Empowered by Hope
You want the best possible quality of life for your child regardless of diagnosis or prognosis. Raising a child with medical complexities is often lonely, scary and overwhelming. Join two parents of amazing children with rare medical complexities, Emily K. Whiting and Ashlyn Thompson, to get help and grow with them into empowered advocates for our kids. Here you’ll find a community of support, encouragement, education and resources, equipping you to navigate your child’s medical complexities with hope. To get more personal support, connect with us directly at www.ParentEmpowermentNetwork.org.
Empowered by Hope
Embracing the Unexpected: Transforming Birth Trauma into Parental Empowerment with Carleigh Joseph-Olivas
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Today's guest is Carleigh Joseph-Olivas, a licensed perinatal social worker, full spectrum doula, maternal mental health therapist, and parenting coach. Her passion for supporting women and families through the profound transformations of pregnancy, childbirth, and the postpartum period makes her the perfect expert to guide us through today's topic.
This two part episode focuses on the emotional journey of pregnancy, delivery,and postpartum, particularly when faced with medical complexities. Emily and Carleigh explore the grief that often arises when childbirth does not go as planned while emphasizing the importance of trusting oneself and fostering community support for parents.
Part 1:
• Understanding the grief associated with unplanned childbirth experiences
• The importance of nurturing mothers alongside their newborns
Part 2 (start at 31 minute mark):
• Rebuilding trust following negative medical experiences
• Techniques for parents to express and process emotions
• Encouraging community support and reaching out for help
• Reclaiming one's inner voice as a tool for navigating parenting challenges
• The role of parents as fierce advocates for their children
About Carleigh Jospeh-Olivas
As owner and founder of Nurtured Roots Doula and Family Services, Carleigh has established a practice that answers the question that inspires her work, ‘Everyone wants to hold the baby. Who holds the mother?” Her previous work in providing supportive counseling and connection to resources for parents of children with medical complexities impacts the scope of her dedicated service to families beyond the labor room. With a deep commitment to ‘restoring the village’, Carleigh is determined to build a supportive network that nurtures the well-being of mothers, strengthens family bonds, and fosters a healthy start for infants and children. By addressing the emotional, mental, and social needs of parents, she aims to create a safe and empowering environment where families can thrive together.
A future midwife and fierce advocate for maternal health initiatives, Carleigh envisions a world where birthing and parenting is an empowering and deeply connected experience. Through her work, Carleigh is dedicated to educating, supporting, and addressing disparities in maternal care while honoring the emotional and spiritual bonds between mothers and their children.
Instagram: Nurturedrootshousto
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Get your copy of She is Charlotte: A Mother’s Physical, Emotional, and Spiritual Journey with Her Child with Medical Complexities by Emily K Whiting on Amazon
Whether you've just been blindsided by your child's diagnosis or you've been in the trenches of their complex medical needs for a while, empowered by Hope, is here for you. Though we wish you didn't know this heartache, we're so glad you found us, so together we can walk this journey in hope.
Speaker 2:Hello, welcome to the Empowered by Hope podcast brought to you by the Parent Empowerment Network. It feels so good to say that name because it is our new name. You might know us as Charlotte's Hope Foundation and you know what made me laugh the other day, charlotte, my daughter. She said, well, when does Charlotte's Hope Foundation end and Parent Empowerment Network begin? And it just made me laugh because I was like, well, charlotte's Hope Foundation doesn't end, it just evolves into Parent Empowerment Network, which is a very hard concept for a seven-year-old brain to wrap their heads around. But we are so happy to have all of you listeners with us today because we have a very special guest, ms Carly Joseph Olivas. She is here from Texas and we are just so honored and blessed to have her because, well, first off, she just I mean, within seconds of you seeing her on your screen or hearing her amazing voice, you'll know she is just such a gift to humanity and also her background is so relevant to us as listeners it's just astounding.
Speaker 2:So today we are going to talk to Ms Carly about what do we do when childbirth does not go according to plan and the undelt grief often undealt with grief that results from that, and then part two. So this is going to be a two part series is going to be what do we do with the resulting fear or anxiety or mistrust or all of the above that can come from that hard experience we've had, that we might then transfer to future medical experiences, and how do we make sure we still navigate our medical needs, taking care of ourselves right, carly Very important and our children while you know, using the wonderful expertise of medical professionals and learning how to trust our inner voice also. So it's going to be an action packed two part series. I'm so excited. So, ms Carly, I'm going to read a little bit from her bio and then toss it to you to be able to tell our listeners a little bit about yourself.
Speaker 2:So Ms Carly is a licensed perinatal social worker. She is a full spectrum doula, a maternal mental health therapist, a parenting coach, and she is the owner and founder of Nurtured Roots, doula and Family Services. And what I love about your platform and your work, carly, among many things, is you really focus on. You know everyone wants to hold the baby, but who's holding the mom? And that's so in line with Parent Empowerment Network, because we stand by the fact that when mom and dad are held up, baby, does you know, is able to thrive within the quality of life that they have, and have the best quality of life possible. And so we focus on the parents, and so do you, and that's such a beautiful thing. So, ms Carly, I'll stop talking. Tell us a little bit about yourself.
Speaker 3:Thank you so much, emily, and let me just say it is a complete honor to be here, not only with you but also with your listeners. So I just I feel like I am so engaged and inspired and motivated by all things maternal and parental and all of those things. And so sometimes when people are looking at my bio, they're like what do you actually do, actually do you are all over Anything that's in that maternal and parenting space? I just love to embark in it. And so my first thought I'll say, when I was probably six or seven years old, I just knew that I wanted to be an OBGYN. I knew that that's what I wanted to do. I knew that that's what I wanted to do. Yes, playing doctor was one thing. I had to be catching the baby, right, right, and I watched TV shows on it, right. There used to be a TV show I don't remember if it was on TOC, but it was called A Baby Story and I would watch it all day long and write down the little definitions that would pop up at the bottom of the screen, like Pitocin. I was so engaged, and then I got old enough to understand just how much school it was going to take for me to become an OBGYN and I said, all right, we'll be an L&D nurse and that's really where my journey started, I'll say academically was in nursing school.
Speaker 3:And while I was in nursing school I worked at a huge children's hospital here in the Houston area. And while I was working there, I was seeing these parents bringing their children in with severe medical complexities and knowing that you know they might be inpatient with us for about two weeks, Right, and then we discharged them home. But I know which ones were coming back. I know which ones were coming back because we made sure that we took care of you know the symptomology of the diagnosis while we, while they, were in the hospital. But what about the social needs? Does mom feel supported? Is mom doing this completely on her own? Is dad feeling like, oh my gosh, I'm losing my job because I'm in, I'm here at the hospital so much and just the tear that you feel. You want to be there for your children. You want them healthy, happy and whole, but I also need to be able to build a life outside of this to work. But I also need to be able to build a life outside of this to work, to keep that insurance that I need to go to all these doctor's appointments, and not only just that, but also in some of those situations when the needs were so high, just seeing the mental health deterioration of the parents, right.
