Answered by Ustadha Shazia Ahmad
If a woman bleeds past 60 days, does she bath at the time the baby was born, or pick up from the following prayer? i.e.: born at 3am after praying isha – bathe at 3am after day 60, and pray isha? or: wait till fajr and bathe?
Answer:
Assalam Alaykum,
Thank you for your question.
Nifas (Lochia)
It says in the Reliance of the Traveller:
e13.3 Postnatal bleeding (nifas) lasts at least a moment, generally 40 days, and at most 60. If it exceeds this, the woman is considered to have chronic vaginal discharge (dis: e13.6).
Ruling
The above quote states only the maximum. A woman in lochia must take a ghusl and start praying when her bleeding has ceased. This could happen after a week, two weeks, 40 days, or anytime within 60 days. It is even possible for her lochia to finish and for her first menstruation to come and go within that 60 days if there were 15 days of purity between the two bleedings.
She would only take her ghusl (ritual bath) on the 60th day if the bleeding were continuous and did not cease. In this case, she would have to ask a scholar to determine which days were considered lochia and which days were considered abnormal chronic discharge (istihada).
Your question
If her bleeding was continuous, and she had to take her ritual bath on the 60th day, then she would take her bath at 3 am and pray Isha as one in istihada, but not after fajr as that would be too late, and she would have missed Isha.
Please see these links for more details:
https://islamqa.org/shafii/
https://islamqa.org/shafii/
May Allah give you the best of this world and the next.
Shazia Ahmad