gold coast doulas

Kristin discusses the ins and outs of navigating parental leave with Linzay Davis, Founder of The Park.  You can listen to this complete podcast episode on iTunes, SoundCloud, or wherever you find your podcasts.

Welcome.  You’re listening to Ask the Doulas, a podcast where we talk to experts from all over the country about topics related to pregnancy, birth, postpartum, and early parenting.  Let’s chat!

Kristin:  Hello, hello!  This is Kristin with Ask the Doulas, and I am so excited to chat with Linzay Davis today.  Linzay is the founder of The Park, and she is a mom of two.  The Park is a consulting agency which is focused on helping businesses create equitable and inclusive parental leave policies and programs that support women and keep them in the workforce after they become moms.  Six months after returning from her own maternity leave, Linzay quit a job that she loved because becoming a working mom of a newborn and a toddler in the middle of a global pandemic became too much.  She quickly realized the system for working moms in the US is broken, and so she started The Park to fix it.  Welcome, Linzay!

Linzay:  Hi!  Thank you so much for having me!

Kristin:  So what an awesome story to really see a problem and go ahead and start a business to hep make it more equitable in the workforce.

Linzay:  Yeah.  I mean, I had such a challenging time through my maternity leave and then getting back to work as a working mom, and I figured I couldn’t possibly be the only mom out there struggling with all of that.  So I created The Park to hopefully make it a little bit easier for all of us moms that are trying to make it all happen.

Kristin:  Yes.  So tell us a bit about The Park and how companies can connect with you.

Linzay:   Yeah.  So like you mentioned, I started The Park because I had just not a very pleasurable maternity leave situation.  It was unpaid.  I had no idea what I was doing.  I thought I had set myself up for success and my team when I went on leave, but I had such a small team, and when I got back to work, it just was like, this is – I never felt like I was going to get my head above water.  And if you live in a state – like, I live in California where we have state-sponsored leave, and it’s just so challenging to navigate.  And there’s so many nuances, and there’s so many parts of maternity leave that are historically holding moms back in the workforce.  And I saw the gender inequities, and so I decided that I needed to get that information out there.  So I started working with companies to help them make more equitable and inclusive parental leave policies so that they can have a more diverse workforce that includes moms because so many women leave the workforce after they have babies because it’s just too challenging, and maternity leave is a big part of that.  So I work with companies to make their policies better.  I work with moms to help them navigate maternity leave.  I make reels upon reels on Instagram just to help moms figure out how to apply for statewide sponsored leave programs, and how do you even write your out of office email when you go on maternity leave.  So that’s all to say, check me out on Instagram.  I’m @theparkconsulting everywhere.  LinkedIn, Instagram.  My email is linzay@theparkconsulting.

Kristin:  Awesome.  So, Linzay, let’s get into really understanding your options and rights and also just having that uncomfortable discussion with your superiors about, say, a pregnancy announcement, having that initial discussion and then really setting up your leave, any sort of temporary help that may fill your role while you’re on leave, and what it might look like coming back, whether it’s part time – I’m sure you do that with your consulting, of what’s the best for you and your family, coming back full time, part time, working remote a couple days and then in the office.  So how does that look for you as far as your consulting role?

Linzay:  Yeah.  Well, how much time do we have, because I feel like that’s such a loaded question.  I could talk for hours.  I’ll try to keep it short.  So, yeah, when people think about maternity leave, they think about this, like, golden rule of 12 weeks, and they go on leave, and they come back, and everything is perfect and fine.  But really, when I look at maternity leave and parental leave, I look at it so much farther.  It’s so much more encompassing.  It’s the weeks and months before you go on leave.  It’s the weeks and months that you’re on leave.  And then it’s the weeks and months that you return to your job, as this new person.  You’re a mom now.  Everything has changed, and society doesn’t really set us up to really accept that new person that we become when we come back to work.  So that’s all to say, I think that it’s so important to support moms, even before your baby is a glimmer in your eye, before you’re even pregnant, before you’re thinking about adopting.  Like, think about your options.  Consider your options.  What’s your parental leave policy at your office?  What’s the culture like?  Have people gone on leave before?  It’s not too late if you’re already pregnant or if you’re already in your adoption process to think about these things, but I encourage women to think about this far ahead of time so that they’re not pregnant and feeling like they’re up against a wall and have to figure everything out when their hormones are in flex.  I know for me, I was crying every day about everything, so, like, maybe think about it before you get to that point.

Kristin:  Yes!  In your family planning, yeah, include that, and also just your plan career-wise for moving up within the company you’re at or on to other jobs.  So, yeah.

Linzay:  Yeah, exactly.  We spend so much time at work, so make sure that it’s a place that you enjoy being at, because even especially once you have your baby, it’s going to be a place that is really pulling you away from your family.  So make sure it’s a good place to be and the culture is accepting.  But so going back to just the first things, like telling your boss that you’re pregnant, like I said, look at the culture.  What is it like?  Can you just go to your boss and be like, hey, I’m so excited to tell you I’m pregnant, and your boss is going to give you a hug and say, amazing, that’s awesome.  Don’t worry about anything yet.  We’ll take care of everything down the line.  Or do you have a promotion on the line, or do you have a review coming up in the next few weeks?  Legally, you’re protected when you tell your boss that you’re pregnant.  Culturally, though, that might not necessarily be the case.  And I don’t want you to be the martyr.  Unless you’re willing to be, but don’t – if you’re going to have a review or promotion that’s something that’s really important coming up in the next couple of weeks, maybe you wait just a couple more weeks and hide your pregnancy if you can.  But also remember that once you tell your boss, you’re now protected under several polices and protections through the federal government and likely through your state government, also, that make it so they can’t fire you for being pregnant.  Because we all know that used to be something that happens, and hopefully it’s not happening anymore.

Kristin:  Exactly.  So every state has different laws as far as breaks, but of course for breastfeeding and pumping moms, having the dedicated space to be able to pump and store milk and take those breaks is also a big part of navigating coming back to work.  How do you work with companies in that way and really making sure they’re set up, especially those that don’t have a lot of female employees?

Linzay:  Yes.  So like I said before, we go back to work at this magical 12-week mark – hopefully later – and we’re just supposed to go back to work like nothing has changed.  But unfortunately, a lot has changed, and you are likely – or there are a lot of moms that choose to breastfeed, and when you don’t have your baby at work with you, you’re going to have to pump.  And so legally, we are protected.  All new moms when they go back to work are legally protected to take break time to express milk whenever they have the need to do so.  And we also are legally protected to have a safe, comfortable space to do this.  And the safe, comfortable space is a room with no windows on it, or if there are windows, it has a screen on it and a door that locks.  So you’re not in the bathroom.  You’re not in, like, an office that people are going in and out of.  You legally have these rights.  So if you get any pushback from any of your managers or supervisors that say that you can’t take this time to pump, they are legally in the wrong.  So it’s so important to advocate for yourself and know your options and what you’re legally entitled to.  So just stand up for yourself.  Advocated for yourself.  And when you go back to work, you’re just this strong, badass mom, so, like, remind them of that.

Kristin:  Indeed.  And also, I mean, navigating childcare.  So you had a child during the pandemic, and it is more challenging to find a childcare center, licensed in-home childcares, like, all of it is so much more challenging during pandemic times than even before, and even then, you had to get on a waitlist as soon as you knew you were pregnant.  So navigating the times for pickup and drop-off and the sick policies and your own flex and vacation and sick days that would need to be used if your child was sent home from daycare, for example.

Linzay:  Yeah, it’s complicated.  Like, I was ten minutes late to our call this morning because I had to take my kids to the doctor this morning, and things just took longer than I expected.  If I wasn’t talking to a doula, maybe that would have been a little bit more complicated to explain, but it’s so important to – that’s why I was saying earlier to plan ahead.  If you’re at a workplace where you don’t feel like the culture is supportive of taking time off when your kid is sick or if you need to take them to the doctor, really evaluate where you are.  I’m not saying, like, jump ship and go get a new job right away, but that’s why I think it’s so important to think about not just your family planning and you having – when you and your partner decide to have a baby, if you have a partner, but also everything else that comes with it.  And when you go back to work, having someone trustworthy to watch your baby and having the time off to be able to watch your baby when that falls through or if they have a doctor’s appointment is so important.  So think about that ahead of time, and look at the culture of your company and see what they expect and what they’ve done in the past.  Stand up for yourself.  Maybe gather a team around you, if there’s other women in your office and the culture is not what you want it to be.  Like, maybe you can create an ERG, an employee resource group, and create one for moms and change the culture so that it is supportive and your manager does understand you can’t go to work because you have to take your baby to the doctor, or your daycare falls through.  There’s so many moving parts.  All the moms know.  I’m preaching to the choir here.

Kristin:  Exactly, and even if you have a nanny in your home, if the nanny is ill, then you need to stay home.

Linzay:  Yeah.  Backup plan B, plan C, plan D.

Kristin:  Exactly.  And hopefully your partner has a flexible schedule and vacation and flex time so the partner can also, you know, share in the load as far as just managing everything.  And when you have more than one child, it gets even more complex than just the newborn.

Linzay:  Yeah, I tell my doctor all the time when I take my kids to the doctor when they’re sick, like, I don’t know how people do this.  How do they have more than two kids?  Because I feel like we’re constantly sick and constantly at the doctor.  But we all make it work.

Kristin:  Exactly.

Hey, Alyssa here.  I’m just popping in to tell you about our course called Becoming.  Becoming A Mother is your guide to a confident pregnancy and birth all in a convenient six-week online program, from birth plans to sleep training and everything in between.  You’ll gain the confidence and skills you need for a smooth transition to motherhood.  You’ll get live coaching calls with Kristin and myself, a bunch of expert videos, including chiropractic care, pelvic floor physical therapy, mental health experts, breastfeeding, and much more.  You’ll also get a private Facebook community with other mothers going through this at the same time as you to offer support and encouragement when you need it most.  And then of course you’ll also have direct email access to me and Kristin, in addition to the live coaching calls.  If you’d like to learn more about the course, you can email us at info@goldcoastdoulas.com, or check it out at www.thebecomingcourse.com.  We’d love to see you there.

Kristin:  And so now again with pandemic times, there’s a lot more remote working and flex working, so how are you navigating this with both employers and also your clients who are planning for their leaves, or if they are working from home, how to separate the mother role from their time on Zoom and deadlines and really trying to get back to where they were production-wise output?  That can be very challenging, even with a postpartum doula in the home or a nanny.  There’s still the cries that you respond to, things that need to be done, so distractions.  So I’m sure you do some coaching on staying focused and even setting some breaks within the schedule to see your children.

Linzay:  Yeah, so COVID was a really terrible thing that we all went through, but there were some silver linings, and one of those silver linings was everybody had to stay home and figure out how to work from home.  And there are definitely pros and cons to that.  Working from home is great because you don’t have your commute.  You can work in your pajamas.  Like, you’re there for – say if you have a newborn and your nanny is taking care of your newborn, and before you were going into work and having to pump.  Well, now you can just take quick little breaks to go breastfeed your baby.  But you’re at home, so you hear every single cry.  Every single whine, every time that somebody needs a snack, you can hear it through your office door.  And it can be so challenging.  So like you said, setting some really good boundaries and setting expectations with your managers, with your family members, with your caregivers.  It’s going to be the best path to success.  And also, setting yourself up for that.  Like, knowing that you’re going to be at home and you’re going to hear your baby cry, and it’s going to be okay because you trust your caregiver to take care of them and learn their needs.  We all know that mom knows best, and you can just go in there and swoop them off their feet and do whatever you need to do and then they’re going to be a happy kid, but then your caregiver is never going to learn to have those intimate moments with your child.  So that’s all to say, setting expectations with yourself and with everyone else involved; communicating with them.  Letting your boss know that you do have a baby on the other side of the wall, and if you really need to in the middle of a meeting, take a moment to go soothe them or feed them or whatever it is.  Let your boss know ahead of time so it’s not this thing that becomes a negative.  It’s just part of your work schedule that needs to get done every day.

Kristin:  Exactly.  We work with a lot of executive in Gold Coast that really do focus a lot on that planning during maternity leave and want to set themselves up for success when they return, so they hire either a sleep consultant and/or our overnight postpartum doulas to ensure that they’re getting rest, and then when they’re back to work, they have a system in place.  So they may have an overnight doula three nights a week.  So they have at least some staggered full nights of rest where someone is caring for baby and they’re able to, again, get back into their career without having so many bumps.

Linzay:  Yeah, I mean, that is one of the most important things for all parents, especially in the newborn stage, but it’s getting enough sleep to even function to go back to work.  This holy grail of 12 weeks that I’ve mentioned is just what we’ve been brainwashed into thinking is the perfect amount of time for us to be this well-rested perfect mom that’s ready to go back to work, but that’s just not the case.  And so having an overnight support system like a doula or your partner is a really good option.  So to share those responsibilities because if you have to go back to work, it’s – you’re not going to be a very productive employee, and you’re going to struggle to be that number one mom if you don’t have enough rest.  So pull in your support system.  Make sure you’re asking for help.  Set expectations with your partner.  When my husband and I had our children, we both decided that, because I had the milk, I was going to be doing the breastfeeding at night, and if the diaper needed to be changed, which it didn’t always need to be – we learned that the second baby.  You don’t always have to change the diaper every single time they wake up.  And then if the diaper needed to be changed, I passed over the baby to my husband, and he took over those responsibilities.  But even better if you can have an outside resource like an overnight night nurse or a doula to help you out with that process.  No shame at all.  You’re just getting enough rest so that you can be a functioning human during the day, especially if you have to go to work.

Kristin:  Exactly.  And again, being sleep deprived, it just adds up.  And if your partner is going back to work within two days or two weeks or whatever that leave is, and it really is falling on you, so they could be rested to again get back to work and have the regular pressures of everyday work life.  So I think really the importance of asking for help, whether it’s family, friends, hiring help, and then also understanding the signs of perinatal mood disorders.  Being sleep deprived is one of the biggest factors.  So I’m sure part of what you’re seeing is also, like with that plan, is if you’re dealing with a client who’s struggling, like how do they go to their employer about having a PMAD, whether it’s anxiety, depression?

Linzay:  Yeah.  Well, I have my own story that I can tell from this.  I had put together this foolproof plan, I had thought, of I’m going to take – in California, we can take four weeks off before our due date, so I did that.  And the I was planning to take six weeks of California disability leave if I had a vaginal delivery; eight weeks if I had a C-section, and then eight additional weeks through California paid family leave.  And that was the plan with my employer.  And I ended up having a C-section, so I got those eight weeks, and then I had eight additional weeks through paid family leave.  But I was struggling.  Like, even though I had that time off with my baby, my husband had to go back to work after, like, a week.  I was by myself.  I didn’t bond right away with my second daughter the way that I did with my first, and I just felt like something was wrong, like I was doing something wrong.  There’s something wrong with my daughter.  And I remember going to my doctor and just crying through the entire doctor’s appointment.  And she’s like, I think you have postpartum depression and anxiety.  And it was such a relief to hear that validation and hear that there was, like, something that was, like, described what I was experiencing.  And she gave me four more weeks of disability leave.  And my first thought was, how am I going to tell my boss, because I know they were waiting for me to come back.  They needed me to come back.  And I was having more anxiety because I knew they were waiting for me to come back.  But my doctor assured me that, like, this is okay, and it’s just going to take a little bit of extra time for me to get through this and for me to rest and recover and spend more time with my baby, and those four weeks will go by, and hopefully I’ll be feeling so much better and ready to go back to work.  And I just had to send a note to my manager, and I said, I’m having some complications and I need to take four more weeks off.  And they were super supportive, and legally, I’m entitled to that, so remember, if you’re in that situation, this is your legal right.  And it was fine.  And now I’m feeling so much better.  I have a four-year-old and a two-year-old, and I’ve seen the light.  But I had to get through it, and it was really hard, especially because I knew my job was waiting for me on the other end, like counting down the days until I got back.

Kristin:  Right, and you didn’t want to let them down, but you have to take care of yourself first before you can go back to your employer, before taking care of your children.  And so I’m so glad you said something to your doctor because many women hide it and try to mask what’s going on, and that just spirals even more.

Linzay:  Yeah.  And I did try – I mean, I didn’t necessarily try to hide it.  I thought I was doing better.  Like, I got into the appointment, and she’s like, so, how are you doing?  And I’m like, I know, I’m making it through.  And the triggering question for me is, she asked me – because she wasn’t there for my delivery.  She’s like, so you had another C-section, and I had done everything in my being to try to have a VBAC, and that’s when I just exploded with tears and couldn’t stop.  And I think there was a lot that came from me having a failed VBAC that aided in the postpartum anxiety and depression that just made me spiral even more.  So I’m glad my doctor asked me that question so that I could be more vulnerable.

Kristin:  Exactly, yeah.  To be heard and tell your story.  Yeah, there is that fear of failure, especially for VBACs.  There’s a lot of pressure, and you obviously work very hard to try to achieve that, so yes.  I mean, there can be some posttraumatic stress after a birth that needs to be resolved, and again, talking to a therapist or your doctor or a friend, writing out a birth story, can all be helpful tools.

Linzay:  Yes, very helpful.  They were very helpful for me.

Kristin:  So any tips on really understanding your rights and options in your own state and how to navigate the system?  Obviously, California has amazing maternity plans.

Linzay:  Yeah, well, amazing is – it should be the norm everything.

Kristin:  Compared to many states.

Linzay:  But yeah, so my first tip is, like I said before, plan ahead.  So before you’re pregnant, or if you’re already pregnant, look into your employer’s policies.  If you’re interviewing, ask about their parental leave policy.  Find out that, so that when you do get pregnant, you already know what your options are, and you didn’t get a job right before you got pregnant that doesn’t offer any leave, or maybe they offer a really great policy, but you have to be there two years, and you’ll have only been there a year.  So look ahead.  Find out what your employer’s policy is.  The standard for the United States, the federal law, is through FMLA, the Family Medical Leave Act.  That is not through your employer.  That’s through the government.  And that offers you 12 weeks of unpaid job protection, which is good, but not great at all.  Basically, your employer – if you qualify.  They have to have 50 employees and a few other qualifications.  They have to hold your job for you for 12 weeks.  But that doesn’t mean you’re getting paid.  So that’s when you need to look into your state options.  So if you live in a state like California, New York, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, you are going to have something that you can take advantage of, a benefit that the state offers you.  And some cities even have additional laws.  Like, I just read Birmingham, Alabama, is offering 12 weeks of paid leave to all of their city workers.  And I know San Francisco has some really great policies that go above and beyond what California offers.  So look into what your employer offers.  Look into what your state offers.  And know that there’s going to be some general federal policies like FMLA that protect you, but you’re not going to get paid through them.  So look into other avenues like state, local, and your employer to figure out how you can get paid while you’re on leave.

Kristin:  Excellent advice.  And I love that you and The Park is focused on really helping companies retain their workforce, so you’re not only helping working women, but it is so hard to retain talent and attract new talent.  I mean, the workforce is so competitive right now.  So companies can work with you in order to not only retain their workforce, but also attract new.  And I feel like maternity plans are becoming more and more competitive.  Like, many companies are now adding doulas to their benefits, for example.

Linzay:  Yeah.  I used to be in HR communications in the Bay area, and I can tell you some wild offerings that some of these larger tech companies offer.  Anything from, like, fertility treatments to – some offer 52 weeks of fully paid leave for both partners, no matter what their gender is, and like, I look at those, and I’m just like, how is this – like, this is amazing, and how can we make this the norm for everyone?  Because we’ve been brainwashed.  The United States has no paid parental leave policies, and we’re the only wealthy country in the world to not offer anything.  Other countries offer lots of things for new parents.

Kristin:  Oh, yeah, a year paid?  For sure.

Linzay:  And we’re the only ones, and we just think it’s normal, but it’s not.

Kristin:  No, not at all.

Linzay:  Not at all.  So yeah, I work with companies to try and make their policies better, and I use better with air quotes because that’s going to be different for every company and what their employee population looks like.  I try to encourage all of my clients to create policies that are equitable.  So what that means, it’s the same for all genders.  So we’re not using terms like primary parent and secondary parent.  What does that mean?  Or even birthing and non-birthing because there’s so many different ways for families to start families these days, and we don’t want to leave out people or make people feel like they’re being singled out by saying birthing and non-birthing or primary caregiver.

Kristin:  Right.  With surrogacy, adoption, so many different opportunities.

Linzay:  Exactly.  And it’s so important for gender equity in the workplace for men to be taking the same amount of leave as women.  We’ve been historically, like, just told that women need more time than men, and men can go back to work after two, three weeks.  Maybe if they’re lucky, they get six weeks.  And the woman stays home for at least 12 weeks with the baby.  But what happens in that discrepancy, in those ten weeks?  That’s a lot of time that the man can be at work getting a promotion, getting a salary bump, while the woman is at home taking care of her baby and probably getting looked over for promotions.  Or maybe there’s this big travel opportunity that’s coming up, and women will just get overlooked completely because we just assume she needs to be home with the baby.  So I advise all of my clients to look at all of their policies from a gender equity lens to make sure that they’re not even not purposely saying things and doing things that could be setting women back in the workforce.

Kristin:  Yes.  You’re doing so much important work!  I really appreciate you sharing all of your wisdom with our audience, Linzay.  I could talk to you forever.  So let’s collaborate.

Linzay:  Thank you!  It’s been so fun.  I could talk about this all day long.  So if you ever want me to come back, I’m here.

Kristin:  Okay.  So, again, why don’t you share your social media links?  I know your website, and you’re on LinkedIn?

Linzay:  Yeah, LinkedIn, you can find us @thepark, but also if you want to follow me or connect with me, I’d love to chat if you have any questions.  I’m on LinkedIn as Linzay Davis.  I also post a lot of reels, like I mentioned earlier, about, like, how to take advantage of your state-sponsored leave programs or just how to navigate parental leave in general.  So you can find us on Instagram @theparkconsulting.  And if you have any questions, like even if it’s very specific to you, you’re not the only one that has that question, so DM me.  Ask.  And I can – if I don’t know the answer, I’ll find out for you, and we can share your question and answer with the world so that some more moms can get some help if they have that same question, too.  So don’t be afraid to reach out.  I love hearing from moms.  That’s my favorite part of my job.  So reach out.  I’d love to hear from you.

Kristin:  Thank you so much, Linzay!  Take care:

Linzay:  Thank you!  Bye!

Thanks for listening to Gold Coast Doulas.  Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.  If you like this podcast, please subscribe and give us a five-star review.  Thank you!  Remember, these moments are golden.

Kristin chats with Peg Sadie of the Resilient Mom Academy about self-care, joy in motherhood and so much more.  You can listen to this complete podcast episode on iTunes, SoundCloud, or wherever you find your podcasts.

Welcome.  You’re listening to Ask the Doulas, a podcast where we talk to experts from all over the country about topics related to pregnancy, birth, postpartum, and early parenting.  Let’s chat!

Kristin:  Hello, hello!  This is Kristin with Ask the Doulas, and I am so excited to chat with Peg Sadie today.  Peg is a trained psychotherapist and resilience coach.  She’s the wife of 19 years and boy mom times two.  Peg founded the Resilient Mom Academy to realize her vision and bridge the gap between therapy and thriving for struggling moms.  Peg has been featured in over 40 media outlets, including In Style Parents and Women’s Health.  Her own experiences with postpartum depression, anxiety, and overwhelm as a new mom ignited her passion to support other women in their motherhood journey.  Welcome, Peg!

Peg:  Thank you so much, Kristin!  I’m super excited to be here with you today.

Kristin:  And I am excited about the work that you’re doing in the motherhood space.  I feel like self-care is an overused term and not really understood, so I’d love your approach and I think we should start off a bit on, again, creating this joy in early parenting and motherhood and reducing the overwhelm.  So what are your thoughts on that?

Peg:  Sure!  Wow, I have so many.  Yes, this self-care – I 100% agree with you, Kristin.  Self-care has become this, I feel, fluffy buzzword as of late, and for so many of us moms with so much on our plate as it is, it kind of feels like one more thing to add on our to-do list.  Like, oh, great, now I have to practice my self-care.  When am I going to fit that in today?

Kristin:  Exactly.  It tends to be more of like a spa day or meeting up with friends; things that may not fit in that very early parenting lifestyle, or even in budgets, to be honest.

Peg:  100%.  I have, actually, a social media post that was very popular, and it’s called, you don’t need a bubble bath.  We have this idea that we need self-care as bubble baths and massages and pedicures and manicures.  And that is not the reality of self-care because if you’re struggling and coming from a place of true overwhelm and your resilience threshold is reduced as a mom managing all the things, it doesn’t matter how many bubble baths you take.  That is not a long-term solution to feel better.  It’s kind of like putting a band-aid on a broken arm.

Kristin:  Yes, exactly.  So what are your tips to really feeling confident in early motherhood, and again, not feeling that huge amount of overwhelm?  What are your top tips in your resilient mom group as your students are asking you questions?  I would love to hear what you’re hearing on a daily basis.

Peg:   Yes.  So we have a little bit of everything, and my personal experience, as well.  The most important thing to remember is your self-care journey and your routine doesn’t have to look like anybody else’s.  I feel like we see other people doing these certain things for self-care and think, well, I need to do that.  Why am I not doing that?  Now I have to fit that in my routine.  One of the best pieces of advice I would give to moms that are about to embark into motherhood is to, first off, have – because this is, I think, for me personally, with the birth of my first son – my kids are spaced almost a decade apart, and part of the reason was because I was – I did have such a traumatic experience with postpartum depression and anxiety and chronic overwhelm for years.  And it took me a really long time to get to a place emotionally where I felt ready to embark on that journey again.  I didn’t even know if I was going to get there.  And I didn’t do this with my first – to have a self-care and support system plan in place prior to the baby coming.  You think you’re going to be able to just go with the flow and manage and do all the things, but what happens is, our life drastically shifts.  Like, for me, I had decided I was going to stay at home with my child, and we all stay home for a short period of time; at least for maternity leave, right?  And it is – if you don’t have a support system in place, if you don’t have a self-care plan in place, it can be extremely overwhelming and isolating, and then if you’re like me, or how I was with my first, I wasn’t asking for help.  I wasn’t realizing that this wasn’t normal, for me to feel this way.  I kept thinking I was very hard on myself.  I should be able to do all these things.  Why am I feeling this way?  Why am I struggling with this?  And the second time around, I did little things like – well, I guess this isn’t little, but I was six months pregnant, and I hired a housekeeper.  I knew this was one thing that I didn’t want to deal with once my child came.  I wanted to reserve my energy, and I didn’t want to have to stress about the house.  I didn’t want to have to argue with my husband over who was going to do the dishes.

Kristin:   And you’re not supposed to be vacuuming or going up and down stairs anyway, so there’s that healing and bonding and feeding time.  So that’s ideal.  We talk about that in our Becoming a Mother class, of really prioritizing what’s important to you in the postnatal phase, and a housecleaning service or even some meal delivery service plans or things to make life simpler.  Even the thought, for certain personality types, of needing to entertain family members or friends when they come in to see the new baby, and then the house isn’t perfect.  So if you have someone to help or a postpartum doula, whatever it might be, to make life easier.  If that is one of your stressors, that you want a clean house at all times.

Peg:  100%.  You made such a good point there, Kristin, because, I mean, going to visit your friend when they’ve had a baby is not, like, helping.  Like, going and holding the baby for a couple of hours is not helpful because exactly like you said, depending on your personality type, like I am, I feel like I have to entertain.  I feel like I have to have food ready.  I feel like I have to have the house clean.  So people popping in that aren’t my mom –

Kristin:  Yes.  It’s different with family.

Peg:  Yes.  So make a meal.  Put it on the doorstep.

Kristin:  Empty the dishwasher; something.

Peg:  Exactly.  That is so huge.  And then for me, the second time around, I also joined a mom group, so I knew that I had other women going through the same thing, that I could get out of the house and be around other moms experiencing the same thing, because I felt so isolated and alone in my struggles the first time around.

Kristin:  Yes, and that can intensify postpartum depression and mood disorders if you’re feeling isolated and don’t have a support group.  I know with my first, having kids later in life, and my husband went right back to work as soon as I got out of the hospital.  So I would wait for him to get home and want to, like, connect and talk and tell him about my day, ask him.  And he’s trying to unwind, and so we really had to find our groove with that change because I was so used to my professional career and being busy, and my friends were all working.  So really, like you said, finding a mom group or Le Leche League and some in-person meetings.  And now that – I mean, the pandemic is still around, but it’s not as isolating as it was early on when mothers didn’t have the option of in-person groups.

Peg:  That’s so true.  And you touched on it earlier, too, Kristin, about knowing the kind of mom you are going to be.  For me, I realized, okay, my energy doesn’t support this lifestyle.  I am an introvert.  I’m an extroverted introvert, but for the most part, I’m an introvert, and I’m also an HSP, a highly sensitive person, empath, and so many moms come to me and they don’t realize that they’re an empath or highly sensitive, and you feel the energies of others.  You can feel touched out, and when your baby cries, it causes pain; like, physically causes discomfort for you.  It’s a much more different sensory experience for you as a mom than someone who’s not a highly sensitive empath.  And if you’re an introvert, you need that alone time to recharge.  That means away from your baby, too.

Kristin:  Exactly, because otherwise you feel like your baby always wants to be attached to you, or you’re waiting for that cry after a nap.  So yeah, as much as we tell our clients to rest when baby is resting, they don’t always take that advice.

Peg:  Oh, my gosh, you know what I had to do, Kristin?  I remember with my second one, I realized that this is something I had to do.  My husband was home.  I would say, “Okay, I’m taking a nap now,” and I would put earplugs in.  I knew if I heard my baby make any noise, that was it for me.  I’m up.  Because also as an empath, you feel deeply connected to your child on this crazy level, that you – it’s hard to relinquish control a lot of times when you are this way.  Trusting someone to babysit or even your partner to do things; you feel like even when they’re taking care of your child, you have to monitor and supervise.  That’s a hard struggle, as well.  Knowing your energy, knowing what you need, and taking the steps to kind of manage that, manage your expectations.

Kristin:  So true, Peg.  And I mean, really understanding that sometimes when a baby is upset, it’s because they’re getting your wired energy and know that you’re exhausted, and so babies feel whatever the caregiver, but certainly, especially the mother feels.  Even as a doula, I want to maintain a very calming energy when I’m with a new baby.  Sort of that balance and really understanding that you need to care for yourself in order to better care for your baby, and your baby may be upset because you are.

Peg:  100%.  I believe that it’s – I even have content with this title, and it’s titled, “It’s not your kids; it’s you.”  Because a lot of moms think, well, I’m so overwhelmed because of all the things I have to do for my child.  And I help moms understand that it is cyclic when it gets to this point because your nervous system isn’t regulated; you feel overwhelmed.  Just like you said, Kristin, our kids are little energy magnets.  That is how they connect with us, especially when they’re newborns, infants, even toddlers.  They don’t have that verbal capacity to communicate.  It’s a survival mechanism that they have.  They even have mirror neurons that mimic our emotions.  Not what we’re saying; how we’re feeling by our facial expressions.  So it is innate.  It is intuitive.  And if our energy is off, they’re going to feel that, and they’re going to respond to it, and they may be even more clingy because they’re feeling unsafe in that moment, if you are feeling riled up.  So learning how to regulate our own emotions and knowing what we need; intrinsically listening to our body, knowing when we’re anxious, when we’re overwhelmed, and addressing that is so imperative for moms who are struggling.

Hey, Alyssa here.  I’m just popping in to tell you about our course called Becoming.  Becoming A Mother is your guide to a confident pregnancy and birth all in a convenient six-week online program, from birth plans to sleep training and everything in between.  You’ll gain the confidence and skills you need for a smooth transition to motherhood.  You’ll get live coaching calls with Kristin and myself, a bunch of expert videos, including chiropractic care, pelvic floor physical therapy, mental health experts, breastfeeding, and much more.  You’ll also get a private Facebook community with other mothers going through this at the same time as you to offer support and encouragement when you need it most.  And then of course you’ll also have direct email access to me and Kristin, in addition to the live coaching calls.  If you’d like to learn more about the course, you can email us at info@goldcoastdoulas.com, or check it out at www.thebecomingcourse.com.  We’d love to see you there.

Kristin:  And when is a point where the mother should identify that everything they’re doing as far as self-care and self-regulation is not working, and when do they – at what point do they need to seek help from a therapist or go to their provider and really share what’s going on?

Peg:  That’s such a good question, Kristin.  I love this.  It’s really – well, first of all, we want to make sure we are doing the things that we can that are in our control, the basics: physical self-care, making sure we are getting sleep, adequate sleep if we can.  Well, I call it survival years, 0 to 3, especially if you’re breastfeeding, and it’s very hard to get – you’re not going to get the seven, eight hours of sleep at night.  And to respond to that – so when we start to feel hopeless, helpless, when we start to lose interest in things that we typically would enjoy, something that we like to do, and we find ourselves not able to laugh and find joy in things that we would normally do, if we find ourselves pulling away and self-isolating from others, if we find ourselves either sleeping too much or not sleeping at all, if we’re having so much anxiety that it’s interrupting our daily functioning, if we’re waking up every 20 minutes to make sure our child is breathing in the middle of the night, you know, if we’re not able to leave our child alone with our partner, whom we should trust with our child, or our parent.  I’m not saying a stranger, but if we’re not able to for even a short period of time out of anxiety.  Or if things that are really minute that normally wouldn’t stress us are causing big, overwhelming, stressful situations in our mind, like, oh, my gosh, how am I going to make this decision, then it is time to maybe go to your provider and get a workup.  I say to all my moms, get a full panel done.  Get your hormones checked, blood level checked, have your iron, your thyroid.  It could be something simple to address.  As you know, Kristin, our hormones go all out of whack afterwards.  I have many moms who go through my program who are either diagnosed with postpartum depression and/or anxiety during the program or prior to it and then come into the program as a supplement.  Because that has to be addressed, whether it’s medication or a combination of medication and talk therapy.  So that is what I would suggest.  If you’re at that point where things – you don’t – you feel hopeless or helpless, and you feel like things are out of your control, then I would just go get checked out.  They’ll ask you some questions, and you’ll know if this is something that – for me, I waited way too long, and another thing I would like to share is that most moms don’t realize you can be diagnosed with postpartum depression up to age 5 of your child.

Kristin:  Absolutely, yes.

Peg:  So it is not just strictly after they’re born.  I recently had a mom who was diagnosed, and her kids are all toddlers.  So yes, I waited too long, and then it became a chronic condition.  So you want to just err on the side of caution, and go see your healthcare provider.  And then you can move forward from them.

Kristin:  And it’s also not known that partners can develop postpartum depression.  Husbands can suffer as well, which can then impact the baby and the marriage.

Peg:  So true.  And another thing, which is nice to do prior to the baby coming, is have your partner at least – educate your partner and maybe any other support team that’s going to be around you – your mom, mother-in-law – on the signs to look for of postpartum depression.  Because I like to say, at least it was for me, it’s hard to read the label from inside the bottle.  Even as a therapist myself, it was hard for me to recognize what was happening with me because I couldn’t differentiate what I should be feeling versus thinking, oh, I can get myself out of this.  It will just go away.  But someone on the outside looking in can be like, okay, this is a sign; this is a sign.  We need to go to the doctor and just nudge them and help them take that first step.

Kristin:   Yes, and the six week appointment can be much too late, so talk to your pediatrician.  Those pediatrician visits are quite frequently, and if there are concerns, they may be able to give you resources.  There are plenty of postpartum support groups out there, in addition to, of course, calling your midwife or OB-GYN and letting them know what’s going on, or your primary physician.

Peg:  Yes, absolutely.

Kristin:  I feel like people just want to wait for that six week visit, and you can get so much help before then.

Peg:  That’s true.  I feel like the first – the baby blues is very typical, as well, right?  The first few weeks.  Usually, that will subside.  But postpartum depression can onset any time thereafter.

Kristin:  Exactly.  So, again, sleep, the lack of sleep really just escalates everything.  Focusing on sleep, self-care, getting a plan, as you said, set during pregnancy, and expressing your needs to family members and to friends and how they can best support that is so essential.  So I love that you brought that up earlier, Peg.  I would love to also spend some time on your Resilient Mom Academy, who that’s for ideally, and let our listeners know how they can best engage with all of your different services.

Peg:  Thank you so much.  Absolutely, yes.  So I founded Resilient Mom Academy – I founded the exact program that I wished I’d had as a new overwhelmed mom because I felt like talk therapy had its limitations.  And I wanted to create a program that kind of combined coaching and education and community together because I feel like community is the one thing that’s lacking in talk therapy, and it is so healing in itself to be around other moms who are just simply acknowledging that they’re struggling, too, and they’re going through the same thing, because I feel like we see everyone’s highlight reels on Instagram or Facebook, and we compare.  Why does everything else have it together and I just don’t?  What’s wrong with me?  But I’m telling you, I know the moms with the highlight reels, which we all are, and I talk to so many of you, and you would never know from your highlight reel, from looking at that reel, that they are struggling behind the scenes.  So I just want women to know that they are not alone.  I’ve created that safe space.  The first thing we do when we start working together is we do a self-care audit and energy audit to kind of get a snapshot of where you are, because everyone’s journey is going to be different.  Everyone’s self-care plan, just like a business plan for success, everyone’s self-care and resilience plan is going to look different.  It’s a self-paced program, and there’s also coaching and that community aspect, as well.  So it’s my baby, and I’m so proud of it and excited to help moms with this.

Kristin:  I love it.  So it sounds like it’s not just for new moms.  Like, moms of teenagers can certainly benefit from it?

Peg:  100%, yes.  Any mom that’s struggling right now, because we not only deal with self-care and resilience building, which most people, when I share this, are surprised.  There are six parts to self-care.  There are six components.  It’s like a wheel, a pie wheel.  And then we also touch on conscious parenting.  There’s a huge module on conscious parenting because I feel like becoming a more self-aware parent, we tend to repeat these intergenerational patterns, negative patterns, unconsciously from our own parents.  So getting in tune with that, deciding what kind of parent we want to be and deciding to connect with our kids on a much deeper level, to have more connected relationships.  I feel like there’s a lot of adults that don’t have a deep connection with their parents because parents have tried to control their kids, and it can become more achievement-oriented and superficial accolades.  So that’s a really popular module.  And then we talk a lot about relationships because our relationship with our partner shifts.  The dynamic shifts.  There’s a lot of stress and stressors in the marriage or relationships.  So there’s a huge module on that, as well.  There are bonus modules in there.  So yes, it touches on a little bit of everything, and I’m always adding to it.