Speaker 3:And so I remember coming to work. I worked night shift. I came to work one night and I said you guys, I think I want to be a social worker. And I remember every nurse on the floor stopped and looked at me and were like are you insane? Funny, I think I want to be a social worker. And so I did. I changed my major with the intent to be a maternal mental health therapist. To be a maternal mental health therapist. So now I'm here and decided to. I've always been a doula. I've been a doula for almost 15 years now, right, and so getting to interact with moms in that space and help them through the laboring process and pregnancy and the perinatal period, and then also just getting to serve that mental health component so that they're taking the best care of themselves, and now wrapping that all up together and going to midwifery school.
Speaker 2:So you're going to end up having more school than if you had gone to OV.
Speaker 3:Exactly, I think about that all the time. You know, I could have just went to med school and been done.
Speaker 2:But the schooling you have is a very different and I'm not saying better or worse, but it's very different and very well-rounded in in this element of the wellbeing, mentally and emotionally, for the family. That's very different schooling than OB school. So I just love the journey you've taken and I feel like probably mirrors something that I would. I started out as psychology major. We're not going to get distracted with my story, but yeah, it's just funny, the journey of of what leads you to wherever you're headed. So okay, I could go a million directions and my mind's going a million miles a minute because you are just amazing on so many levels. But I'm going to try and stay focused. Ashlyn made us a fantastic outline.
Speaker 3:Shout out to Ashlyn.
Speaker 2:Shout out to Ashlyn. Yes, she is not with us today, but she is the inspiration behind this entire conversation which, by the way, it was so funny. She goes. Emily, I think you're the one that needs to have this conversation with Carly, because you're seven months pregnant. Actually, I'm eight months pregnant. So, yes, I'm about to have my fourth, well, sixth child, fourth, who is with us today.
Speaker 2:And so, yes, this is all just so relevant personally and as I hear you describe kind of this experience you were watching in your first job. I mean it hits the nail on the head of the experience I had and, I imagine, most families who are listening to this today. So if we didn't suck you in from my initial description of what Carly brings to the table, I guarantee your explanation sucked our listeners in and they're hanging on your every word. So you have this wonderful phrase that everyone wants to hold the baby, but who holds the mother? So tell us a little bit more about that phrase and kind of what led you to that and and how that affects your day to day.
Speaker 3:I think that even just in my initial birthing experiences, but kind of even before that, we, if you're watching you know, know, maybe on tv the baby is born and then like they're whisked away and moved to the warmer or wherever they're going and all of the attention kind of diverts there, right, um, and my eyes go the other way and I'm looking at mom and mom is trying to overlook all these medical professionals and just see her baby and be with her baby, and I'm like two people were just born here. A mom was just born here and this baby. And it doesn't matter if this is her fourth, fifth, sixth child. There's a new version of her that is emerging when she births this baby, and so the support that maybe we had in place before it might need to change a little bit, right, and who is impacting them? So I think that that was number one, but also number two for me. We can talk about just some of the things that we see.
Speaker 3:When people hear the word social worker, very often they think, oh my gosh, you work for the state, do you work for CPS, do you work for these things? Right? And so I found myself really challenging that narrative a lot and then I started challenging it with my job has never been right, like that CPS type vibe where I'm wanting to remove children. My job has always been how do I hold the family together so that the home is as stable and like a thriving environment for these children, right, and that involves me holding the parents and holding the mother, and so that is where that passion from that phrase comes from.
Speaker 2:Oh my gosh, you're making my heart throb in the best of ways. I also love there's another phrase that you have in your bio where you said you're deeply committed to restoring the village, and that just I've got it highlighted and underlined and italicized, because Ashley and I talk about this all the time. We talk about the visual of like elephants tend to circle around a mother who is birthing and they help that mom until she's on her feet all on her own. And you know we talk about like we are we if you don't have a village, let us help you start it, let us, let us embrace you, and if you do have a village, let us just support it even more. So I'm just curious can you tell us a little bit more about this supportive network concept of restoring the village, because it just hits a chord with me in the best of ways, absolutely.
Speaker 3:Absolutely, I'll have to go and really hit on. I was having a session last night and I was speaking with a mom and I was talking about restoring the village and she said the village costs $600 a week. Right, because the only village I have is daycare. Right, and that impacted me so deeply. Right, she's like and I don't have it, so I can't afford the village. Um, and so us bringing back that space.
Speaker 3:I love the elephant analogy, everything that you just shared there. Yeah, bringing that back, that space. I love the elephant analogy, everything that you just shared there. Yeah, bringing that back. That's why I love what you all are doing, because it is like we are having this shared experience.
Speaker 3:Everyone has their own like individual way that they're addressing it and different diagnoses and things that we're going through, different family dynamics. But how do we bring that collective feeling back, that collective support? Because without it, that is where we really start to see the physical deterioration, the mental health deterioration, how heavy it is to be a mom, to be a parent, to be a mom, to be a parent, and then bring add on the heart wrenching feelings that are tied to, like the medical complexities that we're watching our children deal with Um and just all the ways that we need to show up. And so which is why I named my business, the way that I did, um, doula and family services, and why that's so important to me and why I'm involved in so many things because I really feel like we need to get back to that holistic approach of taking care of others.
Speaker 3:We have, like, the medical needs that need to be addressed, but what about those social needs? I want to be as strong as possible for me and my kids and show up for them, but I'm worried about the lights getting turned off Right, and so that's taking up a lot of my energy right now. And who can I say that to? Who can I, like, really pour my heart out to? Or am I suppressing these emotions and they're feeling like they're exploding from the inside out? Where's my safe space?
Speaker 3:Yeah, where's my safe space, and so I feel like the village brings in that connection and that support that so many, so many families are missing these days.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's really heartbreaking. I often tell my husband can we? I want to. This sounds terrible, but you'll know what I mean and listeners bear with me. I want to live in a village with a bunch of tents and huts and we just live, we do life together. I want that it's our heritage. Every single one of us came from that originally, and that's what I want back.
Speaker 3:Exactly, exactly.
Speaker 2:Done with this individual house, all that stuff Just done with it.
Speaker 2:Yes, Anyway, okay, that's a whole nother, um, whole nother topic. Okay, so, um, okay. So many parents who are listening have dealt with the grief of a birth experience not going the way it was planned, or sometimes, maybe planned is a strong word because sometimes we don't even have a plan but we have kind of this subconscious idea of how we want birthing to go. And birthing really is. It's a sacred space, it is a very sacred space and when you have a child with medical complexities, that sacred space gets bombarded in a million ways. You know funny story, just to kind of bring this home I had a wonderful nurse who was helping do intake for me as I was transitioning OBs. This was just a few weeks ago because, like I said, I'm eight months pregnant and actually I have a midwife. I'm so excited. It'll be my first experience with the midwife, so fun. But anyway, yes, so exciting. I feel so empowered this time around compared to just previous where, like you just have to do what you have to do because of medical complexities. Absolutely.
