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EP47: Trina Grater
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One in three women experience their birth as traumatic. One in four struggle with perinatal mental health. Almost nobody talks about it.
Perinatal therapist Trina Grater joins us to explain matrescence, the developmental transition into motherhood that has been named since the 1970s and that most women have never heard of. She shares her own fast, unattended birth, why "at least your baby's healthy" causes so much harm, and how brain spotting helps women heal what they cannot put into words.
For the mothers who thought they were the only one.
Support: postpartum.net, 1-833-TLC-MAMA, or 988.
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But we do that because things can look fine on paper. And we hear from other people, like, at least your baby's healthy. Then we could go and say everything's fine. But it was really hard for me to hear other people talk about my story. It was a couple years until like my body was screaming, right? Like my nervous system was like, no, no, no. Um I stayed here when it was, I moved here when it was smaller still. Um, I loved the outdoor community, and there was a lot of space here, and it was affordable, and I had a good job. Um, but really I met my husband here, and sometimes we even toy around the idea of like moving other places, but like we always come back to that. It's like, no, this is perfect here. There's so much sunshine sunshine, there's not um mold and mildew and dampness everywhere. Um I like to joke that I will like go on vacations to a forest just because we don't really have that good Midwestern forest around here. But um it kind of just unfolded. Uh I grew up Midwest, mid-Atlantic. I moved here from New Orleans specifically. Um, but I was just kind of finding my way and stringing together jobs, and I always wanted to live in the mountains, even when I was younger. Um relative to Ohio, that was the Blue Ridge Mountains. So that was like the first jump that I made. And here I am now, like almost 20 years living here. I've got a little family myself. Um, and it works, even though there's a lot of interesting components to it, to say the least. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01I mean, you definitely get a uh an interesting, there's an interesting culture in Utah in general. We kind of talked about that a little earlier, but I mean the people here seem pretty nice, yeah, and it's a pretty safe place to live. Yes, it feels manageable, right?
SPEAKER_00Compared to big cities and yeah, I'm from Southern California.
SPEAKER_01I grew up in San Diego, so when we moved here, the energy's different. Yeah, it's a little like slower pace. Yes, and people are on the outside. I don't know what's going on in their mind, but on the outside they're very kind to you, and and they're nice and polite. Yeah, maybe not on the roads as much. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00But that's okay. We can deal with that. It's uh it's an interesting dynamic, but there's gotta be some components to it that like reminds me of the hometown I grew up in, in northeast Ohio. Um, but it's big enough and not too big.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I like that too. Um being from a bigger, like very densely populated area, it is kind of nice to feel like you can breathe a little bit because it's not, I mean, it's growing, yeah, but it doesn't feel like overwhelming with people and congestion.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, there's still so much space. Uh every time I drive into Utah, like often from the Colorado border, I'm like, yeah, I would live here again, I'd move here again. And it feels like the undiscovered Colorado in a lot of ways.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Like the there's so much open space. It's interesting when I hear people say, Oh, it's so crowded in the United States. And I'm like, no, I mean, there's parts that are.
SPEAKER_02Right, right.
SPEAKER_01But just take a drive across the country, and most of the time you're driving, there's nothing around you. Yeah. Wide open spaces. Yep.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01So you have three beautiful children, and you are a perinatal mental health therapist. Um, how does living inside the very thing that you treat how you show up for your clients?
SPEAKER_00I'm with you. Well, I think mostly it's fed my passion to do it. So being um a maternal mental health therapist has been an evolution from being a trauma therapist. I've been a therapist for a decade or so. Um, and in that time had kids, and in that time really just got infuriated with like what we're up against um as new moms, as working moms, um all of that stuff. And it's led me to where I am now. Oh I think that it's it's an important component of being a perinatal therapist, is also being a parent. But I think that way too often therapists only use that to work with the population when it's um the most vulnerable phase in a woman's life, to put it lightly, right? Yeah, um, it's completely transformative. Um even the most high functioning, overachieving, you know, has it all together person is challenged. Oh, yes.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it's it kind of evens the playing field. Everyone's on the same plane. It's not like I mean there's interventions that make it feel easier, but your body still gets thrown all around in this whole process, right? Like you go from puking, all the different phase, right? All the different phases, and it does feel like a lot.
SPEAKER_00In different ways, even people build families now today. Um it's rarely linear at all. But I think, yeah, so I think being a mom fed that passion because I'm I looked at it all and was like, it doesn't have to be this way. Like it's as simple as education because the research is there. Like for example, um premature births or NICU parents, two out of three have gone to develop PTSD. The research is there. It's like why why do we send them home and tell them to wing it?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I mean, that time when your baby's in the NICU is a great time to receive some sort of support. Yeah. Especially the the moms who are going in and sitting with their babies for a few hours every single day.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. I mean, it's hard no matter what. And um a lot is lacking. I think the whole culture around growing a family needs to change drastically. It's laughable. It's laughable that there is a 15-minute, six-week checkup, right? For postpartum moms. And the whole time, like leading up to birth, it's like you're going in every week there at the end, you're like, this place is my second home. The baby comes out, and they're like, Cool, we'll see you one time in like a little over a month, and then that's it. Good luck. Yeah, like it really, when you put it in certain perspectives, like it um it seems archaic. It's like, why are we still here? So um, in my work, I get really passionate just about supporting moms, whatever their hopes are and wherever however their goals are for them. Um to just really to support I lost my train of thought there. Um to wherever moms are.
SPEAKER_01Like you love supporting moms wherever they are.
SPEAKER_00Meeting them where they're at, getting them the education to make informed decisions, um really giving them words for what they're experiencing so that they can delineate like first off, it's not just me. Um, and that there is help. There's help that can work really, really effectively.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_01So yeah. So you just said you realizing there were words for what you were experiencing in motherhood, right? And that was your turning point. So, what were you experiencing, and what did it mean to finally have this name for it?
SPEAKER_00Uh uh right now I'm experiencing it again in motherhood, in terms of like um postpartum and perimetopause, and like this convergence, and I'm like discovering things, then I'm like, oh, there's words for things that I'm experiencing. Um, I'm not just crazy. Um, but backing up, I mean, after my first, I mean, of course, like anybody, like we're all like, I had no idea. I had no idea. Uh, nobody told me about this or that. But um, most significantly was challenges breastfeeding and me and my personality that I'm just like, I've got this. This is just gotta be my fault. Like, I just need to work through this. Um, not having that community. I had one mom, I thank her all the time. I'm like, you were the one that I texted about my nipples. But um I was like bleeding. It took up my whole maternity leave. I mean, let's talk about that, right? Like when we're recovering from stuff. Yes, so much. I had 12 weeks, but I don't think that's I got help at five weeks postpartum. And then my baby did have a tongue tie that was revised. Um the lactation consultant that time, this is like a decade ago, uh, was one visit, like with my last baby. It was so comprehensive. Like I even have this interesting perspective of like what's evolved over the last decade. But um, so I went back to work. I was starting my career really after that baby, and that was really hard. It was really hard. You know, I had this like great idea. I'm like, I'm giving my husband like what I would love, where like I'm making all the money, paying the bills, and he's home and can do whatever he wants and have fun. And it was so hard, it was so hard. Um, the job that I worked, which could be a tangent on its own, was um in in wilderness therapy, in um working with young people in the wilderness. But back to my point, like I was a mom postpartum pumping in the field with no electricity, no running water. Ridiculous, ridiculous. Like, who does that? Um with my second, my second was, you know, and many moms do what I'm about to do. I'm gonna about to say like a somewhat traumatic birth, but we do that because things can look fine on paper, and we hear from other people like, at least your baby's healthy. Uh-huh. As the response when we're like, Whoa, that was a ride. Like, I have not recovered from that at all. But with my second, he was a little bit early. Um, I was planning on on having it at a at a birth suite in town. Um, I did have, I was really dreading the ride to town because I live up the mountain a bit. So that's part of the picture. But I was so stressed out working that job as well. Um, I was pregnant with that baby in the field in the wilderness, um, carrying things like just on my own a lot. Um, but nonetheless, he came a little bit early. Labor happened fast. The midwife didn't make it. My husband caught the baby in the bathtub. Um, and then we could go and say everything's fine. But it was really hard for me to hear other people talk about my story, like my birth story, just right, how did things go? And what oh, we had the baby at home. Like, I really I didn't like that. There was a lot to process still, and I think time had to be part of that factor too. Um I jumped back into work also after that, baby. Um it was a couple years until like my body was screaming, right? Like my nervous system was like, no, no, no, like you can't do this anymore. I was working like 70 hours a week, like um, trying to juggle it all. And again, and I quit. And then I had one last baby after that, and he was born purposefully at home. And it was really healing to be with him longer and not go back to like a full-time, way overwhelming job.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I've often wondered how mothers can do it because I I was fortunate enough that I got to stay home with my babies when they were born, but it's hard.