Kristin:  I love it.  So you’re all over social.  Where else can our listeners and our doula clients find you, Peg?

Peg:  Absolutely.  You can find me on my website.  I love to hang out on Instagram.  My handle is @peg.sadie.  And I’m also son Facebook @pegsadiecoaching.

Kristin:  And a podcast?

Peg:  My podcast, the Resilient Mom Podcast.  And I would love to share a free resource with your listeners if that’s okay?

Kristin:  That would be amazing!

Peg:  Okay, fantastic.  I have a brand new resource I’m really excited about.  I offer retreats a couple times throughout the year, and I’ve taken kind of – it’s called the Calm Mom Method Retreat, and I’ve taken kind of my best tools and tips and infused them in this smaller little micro-course.  It’s called the Resilient Mom Starter Kit, and it’s a seven-day video training.  It comes straight to your inbox, and it’s filled with tools for moms ready to create a calmer and more intentional life.  If you’re a mom who’s struggling with stress, anxiety, or overwhelm right now, you will love this training, and it’s an absolutely free resource.  You can find it right here on my website.

Kristin:  Fantastic.  Is there anything that you would like to add as far as final tips for our listeners?

Peg:  Yes.  Thank you for asking that question.  I just want moms to know that they are not alone in their suffering and their struggles.  One thing I wish I’d done earlier on is I wish I would have shared with somebody close to me that I trusted what I was going through, another mom friend.  It just takes one mom friend that you can connect.  I also want moms to not be so hard on themselves, especially if you’re a perfectionist.  Give yourself some grace.  Allow yourself to make mistakes.  It’s a learning process.  As long as you’re correcting along the way; you’re growing, you’re learning.  Nobody has all the answers.  And above all, I want to tell moms – I just got goosebumps about this, every time I share it – to listen to your instincts and trust your gut in all things related to your child because in retrospect, looking back – I’m speaking for myself.  I don’t know if this speaks to you as well, Kristin.  Looking back, I feel like there have been situations with my own kids where I wish I’d listened to my gut instinct the first time upfront.  I don’t care who it is you’re speaking to; a friend, a parent, doctor, an expert.  I don’t care how many initials they have behind their name.  You know your child better than anyone else in the world, and you need to trust that instinct.  Listen to what your heart is telling you.  Get that second opinion, and do what you feel is right for you and your child and your family.

Kristin:   100% agree, Peg.  We tell our clients that no one knows their baby the way they do.

Peg:  Absolutely.

Kristin:  Fantastic advice.  It was wonderful to chat with you.  Thank you very much, Peg.

Peg:  Absolutely.  100% my pleasure.  Thank you so much for doing what you do, Kristin, and your resources.  What an amazing gift to moms that you guys provide.  So thank you.  I’m honored to be on your show.

Kristin:  Thank you!

Thanks for listening to Gold Coast Doulas.  Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.  If you like this podcast, please subscribe and give us a five-star review.  Thank you!  Remember, these moments are golden.

Kristin chats with Michelle Valiukenas from the Colette Louise Tisdahl Foundation about navigating life after loss.  You can listen to this complete podcast episode on iTunes, SoundCloud, or wherever you find your podcasts.

Welcome.  You’re listening to Ask the Doulas, a podcast where we talk to experts from all over the country about topics related to pregnancy, birth, postpartum, and early parenting.  Let’s chat!

Kristin:  Hello, hello.  This is Kristin with Ask the Doulas.  And I’m here to chat with Michelle Valiukenas today.  She is the proud mom of her angel sweet pea who she lost due to miscarriage.  Her angel daughter, Colette Louise, was lost at 9 days old, and her only living child, her rainbow baby, is Elliot Miguel.  Inspired by her journey with Colette, Michelle and her husband founded the Colette Louise Tisdahl Foundation, whose mission is to improve outcomes of pregnancy, childbirth, prematurity, and infancy, as well as aid in the grieving process through financial assistance, education, and advocacy.  Their flagship program financially assists families dealing with high risk and complicated pregnancies, NICU stays, and loss.  The organization’s ability to help families relies on donations and grants, and they are grateful if you’re able to donate.  Michelle also participates and advocates on issues of maternal health, maternal mortality, infant health and safety, and pregnancy complications.  Michelle lives in Glenville, Illinois with their son Elliot, husband Mark, and dog Nemo.  Welcome, Michelle!

Michelle:  Hi.  Thank you so much for having me.

Kristin:  So happy to chat with you.  I would love to hear more about your personal story and why this was on your heart.  I know it’s so much work to start a foundation and to maintain it and promote it.  I would like to hear more about your journey.

Michelle:  Yeah, absolutely.  I think the journey began when we started trying for kids.  And, you know, we’re both reasonably healthy people with no real issues, so we kind of expected a couple of months, and the tests would show that we would pregnant and we would go on.  And really what we found was that over and over again, we weren’t getting pregnant.  And when we sought out infertility testing and results, it was really an unknown cause.  That’s particularly frustrating, and I think that was sort of the start of the loss of control that you have over so many things.  So we started with infertility treatments, and that in and of itself is a whole big mess of things that – a lot of stuff that happens; a lot of timing.  Again, the loss of control.  You don’t have —it has to go by how your body is reacting to treatment, so you no longer have the control over your schedule.  You’re trying to do this; I was trying to work at the same time, and having to take days off and come in late and all of that.  It was a difficult journey.  When we finally decided to go to IVF, we got pregnant on our first round.  And that was – we were thrilled.  We just thought, okay, maybe we just needed the extra help.  We were thrilled.  We told everybody in our family.  It was really just an exciting time.  And a few weeks later, I started bleeding, and we went to the doctor for an ultrasound check, and they could see a gestational sac, but no baby, so they said I was in the process of miscarrying.  We expect it will pass naturally, but we’ll do bloodwork now, and then we’ll have you repeat it in a few days just to make sure.  That was the Friday before Mother’s Day of 2017.  I still have visions – my husband had decided – because I said, finally, I get to celebrate Mother’s Day.  So he had planned things like – later on, he told me the story of – he was on the phone with Edible Arrangements saying, please, you cannot deliver this.  Like, you cannot deliver this.  So every once in a while when I need to laugh, I think of him, you know, tackling the delivery guy with fruit all over our lawn.  I think that, you know, really, laughter was really an important thing, and that was the thing that carried us through all of this.  When I went back for repeat bloodwork, they found my numbers were rising, so they had me come in for an ultrasound.  It was really at the point of, maybe you’re not naturally miscarrying, and you’re going to have to do a D&C.  So during the ultrasound, they found a heartbeat and said, okay, we were wrong.  Baby is just measuring a little bit small, and that’s what we didn’t see a few days ago.  So you’re pregnant.  You know, start back up and everything.  And that’s really stunning news to hear and just really kind of messed with us.  And so somehow we managed to go to work that day, and after work, I was meeting up with my sister.  And as I was meeting with her, I felt a gush of blood.  So I fully miscarried and ended up in the ER where they told us, yes, everything has passed; no gestational sac, nothing.  So having to relive it again in such a short time – we were talking Friday to Wednesday – was really tough, and that really took a strain on us.  That was a really low point for us in our relationship and our marriage, and I found that we were sort of pushing each other away in a lot of ways instead of trying to grieve together.  That was something that I made sure, after we had been in that for about a week or so, I really made sure of that and insisted that we start couples counseling and really work through that, because I thought, we can’t do this where we’re pushing each other away.  This isn’t going to work.  I wanted to get right back to trying again, and my husband supported me.  We had a failed IVF, and then we got pregnant with Colette.  And, you know, that was – we were so thrilled.  Oh, my God, did I have pregnancy symptoms.  We actually found out we were pregnant with her a couple days after Christmas 2017, and at Christmas, apparently my whole family knew because at one point, my sister gave me a tote bag that had a picture drawn of my dog and his name, and I started crying.  They were like, it’s not a crying thing.  Like, what is going on with you?  So I had every pregnancy symptom, and terrible morning sickness.  That is the most misused word because it’s not morning sickness.  It’s just all day sickness.  But that all meant I was still pregnant.  So we went through and we got past the first trimester and really were excited.  I was excited to tell my employees.  I was excited to tell the world, my friends, everybody.  And everybody was so excited for us, and things were going well.  We crossed the second trimester.  At 21 weeks pregnant, I went to a standard OB appointment.  Actually, that day, I felt the best I had felt during the entire pregnancy.  I had energy.  I finally was like, oh, this is what they say in the second trimester.  You have, like, this boost of energy.  I get it now.  Okay, I feel better.  And my blood pressure was 188/110.  And so I’m sent to labor and delivery, and then I was admitted to the hospital and was told, you’ll be here until you deliver.  And just to give you a frame of reference, that was the evening of May 8th, and I was not due until September 7th.  So a really long time.  And what does this mean?  I went with it, and one of the things that really started sticking to me was that when they told me that, I had a million questions in my head.  Everything from what I now realize as a parent is the stupid, minor stuff at this point.  Like, we don’t even have a car seat.  We don’t have a crib.  What are we going to do?  To, you know, the important stuff, like I supervised a team.  What we were going to – you know, how we were going to – how was I going to do that from the hospital?  I hadn’t had a plan.  There wasn’t a backup for me.  There wasn’t, you know, all of that stuff.  To, am I going to survive this?  Is my baby going to survive this?  And so really kind of struggling with all of those things.  And it’s really scary.  They come in, and they start spouting a bunch of numbers at you about survival rates and what their treatment will be once you get to this week, all of these things.  At one point, I had a doctor who said, let’s just sign it now since we know we’re going to do a C-section.  And I said, well, maybe not, and she looked at me, and she said, “We’re going to do a C-section.”  All of those things.  Everything was just pulled away.  But when I had time to settle, I really thought about, where am I blessed?  And one of the things that I really thought of was, I didn’t have to worry about money.  In all of this, that was a big thing that was just off my mind, and I knew how lucky I was to be in that position.  So I started thinking already at that point of doing something, and when I said doing something, I didn’t know what that meant at that point.  And it went on, so ultimately, I was in the hospital a little over three weeks.  When we had done an ultrasound when I was first admitted, Colette was measuring a little bit behind, and the doctors were not super scared.  They were hoping that once they regulated my blood pressure and everything, that she would catch up.  When they did a repeat ultrasound, what they found was not only had she not caught up, but she had had no growth in that three-week period.  So they came basically saying, you know, really, we think that the best thing to do is to deliver because we have more interventions we can do on the outside.  So I had an emergency C-section, and they pulled her out.  It was a lot of things that she really defied right at the beginning.  One of the things they had said to us to prepare us, and everyone had said to us a bunch of different times, is “You won’t hear her.  She’s too young to cry or make sounds.”  And after they took her out, some of the chaos was a little bit over for me, at least, and they were taking care of her.  All of a sudden, the room got quiet, and there was a little squeak.  I said, “Is that her?”  All the doctors said yes, and they said she shouldn’t be able to make that sound.  And so I thought, well, of course.  This is my badass daughter who is going to defy everything, right?  They had warned us about one of the worries of interventions was if the smallest intubation tube didn’t fit for her, then they couldn’t intubate, and then they weren’t left with very many options.  And the second to smallest fit her.  It was just all these little things happening.  She was in the NICU; straight to the NICU.  That, again, sort of is just a really chaotic time and stressful time.  I think the best advice that I got was from my mom who was herself a former preemie mom.  My sister was about eight weeks early.  She said to me, “Okay, look.  This is a roller coaster.  I mean, it’s a roller coaster.  You’re going to feel great in the morning because your baby is doing so well, and then by the evening, you’re going to feel terrible because all of a sudden something happened.  And then vice versa.  Sometimes you might ride the roller coaster up and down two or three times in a day.  You just have to hang on.”  That was really important advice that I always appreciated having because that is really what happens.

Hey, Alyssa here.  I’m just popping in to tell you about our course called Becoming.  Becoming A Mother is your guide to a confident pregnancy and birth all in a convenient six-week online program, from birth plans to sleep training and everything in between.  You’ll gain the confidence and skills you need for a smooth transition to motherhood.  You’ll get live coaching calls with Kristin and myself, a bunch of expert videos, including chiropractic care, pelvic floor physical therapy, mental health experts, breastfeeding, and much more.  You’ll also get a private Facebook community with other mothers going through this at the same time as you to offer support and encouragement when you need it most.  And then of course you’ll also have direct email access to me and Kristin, in addition to the live coaching calls.  If you’d like to learn more about the course, you can email us at info@goldcoastdoulas.com, or check it out at www.thebecomingcourse.com.  We’d love to see you there.

Michelle:  We settled into kind of a routine once I was released from the hospital.  So my husband would get up early, and he would go into work, and on his way into work, he would call the nurses.  Since I was recovering from a C-section, I would move a little bit slower.  So I would get up and move slowly and then get ready, and I would go over to the hospital and usually stay there most of the day.

Kristin:  That’s a lot.

Michelle:  Yes.  And then my husband would join me after work and we would spend some time with her, and then we would both go home.  And when my husband would call the nurses in the morning, he would send me a message or give me a call and say, like, oh, you know, this happened over night, or she’s stable or whatever it was.  And so on her ninth day of life, same kind of plan happened, but my husband called me, and he said, yeah, so when I called the nurses, they put the doctor on.  And I thought, oh, shit.  And he said they had to jumpstart her heart last night, and there’s some concern about how she’s doing.  And he was like, I’m going to go into work, but let me know anything.  And I basically got dressed very fast and got out the door and went to the hospital.  And I was in denial.  Like, oh, you know, we went through this.  There was another time where they called us at 3:00 a.m. and it was a whole thing, and she pulled through and she was fine.  And when I got there, the doctor said to me, yeah, hold on, let’s talk.  Again, these are kind of those words that you know in the medical system – you’re like, crap.  And he found a private room for us, and he proceeded to tell us – which was a worry we  had always had – so typically, with micro-preemies who are that small – Colette was a little over a pound when she was born – they will place them onto a certain ventilator, and that is supposed to be a temporary thing to give them time for treatments and things while they get healthier, and then after a time, they’ll switch them to a different ventilator because that first one, while it’s amazing and wonderful and helps so many micro-preemies, can also, after a little bit, start stripping the lungs.  And so they had tried to move Colette several times onto the other ventilator.  She would take it for maybe five, ten minutes, and then they would start to see numbers crash and they’d have to bring her back to the first ventilator.  So really, it was now that what we feared was they couldn’t get her onto the other ventilator, and the first one had started to strip away at her lungs, and that she was suffering.  And they just didn’t see that they could make it better.  They were going to do everything they could, but they really wanted us to be aware of what was going on.  I sat there and listened and nodded my head.  Again, total denial.  It was like, oh, they’re going to freak us out, and she’s going to pull through and she’s going to be fine.  And he said, you can stay here as long as you want, and as he turned to leave, he came back and said, do you believe in baptism?  I said, I do.  And he said, I think it’s time.  And that to me was really – so, this is really what you think is happening.  And so I called my husband, and he came and family members came.  I still was in this, like – she’s just going to pull through.  I mean, this is not what happens.  And then I started to turn when she was going – they were going into shift change, and shift change in the NICU, parents weren’t allowed in.  So I was actually in the family room with my sister-in-law, and then the nurse came in and said, Mom, you should come in.  And I was like, it’s two minutes to shift change.  So they let us stay throughout shift change.  At some point, and I don’t remember exactly when that happened – they were pretty strict about two visitors, so it was my husband and I in there.  At some point, my sister was able to come in.  And it was like, you’re bending these rules, and you’re only doing this if this is really serious.  So ultimately, we saw her numbers drop, and they said, we will keep her alive.  We’ll baptize her, and then you guys will get to hold her while she passes.  So we said goodbye in the best way possible.  We were in a family room, and so our parents, both of our sisters, and both of our brothers-in-law were able to be there.  And we all got to hold her.  We all cried together and hugged and did everything and ultimately said goodbye to her.  It’s still surreal to think that’s what happened.  It’s the most devastating time.  They come out, and I still remember somebody coming in and talking to us and saying the phrase, do you guys have a funeral home in mind?  And just thinking, no.  Both of my parents were alive.  My husband was in college when his father died.  We hadn’t planned a funeral.  We didn’t know what to do.  And you’re definitely not thinking that when you’re preparing to have a baby.  You’re not thinking about a funeral home at that point.  So it was really just – it was devestating.  It was sad.  It felt isolating.  You know, it was just one of those things – I mean, I felt so much guilt thinking it was my fault and it was my body.  But again, sort of that money thing came up.  It was – at one point, I guess I must have had a weird look on my face, and the person who had come into the room, and I don’t remember if it was a doctor, nurse, social worker or other random person – I don’t know who it was.  He said, if money is an issue, a lot of people cremate because it’s much cheaper.  And that has always – like, it hit me hard that day and it’s always stayed with me.  Why are parents having to choose something in how they memorialize their child who died over money?  And that really stuck with me.  Again, it was all those money things just coming in throughout the process.

Kristin:  Like medical bills and then you’re looking at –

Michelle:  Medical bills and cost of transportation, you know, one of the people who was in the same pod as us in the NICU who had probably a good – I’m in the Chicago area – in good Chicago traffic, had probably an hour and 15 minutes’ drive because that was the closest NICU to them, and so that expense of gas.  And this was when gas prices were good.  Now if we think about as gas prices have risen and dropped and all that, how much worse that is.  Usually at a time when one or both parents are either working less or not working.  All of those things really were folding into my mind.  So really left with thinking about it, we decided, this is what we’re going to do.  And so we established our nonprofit foundation with really trying to do financial assistance for kind of what we see as essentially three stages of Colette’s life.  High risk pregnancy or pregnancy that develops complications; NICU stay, or loss.  And in a lot of ways, this is me running it; it’s how I’m parenting Colette, and it looks very different.  It’s very different than I parent my living son, but that’s really what I think is really truly important is to be in that spot and be able to do it.  So we’ve been in operation a little over four years.  I think we’re coming up probably about a month on our anniversary from the first grant we gave.  We’ve given away over $1 million in grants.

Kristin:  That’s amazing.

Michelle:  To families across the nation.  The need is astounding to me.  I probably had the biggest vision of what this was going to look like and what the need really was, and I am constantly shocked by just how much need there is.  So yeah, that’s really what we’re doing.  Along the way, we realized how many issues the general public wasn’t aware of, so we also did some education.  And then advocacy wherever we can because really, some of these problems are so structural and so institutional that we need to really change those in order to change the course of some of our mission.

Kristin:  So how do families, if they are seeking assistance from your foundation, how do they connect with you?

Michelle:  Absolutely.  They connect on our website.  There’s a brief application that they fill out, and then we also need a verification.  That’s typically – the vast majority of times, it’s social workers who are submitting those, but it could be a case manager.  Could be we’ve had some doctors and nurses.  It could be a death certificate or other paperwork that’s from the hospital that establishes is.  But basically, just a third-party verification of it.  And once we have those, my husband and I review them every week, and we give a decision.  So basically, if your application and verification and everything is in Friday at 5:00, then we review it on Saturday, and you’d have a decision by Monday morning.  And then once you get a decision, the decision is usually, we’re going to approve you for X dollar amount, and then clients have to submit where they want to spend that, and we would pay the bills directly to the service provider.  So directly to a utility company, directly to a landlord, that kind of thing.  The only kind of, I guess, exception of sort is we do gas gift cards, and that had been our biggest request for some time, and we have actually now seen in the last couple of months that rent is actually a bigger need.  We’re actually giving away more in rent dollars than in gas gift cards.

Kristin:  That makes sense with the rising housing costs.

Michelle:  Which is also – I mean, this is all interesting to see, like, how shifts in the greater world affect families and where they’re at.  So that’s basically what happens.  It’s a very quick turnaround.  That was intentional because we know things are happening very fast, and the people need help when they need help.  And usually when they’re turning to us, things are already pretty bad on their end.  So that’s really what the process is.

Kristin:  And how do our listeners get involved or donate?

Michelle:  So donations are great.  We really – what we have built in as structure is we have a generous donor who is covering essentially all of our overhead.  So postage and website hosting and all of those things.  So donations to us go 100% to families in need.  So it just goes straight into that fund so that you know that you’re doing – you’re not paying for anything other than helping a family, and we really appreciate that.  The ability to give really is affected by what’s coming in, so we appreciate that, for sure.  In terms of getting involved, spreading the word, whether that be for families who might need help or people who might be interested in donating, I think that’s really important.  We’re a small organization.  It’s essentially very much just me.  We’re doing a lot on a national scale, and so getting out the word, sharing some things, learning about something, and then really deciding to share it is really helpful for us.

Kristin:  That is fantastic.  So you are – not only do you have the website, but you’re also on social media, so if our listeners wanted to connect with you, what channels do you prefer they find you on?

Michelle:  So we’re on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn.  Any of those are great ways to reach out to us if that’s your preferred method of communication.  We will respond and let you know how we can help or answer questions or anything like that.

Kristin:  Wonderful.  Any final tips for our listeners navigating loss, Michelle?

Michelle:  Yeah.  I think, you know, feel what you want to feel.  Grief – you know, I think we have this notion that grief ends at some point, and it doesn’t.  You know, grief is reactivated over and over again.  And we have – we just came off things like school pictures, right?  The first day of school pictures, which are really popular to post on social media nowadays.  But they’re really triggering for loss parents because if they’re seeing somebody who’s the same age as the child they lost would have been, that’s really triggering.  That’s really difficult.  And so sometimes there’s a lot of grief over that.  You know, we’re coming up on Halloween; that can be really tricky.  The holidays can be really tricky.  And then there’s just the random Tuesday where out of the blue it kind of hits you and overwhelms you.  And all of those things together – it’s a lifelong struggle, and it’s working through it.  I am a big proponent of therapy, so I’d say individual therapy, couples therapy if you can do it, because there’s still conflict and there’s still issues to work through and to just make sure you’re communicating about how all those things are affecting you.  And then I always recommend finding sort of your village, your people, because I have found, and I have a couple of really good, close loss friends who are also parenting after loss, and it’s really nice because all the thoughts you have, all the actions you take that you know are really resulting from grief – it’s nice to be in a space where you can just reach out to other people and say, this is the thought I’m having.  And you’re getting the, “Yep, I get that.  Uh-huh.  I felt that way, too.”  And you’re not feeling like you’re alone.  And so I think those are the things I can really say, you know.  These are tragedies that honestly will bring out the true nature of other people in your lives, and there are people that are not going to be supportive, and it’s really devestating when that happens.  You have to make decisions as to whether or not those people should remain in your life.  And if they are, how you’re going to interact and deal with them.  That’s really hard, and I think – so that’s why I really say having your village is nice because you can sort of bounce things off and say, you know, I have this one friend who is saying X to me, and we can kind of talk through that and say, what does that mean, what does that look like, how are you going to deal with that.  So I think that’s my best tip.  For parenting after loss – parenting after loss is tough, you know?  There are things that I do and ways that I react – I go in the worst what-if scenario in just about every case.  If he starts with a cold, I’m starting to worry about, oh, my God, what if it turns into pneumonia or COVID or anything like that, and that’s really just because my experiences in my life have led me to this feeling of, like, we are going to experience the worst case scenario.  And luckily, I have a very healthy, very active toddler who is always happy, so that helps a lot.  But still, it’s hard, you know?  It’s just all of those things.  Right now, he’s not really talking yet.  He’s in speech.  And you can look up things, and I have gone to everything from, oh, my God, he’s deaf – which makes no sense, and we’ve tested him now to – you know, just all the extremes that I’ve gone to, when all the experts are telling me, especially COVID babies, are a lot of the time being very delayed because they didn’t have the same social interaction with other kids that they would have and other adults.  And so it all makes sense to me logically; it’s just those feelings, those pit of the stomach feelings that you have, and I think not only is it okay, it’s just how it’s going to be, and so I think, you know, really the individual therapy helps to make sure that you are not over-worrying and, you know, doing things that are really harmful to you and harmful to your child, but also that you are still following your instincts and doing that, and it’s hard.  Parenting is tough.  We all know that.  And trusting your instinct is a good thing.  Sometimes it’s hard to tell when it’s just my mom instinct kicking in or the feeling, or if it’s coming from loss.  And because I never parented without the loss, I don’t know.  You know?  I don’t know which one it is.  And that is really difficult to navigate and to figure out.

Kristin:  Thank you for sharing those tips and your story.  It will help so many listeners, and especially the work you’re doing with the foundation.

Michelle:  Thank you.

Kristin:  It was a pleasure chatting with you, and we’ll be in touch soon.

Michelle:  All right.  Sounds great.  Thank you so much for having me.

Kristin:  Thanks, Michelle.

Thanks for listening to Gold Coast Doulas.  Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.  If you like this podcast, please subscribe and give us a five-star review.  Thank you!  Remember, these moments are golden.

Kristin discusses challenges of the professional mother with Magda Lasota Morales, founder of MLM Brand.  Magda created a timeless line of dresses for breastfeeding and pumping moms.  You can listen to this complete podcast episode on iTunes, SoundCloud, or wherever you find your podcasts.

Welcome.  You’re listening to Ask the Doulas, a podcast where we talk to experts from all over the country about topics related to pregnancy, birth, postpartum, and early parenting.  Let’s chat!

Kristin:  Hello, hello.  This is Kristin with Ask the Doulas.  I am beyond excited to chat with Magda Lasota Morales today about her amazing brand, MLM Brand, and her journey into motherhood.  Magda is a mom of two and founded MLM because she wanted to make the fourth trimester easier for moms by creating a collection of elevated, timeless maternity pieces.  Welcome, Magda!

Magda:  Hi, Kristin!  Thank you so much for having me.  Thank you for this beautiful introduction.  I was like, wow, is this me?  But yes, hello, everyone.  Magda here.  Hello from sunny LA.  I know the weather can be a little finicky around the country, but I’m sending all the positive sunny vibes your way.  I’m so excited to be here, Kristin.  Thank you!

Kristin:  So happy to chat!  Now, I would love to hear how you started in the corporate world and really had this dream and brought it to life because many of us have ideas, but to really – especially when you’re getting into apparel, to make it happen is a whole other level.

Magda:  Yes.  Oh, Kristin, exactly.  So honestly, I think becoming a mom gave me that confidence to do it because now being into – I have two boys.  They’re 5 and 8 now.  Now that they’re a little older and they feel like I’m finally catching a breath, and looking back at my journey, I think to myself, I can’t believe I actually did that.  And I think that, you know, when I became a mom, I had that, like – I felt very powerful.  I had that inspiration and confidence that only motherhood really can give you, outside of other experiences.  So I started the brand about three years ago.  It took a couple more years before that to actually get the design, the first design to the place where I felt like, yes, let’s bring it to the market.  Let’s bring it to the mamas.  So it’s been a long time sort of in the work and a long time coming.  My background is actually political science and survey research, so I worked in corporate world when I had my first son.  And I mostly worked with men, and it was – in my case, it was kind of a blessing because they didn’t ask many questions, just kind of let me take the lead on the pumping front, on kind of getting the flexibility that moms need and deserve when they are asked to go back to work so early, as moms in the US are, right?  I was very lucky, and I took eleven weeks off, and that still felt so soon to go back to work.  But I was determined to do it.  I felt like everyone else was doing it.  You know, at that point, I didn’t know many moms in my community that had a similar experience of working, pumping, and trying to juggle it all.  So I was just determined to do it.  But at work, I found myself – I didn’t really have a path, like anyone to sort of guide me through the process.  HR was kind of hands-off.  They weren’t really that helpful in my case.  So I worked in corporate world, and being in Chicago, I actually really – everyone loves summers in Chicago, so –

Kristin:  Oh, yes.  I’m not far from Chicago in West Michigan.

Magda:  Exactly.  No, you’re in Michigan, yes.  So I was really excited to wear dresses.  It’s a couple of months a year that you can really wear your summer clothes, and I realized that it was impossible to pump and to nurse in my current dresses.  So I kind of set out to design the first prototype, and as I said, it took, you know – it took a couple of years to get the design right, and my breastfeeding journey with my first son ended at that point.  But by the time I had my second son, who’s 5 now, I felt like I finally got the design right, and I launched the brand in 2019, in June of 2019, so shortly before the pandemic.  And it’s been wonderful.  It’s been challenging but wonderful at the same time.  And I’m just happy that I was able to do it, and I love hearing from moms how our designs, how my designs make their pumping journey, breastfeeding journey easier.

Kristin:  Yeah.  I mean, you definitely speak truth about just wanting to have professional attire, wear a dress, and that limited time that you have in the corporate world to take that pumping break.  It’s not like you have time to take the dress all the way off, nor would you want to.  And so the fact that you designed this little black breastfeeding dress with the corporate mamas in mind, but it’s also so needed, whether you are a guest at a wedding or going to an event, like a luncheon, and you want to dress up, but you also know that you need to pump.  Or if you have your baby with you, feed your baby directly.

Magda:  Yeah.  So, absolutely.  And that was just, you know – when you become a mom, when you become a parent, your life changes so much, and I felt like so did my wardrobe, right?  I still wanted to look, you know, good and feel confident in the way I dressed, but I felt like I was lacking these pieces that were pumping and breastfeeding friendly in my closet.  The first dress, the little breastfeeding dress, LBD, black LBD, in short was the first design, and I’ve designed two more dresses since then, kind of with my lifestyle changes in mind.  So I wanted a dress that was a little bit more casual that you can just kind of wear to the playground or grocery shopping or just hanging out with your girlfriends if you are a mom that works at home or has kind of a different flexible schedule outside of kind of 9:00 and 5:00.  And then I designed another dress that sold out so quickly.  I’m hoping to bring it back shortly, more of a flowy, summery, boho style that has been very popular style with moms.  So my mission is to really just transform my favorite dresses, the dresses that I wear now, even though I’m not breastfeeding anymore, into breastfeeding-friendly designed.  And yeah, I think that it kind of makes my inspiration going because whenever I have a dress, I’m like, oh, my gosh, I really, really love it.  I immediately think, how can I make it breastfeeding friendly?

Kristin:  I love your Instagram posts and your dresses.  It almost makes me want to have another child, but I’m pretty much beyond that point.  I had no options when my kids, who are 9 and 11, were born as far as being fashionable, and like you said, dresses.  So I love everything that you stand for, and your style is so sleek and modern.

Magda:   That’s definitely the goal.  Just to add to that, I love seeing the innovation in the field happening right now and the resources available to moms.  I became a mom eight years ago, and I either didn’t know about the products that were out there because Instagram wasn’t as prevalent eight years ago as it is right now.  And probably a lot of the products and the resources weren’t available – even though, you know, I was in Chicago, so I had a six-week postpartum group of moms that was facilitated by the lactation consultants at the hospital in Hyde Park Dayton University of Chicago.  So I had some resources and support, but I felt like it’s such a major change.  Becoming a mom is such a major, monumental change in your life that it felt like I needed a lot more, you know?  A lot more.  And I loved to see there are, you know, services, like everything that you guys do at Gold Coast Doulas.  I look at your website and I look at your Instagram and your newsletter, and it’s like, I wish I had access to this when my kids were little, when I was struggling with feedings.  I think the sleep deprivation was the really big thing for me.

Kristin:  Yeah.  Same, absolutely.

Magda:  Yes.  So I just really love – you know, I’m just like a very sort of small part of the movement to turn the attention and the support to the moms, right?  We’re the ones that go through this experience of giving birth, and as you and I know, it can really be traumatic sometimes.  And I feel like for the longest time, yes, I know women have given birth for years and ages and centuries, but I feel like, you know, in modern times, there’s so much more pressure and expectations put on modern families that the recovery period and the whole experience of being pregnant and the postpartum period is so stressful.  It’s so stressful, right?

Kristin:  Yeah, in other countries, the community and the family gives so much more support.  In the US, oftentimes families that we support at Gold Coast or in our Becoming course, they don’t have family.  They move for a job.  They don’t really have a community to rely on.  So I do agree with you about your support group and just having a circle of women who are going through the same thing at the same time and how valuable that was for you back in Chicago.  So community and resources are so important.

Hey, Alyssa here.  I’m just popping in to tell you about our course called Becoming.  Becoming A Mother is your guide to a confident pregnancy and birth all in a convenient six-week online program, from birth plans to sleep training and everything in between.  You’ll gain the confidence and skills you need for a smooth transition to motherhood.  You’ll get live coaching calls with Kristin and myself, a bunch of expert videos, including chiropractic care, pelvic floor physical therapy, mental health experts, breastfeeding, and much more.  You’ll also get a private Facebook community with other mothers going through this at the same time as you to offer support and encouragement when you need it most.  And then of course you’ll also have direct email access to me and Kristin, in addition to the live coaching calls.  If you’d like to learn more about the course, you can email us at info@goldcoastdoulas.com, or check it out at www.thebecomingcourse.com.  We’d love to see you there.

Magda:  Absolutely.  So now having community – I live in Los Angeles right now, so I have a community of moms here.  But my community, like Instagram and social media, I have become so close with so many of these moms, and I have experienced their lives as they became, you know, the mom for the first time, the second time, the third time.  And just kind of seeing and sharing our stories and how challenging it can be sometimes to juggle it all and do it all.  It’s really validating, and it normalizes the experience.  Like, yes, motherhood is hard, but it’s also the most beautiful experience there.  But it’s also okay for us to say, this is hard.  I have all these emotions, and it’s good to see that other moms also feel the same way.

Kristin:  Yeah, and I feel like it’s so important to regain some sense of your former self, especially becoming a new mother.  So you, with your dresses, are giving women some of that confidence that they may be lacking.  They don’t want to be a frumpy mom.  They still want respect, and they potentially, depending on whatever their choice is, whether they go back to work full time or part time or be a stay at home mom or start their own business, whatever their choice is, I still feel like clothing can give you so much confidence.  And if something, like you said, that you can wear pre-maternity and breastfeeding journey, if you can have that same style and look in a breastfeeding dress, then that is so empowering.

Magda:  Yes.  I agree.

Kristin:  That whole work-life balance and trying to rise in the ranks, and then motherhood can often set women back.  So really wanting to still have that respect in the corporate world.  And if you’re wearing frumpy mom clothes – I don’t know.  I mean, there’s a little bit of that looking down – like, when you’re taking pumping breaks and so on.  So what are your thoughts?  What are you hearing from the circles in California about some of their transitions back to work and how it’s different being a mom versus when they were child-free?

Magda:  You know, I feel lucky being in California because I feel like California – I mean, every state has sort of pros and cons, but I personally feel very lucky being in California because of how this state just leads the way in terms of supporting working parents.  And what I hear from moms here in California – I also have a strong community in Chicago, but also I’m connected to moms in different states.  And I think that it really varies.  I think that support at your workplace is important, but it’s also just a piece of the puzzle, a bigger puzzle of just the wholesome support that working parents need in terms of affordable childcare and how household responsibilities are divided in your home and things like that.  Because one thing that I kind of noticed and learned and I’m still just really kind of feeling passionate about is how unrealistic the expectations are on working parents, but also on parents that stay at home.  I have this with my husband all the time because not by choice, it’s just sort of how it happened in our – my husband pretty much just works, and he’s training to be a doctor, so his schedule is very demanding.  He literally – he doesn’t have any time outside of maybe helping out every now and then.  So the majority of household chores and everything that’s childcare related and kids-related falls on me.  And I wouldn’t be honest if I didn’t say that it created a lot of resentment here.  But I also try to remember the whole system and how the system in the US is set up for working parents or for families in the US.  It’s impossible because – you know, I was so excited when I actually stepped away from my corporate career and I got to work on my business full time.  The thing I didn’t know, and truly, you know, I knew, but I didn’t know, like, how it would actually play out in real life is that everything that I was able to pay for with my paycheck, after I quit my job, that was no longer possible, and that included extra childcare or someone to come and help, like a housekeeper.  So yes, it was really exciting starting my own business, having the flexibility to be there for my young family in a meaningful and positive way, but also, the chores that I no longer had the finances to hire someone to do for the family, like scrubbing the bathrooms, mopping, vacuuming, all of that fell on me.  And it’s been years now.  I just feel like there is such an unrealistic expectation placed on both working moms, because if you are working at an office, like 8:00 to 6:00, right, like, you also don’t have time to do a lot of things, including maybe spending time with your kids every day.  And I feel like moms are just always just kind of gasping for air because you can’t have it all unless you have other people in your support circle helping and chiming in and contributing because it really is not possible for one person to do it all.  Whether you’re working outside of the home or inside a home, and I just think that it’s important that we talk about that.

Kristin:  Absolutely.  I mean, my husband is traveling for work this week, in fact, and I had to make some asks of other parents because I couldn’t be in two places at once with sports and bus stops and so on.  So I had to call in a group of other moms who understood, and I’m always doing favors for moms.  So, yeah.  I mean, in that whole thought of women wanting to have it all, I mean, how many times does a man get asked if they can have it all?

Magda:  That’s the whole thing.  I feel like it’s been so unfair, and this topic is, like – I mean, I’m always passionate about it, but the book Fair Play by Eve Rodsky, and the way it kind of – how she lays it all out, including, you know, like, yes, make a list of everything you do, but don’t show it to your husband, because even when I was making a list of all the things that I do for our family, which is, like, 98% of things, I kind of started feeling, like, even more resentful, thinking, like, oh, my gosh, I really do everything.  Like – but that’s not – Rodsky also addresses that in her book.  Like, don’t do that.  That’s not going to be productive.  She went through that.  She experienced that resentment.  And she tells us that is not going to lead to a productive conversation.  So I’m past that point now, and I’m ready to truly have these conversations with my husband.  And also, you know, continue to educate myself on the topic and how we really got here, that women are just so – treated so unfairly, and the expectations are so unfair, you know?  I mean, we see it kind of in the funny way on social media and memes, like when a dad watched the kids.  And I know these are like stereotypes, right?  There’s different families –

Kristin:  Oh, they make me so mad.  Yeah, dads watching the kids.  He’s not a babysitter.  He’s their father.

Magda:  But I think all stereotypes –different families are different.  There are different ways we do parenting.  But I just think that when my husband has a conference to go to, he literally just, like, packs a suitcase and goes, right?

Kristin:  Right.  He doesn’t have a list of ten things that need to be remembered.