Speaker 2:But she asked me, through a series of many questions, for intake, you know, do you have a history of birth trauma? And I said no, wow, and she knows me. She knows me very, very well and she goes Emily, I don't have birth trauma. She's like, yeah, well, I don't want to tell you what's trauma and what's not, but she was like she was so gentle and wonderful about it. But she was like, emily, think about your first birth and? And and I was like, actually, you know what? You're right, it was incredibly, traumatic, incredibly.
Speaker 2:And when I went on to have my second and third baby, I remember the very little things would totally send me over the edge, things like I mean, in the moment it doesn't feel little at all when they took my third and they bathed her without talking to me about it, I thought I was going to lose my marbles because literally everything was out of my control with Charlotte, she, she.
Speaker 2:I didn't feed her first, I didn't hold her first, I didn't, I didn't do anything first, and so when they bathed my third child first, I was a basket case and I was like, okay, so so, yeah, maybe, maybe I have some things I need to deal with. So how do parents who have had birth experience not go the way that they would have liked it to go, which I would say is probably many, many, many yes? How do they begin to first recognize that? Because I hadn't even recognized that I'm seven years into this. I've written a book about it, I'm a speaker, I'm a podcaster and I didn't even realize that I had some undealt with trauma about this.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, how do people start to first recognize that and then start working through the feelings that it that it brings up?
Speaker 3:yes, I think that I love. I love your story because, defining it like trauma, we very often are like, oh, it could have been worse or it's not as bad as it could have been, right, and we don't really hold that definition in that space for ourselves, right? And so I'm so glad that your nurse was like, I know your story, right, and even if you have not done the work to like, recognize and name this thing for what it is, just listening to it I'm feeling the effects of oh my gosh, yes, oh my gosh. How much we do not give ourselves that space to really sit with those emotions. Because when we experience that and when I'm in the labor room with moms, I very often remind them there's going to be a space during your delivery, after your delivery maybe, both where the room is buzzing, there are people all over the place, they're talking to each other.
Speaker 3:They're talking all over each other and you feel like you lose a sense of control right, you feel like you lose a sense of control and like, okay, everybody's just doing what they need to do, my job is just to sit here, right, and so sometimes it takes us a while when that dies down, right. So process what just happened, what just happened, and so those expectations, those and, like you said, it might not be like we set a birth plan and this is exactly what we are expecting to see. It can just be you know what. Maybe my first birth just went smooth, right, or maybe I've just had this idea of this is what the birthing experience would look like. And so when we don't have that, I really love to work with moms and parents and sit with them in that space and then ask do you have any feelings of grief there? Do you have any feelings of, oh my gosh, I've never even had the time to sit with what I feel like I've lost. It's so natural and normal for us to grieve, like when that experience, when that birthing experience, when our pregnancy experience doesn't really match up with our hopes.
Speaker 3:Experience when our pregnancy experience doesn't really match up with our hopes, with our expectations, right, something as significant as childbirth, bringing life into the world, not meeting our pre-thought expectations how disappointing and disheartening.
Speaker 3:That can feel right, and so, especially if we are, you know, now we're thrust into this world where I am, like, overly concerned and worried. And now I have all these doctor's appointments to go to for my child and thinking of upcoming surgeries and, oh my gosh, all of these things that are completely overwhelming. I haven't even had time to go back to that moment of birth. I haven't had time to go back to that moment of birth. I haven't had time to go back to that moment when I was at the doctor's office and I was getting the ultrasound and the tech said I'll be right back, the doctor needs to speak with you, right? I'm not even getting back to that space and so giving ourselves that room for that emotional validation. Sometimes it takes a lot of unpacking to get down back to that space. So I think doing it is absolutely critical and it's the first step that we need to really start unpacking and dealing with that grief about our past birthing experiences.
Speaker 2:Oh, my goodness, there's so many things. You just said that I'm just like I guarantee our listeners are audibly saying yes, carly, there's something that you and actually I've had a few listeners reach out and say. I find myself talking out loud in response to you guys, which I love. I love that you said it feels like something has been lost and you have to grieve that, and that is so true, and maybe that strikes a chord with me, because the word trauma is hard for me to wrap my head around, but feeling something lost very much so, yes, the other thing and this transitions us beautifully into this kind of kind of reframing and and starting to be empowered by those experiences we've had, and that's really what we're all about is we are not overlooking the hard, the grimy reality that we're all facing and we're also focused on turning those towards. Now, what do we do to be empowered by those experiences and to rise up and to to meet the challenges ahead of us? And so one thing it just brought this story to mind that I remember and, man, now that I think about it, it has been really healing, as I've had future births, to be able to kind of unpack these things. Now, not everybody needs to have more births to be able to unpack it. I'm just saying for me, that's been my experience.
Speaker 2:So anyway, um, our third. I remember I almost like get this immediate feeling like I have to just release all control because I'm in a hospital and the doctors and nurses know best, right, and so I find myself getting in this position of like, you know well, what do you think? What do you think I should do? How should, how do I, how should I nurse? How should you know? Should she get a bottle? Should she this, should she that, whatever? And I remember one of the NICU nurses, cause my third had to be in the NICU also, but for something, um, you know, it was just, it was just glucose sugar. So it was said well, what do you think? And she goes Emily, you know what should be done, and when you leave here I'm not going to be there to tell you. So you tell me.
Speaker 2:And I remember being like dang on it. You're right, yes, I do know, I do know. And so I'm actually really excited for this fourth one, because I feel like I'm going to go in and be like, ok, I kind of I kind of sort of know what I'm doing. Yes, yes.
Speaker 2:So how do we help parents, or how can they work on reframing the narrative of what happens to focus on their personal strengths and and what they've gained from that experience? Cause it's we have to sit in the hurt, we have to sit and recognize that pain, and often what we say with parent empowerment network is we are not afraid to sit in the dark and in the ugly with you, yes, and when you're ready, we will help shine the light towards where do we go from here? And so what's kind of those first steps to shine the light towards where do we go from here? And so what's kind of those first steps to shine the light, to become the empowered parent, who who transforms those experiences into good?
Speaker 3:Yes, yes, you, moving from this place of um, it kind of just feels like despair, it almost feels like just overwhelming and moving to that strength space perspective. It takes a lot of work, but there's a spark right, and to get to that spark sometimes it takes like us practicing an affirmation, us having a supportive network that is speaking that life into us and speaking that light around us, and so trying to find our way out of the dark alone can feel really challenging. It can, and so you want to make sure that you have some things in your toolbox that can kind of help you. Right Door of the Explorer type thing. What can I pull out of my backpack, right? So what do I have? I know that every morning, when I look up and I look at this child, that I am the best person suited to love them, to care for them, and that I have their absolute best interest at heart. Right, and that motivation to get up and care for them and show up for them every day. Where did I find that inner strength? Because before my pregnancy, before the diagnosis, before all of those things, did I think that I could do this level of hard? I don't think I even considered it. I don't think I ever considered it, but I'm here, I'm doing this level of hard and I'm I'm showing up. I'm showing up, so giving ourselves that celebration, even in the small wins right, I am not getting up and putting on my cape and knocking out all of the things today, because today I just feel sad, but I'm here and looking at that as a strength rather than a weakness really begins to build those steps out of that place of despair into a place of like oh my gosh, I now see this as it has built strength in me. It will continue to do so.