SPEAKER_00Well, different mothers are hard, but different mothers need different things, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Oh yeah, right? Oh yeah, everyone. I needed to be home with my babies, and I knew that, and I'm so grateful for the sacrifices that we made so that I could do that, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Because it is a sacrifice, totally, and I knew I needed that, and I also know that I love when I can leave for a few hours and everyone just has to figure it out, right? Um, I also love having my own things, so I know I'm not solely that's some of sometimes in those times that feels like that's all you got.
SPEAKER_01Oh, yeah. Because it's all consuming, it can feel never ending.
SPEAKER_03Yes, definitely.
SPEAKER_01Uh-huh. So let's start. Um well, because I think it's going to be new for a lot of people listening. Tell me about I'm gonna butcher the word, but I'm gonna say it. Metrescence. You did great. Oh, good. You did great. I didn't even practice.
SPEAKER_00And let's even let's even back up and talk about perinatal. Okay, what that means. Let's start there. So keep me on track. We'll get to matrescence. Um, the perinatal period is technically from conception to a year or so postpartum. Um we all know that a lot happens outside of that. A lot can happen even leading up to that conception and birth. Um I could just put the statistic in that one in five moms experience loss. That's way more common than anybody talks about.
SPEAKER_01Um that's 20%. If we want to put it in a percentage, that's 20%. Yeah.
unknownUh-huh.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, in any given room, you're gonna have some moms that have have experienced loss, if not reproductive trauma, even you know, like um, as they're trying to conceive. Okay, and then one year or so postpartum, um, the research shows that it can take up to five years to so-called bounce back, right? Like we're supposed to do. That I in therapy words, that's homeostasis. Um, it's like the rubber band that stretches and when it goes back, returning. Um, so it can take up to five years. How often do we have another birth before we even hit that five years? Most of the time. Most of the time, we're thrown back into the trenches again. Um, so subsequent births, um, breastfeeding, all of these things are part of the picture. So this perinatal period can look nice and neat, but real life exists so much bigger than that. Um, then I start leaking into wanting to talk about like, well, what do we consider postpartum? Like, I'm personally a year and a half postpartum. I could be a little self-conscious in some places to be like, oh, I'm postpartum, right? Like, what do I have to say? Like, I'm not fresh postpartum or anything. But um, I'm 19 years postpartum. Fantastic intermittrescence. Once postpartum, always postpartum. Really? So that that homeostasis idea, the the bouncing back idea, PS, we're never the same again.
SPEAKER_01Again, right? Like our priorities completely change. Not just priorities, but your body will never be the same again. Okay, so you're cleaning. So your body's functions will never be the same again. Right. Right. I'm talking even just after birth, after that year, after that perinatal time, everything is different, and no one tells you that it's gonna be like nobody you think it's gonna bounce back.
SPEAKER_00You think you're always gonna prepare a registry with little baby clothes, and that's it. Um, well, really, we should be preparing for postpartum and matres in the fact that um we're gonna be grieving and grateful at the same time. So matrescence, you it is a developmental phase, so it's not just like a transition period of time, you know, it's it's a developmental phase. Um, what when we're experiencing physical change, changes, emotional changes, um, relationship changes, identity changes. Who am I as a mom? Um everything is affected. And the only other time in life that happens is adolescence. And I mean, we've got like full-on like counseling programs that focus on that. Like there's like specific therapy approaches. It's really honored as a developmental phase, but that's to give us a sense in scope of what it's what it's like. I'm not saying it's like another adolescence.
SPEAKER_01Um feels like it though.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, but it's changes on every level, similar to what happens during adolescence. And it was really when I heard that that I could pronounce the word wonderfully, right? Because you're like adolescence, matrescence. It's right there. Um, okay, a anthropologist, of course. I love anthropologists, they're like the old school psychologists, they're just studying people in this raw st form. Um, an anthropologist named Dana, I'm not gonna remember her last name, but in the 70s, um, coined, named this, named this metrescence. It's been around since the 70s, and nobody's heard about it. No, nobody's heard about it. And really, in my journey in motherhood, when I got that word, I was like, oh, okay, this is a big shift. It's hard for everyone. It's like it helped me see that gray area between like, is this perinatal anxiety or not? It's like, oh, this is just part of it. So Metrescence, it was really funny. It was as I got more perinatal training as a therapist, they're starting to teach it in curriculum now. Um, and I and I went back to my website and I was like, oh my gosh, I've been, I was writing about this three years ago, and I had no name for it. Like literally the lines like, it can feel like something was taken from you. And that's bold to say at a time in life where you're supposed to just be so grateful and happy and blah blah blah. Um, so matrescence can be a game changer just for how you conceptualize motherhood, um, even capturing into the grand motherhood or parenthood years, because roles are gonna change again then, right? Yeah, when you become a grandparent, it's like, oh, who am I as a nan?
SPEAKER_01Change again when your kids are all adults, too, before the grandbabies, even like I don't have grandbabies, but all my children are adults. And there was a shift there too, because you go from being a mother to now kind of taking a step back. And letting your kids, you know, govern and run their own lives.
SPEAKER_00And sometimes it's only then that we ask ourselves, oh wait, who am I again on my own?
unknownRight.
SPEAKER_00Absolutely. Like, what are my hobbies? What what do I do if I'm not packing lunches all day? Like what? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So you're reaching exactly to how it is lifelong. Yeah. It's not just once or twice. Right. Multiple times there's a a shift. I think and everyone experiences metrescence different. It's the same transition. Um but there's no right or wrong way. Yeah. It's just capturing something that's been unnamed for way too long.
SPEAKER_01So you said something a little earlier that I want to kind of go back to that relationships change when um when you become a mom. Like they have to change in order to become a mom, right? So what does that look like and why is that so hard for so many women to navigate?