Magda:  No.  He’s got a very competent person taking care of everything here.  But if I had to go somewhere, I don’t even know.  I did go to visit my family in Poland last summer, and it took my in-laws and my sister-in-law, my brother-in-law to come here and just kind of do it all while I was gone.

Kristin:  Especially with your husband’s busy schedule working in the medical field.  So yeah, that’s a whole other level of intensity.

Magda:  Yeah, it really is.  But as far as moms returning to work, and you and I both know that it’s so early in this country.  California, luckily, is one of the states that you can have a longer maternity leave, but not everyone has that choice, right?  It really depends on who you work for.  And I think that moms now have access to a lot of different resources and accounts that help them prepare for the life after maternity leave, life as a working parent, whether you work in an office or – I often think of moms that do sort of nontraditional jobs, like a bus driver or someone who works in service industry.  Like, how do you find time to pump, right?  It’s crazy.  We often think like, oh, you know, moms work in an office.  All they need to do is just find a little closet and go in there and pump.  But there is so many other jobs out there where that’s simply not an option.  So what I hear from moms is that, in general, it’s really hard to return to work and leave your baby at the beginning with someone else.

Kristin:  And there’s that guilt.  It’s hard to find a nanny now, and childcare centers are full and limit the amount of babies.  And then, of course, the cost of it is prohibitive, depending on the income level.  But certainly we have a lot of professional women that hold off on getting overnight postpartum support until they’re transitioning back to work from maternity leave and bring us on at that point so they’re able to be refreshed.  So we might go in every night when they return to work or three nights a week or the times that their partner travels.  We’ve even done overnight doula support when the woman has traveled and the husband is home with a toddler and a baby.

Magda:  I saw this on your website, Kristin.  This is so important.  This was one of the things I’m like, you know, I wish – I wish this was one of my, like, baby shower – I did not have a baby – like, a proper baby shower.  But I wish that was something that was gifted to me because that’s simply, like – it would literally save my life.

Kristin:  Absolutely.  One good night of sleep?  It’s lifechanging.  Better than a stroller or baby clothes.  I’m all about registering for services.  And like you mentioned, housekeeping, whatever it might be.  If you don’t want a doula, there are so many other services that can benefit you.

Magda:  And I love that because I see moms, and I see our dresses are often added to registries, and you can see what other items are there.  And there are lactation classes there, sleep consultations, overnight nannies or doulas or whatever the proper term is.  And I’m like, yes.  This is really what we need.

Kristin:  Just what we need, yes.

Magda:  A gift card to Sweet Greens, you know.  I’m obsessed with Sweet Greens.  I’m trying to nourish my body after I’ve nourished this baby for nine months in my belly, and now I’m nourishing this baby and growing this baby outside of my body.  So, yes.  I love that there is that shift towards the mom, right?  We’ve seen it on social media where I think there is a quote, how about the mom, you know?  Welcome baby, but how about the mom, or something like that.  I really think it’s needed, and I’m just so glad that more and more people focus on the wellbeing of mom because, you know, you and I know that you can’t really – it’s such a, like, trivial thing to say you can’t pour from an empty cup, unless you truly experience that, right?  When you experience that exhaustion, that you have no energy, you feel like you’re not – you know, you’d like to do your best, but this is your best today.  And sometimes there’s also guilt from that because you know that you’re just exhausted, and you can’t do your best the way you would like to.

Kristin:  Any final tips for our listeners, Magda?

Magda:  Oh, tips, mamas.  I don’t know who will be listening to us, like new mamas.  I just want to tell you that you’re amazing, that the baby is gorgeous, and it matters, and you brought this new life into the world.  But focus on yourself, and I know it sometimes sounds selfish, and you can think, like, oh, how can I focus on myself when this baby takes up all of my time during the day and at night?  But it really is so important to take care of the baby but also find pockets of time throughout the day to do something that makes you happy and that makes your heart skip a bit because motherhood – it can really, like, pull you in, into taking care of your family, but you can’t really do that if you’re not well emotionally and mentally and physically.  It’s investing time and resources in yourself, whether it’s lactation consultants or sleep consultants, doulas, mommy circles, mommy classes where you go in with your baby and meet other moms and share your experience and you just nod heads.  It’s like, yes.  That’s how I feel.  It’s just so invaluable.  So that was a lot of tips, but I think the bottom line is, you matter, mama, and yeah, I think that just take care of yourself, as kind of simple as it sounds.  And I know it’s probably not the same kind of self-care that you were used to before the baby.  Maybe you don’t have time to get your nails done or whatever it was for you before becoming a mom.  There’s other ways that you can do that and ask for help because we really are not meant to do it alone, and I think the US makes you think that you can, but you can’t and you shouldn’t.  So ask for help and take care of yourself, and next time you blink, the kids are going to be 5 and 8, like mine, and you feel like you’ve been there.  You’ve experienced it all.  And yeah, it was challenging, but it was also the most rewarding experience of your life.

Kristin:  Exactly.  Beautiful, Magda.

Magda:  Oh, thank you so much, Kristin.  I could talk for hours.  I just feel like I’m finally out of that – I mean, my kids are 5 and 8, so finally.

Kristin:  Yes, I’m with you.  School-aged kids.  It’s a whole different experience.

Magda:  Yes.  And the years were long, but, you know, I experienced it all.  And I’m just really grateful.

Kristin:  So how can our listeners find you?  Of course, there’s your website.  But you’re also very active on social?

Magda:  I am.  Well, Instagram and TikTok gurus tell you to do that.  I’m on Instagram.  It’s @mlmbrand_ and then it’s the same on TikTok.  I think it’s @_mlmbrand_ there.  But yes, I’m very active on Instagram, so if you have any questions or if anyone wants to be on the blog or do an Instagram Live or anything like that, just come and say hi.  Please do so.  I love connecting with other moms.  It really is the other moms that I met on this motherhood journey that made it so much more fun and so much more meaningful.  So I’m always here.  Come say hi.

Kristin:  Thanks so much, Magda.  I appreciate it.

Magda:  Thank you so much, Kristin.

Thanks for listening to Gold Coast Doulas.  Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.  If you like this podcast, please subscribe and give us a five-star review.  Thank you!  Remember, these moments are golden.

Kristin chats with Lexi Tabor of Hatchling CLE about the latest baby trends and services.  You can listen to this complete podcast episode on iTunes, SoundCloud, or wherever you find your podcasts.

Welcome.  You’re listening to Ask the Doulas, a podcast where we talk to experts from all over the country about topics related to pregnancy, birth, postpartum, and early parenting.  Let’s chat!

Kristin:  Hello, hello!  This is Kristin with Ask the Doulas.  I am so excited to chat with Lexi Tabor today.  Lexi is the founder, postpartum care specialist, certified lactation support counselor at Hatchling CLE.  Welcome, Lexi!

Lexi:  Hi, Kristin.  Thank you so much for having me.

Kristin:  Our topic today is all about registries and prepping for baby showers and what you need and what you don’t need, since a lot of your business – it’s not mentioned in the title – is being a baby registry consultant, in addition to all of your skills in lactation and postpartum doula work.

Lexi:  Yeah, it’s something that I actually – so I started postpartum work in 2020 and got my lactation certification in 2021, but how this all started was that I’ve been – I was a career nanny for 12 years, so I got to work firsthand with a bunch of baby stuff with various families.  Families of newborns and toddlers and things like that, and they were always asking me about which things they should have or what works for this and kind of figuring it out there.  I starting offering, I guess, consults.  I started asking my friends who were expecting, “Do you want to send me your registry?  Do you want to do this together?  I like to do that.  I know a little bit about products,” and that kind of evolved into what I do now.  And then I realized, oh, I have this business.  I might as well add that as an add-on.

Kristin:  It makes perfect sense since you already had so much firsthand knowledge working with nanny families and postpartum doula clients in their homes with the products.

Lexi:  Exactly.

Kristin:  So what is, as far as the percentage of your business, what would that make up, just to get an idea or a sense?  At least in my area, I don’t know of any baby registry consultants.

Lexi:  I’ve never crunched the numbers with it, really.  I guess it would be about 25%.

Kristin:  That’s what I would have guessed, yeah.

Lexi:  I’ve also started – I actually am starting to offer it now as – so it was mostly just a standalone service, but now I’m starting to market it more as an add-on for my current clients and kind of giving them a discount and saying, like, hey, you know, would you like me to look over your registry, or do you want to build this together?  It helps me get to know their needs on a whole different level when I’m working with in-person clients, too, which is kind of cool.

Kristin:   Yeah, that makes sense.  I know as birth doulas, we have add-on prenatals if a client wants help working on a birth plan or a birth preference sheet.  So it make sense to do add-ons in that way.  So you know so much about the industry itself as far as marketing goes and what’s going on with baby products and services and the registry market in general.  What tidbits do you have to share with us, Lexi, on the market itself?

Lexi:  So I guess my experience and my personal values also kind of drive what it is that I do within registry consults.  So I’m trying to get away from the $12 billion industry of baby stuff.  How many times have you heard a parent say, “I didn’t need that,” or, like, throwing their baby items at their friends who are pregnant because they never used it?

Kristin:  Constantly.

Lexi:  Or have so much stuff, right?  Especially in this country, unfortunately, we’re not really set up to succeed postpartum.  It’s all about the things and making everything look good and all about the birth, which are important, but then you have this baby that you come home with, and then you’re like, okay, now what?  So what I try to plant the seed – I try to plant the seed with clients to kind of reframe it as, yes, you’re going to need things, but most of what you will need is support.  Getting them in touch with people in their area or even virtually if, depending on their location, they don’t physically have access to those services.  And just kind of reframing, like, what is it that you actually need and also what is it that will work for your family, right?  Because there is also a lot of people ask their friends what they’re going to need, and if they had other babies or have taken care of other children, they tend to go towards those products, which sometimes work, but every baby is different, so it’s kind of tailoring their registry to their exact needs and their familial buildup, the logistics of their housing, their relationship situation.  All of that is all custom tailored to them.

Kristin:   Yeah, the Snoo doesn’t work for every baby.  You know, different swaddles or baby carriers can be very specific to the individual needs, even if you have multiple kids.  There could be preferences in your household.  So I know that you have ties to Be Her Village, and I’m so excited to take your baby registry training through Be Her Village, and that is all about really incorporating services and experts within the birth and baby field versus registering for things.  For registering for a doula or a lactation consult or postpartum doula and so on.

Lexi:   Yes.  So this course that I’m going to be teaching that you are also taking is – it was kind of born randomly, naturally, in a meeting that I was having with Kaitlyn and JD from Be Her Village.  I don’t even remember what the chat was about.  I think it was just a casual chat, and by the end of it, we kind of had a private conversation, and we’re like, hey, should we make this happen?  And so the focus of the gift registry expert certification through Be Her Village is, again, it’s not going to be, “Don’t buy stuff; only do services,” and all about Be Her Village, because that’s not practical, either.  It’s going to be about exploring the different subjects.  Each week, we have a different breakdown of things from, like, sleep, feeding, things for parents, baby travel, play and development, all of those different things that we’ll take a deep dive into, and each week, we will discuss support resources versus product resources versus, like, different options that you can give people and give people who are taking the course the tools to implement this into their business, as well, so they can kind of spread the word of also planting seeds of, hey, like, you – what do you think this product would do for you?  In some cases, it might be more appropriate to have a service instead.  Like, oh, it sounds like this is something you might actually be looking for that this product could do, but also this person, I know, would do a great job at it, kind of thing.  So just connecting families with that kind of support, as well.

Kristin:   I know we get a lot of questions from doula clients at Gold Coast about everything from the best pump to bottles and a lot of swaddle questions.  So what are you seeing from clients as far as really, like, the most overwhelming registry items?

Lexi:  A lot of my clients are registering through major registry sites that work well, but again, they’re not custom tailored.  So it’s just kind of more of crowdsourcing and what’s in at the moment.  As someone who specializes in feeding, bottles and pacifiers that are in at the moment are actually like the bane of my existence.  But that’s also a good talking point and a point to bring up.  It’s a good lesson to educate.  It’s a good point to educate parents on.  Like, oh, this is really popular right now.  Did you know XYZ about this product?  Or here are some pros and here are some cons about it; what do you think?  There are a lot of questions; bottles, pacifiers, swaddles.

Kristin:  Car seats, I’m sure.  Strollers.

Lexi:  I actually don’t get a lot of questions on car seats, which is surprising.  Usually it’s how to install my car seat, but not which one to get.

Kristin:  And you think of everything that’s interchangeable; anything from a crib that turns into a toddler bed to the car seat with stroller combo and things like that.  So I’m sure that you get some of those questions when you’re in clients’ homes.

Lexi:  There’s so many different choices out there, too, which is – you know, it’s good and it’s bad.  We’re kind of met with this decision paralysis.  Some people like me really enjoy doing the research and kind of scoping out all these products and things like that, and for most expectant parents, it’s just so overwhelming because they’re already dealing with so much.  And going down Google wormholes for six days about which car seat is the best and whatever – if you hire someone who knows this information, they can tell you all that without you having to get into this anxiety blackhole.

Kristin:   Yes, because your time is valuable, and reducing stress, especially during pregnancy, is key.  Win-win to hire an expert who’s really gone through all of the ratings and reviews, and obviously, recalls.  Keeping up with the recalls is, I feel like, almost a full-time job.  I just got an email today about two more recalls.  So keeping on top of that for our clients is also important.

Lexi:  Yes, and that’s something, again, a lot of parents don’t know about these things until we tell them, so hopefully people who are listening to your podcast will now know, if you don’t already, sign up for the weekly emails from the CPSC website.  It’s really easy.  They send you a weekly email, and you get to see what products or recalls.  Sometimes it’s children’s products; sometimes it’s like an ATV, which is not relevant.  But I actually had – I looked on there, and I noticed there was a washing machine that had a fire hazard, and I noticed – I was like, oh, I’m pretty sure that’s one of my client’s washing machines, so I sent that along to them.  So it’s not just baby products, but even if you register things, like your car seat and your baby carrier and if you have any baby containers, things like that, it’s not just baby products that they sent out notifications on.  So it’s good to know about any of these home products that you may be using.

Kristin:  Yes.  Very helpful.

Hey, Alyssa here.  I’m just popping in to tell you about our course called Becoming.  Becoming A Mother is your guide to a confident pregnancy and birth all in a convenient six-week online program, from birth plans to sleep training and everything in between.  You’ll gain the confidence and skills you need for a smooth transition to motherhood.  You’ll get live coaching calls with Kristin and myself, a bunch of expert videos, including chiropractic care, pelvic floor physical therapy, mental health experts, breastfeeding, and much more.  You’ll also get a private Facebook community with other mothers going through this at the same time as you to offer support and encouragement when you need it most.  And then of course you’ll also have direct email access to me and Kristin, in addition to the live coaching calls.  If you’d like to learn more about the course, you can email us at info@goldcoastdoulas.com, or check it out at www.thebecomingcourse.com.  We’d love to see you there.

Kristin:  As far as trends with showers, what are you seeing as you’re helping clients navigate planning for their baby shower or diaper sprinkle, whatever it might be?

Lexi:  A lot of people are – I think there’s – there is a shift away from, like, the traditional baby shower, right?  So it’s not – this is not your mom’s baby shower kind of thing.  I think people are starting to do more research, and millennials are, I think, trying to be more intentional about the things they bring into the world and the things they expose their babies to and things like that.  As years go by, research comes out, and we know differently.

Kristin:  Exactly.  Wanting eco-friendly products.

Lexi:  Yeah, things that are, I guess, more clean and nontoxic as far as detergents go; even sometimes fabrics and crib mattresses.  So it’s kind of cool to see that shift because even 12 years ago before my niece was born, I look at the things we did, and I was like, oh, man, so much has changed even in that amount of time.  So now it’s – there is a lot of research.  Unfortunately, sometimes with that comes a lot of anxiety.  But I think people are trying to be more mindful in how they spend their money and also spend time with their children and the things they expose their babies to, which is why I also think the service is really valuable because you’re kind of starting off on the right foot before your baby is even born.  Kind of help parents out.

Kristin:  Exactly.  I know one of my clients set up a registry, and her focus was to try to make it as eco-friendly as helpful.  She was happy to have regifted items, you know, from her friends who already had babies and really was all about registering for services.  So she got a lot of postpartum doula support and other services that were helpful.  Meal delivery, housekeeping, and so on.

Lexi:  And those are things, again, a lot of first-time parents, without knowing somebody who’d had those services themselves, might not even know that that’s an option or they might be like, oh, that’s kind of weird to put housecleaning on my baby registry.  But it’s not.  You know?  You’re sitting around.  You’re at home all day.  You’re looking at all these things that you – a lot of parents are like, I feel like I should be doing this, when their job is really to be resting and healing if they gave birth.  Yeah, everything from meal services, cleaning services.

Kristin:  Diaper services for those who do cloth.

Lexi:  Yeah.  Anything – any and all of the above.  I actually came across – I think it was a couple years ago – another registry where it is specifically made to register for things that are preloved items, and on there, you can write – whoever gifts it can write whether they want it back or not or whether you can donate it or whatever, which I thought was really cool.  Especially for big ticket items, if you know the home it came from and there are no allergies in your home and their home that mishmash, and if you know that they use safety protocols – like, not having to buy a crib is great.

Kristin:  Definitely.  That’s a costly item.  And even thinking about – the market has changed so much since I’ve had kids where things can be rented.  Like a Snoo, for example.  I’ve had clients rent versus buy a Snoo.  And so some of those higher-ticket items can be returned after use.

Lexi:  Yeah, it’s nice to see that, and also a lot of parents are using Mercari and Poshmark for things as well, like swaddles, which you’re still buying it, but it is preloved, so you’re not necessarily – you’re giving that money to another parent, and not a corporation, which is kind of cool, and keeping those things out of landfills, which is also wonderful.

Kristin:  Exactly.  Any tips as far as things to avoid registering for?

Lexi:  There are very few blanket recommendations that I make.  Kaitlyn from Be Her Village and I were talking about this.  She’s like, “I want to know what’s on your black list.”  The only things, honestly, for me, are things that have safety issues with them.  So obviously, anything that’s been recalled, you can go on the CPSC website, put in a product that you want to register for or that you’ve heard is really good, and you can re-report if there are any on their website of those.  For me, it’s not necessarily the actual product; more so how they’re used, so, like, those sleep pods, like the Dock A Tot, they’re now sold as loungers because they’re not allowed to use the language of sleep pods.  But a lot of parents still use them for sleep.

Kristin:  Right, which is challenging.

Lexi:  Yeah.  So, again, it’s navigating that conversation of while this product is in your home, this is the appropriate way to use it.  This is the safe way to use it, and here’s how it should be – the uses you should avoid it for.  I think the only one that I struggle with the most are formula dispensers, for two reasons.  Number one, babies under the age of three months, or if they’re immunocompromised, they need a special way to have formula prepared, so it’s not actually about boiling the water, letting it cool down.  You’re actually supposed to scald the powder because that is what can have bacteria in it.  And formula dispensers don’t prepare things in that way, right?  So they’re not making it safely for babies under three months, unfortunately.  And also they’re not accurately dispensing the amount of formula that it’s supposed to all the time, so it’s really hard – like, you can’t keep track of that.  You don’t know whether your baby is having too much powder in there, not enough powder.  And that’s tricky.  And in the long run, you have to clean it after every three bottles, so in the long run, it’s not really more efficient, unfortunately.

Kristin:   Right, and if it’s not cleaned properly, then it leads to all of these other issues, like bacteria.

Lexi:  Honestly, other than things that have been safety recalled, which you can read all about those online, I don’t really have any blanket recommendations.  It is more so about, like, what fits for a family, what works for them, and how things are used.

Kristin:  Love it.  So Lexi, based on your background as a lactation support counselor, what are you loving within the feeding area?  I know you mentioned some of the newer products were a concern, but what do you love?

Lexi:  My favorite bottle to use is one of the least expensive.  They are the Evenflo glass bottles, just the glass, four-ounce.  You can use it with a slow flow Evenflo nipple, or you can use it with a Dr. Brown’s nipple.  I really like those.  They are a great shape for feeding.  That makes it optimal for babies that are fed from the body and for just piece feeding them and having a good latch.  And then the Nanobebe pacifier, if you are choosing to use a pacifier.  I really like that one for the shape, and it also kind of forms to the face really well, which helps keep things in there.  As far as for lactating parents, I think Silverette cup.  I don’t know if you have heard of those or had experience with those.  They’re pretty cool.  They’re like these stainless steel kind of – it’s not really a nipple shield, but it goes over the nipple.

Kristin:  And collects, yes.  I love it.

Lexi:  Yeah, it collects it.  It prevents damage and it helps heel.  It’s – they’re really cool.

Kristin:  Awesome tips, thank you!  So any other ideas to share for our listeners or doula clients who are prepping their registry?

Lexi:  I would just encourage you to really look into local resources.  I’m going to plug Be Her Village.  I’m not sponsored by them, but I just really believe in their mission and spreading the word.  My favorite part about them is that the money goes directly into your bank account if you have a registry, and then if you don’t end up needing that service, you can spend it on what you need.  So if you plan on feeding your baby from your body and you end up not needing a lactation consultant, or end up using formula, you can use that money for diapers instead or a meal service or other things like that.  And it kind of also connects you with – it widens your horizons of what’s even available around you, which is pretty neat.

Kristin:  Right.  You can see all the experts in your area by searching for the different services.  That’s very helpful.

Lexi:  Again, avoiding that Google wormhole.  Love-hate relationship with Google.

Kristin:  It can be terrifying and overwhelming all at once.  Yes, avoiding Google and trusting expert sites and resources is what it’s all about.  So if our listeners want to get in touch with you, you obviously do virtual work as well as in person.  How can they best reach you, Lexi?

Lexi:  The best way, I think the most active way to reach me, is on Instagram.  My handle is @hatchlingcle.  And then my website, too, which has all of my contact info on it.

Kristin:  And you’re located in Cleveland, so not too far away from us in Michigan here.  We actually have sunshine today.  It’s been a long time.

Lexi:  I know.  See, I looked outside this morning – well, I went to work before it was dark, but after a while when I was at work, I looked out the window, and I was like, oh, my gosh, I can’t wait to leave just so I can be in the sun.

Kristin:  Right.  It’s so needed.  Well, I loved our chat.  I can’t wait to learn from you at the certification course.  So I am all about adding different knowledge bases to my profession, so the baby registry service is something that I don’t have the background that you do on, so thank you for making this available to doulas and other childbirth professionals.

Lexi:  You’re so welcome.  I can’t wait to see where this is going to go.  This is the first time we’re offering this, so it’s kind of a new ride for us, too, and we’re all very excited to get this going and spread the word about it.

Kristin:  Awesome.  Any other resources to share before we pop off?

Lexi:  Not that I can think of off the top of my head.  I am constantly sharing resources in my Instagram stories, though, so check that out.

Kristin:  I know you’re on LinkedIn, as well, and you share some content there for the business professionals.

Lexi:  Oh, one other thing I’ll plug – sorry, it just popped in my head.  I also do some work with major care doulas, which is – we call it a postpartum doula in your pocket.  So if you don’t have a postpartum doula in your area and you’re looking for virtual on-call support, that’s a wonderful service, and they have a whole guide of the first few months and what that looks like.  It’s a daily guide, and everyone who works on there is also great.

Kristin:  Awesome.  Thank you, Lexi, and appreciate you sharing all of your wisdom around the baby registry industry.  Take care!

Lexi:  Thank you for having me!

Thanks for listening to Gold Coast Doulas.  Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.  If you like this podcast, please subscribe and give us a five-star review.  You can also check out our Baby Registry Consultation services. Thank you!  Remember, these moments are golden.

Carrie Kolehouse, Executive Director of MomsBloom chats with Kristin about why MomsBloom is focused on supporting mothers in West Michigan and beyond.  You can listen to this complete podcast episode on iTunes, SoundCloud, or wherever you find your podcasts.

Welcome.  You’re listening to Ask the Doulas, a podcast where we talk to experts from all over the country about topics related to pregnancy, birth, postpartum, and early parenting.  Let’s chat!

Kristin:  Hello, hello.  This is Kristin with Ask the Doulas.  I’m excited to chat with Carrie Kolehouse today.  Carrie is the executive director of MomsBloom, which is a local nonprofit here in West Michigan that supports women after they give birth.  So welcome, Carrie!

Carrie:  I’m so happy to be here!  Thanks for having me!

Kristin:  And you have quite the resume in addition to your work with MomsBloom.  You are currently – you have your own freelance public relations and marketing business and have experience in corporate marketing and media.  You were even a news reporter for WoodTV.  So what an interesting journey your career has taken.  I feel like we have similar paths of really becoming passionate about supporting women after our own birth experiences, so we’ll have to dive into that a bit, as well.

Carrie:  Yes, absolutely!  I’m excited to do that.

Kristin:  So let us start with your journey as a volunteer for MomsBloom, and if you wouldn’t mind expanding on the work that MomsBloom does in the community a bit more, that would also be helpful to our listeners.

Carrie:  So I got inspired to become a volunteer about twelve years ago, and I had moved to Grand Rapids recently at that time, and I just became aware of MomsBloom, I think just like on social media.  I saw a post that someone had shared saying, oh, this is kind of a newer organization in Grand Rapids that could really use some volunteers.  And it immediately struck a chord with me because I’d had a really challenging postpartum time very recently prior to that when I had my son, my first child, who’s now 13.  And I had been so struck by what an isolating time that was and an overwhelming time, and so when I saw that there was an organization that had been created, like, specifically to address that, I was like, oh, my gosh, I have to be a part of that.  Like, this is – I fired up inside the minute that I saw it online.  I was like, this is so great.  So I signed up to become a volunteer, and I went to a volunteer training, which is just like a two-hour training, and then I got matched with a family.  So I got matched with a mom who was a single mom of two children, and I was very humbled, actually, by what a good mom she was and honestly what a good, like, housekeeper she was.  She had – you know, she’s a single mom to two kids.  She’s got a little tiny baby.  She also had a medical condition that made things extra challenging for her.  Yet every time I go over there, her house is, like, spotless.  Though, sometimes that happens because – something I’ve learned in my time with MomsBloom is that a lot of times people with super clean houses, that can be anxiety showing up sometimes.

Kristin:  I have seen that as well with our work with clients.

Carrie:  Yeah, you see both extremes of the spectrums.  You can see a really, really messy house is a lot of times indicative of depression, and then a super duper clean house sometimes can be anxiety.  Anyway, so I visited her once or twice a week for three months and just did things like hold the baby so that she could get a nap or a shower, doing dishes or laundry.  You know, typically, in a match you do some cleaning, but in that case, I didn’t do a whole lot of cleaning because she was doing it herself.  And then just talking with her; just providing some adult conversation, talking through some of the difficult feelings that she was having, and then screening her for depression and anxiety and helping her figure out the resources that she might want to utilize for that depression and anxiety, you know, like maybe finding a therapist, support group, things like that.  So the experience was so rewarding, and I could not believe what a difference I had made for her and how meaningful it had been for her, and it was, like, not that big of a time investment for me, and I was like, wow, this is a really great way to spend my time volunteering because I can see the impact really dramatically.  And then I was like, oh, my gosh, I have to keep doing this, and I have to do everything within my power to, like, help grow this program because I think it’s so cool and so powerful, and it provides such a meaningful experience, I think, for both the client, the mom, and the volunteer.  So over the years, I’ve just gotten more and more involved with MomsBloom, and three years ago now, I decided to leave my 9:00 to 5:00 marketing job, which was scary –

Kristin:  Yes, it had to be!

Carrie:  Yeah.  To become MomsBloom’s executive director, and it’s just been a dream come true, and I absolutely love the work, and it doesn’t even feel like work because I’m so passionate about it.  That’s kind of been how I started to get involved and how I got to where things are now.

Kristin:  I remember serving on events committees with you at some of the annual MomsBloom events, and I used MomsBloom with both of my kids, actually, before there were postpartum doulas in West Michigan.  So I had a grandma help with my first, and she didn’t live near her grandkids and would come over for a little while and help around and again, allow me to take a shower or help with feeding.  It was really wonderful.  And then I started doing intakes for MomsBloom in between having kids and then did a little bit of volunteering without going into the home.

Carrie:  I know you have been involved with MomsBloom over the years, and we’ve so appreciated all of the support from Gold Coast and being able to refer to you guys, too.  It’s so exciting now that birth doulas and postpartum doulas, I feel like, are coming so much more into the mainstream consciousness, you know?  I feel like when I first got involved with this kind of work, it was very rare that anybody had a birth doula or postpartum doula.  More and more, you know, now people are realizing that that is something that they are really going to need, and if they have the resources, they’re able to utilize a birth doula or postpartum doula.  And then I’m so glad that we have the MomsBloom program for people who might not have the resources or who really need that additional support.  But I’m just really passionate about, and what I really see my purpose over the long term, is not just to grow MomsBloom, but also to change our culture, right?  Someone told me years ago when I first kind of started taking a leadership role at MomsBloom, they said, your goal should always be to put your nonprofit out of business, right?

Kristin:  Yes.  So true.

Carrie:  Yeah.  Like, a nonprofit is a Band-Aid, right, that solves a societal problem for now, but while you’re doing that work, you should always then be thinking about, what advocacy can I do to make it so that my nonprofit doesn’t even need to exist.  And so I think about that a lot, and I think about, like, what would have to be true for there to be no need for a MomsBloom?  So I think that there’s a lot of things that would have to be true, but I think one of them would be that we would live in a society that understands that the postpartum time is a sacred stage of life that deserves people rallying around you, all of your friends, your family, your neighbors, your church community, all of the people in your life rallying around you and allowing you to just focus on rest, recovery, feeding.  And I think the ideal situation for any woman is to be able to not have to do any of the other baby care other than feeding, right?  Like, if you’re breastfeeding, that’s a full time job, so I think your ideal situation is that you’re resting.  You know, you’re eating really wonderful foods that are being prepared for you.  You’re taking really, really good care of yourself.  You know, in a lot of cultures, they have – like, in South America, for 40 days, the mom is just expected to rest, eat certain foods, get into nature, and all the people around her, their job is to do everything else.  All the housework –

Kristin:  Sibling care, newborn care, outside of feeding, as you said, yes.

Carrie:  Exactly.  And that is so vastly different from what the expectation is here in the United States.

Kristin:  Get back to work, start losing weight.  There’s so many expectations and so much pressure.  Have that perfect house and entertain.  In other cultures, it’s all about the mom and that right of passage and transition, and in the US, it’s like, okay, you’re celebrated during pregnancy, and then you give birth and it’s all about the baby, and the mother feels left behind.  No one wants to hear her story.  No one wants to help her.  It’s like, let me hold the baby.  Let me bring gifts for the baby.  But you just went through this momentous occasion, and you’re left depleted and lonely, and like you mentioned before, isolated after giving birth.  And especially now with the pandemic – in early COVID, there was so much isolation.  I mean, you couldn’t even have family in the home or doulas.  And I know you did some virtual as you pivoted quite well early in the pandemic, as well, with your volunteers and the support that you could offer?

Carrie:  We did, and you know what’s so – this is so hilarious, looking back.  Right after the shelter in place order came and we were like, okay, we can’t do matches – a day or two after that – you know how you get really good ideas in the shower?  I was in the shower, and I thought – I got this what at the time I literally thought was a groundbreaking, amazing idea, which was, what if we had people do, like, visits on Zoom?  What if we used Zoom?  Because at that time, Zoom was not something that I used very often.  Like, I didn’t do that many Zoom meetings.  And so to me, this was like this revolutionary idea that we’re going to do this.  And, I mean, it was good that it occurred to me early on because then we very quickly put together a training program of how to do virtual visits and we were able to pivot really fast, but, I mean, it wasn’t long before everybody else started doing the exact same thing.  But yeah, and there was value in that.  I don’t want to say that there wasn’t any value in virtual visits because there was.  You know, we had people focus on listening, you know, compassionate listening and resource navigation was huge, especially during the pandemic when so many people’s financial needs and just needs for diapers and food and things were often heightened.  So the resource navigation was really important There was definitely value in that.  But that being said, there is no replacement for having someone come over and hold your baby so that you can take a nap.  So we tried to pivot back.  I mean, we followed CDC guidelines, obviously.  We kept everybody safe, and knock on wood, I don’t think there was ever, that I was aware of, a COVID transmission as a result of the MomsBloom program.  But we did try to pivot back somewhat aggressively because we knew that there were – I mean, especially our families that have a lot more need or our single parents, you know, we were like, we have to sort of weigh the risks.  We have to kind of weigh all the risk factors here.  It was like, so we were able to – thankfully, a lot of our volunteers were people, I think, who were really cautious in their personal lives in terms of their exposure, and then we were able to come up with great practices about how they could wears masks and wash hands and wear gloves and all that kind of stuff.  And so we were able to start to pivot back, and then pivot back to virtual, and then pivot back to in person.

Kristin:  That’s how it was with us.  It’s like constantly adjusting.

Carrie:  Yeah, exactly.  I mean, yeah, we just had to kind of bounce back and forth.  One of the advantages of having a nonprofit that is small and doesn’t have, like, really large leadership team is that you can pivot really quick.  You can just kind of make the decisions and move really quickly.  So I was really glad that we were able to do that.

Kristin:  Yeah, that’s amazing.  And you say small, but I’ve seen so much growth under your leadership, so I know you’ve expanded to the lakeshore.  You have a waiting list for families that need your help, and you also have been very creative in how you’ve found volunteers, like connecting with colleges and finding nursing students and really trying to meet the demand with the budget that you’re working with, which is amazing.  I have experience in the nonprofit sector, and it’s very challenging.

Carrie:  It is.  It’s very challenging.  I mean, every job is hard, right?  But there’s things – it’s just a different kind of hard, right?  So the corporate world is different, a different kind of hard.  You tend to have a bigger budget.  You’re very certain that you’re going to have your budget; all that kind of stuff.  But for me, the things that were so hard about – I guess to put it more positively, the things that I appreciate so much about my job now is that I never lack for motivation because I’m so genuinely passionate about the work, and it’s so fulfilling that I don’t find myself needing – like, I think when I worked in more of the corporate world, I really needed, like, a lot of validation from my boss or my colleagues.  I needed to have a carrot to chase all the time, right?  That there was a raise in it for me or there was some adulation in it for me.  So it’s been really beautiful and cool to have a job where – I mean, not that I don’t appreciate those things.  I love all the wonderful recognition that you just gave me now on this call.  It’s wonderful.  But I don’t need it.  Like, I can operate – I can fuel myself just with the fulfillment of the work itself, which is so – it’s just really cool.  And I think a lot of people never get that experience in their work life, and so I feel really fortunate.

Hey, Alyssa here.  I’m just popping in to tell you about our course called Becoming.  Becoming A Mother is your guide to a confident pregnancy and birth all in a convenient six-week online program, from birth plans to sleep training and everything in between.  You’ll gain the confidence and skills you need for a smooth transition to motherhood.  You’ll get live coaching calls with Kristin and myself, a bunch of expert videos, including chiropractic care, pelvic floor physical therapy, mental health experts, breastfeeding, and much more.  You’ll also get a private Facebook community with other mothers going through this at the same time as you to offer support and encouragement when you need it most.  And then of course you’ll also have direct email access to me and Kristin, in addition to the live coaching calls.  If you’d like to learn more about the course, you can email us at info@goldcoastdoulas.com, or check it out at www.thebecomingcourse.com.  We’d love to see you there.

Kristin:  I agree.  I feel the same way.  My mission is to support women without judgment, and I feel like I wake up every day excited.  There’s more work to be done.  There are so many barriers within healthcare and just navigating maternity leaves and insurance and what is self-pay, and so hopefully Medicaid will cover doulas in the future, but I know you’re very involved in advocacy and efforts, especially on improving maternal mental health.  So what are you seeing in this space?

Carrie:  I’ve been doing a lot of advocacy and working on legislation, and you brought up Medicaid paying for doulas.  There was some legislation – it didn’t pass, unfortunately, but it was part of a big package.  It didn’t pass, but one problem with it was that the compensation for doulas was going to be so low, and it was probably going to require so much red tape in order for a doula to get paid and everything that I was like, come on, guys.

Kristin:  Yes.  It was very low.

Carrie:  Nobody’s going to do that unless you sweeten the deal a little bit.  I’m sure you and many other doulas really want to be able to serve people who are Medicaid eligible and would never otherwise be able to afford a doula, but you have to make it – people need to be reasonably paid for their services.  So yeah, that’s something that I think – I mean, I really think doulas – obviously, there’s a ton of discrimination happening in the healthcare system.  We’re hearing about it all the time.  When we go to do the intake visit, the purpose of our intake visit when we first go to the home and kind of get the lay of the land is to meet the mom and get to know a little bit more about her needs.  We often find in those visits some of the work that we do is just helping the client process their birth story.  And we find just anecdotally that women of color – I mean, every – this is, of course, anecdotal.  This is not scientific, but there’s plenty of scientific research to back it up.  But anecdotally, every single intake visit lately that I do with a woman of color, she has a traumatic birth story to process.  And there are traumatic birth stories – you know, white women certainly have traumatic births, too, but just not nearly at the same rate.  So I’m just seeing that every day in my work, which just supports the scientific findings which is that black women are three times more likely to die during childbirth or postpartum than white women.  That’s college educated black women versus college educated white women.  I think so often people kind of point to socioeconomic factors of whatever, but we’re talking about college-educated black women versus college-educated white women.  Clearly, this is due to some discrimination that’s happening.  So we’ve got really a lot of big work to do to figure out how to fix that.  But I really see doulas as a great tool for helping with that right now.  Like, obviously we’re not going to be able to fix the embedded implicit bias in the healthcare system overnight, but if we can get people a doula who can advocate for them and can provide some of the assistance that they’re so often – the attention and assistance that they’re so often not getting from the healthcare workers, I just see that as an immediate – something we can do that will have an immediate impact on those outcomes.