Speaker 3:That empowered place that you're talking about, even in birthing, that is the space that I hold for every family and every mom. So much of our control just kind of feels relinquished in so many things. And when we're well educated, when we're knowledgeable, when we know where to like go to connect to resources and like, no, I'm making educated decisions. Now, right, I know what's best for me, I know what I feel is like things that I need to advocate for my child. On, right, when I move into that place of power, now I'm strengthened, right, and that is even when we're around a lot of people who you know they might have degrees that we don't have or education that we don't have. It can still be a two-way conversation. It does not have to just be. They are sharing what needs to happen, and that's what I need to do Feel empowered to educate yourself and show up in that space as well, and I think that that helps us reframe the narrative a little bit and move into our power in that strengths perspective.
Speaker 2:Yes, oh my gosh, we could do a whole episode just on that. We absolutely would, and I would love to. Oh man, I love it. Okay, so we are going to close out part one. We have so much more to talk about, ms Carly.
Speaker 2:So for those of you tuning in who would like to hear more, tune in again for part two. It will come out next week and so we will be focusing in this next part about what do we do with. If I've had a, a, a hard experience with birth and, honestly, for those of you listening, even if birth is not part of the challenge, but it's after, this is so relevant because the insight is the same, really, regardless. But what do we do with that resulting fear, the anxiety we might have, or the mistrust that we might have of medical professionals, or the mistrust of ourselves and our own judgment, or our own inner voice, which we talk a lot about on Parent Empowerment Network, about how that inner voice is so very wise and we discredit it so often, and I can give a million examples of how I discredit my own all the time.
Speaker 2:So part two is going to be talking about this. What do we do to rebuild that trust in ourselves, in medical professionals, and to to be able to be that empowered parent that we know we are all very capable of being and that we want to be, and that our children are seeking for us to be as well. So to reach out to Carly, you can get connect with her at Nurtured Roots Houston. On social media is Instagram the best way, carly.
Speaker 3:Yes, it is Instagram and sending me a private message and there's a link in my DM where you can schedule a video visit with me as well.
Speaker 2:I highly recommend it. Gosh, I am wishing you were in Ohio so that you could be at my delivery. It would be amazing. But it has been such an honor to talk to you today and can't wait to share more insights with our audience next week.
Speaker 3:Awesome, it was a pleasure. Looking forward to speaking soon.
Speaker 1:You are capable, you are equipped and you are not alone. Together, we can do hard things for our children. If this episode connected with you and you want to hear more, be sure to hit the subscribe button. We would also love to learn about your personal journey and how we can support you and, last but not least, if you know of someone who could benefit from this podcast, please share when hope is buried. Thank you.
Speaker 2:Thank you. Welcome to the Empowered by Hope podcast brought to you by the Parent Empowerment Network, previously known as Charlotte's Hope Foundation. Today is part two to an incredible series that we have started with Ms Carly Joseph Olivas. She comes to us from Texas and she is owner and founder of an organization called Nurtured Roots, doula and Family Services, and today we are going to continue the conversation we started last week, talking about what about when your childbirth does not go the way you envisioned it or the way you planned it, and how do we deal with that. The grief from that and, quite frankly, it's very relevant beyond childbirth it's also just what about when parenting doesn't go the way you know, when your child has these diagnoses and all of a sudden, so many things are out of your control. And so we have.
Speaker 2:You know, we talked a lot in part one and I highly recommend, if you're tuning in now and you missed part one, go back to last week. It's incredible. You're going to find yourself talking out loud to the podcast going. Yes, carly, yes, so she is amazing. I'm going to let her introduce herself in a moment, but I'm going to quickly just read from her bio. She is a licensed perinatal social worker, she's a full spectrum doula, she's a maternal mental health therapist and a parenting coach, and she's very passionate about supporting women and families through the transformations of pregnancy, childbirth and postpartum period, which is incredibly relevant because I'm eight months pregnant and heading into delivering this little sweet nugget. So, ms Carly, tell us a little bit about yourself and then we'll dive into this very, very important topic.
Speaker 3:Yes, absolutely. It's a pleasure to be with you all and continue the conversation today. So thank you so much. I just love all things maternal, parental especially that mother-child bonding and that health right, creating that stable home and that warmth that cultivates an atmosphere for growth and wellness and all of those things. And so I think that in my very multifaceted career that I've kind of blended to be Nurtured, roots, doula and family services, one thing that rings true is that we want to make sure that we are holding the mother. In this space Everybody wants to hold the baby. We need to make sure somebody is also holding mom, holding family together as a unit.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, and I love this because and I said it in part one also Parent Empowerment Network. We are very intentionally designed to uphold the parents, because we know when the parents are supported, the child is able to thrive within whatever diagnosis they may have. And so, and that's all, the be able to cross paths, carly, and I can't wait to be able to refer future parents, when they reach out to us, to you and to your incredible services. So, for the sake of today's conversation, let's talk about for those parents who are listening who've experienced trauma in the medical system, trauma from their birthing experience what are some first steps? And maybe trauma we just talked about in part one.
Speaker 2:Trauma can be a hard word to wrap our head around. Sometimes it can feel more like you lost something, you lost what you thought it was going to be, or you lost control. In a lot of ways, right, I feel like 90% of this medical journey for me has been learning that I don't have control. And so what are the pieces I do have control over? And to be able to feel empowered by those and to let go of trying to control things I can't right. And so what do we do to be able to handle the grief from our experiences and start to validate those feelings, to be able to rebuild trust in ourselves and also in the medical and medical providers, because sometimes that can be broken as well.
Speaker 3:Absolutely, absolutely Thinking about that grief sitting with that Right, and thinking about that grief sitting with that right. We might not. When we hear the word trauma, we might not readily identify with that word, right, until we really start to unpack it and like, oh my gosh, wait, that might have been a little traumatic, right. But when we think about grief, we very often, you know, teach, and when I'm hosting therapy sessions when we think about grief we think about those very common things the loss of a life, right, something hard, traumatic, that's just like impactful. But there's also disenfranchised grief, right, and those disenfranchised grief experiences are things that feel really hard to us but like socially, they're just not like broadcast right.
Speaker 3:Sure, there's no bereavement package, for I was expecting my birth to turn out like this and it did not, right. There's no bereavement package, for I woke up today and it actually dawned on me. I had my kid four or five years ago. Today it really dawned on me. This was not what I was expecting and I never got the chance to unpack that right. That is still a really heavy emotion for us to deal with. It's just not one that's as readily identified in society, right, and so we need to hold that space for ourselves and be in environments that feel validating for us.
Speaker 2:You know, and it made me oh sorry, go ahead, no, go ahead, no, no, no. Well, I don't want to derail you, but it made me think. Often and maybe this isn't how I envisioned it is immediately followed for me with guilt, of feeling guilty that I but, but why? But I, but I love my child. Obviously I wouldn't trade them for anything. And so it's this kind of this dance with guilt and with loss and grief, of trying to also recognize it's okay to grieve and that does not mean that I love my child any less at all.