SPEAKER_00Um it's the perfect storm, really, right? That just captures how it's not anybody's fault. Um, but it's the perfect storm. Like you you're sleep deprived, you're you literally don't have time or energy. Um, you and a partner just are passing ships in the night. Like it's just about the logistics at a certain point. That's the nature of responsibility, really. Um but it's, I mean, I often where I start with partners, with coup people that partner together in finding each other again, uh, you know, during these phases, is coming back to rituals. Most of the time, the rituals that we used to do are the first things that go when we get stressed. It can be the simple thing of saying hello, giving a kiss before you leave. Um, but if you think about your own life, right, when you're stressed, those are the first things that go.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, because you're just in survival mode when you're really stressed. It's like all the extra stuff has to go away because I'm just trying to Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And and I'm in the camp, and I know of course a lot of other moms are, but not all of us have family and grandparents and people that that is such a luxury to just be like, hey, I'm gonna drop them off. And we a lot of different people don't have that for many different reasons, right? Um but that's a real factor, and it makes a difference when it's like you or your partner have been with this child for eight years straight, right? Nobody, um nobody else. So uh yeah, it's so hard because it's the perfect storm, and people don't really know how to help. People don't really know what to say. Um, the classic, let me know if you need anything is not cutting it.
SPEAKER_01Is it really ever cutting it? Let's be honest. That's like the worst thing you can say to somebody in the here's another task for you. Yeah, you get to now figure out how I can help you. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Instead of me just showing up and doing something, bringing you a meal. That's where I was gonna go to is food is always the answer. Like, what to do for your partner that's given birth? Bring her food. Just bring her food again and again. Um, and and it's hard to know what to say because all of this perenatal mental health stuff isn't talked about enough. We're still scared of it. I mean, our response, the public response is like, well, yeah, those horror stories, why would I listen to those? Of everything that could happen. It's like this actually tells us more about the problem than anything else. Um, it needs to be talked about. It needs to be talked about though, and and then people can start to know to respond things like back to the well, at least your baby's healthy and here. And your mental health matters too. Like balancing so much of motherhood is balancing things that are really complicated to balance.
SPEAKER_01Sometimes, like, especially as a breastfeeding mom, you're the only one that can do certain things for the baby, right? So anything else that someone can take off your plate while you're doing the things that only you can do.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Yes, please. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00I I'm in that boat too. I had zero out of three babies take a bottle. This was with going back to work. Like my husband was like spoon feeding milk. Okay, like half of it like goes down. Oh, yeah, yeah. Um, I was going somewhere else with it though. Breastfeeding, nobody else can step in for certain things for us.
SPEAKER_01So so just show up and do the things without asking for permission, because you don't need permission to feed somebody. Yeah. They could just say no, that's okay, but it's the offering, I think, that that helps the most, whether you're hungry or not, just somebody bring bringing you food and offering to just take that off of your same things that the babies need.
SPEAKER_00Really, the mom needs. Yeah. Swaddle her, hold her, love, love her, feed her, um, bathe her, change her diapers at times. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, just do.
SPEAKER_01It's it's interesting because we had I had someone on that was talking about the grieving process, and it's very similar as far as I don't want to make a decision and tell you what I need you to do, just do something for me. And sometimes just sitting there and being present with somebody and letting them cry to you, and just letting them know it's gonna be okay. Community, yeah, you're coming back to the city. I'm always here for you, and it's gonna be okay. I've been there, I know how you're feeling. Let's just sit here and just be together so that you don't feel alone. Right. Even if it's in silence, because sometimes just having someone there that holds that space for you gives you the support that you need, just that space.
SPEAKER_00Oh yeah. More than what talking could do. Oh yeah. And it's okay to say, I don't know what to say, but I'm here for you. Yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And that's free.
unknownYeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01That's what I love is a lot of the things that help people the most don't cost us anything.
SPEAKER_00Right. Just our presence. It's community. I mean, that comes to community again. Um, when I work with paranoid perinatal mental health clients, um, I'm educating them about risk factors, which are like research proven events, characteristics, history that can actually lead you to like what you need to look out for in terms of mental health struggles. Um, not to scare people or anything, but to educate them. Um but prof protective factors are just as important, and community is the most important one. Like nothing substitutes community. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01There's nothing like it's coming back. I think we got away from community, especially during COVID and stuff, and for a couple of years, but I think we're all realizing no, we need that back. I want that back.
SPEAKER_00Give me my well, I would even say like modern motherhood, like the 1900s, all of the 1900s, was um taking away the village. Taking away the village, like early 1900s I mean, reading a book right now about all of this history of gynecology, and it's startling. Like, you know, around 1900, sanitation becomes more of a thing. Like all of these mostly southern black midwives that took care of everything and nobody knew how, really, um, that was seen as not a science. Okay. And we moved into the white male doctor and in the hospital, and everything needs to be sanitized and mid-century, even um taking the baby away from the mother's standard care. They used to go put them all in the nursery away from their moms.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Take them away from their moms. You're not taking them. So, what was happening there was very different than the rest of our history. Yeah. Um, I read a startling, like the um stitches needing stitches, the the doctors basically just figured out like how to take care of stitches on servants. A dozen specifically, that these they were experimented with basically. And then that's when, of course, doctors started doing the stitches in the hospital with anesthesia then, of course, to the white mamas, which I could even at least briefly touch on black maternal mental health is even more startling than maternal mental health in general. Um, the rates of death are like three times as much for the black babies and the black mamas. I mean, the writing's on the wall. It's yeah, like I've said, there there needs to be a huge cultural shift. Uh I feel like um right now in St. George, I'm trying to start a revolution of types. And there's there's a lot of different things you run up against. And back to the history piece of just how how deep it goes. Um, I mean, let's think about how midwives were illegal. They still are illegal, like certain parameters in some states. Unless they talk about other countries, but um, they literally made it illegal. And now, more than ever, literally right now, more than 10 years ago, more first-time moms are seeking alternative options and making way more informed decisions because they've gotten this notion of like the cascades of interventions that can happen, and before you know it, your whole plan, your whole dream is like the worst day of your life. Yeah, and we talked yesterday then then and then there's candles on that day every year following. Yeah, yeah, of almost dying.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Yeah. Literally for some of us, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Almost dying in birth. Absolutely. And most of the time, moms that are in a crisis postpartum, they had no idea the crisis existed. I have a therapist friend. Oh, go ahead.
SPEAKER_01I think they think it looks one way and then when it presents another way, they're like, Well, that's not it, because it it looks like this.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01So I think that sometimes because it's not it's like a gradual thing too, you know, it's not like you wake up one day and boom, it hits you. It like you kind of almost move into it to a point where it's there. It's it's very similar to trauma and abuse. Like if you're an abusive relationship, you're not, it's not like day one, boom, here it all is. It's like dropped on you slowly.
unknownYep.
SPEAKER_01And then you find like by the time you realize what's happened, yeah, you're like this deep in it, and you're like, how did I get here? What's going on? And and why do I feel like this?
SPEAKER_00Uh-huh. Left untreated, it can take a life of its own.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Yep.
SPEAKER_01I remember reading somewhere that folate helps with that. Yeah. Taking folate instead of exactly folic acid. Exactly. One synthetic. In your prenatal, yes. Because folic acid is synthetic. Okay. And folate is the natural version. I remember hearing that from a midwife a long time ago. Yeah. And so if anyone's listening, that's one thing that you can do to help yourself beforehand.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Which I I never knew, but fortunately I didn't struggle with any sort of postpartum. Yeah. I I take that back. I think I did with my daughter because she was born so pre she was 16 weeks premature.