Kristin:  A lot of it is that prenatal support that doulas give.  We’re there through their whole pregnancy journey, giving resources and emotional support, listening, and then giving them some questions to ask their providers.  And that is key to really feel like you have an open relationship with your provider before delivery and that you’re on the same page as far as birth plans and preferences, and a lot of women of color don’t feel like they’re heard.  They have concerns; they know their body, and they bring it up, and then in a lot of the articles I’ve read and studies, it’s been like, well, I knew something was wrong with my baby, but no one listened.  And obviously hemorrhaging; there are so many different things that can happen.  And then they have PTSD.  They get into perinatal mood disorders.  Unfortunately, that just compounds and nothing is really resolved, and then it affects the baby and affects the entire family.  So yeah, the work that you’re doing around perinatal mood disorders and listening and really with anyone, if you’re not currently pregnant and have a friend or family member who is, really listen to them.  This is the one piece of advice that I’m sure both of us would agree on.  Yes, listen to their story.  Support them and truly feel like you’re mothing the mother and don’t let her feel left behind after baby’s born and isolated, and give resources.  Reach out to organizations like MomsBloom.  Carrie, since our listeners are all over the country, how would someone find a similar nonprofit around the US?  Are there similar organizations or resources that you would recommend?

Carrie:  Yeah, there’s a handful of programs like ours.  Unfortunately, there’s not coverage in many communities, and that’s something that I really want to change.  MomsBloom is right now working with a consultant who founded an organization that has several hundred chapters, and she’s kind of teaching us how to create a bundled up little chapter model for MomsBloom that would be really easy to distribute.  So we’re hoping.  My dream, of course, is for there to be a program like this everywhere in the US, if not everywhere in the world, but there are similar programs.  The MomsBloom program was inspired by a program called Many Mothers.  There are some similar programs.  I would tell your listeners who don’t live in West Michigan to Google “postpartum support.”  The Postpartum Support International website is a great place to start.  They have chapters, I believe, in every state, and then those chapters have listed on that website a lot of the support resources available in each community.  At the very least, everyone anywhere in the United States can get support from Postpartum Support International via phone and can support in their virtual support groups.  So that is a baseline.  Everybody can do that.  And then that organization can also help you figure out what other resources might be available in your area.  In some areas, for example in Montana, they actually have peer support.  That’s what it’s kind of called in the clinical or government world, right, is peer support.  And in Montana, they have a peer support program that’s actually paid.  The people who come and visit you are paid individuals.  They’re compensated through insurance.  So these are people who have a lot of great experience, and they can come do practical things like what we do at MomsBloom, and they can also provide really in depth emotional and mental health support.  So every community has a varying level of support available, but I just encourage people, definitely start with Postpartum Support International.  Reach out to your friends and family.  Reach out to a local church.  Even if you are not religious and you don’t attend church, churches can be a great resource for people for just finding people who want to help.  Reach out to your local church, your local school.  A lot of times schools can be great places for helping get connected to people who want to help new moms.  It’s so hard to ask for help.  You know, it is so hard to ask for help.  It puts you in such a vulnerable position, but I’ve never talked to anyone who said that they regretted asking for help.  Once you do it, it is worth every ounce of discomfort that you had to experience to ask for help, and it really is the best thing for your baby, too.  It’s not selfish to ask for help.  It’s the right choice for your baby.  So yeah, I know it’s a difficult thing to do, though.  I still struggle with it.  As much as I go around and preach this to other people, I still catch myself all the time not asking for help when I need it or not remembering that my wellness is inextricably intertwined with my children’s wellness and that taking care of myself is absolutely required in order for me to take good care of my kids.

Kristin:  Absolutely.  Put the mask on yourself first before everyone else.  As far as locally to us in West Michigan, as you’ve talked about the need for volunteers and families who serve, if someone is interested in utilizing MomsBloom services and having a volunteer, how would they reach out to you?  And also if they’re interested in volunteering, how would they connect?

Carrie: Well, in both regards, we do everything through our website.  So if you go to our website, there is a form on there that you can fill out to sign up for services.  When you get to the home page, there’s a big button right there the middle of the home page that says “Sign Up Now.”  So you just click that, and then you fill out a form and just give us some of your information, and we will then get going and get the intake visit scheduled and get you set up with a volunteer.  And then if you’re interested in volunteering, same thing.  Go to the website and there is a link right at the top that says “Volunteer,” and you just click that and fill out the volunteer form.  We will be in touch about getting you signed up for our next volunteer training.  It’s really as easy as that.  You mentioned earlier that we have a waiting list.  I hate having a waiting list.  It tears apart my soul.  But I want to make sure people know, by the time this podcast is published, we likely won’t have a waiting list.  Different times of year, our volunteers sometimes will take time off, and I’m thinking around the time that this podcast is published, we’ll probably be at a time where we will actually have a lot of available volunteers.  So please don’t hesitate to reach out.  And even if we don’t have a volunteer, we can at the very least – we like to give every family an intake visit where they get a chance to review several of the resources that are available to them, have a great discussion, have a chance to process their birth story, and then we can offer them ongoing resource navigation support from our staff.  So I really encourage everybody to sign up.  Don’t hesitate.  I love it when people sign up when they’re pregnant, too.

Kristin:  That is the best, giving that notice.  That’s what I did with my kids.

Carrie:  Yes, because then we can come out and get to know you a little bit, and we have a little bit more time to find you a volunteer who hopefully can be a really excellent fit.  And then maybe you’ll even have a chance to meet that person while you’re pregnant before they come over and see you in your most vulnerable state you’ve ever been in your entire life.  I think it’s nice to break the ice with this new person before they’re coming over and you’re sleep deprived and feeling so very vulnerable.  So yeah, please don’t hesitate to reach out if you’re pregnant or postpartum.  We really want to be there for you.

Kristin:  And I’m sure you’re always welcoming any business partnerships, sponsors, and financial contributions?

Carrie:  Oh, absolutely.  Always.  If you go to our website, there’s a list of all of our sponsorship opportunities there.  Our three main ones are the BloomAwards, which I know, Kristin, you’ve attended and I think been honored.

Kristin:  Yes, Alyssa was honored, yeah.

Carrie:  Yes, Alyssa was honored.  You and Alyssa are filed in the same place in my brain, I think.  So that’s our luncheon where we award a parent of the year, a volunteer of the year.  We celebrate the whole community, all the people and the organizations that are helping us do this great work.  So that’s always an event where there’s always lots of touching stories shared.  And then we also have a spring event, which is usually held at the home of a MomsBloom donor.  It’s a little bit more intimate, and again, we have really inspiring stories shared by our families.  And then we also do a big fundraiser for Mother’s Day and encourage businesses to support us that way, too.  So there’s a lot of ways to partner up with MomsBloom in a way that I think is mutually beneficial, and we just want to keep growing our program.  We’re on pace to serve about 400 families this year, but I know we’re only scratching the surface of the needs.  So the more support we can get from the business community, the more great work we can do.

Kristin:  Yes, and you’re definitely one of our yearly charitable contributions.  We value the work you do, and thank you so much, Carrie, for coming on to chat with us.  I know you’re also on social media.  You’re on Facebook, Instagram?

Carrie:  Yes, MomsBloom is on Facebook and Instagram.  If you just put in MomsBloom, you can find us, and we post a lot about not only about what our organization is up to, but we post a lot just about awareness about the difficulty of the postpartum period and great content about how we can change our postpartum culture.  We would love to have you follow.

Kristin:  Thanks, Carrie!  Have a great day!

Carrie:  Thank you!  You too, Kristin.

Thanks for listening to Gold Coast Doulas.  Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.  If you like this podcast, please subscribe and give us a five-star review.  Thank you!  Remember, these moments are golden.

Kristin chats with Dr. Karlie Causey, co-founder of a postpartum activewear brand called Jen & Keri, a sports chiropractor and certified strength and condition coach who is passionate about providing practical tools to moms and moms-to-be, helping them restore their bodies and continue exercising after their babies are born. You can listen to this complete podcast episode on iTunes, SoundCloud, or wherever you find your podcasts.

Welcome. You’re listening to Ask the Doulas, a podcast where we talk to experts from all over the country about topics related to pregnancy, birth, postpartum, and early parenting. Let’s chat!

Kristin: Hello, hello. This is Kristin with Ask the Doulas. I am so excited to chat with Dr. Karlie Causey today. Dr. Karlie is the co-founder of a postpartum activewear brand, a sport chiropractor, and a certified strength and conditioning coach who is passionate about providing practical tools to moms and moms-to-be, helping them restore their bodies and continue exercising after their babies are born. Welcome, Dr. Karlie!

Dr. Karlie: Hi. Thank you so much for having me.

Kristin: So excited to start chatting about your company, called Jen & Keri, and also really getting into how to build foundations to stay active in the postnatal time. I know that’s a big topic for a lot of our doula clients is really getting back into fitness.

Dr. Karlie: Yes, totally. And I’m just so excited to talk about it. I love, obviously, love to talk about this topic and try to give people the helpful, practical tools as far as staying active, getting active again, especially after that baby comes and joins your world.

Kristin: Exactly. Big change.

Dr. Karlie: Yeah.

Kristin: So let’s chat about Jen & Keri. So obviously you saw a need and you filled it?

Dr. Karlie: Yeah. So after my first son – I have two boys, one who is just about three and one who is five months old. Right after my first son, I was – well, I will call it complaining. I was definitely complaining to one of my close friends and now business partner at Jen & Keri, Jess, and I was just telling her that, you know, I was really excited to get back into the gym. I have a postpartum rehab plan that I use with my patients. I’d done my plan, and I was like, okay, I’m getting back in the gym. But for me, I really felt like the nursing bras that were available were just not cutting it. I wanted something without clips, without Velcro, without the zipper. You know, all those things, while very useful, they just sort of scream nursing mom, which is wonderful, and I was so happy to be a nursing mom, but I wanted this hour where I could go to the gym or I could feel like myself, try to feel like an athlete again, and have it just be me and not focus on the baby while still being able to race home and feed my baby. So we started looking, and my friend Jess is just so good at research, and so she’s looking everywhere for me to try and help, and we couldn’t find anything. And so we sort of just started on our own, cutting up bras and seeing, what would it look like if we made it like this. And our goal was that it just would look like a regular sports bra. Yeah, and so that’s what we’ve come to now. We have a high impact sports bra that’s developed for nursing and pumping, which we also felt was really important to support moms who are pumping, as well, and give those options. And also fill that need of, you’re an athlete. You can still do these things that are important to you for your mental wellbeing, your physical wellbeing. And maybe that little bit of confidence, too, of feeling more like yourself helps you get back into the gym and helps you do some of these things that maybe you want to do and you’re feeling nervous or anxious or whatever the case might be.

Kristin: For sure. So not only are they stylish, but also functional, and as you said, it’s so important to have that normalcy and feel like your old self versus, again, thinking about your leaking breasts and all of the things and how it’s just not comfortable to get back into a workout routine.

Dr. Karlie: Yeah. And we wanted something that was really for high impact. So the bra that we have now, it’s not designed to be worn all day. It is really trying to hold the girls down so you can run, so you bike, so you can jump, do all that kind of stuff. But you can size up. I’ll often wear a size bigger and kind of wear it all day, you know. And we’re working on another one that’s more of an all day bra. But that was the need was saw that was so – I’ll use the word urgent. It felt urgent to me. And yeah, we’ve had good feedback. And the other thing that was important to us is we make it in a small to a triple XL. We really wanted to feel inclusive of all sizes and really make sure people know that it doesn’t matter your shape or size or where you are in life. You still can be an athlete. You can still do those things that you want to do and support women of every size.

Kristin: I love it. And then I saw on your website that you accept most health savings and flex spending, so that’s awesome!

Dr. Karlie: I’m a chiropractor, too, and so when we were researching, I was like, wait, you can use health savings to come see me. I bet you can use it for our bra, and turns out you can. Yeah, all you do is enter it. It’s pretty easy. Just enter is as a credit card. We felt like that was important, too, to just try to help out as much as we can. You’re buying so much stuff, you know, when you have a new baby and it just feels never ending, so that’s another piece. Okay, if we’re going to make this bra, we want to make it feel like you can wear it even after you’re done nursing. So we have some friends – it’s funny. When we were making the bra, you know, and kind of testing different models and stuff, we had some friends try it on and play beach volleyball in it, who are actually not moms, and they were sort of confused about – they just thought it was a regular bra. They didn’t know it was a nursing bra, and we were like, yes. That’s exactly what we want. We want you to not know. You don’t know you just said the right thing, you know?

Kristin: Yes. I love it. So do you ever get moms who want to use the bra in labor? I have this issue with my birth doulas clients where they prefer to wear a sports bra, but them I’m talking to them about the fact that it might need to get cut off, and you don’t want to lose that great bra that you had at one point. So have you thought about that labor time of having something that’s, again, not necessarily high impact, or do people use those bras for different reasons, whether it’s a home birth or in the hospital and just wanting to have something that’s not necessarily a nursing bra yet but give support during labor?

Dr. Karlie: Yeah, that’s so funny. I did that exact thing when I was having my first son. I had this bra, and my midwife was a really good friend of mine. She’s like, I think we need to cut this off. I was like, no, we have to save it. But yeah, we’re working on just – we call it a no-impact bra, and it’s sort of for that purpose, right? You can just, like, wear it any time. It’s just sort of holding things in place. We haven’t launched that yet, but that’s also in the works, and that would be more of a fit for that kind of thing. And I think so often women have the idea of that and then I think just end up with nothing, no bra on.

Kristin: Yep. That happens.

Dr. Karlie: So yeah, we thought of some of those things, and we’re like, okay, we have all these things we want to develop, so they’re in the works, but everything takes more time and more money than you want, so we’re working on it.

Kristin: Yes, exactly. So I’d love to hear your tips, Dr. Karlie – I know you have custom plans for your patients, but what is your advice for our listeners who are prepping for that postnatal recovery time and want to get back, whether it’s running or spinning or Pilates, whatever it might be, but to get into some sort of routine?

Dr. Karlie: Yes. Okay, great question. So there’s a couple of suggestions I always give, and one is, even if you have multiple kids, but especially if you’re a first-time mom, I always recommend to start this plan before the baby comes. Like, you know, plan out, okay, who is my pelvic floor PT going to be. Do I have a sports chiropractor? You know, all these things. Same as with, like, planning your doula, you know, you just want to have these things in place because once the baby comes, your brain is mush and life is so different, and you forget all these things that you had planned. But if you already have them set in motion, then I find women are much more successful in general after giving birth. So that’s one. Two is that I always recommend not waiting until six weeks to start something. So, obviously, that doesn’t mean you’re jumping into working out immediately after birth, but you can start with breathing exercises as early as in the hospital bed. And what we see is that during pregnancy, that diaphragm just gets so crammed up, and we really lose a lot of the endurance of it, and so even just starting some deep belly breathing and trying to see, okay, can I start to feel my transverse abdominis engage, you know, within a few days of giving birth? I have women try – the cues I like to use are, you know, you take your breath in, and then as you breathe out, you try to just lightly pull the two hip bones together in front, you know, and that will sort of start to engage that big transverse abdominis, that big flat abdominal muscle that gets so stretched out during pregnancy. It’s really important to stabilizing our core. So starting on some simple breathing exercises. I actually made – it’s called a postpartum restoration plan a few years ago, and I started using it with my patients, and it’s now available online. When COVID hit, so many people weren’t coming into the office, so I had to try to figure out a way to give people the rehab they needed when they couldn’t come and see me. And it’s an eight-week plan, and basically it just starts with breathing exercises, with bracing, with some really simple diastasis recti healing exercises and then progresses from there. So I always like to recommend that people either find a plan similar to that or they find a PT, like I said, or a postpartum exercise specialist to work with, someone that can just help, even if it’s not like a big, huge plan, someone that can give some guidance and just set them in the right direction of, here’s where you start. Where do you want to go? Let’s help you build some steps in between.

Hey, Alyssa here. I’m just popping in to tell you about our course called Becoming. Becoming A Mother is your guide to a confident pregnancy and birth all in a convenient six-week online program, from birth plans to sleep training and everything in between. You’ll gain the confidence and skills you need for a smooth transition to motherhood. You’ll get live coaching calls with Kristin and myself, a bunch of expert videos, including chiropractic care, pelvic floor physical therapy, mental health experts, breastfeeding, and much more. You’ll also get a private Facebook community with other mothers going through this at the same time as you to offer support and encouragement when you need it most. And then of course you’ll also have direct email access to me and Kristin, in addition to the live coaching calls. If you’d like to learn more about the course, you can email us at info@goldcoastdoulas.com, or check it out at www.thebecomingcourse.com. We’d love to see you there.

Kristin: And do you have a different plan for your patients who have surgical births or any other medical conditions? I’m sure it’s adapted based on the individual’s needs?

Dr. Karlie: Yes. My second son was breech, and try as we might, every single thing that you can think of, natural, medical – we tried two fail versions. The guy would just not flip.

Kristin: He was there for a reason. We just don’t know what it was.

Dr. Karlie: Totally. I know. And so I am actually really grateful for that now, as much as I didn’t want to have a C-section. I really wanted to try and have an unmedicated birth and all this stuff, but I’m so grateful for it now because I really understand both sides of the story, both the vaginal birth and C-section. So I’m working on right now actually making the modifications because I don’t think I really could have – you know, as much education as we have and as much research, until I think sometimes you go through something, then you really, really understand how to change things for people you’re helping. So I’m going through right now and making some of the modifications. Like, for example, in my just regular plan, there’s some supermans where you’re laying on your stomach trying to engage the low back muscles, which is a super important part of our core. But I could not do that for the life of me six weeks. There’s a big surgical scar. So that one is a little bit obvious, but there are some more that are not quite as obvious that I’m grateful now that I know and I realize and I’m kind of making those changes. But I’ve had a few people who’ve had C-sections just kind of work with me. They tell me that, hey, I want to do this plan, but I had a C-section or had some other – you know, a little bit more traumatic tearing, that kind of thing, and then I usually just can email back and forth with them or jump on a call and try to help them that way for now.

Kristin: That makes sense. So how can our listeners work with you to come up with a plan or download a plan? How does that work outside of a course in your online store?

Dr. Karlie: I try to post stuff on Instagram as much as possible. It’s less right now with a little baby. You know, trying to really soak in the baby snuggles and all that stuff. But yeah, my plan is available online, and then people can reach out, again, of course, on Instagram either at Jen & Keri or Dr. Karlie, and I’m always happy also to help refer. I have a lot of friends and colleagues in different states, both physical therapists and chiropractors and strength coaches who work with women, so I’m always happy to help people make connections, too.

Kristin: Wherever they live. I love that. And so I’m all on board with coming up with a plan in advance, because otherwise it just doesn’t happen, and it can be overwhelming whether it’s baby number one or baby number five. So what are your tips, Dr. Karlie, on really asking for help, whether it’s the partner or family or hired care, a nanny, to really carve out that time that is so important?

Dr. Karlie: I think there’s a few things to think about, and one is sort of knowing yourself and how you operate best. So if you’re the type of person who is used to having that hour and a half, whatever it is, three, four, five days a week that you’re working out, then maybe what’s best for you is to set aside 20 to 30 minutes to do your rehab, to work on your breathing, to really get in touch with your body again because as you know, it just feels so foreign once the baby is out. You know, now you have this whole new body that you didn’t have before. It’s not the body you had while you were pregnant. I just even personally remember feeling like, whoa, what – you know, how do I move this thing? And so just trying to figure out, okay, do I like to have time set aside for myself? If so, can I talk to my partner and plan that out? You know, and it’s not perfect, but if you make that plan, then at least you kind of set that standard, and I think explaining to your partner the importance of it and why is also really helpful. Or are you the kind of person who that’s just too overwhelming, and what would be better for you is, here’s three or four exercises. You’re going to do them in five minute increments throughout the day. And I like the term habit stacking, which comes from the book Atomic Habits, if you’ve read that. I love that book.

Kristin: Oh, yes. It’s a great book.

Dr. Karlie: But I use that with my patients a lot because – well, I always joke, don’t stack anything to brushing your teeth when you’re a new mom because you might forget and it might not happen in those first couple weeks. But every time you nurse and then, let’s say, if you hand the baby to your baby to burp them, then you do a set of breathing exercises. Or every time you go to the bathroom, you do a set of five squats. If that’s more kind of congruent with how you are most successful, then make that plan and just come up with those exercises or get on board with someone who can help you with that and then sort of make your plan that way. But I think learning about how you are going to be most successful and then building from there is best, rather than trying to squeeze yourself in some other kind of box that maybe isn’t the most successful for you.

Kristin: That makes sense. And I think again, like, some people just don’t want to ask for help, or they just – they’ve moved to a new area and don’t have it and can’t afford to hire out, so I love having those five minutes. Are there any – as far as that six-week appointment, what are the key physical activities that people need to get that permission from their OB or midwife to engage in other than, obviously, running and things like that, that are more high impact?

Dr. Karlie: Right, yeah. So that six-week appointment can just be so helpful or so useless, you know, just depending on where you are and who you see and that sort of thing. I’ve had patients where they just got no guidance. They just basically like, six weeks, you’re cleared. And I think there just has to be some more education around, like, what that means, what you’re actually cleared for, whether it’s working with someone like me or someone like you or a midwife. I don’t know. There has to be – I feel like it’s so much better when people can get a little more guidance. So what I like to tell people is, if you’re doing your breathing, you’re doing your bracing – I like people to remember that the glutes and the low back are part of the core, and the glutes are connected to the pelvic floor, right? So it’s really important to start just some light exercises that are safe, like glute bridges, you know, whether you’re holding those or kind of doing reps. Squats, even like hip hinges or good mornings with just a band, something that’s working the posterior chain. Even just walking hills is an easy one that I tell moms they can start with if they want. If they’re out walking, that’s one good one that can get the heart rate up a little bit, and that really works the posterior chain, so they’re sort of getting a two for one there, which is good, and just starting some of that basic rehab. And then after the six weeks, sort of being a little more intentional about, okay, what is it that you want to get back to? Is it weightlifting? Then we need to start off with a blank barbell and a PVC pipe and starting slow. Or is it running? We need to make sure that you can jump on one foot for a minute on both sides for a certain amount of time. That sort of thing. And just what are those things that you want to work back into, and it’s all based on the person and what their goals are.

Kristin: That makes sense. And certainly – I love that you brought up pelvic floor therapists earlier and physical therapy. So that is something that is getting brought up more and more at those six week appointments, so it’s not just doulas talking about those options, so I’m very thankful for that.

Dr. Karlie: Yeah, and it’s so funny because I think, you know, back in the day, chiropractors and physical therapists were sort of a little more at each other and didn’t work together as well in some cases, and in my world, it’s not like that at all anymore. I work really closely with a lot of great physical therapists and a lot of great pelvic floor physical therapists, and I think we can work so well together. And the thing I think is most unfortunate is that it’s not as it is in some countries sort of required, you know, as part of the postpartum birth process. In other countries, you just like straightaway see a pelvic floor physical therapist. And they can help you see, okay, are things fine and you’re progressing just normally? Are things too tight? Are things – you know, like, what’s going on? How’s the alignment of your pelvis? And so yeah, we can work together so well. So I always recommend my patients – even if they’re like, I have no problems; no leaking, no pain, no nothing. I’m great. I’m like, just go for one visit then to a pelvic floor physical therapist. Just let them do a quick check over, and let them tell you that you’re all good. You know, and in most cases, they’re so busy that if you’re good, they’ll get you out of their office. They’re not trying to keep you there, you know. So I think it’s just – it can be really helpful for people to go that route, too, and know that, like, not all those visits are internal exams. They can do external, and there’s a lot of conversation around that. They’re not just like jumping right in, you know?

Kristin: Exactly. And I’m sure as a sports chiropractor, you’re also giving referrals to pediatric chiropractors if they’re struggling with latch or colic or other issues.

Dr. Karlie: Totally, yeah. Constipation is a big one. And even birth trauma because the way that babies come out of the body is pretty traumatic, as you know. So yeah, most babies can benefit also from a check, so I work closely with those docs, too. They’re wonderful.

Kristin: Great resource. So any final tips for our listeners and doula clients?

Dr. Karlie: Yeah. I think one thing that I always like to stress is even though I say you don’t need to wait until six weeks to be doing breathing and light rehab stuff, I always make sure people know that the slower you start off, the better, as far as those bigger movements and jumping back into maybe stuff that you were doing before you were pregnant. Slow and steady wins the race, and I always just make sure I stress that. It sometimes feels so boring to do the rehab work, the breathing, this kind of stuff first, but when you build that foundation and then you slowly ease back into whatever activities it is that you love, that’s where success really comes and where you make sure that you don’t cause problems down the road that are going to inhibit you getting back to the gym and getting back to even just running around with your kids, you know? So slow and steady wins the race, and I’ve never really heard anyone say, oh, I wish I would have started running sooner. Right? But I’ve heard many people say, oh, I started running too soon and I wish I would have waited. So that’s one tip that I think is definitely worth putting out there.

Kristin: Thank you, Dr. Karlie. So outside of your website and Jen & Keri, you had mentioned, of course, Instagram, and that’s also @jenandkeri, but you’re on a couple other social media networks?

Dr. Karlie: Yeah, we’re on Facebook, too, of course. My own personal Instagram is @drkarlie. I guess we’re on TikTok, too, but I am just like – I don’t really know how TikTok works.

Kristin: Same.

Dr. Karlie: My partner does that. But we’re there, and we’re always happy – you know, if you have a question or are looking for a provider or even have some feedback, if you have the bra – we’re always looking for feedback. You know, we’re a small company, and we really created this bra to empower women. It’s our small little corner of the world to help people get back to doing what they love to do and to tell them, like, hey, our motto is every mom is an athlete, and that means a couple of things to us. It means, one, the things that you do as a mom are very athletic, so even if you don’t consider yourself an athlete, you know, you lower the baby into a crib. Well, that’s a hip hinge or a deadlift. You pick the baby’s car seat up and put it into the car. That’s a press. So just sort of honoring all the athletic things that moms do all day long. And then secondly it’s saying, you know, you can be that athlete again if you want, and we’re here to support you in doing that.

Kristin: Beautiful. Yeah, and I agree. I mean, even looking at birth, it can be an athletic event.

Dr. Karlie: Oh, my gosh, the most athletic event, arguably, right, that most of us will ever do!

Kristin: Exactly. Yeah, I compare it to training both mentally and physically the way that athletes prepare. Doing prenatal visits and supporting our clients is really getting into that mind-body connection that athletes have, so I love your slogan of every mom is an athlete. It’s beautiful.

Dr. Karlie: Thank you.

Kristin: Well, thank you so much for your time and your amazing tips, Dr. Karlie. I hope we can chat again soon. We’ll keep an eye on your updates bras as you release more options.

Dr. Karlie: Yeah, thank you. We’re very excited.

Kristin: And I will definitely share Jen & Keri with not only our doula clients but also our Becoming a Mother students.

Dr. Karlie: Awesome. Great.

Kristin: Thank you again!

Thanks for listening to Gold Coast Doulas. Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube. If you like this podcast, please subscribe and give us a five-star review. Thank you! Remember, these moments are golden.

We talk with Estelle Giraud, CEO and co-founder of Trellis Health, about navigating healthcare systems during pregnancy.  You can listen to this complete podcast episode on iTunes, SoundCloud, or wherever you find your podcasts.

Welcome.  You’re listening to Ask the Doulas, a podcast where we talk to experts from all over the country about topics related to pregnancy, birth, postpartum, and early parenting.  Let’s chat!

Kristin:  Hello, hello.  This is Kristin with Ask the Doulas, and I am so excited to chat with Estelle Giraud today.  Estelle is the co-founder of Trellis Health, which is an online platform that takes the frustration and anxiety out of coordinating and curating pre- and postnatal health.  Estelle is also a mother herself.  So navigating the healthcare system is a personal passion of hers, as well.  So welcome, Estelle!

Estelle:  Thank you so much!  It’s great to be here.

Kristin:  I would love to hear a bit about your journey as a mother and then what led you again to getting into technology in the healthcare space.

Estelle:  Yeah.  So I’ll preface this by saying that I’ve worked my entire career in healthcare in one way or another, in human health.  At the time, kind of prenatal and throughout the early part of my pregnancy, I was working for a corporate company in the medical and healthcare space, and I was really focused on precision medicine and kind of how do we make medicine better.  So it’s always been in the back of my brain, and a big part of that was focused on cancer patients and, you know, really sick – these really kind of catastrophic diseases that we face.  I didn’t think about parenthood or motherhood or really anything in that journey, and I’ll say with my motherhood journey, I am an IVF mum.  I’m really open about that.  It was not an easy or a fast IVF.  We were doing it for other reasons.  I went into thinking, I’m in my early 30s.  I have no kind of infertility issues.  This is going to be really straightforward.  I’m one of the lucky statistics.  And that obviously wasn’t the case, and we did three cycles and multiple egg retrievals.  I had a couple of pregnancies that didn’t come to term that I lost the children.  I lost the babies during pregnancy.  I mean, this is a quick sidebar.  I think I didn’t speak about these things, but as I’m speaking about them now, I realize how common this is and how quiet we stay as women generally, and I think we miss out on a lot of support for each other to just understand and be there and say, you know what, I experienced this as well.  It’s really, really hard.

Kristin:  Absolutely.  We don’t talk about it enough.  I agree.

Estelle:  We don’t talk about it enough.  So, you know, I went through this process, and then I became pregnant with my son.  And, you know, I’m sure we could talk about just what IVF looks like in terms of early pregnancy, but some of the things around injections and progesterone injections – everything was just mind blowing to me.  But then I made it into – I think I was about 20 weeks when I started to feel really kind of comfortable in that pregnancy, and I was like, oh, I can breathe out.  I’m like, it’s fine now.  I’m – you know, I’m pregnant.  It all – you know, I don’t have to – there’s nothing really that can, like, happen at this point.  And I don’t say any of this to kind of scare your listeners or anything like that.  It’s just about, you know, education.  All the different journeys that motherhood can take, and to be secure and empowered in that, in your journey.  It’s nobody else’s, but this was my journey.  And so I had a couple of months, but then I had prenatal hypertension, and I was a high risk pregnancy, so I had a lot of appointments.  I was monitoring my blood pressure.  I was monitoring all of these symptoms.  I was at risk for preeclampsia.  And I ended up getting postpartum preeclampsia.  Ended up back in the hospital, actually in the same delivery ward with the same nurse in the same room that I had my son.  The nurse was like, what are you doing?  Why are you back here?  But I was back in hospital at day seven after he was born.  So I had a newborn, and it was just – you know, the experience wasn’t what I expected all around, but one of the things that I really took away from that is how much women take responsibility for their health throughout this journey.  And as a first time mum, you know, you think that it’s all this completely standardized process, and then when you get into it, you realize that it’s not, and you have a lot of decision-making power, and you have a lot of kind of – you take responsibility for your health like you never have before, but at the same time, our medical system – everything about it isn’t really set up to support women easily and kind of, you know, take away some of that anxiety, support them in their choices, support them in understanding their health, giving them digital tools to help them manage their health.  You know, I had hypertension.  I was measuring my blood pressure three times a day.  And I had it in an Apple note in my phone so I would, you know, make note of the time and what the measurement was and take that into my doctor’s appointment every week, and I had ten minutes with the doctor.  And the question always was, you know, how are you feeling?  What should I know about?  And I’m trying to, like, communicate everything in ten minutes and be really efficient about it, make sure that I don’t miss anything.

Kristin:  Yeah, it’s not enough time at all.

Estelle:  It’s not enough time, and, you know, they want to be helpful.  They want to make sure that they’re not missing anything.  But we don’t have – you know, it’s not like 50 years ago or decades ago when we had family doctors and this kind of really supported generational care.  I’ve lived in multiple states.  I’m in Seattle now, but I moved here just a couple of years before I was pregnant, and so I’d never seen these doctors before.  They didn’t have my history.  It’s just a lot of pressure to put on a new relationship, and so to cut some of the story out but to sum it up, what I’m really committed to now with Trellis Health is this idea of, can we support women in this journey with their own personal health information, with everything about their health history and their choices and goals and give them the tools to navigate that journey with ease.  And so things like blood pressure monitoring for anybody at risk or suffering hypertension, we have a digital app.  We kind of pre-program in all the reminders that you would need to manage your health with prompts.  You can input measurements directly into the app.  And we summarize all of that into, like, a snapshot of your health that you can then take into your doctor for that appointment.  You can make note of questions that you have.  But they have all of your lab history and blood pressure readings for the last week or two weeks or however long it’s been, symptoms, kind of everything summarized in one sheet that you can both look at and kind of have a real conversation about your health in a very efficient way.

Kristin:  That’s amazing.  And I’m sure if any of our listeners are working with, say, a homebirth midwife, they could also, of course, you know, share that information regardless of who the provider is.

Estelle:  Exactly.  I’m really a strong proponent of the midwife.  I mean, anybody in that care team, and even partners, as well.  There’s support for women around their health and around pregnancy, like being able to communicate that story with people around you that are helping you manage your health.

Kristin:  I’m all about that empowerment.  We have a program at one of the hospitals in my area called the Centering for Pregnancy Model, and they do some of their own assessments and meet together weekly and really take charge of their pregnancy, and then also have that support combined in one.  So I love everything you’re doing.

Estelle:  I think it’s such – I mean, I get really riled up about this.  Like, women’s health has been overlooked.  I’m a woman in tech.  I’m building a software company.  And it took me until I was pregnant to realize the gap here.  And why in this age with all the solutions that we have is this still overlooked?  Women’s health is such an important area, and particularly around pregnancy, we have to do better.

Kristin:  Yeah.  And women are dying in childbirth.  It shouldn’t happen.

Estelle:  Exactly.  These are preventable deaths.  I’m sure you know this and I’m sure your listeners know this, as well, but the US has one of the highest maternal mortality rates in the developed world.  We’re trying to change those statistics and giving women the tools to really advocate for and communicate their own health, and everybody, like regardless of access to the top holistic, women’s health, maternal care facilities in the country, like, this should be available to every woman.

Kristin:  Right.

Hey, Alyssa here.  I’m just popping in to tell you about our course called Becoming.  Becoming A Mother is your guide to a confident pregnancy and birth all in a convenient six-week online program, from birth plans to sleep training and everything in between.  You’ll gain the confidence and skills you need for a smooth transition to motherhood.  You’ll get live coaching calls with Kristin and myself, a bunch of expert videos, including chiropractic care, pelvic floor physical therapy, mental health experts, breastfeeding, and much more.  You’ll also get a private Facebook community with other mothers going through this at the same time as you to offer support and encouragement when you need it most.  And then of course you’ll also have direct email access to me and Kristin, in addition to the live coaching calls.  If you’d like to learn more about the course, you can email us at info@goldcoastdoulas.com, or check it out at www.thebecomingcourse.com.  We’d love to see you there.

Kristin:  I totally agree, and having had preeclampsia myself and bedrest and an induction, I can totally understand, you know, that need for really understanding how you can converse with your healthcare team and really advocate for yourself early on because I was overwhelmed.  And then as you had mentioned, eclampsia after delivery and so on.  So many things get missed.  It’s not just the pregnancy complications, but as you had mentioned in your own story, it’s some of the postnatal and hemorrhaging, eclampsia.  Really being able to have that self-assessment and understand your own personal healthcare history and story.  So knowing when things might be off or wrong rather than waiting for that six-week appointment.

Estelle:  We spoke to so many women – you know, user interviews – and it was such a common theme that you – you know, for your entire pregnancy, you have so much focus on you and your health.  You know, people will give you a seat to sit down or you’ve got these appointments, in the end particularly, like every couple of days, every week.  And then the baby is born, and in a lot of cases, whether that’s a natural delivery or a C-section or whatever that looks like, it’s a huge experience.  And from a physical, emotional, mental, everything, and then you don’t have a follow up for six weeks and you’re taking care of another human around the clock.  It’s just – you know, we’re also really kind of focused on that early postpartum period.  Like, how do we check in with women?  How do we make sure they have the right tools again to easily manage their health, whether that’s pain medication or other medications that they’re on?  When I was leaving the hospital, my husband pre-programmed in my calendar all the whole schedule of all of my medications for the next two weeks.  You know, I had blood pressure medications.  I had painkillers because I had a C-section.  I had all these different things.  And I just couldn’t do it.  But he – like, I didn’t even know what time of day it was, but I would just get a ping on my phone.  It’s time to take this medication.  I’m like, oh, this is convenient.  This is helpful.  But he had to spend, you know, a couple of hours manually doing that.  I was like, why can’t we have a digital tool that helps do this for parents?

Kristin:  Yeah.  That’s amazing.  So how – you know, there are so few women in tech.  How did you make this happen?  Bring the dream to reality.

Estelle:  I’m sure we could spend a whole podcast talking about this.  I’m mission driven to found it.  Like, I couldn’t do this.  I think there’s such strength that you have if you recognize, and especially if you’ve lived through a problem yourself as a founder, and you’re like, the world needs this, and I have this skill set, and I have the experience to be able to build this.  There’s this responsible that comes with that, and it’s something that drives me to be able to do it.  When I left my corporate job and – you know, we haven’t really spoken about it, but the vision for Trellis Health is beyond pregnancy and even women.  We see it evolving into a family health platform that houses all of your family’s health records.  You know, health is such a generational thing.  And for a lot of women, post-pregnancy, you are managing the health of that child.  Women are the chief medical officers typically of their family.  You know, you’re making the decisions around healthcare or you’re in those early appointments.  You’re responsible for feeding and sleeping, a lot of these things.  And, you know, partners of course are part of that, but it’s a transition from pregnancy that often doesn’t kind of fully go away.  And so we see Trellis Health evolving into tools for women to manage the health of their children; partners on the platform, as well, and then elderly parents as they age.  You get kind of sandwiched into this health management role as a woman, and you’ve got a corporate job.  You’ve got a life.  You’ve got all of these other things that you need to be able to do with your time.  Like, let’s just make that easier and connected and build this generational resource that you can then kind of pass down to your children.  They can see your health history, risk factors, really help them manage their health for the rest of their life, as well.  This goes all the back to my genetics background.  You know, I see the generational nature of health and how we can develop a better understanding of what contributes to disease through really connected family generational information.

Kristin:  Beautiful.  And oftentimes we don’t know our own family history.  We get asked, you know, those questions at doctor visits, but we don’t always have the answers.

Estelle:  Yeah.  And so this is something that I saw when I was in my corporate job, and I see the way the medical industry is evolving, you know, indirectly, as well.  We just have a data problem in healthcare.  Your data is all over the place.  And this is not – this is such an obvious take in healthcare, but nobody has been able to fix it.  And I think part of that is missing the right value proposition for the right customer at the right time, and my experience through pregnancy made that crystal clear to me, that this is a missed opportunity for women.  And yeah, nobody was building that.  So I’ll say it’s not easy.  It’s a process.  Everything’s a process.  And we’re small.  We’re building.  I have a great team of people that are really committed to this mission with me.  I can talk about kind of what it takes as a female in tech, you know, VC-funded and the way that our funding system works and some of the biases that exist against women founders, but at the end of the day, wanting to change those statistics, as well.