Speaker 3:Emily, that's so good, that is so good. I'm like, yes, we're getting to it Because it is so true, that guilt, and then, oh my gosh, this is not an emotion that I should be feeling, right, I'm like judging myself for having this emotion and so I'm going to suppress it. I'm not going to talk to anyone about it. I feel guilty. How does that make me feel? How does that make me look? If I was to share this emotion with someone else, right, so I'll just suppress it.
Speaker 3:And what we suppress we do not deal with, right, and it is still there, waiting for us to face it, waiting for us to face it. And so, like so many of our examples, when we feel like we've had that loss, that loss of control that maybe we experienced in the birthing room, that we experienced in the ultrasound room, right, when we just felt like the world stopped moving right For many of us how do I get back to that place? Because life has, like, given me a list of responsibilities now that I was never expecting. How do I take the time to get back to that place and cultivate that healing there? It's so important. It's so important, yeah.
Speaker 2:And you know something else. I find myself often and I hear other parents saying too well, I shouldn't be grieving that or have that emotion, because others have it worse.
Speaker 2:I find myself struggling with that a lot because we, we, we interact with families who have all kinds of different challenges, and so I will often and poor Ashlyn has to coach me through this a lot because I'll say something like okay, the other day was a really good example. I was feeling I was talking to pain management, because we always have a lot of pain around holidays with Charlotte for a whole lot of reasons, and we were going through kind of a proactive plan for how to face the holidays and and try to deal with this pain, which we've done for seven years at varying degrees of success. And I had this like thought of, you know, like that loss of. I just want to be able to enjoy the holidays without having a whole slew of medical things, without having to carry the medications with me, without having to schedule around all the appointments, without having to worry about how she's going to be up all night in pain because routine has been changed.
Speaker 2:And then that immediate thought of like but so many people have it worse. There's so many people in the hospital right now. There's people who are dealing with feeding tubes and wheelchairs and things that I don't deal with and and then the guilt of like but you should celebrate, because your child is well enough, that we're having proactive plans. And it's amazing because, Carly, I'm seven years into this and I've been the podcast host talking about these things, and it's still something that I have to stop and say Emily, that was a valid thought. You are allowed to mourn the fact that your holidays look different than others, and then we can go from there and be empowered. But right now you can mourn it, because if you don't mourn it, it's going to haunt you through the whole holiday.
Speaker 3:Yes, yes, that coping skill of like trying to rationalize or balance our emotional experience. It kind of gives us like a sense of quick relief, right, yeah, it is a way for me to you know what it could be worse. Right, it is a way for me to like discharge this emotion and I don't have to sit with it. Right, you can feel really uncomfortable sitting with our feelings, but that is where we allow the space for the validation to come in and the affirmation that you know, this is hard, this is hard, this is hard, this is painful. Sometimes there is loss there. Right, If I were to say, hey, I need a, I need a day, and thank goodness, you know a lot of our um jobs and career fields are moving to this understanding like of a mental health day.
Speaker 3:But if they were like, what are you feeling? And I'm like grief because I wish that I had a normal holiday, right, Right, the amount of like you can't always follow me down that path, but it does not make it any less impactful for me. And so, not shutting off that space in ourselves sitting in that and that doesn't mean getting stuck there, but providing that validation there. And so I'm glad that Ashlyn is there to coach you through that. Oh, I know she. I'm trying to minimize this so that you know it feels a little bit more livable. But let me also give myself self-compassion and grace and validation here, because those things cultivate the healing that I need to continue to move forward.
Speaker 2:So, carly, I'm so this is something I have found to be kind of helpful for me. I'm curious if it's something you've you've seen for others where, ok, you're in the throes of child care, which is an all day, never ending, relentless, you know, wave of need, these thoughts, right, like I have this thought at the end of the pain management call, but now I've got three kids who are hungry and I need to get meds administered and I need to go, you know, do the GI clean out, and I, you know, like my mind is on to the million other things. And so what I've learned to work for me is to make a mental note like, oh, that was a thought that I need to come back to Sometimes. I literally will write it down so that when the kids are in bed, or the next day when I get up for my five minutes of peace, if I get up for my five minutes of peace, like mental note, I've got to deal with that.
Speaker 2:I don't have the time to deal with it now, but I've got to sit and process that at some point. Is that something that you've seen other parents do successfully? Or, ashlyn tells me I'm really good at compartmentalizing, and it's true, I will be like I'll schedule processing that later, for better or worse, I don't know, but I'm just curious. Is that, um, like, what are some of the methods that you have found to be helpful when you've got these emotions but you can't deal with them right now?
Speaker 3:Yes, yes. So is that something that I see other parents dealing with? Yes, is it something that I see other parents dealing with successfully? I mean, it is such a hard concept for us to grasp. It is like I always tell my clients when you know we're in a therapy session. If somebody is like, what have you done today for self-care? And your immediate thought is like are you kidding?
Speaker 2:Right, that's totally my immediate thought.
Speaker 3:Then there's space. If you want to even just bring back the theme of holding the parent, holding the mother. When I flip that on my mom's about 12 weeks into our therapy session and say, ok, great, so we've tried to set boundaries and encourage family to be the village and be supportive of you and you're the nurturer and you're nurturing everyone around you, are you nurturing yourself, right? Because this holding the mother concept is not just for everyone around you, it's for you as well. And then it's like, oh, wow, I have a part to play in this too.
Speaker 3:No, I have not been nurturing myself. I have not been nurturing myself through those really challenging thoughts and emotional experiences that I've had. And so then, trying to work together to find those spaces, that five minutes that you're talking about, emily we talk about those things in every session I feel like, yes, well, I have this little alarm clock and that little alarm clock does not wait those five minutes for me to spend time with myself. And so it's about bringing in that mindfulness and that time for presence at some point in our day when we find it. For many of us it's in the shower.
Speaker 2:Oh my gosh, I was just going to say that that is where I do my best emotion purging, and there's something visceral about it because I wrote about this. In say that that is where I do my best emotion purging. And there's something visceral about it because I wrote about this in the book she is Charlotte. There's a whole chapter about it where I would get back from the NICU to the Ronald McDonald house and my child's still in the NICU and an outrageous amount of trauma happened every single day because you're in an ICU and I would just stand in this scalding hot shower. I'm sure it was physically unhealthy, but it felt so good because it felt like it was literally washing the gunk of the day off and I would just like visualize my emotions and my all that kind of like falling away and sometimes I'd shower for 30 minutes. Did I really need a 30 minute shower? No, Was it bad for the environment? Probably a hundred percent. But sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do.
Speaker 3:Yes absolutely, absolutely. If it was therapeutic and cathartic, then yes, it was necessary.
Speaker 2:I'm sorry for water supply. I'm sorry. Oh man, that's so good. So how do we begin, carly, to give ourselves the permission not only the permission, but also the expectation for ourselves to sit with these emotions? Like, how, how do we begin that? Cause many of us probably haven't done that, and it's a scary thing to really it feels ugly to sit down and look at those big emotions.