SPEAKER_00So I think I did, but I was I had too much going on to even No, most people go decades without processing that stuff.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_00I mean, life goes on. Part of it's the hard that's the hardest part is everything just goes back to like normal, you know? New normal. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. One. Okay, here's another statistic. One out of every three birthing people experience their birth as traumatic. One out of every three. 30%. And most of the time that comes down to like what happened could be boiled down to either one or all of lack or loss of control, um, communication issues at a really crucial time, or no practical emotional support. Just the premature birth itself can, you know, and and of course, trauma's in the eye of the beholder, right? Like people can have the same experiences and one feel that it was traumatic for them and the other one not. Um, and that's a really important piece with all of this stuff is to is how an individual experiences things matters.
SPEAKER_01Yes. Because we all come from a different background, a different perspective, and a different understanding of things.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01So what might affect you, might not affect you, could really affect me. Yeah. And make me feel some kind of way. That doesn't make you better than me. That just means that my perspective, my experience, my life up to that point, that could have been the one thing, the one tipping point for me. Right. For you, it's like you're good. Because you have support, maybe, or you have these other things that make it feel more manageable. Because I was so fortunate that when my daughter was in the hospital, I had a two-year-old at home and I could send him to friends and family and go visit her. Because there's no way I could take a two-year-old with me every single day to the hospital. And he would come once a week because we we didn't want him to feel like he wasn't a part of that. It just couldn't be every day. Yeah. And he would come once a week, but if I didn't have that tribe of people to help me with him, like you were just talking about, I don't know how I would have done it. I had to drive 45 minutes each way to go see my daughter for three or four hours a day.
unknownRight.
SPEAKER_01And pump in the car on the way back. Right. I got real good at that because I'm not trying I'm trying not to waste time because when I get home, I want to be with my other child.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01But I know that that was such a blessing for me at that time because I saw other mothers in the NICU that would struggle to get there because they didn't have support, they didn't have a ride, or they didn't have a baby sitting there.
SPEAKER_00Mothers everywhere are managing the impossible.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. And when I hear those stories, I'm like, do you live near me? Because I'll come right now. I'll be the mama. I'll be the I'll be the whatever. Because it's so important to feel like so important.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Um I think that postpartum-wise, like things that are worth their weight in gold is a doula, a birth doula, or a postpartum doula. Because we can hire our village. I guess we've got that. We've got that option, then we can. Um a PMHC therapist. So that's a therapist trained in perinatal mental health. Um, I think bodywork is great for the whole family. Oh, how there's lots of different ways to go about that. An IBCLC, a lactation consultant, is what that is.
SPEAKER_01Um I want to say something about that. So if you do have a baby in the hospital in the NICU, yeah, that's free for you.
SPEAKER_00Yes.
SPEAKER_01I had tons of reasons. Because my daughter was born so premature she didn't know how to breastfeed. Yep. Because that's something that they develop as they age. Yeah, she didn't have that. So we had to teach her how to breastfeed, which took a lot of time. Everybody learns I was gonna teach that baby how to breastfeed because I was not gonna be connected to a pump for the next 18 months or whatever. Right, you know? Right. So I took advantage of that, and that was really important to me.
SPEAKER_00It's necessary. So much work. I would say everyone needs some education even before you're in the throes of breastfeeding. Yes. Um, and I was a person, and I see every one of my friends, they're like, no, it's fine, I'll reach out when I'm having struggles. It's like, no, no, no. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. So those are probably like the biggest recommendations that I have. But back to your point of like, you need a village. Yes. You need a village, and you and your partner um are going to struggle, and you guys, you guys need support.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and and find it in your village, find it in your community, find it in those support groups that you find on Facebook.
SPEAKER_00I've got some resources that I can share. And I don't know, maybe it's it's hard. I I mean, it's probably the case everywhere, anywhere in its own distinct ways, but it's it's really hard to find your village. Even all of us, like I can own and you know, our own my own mom life where it's like, yeah, gotta cancel all the plans, you know, that it's just life. But it's it's really, really hard. So I'll be sure to share some of those resources.
SPEAKER_01We'll have we'll get those at the end so that they're fresh when we when we finish. Um, so let's go into perinatal mental health. We kind of talked about it a little bit. Yeah. But when we talk about it, what does that actually cover? Because I think most people hear postpartum depression and they think, oh, that's just that's what we're talking about. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00But there's more. So what more is there? Um, we can have mental health struggles while we're pregnant, in the, you know, after birth. Um postpartum depression gets all the attention, maybe postpartum anxiety too. Um, your own mental health history matters in um what you need to be looking out for. Um, I've had, I've known two colleagues, one a therapist and one a medical provider that literally works in the hospital. Um each experience postpartum psychosis, and they didn't even know that they were in it at the time.
SPEAKER_01Like I that's kind of part of the name, right? Like you don't realize what's happening.
SPEAKER_00Oh, of course. Right, right, right. Everything else feels real to you. Yeah. And and I want to like start to paint the picture, some of like how okay, all moms have intrusive thoughts. It's part of our biology and it helps us care for our kids. Oh my gosh, my baby's crying. I need to go get my baby. Um, it's it's wired in us. Um, it's when thoughts uh it can feel like an itch, like an itch that you can't just scratch, where like we start adding an action to it to try to soothe ourselves, but it never does anything. Here we're at perinatal OCD. Okay. Um good moms have scary thoughts. So most of the time when people are looking for support during this phase in life, they're terrified that their baby's gonna be taken from them. And to be frank, if you don't go to a therapist that has this specialized training, um, I don't know, I've heard of other therapists be like, I called CPS. And a perinatal therapist is is going to know that thoughts don't mean actions, and that all of us, it's actually an indicator of being a really great mom to have the intrusive thoughts. Um mood swings, I mean, rage is getting all the attention now, like as a symptom. Like postpartum depression doesn't look like the stereotypical way that we think it does. It's rage, it's holding it all together on the outside, but not being able to turn off your nervous system on the inside. Um, it's childhood stuff that you thought was resolved coming back up. Um it. It doesn't look like how we necessarily think it looks like.
SPEAKER_01Um I think sometimes we call it overstimulation too. Yeah. And it's because there's so much going on inside. Yeah. And then when we add some of the outside stuff, it just sends us over that edge. But you get overstimulated all the time in momhood, right?
SPEAKER_00Like I can't even like complete a sentence, I don't think, in my house right now. And um, it's very clear to me when I just need to take a break. Us moms have to fiercely fight for it. And even if there's nobody, no other adult right around to remove yourself from the immediacy what's going on and to explain to our kids that um this is just I've just hit a limit inside of me. I'm human. This is nothing to do with you, it's not your fault. Um, I just need to cool off. I love Bluey, the kids' episodes right now. The mom's always like, mom needs 20 minutes. It's like, yeah, mom needs 20 minutes, but to um be fierce about getting that. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01I was fierce about nap time.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_01Which then turned into quiet time when we were older and didn't want to take naps. I'm like, okay, well then it's an hour of quiet time. Yep. Yep. And don't come ask me. I'll let you know. Right. When it's my mom's time. Because the asking is like interrupting my like reset. Yeah. That that I think is important for us because I want to be a good mom in an hour when you guys get out of your rooms. So I need an hour to not be a mom for a second, like you were just saying, like take that time, create it however you have to. Make sure your children are safe, but create that for yourself. Because my kids would go to their rooms and sometimes they wouldn't want to stay in there. And I'm like, hey, well, I don't want to start the time over. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00I love it.
SPEAKER_01Because it really was survival for me. It really was. I just had to paint it as you guys just need to rest for a little while. Yeah. So that you're ready to play later.