Kristin:  I mean, it’s honestly just tackling two huge problems in society in one business, so I love it.  Yes, so walk me through how our listeners would be able to join the platform, how affordable is this.  I’m thinking it’s almost like having concierge medicine but in the tech space.

Estelle:  So we are in private beta right now, and I say private because we’re not – you know, this isn’t something that you’ll find on Google ads.  But we are still open, and so if any of your listeners are currently pregnant and want to be a part of our beta program, we’re offering that free of charge for two years, and so they can sign up on our website.  There’s a short form that they fill out.  We will be in touch with them, get them set up.  We’re offering a white glove onboarding for all the people who are part of our beta.  And then what I will say is the experience that we’re trying to enable is that this is as frictionless as possible.  So for anybody that maybe has thought about health records before – I regularly come across people who think they have to call their doctors and get all these faxed medical records or input in a lot of data themselves.  One of the key differences with what we’re able to build today is that we can do a lot of that completely frictionless.  So we verify people’s identity.  We have a super secure system.  We’re a HIPAA-covered entity.  So we have this security system that enables us to verify identities and then connect medical records in the back end so users don’t have to kind of do that heavy lifting themselves.  You’ve got other things that you want to do with your time right now.  And then the beta, the one ask that we have is that people would be willing to give us feedback.  We’re making this product for women and for this experience, and so any and all feedback, we’re really kind of leaning into.  So if people are really kind of passionate about this space or even just interested in and want to test it out, please get in touch.  We would love to chat with you.  In terms of moving forward, we’re priced at $99 a year.

Kristin:  Very affordable.

Estelle:  Right.  We’re still investigating, but I have a goal that we will be able to be covered under HSA and FSA accounts, as well.

Kristin:  Makes perfect sense that it should be covered.

Estelle:  Yes.

Kristin:  I love it.  So you’re also on other social media channels, correct, Estelle?

Estelle:  Yes, that’s correct.  And I am personally on – you know, we were talking about women in tech.  I want to be a voice for other women.  When I was pregnant and I was in the early days of founding Trellis Health, I was constantly looking for role models.

Kristin:  Of course.

Estelle: I would spend hours on Google.  Where is the pregnancy or founding a tech company – how do I know that I can do this?  And there wasn’t a lot of – you know, I really struggled to find examples of those women.  And so I am on Twitter.  I’m on LinkedIn.  I’d love to connect with anybody, particularly other women if they’re interested in the story.  I talk about, you know, just what it means to be a female founder and to build a company in software and being a mother at the same time.  So yeah, happy to connect with people there.

Kristin:  You are so inspiring.  Thank you for sharing your story, Estelle, and for the work you’re doing.  You’re definitely going to be changing so many lives for the better, and I will share the information about your beta with my doula clients and Becoming a Mother students, and of course, our listeners.

Estelle:  Thank you so much!

Kristin:  Thank you!

Thanks for listening to Gold Coast Doulas.  Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.  If you like this podcast, please subscribe and give us a five-star review.  Thank you!  Remember, these moments are golden.

We talk with Cara Tyrrell about using sign language with newborns, infants, and toddlers.  You can listen to this complete podcast episode on iTunes, SoundCloud, or wherever you find your podcasts. Be sure to listen to find out how to get a free download on the benefits of ASL for your little ones!

Welcome.  You’re listening to Ask the Doulas, a podcast where we talk to experts from all over the country about topics related to pregnancy, birth, postpartum, and early parenting.  Let’s chat!

Kristin:  Hello, hello!  This is Kristin with Ask the Doulas, and I am so excited to chat with Cara Tyrrell today.  Cara has a bachelor’s degree in ASL and linguistics and a master’s degree in education.  She’s a trained early childhood teacher and early years caregiver, continuing education consultant, and a parent coach.  In her preschool and kindergarten classrooms, Cara identified a pattern of underdeveloped skill sets in her students indicating a lack of overall readiness to learn.  After years of hearing parents say, “I’m so glad you’re their first teacher,” she realized she wasn’t.  The solutions to arming preschoolers and kindergarteners with comprehensive readiness skills for finding success in school started with these same parents in the family home at birth.  This led her to professionally pivot.  She left the classroom to test her earliest years methodology as a full service nanny, serving a family from the birth of their child until they entered a traditional school setting.  Years of implementing strategies, systems, and scripts confirmed her hypotheses.  All children, regardless of their birth origin or natural characteristics, can thrive as early learners in the Core4 readiness areas when parents and caregivers create the home environment with intention.  So early in the onset of the COVID pandemic, Cara felt called to bring the Core4 methodology for raising truly world-ready kids to the world to arm proactive parents with the tools they want and need to raise happy, healthy, successful kids.  Through Core4 Parenting, Cara is shifting the focus.  Parenting personal development meets early childhood education.  She coined the phrases “parenting GPS” and teaches how to write a personalized parenting mission statement as a cornerstone of the Core4 methodology serving the invisible learning years from birth to age 5.  Welcome, Cara!

Cara:  Thank you!  So glad to be here and thanks for that beautiful introduction.

Kristin:  What an amazing journey from teacher to really testing out your methodology as a nanny and creating this much-needed program during the pandemic when parents were overwhelmed and isolated.

Cara:  You know, it was like coming home for me because I started my journey to serving little people as a nanny when I was a teenager and then a young adult and moved into the teaching space and so coming back to nannying with an agenda, if you will, felt really right, and it was an amazing experience being with little people again in a different time period because clearly, it was 20 years later since I had first become a nanny.

Kristin:  That’s amazing.  So our topic today, although I think I could speak with you about so many different topics, is focused on the child’s first communication, so using sign to speak and ASL classes that you offer for newborn, infant, and toddler parents.

Cara:  Yes.  As you mentioned, I do have a degree in linguistics and in American Sign Language, so for me, this is a real passion point, and the first thing that I always want parents to understand is that communication is not language.  And language is not communication.  They are uniquely different in many ways because your baby communicates with you from the minute that they’re born.  They’re just not using words.

Kristin:  Yes.  So true.  So I know I used a bit of baby sign and took classes with my first child, and it was very helpful, especially with eating communication.  Any tips on really how to find the right program, how families can begin implementing at a very early age some of the ASL techniques?

Cara:  Yes, absolutely.  What’s important to understand is that the earlier you start, the better, but the earlier you start, the longer you will wait to see your child start to produce signs on their own.  It’s one of those “believe it to see it.”  We know our kids are going to talk someday.  We believe it.  But we know we have to wait a really long time for that to happen.  Your baby’s brain is making neurological connections, is creating those language-based pathways from birth, and you are their language source.  You are creating the dictionary from which they will pull from when they have the ability in their physiological body and brain and the muscle motor control in their tongue to start communicating back with you.  So the earlier you start, the bigger and the more complex and rich that dictionary is going to be.  So I highly recommend that parents take my Sign to Speak: The Communication Bridge Course when they’re still pregnant, and start using it immediately when their baby is born.  Obviously, not everybody finds me or my programming that early, and that’s okay, too, because the beautiful part of this is that the human body, your baby’s body, will be ready to produce signs with their hands long before they will be ready to produce words with their mouth.  Right?  Gross motor skills come first.  The moving of their arms up so that you know they want you to pick them up; the index finger pointing when they see something new so you know they want you to tell them what that object is.  These are gross motor movements with their hands and bodies that are communicating in a pre-language way.

Kristin:  And with that delay, their speech, then, as far as their first words, if they’re used to signing and getting, you know, exactly what they need through that early communication, is there any delay in speech if they’re able to express themselves through sign?

Cara:  I am so glad you asked that question because it is the top concern that parents have, and the answer is no.  There is definitely no delay.  The more language inputs, the better in those early years when their brain is developing, and actually, the answer is it helps their speech become a part of their natural life if not on time, even earlier than that typical milestone would have been reached.  And the reason is – well, I guess it’s how you use it, right?  We need to know as parents why we’re choosing to use signs with our babies.  And in my course, I break it down into three groups on purpose.  The first are basic needs, our basic survival needs.  And the next are health, hygiene, and safety signs because after you have a newborn, you now have an infant that is going to be exploring their world a little bit, and your job is to keep them healthy, safe, and clean with hygiene, and then after you have an infant, you have this pre-toddler or you have this toddler who is exploring the world even more with their bodies and now their brains, and now they have opinions and wants and needs and desires.  And so the third group of signs that we tackle in the course are those so you can start building a choice-making relationship with your child inside your home.  So not only doesn’t delay their speech, it encourages it because the arc of the course is such that I’m encouraging you to say the spoken word as you produce the sign, and when you start to see your child try that – I have this cool little video montage that shows a 10-month old signing, exclusively signing, “more.”  And then a 14-month old saying “mu-mu-mu-mu” as they sign “more,” and then an 18-month old who has completely dropped the sign and is just communicating with you.  “More, please.”

Hey, Alyssa here.  I’m just popping in to tell you about our course called Becoming.  Becoming A Mother is your guide to a confident pregnancy and birth all in a convenient six-week online program, from birth plans to sleep training and everything in between.  You’ll gain the confidence and skills you need for a smooth transition to motherhood.  You’ll get live coaching calls with Kristin and myself, a bunch of expert videos, including chiropractic care, pelvic floor physical therapy, mental health experts, breastfeeding, and much more.  You’ll also get a private Facebook community with other mothers going through this at the same time as you to offer support and encouragement when you need it most.  And then of course you’ll also have direct email access to me and Kristin, in addition to the live coaching calls.  If you’d like to learn more about the course, you can email us at info@goldcoastdoulas.com, or check it out at www.thebecomingcourse.com.  We’d love to see you there.

Kristin:  And I remember my daughter doing some of that.  So she was signing and trying to attempt her first words.  That makes complete sense.  So ideally, you would take the course during pregnancy, and then with these different stages, of course you would be able to refer and refresh your memory.  So you have that extra time during pregnancy to really absorb versus being so focused on that early parenting and postnatal recovery.  So I love that they can reference it versus taking an in-person class and then forgetting or referring to books or handouts.  Really having those videos to accompany as time goes on and our memories are short, so we can refer to that toddler stage and how to basically enhance skills that their child already has from the earlier portion of your course.

Cara:  Absolutely.  And yes, it is yours for life.  You have lifetime access.  You go in there and grab what you need when you need it.  But the only way that you’re going to know to go grab what you need is if you’ve already opened up to the awareness that this is the tool that you’re choosing to support your child’s language development as they grow.  And the other thing that makes it – what I try to do in each module, and just so you are aware and your listeners are aware, each lesson is five minutes or less.

Kristin:  Oh, wonderful.

Cara:  And you don’t even have to think about it.  When you sign up for the course, you get your introduction email, and then once a day, you get a “Here’s your lesson one” email, “Here’s your lesson two” email.  All you have to do is click, watch, and go implement it.  And I did this on purpose because as a teacher, I know that building the habit of signing, creating it as just part of the culture of your home, is what’s going to create long-term transformational results for you.  And so building a habit takes about three weeks.  My course takes three weeks.  And you get one sign a day delivered to you for 21 days in a row, and you have created a new, healthy communication habit that not only is creating the dictionary of your new baby’s brain, but it also takes some of the stress of that early communication between yourself and the other members of your household down a few notches.  And that’s my favorite thing, when I hear people say, “I feel calmer and I feel more confident knowing I’m doing something wonderful for my child.  But also, it’s really helping everybody else in the house stay connected, too.”

Kristin:  I love it.  Yeah, and if there are other children in the house, they can engage.  So it’s beautiful.  And then of course as the modules continue and questions arise, is there an interaction component that our listeners can expect?

Cara:  Yes.  So one of the things that matters to me is that they feel supported.  And what I have created is a virtual village.  It is a private online community for conscious moms raising world-ready kids, and we are all in there together.  And then inside the village is yet another group that is exclusively for people who are taking the sign language class, and in there, we can ask our questions.  I’m hopping into the group all the time.  They can get the answers that they need.  And then they can come back into the larger feed of the virtual village and be interacting with other moms who have same-aged kids.

Kristin:  Yeah, that interaction is so important.  Otherwise you can feel so isolated during pregnancy and certainly in early parenting.  So I love that there’s specific networking for the Sign to Speak students but also the larger community, since you have so many other programs for families.

Cara:  Yes.  And I recently was asked the question, when is the best time to take parenting classes, and quite honestly, the answer is while you’re still pregnant.  We know it’s so much easier to take care of your tiny growing human while they are inside you than after they have joined the world.  It’s a different skill set that’s required, and it’s so much more energy.  And so that’s why inside the virtual village is where I have the rest of the Womb to One digital course series, and parents can just work through it on their own time.  Concerned about the third trimester and it’s approaching quickly?  Eight weeks to go, here’s what you need to know is a course we offer.  Concerned about postpartum, what it’s going to look like when you get home from the hospital?  We have a course and it comes directly after the third trimester course.  What to expect when you’re done expecting.  And so what I tried to do is design these digital courses in such a way that they truly hold you where you are in your pregnancy journey all the way through until your child turns one year old because that first year can be the most overwhelming and hardest to keep perspective in as you navigate your daily life.

Kristin:  Agreed.  Yeah, it’s a similar focus that we have in the Becoming a Mother course in really getting our students to engage in early pregnancy, even though half of our course is focused on the early parenting and postnatal recovery and feeding options and so on.  It’s so much more beneficial to engage during pregnancy when you have the time, even if it’s your fourth child.  You have more time than caring for a newborn, and caring for yourself during recovery.  So I completely agree.  How can our listeners connect with you?  I know you’ve got an amazing website, but you’re also very engaged in social media?

Cara:  Yes, if you’re so looking to connect with me on social, we are @core4parenting on Instagram and the broad birth to five space.  If you’re looking to connect with me specifically about toddlers, you can find me @core4parenting on TikTok.  I have a channel there that’s specifically for pandemic moms raising toddlers now and the strategies that they need in order to feel successful in helping their kids meet their milestones.  And if you want more information why it’s so valuable to arm your child with ASL skills, I have a free download that I am so happy to offer your listeners, 5 Reasons To Use ASL Signs With Your Infants and Toddlers.

Kristin:  So helpful, Cara!  Any final tips for our listeners and what we didn’t cover as they’re preparing for their new baby?

Cara:  As they’re preparing for their new baby – well, since we’ve been talking about language, I’ll just leave them with this: knowing that there’s two different types of language, receptive and expressive, and your new baby comes into the world as a receiver.  They are going to be receiving everything from you.  The words you say, the way you hold them, the emotions you’re feeling.  It’s all being absorbed into their beautiful body and brain.  And so just know that what you have to put in, you’re going to be putting in for a long time before you see any of the expressive pieces start to come back at you.

Kristin:  I love it.  And that can be challenging for partners to not feel as bonded until baby is more expressive, so I love your final tip, especially as you’re looking at partners and fathers and knowing that the engagement will be reciprocal over time once they’re able to communicate.

Cara:  Absolutely.  And we’re often surprised by what comes back at us, and we say, how did they learn that?  Oh, wait, I didn’t realize everything I was doing was being put in this memory bank.

Kristin:  Exactly.  So lovely.  Well, thank you for your time today, Cara, and all of the work you’re doing.  I love everything about your program and can’t wait to connect with you more.

Cara:  The feeling is mutual.  Thank you for the space to share, and I look forward to hearing from you in the future.

Thanks for listening to Gold Coast Doulas.  Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.  If you like this podcast, please subscribe and give us a five-star review.  Thank you!  Remember, these moments are golden.

Kristin and English Goldsborough chat about body image during pregnancy and the importance of nutrition.  English owns The Nourishing Tree and is a functional nutritional therapy practitioner and a certified lactation counselor.  You can listen to this complete podcast episode on iTunes, SoundCloud, or wherever you find your podcasts.

Welcome.  You’re listening to Ask the Doulas, a podcast where we talk to experts from all over the country about topics related to pregnancy, birth, postpartum, and early parenting.  Let’s chat!

Kristin:  Hello.  This is Kristin with Ask the Doulas, and I’m joined today by English Goldsborough.  Welcome, English!

English:  Hi, Kristin.

Kristin:  And you are with The Nourishing Tree and a functional nutritional therapy practitioner.  So let us know what type of training you go through to – you know, I understand functional medicine, and I understand nutritionist, but this is a whole other category, so I’m really interested to hear your journey in this.

English:  You know, it’s kind of marrying those two things together.  So I went through the Nutritional Therapy Association.  It was back when we actually got to meet in person before things changed.  So now it’s all online, but we actually got to meet in person and do some body work and stuff like that.  We basically learned all about the ancestral diet, you know, how cultures ate in the past, where things kind of took a turn, not for the better, as far as the industrialization of foods, that kind of thing.  The turning food into not food, that kind of thing.  A lot about how the whole body works as a whole system and how when we put the right foods in the body, it works how we want it to.  When we feed it foods that it doesn’t realize is foods, it doesn’t necessarily work like we would want it to.  So I started there and then went on to some extra trainings after that to tie in the lab work and things like that.  But very Weston A. Price foundation type.

Kristin:  Nice.  And you’re also a certified lactation counselor, so that works very well in conjunction with the nutrition and functional medicine.

English:  Yes.  I like to tie in the whole preconception, prenatal, postpartum, lactation, the whole nine yards, right?

Kristin:  Yes, because it’s so important to focus on the food that you’re putting in your body when you’re feeding your baby.  So I really love that you combined all of that.

English:  Thank you.  I find it important.  I mean, I find that a lot of couples come to me when they’re struggling to conceive, and they say, okay, well my goal is, let’s get pregnant, and what I give them is a goal that’s so much bigger than that, you know, with affecting the child’s health long-term for their whole life.  So something that’s not talked about, I guess, a lot, but so important.

Kristin:  Yes, it’s key.  And you look at allergies and other things during the breastfeeding stage, and so working with a nutritionist like yourself if you need to cut out dairy or other foods would be very helpful.

English:  Absolutely.  Yes.  Absolutely, because there’s so much we can do, right?  You don’t have to suffer.  The baby doesn’t have to suffer.  We can really get things back on track, for sure.

Kristin:  So English, I would love to hear how – you talked about pre-conception, but when your clients are in the early phase of pregnancy, what is it like to work with you?  How are you checking in with their health and progress?

English:  Yeah, so a lot of times we will actually do some blood work, but we’re looking at it through the lens of pregnancy, right, because a lot of things change as we’re going through pregnancy.  So we definitely have to keep that in mind and not look at this bloodwork and compare it to someone who’s not going through pregnancy.  So we’ll look at that, but, you know, we’re really looking at nutrient status, you know, things that the mom is going to need, the growing baby’s going to need, that we’re going to need once we get into breastfeeding.  I think a lot of women initially come to me because perhaps they maybe lost weight before they got pregnant or they’re worried about gaining that back, so weight, I think, is at the forefront of a lot of women’s minds where they’re like, well, how can I have a healthy pregnancy without gaining unnecessary weight.  So a lot of it is working through what is actually – what your body wants to do, how we can honor that, those kinds of things.

Kristin:  Yes, that makes complete sense.  We have an online course that we launched during the pandemic called Becoming A Mother, and our first module goes into a lot about that body image and how you feel as your body’s changing, especially for women who’ve had past issues with weight fluctuation or just their overall body image in general.  And so getting on that scale for every appointment can be triggering if someone has had an eating disorder or is feeling pressured about weight gain, especially carrying multiples and so on.

English:  Yes, very triggering, and a lot of times, the body, especially in those first two trimesters, right – and I’m sure you all touch on this in your program – but the body’s just doing what it was designed to do, and it’s putting reserves away for that third trimester where in that third trimester, the baby’s going to need all those glucose stores.  So the mom then starts to burn her fat stores, so in those first two trimesters, the body’s preparing for that, and it can just feel a little unsettling if you don’t know that, if you’re not prepared for that.  It can just feel so different.  We just have to find that healthy balance where we’re not undereating and not overeating those processed foods.

Kristin:  Exactly.  So many people that pregnancy is an excuse to fulfill every craving or go get that fast food.  I tell my clients focus on eating whole foods and healthy and nourish your own body and your own baby.

English:  You are my kind of person.  I think sometimes when we utter those words, right, where we tell someone – especially when someone’s pregnant, you don’t want to offend them, so a lot of people think, oh, well, you shouldn’t tell a pregnant mother what she should or shouldn’t be eating.  You should just let her do her thing.  But it really is kind of a disservice because it’s not setting the mom or the baby up for health, and that’s not fair.

Kristin:  I love it.  I mean, it sets the foundation for everything and can really – I mean, there’s so many studies now showing that getting proper nutrition during pregnancy can prevent things like preeclampsia.  I mean, if you’re low in vitamin D3 or vitamin C and so on.  So just really focusing on your health can prevent a lot of issues.

English:  Absolutely.  I mean, our diet, our lifestyle, infections that you came into pregnancy with, stress – I mean, the stress that a mom feels during pregnancy has that – I guess it’s called stress hardiness with the baby and it teaches the baby whether stress comes and goes or whether it’s constant, that kind of thing.  And that can come in the form of diet, too.  So yes, not saying, oh, I’m 12 weeks pregnant; my baby needs a whole chocolate cake.  Hmm.  I don’t think baby is the one that wants that.

Kristin:  Exactly.  Do you ever get into what cravings mean, like if someone’s like, oh, I’m just craving, like, a Big Mac or whatever, and what certain – whether it’s savory or sweet foods, what might lead to an imbalance?

English:  Yeah, so I don’t offhand remember what each of them are, but for sure.  I mean, it goes back to an example I use with a lot of clients to where you can sit down with a bag of chips and eat the whole thing and still feel like you’re hungry, and that’s because those chips are not giving your body the nutrients that it actually wants.  So your body keeps telling you, we’re hungry, and it’s not because it’s hungry for more chips or more calories even.  It’s hungry for those nutrients that it’s not getting.  So when we really honor the body’s signals and start eating a lot of healthy fats and vegetables and fruits and meats and the things that it really does need, the hunger signals can be satiated.  So, yes.  And I think I do have a chart that I use with clients as far as, if you’re craving this, then you need maybe some magnesium, or if you’re craving this, maybe more vitamin C.  And cravings really do – once you start to eat all the whole foods and not so much the processed Frankenfoods, the cravings really start to go away.  At least in the sense of like, oh, my God, I have to have that right now kind of thing.

Kristin:  Yes, I would think so, and I’m sure you work with clients who are dealing with gestational diabetes or other forms, you know, type A and so on.

English:  Yes.  And we kind of can get into a tough position if we’ve let it go for a while, right?  So we have to set realistic expectations as far as how long it’s going to take to really get the insulin sensitivity back, but it’s never too late.  We can always make progress.  But yeah, realistic.

Hey, Alyssa here.  I’m just popping in to tell you about our course called Becoming.  Becoming A Mother is your guide to a confident pregnancy and birth all in a convenient six-week online program, from birth plans to sleep training and everything in between.  You’ll gain the confidence and skills you need for a smooth transition to motherhood.  You’ll get live coaching calls with Kristin and myself, a bunch of expert videos, including chiropractic care, pelvic floor physical therapy, mental health experts, breastfeeding, and much more.  You’ll also get a private Facebook community with other mothers going through this at the same time as you to offer support and encouragement when you need it most.  And then of course you’ll also have direct email access to me and Kristin, in addition to the live coaching calls.  If you’d like to learn more about the course, you can email us at info@goldcoastdoulas.com, or check it out at www.thebecomingcourse.com.  We’d love to see you there.

Kristin:  As you’re working with clients and they’re preparing for the postnatal phase, what are your top tips for simplifying meals, making things easy again, avoiding processed foods, as they’re in the nesting stage and doing all of the baby prep?

English:  Yes.  So one, leaning on the people around you, I find to be super helpful.  Not that a woman can’t do it on her own, but I think a lot of times we as women put all that pressure on ourselves to get it all done, right?  So we are going to birth.  We are going to breastfeed.  We are going to make our own meals and clean the house and do the dishes, and we don’t have to do those things.  We can ask for help, and we should get help, and that’s fine.  And then as far as meals and stuff go, smoothies have always been really helpful.  Things that super simple, like picking a meat; picking a vegetable; pick a fat.  It doesn’t have to be these complicated meals.  Sipping on bone broth throughout the day.  Adding avocados to things, those healthy fats that are really going to help nourish the body are really helpful.

Kristin:  And I always say focus on hydration with breastfeeding moms and snacks throughout the day and don’t limit it to those three meals because then you need to build up your milk supply.

English:  Yes.  You need more calories during the breastfeeding phase than you did during the prenatal phase, right, while you were growing the baby, and society tells us, okay, well, right after you have that baby, you should go back and be back to your prebaby weight.  That’s not – yeah, that’s not – that’s not what we want to do.  That is not honoring our body and our baby, and society just sends us those terrible signals with that.  Because I do have a lot of women that are like, well, I’m X amount of weeks out of pregnancy, you know, since delivery.  Why is the weight not coming off?  And then we have to have that discussion of, that’s because your body doesn’t want the weight to come off.  It needs that weight.  It’s there for a purpose.  So let’s continue eating what we should because depriving our body of the nutrients that it needs is really just going to backfire in the end, anyway.  So it’s there for a reason, and we can work on it later, but forcing your body to lose weight is never going to be the answer, anyway.

Kristin:  Yeah, just to get back into those jeans when you’re not supposed to be working out initially.  You’re healing.  You’re supposed to be resting and bonding with baby.  Yes, but there is – you’re so right, English.  There’s just way too much pressure on women to get back to work, get back to keeping the household, to look a certain way.  And it’s just – we need to give ourselves a break and like you said, ask for support.  I mean, our postpartum doulas, we can do some light meal preparation, get snacks and household things so you can really again focus on rest and bonding.  We offer feeding support.  There are so many other services you can look into, but that’s just one.  You know, hiring a housekeeper is helpful.

English:  I saw a meme that kind of just stuck with me – or we can call it a meme, I guess – that it was like all your friends come over to see you after you have your baby, and they all want to hold the baby, right, but really what we as friends should be doing is doing some housework for the new mom.  Let the mom spend the time with her new baby, and we can help pick up the slack around the house.  And that kind of stuck with me.  We go see this new baby and we want to love on the new baby, but that’s not what we should be doing.  We should be more that tribe that supports the new mom and helps her around the house instead.

Kristin:  Exactly.  Traditional cultures, it’s all about caring for the mother, and of course, helping with newborn care, but really nourishing her and allowing her to heal.  Like looking at Malaysian cultures and, again, other traditional focus on the first 40 days as being a primary time for rest and bonding and nutrition.  If only it were like that here!

English:  I know.  It’s just interesting, the pressures that we put on ourselves, I guess, you know, because you see it around whether it’s a movie or just societal or what have you, the perfect way that you should be.  And it’s just – that’s not real.  It shouldn’t be, anyway.

Kristin:  Yeah, and then like you said, friends asking how you can help, and I find as a birth doula one of the most important things that a friend can do is really ask how you’re doing and allow the sharing of the birth story or whatever is going on or just talking about the changes of being a new mom or having yet another baby and really hearing the woman out versus talking about how cute the baby is.  It’s like there’s so much focus on that new baby, and then the mother can sometimes feel lost.

English:  Yes.  Right?  And there’s not much education – and I’m sure there is, you know, if you’re a doula, right, which is why it’s so important, but if somebody doesn’t have that resource, there’s not much education that goes into how the postpartum period is going to go.  So there’s probably a lot of surprises, and you’re just not sure how to navigate that.  You might feel alone.  You might feel like you’re weird, that nobody else went through this because nobody else talked about it.  So there’s almost a little bit of suffering on your own.  There doesn’t need to be.

Kristin:  Exactly.  The same applies for us.  We love to walk with clients from the moment they conceive through the first year of a child’s life, but if someone has had their baby and they want to reach out to work with you, what does that look like?

English:  Like I said, it’s not like it’s ever too late because those first 1000 days, that critical 1000 from conception to age three is so important for shaping the epigenetics of the baby for the rest of their life.  So we can work through that.  We can work through mom’s health.  You know, even if you didn’t necessarily prepare pre-conception, that doesn’t mean after, we can’t work on those things, especially because pregnancy tends to steal those nutrient stores.  We just kind of work on your realistic goals, right, like if we’re breastfeeding, there’s a lot of things that we’re going to put on hold until that’s finished, which the breastfeeding is going to be more important, right, and that’s fine.  But just getting those minerals back, those nutrients back, working on resting where we can, stress management, adjusting to new life.

Kristin:  Do you have a different focus with twins and triplets as far as working on a plan than you would if someone were pregnant or newly postpartum with one baby?

English:  Yeah, I actually have only gotten to work with one female who had twins.  So that’s not a huge experience that I’ve had.  Now, I will say I have twin sisters, so my mom had twins, and it was baby five and six for her, and I can tell you, she was super nutrient depleted.

Kristin:  I’m sure, yes.  And there weren’t any resources.

English:  Yeah.  Had I had this education now – I mean, I was young at the time.  I didn’t have it.  But so many things I would go back and be like, oh, mom, you really need to work on this because you grew two whole humans.  Or in the case of triplets, three whole humans.

Kristin:  Exactly, and if they continued to breastfeed, then they’re even more depleted than feeding one baby.  So yeah, and obviously, you customize to whatever the needs are: health issues, dietary issues, celiac, and so on.

English:  Yes.  And I did hear that breastfeeding actually cuts the risk of celiac in the babies down, like, some odd 57% or something like that.

Kristin:  Wow, I had not heard that.  That’s amazing.

English:  There’s not much research on it yet, and there’s even less research on how the genetics and the health of the babies changed just in birth, whether it’s vaginal birth, C-section birth, what drugs are used, not used, that kind of thing.  But the breastfeeding – yeah, it cuts down a lot of celiac, IBS, that kind of thing.  Kind of magical, really.

Kristin:  That is amazing.  So any final tips for our listeners as far as focusing, whether it’s body image or anything we discussed?  I’d love to hear your top takeaways.

English:  I think the main thing that I would like to remind everybody is that pregnancy and postpartum is such a tender time, and you use so many resources, and it’s just so beautiful, that we all really just need to cut ourselves not necessarily slack but give ourselves grace, I guess, is how I would say it, and just honor the fact that the body knows what it needs to do.  So fighting it isn’t necessarily what we need to do.  Honoring the ebb and the flow of gaining some weight and that is okay.  It’s going to get us farther in the long run.

Kristin:  Perfect.  Yes.  100% agree.  So English, how can our listeners and our clients connect with you, and what virtual options do you have if our listeners are not located in Kentucky?

English:  They can find me at my website.  My Instagram is @nourishingtreelou.  There is a link on there where they can schedule a complementary consultation.  So we can really just sit down and discuss what stage of life you’re in, what your goals are, that kind of thing.  But everything is really Zoom now.

Kristin:  Yes.

English:  It makes it super easy, right?  And it’s a little different because you don’t get that face to face interaction, but it’s super convenient for anybody anywhere, really across the world, right?

Kristin:  Yeah, you can help anyone in the world now.

English:  Yes.  It is – it’s cool.  It’s definitely a different vision that I had kind of going into business, but I like it, and it works.

Kristin:  Same.  With us, we’ve changed.  We’ve had to pivot.  Many of our classes are virtual, and we’re just going back to some in person and created a course due to the pandemic.  I love being able to reach people outside of our footprint in Michigan.

English:  Yes.  And it’s so different than 20 years ago when people had a business.  It’s cool.

Kristin:  Exactly.  So what’s next for you?

English:  Oh, wow.  Well, in personal life, we’re actually headed – we’re going to try out a couple different cities.  Now that everything is virtual, we’re going to kind of “live” in different cities for a month at a time.  I call it “virtual virtual” because I already see everybody virtually, so it’s just a little bit farther away, maybe, each time.  So we’ll be doing that.  Just kind of continue seeing clients one on one, eventually get back into some group work with some couples.  That’s kind of what’s on my plans.  I’m always open to whatever the world throws at me.

Kristin:  Awesome.  Well, maybe a book will come your way.

English:  That’s really not my strong suit.  I’ve heard that’s a lot of work.

Kristin:  Yes.  We are in the process, so it is a lot of work.

English:  I was going to say your yes sounded like a yes from personal experience.  It’s probably so worth it, but I have heard it is quite the beast to take on.

Kristin:  Yeah.  There’s so many ways to reach people with social media.  I love it.  Well, thanks so much for your time, English!  It was so good to get to know you, and I love all of your tips.

English:  I appreciate you having me on!  This is a joy.  Thank you.

Kristin:  Thanks.  Have a great day!

Thanks for listening to Gold Coast Doulas.  Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.  If you like this podcast, please subscribe and give us a five-star review.  Thank you!  Remember, these moments are golden.

We chat with Jodi Klaristenfeld, founder of FLRRiSH, about navigating the NICU and supporting moms of preemies.  You can listen to this complete podcast episode on iTunes, SoundCloud, or wherever you find your podcasts.

Welcome.  You’re listening to Ask the Doulas, a podcast where we talk to experts from all over the country about topics related to pregnancy, birth, postpartum, and early parenting.  Let’s chat!

Kristin:  Hello, hello.  This is Kristin with Ask the Doulas, and I am here today to chat with Jodi Klaristenfeld.  Jodi is a preemie mom who understands what it means to be a NICU parent.  She created FLRRiSH as a result of her own personal experiences and stresses as a preemie mom.  Welcome, Jodi!

Jodi:  Thank you, Kristin!  It’s so nice to be here on your podcast and spread the word about preemie awareness for families and just overall parental wellness and mental health wellness.

Kristin:  Thank you for sharing your story.  I would love to start from the beginning with your pregnancy journey and also chat a bit about your postpartum experience as a preemie mom.

Jodi:  Sure.  I had a relatively easy pregnancy for the first 28 weeks, and the next four days were quite difficult.  I was so sick, actually, that when I was in the hospital with my mom, my OB said to my mom, if I have to choose, who do I choose?  That’s how dire of a situation and how quickly my easy pregnancy turned, you know, not so easy.  I had what’s called HELLP syndrome where your body organs start to shut down and you reject, actually, the pregnancy, and it’s best described as the, I’ll say, severe and often deadly form of preeclampsia.  My blood pressure was 190/160.  My platelets were extremely low.  They were giving me platelets, actually, as they were delivering my daughter, and at the same time, they weren’t sure whether they would be able to do a simple C-section or whether I would need a hysterectomy or anything like that.  Thankfully, I did not need a hysterectomy, and thankfully, we’re here today and my daughter’s doing great and I’m doing great.  It just took a while.  I didn’t get to meet my daughter for three days because I was hallucinating from the medicine to help with the blood pressure situation and all the other ailments related to HELLP syndrome.  But at the same time, I was also in no mental condition, either, to see her, as well.  On top of that, my husband happened to have been in Europe because, you know, she was born 12 weeks early.  This was his last business trip he was going to take.  Fortunately, my mom was in town because we were going to do some layette stuff.  You know, pick out some cute outfits and things like that.  But little did we both know that I would be checking into the hospital for an 11-day stay instead, and my daughter for a 77-day stay.

Kristin:  So what was it like to meet your daughter for the first time after you’re getting off the meds and you’ve gone through the stress of labor and early labor?  What was that moment like?

Jodi:  Well, I didn’t have a labor.  I was an emergency C-section.  They completely knocked me out.  That’s how dire of a situation it was.  And insofar as I was still in the labor and delivery room right next to the OR room for three days until I moved to the room closest to the NICU on the opposite side of the floor.  I was that case that the entire floor knew who I was, and I couldn’t quite figure out why.  But when I went to go visit my daughter, I don’t remember much, and that really upsets me to no end, I think because myself, I was still so sick and fragile, and I didn’t know what I was going to see, either.  But I remember that I wanted to take a wheelchair into the NICU, and my husband was like, no.  You can walk.  You can do this.  He goes, I will push the wheelchair behind you or I’ll get a nurse to push the wheelchair, but you are not – because he’s like, I know you can walk the steps now.  And it was probably maybe 10 or 15 steps, so we’re not talking a great distance, but after having had a C-section, first of all, you know.

Kristin:  Major surgery, yes.

Jodi:  Yes, and also just the overall, you know, trauma to my body.  I was just really scared.  But, you know, and I remember seeing her name on her isolette and just crying and my husband saying to me when I got over to the side of the basinet where I could see her better – he goes, “Well, does she look like a Jenna?”  And I’m like, of course she looks like a Jenna!  I just can’t remember much after that.  I think I was just overcome with emotion and so happy to see her and meet her, yet so scared and terrified at the same time.

Kristin:  So how long was she in the NICU, and how many days did you stay in the hospital before going home and navigating the back and forth?

Jodi:  I was in the hospital 11 days, and she was in the NICU 77 days.  It was the weirdest feeling to me to leave the hospital without my daughter.  I couldn’t understand it.  I knew she was in the place where she needed to be to get the care in order to help her survive and grow, but at the same time, I think when most women, myself included, unless you have a history or someone in your family, maybe, that’s gone through something similar, you don’t think that when you’re going to go have a baby that you’re not going to leave the hospital with your child.  You think, oh, I’ll be in the hospital two, three days, you know, assuming everything’s fine, come home with the baby.  And that was not the case by any stretch of the imagination.  So it was a very confusing, you know, time.  I wanted to stay in the hospital, but I wanted to get some fresh air.  I didn’t want to leave my daughter.  And I was also told still because my blood pressure was high that – and this was January.  She was due in April, and she was born in January.  And we live in New York, so I was told if the weather – the temperature got below a certain – like, freezing, I wasn’t allowed outside and I couldn’t go and visit her because it’s a lot more strain on your heart and your body to do work when it’s so cold out.  And they didn’t want me to elevate my blood pressure any more than it already was.

Kristin:  Makes perfect sense, yes.

Jodi:  Yes.  But there were some days like that, and in that first week I was home, there was, I think, two days like that.  And I remember feeling like I was the worst mother.  I already felt like I was the worst mother, you know, that somehow I did this to her.  I caused this.  And then I was thinking to myself, well, all the NICU doctors and nurses are going to think even worse of me because I’m not visiting my child and doing kangaroo care and holding her for hours.  I’m just leaving her there.  But as I got stronger, too, those – you know, that was lifted in terms of the temperature because I got stronger and I got better.  But at first, you know, I had to listen to what all the doctors said.

