You did it! You birthed an entire new human being! (... And what comes next?)

"I have lain down and sweated and shaken …

I have done this thing,

I and the other women this exceptional

act with the exceptional heroic body,

this giving birth, this glistening verb."

The language of the brag Sharon Olds

A newly born mother and baby

You did it.

Either vaginally or by a caesarian section, you've brought your baby into the world.

You may be euphoric, drenched in tenderness and joy. You may be disoriented, shocked, in pain. You may be exhausted beyond words. And here is this strange little creature, streaked in vernix and maybe some blood, lying against your body and in your arms.

Many women and their partners enter a liminal place immediately after the birth, as if time is suspended. This is a time for privacy, if you can possibly arrange it, a time to enjoy snuggling the baby into your body against your bare chest and breasts. We refer to this as skin-to-skin contact, whether it's with a loving woman or a loving man or a loving person of non-binary gender.

Skin-to-skin contact with your breasts (without feeling under pressure to have baby feed) helps orient your little one

Things go best for breastfeeding if your new little one has abundant opportunity to rest against you and cuddle into you, to smell, lick, and nuzzle around the breast in those first hours after birth, without any pressure to feed but simply for enjoyment and for getting to know each other.

And if you're not feeling enjoyment, don't worry, that's very normal after giving birth too. From now on, surprisingly strong feelings or even sensations of emotional numbing are likely to come and go, in the way storms and clouds and sunshine come and go. For your baby, it's your loving behaviours that matter, even if you're not feeling particularly loving at that moment. You can find out unexpected or painful feelings including after you've had a baby here.

From the first hours onward, there is no need to wait for your baby to dial up and start crying before offering the breast.

• Frequent access to your breasts and body, or even nearly continuous access to your breasts, usually keeps your little one dialled down.

• Frequent access to your breasts and body in these first hours also sets your breasts up for the best chance of producing enough milk to meet your baby's needs later on, by optimising the settings on your breasts' milk secretion pathways.

Some breastfeeding support professionals worry about damaging the nipples when I suggest that the baby has continuous or frequent access to your breast from birth. But frequent access to your breasts mostly only damages your nipples and breasts if the baby is not well fitted into your body. If you feel any unpleasant sensations in the nipple, don't put up with them, start experimenting with tiny little relaxed and slow micromovements, to see if you can change that uncomfortable or painful sensation into something neutral or pleasant. Your baby takes only tiny volumes of colostrum in the first two or three days, and doesn't need to be on for long - just very frequently.

• You can find out about frequent flexible breastfeeds here.

• You can find out about micromovements here.

• You can find out about the gestalt method of fit and hold here.

The narcotics commonly used for pain relief after the birth may affect your baby through your milk and dampen down his breastfeeding reflexes. They may also make him quite drowsy. This can mean your baby doesn't want to take the breast much, and you may need to wake him to try. The sooner you can sensibly minimise these medications or substitute them with paracetamol or non-steroidal anti-inflammatories, the better for breastfeeding.