SPEAKER_00Yep. Yep. That's what you've got to do. Um I mean, what else about perenatal mental health? Subsequent pregnancies can be totally different. Um, you can you can feel totally different. Yeah, and you can have a harder time, right? You know, we can say to ourselves, I've done this before. This shouldn't be so hard. Um what else is important? I mean, I think that I think that it's important to understand perinatal mental health disorders are 100% treatable. They respond really well. It's like, why isn't this built into postpartum care? Is beyond me. We've got a lot of work to do, and it works political, wildly enough, that pregnancy is very, very political. Yeah. But um, we've got a lot of work to do, and we need to normalize moms asking for help because if it's left to its own, like like anything.
SPEAKER_01We need to normalize just helping mothers and not waiting for them to ask for help. Yeah. Because no matter who the mother is, if you do something that takes something off their plate, it's appreciated.
SPEAKER_00Okay, we've got one more statistic for this one. Very simple that um one in four moms experience mental health issues during the perinatal period. One in four. So why aren't we talking about this more? Well, we are. We are, and and and hopefully there's the beginning. Yeah, and hopefully there's a mom out there that feels like she's crazy and she realizes she's not. No.
SPEAKER_01No, so let's let's talk about that. Let's go there. Let's go now. We talked about all the things that can happen. Yes, let's talk about all the things that can be supportive and helpful. Yes, and I really want to talk about um brain spotting and somatic.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, for sure. Okay, so what's gonna be helpful? Um, like I've talked about a therapist trained in perinatal mental health, med management can be part of the picture, but I guess I probably work with kind of crunchy moms and they don't want to head that direction. And there's a lot of other alternatives too. It's important that your support meets you where you're at and finds out what's gonna fit for you. Um, community is gonna be so important. I kind of want to go to brain spotting to somatic approaches quicker than I need to. Um, we talked about one in four moms are struggling. The biggest barrier for them is just reaching out, is going out of their comfort zone. That fear is very real that it's gonna backfire somehow, um, or that they can figure it out on their own, like they probably have done with a lot of things in life. Cause we do. Yeah, because we do. It's easier to sometimes to figure it out and then find somebody to help. Exactly. Exactly. So a perenatal-trained therapist is going to know what to say to not make it worse, what to screen for, and what to do. And that response is really important. Um, I went back to a therapist postpartum that I had seen previously. She was fine and I liked her now. And um right away I got that message of um, but your baby's fine. So cute. Let me see a picture. And I knew very quickly, like, okay, this isn't gonna help right now. And for a therapist to even have that experience puts in perspective how hard it is to find the right care.
SPEAKER_01Um again, I'm gonna bring this up like I do every time is the first therapist you go to is not always the right therapist for you. So shop around and find someone that you feel like hears you and sees you where you are and can support you through that.
SPEAKER_00Connection is the biggest indicator of good outcomes in therapy. Do three consultations and sit back and just see what it feels like, even talking to each of them. Um so med management can be part of the picture, community can is a really crucial part of the picture. Um education, normalizing things. Uh, but me in my time working with moms, more and more often I'm leaning into the nervous system more than the story. Um, with with these things that we're talking about, they're hard to put into words, you don't know where to start. Um, you logically know what happened, but there's still more to process somehow. And so somatic therapies in general are really, really helpful for the perinatal population. They go, they don't go too fast too much. You lead the way uh in a lot of different ways. Um you learn to trust yourself that you have the answers because the it's the it's humanistic innately that I'm not handing them an answer. I'm helping somebody connect with themselves and find that answer. What's that? The intuition that sometimes we don't hear. Yeah. And I was thinking a lot since we talked about that. Um, I think a lot of therapy, talk therapy, sets out for you to do something like connecting with something that's inside of you in a meaningful way for it to put changes into motion in your life organically, right? That don't feel like self-discipline, you know, just work harder at it. And that is like the essence of brain spotting, um, in my mind, is that you you don't have to explain it all. Um, feeling it is more important than talking about it, saying it.
SPEAKER_01So talk about brain spotting so that people understand what you mean when you say that.
SPEAKER_00I'll start at the top with that too. Okay um because I want to go in all different directions. So brain spotting, brain spotting grew out of EMDR like 20 years ago and somatic experiencing. Um, we all brain spot naturally on our own. We've been doing it here as photography. Every time you yeah, every time we look around. We try to think of something and we look up at the corner. We literally like will look around when we're looking around in our brain. Uh-huh. And that's because different eye positions access different parts of the brain. So let me also put into context how important our eyes are. Our eyes are how we orient to everything, they're so complex, fragile. I mean, we, you know, they historically even poetically, they're the um gateway to the soul, right? Like they are so much. They're also really closely connected to our brain. Okay. Because if we have our sight, that is the first thing we're doing. We are scanning, we are taking in information, we're processing things. Um, so the brain spotting uses eye positions to access different parts of the brain. We're gonna do a little, this is my brain right here. This is my brain, my fist. This is our spinal cord, right? When it's like, I love the reminder of like, of course, our what we think in our bodies are connected because they're connected.
SPEAKER_01Literally.
SPEAKER_00They're connected and at a very vulnerable spot, right here on our neck, all of our nervous systems are running right through there, right? Neck injuries are a big deal. Um, okay, so back to our brain. Most of the time in our lives, we are right up here. We are in our prefrontal cortex. Oh, logic. Everything makes sense there. It's like, here's my to-dos, here's my birth plan, everything's gonna go accordingly. Two plus two equals four. I know logically what happened, therefore, everything else needs to make sense. The world, jobs, all of this is conducive to us being in our prefrontal cortex. We literally get yelled at in school when we're not, you know, we get the slap on the hand. Yeah, get back in that logic part of your brain. Um, there was a point earlier we were talking that reminded me of when um it was postpartum, I think for you, that um when we flip our lid, uh, logic isn't happening. Some people use the term like my brain's offline. It's like those moments. Like recently I had a friend text me, but I was like, had this other stuff going on, and I like didn't even register the text. I like found it days later, right? Um, that's when our lid lids flipped, our brain is offline. We're not processing things, and we are in this part of our brain. So you're noticing it's kind of like the middle, middle, middle part of our brain. It's right on the top of our spinal cord. Um, and it's the limbic system. It's emotional intelligence, it's where fight, fight, flight, freeze, fawn live. So anytime we're chased by a cheetah, let's right, um, our brain goes offline. We can't, this is really interesting. Um, when we aren't in our prefrontal cortex, we can't tell what time it is. Fascinating. Yeah. When we're down here in our, yeah, your wheels are turning so when we're in our limbic, we can't tell what time it is. Um, the only thing that matters is where's the exit? Like I'm scanning for the exit. Maybe like a random thing that's in your face right there, you're gonna be like, okay, this floor is cold. Um, or however. Um, once we escape and we are doing things beyond the parasympathetic nervous system, which is um the things we do automatically. You know, when we're running from the cheetah, we're gonna be breathing still. We're not gonna have to think about that to do it. But we're not gonna see a clock, or we're not gonna know what time it is, even if we see a clock. Um so once we get safety, our brain comes back online. We're like okay, so two plus two equals floor. This is how I'm gonna heal. Let me just read a brochure. It's all gonna make sense. Where I say all the time, like, this isn't where healing happens. Yeah, healing happens here, or I would even say here. And these sometimes have to catch up to what we might know logically. Um it is an experience to be in your limbic system or um, in your brain. And brain spotting essentially with the eye positions helps you do that and access, find and access stress, emotional pain, trauma, um, and find it, release it, heal it, send it on whatever course it needs to go on that it's been stuck, because we avoid that part of our brain when we don't need to be in it. And