silicon Valley– based Fistula Foundation from a modest start-up into the global leader in fistula treatment. Through vivid firsthand accounts of surgeons toiling in remote corners of Africa and Asia, we see inside the fight to restore hope to some of the world’s most vulnerable women.
A compassionate army of donors spanning nearly 70 countries makes such life-changing care possible. Grant demonstrates the profound power of individual action to change lives at scale, since Fistula Foundation takes no government money. No Woman Left Behind is a compelling personal journey and a how-to guide for anyone looking to make a lasting difference in the lives of others.
100% of the net proceeds from No Woman Left Behind will go to Fistula Foundation’s Love-a-Sister program to fund free surgeries for women with childbirth injuries.
LITERARY TITAN 