Kristin:  Of course.  So you’re trying to focus on your own recovery and then, you know, worried about Jenna and her recovery.

Jodi:  Yes.  And just – you know, it’s a feeling, and I say this to people kind of like when you’re trying to get pregnant.  It’s kind of like you have no control.  You can do things to put yourself in the best position to help yourself and help – you know, help your child at this point, but basically, right, there is no reading of a manual.  There’s no spreadsheeting.  There’s no nothing, really, that can help with the process.  Jenna just needed time like all NICU babies.  They just need time to eat, sleep, and grow.  And it sounds so trite to say it that way, but it’s the truth.  You know, they told us to figure she would come home around her due date, and I remember saying to my husband, like, but she’s not due for such a long time.  I don’t understand.  And sure enough, she came home three days before her due date.  I mean, they were right about everything.  And I will say this: special shoutout to all the doctors and nurses in the NICUs, and also my OB.  They’re lifesavers and angels and heroes.  They are people of a personality that is like no other.  The patience to deal with parents in such a stressful situation and to be able to calm the parents down and take care of the children at the same time and provide, you know, some comfort and instruction is amazing.  It’s a special person.

Kristin:  I completely agree.  My daughter was only in the NICU for four days, but they are very special, and I felt so comforted when I left the hospital with my daughter still in the NICU.  But I couldn’t imagine, you know, having a much more extended time period to again go back and forth and communicate.  So what obstacles did Jenna face as she is growing?

Jodi:  When she was first born, and this is what I tell people all the time: do not Google, for this very reason.  There were a host of things.  She had a premature retina of the eye.  She had a hemangioma on top of her head.  She had really bad gas, like reflux, to the point where some days her belly looked like the biggest part of her body.  And she had ASD, also known as atrial septal defect, so that is a hole in the middle chamber of your heart so the blood flows both ways between the left side and the right side.  So of course I took it upon myself to Google what exactly that was, and I went down a rabbit hole.  It was not good, and I told my husband after that I would not Google, and to this day, I still haven’t.  But thankfully by the time she was 18 months old, the hole had closed up, so they did not have to do surgery.  And it was during COVID when – the height of COVID when we had this appointment, and I remember saying to the doctor, like, I really want to hug you right now.  I know I can’t, but I was just – it was like raining down my face because I was just so, so happy to – yeah, and we had to see specialists for her acid reflux.  She had to have an upper GI while she was in the NICU just to rule out, you know, that there wasn’t any type of blockage or something, and it turns out that she needed this special formula to supplement my breastmilk, so with many of the NICU babies, on top of the moms pumping, because you can’t nurse, they add formula to it to help them gain weight and get necessary nutrients.  And it took four different ones to finally find one that worked and her gas, like, went away.

Kristin:  Amazing.

Hey, Alyssa here.  I’m just popping in to tell you about our course called Becoming.  Becoming A Mother is your guide to a confident pregnancy and birth all in a convenient six-week online program, from birth plans to sleep training and everything in between.  You’ll gain the confidence and skills you need for a smooth transition to motherhood.  You’ll get live coaching calls with Kristin and myself, a bunch of expert videos, including chiropractic care, pelvic floor physical therapy, mental health experts, breastfeeding, and much more.  You’ll also get a private Facebook community with other mothers going through this at the same time as you to offer support and encouragement when you need it most.  And then of course you’ll also have direct email access to me and Kristin, in addition to the live coaching calls.  If you’d like to learn more about the course, you can email us at info@goldcoastdoulas.com, or check it out at www.thebecomingcourse.com.  We’d love to see you there.

Kristin:  This was all new to you, obviously, like the terms, and you said that you hadn’t had relatives or friends really navigate this, so it’s a whole new experience.

Jodi:  Yes.  I mean, daily it was a whole new experience.  I was very fortunate in that I was able to be at the NICU every day or at least every day, like I said, except for those beginning days.  And I made sure I was there for rounds in the morning so that I could understand or try and understand what was going on, what they were looking for or not looking for, and ask a million questions of all the doctors because at that point, aside from, like, the specialists, like the pediatric cardiologist or the pediatric ophthalmologist, all the other specialists did the rounds at each of the isolettes, so you can ask a million questions, you know, if you wanted to.  And so I took it upon myself to learn as much as I could because, you know, to your point, there is so many terms, and they use a lot of acronyms, understandably so.  That’s their vernacular, that I couldn’t begin to understand.  And I would write them down in a journal because when they would do the rounds, they would hold the baby.  I wasn’t holding the baby.  So I could write things down, and then I’d ask afterwards, oh, what does this mean?  What does that mean?

Kristin:  And I know you’ve got a download of those terms, which is so helpful, from your website.

Jodi:  Yes.  You know, I tried to make everything actually in laymen’s terms.  I think that’s so important.  Yes, you can ask all the questions you want, but you still also then have to remember that or write it down or something.  So for me, I thought it was helpful to help other parents by providing all of the terms but in regular, general vernacular, not so technical that it would be difficult to understand.  And, you know, I just felt so strongly that I knew I wasn’t the only other mother out there in the world experiencing what I was experiencing and that I knew I somehow had to turn this experience into lemonade, as they like to say.

Kristin:  It’s beautiful.  So tell us a bit more about the programs you run at FLRRiSH and how moms – say they’re on bedrest and they’re anticipating, or they’re expecting twins, triplets, and want to get ahead of the challenges the NICU may bring versus someone who may not, you know, have that awareness that the NICU is part of their journey.

Jodi:  Right.  I think the thing is, even if you are on bedrest and you have that awareness, it’s still overwhelming in and of itself.  You know, I think it’s important to note that, again, even if you have twins or triplets, chances are they won’t be full term and they will have somewhat of a stay in the NICU.  And it’s okay to feel overwhelmed.  It’s okay to feel upset and sad and frustrated.  I always tell people that’s the most important thing.  Allow yourself to feel before trying to learn anything.

Kristin:  Yeah, you almost have to grieve what you envisioned your birth to be like.  I know I had preeclampsia, and as I am in my room without my baby, my first child, and the photographer’s coming in and lactation and I’m getting all of these visitors and there’s not a baby with me – she’s in the NICU.  There is a bit of that grieving, you know, as you’re turning people away, like no, I don’t need photos right now.

Jodi:  Right.  Or, like, I don’t have the footprints, right, that are on a lot of parents’ birth certificates or whatever.  Obviously, that was not important for my daughter’s situation.  So, yes, you’re absolutely right.  You have to mourn that.  And it does take some time.  I want to be clear, and I just want everyone to know that, that it does take time.  It’s not like, oh, okay, this isn’t going to happen for me, and then I’m going to be fine.  You know, you really just have to allow yourself – because once you allow yourself and you can process, then you can move forward.  As with anything in life, right?  Once you deal with something, you’re like, okay, this is what has to be.  You can move forward.  So in FLRRiSH, I wanted to create that for other parents out there.  I know I say moms most of the time, but it’s for moms and dads.  It’s just that dads don’t ask for help, really, the way moms do.  And I also think the particular part about mom guilt or feeling like your body somehow betrayed you and that in turn you betrayed your child is only owned by the mother and that dads cannot relate to that.  But yes, so FLRRiSH offers – first and foremost, there are audio courses.  So there are little stories – right now, they’re only stories of mine.  I’d love to get stories from other women such as yourself, and they’re three to five minute stories, short vignettes, that I envision someone doing kangaroo care, listening to their ear pods while holding their baby on their chest.  Just about, you know, little experiences that I had; good things; some not so great things, how I overcame them, or what certain things mean or how to best help yourself and also become aware of the other parents around you.  Because I say this – one of my closest friends now is one of the moms that I met in the NICU, right, because you’re going through something similar that most people don’t go through, right?  So at least you can have each other, and therein was the crux of FLRRiSH because she and I could talk to each other, but I didn’t know really anyone else outside of that or even who had been through it, right?  So I created these stories in hopes that parents will listen and feel they’re not alone.  They’re not unsupported.  The doctors and the nurses, rightfully so, take care of the baby, but the parents are also left to process their own trauma.  Plenty of parents have PTSD afterwards or, you know, go through their own traumatizing experiences.  They might have to go through EMDR therapy depending upon the situation.  And I felt that if I could just provide some calmness and a voice of reason from a parent perspective, not from a clinical perspective, not any medical advice, but just to be like, hey, I’ve been in the trenches.  I’ve been in the thick of it just like you have.  And you will get through this, and you’re stronger than you know, and your baby is stronger than you know.  So that was important to me to help parents that way while they were actually physically in the NICU.  And on top of that, there are also resources that I have broken down state by state, county by county, where people can find out about early intervention or early start, any of those government programs, because as you know, it’s pivotal to get your child evaluated right away for those services.

Kristin:  Absolutely.

Jodi:  And how to go about doing that in your state and where to go, who’s a provider.  You know, where I live, I was given a whole bunch of information, and I share this story in the course, and the woman said to me, well, I have 30 days to file all of your paperwork, and I’m like, well, just because you have 30 days doesn’t mean you’re going to take 30 days?  She’s like, oh, yes, I can, and I said, no, no, you won’t.  You haven’t me.  Like, this is my child’s growth and development.  It’s my child’s life.  I’m not waiting any longer than I have to.  You know?

Kristin:  Good for you.

Jodi:  So just empowering parents as well and teaching them that they are their child’s advocate.  Their kid obviously doesn’t have a voice just yet, so they have to do the talking for them.  And there’s nothing wrong with being pushy and bossy.  This is your child’s future and well-being, and you just want to set them up for success.  So there’s that piece, and then there’s also one-on-one coaching, I guess, with me, if you want to call it coaching.  I currently talk to about six moms, and I have to say, I find it so rewarding just to hear them say, “Jodi, thank you.  You make me enjoy being a mother.  You understand this situation, and I’m not going crazy.”  To hear that is so rewarding because I know for myself, I wish I heard that.  And so that makes me believe that I’ve created what I wanted to create, right?  That place where parents can go to feel like they’re supported, educated, empowered, and most of all, feel like they’re not alone.

Kristin:  Beautiful.  Yeah, it’s so needed in this world.  I wasn’t aware of resources or courses and programs similar to yours.  So I was thrilled to connect.

Jodi:  You know, I just want to say, with respect to doulas caring for the moms, you know, there’s so much help and so much compassion that doulas have.  It’s another compassionate person who can help moms out through this process, you know, in a different way.  Helping them with their mild production, and even just telling them, you know what?  Kangaroo care is great.  It helps stimulate milk production.

Kristin:  Yes, skin to skin.

Jodi:  I actually loved it.  It was so funny.  My husband and I both tried to do it once we were home from the NICU because we both in a way loved it.  It was kind of special and magical in its own way because I feel like I got to bond with my daughter in a way that I never would have, and I got to experience so many things, you know, that I wouldn’t have otherwise.  And, you know, we tried to both do it at home, and we’re like, yeah, no, not the same.  But, you know, I think also, too, I will say this: my husband was instrumental, and this is where a doula or more of a lactation specialist, too, could have helped, but especially a doula if I had one.  I didn’t even want to start pumping.  I was just so sick, and I was like, no, I can do it.  I can do it.  And my daughter had donor milk at first.  She was not allowed to have my milk because of the magnesium.  So we had to wait anyway.  But I ended up – but my husband found not – there wasn’t – like, the lactation specialist and I didn’t, I’ll say, click in the hospital.  But he found one of the nurses who had recently given birth, and he’s like, you have to talk to my wife.  You have to talk to my wife.  And this is where a doula would totally come in, right?  And I ended up producing so much milk that even after I stopped pumping when Jenna was ten months old, she still had three months’ worth of milk.

Kristin:  That’s amazing.

Jodi:  They say not to keep it more than two months, and I knew I had too much, so I donated my milk.

Kristin:  Full circle.

Jodi:  Not every place would take it because I was on blood pressure medicine for a while, and I guess they didn’t want to necessarily, I guess, give that to other babies, but I found a place that would take it because I felt like I can’t throw this out.  This is like – what do they call it, liquid gold, right?

Kristin:  Exactly.  Yeah, other babies need it.  So I love that you donated, but yeah, some milk banks do have very strict rules, of course.  I’m glad you found a place to donate, and I’m sure the family was so overjoyed, as you were when you received donor milk.

Jodi:  Yeah.  Again, it’s one of those things you don’t think about.  Like, I thought of, okay, blood transfusions, right, but you don’t think about milk coming from somewhere else.  Or at least I didn’t.  And so yes, I was happy to be able to, and like I said, the woman – the nurse helped me so much.  And one thing I did learn, which I thought – I’m kind of small chested, so I thought, oh, no way am I ever going to make a lot of milk.  I made more milk than I – like, I was like a milk machine.  It was kind of funny.  My husband was like, where is all this coming from?  But yes, and I think in that case, especially for me, it would have been so helpful for someone to say to me, you know, just do this.  It’s going to be okay.  Your baby will have – there’s so much going on.  It’s just an added layer of support for women that is much needed.

Kristin:  Exactly.  So how do our listeners and doula clients connect with FLRRiSH?  I know you’re on several social media channels as well as your website.

Jodi:  Yes.  So our full-on website with all the audio and all the resources will be ready by the next month.  We had a few delays.  But until then, they can find me on Instagram @flrrish.  And our website is the same.  They can email me at hello@flrrish.com.  Or through LinkedIn.  I’m always happy to talk to anybody.  You know, any way I can help someone.  You understand.  You’re in the same place, right?

Kristin:  Of course, yes.

Jodi:  You just want to make someone’s journey better than your own.

Kristin:  Exactly.  Sharing wisdom and being a listening ear.  I love that you brought this program into the world.  Thank you very much for sharing your story and your journey.  If you have any final tips for our listeners, Jodi, I would love to hear any last NICU navigation tips.

Jodi:  Yes.  I would just say, please don’t be hard on yourself.  You know, I think as moms, first of all, we think that we have to have all the answers right away, and that is not true.  And don’t be hard on yourself, especially if you don’t bond with your baby right away.  It takes time, and especially if you have given birth early, you have to process for yourself what happened to you before you can be there for your child, and there’s nothing wrong with that.  You know, even in full term babies, there’s a large percentage, something like 18-22% of people that don’t feel instantly bonded to their child.  So know that that is okay.  And to just allow yourself to feel.  You know, there’s a whole host of emotions, and even when someone says something to you that might not be appropriate who’s a good friend, you know, they’re just trying their best to be there for you, and people just say things that, you know, when they can’t think of something else, sometimes something not appropriate comes out.  And just know in your heart that your friends really love you and they just really want to be there for you.  And also, I would say lastly, you’re not alone.  10% of moms go through this every single year.  There’s a whole bunch of us out there, and that’s why FLRRiSH, that’s why Gold Coast Doulas, that’s why there’s so many organizations out there to help you.  You are not alone.

Kristin:  Love it.  Thank you so much, Jodi!  Really appreciate the time today.

Jodi:  Thank you!  I had a great time.

Thanks for listening to Gold Coast Doulas.  Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.  If you like this podcast, please subscribe and give us a five-star review.  Thank you!  Remember, these moments are golden.

Kristin interviews Sarah Ann Kelly.  Sarah Ann is the owner and founder of MomTrainer.  Sarah Ann shares prenatal and postnatal fitness tips and suggests ways to create intentional time for working out.  Sarah Ann is also giving 50% off with the discount code GoldCoastDoulas!

Welcome.  You’re listening to Ask the Doulas, a podcast where we talk to experts from all over the country about topics related to pregnancy, birth, postpartum, and early parenting.  Let’s chat!

Kristin:  Hello, hello.  This is Kristin with Ask the Doulas and owner of Gold Coast Doulas.  I’m here to chat today with Sarah Ann Kelly.  Sarah Ann is a trainer.  Her focus is on helping busy women get and stay in the best shape of their lives during and after pregnancy.  Sarah Ann has a fantastic background that we’ll get into, but she is certified as a pregnancy and postnatal trainer from ACOG.  I’m thrilled to have you here, Sarah Ann!  Welcome!

Sarah Ann:  Hi!  Thank you so much for having me!

Kristin:  I’d love to chat more – you have so many certifications – about your specialties and how you support women in the prenatal and postnatal fitness realm.

Sarah Ann:  Sure!  So I’m certified through ACOG, so the American Council of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.  I got certified back in 2007, and I’ve been working with prenatal and postpartum women ever since and teaching all different kinds of group fitness classes from Pilates to boot camp.  I have two little kiddos of my own, too.  They’re like my own little certifications, good Lord.

Kristin:  Yes, having gone through it yourself.  You started your journey as a trainer in New York, correct?

Sarah Ann:  Yes.

Kristin:  And now you’re in West Michigan.  Big change!

Sarah Ann:  I know.  We’ve moved around quite a bit, especially in the pandemic, but we were like, where can we go where we have help?  My kids are 3 and 5 now.  They’re 19 months apart, and surviving that two under two was just a lot.  If you can avoid it, I don’t recommend it.  It was a lot of work.

Kristin:  I get it completely.  My kids are 21 months apart, so yeah, right there.

Sarah Ann:  So yeah, you’ve been through it, yeah.  I mean, now it’s so great.  They’re best friends, and they’re amazing, but we’re just really happy to be kind of settled where we have a little bit more support, which is one of the things we’re going to talk about today, for sure.

Kristin:  Yes.  So Sarah Ann, let’s start by talking about prenatal fitness and your recommendations.  I know you’ve got plenty of exercise tips.  Let’s dive into what women can do in pregnancy to set themselves up for a great recovery postpartum.

Sarah Ann:  Gotcha.  Oh, I love this question.  I mean, the honest answer is so much – again, I’ve been doing this for a long time, and I know every pregnancy is different, so your body is very different from the person next to you.  But I think we have it backward.  We treat pregnant women like delicate flowers who shouldn’t lift anything, who shouldn’t get their heart rate up, who shouldn’t stretch too far, and postpartum people are just expected to, like, you know, start doing burpees the second they get off the table.  And it’s very opposite.  You know, I worked out through both of my pregnancies so I know personally how helpful it is to reduce the bloating and fatigue, and obviously, I’ve worked with thousands of women at this point.  I think the more active you can stay during pregnancy, the better.  They’ve done a bunch of research on bedrest, and they’re saying, like, it’s helpful for very few people.  The more you can move, the better in pregnancy, however that is.  So I use the RPE scale, or rate of perceived exertion, when I work with my clients.  So, basically, from a scale of 1 to 10, 1 is savasana in yoga where you’re just laying on the floor.  10 would be, like, wearing a backpack and running up a mountain.  You want to stay around a 6 or 7, and that’s the end point.  So basically anything that you were doing before pregnancy, or even if you get pregnant and you want to start exercising, as long as you can talk, as long as you can breathe, and that rate of perceived exertion doesn’t go over, like, a 6 or a 7 if you’re a little bit more conditioned pre-pregnancy, you’re fine.  Like, I have clients who train up until they day that they deliver.  I’ve never had anyone go into labor in my classes.

Kristin:  Well, that’s good!

Sarah Ann:  I think for the most part, you can do a lot more than I think we’re often told.  Whereas postpartum, I believe in rest and recovery.  I mean, I don’t want to scare any pregnant people who are listening right now, but, you know, labor and delivery, no matter how the baby gets out, is a big deal on the body, so rather than encouraging women to, like, go back into it as soon as you get that “exercise clearance,” go start working out and get yourself back in shape – no.  Like, recover.  Slow recovery process; make sure everything feels okay; make sure you’re working with a PT if you’re noticing any severe diastasis or prolapse issues.  A slow entrance back into working out postpartum.  But as far as pregnancy goes, I mean, go for it.  For me, again, I worked out every day while I was pregnant, and I felt really, really good.  I know that doesn’t work well for every single person.  I certainly have clients who, the second they hit their third trimester, they’re like, nope, I need to do things where I just lay on the floor and you hand me dumbbells.  So every pregnancy is going to be very different, but as far as the actual guidelines, there are no strength training guidelines anymore, and the old idea to not bring your heart rate up over 140 beats per minute has been thrown out the window because everyone is different, right? A person who’s never exercised before and a marathon runner are going to have two very different experiences exercising in pregnancy.  So you just kind of go off of how you’re feeling in the moment and day to day because in pregnancy, your first trimester is going to feel very different from your third.  So day by day, doing something that moves your body, makes you feel good, and that you enjoy doing, as long as you can breathe and talk comfortably, you’re good.

Kristin:  Exactly.  And Sarah Ann, that flexibility will definitely benefit women during labor and can certainly help get into different positions to optimize baby moving down the birth canal.  There are many benefits.

Sarah Ann:  Oh, yeah, absolutely.  I mean, labor is a marathon.

Kristin:  It is, yes!

Sarah Ann:  You’ve got to be in shape for it!  But also, so is parenting.  When I teach classes, I’m always like, these are car seat muscles, guys.  Your kids are only going to get heavier!  So we don’t have to just play with two-pound weights for your entire pregnancy.  You can lift heavy stuff.  But just learn to do it safely and in a way that will support you during labor and postpartum.

Kristin:  Yes, I love it.  And then of course swimming is so fantastic.  We’re in summer in Michigan right now.  As far as any other tips prenatally or your top exercises, anything you’d like to add on prenatal fitness?

Sarah Ann:  For prenatal fitness, just do what you love and don’t be afraid of it.  One of the most common questions that I get for prenatal is how much weight can I lift, and you really can do about the same.  There is a regression at some point where if you were hiking and running up a mountain – bad example.  If you’re going for a 10, you will need to scale back.  I wouldn’t go for your max repetition at this point, right?  Stay at something where you can breathe.  But just really taking every single day as an opportunity to move but also respecting when your body is telling you to slow down.

Kristin:  So true, yes, and talking to your provider if you want to change anything up.  But I’ve worked with many athletes and marathon runners who ran up until the very end and CrossFit who have continued with that with approval from midwives and doctors and so on.

Sarah Ann:  Oh, yeah.  Absolutely.  Your body is built to move.  And I think also one thing: I do work with a lot of people who are in PT, and going to see a pelvic floor therapist before you deliver if you start to notice any pelvic organ symptoms, like pain peeing or prolapse or pressure, if you start to feel that, go get in early.  And make sure when you go to get checked for your four to six week postpartum, if you need a referral, if your insurance requires it, make sure you get it during that appointment because it’s always just helpful to have.

Kristin:  Thank you for saying that!  I can’t stress that enough, so I’m so glad you feel the same way.

Sarah Ann:  Oh, yeah.  For me too, I worked – I’m very scope of practice.  When in doubt, refer out, to all of my clients.  I would never want to recommend something – because I only work with people on the outside and not the inside.  So if there’s something going on, or if I notice that my client has some pretty significant symptoms, I’m not going to play God.  I’m going to refer them to a doctor who knows more than I do, whether that’s chiropractic or physical therapy or whatever.  I think it’s really important to develop a team of providers during pregnancy so that way you’re just really supported during pregnancy, postpartum, and beyond.

Kristin:  Exactly.  So, Sarah Ann, let’s get into postnatal recovery and your tips on how to transition back into exercise.  I know you mentioned slowing it down, focusing on recovery, and there is that six-week appointment that many women want that clearance to be able to start working out.  So what does that look like?

Sarah Ann:  Yeah.  So again, it really depends on your actual delivery and recovery.  And I’m not saying if you have a C-section, you’re going to have a really, really horrible recovery.  I’ve heard a lot of people have a lot of fear around that.  I’ve had people have a C-section and have way easier recoveries than someone who pushed for four and a half hours and had a forceps delivery.  So I think just respecting where you’re at and just really enjoying that postnatal period as snuggle time, resting, recovery, making sure you’re getting a lot of nutrition.  And then as far as exercise, if it feels comfortable and you’re cleared before you leave the hospital, you’re okay to walk.  I have a lot of breathing exercises that I can recommend on my website if you go to the Postpartum tab.  I have a lot of stuff up there.  But just breathing, gentle pelvic floor exercises, stretching, just light, light movement.  Because I think there is the risk, obviously, of blood clotting and bedsores if you’re just sitting around and not doing much.  So trying to stay moving, even before that four- to six-week appointment, again, in most cases is totally fine because that four- to six-week appointment, I feel like we put so much gold around it, but your doctor is mostly there to check your cervix and your blood pressure, and they might not be the best person to get the complete go-ahead.  And I say that because my OB-GYN for my first delivery did my diastasis recti check incorrectly and almost sent me out the door with a first degree uterine prolapse.  And again, I’m a triathlete, so she’s like, just go back and ease back into it.  You’re good.  And I’m like, okay, so should I run four miles tomorrow or ten, you know?  And so I think just making sure that your provider really knows.  Ask, hey, can you check me for prolapse?  Can you check me for diastasis recti?  And if you can’t, who can you refer me to?  That might be a pelvic organ PT that I can start seeing because I’m noticing X, Y, Z in that four- to six-week period.  So, again, we have to advocate so much for ourselves in our American medical system, and this is just an example of you having to do that, unfortunately.  But go to that four- to six-week appointment.  Ask for a referral, just in case you need it in the future.  Ask about prolapse when they’re doing your cervical exam, if they feel anything when they’re in there.  Obviously, you need to be okay for blood pressure.  And then they’re also going to do the depression screening.  I think you’re okay to start moving if you feel comfortable before then, obviously keeping it very, very light and moderate.  But once you get the go-ahead, it doesn’t necessarily mean like, okay, go back to doing what you were doing pre-pregnancy.  It’s go back to what you were doing in the third trimester, but now you can lay on your belly.

Hey, Alyssa here.  I’m just popping in to tell you about our course called Becoming.  Becoming A Mother is your guide to a confident pregnancy and birth all in a convenient six-week online program, from birth plans to sleep training and everything in between.  You’ll gain the confidence and skills you need for a smooth transition to motherhood.  You’ll get live coaching calls with Kristin and myself, a bunch of expert videos, including chiropractic care, pelvic floor physical therapy, mental health experts, breastfeeding, and much more.  You’ll also get a private Facebook community with other mothers going through this at the same time as you to offer support and encouragement when you need it most.  And then of course you’ll also have direct email access to me and Kristin, in addition to the live coaching calls.  If you’d like to learn more about the course, you can email us at info@goldcoastdoulas.com, or check it out at www.thebecomingcourse.com.  We’d love to see you there.

Kristin:  Great tips!  Sarah Ann, let’s get into finding the time.  So you’ve gotten cleared, and whether it’s baby number one or baby number four, it’s a transition.  So how do you make the space in your busy life to achieve any fitness goals you have or again, for those runners, get back into running and find some time away?  How much time should they be working out, early as they’re starting to get back into it?

Sarah Ann:  So I’ve got a whole list.

Kristin:  Yes, so many questions!

Sarah Ann:  Number one, and I see this in a lot of my clients: you have to make it a priority.  And there is just no such thing as motivation, right?  You just have to keep showing up for yourself.  I think a lot of times we struggle, and I know I certainly did after my two kiddos.  Like, okay, it’s nap time.  I got one down.  I have a toddler who’s running around.  I don’t really want to put them in front of the TV, but I really need to exercise so I can feel better and show up as a parent.  But we don’t really make the same space for ourselves when there are mountains of laundry and phone calls to make and you might have gone back to work at that point.  It’s really hard to make yourself a priority when there are so many other things in your face at the same time.  But I think the more that you just create a mantra to yourself that you matter; you need to take up space; and just respect that you’re in it for the long haul.  It will help you show up for sure.  So I think – because a lot of times when I’m working with clients, I’ll send them workouts and be like, hey, just following up, did you get to that workout?  “No, I had to read a book on potty training.”  Did you get to that workout the next day?  “No, we had to take so-and-so to the doctor.”  There’s so many things on top of your personal health, but I love this quote: “Exercise is the most underused antidepressant in the world.”  It’s not just about your physical health.  It is about emotional, spiritual health.  Just even taking ten minutes to meditate or do some stretching on the floor makes a really, really big difference on your emotional and spiritual well-being.  It doesn’t necessarily mean making your body smaller, right?  Exercise is not just about making ourselves skinny and trying to get the body back.  That is not my intention with this at all.  It is about respecting your body and your space and getting your body back to a way that you feel comfortable moving around in and making sure that you’re strong and preventing injuries and all of that golden stuff.  So there’s just a lot of other reasons to exercise.  Sometimes if we’re just focused on, like, I have to get an hour at the gym of lifting heavy weights – you don’t have to do that every single day.  But I do think just finding the time and making yourself a priority, even if it’s for ten minutes if you don’t have a lot of support that day and then maybe taking a little bit more time out a couple of days later, that’s number one for me, just finding the motivation to move, making yourself a priority to create the space and time to do that.  So that’s number one.  And then number two is just also literally physically taking up space, because I think a lot of us have a hard time getting to the gym or might not feel comfortable going to work out in a physical space yet with other people.  Create a space in your home where you keep all of your stuff.  Whether that’s a basket that you cover with a blanket, or you store some dumbbells under your bed, but just keeping all of your things consistently there so that way when it’s time to work out you don’t have to run all over the house to find equipment is really helpful.  There’s obviously, like, the pack your bag if you’re going to the gym the night before.  But also just creating the space for that bag.  So when it’s time to fold your laundry and you have your workout outfit, you just roll it up and put it in the bag.  Keep socks, keep spare hair ties, keep everything in there, so if you are running out the door to go to a yoga class and your kid is losing their mind and you don’t want them to see you run out the door, you can just do that and you aren’t searching for stuff.  And then one thing for at-home workouts I always say, like, make sure that you’re covering up your dumbbells and all of your exercise equipment because babies and dumbbells don’t mix, and a lot of times if you have crawlers or toddlers, they tend to gravitate towards all of your toys, so just make sure they’re covered so they’re out of sight.

Kristin:  Great tip.

Sarah Ann:  So another thing, number three, creating a routine that can be flexible.  Finding the flexibility throughout your day.

Kristin:  With naptimes being unpredictable or feeding, yes.

Sarah Ann:  Yes, or like someone comes to visit unannounced – although hopefully we aren’t doing that anymore to people.  Just creating a routine and a schedule but also being really flexible about it.  The American Council on Exercise recommends 150 minutes per week of moderate exercise, so meaning like yoga or walking, something on the lighter side, or 75 minutes of vigorous exercise, so like your more high impact classes or workouts.  So you don’t need to do it all in one day.  Don’t feel like you need to do an hour to make it count.  I send a lot of my clients 15- to 20-minute workouts because usually that’s all they have if they’re working and they have little kiddos.  So I think just creating a flexible routine where, okay, I’m going to try to get up in the morning.  If I need to sleep in, I’m going to, and then I’ll do something before bed.  And I think it’s really helpful if you have a partner or if you have any kind of family help to include them in the schedule because it’s really hard to do all this on your own, especially because naps are so – we really struggled with naptime, so that’s like a hot button for me.  I think just creating some flexibility or really getting help in that and just having that conversation around time and boundaries of, like, I’m going to go and shut the door for 20 minutes, and you are in charge of the kids.  Or, can I drop them off so I can go take a class?  Or finding a studio that has childcare.  It’s not all on you, and I think it’s really helpful if you have, A, the accountability of other people, but also just creating that space and taking up the time to say, I need to do this for myself, and I need a little extra help is really important.

Kristin:  Yes, because after giving birth, the focus is on the baby.  And the mother just feels like she’s – I don’t know, not as important, not a priority.  So the fact that your suggestions are really taking the time, making space to feel more like yourself pre-baby, and get stronger versus sacrificing everything a new mother or, you know, again, fourth-time mother.

Sarah Ann:  Yeah.  I think the more help you can get – and you can always partner up with a neighbor, or if you have other friends who have kids, use each other as a village, because I think that’s one thing that we really lost in the past couple years is just using each other to help everybody out because I think that’s the one thing that I loved about my postpartum period is that we had just moved to a new city and I really didn’t know anyone before I was pregnant, but you meet people at the playground or in lactation group and you really get to find your tribe, and I think it’s okay to ask for help because I think we all love helping, right?  If someone called you and was like, hey, I really need help getting to this appointment.  Can you help me out?  Can you watch my kid?  You’re like, yeah, the more the merrier.

Kristin:  Yes, a specific request is where it’s at versus oh, I’m struggling, but you don’t know what you need.  If you can say, hey, I would love for you to join me, or can you watch my kid while I go to the basement and work out for 15 minutes.  Yes, a specific request is so important.

Sarah Ann:  I know, and it’s so hard to do.  It’s hard to make that request because sometimes you’re like, I don’t even know what I need and I don’t want to be in charge anymore.  But even just, hey, can we meet up for a walk a couple times a week so we get in the sun and I’m accountable for getting off my couch and going away from the laundry?  Kind of creating a friend appointment so it becomes a little more than just about the workout is really great.  Obviously, people hire me so I can show them and tell them exactly what to do, but I still think the more support you have, the better.  And it’s okay to ask for help.  Everybody wants to help you out.  The more specific, absolutely, the better.

Kristin:  Exactly.  Yeah, and you had some great tips for our Becoming A Mother students, and that course is all about assembling a dream team, asking for help, knowing your options, because we strongly believe that if you don’t know your options, like physical therapy and even understanding how to install your car seat correctly so we have car seat safety technicians and really understanding who makes up both your personal village as well as your professionals.

Sarah Ann:  I have a couple more if we have enough time, or I can save them.

Kristin:  Yeah, go ahead and give us your final tips and then we’ll chat about your business.

Sarah Ann:  Okay.  So my last two: if you are not feeling it and you are tired and you’re a little groggy going into your workouts, use music.  So find something that kind of pumps you up and start listening to it.  So plug those headphones in while you’re getting ready to workout.  If you’re driving somewhere to exercise, like going to a hike or going to a gym, put that music on in your car so it’s like a little bit better of a transition into the fitness.  They’ve done a lot of studies on music and beats per minute, so find something that’s a little more high energy to get you in the mood if you’re not feeling it.  That being said, please don’t exercise on less than four hours of sleep.  Sleep is really important, and I think it needs to be said that you can regret a workout.  Don’t listen to all those fitness memes on the internet.  They don’t apply to you.  Rest is still really, really important.  So using music as a motivator, and then my final tip is just to find something that you love.  So dance in your kitchen.  You know, go for a walk with some music.  Take a hike, swim, bike, lift heavy things, try acro yoga.  Try to find something that is fun that you really look forward to doing and finding the joy in it because you’re not going to do it if you don’t feel inspired or you’re just not interested in it.  And I feel like there’s this old – I kind of said it before, but using exercise as a form of punishment, and it’s not.  So I think that exercise can teach us a lot of life lessons and goal setting and things like that.  So finding something that brings you joy or makes you feel accomplished and gets you a good sweat on.  It doesn’t matter what it is.  Just find something that you really love to do so that way you’re actually wanting to show up for it.

Kristin:  Perfect.  Thank you, Sarah Ann.  So how do we find you?  I know you mentioned MomTrainer.com, but you are all over socials, so share all the ways that our listeners can chat with you.

Sarah Ann:  Yeah.  So number one, go to my website.  You can reach me there if you have a more specific question.  I’m also mostly on Instagram @themomtrainer.  And if you’re in the Grand Rapids area, you can come take a class with me.  I’m teaching at Mind Body Baby Yoga, and we’re adding a lot more classes.  So I’m teaching some barre classes there, and they also have some really great yoga classes.

Kristin:  We love them!  That’s so great.  Of course, Sarah Ann, you also for our listeners who are all over the country, you have a virtual and one on one classes so they can work with you regardless of where they live.  So fill us in a bit about those, the coaching sessions.

Sarah Ann:  Yeah.  So I do have online consulting, so you can book me for an hour, pick my brain, and I’ll send you a workout.  I have an online coaching program that is a monthly program.  I have a one month and three month jump starter package where we meet once a week and discuss everything prenatal postpartum fitness, and then I create workouts that you can follow along to, so you get a recorded video that you click in your document.  Everyone gets a document with all of their workouts, recap of our calls, any nutrition support, and any kind of helpful PDFs that I might have created for another client, everything goes in there.  So you just literally, you know, what am I doing on Monday?  You click on the link, you follow along.  It’s super easy.  So I have that program as well.  And then I also have a ton of free resources on my website.  I have a lot of free workouts that you can try on there.  And for this specific call, all of my recommendations, I’m putting in a pretty little PDF that you can click on in the postpartum tab, so if you’re like me and you listen to podcasts doing laundry and you just tune out a little bit, it will all be there.  And you can use the discount code GoldCoastDoulas for 50% off!

Kristin:  Perfect.  Thank you so much, Sarah Ann, and it was lovely to catch up with you!

Sarah Ann:  Thank you so much for having me!

Thanks for listening to Gold Coast Doulas.  Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.  If you like this podcast, please subscribe and give us a five-star review.  Thank you!  Remember, these moments are golden.

Kristin chats with Jasmine Emerick about her personal struggles with postpartum anxiety and OCD and her work as a therapist.  Jasmine is the author of The Postpartum Therapist.

Welcome.  You’re listening to Ask the Doulas, a podcast where we talk to experts from all over the country about topics related to pregnancy, birth, postpartum, and early parenting.  Let’s chat!

Kristin:  This is Kristin with Ask the Doulas, and I’m joined today by Jasmine Emerick.  Welcome, Jasmine!

Jasmine:  Yes, thank you for having me!  I’m really excited.

Kristin:  So Jasmine is an energetic mother of two.  She’s a devoted wife, daughter, sister, friend, colleague, and family member.  Jasmine’s often described as one of the craziest people you’ll ever meet.  She has a heart of gold and a love for people with a passion to support women especially.  Jasmine has almost ten years of clinical experience as a mental health therapist and is trained in treating perinatal mood and anxiety disorders.  Now, I would love to chat about your book, The Postpartum Therapist, a humorous and honest approach to the postpartum life.

Jasmine:  Yes, so as you kind of shared, you know, as a therapist, I’ve been in the field for almost ten years.  I did my first treating perinatal mood and anxiety disorders back in 2011.  At that time, we just referred to postpartum depression and postpartum mood disorders.  Now the terminology has trained.  And then I took training again back in 2017, I believe it was.  Before having kids, I had been trained in this area, and I was like, I’m good.  I know what to look for.  So I’m going to let myself know if I experience anything, and I’ve worked with patients and blah, blah, blah.  Then I become a mom, and it’s different.

Kristin:  It’s not textbook.