that's where we have experiences that haven't really integrated. Um, they could be frozen, they could be fractured, you know, they could um yeah, just kind of be stuck there and inadvertently get in the way in a lot of different things in life. And show up out of nowhere. Yeah, and show up out of nowhere. Yeah, yeah. So I wanted to be clear that brain spotting is not just for perinatal pa patients or population, and it is not only for trauma. I mean, it is great at a whole lot of things, including complex PTSD. Um, but it can be really powerful for creatives, for athletes, for sports performance, for young people that know how to feel way better than they know how to put it into words. Um, I love, okay, so what's the difference? I often am asked with EMDR and brain spotting, and and each have their space, their both somatic approaches. So I could even talk about what that means. Um traditional until a handful of last few decades, um, trauma counseling was really narrow in general. And talk therapy, of course, it's um clinically empirical for cognitive behavioral therapy, but it might not actually be reflecting real life and what is happening. Um, so traditional talk therapy starts with the top, it starts at the top down. Um, it starts with your brain. Hi, how are you? What are you thinking? What's been on your mind? And if you're lucky, you'll get to the body. Um, what does that feel like inside your body right now? Which is, yeah, you're starting to get this sense of how different an experience that that is in therapy. A bottom-up therapy, EMDR, somatic experiencing, brain spotting, they're gonna, we're gonna start with the body. You're gonna come in and you're gonna be like, I am so annoyed, my partner didn't do their dishes again, and they never do this, and da-da-da-da-da-da. Um, and instead of getting distracted by the story, the somatic therapist is gonna say, What do you feel in your body right now? Um, and be curious about that and see where it takes us. Um, my clients that have done both often say that EMDR has a little more structure. Um, brain spotting feels a little gentler or more fluid. Um, we need to talk about mechanism of change, like what's even going on with these things. EMDR uses eye movement, uh, brain spotting uses an eye position. Both of these are rooted in this idea that when we sleep, uh, when we're doing REM sleep and our eyes are moving, that's stage four sleep. That's crucial. If we're not sleeping, we can't do anything. And during stage four sleep, we're repro we're processing, we're dreaming. And it's so random, and like we never make sense of all of it. But that's what's happening during that time. Like it can be things you like subconsciously see during the day, and your brain just needs to process it. That's what we know about dreams. But these somatic approaches use that bilateral stimulation that's happening when we're sleeping to help us reprocess. So you can do that a lot of different ways. I'm doing it right now. I've got little kids that will just they'll just start rocking, they'll just be thinking about something and they'll just rock. It's like that's fantastic bilateral stimulation. It helps us process things. In my go-to in my therapy office is um headphones that are really low, um, that have nature music that's going one ear to the other. And that's just an aid in processing it. It's not needed. Um, but that gets into some of the mechanics of what's going on and how it's helping us reprocess. Um I had another tangent there that I thought about, but I'll get back to it. Um our brains are our brains are machines, like they're very complex machines and they're always processing information. And a lot of it's related to our eyesight, and they're so intricately connected there. Um and sometimes when we experience something that's really hard, we avoid processing it. Sometimes we need to talk to process it. I know those moments where I'm just like, I just need to vent to somebody. Like the person that's gonna be the best audience for what I need right now is who I'm calling.
SPEAKER_01Um, and it's not like it's almost like just listen because I need to say this so that I can so that I can process it.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sometimes the moments we're doing brain spotting on our own. Like, have you ever um been at a campfire and you kind of get in a daze at it and it feels really good? I do it a lot. Yeah, that's brain spotting.
SPEAKER_01I do it at the gym, I do it. Yeah, it's a taste of it. A lot of times when I'm sitting outside, because I just love to be outside. And a lot of times when I'm sitting outside, I'll just kind of like start to do, you know, start to stare.
SPEAKER_00The power of doing that, being curious, like finding that access point, being curious, and having a uh an attuned witness. So the therapist that's right there with you, even though it's pretty silent. Um, some of my brain spotting set, well, even me as a client, when I've done brain spotting, I'm pretty talky. I'm kind of stream of consciousness. Um, then there'll be moments where I like go in deep and I've like literally told the therapist, like, stop, you know, like stop, like you get you're getting in the way, basically. I welcome my clients, Steve, but um less is more with brain spotting. You can travel so much further in your mind when you don't have to explain it all. And the most important thing is really just connecting to that stuff and taking a good look at it. Like so many times in life we're like, I don't know, I have these stomach issues, I don't know. This is coming up for me right now. And it's like, well, let's take a moment and really look. We we might be surprised, but there's more there than we think to find. So there's no really wrong way to brain spot. Um, but it could be five minutes of a session. I have clients that do it for 50 minutes, you know, like most of a session. Um, but that's not indicative of what it can put into motion. My pr my well, clients are also processing in between sessions too. That frame is always changing. So most of the time with somatic approaches, you're gonna notice shifts happening in your life faster, more organically. Just like something clicks and you're like, wow, that used to bug me so much. And look at this, I'm not activated right now.
SPEAKER_01Um yeah, I I like that because sometimes I don't have words for things, but if I don't, if I can't find the words, I can still do that work and process through that, even if I'm not quite sure how to say it. Yeah, feeling it's the beauty of that too. And I'm an empath, so I'm a big feeler. So feeling is very easy for me to do. And so I think that's why because I've I've done a lot of my own work on myself just because I just go without even knowing it. Yes. I think for me it just felt like this feels good. I'm gonna do this. We know more than we think we know. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And then you sit there and then you think about it. And sometimes you have to say something, sometimes you don't know what to say. So sometimes you just think about it, and then you just go, Oh, okay. Well, this kind of feels like this for me. This feels like that. And then you can like for me, it's almost like building a Lego set. Yeah. And I'm like trying to find all these pieces and how they fit together so that it makes sense. And once it makes sense, I'm done and I can move on to the next thing.
SPEAKER_00Yes, brain spouting would be great for you. I mean, all of us even here right now can explore this. This usually, I think that was most of my soapbox, so to say, for brain spotting. I may have left some things out, but um, most of the time I I start, I talk about it so long, and then I'm just like, let's just try it. Let's just try some brain spotting. So people listening, um, and us, like we can just even check out maybe it's the lights that are drawing me down here, but to just check out one side of the room, like wherever anybody is that's listening. And you might notice your eyes are drawn higher or lower. Maybe think about something that's been bugging you even and notice what comes up in your body as you think of it. It's profound what can come up when we let our minds wander. Okay, and I'm kind of fast-forwarding this, but check out the other side of the room. I want us to experience how truly, like, where you look affects how you feel. You know, we talk about how we do brain spotting organically and different ways that we can we self-spot is what it's called. Um just imagine a big chunk of time like exploring whatever you're on right now and seeing where it takes you. And every time we scan our bodies to note notice what's going on inside our bodies, it pulls us into that limbic part of our brain. Of course, right? It's connected, it's right there.
SPEAKER_01That's why um a lot of people uh meditate, but yeah, because meditation is a form of that as well.
SPEAKER_00Exactly. But brain spotting uh for the insurance companies, like we can it's so it's such mindfulness. You know, it's really like mindful reprocessing. And we know how those insurance companies can be with this kind of stuff. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Spill it out, right?
SPEAKER_01So um I wanna move. I I love that we just did that because I think that's a powerful tool for a lot of people that's free that they can do at home. Yeah, they can do it anywhere. Yeah, you can do it in public and nobody knows.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01So it's not like you have to be in this certain space, it can happen anywhere, anytime. Probably safe is not while you're driving, though.