Speaker 3:It absolutely does. It absolutely does. I think the first thing that I try to have my moms and my family's practice is we sit in a silent environment for one minute, yeah, one minute, just sitting in silence. Who gets silence with littles running around the house, though right, sitting in silence. Who gets silence with littles running around the house, though right?
Speaker 3:It feels like there's this inner urge, like somebody needs to say something, I need to say something, I need to do something. Can I fiddle with something in the 60 seconds? Like no, I just want you to sit Right. And then, when we are able to acknowledge how uncomfortable that feels for us, when we are able to acknowledge how uncomfortable that feels for us, then I'm like okay. So this explains why we're running from sitting with our emotions right. Yeah, it feels uncomfortable, it feels unwelcome, it feels like you know what? I don't have time for this. It very much reminds me of that. You know, like I've been holding tears all day long and somebody just kind of walks up and says, how are you doing Right? And the dam just breaks. Yes, giving ourselves permission to feel, reminding ourselves and having to have that talk with ourselves like this is a human experience, and I am a human with human emotions, and that does not make them wrong. That does not make them wrong.
Speaker 3:One of my favorite exercises that I like to do is called be the pond. Right, we have emotions and like we judge them. We judge them as hard or joyful and easy to experience. We judge them as right and wrong, all of these things. So when we practice Be the Pond, I really tell my moms okay, I want you to think of every emotion that you've felt in the past week, right, and that can feel really overwhelming, and think of those emotions as these fish in this pond that are like swimming around, like crazy, right, and we want to calm them down.
Speaker 3:Your job is to be the water. You can look at the, the emotions, you can name them. You can name this fish, this one's beautiful, that one is really scary, all of that but your job in that is to be the water, right, and so kind of create that space and process them one by one, identify them, sit with them in a space, and that life does not always feel like it gives us space for that. It does not. So finding your way to do that Is that through journaling, is that through you know what I get a morning run twice a week, right, and that's where I think clearly is that with my therapist, you know if you're meeting and speaking with someone. When do I get that time to name what I'm feeling emotionally and knowing that I need to do that, because just running, having the thought and not addressing it when I'm ready to address it, it looks like a mountain. Yes, I don't. I'm not great at climbing Mount Everest.
Speaker 2:It's the great white shark.
Speaker 3:Yes, I'd rather deal with it when it's a little hill than trying to climb this mountain of emotions.
Speaker 2:Yeah, oh, isn't that true. And once it becomes a mountain, it becomes like you can't even decipher why you feel what you feel or what the root of it is, because it's just so big and monumental, absolutely, gosh. I. So for me, and everybody is going to be different how they process. I clearly am a writer. I wrote a book. I'm not suggesting anyone should do that, but for me, the journaling piece Carly has been, I mean, behind me you can see right there there's like 10 journals and that's like a journal for every year. Since I was in college, where I've found, if I don't give myself the space at least three to four times a week to sit down even just for five minutes and write down what's going on in my head, I start feeling unraveled.
Speaker 2:you, know, and for me it's not. It's not just journaling, it's prayer journaling. For me it's talking with God, it's laying it all at his feet, being super honest and transparent with him, cause it feels like when I have him to give it to now I'm not just battling it on my own. Right now, I'm saying you deal with it, god. My mantra, carly the last couple of weeks I've gotten really good at being like you deal, deal with it, god.
Speaker 3:Yes, I love that, I love that. So the journals I always challenge my moms. I'm like writing a biography. Writing your biography is not just for celebrities and great world leaders, it's for you too. You have a story to tell, you have a story that matters, and I want you to be able to express that, to find your inner voice right, to find it, bringing faith into it. You know, there's a whole book that we read of stories that guide our faith, that guide how we walk, what we give us the permission to give things to God and lay it at his feet right. Without that story, what would we have? What would we have?
Speaker 3:And so, finding that power in your story, looking back, you know, finding a journal from two years ago and, oh my gosh, I had no idea how we were going to. I was so scared when we had this coming up, this surgery was coming up and, oh my gosh, I did not realize how much progress that we made, but also how much progress I've made emotionally. Our family has grown so much, and so giving ourselves that time and space to move there, to work through everything that we're going through and I know it's a challenge to really implement those things when we're doing so much. I will tell on myself, full therapist here. I had a dual client last month and she ended up delivering a 26-weeker preterm, and so I, of course, stayed at the hospital with her and we got to that space where, like you've supported me, I can't leave this room right now. I want you to go to NICU and be with my baby.
Speaker 3:And sure enough, emily, I go to the NICU and this baby is in the same room that my daughter was in when she was in NICU. And this baby is in the same room that my daughter was in when she was in NICU, and it was the sights and the smells and I was like I this feels really traumatic, right, and I'm able to know this. And you know what? I don't think I ever dealt with this. I don't think I dealt with it. So not my baby emotions are still there and I'm tearing up. I'm tearing up and I'm like, oh right, so now the therapist has to call her therapist when she gets home, and like I need to work through it.
Speaker 2:But you know what? I bet that mom felt relief in knowing that you're human too, Like I think it's beautiful to show that and to let a tear flip. You know, I think that's so beautiful and obviously heartbreaking. We don't, we don't want you to hurt, and also it's so helpful to know we're not the only ones right.
Speaker 3:Yes, it was so therapeutic for me I mean my daughter's nine and I was like, oh, these things are still here. Great, let me deal with them. Let me deal with them. And I think that also brings up because I know that we were talking a little bit about like rebuilding trust, like in just the medical professionals, and also finding that trust in ourselves as well.
Speaker 3:We know that some of those experiences that we have can leave like a really long lasting impact and so when I'm working with a nurse or physician or a doctor, right, and I want to feel heard, I want to feel supported, I want to feel seen and all of those things, and so I am just a huge proponent of you know, if I was working with someone and I was like you know what, this doesn't necessarily feel like the greatest fit. Can we work on this relationship Right? And if we can't work on this relationship, is there a space that I can move to Right and advocating for ourselves in that space, really being open and honest? I know that sometimes those doctor's appointments feel like we have this small window of time and I need to say everything that I need to say in this space, but maybe the provider did most of the talking and we didn't get to bring in that holistic approach. I didn't get to say I'm scared, I'm frustrated, I'm overwhelmed, I have concerns.
Speaker 3:Right, remembering and reminding ourselves that we can verbalize that in the doctor's office, in the medical office, in the room speaking up for ourselves, that is what doulas are for, right in the birthing realm, right and in the pregnancy realm. But never do we want to speak for our moms, even though that's, you know, advocacy is what we do. We make sure that we give our moms and our parents the space to speak for themselves and learn to hold that space for themselves, and so that's something that I encourage every mom to do, even past pregnancy. Right, and you're going to these doctor's appointments for your kids, you know that you're their fiercest advocate. In fact, I introduce myself that way hi, my name is Carly. My daughter's name is Maya. My name is Carly, I'm Maya's fiercest advocate. Nice to meet and they're just like okay, I already know what we're doing here.