Jasmine:  Yes, it wasn’t textbook.  So I was motivated to write my book when I realized how much I had suffered from postpartum anxiety and OCD, and I can help differentiate the two of those later.  But that was kind of what – when I came out of it, I realized how much I had truly suffered, and I was able to relate to women and moms at a level that I never thought I would experience or understand.  And so it started with me just posting a couple things on Facebook about my experience, and people liked it, and people were reaching out to me and they’re like, we want more.  And then I was like, okay, at nap times, right, I’ll shoot out a post of my thoughts.  And I just could not keep up with it, not at the level that I wanted to.  But then I just basically wrote an outline and said, okay, what would I want to share with people that I experienced that I want other women to know they’re not alone, or even dads, to be honest.  I started with an outline, and it turned from a couple pages to more pages and more pages, and I said, I think I’ve got a book here.  So that’s where we were with it.

Kristin:  I’m so glad you got it out to the world, especially not only your experience clinically, but personally, and sharing the personal struggles you have and how you worked through it.  I would love for you to define the difference between postpartum anxiety, OCD, depression, mania, and some of the other terms related to postpartum mood and anxiety disorders.

Jasmine:  So I’ll start with the two that I can relate to.  Keep in mind there’s a plethora of knowledge out there; people that are much more trained in this area than I am.  I’ll start with my experience.  So in my experience and what I’ve heard from moms and what I’ve researched, the anxiety is more of the worries, the concerns, and maybe even some of the physical symptoms: you know, sweating, heart racing, maybe feeling nauseous, feeling flushed.  It’s just the worries.  In my opinion, what differentiates the anxiety from the OCD is with OCD, you have the worries but then you have the compulsion.  So it’s not just that you just worry; you’re acting on those worries.  For me, if I were to give you an example – well, I’ll save that for later.  We’ll let that juicy detail be later.  One of my fears, right, was accidents.  My biggest consuming thing, or one of them, I should say, was my kids – an accident happening.  An unintentional, right, that was my intrusive thought, was that an unintentional accident would happen.  Most likely, if I allowed them to be in somebody else’s care.  So it could be as much as, like, what if somebody was wearing a sweatshirt with a button, and it came unraveled, the thread did, and that button went in their mouth when they cried, but this person was talking and didn’t see that the button fell from their sweater into my child’s mouth and they choked?  So what do you do?  You don’t allow your kids to be with anyone else unless you’re there, or are you are constantly hawk-eying how somebody’s holding your child or what they’re wearing when they’re holding your child.  So the anxiety, you know, you kind of stop at the worry, but in my opinion with the OCD, you kind of start the behaviors of maybe prevention or avoidance to counteract that worry, if that makes sense.

Kristin:  It does completely.

Jasmine:  Then when you get into the depression, you know, people kind of think of depression as feeling sad or feeling depressed, and that can be true for a lot of moms.  You know, a lot of moms will say it’s not what they thought.  You know, they’re not happy; they’re not connecting with their baby.  Some are suicidal.  You know, some don’t want to live.  Some maybe regret the decision of having a baby.  But I’ve also talked to moms that it wasn’t your stereotypical depression symptoms.  It was the loss of self, the loss of the lives that they had before they had their baby.  It was grieving the loss of social interaction, of attending things.  Maybe they’re the first in their group to have kids, so they’re staying out as late as everybody else.  Maybe they’re not attending everything that people in their friend group are.  And so it’s kind of that loss of self, loss of connection with others that brings on that depression.  And then you also have the kind of bipolar, and I forget the stats.  It’s in my book.  I apologize.  But the number of women that end up being diagnosed with bipolar for the first time during the postpartum period.  Bipolar can be kind of tricky and confusing because it kind of mimics the symptoms of depression, but it can also kind of mimic just plain adjustment things, as well as anxiety.  So your bipolar is going to kind of be the changes in mood, which any mom listening or any woman is going to be like, check.  In my experience, again, I want to give that disclaimer, it’s going to be to a level that causes probably distress, discomfort, and potentially, you know, maybe the risk-taking behaviors.  Your stereotypical bipolar might be overspending to the point where it impacts you paying your bills or risky behavior such as speeding or racing when you’re driving or, you know, for some people I’ve talked to, they would go on dates out of state without ever meeting somebody and did it spur of the moment.  Some risk-taking behaviors.  Bipolar postpartum can be kind of that changes in mood that causes probably more distress and things that might be a little bit more risky that you’re doing, maybe not paying as much attention to details, et cetera.  That’s what I would say for that.  I’ll be honest, I haven’t personally experience bipolar postpartum personally, and I also haven’t seen a lot of it when I’ve worked with people, so I don’t want to speak too much on that just because I feel like I haven’t witnessed it enough, if that’s fair to say.  And then as a final diagnosis – well, there’s two more.  The other one that we hear about and that gets a lot of media attention is the psychosis that, yes, can happen.  So the psychosis that can happen postpartum is kind of what you see on the media where it is true.  You know, parents feeling like somebody else is in control of their thoughts, or maybe a higher power wants their children or, you know, sacrificing things for a belief and whatnot.  So that can happen.  It’s pretty rare, and media hypes it up.  But it is a real thing that can happen postpartum.  And then you also have postpartum PTSD.  That’s posttraumatic stress disorder that is specific to the postpartum experience.  So you see this with women that might have a traumatic labor and delivery.  Complications happen, and some people are like, okay, what’s the difference between being anxious about that experience and it being PTSD?  You’re going to notice nightmares.  You’re going to notice fear or avoidance of the place where maybe the incident happened.  You might notice reliving it or reseeing it in your thoughts.  So that’s kind of what might differentiate a PTSD experience from anxiety, would be a traumatic experience to the point where maybe death was likely to occur, harm, you know, significant harm was likely to occur to yourself or someone that you care for.

Kristin:  Thank you for giving us a lot of these definitions because it can be confusing.  You also mentioned the husband and partner’s role.  So they can also experience postpartum depression or anxiety and so on?

Jasmine:  Yes, so this is where I get kind of nerdly excited, if I can say that.  So a lot of people don’t realize that any partner – so dads, it can be – and I have a podcast, as well, so I’ve interviewed an adoptive mother – any person providing direct care to the infant can experience a postpartum mood disorder, which a lot of people have historically thought would only happen to the mom because they thought it’s only hormonal changes that must bring this.  True, there are hormonal changes, but there’s a lot of adjustment for everybody involved.  So yeah, dads, I always include dads or other partners or same sex couples; adoptive parents, foster parents, grandparents at times or other family members that are kind of co-parenting with whoever that person is.  Anyone has a likelihood and a chance of having a postpartum mood disorder if they provide the direct care for that infant.

Hey, Alyssa here.  I’m just popping in to tell you about our course called Becoming.  Becoming A Mother is your guide to a confident pregnancy and birth all in a convenient six-week online program, from birth plans to sleep training and everything in between.  You’ll gain the confidence and skills you need for a smooth transition to motherhood.  You’ll get live coaching calls with Kristin and myself, a bunch of expert videos, including chiropractic care, pelvic floor physical therapy, mental health experts, breastfeeding, and much more.  You’ll also get a private Facebook community with other mothers going through this at the same time as you to offer support and encouragement when you need it most.  And then of course you’ll also have direct email access to me and Kristin, in addition to the live coaching calls.  If you’d like to learn more about the course, you can email us at info@goldcoastdoulas.com, or check it out at www.thebecomingcourse.com.  We’d love to see you there.

Kristin:  Obviously, sleep deprivation for anyone caring for the infant can just bring that out even more.

Jasmine:  Yes.  We talk about that in the book.  Just in mental health in general – I don’t only work with postpartum women or perinatal women; I work with all age groups.  Literally, my youngest patient has been a newborn to my oldest being in their 70s so far, with a plethora of diagnoses.  So sleep you will see, whether you’re a parent or anybody else, is one of the biggest factors to your overall mental health.  So when you add in the sleep deprivation – and this is where parents, and I typically just say moms because I’m usually talking to them – they get annoyed.  “Sleep when the baby sleeps,” or “sleep when you can.”  But even when you do that, it doesn’t account for disrupted sleep.  So healthy sleep from what I’ve learned is consistent sleep without waking for, you know, a reasonable amount of time.  So even if these parents are sleeping in three to four hour increments, it doesn’t cover the loss of healthy sleep.  Now, it’s great if you can sleep, you know, those three to four hours, two to three.  I know when my daughter was born, it was one to two for a long time.  But there’s still going to be a deficit there, and that is going to impact functioning.  It’s going to impact your mental health.  And so that’s a huge factor that when I’m working with parents to see how can you get sleep, but also understanding that it might be really unrealistic for them to get good and healthy sleep, at least initially in the postpartum phase, and I personally experienced hallucinations after the birth of my second daughter because our one daughter wasn’t sleeping well through the night, and then we had a newborn that had some acid reflux issues and had to, you know, sleep upright, but she was waking up frequently.  So between two kids not sleeping well, that’s severe sleep deprivation to the point where I did start to hallucinate.  It was one week where I had just seen whatever, you know, black images or, like, stars that weren’t there, and it wasn’t from being dizzy.  I was like, okay.  I’ve got to get this sleep under control.  In my book, I tell you what I did to get sleep, which is something that I never thought I would do, but I ended up co-sleeping because it was the only way my acid reflux daughter would sleep for longer periods of time was upright on my arm, and it was something I was terrified to do.  As someone who was experiencing postpartum anxiety, and my fear of accidents, you know, this was against what I wanted to do, not from a judgy, like, you shouldn’t co-sleep, but just from my own well-being of having a conscience of being able to sleep would be like, don’t co-sleep.  You’ll feel better, you know.  You’re not putting your kid at risk.  But unfortunately, that was how I was able to regain sleep, so I did research, and there’s a lot of – you know, there’s websites out there if you feel like I did, like co-sleeping might be the best option for your family right now.  So that’s how I ended up.  I just had to make that choice of, okay, I truly need sleep.  This is to a point where it’s not okay, and for me, that was the best way that I could get it at that time.

Kristin:  And it sounds like you wouldn’t have felt comfortable even with an expert postpartum doula coming into your home due to some of the fears or, like, the buttons or caregivers having an accident and so on.  We do work with a lot of sleep-deprived families with day and overnight support, and that certainly helps, even with daytime stretches of sleep.

Jasmine:  I think to be honest – and if I look at now, I would say, heck, yeah, I want a doula.  Help me out.  I want all the help I can get.  I think if I were to think about then, the biggest barrier would have been lack of knowledge, more or less.  So as long as I was present – well, and this is what you’ll have to educate me on.  As long as I was present and I could micromanage, I did okay.  But yes, I guess you’re right; if a doula were to have been, like, go get some sleep, I have the baby.  I probably would have been like, no, that’s okay.  Let’s watch TV together.  You’ll energize me socially, and that will be fine.

Kristin:  And we do that.  I mean, every day can be very different.  Sometimes it’s newborn care.  Other times it’s mothering the mother and really focusing on their emotional needs or companionship when the partner or husband is away, and then we do light housekeeping and meal preparation during the healing phase or honestly any time, and sibling care.  So for some of our clients who didn’t want anyone else to hold their baby, we were still able to be helpful.

Jasmine:  Then I think all moms need a doula, or all families need a doula, absolutely.  Because those things are essential.  They really are.  I’m laughing about it, but it’s essential.  And if you look at other cultures, that’s what happens, right?  That’s where we get the phrase it takes a village because if you look at village societies, that’s what would happen.  You would have several women around, and I can say women because historically it was.  You would have several women around to help with all those, meal prepping or physical care if there was injury, helping with the home.  So the mother was being taken care of.  And we just don’t see that as much in our society with families moving away and people being more independent, and we’ve lost that for our moms, and now we’re wondering, why do these moms feel like it’s so hard or they feel so alone?  Well, a lot of them don’t even have grandparents in the picture if people have moved away or sisters, close friends.  We’re kind of losing that community aspect of the postpartum experience and expecting moms to get that – you know, take care of all their own needs independently now, and then they’re asking themselves, why can’t I do this?  Well, we didn’t used to.  We didn’t used to have to do this all by ourselves.

Kristin:  Exactly.  And depending on the culture, it’s caring for the mother in the first 40 days.  In some, it’s six months.  Some even longer.  And you’re right; it’s family members, friends, anyone in the community, focusing on their emotional needs and the household tasks as well as the newborn.  So yeah, that is a very important thing that is lacking in our culture here in the US.

Jasmine:  Yeah, we have a close neighbor from Bangladesh.  I had talked to her one day about the differences and what she was seeing with me versus her own experience, and she’s much older than me, so I’m sure it’s even changed in her country since she’s been here.  But, you know, she was saying that she had two or three people in her home that were paid that helped to do all the meal prepping, to take care of her baby and her other child, to allow her to sleep, to help with the household tasks, to get things done, to do laundry and cleaning.  And I’m like, oh, my goodness, and I just fantasized about it for a minute.  Like, what would that look like here in Zeeland, Michigan for me?  I would love it, but we just don’t see it as much.

Kristin:  No, we don’t.  So what other tips do you have for our listeners and clients about caring for yourself in that postnatal phase or identifying signs of postpartum mood disorders?

Jasmine:  One of my biggest things that I wrote about is in the chapter Slipping Through The Cracks, and what I realized with talking to a bunch of friends – because once I realized I was suffering, I became this open book and talked to as many people as I could that were comfortable and willing to talk and just got some feedback.  What we noticed is many of us had a diagnosis; definitely would have qualified for a diagnosis, but kind of slipped through the cracks.  We kind of went untreated and suffered silently for a long time without even realizing it.  And so one thing that I make sure to let moms know, and I say moms here because they’re typically the ones given the questionnaires, is the questionnaires that you get at your checkups or after you have your baby or even at the pediatrician’s office – don’t count on them to be the determinant of your mental health.  So if we think about the Edinburg or the other depression screening, people kind of think, okay, if I pass these screenings, then I’m good.  Right?  I’m good.  Nothing was picked up.  Well, that’s true because a lot of my symptoms and a lot of the symptoms that I’ve talked to other women that we experience were not things that would have been picked up on your questionnaire.  My close friend who had body dysmorphia and was grieving the loss of her life and independence – those weren’t the questions that you’re asked.  She’s like, well, no, I don’t want to harm my baby.  No, I don’t want to cry.  I’m happy I have my baby.  I’m happy I’m here.  I’m not sad.  I’m not crying.  But she still was really struggling with the changes of her body.  So some people think, okay, if I “passed” this questionnaire, then I should be good, and that’s not true.  How do you feel?  You know, what’s it feel like day to day?  I know for me, a lot of the questions for the anxiety that are brought up in the postpartum questionnaires use the term – what is it – unreasonable worry or something along those lines.  Something that makes it seem like, you know, you shouldn’t be worrying.  Well, that’s going to kind of deter a lot of moms from answering that at times because when you’re a new mom, it feels reasonable to worry.  So when you see questions that say, you know – I forget how it’s phrased, but something about unreasonable worry – those questions didn’t screen for me because in my mind, I have an infant in the winter during flu season, during RSV, so my doctor is telling me I should be worried.  My doctor is telling me not to go in big social places.  And this is before the pandemic, even, so imagine that.  For a lot of these moms, having babies during the pandemic.  A lot of these screenings won’t pop up because we’re told we have to worry.  We leave the visit with a whole page worth of things to make sure you do this in your home and make sure you’ve done this and make sure you baby proof that.  So when you use those words, it can distract the mom from feeling like I should answer this positively or yes because no, I’ve been told I need to worry.  A lot of those questions didn’t ring for me or have a red flag because as a good mom, you worry, right?  You want to make sure your home is ready for a baby and they only have a crib sheet and all these things.  So I tell people, yes, answer the questionnaires, absolutely, because a lot of people do get screened on those positively, and that’s good.  We want that.  But there’s a lot of people that are missed.  How do you feel?  What does your partner say about you?  Is your partner noticing anything?  Allowing your partner; having the conversation before that baby is brought into your home, allowing your partner the freedom to let you know when something’s up and opening up.

Kristin:  So helpful.  They know you better than anyone else, so they can tell the change.

Jasmine:  Right.  And a lot of partners that I’ve talked to – because I told you, I became an open book and I talked to dads and everybody – you know, a lot of partners will say, well, they’re the mom.  This is kind of natural for them.  I just kind of follow their lead.  I guess I was just kind of assuming they would let me know.  Well, for me, even being a therapist, even having the training, I was so blinded by my own mental health that I didn’t see it.  And let me tell you, another big fear that I had as an intrusive thought was somebody abducting my kids.  I was looking out the windows multiple times at night.  My daughter was born in January so there was snow.  I was looking for shoe prints outside our windows.  That is classic anxiety OCD that is completely unrealistic.  Even I, doing those behaviors, it didn’t ring to me.  It was like, no, you have a baby.  This happens.  You’ve heard about it on the news, so it can happen.  You start to justify if you’re really in the thick of it, and you really might miss it yourself, even with the best of intentions.  I didn’t want to go undiagnosed.  I talked to my partner before we had our daughter.  Hey, I have a history of anxiety.  This might really flare up when we have our daughter.  Still, I didn’t catch it.  So I just tell people, how do you feel?  Listen to your partner.  Listen to your friends.  If you can, allow open dialogue because they might see it before you do, and just believe them.  If they’re good-natured people, if they’re people you’ve trusted and you’ve loved, just believe them.  I don’t think they’d have harmful intent.  There are harmful people out there, I’ll give you that.  There’s harmful family members.  But I’m saying if somebody that you love and trust is giving you feedback, then believe.

Kristin:  Yes.  So how can our listeners who live all over the world find help in their area if they are experiencing any perinatal mood disorders, whether it be support groups, online resources, or finding a therapist?  What should they be looking for?

Jasmine:  My go-to site is Postpartum Support International.  I did all my training through them, and that is where I go to refer everybody because they have ways to search for therapists locally.  They have online support groups for people all over the world.  They’re basically, in my opinion, your kind of go-to website to get connected, to get support.  They have a help line.  They have all sorts of resources and are kind of the leaders in this field.  So that’s simply where I would refer people if we’re thinking about just in general, if anybody is listening all over the world, would be to go to Postpartum Support International.

Kristin: Perfect.  And then when searching for a therapist, or if they’re getting a referral from their provider, what sort of specialties should they be looking for?

Jasmine:  For anyone interested, I say to make sure they are trained in postpartum mood disorders or perinatal mood and anxiety disorders.  If you go to that website, they will give you a list of clinicians, many of which can do telehealth now, thank goodness.  From the pandemic, that has been a benefit is allowing access that way.  Anybody that’s been trained through that program, and I believe they’re the only program that can train people, at least right now in the United States, to get that, to say that they’ve been trained.  So if you look, that’s where you’ll get a list of therapists that would meet that specialty and criteria for being trained in postpartum mood disorders or perinatal mood and anxiety disorders.

Kristin:  Perfect.  So Jasmine, how can our listeners connect with you personally as well as your book?

Jasmine:  My book is on Amazon, so you would just go to Amazon and type in The Postpartum Therapist, and then my name, Jasmine Emerick, and it will pop right up.  I do have an email, which is postpartumtherapist@gmail.com.  I’m on Instagram.  This was new for me, so I’m a little bit older in regards to being friendly to Instagram, but I’m learning.  So I started an Instagram that is specific to my book, so that would be another way to connect.  Then I would say if you just want to listen – one thing I did – the reason why I did a podcast was because what I learned is even though we’re all moms and maybe we can attach these labels of “I had postpartum anxiety” or “I had postpartum depression,” many of us experienced it very differently from each other, so I wanted to interview different moms to show that my experience is not representative at all of all of us or even many of us.  We all have our unique experiences.  Another thing is that if you search on iTunes The Postpartum Therapist, I have a podcast that I’ve started where there’s many moms on there that share different backgrounds, different diagnoses, and what they’ve experienced as a way to help connect and kind of fill the gaps and help moms realize they’re not alone, no matter what their symptoms are.

Kristin:  Wonderful.  That’s a great resource for doulas, as well.  Thanks so much for your time, Jasmine.  It was so great to connect with you, and I appreciate all of the important work you’re doing.

Jasmine:  Thank you so much.  I appreciate it.

Thanks for listening to Gold Coast Doulas.  Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.  If you like this podcast, please subscribe and give us a five-star review.  Thank you!  Remember, these moments are golden.

Krista Lockwood, founder of Motherhood Simplified, shares her top decluttering tips for new moms to prep for the arrival of a new baby.  You can listen to this complete podcast episode on iTunes, SoundCloud, or anywhere you find your podcasts.

Welcome.  You’re listening to Ask the Doulas, a podcast where we talk to experts from all over the country about topics related to pregnancy, birth, postpartum, and early parenting.  Let’s chat!

Kristin:  Welcome to Ask the Doulas!  I’m Kristin, and I’m here today with Krista Lockwood.  Krista is the founder of Motherhood Simplified.  Krista teaches decluttering for moms who don’t want to be a full-blown minimalist.  In 2013, she and her husband moved from Alaska to Florida with only one suitcase each.  While she doesn’t believe you need to go to that extreme, Krista’s been able to master the balance of having enough but not too much.  Welcome, Krista!

Krista:  Hi!  Thank you so much for having me.

Kristin:  I would love to hear a bit about your journey to get into owning your own business focused on simplifying and downsizing all the clutter that, especially as moms, we tend to accumulate.

Krista:  It started when my husband and I moved from Alaska to Florida, both born and raised, and at the time, we had three kids, and we moved with just our suitcases.  And we rented a furnished house and basically had a chance to start over.  At that point, I didn’t know that decluttering was a thing or minimalism or simplifying.  I had no idea.  We just knew that logistically, it was very expensive.  It was actually more affordable to start over after our move, so that’s what we chose to do.  And I lived that way for about four years.  You know, we reaccumulated stuff, but never to the point of where it was before when we lived in Alaska.  It wasn’t until 2017 when I got pregnant with our fourth baby, and I was a part of a due date group, which I’m sure your listeners know what that is, or they might know.  They’re just dedicated Facebook groups for moms who are due at the same time.

Kristin:  They’re so fun!

Krista:  Yes!  Oh, my gosh, they are so much fun.  And we all got really close.  After we had our babies, in the postpartum phase, we started doing this thing called house tours.  It was so much fun.  A lot of us were struggling with, like, the messes and the laundry and the dishes and the toys, and when it got to be my turn, they were like, hold on a second.  Did you stage your house?  We all agreed we would show it as is.  It was then that I started to realize what we had actually done.  My first postpartum phases were not like that.  I wasn’t able to just sit on the couch and breastfeed my baby and focus on my recovery and rest and take naps.  I was constantly doing laundry, dishes, trying to keep up.  And I started to put the pieces together.  We got rid of all of our stuff four years ago, and that’s when it got easy for me, even in my postpartum phases.  I just asked them, do you want me to show you how to do this?  And then, heck yes, please do, and that’s how I got to where I am now.

Kristin:  I love it.  You saw a need, and you filled it.  It’s perfect.  I find that our students in our Becoming a Mother course and our doula clients are overwhelmed with the registry process and all the things that people want to gift, especially to first-time moms.  What are some of your suggestions to minimize all of the things so you don’t have the clutter to pick up?

Krista:  I was the same way with our first three kids.  I felt like I needed all of the things.  A swing and a bouncer and – I don’t even know.  There are so many gadgets out there, and then when you get on a registry, it’s so easy to just click “add.”  Add to the registry!  And not really think about how it will be used and if there’s an alternative or if it’s even something that will actually make your life easier after you have the baby.  With my first baby, I had no idea what those things would be.  To a degree, even after my second baby, I had no idea because having two babies is completely different than having one.

Kristin:  Exactly.  It’s so different.

Krista:  But after our fourth baby, we had decluttered.  We had lived that way for a while.  Everyone in the due date group thought I was kind of the weird one because I was like, I’m not going to buy all that stuff this time.  I’m going to get a car seat.  I’m going to get a small amount of clothes and a really nice baby carrier that’s really comfy.  I don’t know if you have a recommendation, but I love the Lenny Lambs.  They’re so soft.

Kristin:  My kids are 10 and 9, so I think that might be a newer product.  But I loved the Ergo and the Moby.

Krista:  Yeah, it’s similar.  Instead of it being like a canvas, it’s like a really soft linen, but still strong, so it’s more flexible.  They’re really nice.  But I knew the basics of what I needed, and then I decided that after they were born, I would get things as needed.  I did find that with having three older kids and a dog, having a small bouncer-type chair where I could set her down quickly in moments and her be safe was worth getting.  But I think sometimes we get so much in preparation mode that we get all of these things, unsure of if we’ll actually need them, and then that becomes overwhelming because the house is full of all of this stuff.  Ultimately, then we have to end up cleaning it up and shifting it around our houses and making room for it and rearranging it.  I would say just basics: food, clothes, a way to feed the baby, a way to keep the baby safe and held so that you can still move around, and then wait and see what you need as things come up.  Even toys.  There are so many baby toys out there.  You don’t even need toys or any of that.

Kristin:  And people love to buy toys and high chairs and things that aren’t needed until a baby is older, so again, they’re sitting around taking up space in your home and causing more clutter, which for many people, causes anxiety when you look around at the clutter.  It can be very stressful.

Krista:  I know for sure that was my experience with my first three kids.  Having all this stuff around me and then feeling obligated to use it and then missing the window for actually being able to use those play mats and stuff because it goes so fast.  And then noticing a really big difference after having our fourth and then our fifth baby without all that stuff and just my ability to be with my baby.  I think that’s one thing that I learned, too, with a lot of the gadgets and things unintentionally – I’m not going to say that all gadgets are this way, but it really took away from my ability to be with my baby.  It was like, I have to play with these things.  I have to show her this.  I have to do all these activities and stuff instead of just laying with her.

Kristin:  There are so many things.  Like you said, the gadgets, the orbit and different things that are computerized and can occupy your child so you can clean and reduce clutter instead of, again, bonding and holding your baby or putting them down to sleep and so on.  I love it.  So you’ve had completely different experiences, it sounds like, from your first couple of kids and to now as far as the experience in your household.  What was your plan for your last baby in that nesting phase?  What were you doing to prepare for the change in your family?

Krista:  Baby number five was born in 2019, and I remember that first round of two under two being so hard.  I could handle one just fine, but then when the second one came, it was like everything I thought I could do went out the window.  And so with this fifth baby, I was preparing to have two under two again, and the majority of my focus was to get systems in place in my house with my older kids.  There were expectations of the chores that they were responsible for, making sure that my house was pretty easy to manage with one adult, and I wanted that to be my focus because my husband works a lot.  So I thought that if I could reduce the workload down to one adult, I would have a better chance of being able to really recover as well as possible because I was just crossing my fingers that I’d survive two under two again.  And I’ll be honest, two under two is really hard, for me anyway.

Kristin:  It was for me, as well.  I went through the same thing.

Krista:  Yes, you understand.  It just feels like the workload, not including day to day stuff of groceries and meals and cleaning up messes, just quadruples.  My focus was on mentally preparing myself for that and making my house as simple as possible, setting up those systems, but really just preparing myself to be ready to do the absolute bare minimum for about two years.  I’m at the tail end of that now.  How I’m even able to be here with you right now – she’s two and a half now.  It was really preparing myself mentally to be okay with it being a very low-key season where I’m not doing a lot of things outside of taking care of small children, being tired, and trying to sleep, and focusing on those kinds of things.

Kristin:  As far as your business model, take us through what it would be like to work with you if a client of ours or a listener is interested in setting the stage before they have their first or next baby, and then walk us through what it might look like in the postnatal phase, if they’re hearing about you and they’ve already had their baby and they really need to get things organized and in order.

Krista:  I’ve actually had a lot of moms come to me when they’re pregnant and wanting to do this before they have their babies.  Under the assumption that you have a healthy pregnancy – obviously, you’re tired and dealing with all of that – I always recommend doing as much as you possible can before the baby gets here because I feel like once the baby is here, it’s just a different kind of workload, a different kind of 24/7 job for you, especially when they’re teeny tiny.  I want moms to be ready for that.  I want them to clear the space from their homes so that they can be ready to just have that around-the-clock time with this tiny, super sweet baby, which I miss, to be honest.  But I always recommend starting with the areas of your home that are going to have the most impact.  Things like your kitchen, your dishes, having less dishes overall so that they’re easier to keep up on, going through your pantry and making sure that you’ve got food that’s not expired, those kinds of things.  Laundry, because laundry can pile up very quickly.  Decluttering and simplifying laundry.  And then if you have other children, going through and simplifying the toys and crafts and whatever it is that you have for them.  What I’ve found for me specifically is the more kids I have, the less stuff and toys and crafts we can really manage.  We still have enough to meet the needs and desires of our family, but when we had three kids, we have, like, four times as many toys as we do now with five kids.  Part of it, I think, is because we just don’t fully understand how much we actually need and use on a regular basis, but also, they play with each other, and that part gets easier.  But those are the areas that I have them focus on first just because those are the most common areas of the home that can get very overwhelming.

Hey, Alyssa here.  I’m just popping in to tell you about our course called Becoming.  Becoming A Mother is your guide to a confident pregnancy and birth all in a convenient six-week online program, from birth plans to sleep training and everything in between.  You’ll gain the confidence and skills you need for a smooth transition to motherhood.  You’ll get live coaching calls with Kristin and myself, a bunch of expert videos, including chiropractic care, pelvic floor physical therapy, mental health experts, breastfeeding, and much more.  You’ll also get a private Facebook community with other mothers going through this at the same time as you to offer support and encouragement when you need it most.  And then of course you’ll also have direct email access to me and Kristin, in addition to the live coaching calls.  If you’d like to learn more about the course, you can email us at info@goldcoastdoulas.com, or check it out at www.thebecomingcourse.com.  We’d love to see you there.

Kristin:  I agree on the toys.  Family members and friends, and kids start having birthday parties where friends attend, and it gets to be overwhelming.  I always have my kids donate before Christmas or a birthday before they get more toys.  It’s like, what are we giving back so we can make space for new things?

Krista:  That’s a good rhythm to get into, as well, for them so that they know kind of, like, we only have so much room.  We don’t have room to keep everything that we get every year.  But then I think your next question was what about for afterwards.

Kristin:  Exactly, yes.

Krista:  One of the reasons that I do recommend doing it before you have the baby if at all possible is that if you have family and friends who are willing to come and help – I know not everybody has that – it does make it a lot easier for people to come into your home and do simple things.  You know, help out with the dishes or help out with a load of laundry.  For me, I’ve often felt embarrassed about the way that my house was, so I didn’t want people coming over and being like, oh, wow, she’s quite a mess.  Decluttering and simplifying it just made it easier to accept help when people did want to come over.  If you don’t get to it before baby, it’s totally okay, as well.  I still would recommend focusing on those areas because you want to maximize the effort that you put into decluttering the things that are going to have the most impact on your days, and the most important thing is to not overdo it because you are healing in so many ways.  You do have time, and if you can find someone who can give you just tiny little bite-sized steps to take that will help you clear things out of your home efficiently and maximize your effort, that’s really great.  Of course, you can also just look around your house and ask yourself, like, what would be the best thing for me to have less of?  Have less laundry or clothes; have less toys; have less dishes.  Just kind of take note of that and figure out how you can give yourself some relief.

Kristin:  I love it.  So helpful.  And as you said, it makes it easier for others to help after you’ve had your baby if they don’t need to ask you where to put things and things are simplified.  Some of our clients have a parent or friends stay with them during that recovery period if their partner is working quite a bit during that time.  It makes it easier to have company.

Krista:  That’s an important note, too.  Even if they aren’t coming to help you with dishes or something like that, we have social needs, as well.  I found myself with my first babies kind of isolating myself because I was embarrassed to have people over unless I did a whole lot of work to prepare my house.  Not that anybody cared, but I cared.  But then I was also so overwhelmed that it made it difficult to leave my house and go meet people at other places because I’m like, there’s so much I have to do at the house; I can’t go anywhere.  I really love, as much as possible, to help moms and make this easy for them so they don’t end up being isolated or feeling overwhelmed or taking time away from being able to bond with their baby because they’re cleaning up these messes or just trying to get ahead in their house.

Kristin:  Exactly.  So what are your top three tips for listeners, Krista, if they want to make some change or hire a consultant like you to help them simplify?

Krista:  I would say just start with one thing.  This is something that we do inside of our Facebook group every now and then where we just share literally one thing that we’re going to declutter.  Maybe it’s something that’s been sitting on your kitchen counter that you’ve been avoiding for a long time.  Maybe it’s some dishes.  Maybe it’s a pile of stuff that’s been sitting on your stairs.  Literally just one thing, because that will get your momentum going.  I think a lot of times the hardest part is when we think about what we’re supposed to do, and then we think about it forever, and it’s so exhausting until you actually just take one step.  You’re like, oh, that wasn’t so bad, and then you can take the next one.  That would be my first tip.  My second tip would be start – just do declutter your spice cabinet, just to be really specific.  Go declutter your spice cabinet, or if you don’t have that, under your kitchen sink.  If you go declutter one of those spaces, there’s not a lot of sentimental stuff in there.  You can do it while you’re making dinner or when you’ve got a spare five minutes throughout your day.  It’s all pretty simple stuff to get rid of, and it will give you a quick win.  It will make you feel like you’re making progress and like it’s not so scary to declutter and not so daunting.  I think sometimes when we think about decluttering our houses, we just see the whole house.  It’s like, oh, my gosh, it’s going to take forever.  If you can just do a tiny little thing, it feels a whole lot less daunting.  And the last thing that I would recommend is to just find some kind of a community who can help you along, right, who understands it.  If you’re a mom or if you are pregnant and about to become a new mom, find a mom group who knows about decluttering and can relate to you and will totally validate and understand the feelings that you have when you’re just exhausted because you’re pregnant or you just had a baby and your house is overwhelming, and they can brainstorm with you and strategize and just let you know you’re not the only one who feels that way.

Kristin:  And you mentioned you have a Facebook group?

Krista:  Yes, I do.  It’s called Motherhood Simplified (The Group) and there’s about 40,000 moms in there right now.  We do monthly challenges.  We’ve got a really good system for asking questions and giving feedback.  It’s really respectful.  Very high-level, wonderful moms to learn from.

Kristin:  I love it.  And then how else can our listeners get in touch with you?  You’ve got a website.  You’re on Instagram?

Krista:  Yes.  If you go to my website, you’ll find everything there.  I’ve got a bank of blogs and free guides and podcast episode and courses.  Whatever you consume or use, you can find it on my site.  You can join the group there.  It’s all right there.

Kristin:  As far as course options, what would you suggest for our listeners at this point if they’re pregnant or newly postpartum?

Krista:  I have a course called Decluttering Simplified, which is a step-by-step process to help you declutter your house start to finish, one step at a time in sequential order.  It’s how I decluttered my house and then for the last three and a half years, it’s how I’ve helped other moms declutter their houses.  I’ve given them the program, had them go through it, gotten feedback so I could adjust it and refine it.  I would recommend that.  And if you want something less intensive, if you don’t want to do the whole entire house, I do have a toy course.  You can do just the toys or just the clothes, just the paper, because those are the top three that I get requests for.  That’s where I would recommend.  It’s all created from the lens of motherhood and understanding that we have limited time, limited energy, and we still want to make a lot of progress with the time and energy that we do have.

Kristin:  Exactly.  And you mentioned sentimental items.  When I think of paper, I think of my kids’ report cards and cards that they made us or drawings, and there’s just so much that builds up when you get into sentimental paper products related to your children and wanting to have memories for them to take to their own homes one day.

Krista:  Yeah.  You want me to share kind of how we do it real quick?

Kristin:  Yes!

Krista:  So we have five kids, and we have tons of paper.  Right?  They come home with school projects and all of that stuff, and a few years ago – actually, maybe four or five years ago, I had, like, three bins of papers and crafts and all these special memories, and I decided to go through it with them.  What we found when we started going through it was that a lot of it was not special.  Nobody could remember what it was or when they made it.  So we went through and really got to curate our collection of the memories that we did want to keep, and we condensed it down to about one large Rubbermaid bin.

Kristin:  So much better.

Krista:  Yes, and it feels so much better because we go through it about twice a year.  At the end of the school year, we’ll go through it again, because we add to it all year.  We’ll go through it again, and it’s really fun because everything in there is like a museum rather than an archive where it’s stuff that we really love, and we laugh about it, and it’s fun to revisit.  Then we do it again at Christmastime because the box is near our Christmas décor, so we just pull it out for fun.  So if you do have boxes of papers, I would recommend just going through it with your kids and revisiting stuff.  I’ve found the weirdest stuff in there, too, like a flyer for some fall festival.  Like, why would we keep that?  It’s such a weird thing to keep.  But yeah, go through it with them and have some fun.  See what they remember and see what you remember.  The other thing that I’ve found, especially when my kids were young, was that a lot of the papers and crafts that I kept were definitely things that were made by adults and then put my kids’ names on it for Mother’s Day and stuff, which is totally okay, and we kept some of them, but some of them, I was like, you know, we have so many other nicer things that really look like you made it.  So how to handle the kid paper, which I know is a big deal for a lot of families.

Kristin:  It sure is.  Thank you for your tips, Krista!  It was so great to chat, and I will be checking out your Facebook group and getting on my spice rack, for sure.

Krista:  Thank you so much!

Thanks for listening to Gold Coast Doulas.  Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.  If you like this podcast, please subscribe and give us a five-star review.  Thank you!  Remember, these moments are golden.

Sarah Thompson, author of Functional Maternity explains what maternal functional medicine is and the role nutrition plays in pregnancy and birth outcomes.  You can listen to this complete podcast episode on iTunes, SoundCloud, or wherever you find your podcasts.

Welcome.  You’re listening to Ask the Doulas, a podcast where we talk to experts from all over the country about topics related to pregnancy, birth, postpartum, and early parenting.  Let’s chat!

Kristin:  Hello!  This is Kristin with Ask the Doulas, and I’m joined today by Sarah Thompson.  Welcome, Sarah!

Sarah:  Thank you!  Thanks for having me.

Kristin:  You are a certified functional medicine practitioner, and you’ve got 15 years’ experience, correct?

Sarah:  Yeah, that is correct.

Kristin:  I’d love to hear more about why you got into specializing in reproductive care, fertility, pregnancy, and postpartum.  Of all the specialties that you could choose, why are you passionate about maternity care?