SPEAKER_00No, not while you're driving, and really just any opportunity of going inwards is what we're talking about. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01So um the next thing I want to talk about is birth trauma. So birth trauma is something people don't openly talk about it. So I want you to tell us what is it and how does it show up in the women that you get to work with.
SPEAKER_00We talked a little bit. I mentioned that one out of three birthing people feel like they've experienced something traumatic. Just startling. I know each of those statistics are startling and infuriating. Well, so high. I mean it's so high, and it's just like what why aren't we getting? Why aren't we getting in front of this? And like everybody comes from a mother. So it's like, you know, worth worthwhile for sure. Um, but birth trauma, I mean, it usually boils down to these three camps that I had mentioned of lack or loss of control, communication issues at a really crucial time, um, or just no practical or emotional supports. Right. We're just sent home and just wing it, see how it goes, like we're headed for a train.
SPEAKER_01And I think that breastfeeding can be a big part of that. I was my mom had a lot of kids and she breastfed all of her children, and I was the second oldest. So I grew up watching my mom be a mom like that and breastfeed her children. Yeah, so I had that support when I had my children. Yeah. Because my sister was three months old when I got married, and she was like a year and a half when I had my son. So my youngest sister and my son are are like not very far apart in age. Yeah. So my mom was still kind of in that mode when I was started having children. And what a matress. I got to be there for my sister when she had her babies and support her through that. Because in the hospital, the the nurse was almost encouraging her not to because it was too hard or too much work or whatever, whatever she was saying. We just tried to ignore her and I just supported her.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01But it was frustrating for her.
SPEAKER_00You don't have people looking out for you like that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Um, you fed to the wolves, basically. Yeah, which is awful.
SPEAKER_01It shouldn't be like that. It it sh it should be if a mother's choosing to breastfeed, they should instantly send in support for that instead of being like, Well, you're doing it wrong. Why are you doing it like that? Which I think is number one, an awful way to speak to anyone, yeah, much less as a nurse to a new mother.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01That in and of itself can cause trauma. Just right with that instant.
SPEAKER_00Yes. Yes. Uh-huh. There doesn't need to be something big or something on paper for it to be traumatic.
SPEAKER_01Imagine how we feel right after we have a baby. Uh-huh.
SPEAKER_00It's supposed to be the most wonderful moment of our lives.
SPEAKER_01But our hormones are kind of everywhere, right? We have so much going on, and all we want to do is sit and just enjoy this baby. But sometimes the interventions that happen in the hospital disrupt that. Oh, yeah. And make things feel chaotic and make, and then our nervous system is like starting to go like this, and we're just trying to be a mom to this new little baby.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. There's a lot of forces at work there, like the bureaucracies and the um even, you know, C-sections and the cascade of interventions that can happen. I mean, it comes back around to being educated. And that doesn't entail like moms hearing horror stories and things like that, right? Like that's our response most of the time in this world. Um, which again is more information just about what's going on than yeah, not less. Um okay, so birth trauma, the individual decides if they feel like something was traumatic. It's really easy for something to be traumatic during birth. Um, by nature, you can feel lack of control, it can be hard to communicate. Um there are relatively easy steps too that could happen to make those numbers go down. And I think that's some of the movement that needs to that is starting to happen. Um that you're leading the charge for here in St. George. Yeah, here in St. George, but of course it's much bigger than me. There's um an app these days for mom friends that's called Peanut. And Peanut has started this movement that is called um I D G A F. I don't give a F, is in the dictionary, but Metrescence isn't. And it's time to GAF about mothers. Um, but this is yeah, the movements that need to happen. Um, and I think that first-time moms are actually stepping into this without even knowing it, as more of them want to have alternative options per birth, or they just want to have informed decisions. There's so much that nobody talks about. Even can we go there with um circumcising boys? Like there's there's becoming a movement with young moms now. Um, that it's like, why are we doing that? What's the purpose of that? Is this genital mutilation essentially that's been socially acceptable and renowned even? Um so these mothers are starting to stop and think and and instead of just doing what we're told, we're like, no, I mean there's a time and place for medical intervention and it saves lives and it needs to be there. Um and yeah, there's we don't need to head into growing a family completely blind. So birth trauma is rampant and a somatic approach is really going to I mean PSI, and we'll talk about PSI, but um it's it's the the top recommended approach for birth trauma is a somatic approach. Um birth is so somatic, birth is in your body, somatic soma is like Italian for body, so this is body-based.
SPEAKER_01Um yeah, yeah, and the changes that your body goes through, and then in turn, while you're going through the act of childbirth, your mind is in a completely, it's like you know, it's in this state that you see.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah. Like you're totally so primitive. Yes. And you're just helian.
SPEAKER_01There is one goal in mind and one goal only, and nothing else matters, and this is what I'm gonna do.
SPEAKER_00And to normalize for people that have experienced this, we freeze sometimes, right? In those moments. So there's so much that can come with the intrusive thoughts and flashbacks and nightmares of like playing things over or saying, if I just did something differently, um, and the fact of the matter, especially with near-death experiences, is that sometimes things just happen. There's no good reason. And there's no way to make it make sense.
SPEAKER_01And sometimes things happen that you have zero control over, too. Yes. And you still feel guilt because you felt like if I only did this or if I if I did this different or if I did that better, or whatever. Because we're looking for solutions, right? Inside. Yeah. So trying to find how was I at fault in all of this makes it easier than it being just like no one was at fault, it was a freak thing.
SPEAKER_00Easier than saying I it was completely out of control. Yes. I was completely out of control. Yes, right, because that's terrifying, you know, and this relates to um bringing together a few different topics, but in my work, um, we learn about those risk factors that are complications in birth is a risk factor. Um trouble breastfeeding is a risk factor. Let's also say, like, teen pregnancy is a risk factor, of course, right? These are some of the examples of like some things are in our control, and some things are just some cards we got dealt. And we can look at them and we can say, okay, that's real. Like, I gotta watch out for mood swings and untreated, it could go to psychosis, right? And sleep deprivation, of course, sleep deprivation will just make the perfect storm for that. Um, and there are things that are in our control, some that we can do. But um, what else are risk factors? I mean, that it's it's powerful once you start to understand to see things like that, moving, a big life event, like moving your house to the death of a family member. It's like, okay, this is part of the picture for me right now in my my postpartum era or my you know, chapter in matrescence. Um, and I need to be a little more heightened of things to look out for. So if I start snapping and just having a bunch of rage suddenly and then feeling so ashamed afterwards, hmm, I'm not gonna just be myself up. I'm gonna back up and I'm gonna be like, okay, I'm gonna go to a support group. I'm going to go to therapy. Um, I'm gonna go to a mom group and talk to other moms because they're not, we're yeah, we are literally sent out in motherhood to think it's random. I see posts every single day in the mom group in St. George of people in active psychosis and people that just had their baby die the night before, of people, I mean, anything that you can imagine. And most of the time there's one or two responses that actually have resources, and everybody else is like, I'm praying for you. Uh I, you know, like they don't know what to do. And it's like, okay, for the world to know, like there, so let me mention postpartum support international. It is a nonprofit, it's in 35 countries around the world, it's reliable information. I tell every client that thinks that they're ever gonna start a family, which by the way, that's when your metrescence journey starts, is when you see something sometimes, like it's like at five years old, your journey of matrescence has started because you're like, I'm gonna be a mom. Yeah, this is yeah, yeah, I see you. Um, but to follow postpartum support international on socials, that's the first step. Like you are gonna, even moms in the trenches.