Speaker 2:I know who's in charge in this room. Oh my gosh, I love it. Yes, yes, yeah, we talk about. We talk about relentlessly pursuing the best care for your child and for yourself, and and and Fierce's advocate that's such a great way to put it, and when you go into appointments, feeling like that just makes you stand up straighter, doesn't it? I am my child's fiercest advocate, and it doesn't matter, you know, if you're new to this journey or if you've been doing it for 10 years. I guarantee every parent here is their child's fiercest advocate, because you're the one who loves them the most. So every single person who's listening to this can steal that line and use it, because it's true. Please do, please do. Oh my gosh, I love it. I love it. So how do we move? Like, okay, let's say, let's talk about this, this concept of maybe mistrusting our own inner voice. Let's focus on that first. Yeah, how do we start to recognize, first off, we do have an inner voice that is very accurate. And second off, how do we start trusting it more?
Speaker 3:Yes, yes, I think one of my favorite activities to do is I just ask moms like, what's something instinctual that you have experienced during pregnancy, during, like, postpartum period, delivery, all of those things? And so most moms are like I don't think I have one. And I'm like, what made you take a pregnancy test in the first place? Right, I just had this feeling. I'm like, oh, an inner instinct, you had one. You had one. I just had this feeling like, oh, you know, I'm more tired than usual. Food is repulsing me at this point.
Speaker 3:Right, you were able to dive in and connect with those inner instincts, right. And then they have just continued to come as you're caring for yourself, as you're caring for your new littles, as you're caring for your family, right, you know when it's time, when it's time to feed, when it's time to do these things, when you know what this cough doesn't sound the way that I want it to sound. You know what. You just look a little bit more lethargic than I'm used to, right, those are instinctual things that we just think, oh, my mom, this is how I'm supposed to react. So, highlighting that understanding that you have this gift that no one else has, and it starts with your love for your child. It starts with your love for your child. So even for our moms that feel like it didn't come naturally, it didn't click overnight, the love was there. The love was there and so trusting that first instinct to build the rest of them.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's so beautiful and really it transfers into everything in life. You know, I find it transfers a lot into marriage. I was just having a conversation with my husband the other day that I have poo-pooed these thoughts and emotions that I've had and poo-pooed is such a medical term I've like buried them of, like, well, let's just justify it this way, let's justify it that way, and then and then it ends up becoming, you know, months later, of wait a minute, I was actually right Three months ago when I had that thought that maybe we should talk about this because it's a problem, you know, yeah, and so it's amazing how much we can doubt ourselves and and I'm sure we could go down a whole rabbit hole of why we doubt ourselves, but being and honestly, I think, carly, it comes back to that time to really give yourself the space to hear your own thoughts, recognize them and then decide what to do with them, rather than just shoving them down and moving on. Absolutely, yeah, I remember this is just a really quick story that maybe many of you can relate to. You know, when you're in a hospital, there's a lot of policies, and it's for good reasons for the safety of the floor, for the safety of the patient, et cetera. Sometimes those policies are quite irrelevant to your specific situation or, or not you know, possibly, you know, not helpful.
Speaker 2:So I remember um early in our NICU stay. They're on a three hour schedule, some are on four hours, some are on two hour, but ours was on a three hour and so every three hours our daughter got fed and that felt so icky to me because I knew if I took her home I'd feed her when she was hungry and some babies are hungry every 20 minutes for a while. And it wasn't until month three that I finally voiced this. And I remember kind of like making this shift and I write about it in my book again, where I made this mental shift of like I'm not going to ask permission to feed her more than every three hours, cause I'm the one here and I'm the one with the milk, I'm the one pumping, I'm the one feeding her most of the time. I'm just going to tell them, unless you give me a medical reason why I can't, I'm going to feed my child when she's hungry.
Speaker 2:And I remember, I distinctly remember the faces at during rounds of the doctors and nurses looking at me like did she just tell us that she's going to do that. And I stood my ground and was just like, unless you have a good reason why I can't. I understand, when I'm not here you have to follow a schedule, I get it, but when I'm here, she's going to get fed when she's hungry. I'm tired of sitting here watching her cry because it's still a half hour until the three hours. You know. Yes, yes, yes.
Speaker 2:And they were like, okay, okay, she's going to do that. Absolutely and so yeah, when you have that little inner voice telling you this does not feel good, it's okay to voice it. Sometimes you can't do anything about it, but sometimes you can.
Speaker 3:Yes, yes, and finding that feeling empowered to say that, to speak Right. For some of us we are, like, naturally really mild tempered and like these are the professionals I don't want to push against what they say but there's that inner drive, especially that we find, when it comes to our children, that you know what this doesn't feel right Doesn't feel comfortable, that you know what this doesn't feel right Doesn't feel comfortable. I want to make sure that I'm very attuned with my baby in a way that your very general policies are not Right, and so let me respond to that, let me find trust in that, let me not doubt myself there Right. And so just from that experience, I am sure the inner like, oh yeah, I got this.
Speaker 2:I am woman, hear me roar. Yes, absolutely, mama Bear has shown up.
Speaker 3:Absolutely, absolutely. I love it.
Speaker 2:And no, of course you know they were taken aback. But everybody was like I mean, yeah, ok, cool. Like I mean, yeah, okay, cool, absolutely. So I think it just goes to show that when you have that inner voice speaking up about it can make such a big difference. It might not be able to change things, but it also might, and either way, you've at least voiced it and you've trusted that, you've had that thought and it's valid Absolutely, Absolutely.
Speaker 3:Absolutely.
Speaker 2:Okay, we could continue for so long, but I'm trying to respect keeping these podcasts relatively short, so I'm going to go down the route of of what if our past experience has caused us to mistrust medical advice, medical professionals, and this can be a really big, big issue because, well, I'll let you talk about why. So so, first off, how do we recognize that we have that mistrust and what do we do about it to be able to lean on medical professionals insight and also know that our insights are very valid too?
Speaker 3:Absolutely. When we're talking about communicating with the medical profession professionals in our life, in our children's lives, that is a very we talk about birthing and parenting as a very sacred space. Connecting with the health care providers is also a sacred space, right. When I think about interacting with my spouse or my mom or my children, fear and anxiety aren't necessarily feelings that I want to feel there, right? That's not what I should be feeling in those warm environments With my healthcare provider. I should not be experiencing those things either, and so, if I am, that's probably a flag for me that there's something here. There's something here that feels like conflict and tension, because it is creating this and eliciting this emotional response for me, and so do I feel like this is a safe space for me to talk about this with my providers. And if I don't, then there's a level of mistrust there. There's a level of mistrust there, and so now I want to unravel that. I want to figure out where that comes from, and if I know where it comes from, right, and I'm really holding that space, then wow, wow. How does this impact my ability to speak up, like you were sharing? How does this impact my ability to advocate for my child? How does this impact my ability to really show up fully in this process? And so there's work for me to do there. There's work to be done there.
Speaker 3:Can I move into a space and have a conversation with these providers that feels warm and inviting? And if I cannot, why? What's the barrier there? What's the barrier there? That's such an important relationship, one of the most important relationships that we can have, and so we want to build it to be the best right. And sometimes we're in those spaces where you know what. This is not gelling, this is not gelling. And I want to feel heard, I want to feel seen, I want to feel validated. I want my child to feel heard and seen and validated and affirmed Right. And if I don't feel like that's happening here, if I don't feel like that's happening here, how do I find that space?