Sarah:  Well, I think like most people – in my profession, I’m an acupuncturist by trade before functional medicine.  I started off in sports medicine, pain management, and pregnancy was not something that was even on my radar.  And it wasn’t until I actually became pregnant with my first child that I became fascinated by the internal workings of pregnancy.  It was basically an understanding of my own body that I was like, oh, I have to know how this works.  This is so cool.  Why didn’t anybody tell me pregnancy was so cool?  And I immediately decided then and there that I needed to shift my focus because this is where my passion was.  The other thing that drove me was the fact that there weren’t many practitioners offering any sort of alternative care for pregnancy.  Most of the care, obviously, is through OB-GYNs and through midwives and the conventional medicine practice.  And I remember having questions for my midwives, who were fantastic midwives, but they didn’t have the answers, and they kind of struggled with, I don’t know, maybe there’s a book you can find to read on it.  And I didn’t really love those answers.  So I started doing my own diving and my own research and kind of discovered the functional medicine route even through that experience as well and even within the functional medicine realm, there wasn’t a lot of specialization within the reproductive.  Definitely some into the fertility side, but nothing on the maternity side.  And to me, maternity care is probably the most important specialty there is because it’s the beginning – it’s where everything culminates, right?  What a mother does not only influences her health and that pregnancy, but the next generation.

Kristin:  Exactly.  And of course, I mean, as an acupuncturist, you’re already working with women in pregnancy, and they’re coming to you for relief in a variety of conditions or potentially wanting to avoid induction or get baby to flip and so on.

Sarah:  Absolutely.  Acupuncture offers a number of different clinically supported benefits in pregnancy.  We can use it to reduce hypertension.  We can use it to facilitate labor, which is pretty cool.  Flip breach babies.  There’s a number of things that we use acupuncture for.  The cool thing about the combination between acupuncture and functional medicine is functional medicine is that foundation.  It’s how nutrition plays into what we’re asking the body to do with acupuncture at a nutritional and biochemical level.  So I always tell people, I can tell your body to do something with acupuncture, but if the foundation is broken, then it’s not going to work.  So looking at labor induction, with acupuncture, I can tell the body to make prostaglandins and to make oxytocin to facilitate natural labor, but if that person was magnesium deficient or vitamin A deficient or deficient in the nutrients that go into the production and the function of oxytocin and prostaglandins, it’s not going to happen.  And that’s where functional medicine comes into that.

Kristin:  So you look into the lifestyle, and I’m sure you do very lengthy intakes with your patients about their nutrition.  So how does that process work when you’re accepting new pregnant patients?

Sarah:  Sure.  So we offer a couple different options.  I have a functional maternity package, which is unlimited functional medicine appointments, and we follow women through their entire pregnancy and for three months postpartum.  The earlier I can work with somebody, the better.  I kind of joke with my patients and in interviews like this, that everything in pregnancy is preparing.  And oftentimes, what we’re working on in a specific trimester has less to do with that trimester and more to do with preparing for the next trimester.

Kristin:  Makes sense.

Sarah:  So with the functional maternity package, the earlier we can get somebody in, so first trimester, right, the better we can set them up for success throughout their entire pregnancy.  We also offer pre-conception appointments where we talk a lot about the nutrition and the functional aspect of how the ovary and the sperm and everything comes together to support that first trimester.  And that’s not part of the package.  That would be separate, just because some people struggle with conception, and that can sometimes take longer.  But we are always basically trying to build off of in each phase in that pregnancy gestation cascade.

Kristin:  And as far as nutrition, do you have different recommendations based on history or a guideline for each client based on what their current diet is and so on?

Sarah:  Absolutely.  So we do have – I have handouts I give to patients all the time that are the generic dietary guidelines for each trimester of pregnancy and things that I want them to focus on, foods I want them to focus on.  But that’s also modified based off of the individual.  So a mother who may have PCOS prior to conception, she might need a different nutritional pattern and guidelines than somebody who didn’t.  Or if somebody struggled with conception – they had recurrent miscarriages; they carry MTHFR genetic mutations that change the way their body processes the latent B vitamins and those sorts of things, then they’re going to need a different guideline than just the generic guideline.  So we have our generic that basically will say things like, this is what’s happening in the maternal body at this time.  This is what we’re looking at in fetal development.  These are the things we focus on in a general trimester guideline.  But for you, because of this, we’re going to add these things in.

Kristin:  Makes sense.  And then with gestational diabetes and other conditions, then you would, of course, focus on those specific needs?

Sarah:  Absolutely.  Yeah.  That definitely changes some of the guidelines when somebody pops up with gestational diabetes or preeclampsia and some of these more severe conditions.

Kristin:  Yes.  And you are also an author, so how did you manage a busy practice and taking on a book project, which is huge?

Sarah:  It was a huge project.  It was a lot of fun.  It was something that I had had in the back of my head for years, and it was a resource and a guide that I was hoping, you know, somebody else would write.  You know, following my mentors and these things and going, okay, so when are you guys going to write this book?  Okay, we need this resource!  And finally, somebody said, just write it.  And I said, all right, I will, because we need it.  We need this out here for people, whether it’s a practitioner or a mother who just conceived or somebody who’s looking to conceive.  The book was designed to be an introduction to the use of functional medicine and nutrition in pregnancy care.  So it’s a little bit more in depth than just your kind of general guide to pregnancy and nutrition.  We dive very deep into the inner workings and biochemistry and physiology of the maternal body and how nutrition plays into these different biochemical processes.  So it’s a little bit more in-depth, but definitely something that a pregnant mother could pick up and read and get a lot of information out of, as well as a practitioner.

Kristin:  And how do we find your book?  It’s available on Amazon and a variety of places.  Are you in bookstores, as well?

Sarah:  I will be in bookstores.  If you go to your local bookstore and request it, they can order it for you.

Kristin:  Great!

Sarah:  But it is primarily right now on Amazon.

Kristin:  And the title for our listeners?

Sarah:  The book is called Functional Maternity: Using Functional Medicine and Nutrition to Improve Pregnancy and Childbirth Outcomes.

Kristin:  That’s great.  So do you have any future projects in mind beyond book number one, or what are you working on outside of your practice?

Sarah:  We are looking at maybe creating some courses based off the book that are designed for practitioners and for expectant mothers that guide into a little bit more into the different conditions or general nutritional guidance for pregnant moms, so that’s something that might be popping up this summer.  We’re also contemplating our own supplement line at this point, something that has been brought up and requested from numerous practitioners at this point.  So we’re diving into the world of possibly setting up a supplement line based on functional medicine and maternity care and the research behind it.  So those are some things to keep an eye out for.  And on the website, we do have a blog full of articles, and there will be some free e-book downloads on there.  I have a pre-conception and fertility e-book that will be available as a free download on there, hopefully in the next couple of weeks.

Kristin:  Great!  We’ll share that for our listeners in our notes.  So as far as – you not only take patients, and are you doing both in person and virtual right now, or how are you practicing?

Sarah:  We have – our practice runs in office and virtually.  I have patients all over the world, actually.

Kristin:  It would seem like that, from your website, yeah.  That’s fantastic.  So Michigan clients can access you virtually?

Sarah:  Absolutely, yeah.  And we have patients as far away as Australia and Canada.  We follow them through their pregnancy and guide them through nutrition and functional medicine if things pop up.  It’s something that definitely can be used for people who are just looking to support a natural healthy pregnancy and for people who are experiencing complications.  It’s a great avenue for all people in any type of pregnancy.

Kristin:  Sarah, how does one, if they wanted to find a practitioner to go in person in their area, how do you best recommend finding a functional medicine practitioner?

Sarah:  With those who are pregnant, it gets really hard, simply because the functional medicine trainings do not offer, really, specialized maternity care.  I don’t know many practitioners out there who have additional training in supporting pregnancy with functional medicine.  And it’s something that I’m trying to change.  That’s one of my missions is I would love to see functional medicine practitioners doing a little bit more in-depth training in maternity care simply because a lot of the things that we do in functional medicine can’t be done in pregnancy.  A lot of the testing that we use is different in pregnancy.  I like to use an example that I also mentor practitioners around the country, as well, and I had a functional medicine practitioner from another state contact me slightly in a panic that he had run heavy metal testing on a woman who was in her third trimester, and copper levels had come up elevated.  And he was wanting to come up with a protocol to bring her copper levels down without causing complications within the pregnancy.  A lot of the supplements that we would use for that are contraindicated in pregnancy.  And I had to stop him very abruptly because having elevated copper levels in the third trimester of pregnancy is 100% normal.  And in his training – he had not done additional training in pregnancy support and these different physiological changes that occur in pregnancy that, outside of pregnancy, could be considered toxic patterns, but in pregnancy, are 100% normal.

Kristin:  Okay, so he was in panic mode –

Sarah:  He was, and it was 100% normal.  And if he had done that, he would have caused complications within that pregnancy.

Hey, Alyssa here.  I’m just popping in to tell you about our course called Becoming.  Becoming A Mother is your guide to a confident pregnancy and birth all in a convenient six-week online program, from birth plans to sleep training and everything in between.  You’ll gain the confidence and skills you need for a smooth transition to motherhood.  You’ll get live coaching calls with Kristin and myself, a bunch of expert videos, including chiropractic care, pelvic floor physical therapy, mental health experts, breastfeeding, and much more.  You’ll also get a private Facebook community with other mothers going through this at the same time as you to offer support and encouragement when you need it most.  And then of course you’ll also have direct email access to me and Kristin, in addition to the live coaching calls.  If you’d like to learn more about the course, you can email us at info@goldcoastdoulas.com, or check it out at www.thebecomingcourse.com.  We’d love to see you there.

Kristin:  It’s so great that, not only are you mentoring, but you plan to further education functional medicine practitioners.  I do find that even in my work as a doula, there aren’t a lot of specialists.  There are so many other healthcare practitioner referrals that we can make, but very few really specialize or have the knowledge base around maternity.  They might have a focus on, say, gestational diabetes if they’re a naturopathic doctor or a functional medicine doctor and so on, but as far as other conditions, they don’t have that background.

Sarah:  Yeah, and if somebody was looking for a practitioner in their area – you know, a functional medicine certification is an adjunct to a medical license.  It’s not its own separate, you know, licensure.  It’s off of a license.  So finding a practitioner whose base licensure is specialized in pregnancy care definitely would be – like a midwife or an OB-GYN or an acupuncturist who specializes in pregnancy.  Those sorts of things, a naturopath who specializes in women’s health, might definitely put them in a better advantage to find somebody who has the additional training and the additional knowledge in these different aspects of maternity care.

Kristin:  Makes sense.  So I’m curious about your approach in the postnatal phase.  That is also a specialty of yours and something we’re very passionate about at Gold Coast.

Sarah:  You know, postpartum care is often neglected.  I think the conventional medicine world kind of says, well, you had a baby.  Good luck.  We’ll see you in six weeks.  You’re doing great.  Keep going.  Where we know that the maternal body, the baby itself, they are still in this hormonal pattern of pregnancy postpartum, and we have the fourth trimester, what we call it now, those three months postpartum.  And that’s why with my functional maternity package, we include those three months postpartum as part of that package, because there is a lot of maternal change that happens very quickly during that time frame, and it is definitely still a phase hormonally of pregnancy.  And so we do monitor, especially the first six weeks; we’re talking to patients every week postpartum, typically.  Checking in, seeing what’s changing, how’s breast milk, how are we feeling emotionally, and discussing what is happening in her body so that she understands what’s normal and what’s not and how we can do things to support those different changes in the body.  Things like thyroid hormone changes that occur postpartum, the drop in hormones and why and why that happens; changes in breast milk production; how do we support that.  And any time we’re looking at postpartum, we have to go backwards.  It’s that preparing for preparing aspect.  What’s happening in the postpartum phase oftentimes isn’t because of what a mother is doing in the postpartum phase; it has to do with what happened in the third trimester and during the birth itself.

Kristin:  And I’m sure there’s a lot of focus, for mothers who choose to breastfeed, on their nutrition and water intake and so on?

Sarah:  Absolutely.  Yeah, one of the things we focus on a lot is something like vitamin D.  That’s kind of one of my examples I use a lot.  Newer research shows that the current recommended daily allowance of vitamin D is 600 international units, and that is far from what a mother actually needs in pregnancy and significantly less than what a mother needs postpartum.  The demand for vitamin D goes up quite a bit in the postpartum phase if she is breastfeeding.  So babies need, when they’re breastfeeding, about 400 international units of vitamin D, and for a baby to get that through the breast milk, a mother needs to consume a minimum of 6,000 international units per day in her diet.  That’s a lot of vitamin D!

Kristin:  It is, especially if you live somewhere cold and you’re not getting it from the sun.

Sarah:  Exactly.  And like I said, the current RDA is only 600, so far lower than what newer studies are showing that women need.  And this changes from that pregnancy phase to postpartum phase.  And so we actually need more in the postpartum phase than we did in the pregnancy phase.

Kristin:  And then is that also a focus with preeclampsia?  You mentioned preeclampsia earlier.

Sarah:  Yep.  So we look at a number of things with preeclampsia, and interestingly, every nutrient known to man, a deficiency in those nutrients is associated with an increased risk of preeclampsia, yet the treatment of preeclampsia once it occurs, treating with those nutritional deficiencies, fixing those nutritional deficiencies, doesn’t improve the symptoms as dramatically as we would expect, and it’s because the damage has been done.  A nutritional deficiency in the first trimester or pre-conception coming into the first trimester and second trimester changes placental development, and if that placental development gets shifted into a dysfunctional pattern, then now we have the increased risk of developing preeclampsia sometime in the second and third trimester.  So we can’t fix damage that’s already been done, right?

Kristin:  That makes sense.

Sarah:  And so people who come to me with acute preeclampsia, really, our goal is to keep that woman pregnant and healthy as long as we can, knowing that this is a progressive disease.  I have patients who come to me wanting pre-conception help for a second pregnancy or a third pregnancy where a previous pregnancy, they had preeclampsia, and they’re wanting to prevent it.  That’s our preventative phase is that pre-conception first trimester phase.

Kristin:  That makes sense.  I had preeclampsia with my first and then was focused, like the moment I found out that I was pregnant, on trying to prevent and seeking alternative practitioners and hiring doulas.  Yes, so that makes a lot of sense.  And many of our listeners are not aware of eclampsia and some of the effects after having baby and how to manage that, as well.

Sarah:  Yeah, I think there’s definitely, as you know, a great myth out there, delivery cures preeclampsia, and that’s not the case.  It is a progressive condition, and a lot of women experience postpartum symptoms of the disease.

Kristin:  Yes.  And so as far as treating patients – now, I know that, obviously, optimally, it’s better to work with you from the point of conception, early, but what about those patients who are struggling in the postpartum phase, or they’re dealing with eclampsia or other conditions?  How do you work with them and manage not having the time to really get into what they’re deficient in and so on?

Sarah:  And sometimes we do.  Like, we can still run lab work.  We can figure out, is it a vitamin D deficiency?  Vitamin D deficiency is associated with an increased risk of so many pregnancy complications.  But we definitely do crisis management, is what we’ll call it.  All right, here’s what we’re going to do.  We don’t have time to do a lot of the stuff.  We’re going to do these pretty hefty protocols sometimes, and it depends on the patterns, right?  HELLP syndrome, for example.  One of the classic things that we see with HELLP syndrome is the filling of hemoglobin into the maternal blood flow from the baby.  The placenta is dysfunctional, and fetal hemoglobin pops into mom’s blood, and that’s why we see increased hemoglobin levels in HELLP syndrome.  It’s not that mom is now making more hemoglobin.  It’s that baby’s hemoglobin is now flooding her system.  And that creates a whole cascade of complications.  Sometimes we’ll use supplements, right?  Here, we’re going to give you this manganese and this super oxide because we know that it helps to treat the iron toxicity associated with that spilling of hemoglobin.  So it’s an acute management of that scenario with what we can do, with the idea of preventing more extreme complications.  Sometimes we can get those complications to reverse, even, in the lab work, which is really cool to see, and it’s always fun to surprise physicians.  They’re like, wait, how did that happen?  We’re like, oh, it’s functional medicine.  It’s really cool.  You should look into it.  And we do those sorts of things with the idea of, again, this is a progressive disease, and our goal is to mitigate it as much as possible to get mom and baby further into gestation so that we have a more viable pregnancy.  So we do crisis management, and sometimes the things that moms don’t love, right, it’s like, I want you to eat liver every single day, and they’re like, no, I don’t want to do that.  That’s what we’re going to do.  Or things like, I want you to have – sometimes it’s simple things that don’t sound like they do a lot, but they do.  Things like, I want you to have a glass of milk at every meal, and I want you to eat five eggs a day.  And there’s methodology to why we do this, but it’s kind of this really quick, intensive dietary approach that floods her body with specific things that we need to help mitigate this dysfunction.  So yeah, we work a lot with crisis management, things like small for gestational age babies and intrauterine growth restriction.  That’s something we work with quite a bit in that kind of third trimester type stuff where it’s like, oh, I went in, and my baby’s growing three weeks behind; what do I do?  Those are things that we hammer certain nutritional protocols with the idea of understanding that something is happening between the placenta and the baby or something’s happening in mom’s diet that is limiting the amount of nutrition that can go to baby.  And so we have to kind of figure out the why behind it.  The key to functional medicine is understanding the why.  Why is this happening?  Not just here’s the band aid for it, but we have to understand the why.  Is it narrow blood vessels in the placenta?  Is it something that happened in mom?  I’ve had a couple of cases just in the last couple months of, oh, moms who’ve gotten COVID at certain times of gestation, and when they’re done, their baby is smaller, and that’s something we’re definitely seeing, and it’s something we have to treat.  So when I have moms who pop up with COVID, we have a protocol to help prevent that change in placenta and fetal growth.  So there’s a lot of things that do become crisis management in pregnancy, and we are limited on time.  One of the downfalls of working sometimes in pregnancy is that we are limited and the maternal body changes so much from trimester to trimester, month to month, week to week, that you have to understand the different physiological and hormonal changes that occur throughout gestation, the nutritional components, and how that changes your treatments, how that changes your approach to that individual as they come in.

Kristin:  Makes sense.  Well, we are running out of time.  Any last tips for our listeners as they’re navigating pregnancy and the postpartum phase?

Sarah:  Absolutely.  So, you know, there’s all sorts of different diets out there, and I don’t prescribe to any one dietary theory.  I believe in nutrition; individual nutrients; what they do in the body.  And we see from study after study after study that diet is key to pregnancy outcomes, fetal development, and postpartum recovery, and if I had one single tip to give to the moms out there who are listening, it would be eat a variety of whole foods.  And it seems so simple, but it’s something that is often times very difficult.  80% of women of reproductive age aren’t even eating the minimum requirements for vegetables, and that’s where our vitamins come from.  Primarily, it’s from the vegetables and the legumes and the plant-based foods that we eat.  And something as simple as switching to whole foods, kind of cutting out the processed stuff as much as possible, really does have a big impact pre-conception, first trimester, pregnancy, postpartum, the whole gamut.

Kristin:  And any tips on protein intake?

Sarah:  Yeah.  Protein is important.  We need lots of protein, and definitely in the prenatal diet, we focus a lot on protein.  And I have patients who eat meat, and I have patients who don’t eat meat.  And we can easily get the adequate amount of protein that we need in pregnancy, but it’s just making sure you do get the protein.  Legumes are protein.  Nuts and seeds are proteins.  Obviously, meats.  Obviously, eggs, dairy, cheese.  All those things really do play a part.  I’m not anti any food.  I think all foods have a place in the diet.  We’ve just lost a lot of our traditional knowledge on how to use certain foods, and I think it’s important that people know how to properly use foods in the diet.  You know, things like legumes needing to be soaked before you cook them and things like that really unlock the nutrition within those foods, as well.

Kristin:  I’m so thrilled to have you as a resource, and I look forward to connecting again in the future and sending clients your way.  Sarah, would you recap a bit about how our listeners and clients can find you?  I know you’re on Instagram and some other social media platforms?

Sarah:  Definitely, we have social media.  Instagram and Facebook, we are at functional.maternity.  And we have a website.  From there, there is a link on that website to access the clinic, Sacred Vessel Acupuncture.  You can use either website to communicate with me.  I always offer a 15-minute free phone consultation for anybody who is interested in becoming a patient before they ever schedule, so that’s something that’s nice because people have a lot of questions about functional medicine and what we can offer and specific conditions, so I think it’s nice to be able to get that free phone consultation and just ask some basic questions beforehand.  And like I said, the book is Functional Maternity.  You can find that on Amazon, and then you can also request it at your local bookstores.

Kristin:  Perfect.  And you can find information on your website about the book, as well?

Sarah:  You can, absolutely.

Kristin:  Thank you so much, Sarah!  Have a great rest of your day!

Sarah:  Thank you.  You, as well.  Thanks for having me.

Thanks for listening to Gold Coast Doulas.  Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.  If you like this podcast, please subscribe and give us a five-star review.  Thank you!  Remember, these moments are golden.

We talk about Pilates with Emma Jory of ePilates Online shares tips on how to take care of your body in all four trimesters.  You can listen to this complete podcast episode on iTunes, SoundCloud, or wherever you find your podcasts.

Welcome.  You’re listening to Ask the Doulas, a podcast where we talk to experts from all over the country about topics related to pregnancy, birth, postpartum, and early parenting.  Let’s chat!

Kristin:  Welcome to Ask the Doulas.  I’m Kristin, and I’m excited to chat with Emma Jory today about how to take care of your body in all four trimesters.  Emma Jory is an international certified Pilates, barres, and Hatha yoga instructor.  She’s also a certified health coach, online instructor, and specializes in women’s health, specifically pre- and postnatal programs with over 17 years of teaching experience.  Emma is the creator of ePilates Online, an online global fitness business, and she’s the former owner of Emergy Pilates Lounge in Sydney, Australia.  In 2014, she sold the business and launched her ePilates Online business.  She connects with over 40,000 of her members by offering 300-plus classes and builds a community to help them transform their health.  Emma’s been featured in Parenthood and Pilates Style magazine.  She took the stage as an expert professional at Malaysia’s Murfest and Sacred Postpartum Summit and was a podcast guest on The Purpose Effect and Conscious Connections.  Emma lives in Malaysia with her husband and pups.  Welcome, Emma!

Emma:  Hi, Kristin.  Thank you so much.  Lovely to be here.

Kristin:  So excited to chat with you about four trimesters.  Most people only think of three, but I would love to hear your take on postnatal prep and what your focus, both prenatal and postnatal care, for women is all about.

Emma:  Nice.  So true; a lot of people don’t pay enough attention to the fourth trimester, that’s for sure.  It is definitely an important time for women.  I actually teach women to prepare their bodies for birth during the first, second, and third trimester with exercise like Pilates and yoga, but also a little bit of mindset coaching, which is all intertwined, as well as meditation.  It’s important to prepare the body, but then as you say, look after the body and your mental and physical wellbeing in the fourth trimester because you are a new mom.  Obviously, you are – some are new moms; obviously, not everyone, but you are taking that change in your life as well as the baby’s.  So it is important to recognize that.

Kristin:  So as far as preparation, fitness, and as you mentioned, the mental preparation to get your body not only ready for birth but for that healing time.

Emma:  Yeah, because technically – you know, we don’t think about it like this often, but really, the body has gone through trauma.  It’s like having an injury.  Often, it can be – you know, some people have more effects in their body than others, but the body has changed, and to recognize that change is really important, to not rush back to exercise too quickly, because if you had an injury, for example, in your shoulder or your knee, you wouldn’t go back into a normal level of exercise perhaps that you were doing prior to your injury.  So I like to get my clients to think of it that way so that they do take regaining the exercise routine back steady and they don’t rush into things too quickly because you can actually do – not damage as such, but, you know, you can do a little bit more detrimental affects to your body than if you did take it slowly.  Working from the inside out and letting your body recover is really important.

Kristin:  So true.  I feel like women are in a hurry to get back to their size pre-birth and just get into fitness routines, and it’s challenging for them to wait until they get clearance from their doctor or midwife.  So very good advice.  So I’m fascinated by Malaysian healing traditions.  Would you like to share a bit about the 40 days and rest and nourishment?

Emma:  Yeah, it’s interesting.  I know you’ve spoken to Valerie from The Mommy Plan.  I know Valerie here.  I met her Malaysia, and she’s into all of the Malaysian techniques, as well.  I’ve actually been very lucky and blessed to have learned a lot about these postpartum healing methods while living here in Malaysia for the last eight years, and it definitely has become a passion of mine, the postpartum period even more so of a passion to help moms because I’ve seen how much the local culture here really does embrace this fourth trimester.  They really take care of the mother like she is just as important as the baby, if not more in some ways, taking care of her mentally, because I think it’s missed a lot in Western culture.  We tend to rush back to work.  We think we have to get back to normal tasks of everyday life whereas we do take this time to heal; we are definitely going to be in a better head space to look after our baby.  And a lot of the techniques they use here, a lot of massage, specific foods that they like to eat that are very nourishing; they have a lot of techniques around binding the stomach muscles and the stomach area, but also putting on heat packs and creams, using different herbs.  It’s a really beautiful process, and a lot of the women actually have someone come into their home to actually do all of these treatments for them, so they’re very lucky.  And it’s something like once a week or once or twice a week, even.  Some of them even have people living in.  So they’re really well looked after here, and they make it a big focus, which is – I think we can learn a lot from that.

Kristin:  I agree.  Mothering the mother is so essential, and you are correct, I’ve learned so much from Valerie and her books and lectures and so on.  I would love to hear more about your online program, if you’d let our listeners know a bit about what that involves and how they can join anywhere in the world.

Emma:  Oh, yeah.  So I have been teaching postpartum and prenatal women for many years.  I’ve been teaching Pilates for 17, and throughout my whole journey, I’ve been teaching mums through this period.  And I have helped a lot of women face to face, and there was a lot of women that I couldn’t get to see because my schedule was so quite busy and full.  I felt like I really needed to be sharing this information and these techniques with more women.  And this is actually – this online program I created for postpartum women and prenatal, as well.  I actually put together before everyone was sort of going online, so it’s been a well-received program for many years, and it helps to regain the body back after giving birth in a safe way.  It helps to strengthen the pelvic floor.  It’s safe for women who’s given birth probably – sometimes even women will start as early as six weeks.  It’s very gentle.  It’s safe to do.  Some even earlier.  You know, I’ve had some ladies actually do the breathing and connecting of the pelvic floor muscles and deep abdominals earlier on like four weeks because it’s very gentle, and sometimes the sooner the mothers can do that if they’ve had, especially, tearing or even a C-section, as long as it’s feeling comfortable and there’s no pain, they can do that gentle engaging to help actually recover from the scar tissue.  It helps bring blood flow back to the area.  So the program helps with restoring the body, also after Cesarean, and it’s in a functional way, as well, so you are not just doing Kegels where you’re just squeezing the pelvic floor muscles.  You’re actually doing gentle movements, pelvic curls, cat-cows, those sort of movements, and that’s really great to have that functional movement, not just connecting the pelvic floor.  So it’s a three-month program, and it’s tailored for women who’ve just given birth, so it gives the content in a weekly, I guess, delivered format, so you don’t progress any sooner than you should, than you’re ready for.  It’s basically the same program that I would teach my clients if I was going in face to face to teach them.  So it’s a really beneficial program, not just for women who’ve had babies recently but I’ve also had ladies who have done this program and their baby’s 20 years old, and it’s still helped their pelvic floor.  It’s really good, and it’s not normal Pilates.  It’s – yeah, different style.  It’s also using – releasing the fascia, so if anyone has a diastasis, as well, it’s really great for repairing diastasis.  I’ve had a lady who – or quite a few ladies I’ve helped repair that; many, actually, but a couple who were recommended surgery, and they had a four to five finger gap, their diastasis.  And we got them down to two fingers after just a couple of weeks, even, two or three weeks, which is far better than having surgery.  So it’s a great program for all those conditions, even pubic symphysis pain, as well.  So it’s definitely a really great healing program.

Kristin:  Sounds like it.  So glad that you were thinking of doing something online before the rest of us.  We just launched an online course called Becoming A Mother during the pandemic, and I feel like there are so many more online options, but you thought of this, you know, so far in advance.  So it’s a beautiful resource.

Emma:  Thank you, and I did see, yeah, your amazing program, too.  It looks fantastic.  You’re helping women in such a great way.  I love that.  It’s so important to give women the guidance during this time because I think so many women can feel alone and unsure of what they’re doing.  So I love what you’re doing.  I love your work.

Kristin:  Thanks!  So you have a supportive community in addition to the courses, correct?

Emma:  Yeah.  I actually – I have the pre- and postnatal focused programs, and I also have another program that is Pilates for women who are a little – obviously, you know, not going through the changes as pre- and postnatal, so they may be getting into more cardio style or strengthening and toning.  I have that program, as well, and I do have – yeah, I’ve got a Facebook community of about – nearly, I think, 45,000 people now, which is growing and quite amazing.  Yeah.  I run regular challenges, and yeah, it’s quite an exciting online studio, really.  I’m very proud of all my members and the clientele I’m helping around the world.  It’s wonderful.  It’s incredible what you can do, actually, still online.  So a lot of people are getting some great results.

Hey, Alyssa here.  I’m just popping in to tell you about our course called Becoming.  Becoming A Mother is your guide to a confident pregnancy and birth all in a convenient six-week online program, from birth plans to sleep training and everything in between.  You’ll gain the confidence and skills you need for a smooth transition to motherhood.  You’ll get live coaching calls with Kristin and myself, a bunch of expert videos, including chiropractic care, pelvic floor physical therapy, mental health experts, breastfeeding, and much more.  You’ll also get a private Facebook community with other mothers going through this at the same time as you to offer support and encouragement when you need it most.  And then of course you’ll also have direct email access to me and Kristin, in addition to the live coaching calls.  If you’d like to learn more about the course, you can email us at info@goldcoastdoulas.com, or check it out at www.thebecomingcourse.com.  We’d love to see you there.

Kristin:  I will share that with our Becoming students and our doula clients.  What a wonderful resource.  So as we recently interviewed a client, and she had a successful VBAC after a Cesarean, and she really raved about the benefits of using Pilates throughout her pregnancy and how that really helped her prepare for a vaginal birth after Cesarean.  So it’s great timing that I’m talking to you.

Emma:  Yeah, absolutely.  It’s quite powerful.  And just to have that body awareness, I think, as well.  You know, if you haven’t done a lot of that mind-body connection work prior to giving birth, you may not be as, I guess, as prepared as you could be.  You know, once you start to go down that path of really understanding your body when you’re in the situation, which obviously you know all about – I don’t need to explain that to you, but you really are – not necessarily in control, but you have a little bit more control over your breath and mind and what you may do if you didn’t practice some of these mind-body connection practices.

Kristin:  Exactly, yeah.  And she is a big fan of the barre method and used that in recovery as well, and all through pregnancy.  So I would love to hear what’s next for you.  You’ve got so many achievements, but I’m sure you’re planning your next release into the world, whether it’s a book or a new program?

Emma:  Oh, yeah.  It’s true, actually.  I have a lot of my clients asking me about weight loss, and I am a certified health coach, and I tend to give a lot of free advice, you know, just helping my existing clientele around that.  And they keep asking me, you know, can I help them more, and it’s something that I’ve decided to put together.  Not necessarily weight loss, but an inch loss program, which will be hopefully coming out this year at some point.  It will really be – I don’t believe in looking at the scales.  I think that’s why I wouldn’t want to call it a weight loss program, but it will be inch loss, so I think it’s a little bit more about how our clothes fit on our body as opposed to what we weigh on the scales, what the numbers are.  It will be a lot around mindset.  I’m quite big around being kind to ourselves, loving ourselves, and that’s all part of the journey of weight loss.  I have come from a background of myself with an eating disorder when I was younger, so I know too well what it’s like to be monitoring my weight, but I feel I’m in a really good place in my life now at 47, turning 48 soon.  You know, I have had fluctuations up and down, and really now I’ve really embraced my body and love it and still believe in a balanced attitude towards our diet.  I believe in the 80/20 rule.  We can still indulge.  We can still eat the things we love.  I’m a chocolate fan, and I don’t mind a wine.  So I fully believe in that and not depriving ourselves because once we start to do that, that’s when we want things more.  So really helping women through that journey and making lasting changes, not just following a diet for a short period and thinking that’s – they have to reduce what they eat or those sorts of things.  But incorporating an exercise program alongside what the individual needs, because I think often we do – often, we over-exercise thinking we need to do that to lose weight, and often if we’re already stressed, we can be having the opposite effect.  You know, if we think we have to do a lot of cardio or strenuous exercise, we’re actually putting more stress onto the body, which can often have the opposite effect, and we can hold on to weight.  And there’s a lot of reasons behind that.  You may have already heard all of those, but it’s driven by hormones.  The stress hormone is called cortisol, which is released when we’re stressed, and so that can tend to cause us to hold on to weight.  So that’s sort of the program I’ll be putting together – hopefully, it will be coming out this year, which will help a lot of women, both postpartum and everyone, I think.

Kristin:  Yeah, everyone can benefit.  And as you mentioned, the hormone changes, and even women entering perimenopause or in menopause are struggling with some of the weight gain issues there.

Emma:  Absolutely, yes.  I’m actually in that phase myself, and certainly feeling and noticing the changes.  The energy levels change, as well.  So you really have to adapt to what your body is asking for.  I believe in that.  I teach that a lot to my clients, to really listen to their body, not to force things.  Obviously, you need to know the difference between when you’re just being – thinking you can’t be bothered to do anything, and yet you could find the energy for it, or whether you really are exhausted and you don’t have the energy and you’re pushing yourself if you do do it.  So I think it’s important that we learn the difference and start to really listen to our body and what it needs.

Kristin:  Beautiful, yes.  So what tips do you have for women who are going through so many transitions, whether it’s baby number one or baby number four?  You had talked earlier about that mental preparation.  What mindset tips do you have for our listeners?

Emma:  I love to help my clients to visualize the birth that they want to have, which you probably teach a lot of, I’m sure, to your clients.

Kristin:  Yes.

Emma:  Yeah, I thought so.  So we’re coming from definitely the same page there.  You know, I teach yoga and Pilates, and you know I like to have the ladies focus a lot on their breathing, which obviously would come into the doula focus, as well, I’m sure, and to really visualize and stay focused on the birth they want, but obviously, at the same time, things don’t always go to plan but to really embrace and be kind to themselves no matter what happens, you know, during the birthing process.  So for me, that’s a really big one.  And I try to support my clients in probably a fairly gentle approach.  I still give them some good workouts, but I also make sure that they get the relaxation part, as well.  I find that’s really important.  I think many women these days tend to probably do a lot, and they don’t realize they’re doing a lot, so to give them a few moments in class, even if it’s at the end of class, five, ten minutes of focusing on relaxation, breathing, mindset.  It’s sometimes the only moment they get during the day, so I like to always incorporate that.

Kristin:  Yeah, that’s wonderful.  And we focus so much during pregnancy on connecting with baby and taking that time.  I feel like self-care can be an overused term, but it’s also so important, and after having baby, for women to feel like themselves again, like a whole person, versus being in this new role as a parent or being a parent all over again, to take that intentional time for themselves is key.  So the fact that your program offers this break, it’s not just the fitness aspect of it.

Emma:  Yeah, it incorporates all of that.  And I do a lot of work with the women on the fit ball, as well, so I find – I teach them how to use the fit ball during labor, also, which I’m not sure if you go into that, as well, but I’m sure you probably would touch on that.  So that’s a focus I also bring into class, teaching them how to use it during the session so it becomes second nature so they know what to do and it doesn’t feel foreign to them during labor if they do decide to use the fit ball.  They know all the moves and have been practicing it weekly.  So we incorporate it for core strength when they’re in the prenatal phase but also some of the moves for labor.

Kristin:  Love it.  Any final tips for our listeners on any of the subjects that we covered?

Emma:  I think one thing that I do really try and emphasize, I guess, is – a lot of women don’t sort of think about it when they first get pregnant, but I like to teach the women in their first trimester about the postpartum recovery because in the first trimester, you’re still feeling the connection of the abdominals.  You still have your body, technically, prior to it changing, if you like.  Your current connections of abdominal muscles, and that starts to change as you get further along in the pregnancy.  So I love to teach the women what to look out for and what to feel in the postpartum recovery in the first trimester.  So it’s really quite an easy or easier, I should say, transition into postpartum recovery.  You already know the feelings so that you know what you’re looking for because it can be different to find that once you’ve given birth to find that connection back to the abdominal area.  So having that reference before in the prenatal time, especially if it’s new; if Pilates is new to you, or this style that I teach is new, I find that’s a really beneficial way to go through stuff and it can make it an easier transition.

Kristin:  There are so many things.  I love that you’re doing that education for postnatal recovery during pregnancy.  Like you said, there can be surprises, and you don’t really feel like friends or even providers are talking about some of the things to look out for.  A lot of our clients talk about that cramping after delivery and the difference between baby one and baby three and how you might feel in recovery.

Emma:  So true.  And a lot of women also have Cesareans, so that can take a little bit longer to recover, also.  Knowing what you have felt at the beginning, it’s good to have that reference point.  The training that I teach, as well, is really great for Cesarean because it’s not a normal Pilates.  It’s a deeper connection, and it’s interesting because a lot of my clients who come from my Pilates membership, the online membership – I call it the Core Fit Club – they’re doing sort of more of a fitness style of Pilates, but some of them have tried my Core Restore program, which is the postpartum program, and they find a whole new connection.  So even women who haven’t had children or had children many years ago, they come back to this program even though they’re fit and strong, and they still find new connections and new awareness.  So it’s quite powerful and quite an interesting technique that I teach in that respect.

Kristin:  Love it.  So how can our listeners connect with you?  I know you’re on social.  You’ve got a website.  So if you’d share the best ways to connect with your program or you directly?

Emma:  Thank you, yeah.  So if any of your listeners are interested in the postpartum program, that’s the Core Restore Program.  My normal website keeps all of the information, as well.  I’m also on Instagram and Facebook at epilatesonline.  All the information can be found there.  I do have a free five-day kind of like an intro to the course or program there, which is my five day core awareness challenge for new moms or anyone wanting to strengthen their pelvic floor.  That’s available free, and I do have a Pilates pack for free, also, that can be found on my website.  And I do offer the prenatal Pilates, so that option is there, as well.

Kristin:  And then you mentioned you have a Facebook group?

Emma:  Yeah, that is – it’s a different section, but it can be found on my website, as well.  Usually, people join that when they’ve joined some of the programs or at least the free program.

Kristin:  Love it.  Well, thank you so much for your time and sharing your wisdom, Emma.  It was a pleasure.

Emma:  Thank you, I really appreciate it, Kristin.

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