**1. Introduction**

The postpartum period is often a complex time for new parents. Social, cultural, and medical discourses have created norms and shaped the beliefs, values, and practices of new parents during this time. These discourses position the postpartum period as a time for new parents to bond and form connections not only with their baby but within their larger family. Postpartum is well acknowledged as an opportunity for family-forming [1]. Social, health, and nursing discourses of mother-child bonding are dominant during this period and positions such bonding as critical for the development of healthy relationships, positive mental health and confident parents [2,3].

Family health nursing is a specialty clinical practice that focuses on understanding how relations within the family impact their health [4,5]. Decades of research have demonstrated the need to understand the family as a unit where " ... family has a significant impact on the health and well-being of individual members (p. 1)" [6]. However, the family does not operate in isolation and supportive relations with extended family, friends, health care professionals, and others are extremely important [6,7].

The postpartum period is also a time for much needed social support [2]. New parents often seek and need social support for a variety of reasons from extended family members, friends, other parents outside their immediate social networks, nurses, midwives, lactation consultants, and other health care professionals. It is a time when new parents learn about their babies and when new families adapt to their changing experiences and the expectations placed upon them. Social discourses about the role of mothers perpetuates knowledge about what it means to be a mother and (re)creates many expectations for them [8,9]. New parents are challenged to balance new parental roles, work, extended family relations, and a myriad of other responsibilities while also attempting to enjoy these early moments with their baby [10].

Postpartum is also a period of time in which new parents are tasked to ensure they start their babies off onto the "right" path to be successful, whether this involves creating loving moments of family bonding, socialization with their babies, or ensuring proper nutrition [9]. Emotional and social well-being of infants and children are significant parts of these expectations. In the field of psychology, research continues to examine the emotional and psychological development of children and correlations with socialization and behaviour. Brownell [11] states: " ... socialization of prosocial behavior occurs continuously via social engagement beginning at birth. Because the infant participates actively and eagerly in social and emotional exchanges, socialization encompasses more than top-down teaching or shaping processes and selected social-learning processes such as imitation. Instead, socialization includes many bidirectional social processes, some of which are quite subtle (p. 223)".

Furthermore, social networking for new parents is one way to seek out relationships with other parents to share information, experience support and gain confidence in their parenting abilities with their newborns [12–17]. Social networking occurs both online and offline with the purpose of facilitating supportive meeting spaces for babies and parents. Research has identified that peer and social supports are essential in the postpartum period to improve outcomes such as breastfeeding or maternal mental health, including postpartum depression [18–21].

Isolation can put parents at risk for mental health issues; therefore, connections between people can help to alleviate some of the risks. Postpartum programs and services offered by health care professional and community groups all focus on supporting the physical, emotional, and social well-being of parents. Our research to date has demonstrated that social networking is an essential part of the postpartum period [22,23] and is important for both parents and babies to ensure healthy short term and long term mental and emotional health. The COVID-19 pandemic has significantly reduced opportunities for parents to gather or meet with family, friends, other parents and health care professionals [16,24–26]. Therefore, examining the postpartum experiences of parents during the COVID-19 pandemic and required self-isolation, enabled us to examine how parents in Nova Scotia coped with the social and relational aspects of postpartum.

The overarching aim of this study was to examine parents' experiences of the postpartum period during the mandated health protection orders in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The research also explored how various social and institutional discourses shaped their experiences. The research question was 'How do parents experience the postpartum period during COVID-19- ?