Speaker 2:And would it be fair, Carly, to say sometimes it's work on our end, working through some challenges, and sometimes it's finding a new provider.
Speaker 3:Absolutely, absolutely. I think that one of the main reasons I take this to heart and it's like the core and the crux of what I do is that I've just seen I've seen the worst of that mistrust of medical professions. I've seen the absolute worst Right space having a mom come in to deliver and sharing that. You know, I do not trust doctors, I do not trust nurses. Like I need to be here to deliver my baby. I just I don't have. I don't trust anything that you're going to say to me, and this actually being an emergency situation.
Speaker 3:But due to that mistrust, there was no consent ever provided to give the care that needed to be given and mom passed away. And that was probably the most crushing experience I think that I've ever witnessed. Just trying to hey, I'm here to advocate for you truly. Hey, I'm here to advocate for you truly. But that mistrust was so deeply rooted it makes me, it begs me, to wonder had somebody actually been able to take the time which the staff? At that point?
Speaker 3:We think we did everything that we could to really connect with mom in that space, but the damage had been done. We don't know by what providers, we don't know what happened in the past. We just know that the damage had been done. We don't know by what providers, we don't know what happened in the past. We just know that the trust had fallen apart in such a way that the result was mom losing her life Right. And so how impactful that was and how I will always now intervene, empower moms, families, to be able to speak up when they feel mistrust, to find another provider if things aren't getting better right. Because, again, that is such a sacred relationship, it's a very important relationship and you want to find a good fit, you want to find a good fit.
Speaker 2:Thank you for sharing that. That definitely is a just profound story that I think brings this whole topic home of why it's so important that we don't brush these thoughts off, that we don't ignore them, that we really sit with them and we figure out what is the true thought we're having, and then we figure out what to do with them. And we figure out what's what is the true thought we're having, and then we figure out what to do with them. And we and this actually brings us to the next kind of closing thought this whole restoring the village circle, the wagons, whatever you want to call it yes, this whole concept of just like making sure that and sorry, my brain, my brain, is so emotionally invested in the story. You just said that it's it's, it's hard I'm, I lost my focus, but anyway, so, as we kind of try to make sure okay, sorry, I just got back to my, my thought that story helps us realize why this conversation is so important.
Speaker 2:And of course, knowing that maybe that is is a very um an an extreme situation of how this mistrust can manifest itself, but a very real one, a very, very real one. Yes, Um, and so the more, and I think it just highlights how much it's so important that we, as moms and as parents, really have to deal with what's going on in our head and our hearts, because we, because we can't show up for our kids when we haven't dealt with ourselves.
Speaker 2:And I'm preaching to the choir because, heaven knows, I'm the worst at dealing with myself. So just to kind of close out on a positive note, I think one of the amazing things, one of the many amazing things you talk about, is restoring this village for mothers and for families, and so one way that people can rally a community around themselves is, of course, leaning into Parent Empowerment Network, tuning into Empowered by Hope. Honestly, it's the driving factor of why we're doing this. I remember, ashlyn and I, when we connected and we started talking about what would we do if we did a podcast, what would we do if we did a nonprofit? We said there are many supports for the child and their medical needs, but what about the parent? We need to rally around them to support them. And so please lean on us. Yes, join our community.
Speaker 2:We have a closed Facebook group that you can easily find if you just type in our name, so that you can get that community and that support closed, meaning like you just have to answer a few questions, so we know that you're doing this life as well. You can go to our um, our website, to get quick access to that community as well, if that helps you to find us quickly, and then you can also connect directly with Carly, which I plan on doing. She is on Instagram with the social handle nurtured roots Houston, and we'll put this in the show notes too, but you can direct message her, and I guarantee that if you reach out to her, you will not regret it. She is, as you all have learned from this time with her, just such a light, such a gift. And, carly, thank you so much for your time. We're so grateful.
Speaker 3:Thank you for what you guys are doing and just being that supportive space, because the support is a barrier to just so many other things. It ensures the wellness of the family and that the children and parents have a place to thrive, and so thank you for what you guys are doing.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, it is an honor. Well, carly, I have a feeling this is only the beginning of our paths crossing, so we are just so grateful. So, yes, please, all listeners, if you would like to reach out to Carly, go to Nurtured Roots Houston on Instagram and go to our website at Parent Empowerment Network to find our closed community, so that you can find that support and just know that you're not alone. Okay, so the reason it's kind of an awkward end is because then somebody will edit it and pop in our closing. So that's why we just like yes, yes, yeah, yeah, okay. So I'm going to end. I don't know if we can still talk once I hit end recording. So I just want to thank you so much, carly, for your time. You are such a light and such a gift.
Speaker 3:Thank you, thank you. I'm really excited for you that you're birthing with a midwife this time, but that you're in that empowered space, so where you get to claim a little bit of things that may have been lost in your previous experiences, and so I hope that it's a healing journey Not only just a healing journey, but just a blessing overall of birthing for you that is restorative in nature.
Speaker 2:Thank you, it already has been in so many ways, you know. And then, kind of a side note, when? So my original OB, her office, closed and I I love her and I love her approach and unfortunately, her approach to medicine is basically impossible to find in the general medical world and so I was so disappointed to have to find other care. But I was able to find this wonderful midwife who's fantastic, and it was interesting because I got referred to MFM, because there's just something this baby just has a few things, very minor, but a few things that need followed. So I remember this was a couple of months ago, thinking OK, clearly I know a few MFMs because we've been involved and we've all been delightful, but there was something really important to me that they viewed. They viewed life and the value of it the same way I did.
Speaker 2:And I remember doubting myself, thinking like well, but in the end they're all going to give the same medical advice. You know, like, don't be so picky, emily. But I talked to my husband and he validated. He validated. He was like, well, if that's something that's really important to you, if you're going to go into that appointment already defensive over the baby and like protective, that's a problem. So go to an MFM that you feel is aligned with your values. And it made more work. You know we had to do extra appointments and go extra far and whatever, but I am so grateful I did because I was able to show up and be receptive and not defensive. It was just such a good learning experience of that inner voice of like you know what. Yeah, that was a self-care moment for me. Yes, yes.
Speaker 3:And that receptive versus defensive that is the key to like. If I have, if I'm not trusting my medical professional right, I always tell people date your doctors, date your doctors If it does not feel like a good fit. I'm not going to stay in a relationship where every time I talk to this person I feel fear and anxiety and defense. I have to feel defensive. So it might not be a good fit if we try to talk it out and work it out and it's not working. So I'm glad that you found your space.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's a constant work in progress. Yes, yeah. So thank you so much, carly, and I can't wait for us to connect again. I'm sure we will. Yes, thank you so much.
Speaker 3:Good luck to you, happy holidays, all those things, and I'm sure we'll talk soon. Thank you.
Speaker 2:All right, have a great day, carly. Bye, you too, bye, thank you, thank you.
