Postpartum Meal Prep Is Now a Competitive Sport

Earlier this year, before I started telling friends and family that I was pregnant, my internet feeds started filling with a genre of prepper I never knew existed. Instead of ex-military types stocking up for a post-apocalyptic future with basements full of walkie-talkies, these were pregnant women. Silky-haired, young pregnant women, swathed in soft-looking athleisure sets and get-ready-with-me headbands, prepping for their postpartum futures with a competitive sense of perfectionism and self-reliance. 

At eight months pregnant, staring into the unknown abyss of birth, they calmly instructed their viewers on how to prep hospital bags, hip flexor muscles, and postpartum medical supplies. Most compellingly, for me, they also documented how they were planning to feed their postpartum selves in the many sleepless months to come. 

Leaving no bite of food to fate (or husbands, or meal trains), this meant scrupulously stocked bedside carts full of protein shakes and power bars and freezers full of pleasingly stacked bags of sludge. There were sandwich-ready chicken cutlets, slow-cooker-ready bags of stew ingredients, and golden-topped pot pies. (It goes without saying that there were also commissionable ShopMy links to the best vacuum-packing equipment and heat-safe containers to use for this type of meal prep.)