SPEAKER_01Even if you don't need it because it might be something that you learn something about or you get something from to help a friend or another mother that you come across. Because I think again, it takes a village, it takes community. We need to look out for each other.
SPEAKER_00We'll see these statistics more and more of one in three have birth trauma, one in four have mental health struggles, and one in five have losses. And two out of three NICU parents are PTSD. Like this is um, it's not rocket science. It's what I just keep coming back around to. And it's not like a one-off. Right. No, it's very calculated. You have risk factors, you can bring in more protective factors, you know what to look for. Um, it's not meant to scare anybody, what exists. Uh, there have been too many people, not even just moms, but like like moms that work in the medical field, nurses, you know, that um experienced these crises and had no idea about it. No idea leading up to it. Um, I don't know if I answered your question just a second ago. We're talking about risk factors. Um PSI, so Postpartum Support International. They have gosh, I never can do it justice. I mean, you just gotta go to postpartum.net to learn more online, and you'll see all these resources. But they have over 50 specialty free confidential online support groups. Um, so we're talking titles that are like um uh neurodiverse moms of medically fragile kids. Like these are some of the titles. Like you're gonna find very niche, very niche, because there are moms. I mean, we it's not talked about enough, but like um needing to terminate for medical reasons, having to end a pregnancy early. Um lot, there's there's a group that's like black dads in loss. Like, wow, okay. So there's for moms and dads. We're paying attention to culture over science. Um, 50 to choose from free. The coolest part about those online support groups is they're made for mom life. You sign up for them, you're like, you okay, I'll sign up for this and that one. When the time comes, they let in the first 16 people and then they lock the doors. So if you can make it, great. If you bail, nobody's gonna even know. So you just sign up for groups until you can make it to one. That's my so hard to get moms that need community to do that. But that's that's it right there. If you've got nothing, no matter where you are, you're signing up for online free support groups and joining them the best that you can. But there's also um a peer mentor program where you're paired with, thoughtfully paired with somebody else that has a similar story and made it through. You're like texting, calling whenever you want. Like a healing mentor. Yeah. Yeah. Um, there are a directory. So um the PSI directory will give you only therapists that are trained in perinatal mental health. So no matter where you are, there's virtual therapists, right? You're gonna get more variety to look in your state. It's so beautiful that we have that option, though.
SPEAKER_01Just think of people like you said you live kind of a rural, but imagine people that live oh yeah, almost off the grid.
SPEAKER_00And the therapists that are like grocery shopping with all their clients around you, you know, it's it's gonna be a small world. Um, there's a lot more options than we can think at times. Um, so there's that one-on-one support, there's a hotline, the maternal mental health hotlines on there. There's a warm line, which means you like call and leave a message and they'll call you back. You can text with them. Um, but really in the homepage of postpartum.net, you scroll down in the buttons supports for mom, help for dad, either of those. Click on them and they will list and detail all of these different supports. They have at least five different ones. You can find a therapist, you can find a prescriber. Um, and mostly their socials, like the reliable information is huge. It's huge. I bet any mom that follows that will find one that's posted at some point that will stop her in her tracks and just hit home and be that key to make sense of what they experienced instead of blaming themselves. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Because sometimes you need to know that you're not alone. Yeah, okay first. And then you go, okay, if I'm not alone, then there has to be support somewhere.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01If I'm not the only mother that experienced X, Y, and Z, somebody has to have talked about this more somewhere. I'm gonna find that now. Yeah. So prenatal.net. Postpartum. Sorry. You're fine. Postpartum. Good to know that word.
SPEAKER_00Prenatal. Postpartum.net. And one day we um, I mean, there's a they have a podcast, they have the I Am One podcast, which is like I am one of four, I am one of three, you know, that experienced XYZ. Um, and they have a awareness, it's like a walk to raise awareness. And I'm gonna have one here locally someday. It's called the climb, and it will be fabulous. Yeah, but that's what we Need is this whole culture around birth to shift.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01So show up for someone who's had a baby. Yeah. Even if it's just to sit and be there. Don't even ask them a question.
SPEAKER_00Just text them and say, I'm dropping food off at your door. I'm thinking of you.
SPEAKER_01I'm gonna leave it at the door and leave so that you don't exactly.
SPEAKER_00That's the catch. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01You don't have to do anything except open the door, grab the exact DoorDash, but free.
SPEAKER_00Exactly. And with more love.
unknownYes.
SPEAKER_00Absolutely. Maybe homemade. Yeah. Probably. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I love it.
SPEAKER_01That's the best way. We all like a home-cooked meal. Yeah. Because you can send your husband to go get fast food. Right. But a really good home-cooked meal that's made with love right after you have a baby. Yeah. I still remember some of the meals people brought me. There was one meal that's probably the best food I've ever eaten in my life. I don't know if that would be true for today, but that day, I had never put anything more delicious in my mouth in my entire life.
SPEAKER_00How a woman is treated postpartum will stick with her forever.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Truly.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Yeah. And each of us can be that guardian angel over that woman at that time, just with a simple meal and a text. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And not judgment. Because everybody's got way too much information about like how we're supposed to give birth and how we're supposed to feed and what we're supposed to do. And a good idea.
SPEAKER_01Hey, I haven't seen or heard from you in a while. How's everything going?
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_00Are you good?
SPEAKER_01Are you okay?
SPEAKER_00And take your time answering this because that's what mom life is like.
SPEAKER_01And if somebody's asking, if somebody noticed that you're not around and they're asking, yeah, they're opening the door wide open for you to say what you need to say. But you felt like you haven't been able to say.
SPEAKER_00I mean, that brings us around to how in matrescence we we like, it's a wonderful time to disappoint everybody that's like benefited from our lack of boundaries. You know, to just suddenly be like, no, you know, I'm gonna just change my mind for no reason and not explain it, you know, and just these yeah, new boundaries that um yeah you have to be fierce with as well to get what you need in motherhood.
SPEAKER_01And don't let somebody guilt you for what you know is right for yourself and your family.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that's the trickiest part of it is balancing all of the information with y you, with your gut feeling. Um I like to joke around sometimes that at the end of the day nobody actually knows anything about babies. Like they're the biggest mystery left and they can't tell us about it.
SPEAKER_03And none of us remember it.
SPEAKER_00So not cognitively, but I think sometimes we we often can remember how well, of course, how we felt in our home. Smells certain door banging closed, maybe like some carpet or like a chair, you know? That's how the memories are. They're not sequential episodic. Um but it is a huge mystery, and it's as much of a science as it is an art.
SPEAKER_03I'm grateful for some of my children's lack of memory.
SPEAKER_01Of course. On those hard days, you know. Uh-huh. But at the same time, I think it's really good to open the door to like, let's talk about this. I want to know how you felt about it because that's it's still important, even though mommy kind of lost it. I'm really sorry. How did it make you feel? And what can we do so that we don't have this happen again?
SPEAKER_00It's a hard pill for a lot of parents to swallow that they didn't don't get to choose how they did as a parent. Like our child our children tell us.
SPEAKER_01Well, because sometimes a lot of us are healing while we're trying to raise children. Absolutely. Or we're trying to figure out why do I feel all of these things. Yeah. And I'm just trying to raise these kids. Yeah. But I think it's kind of some of that, like, you know, sometimes a memory can just wash back when there's a similar time frame or a child turning a certain age, or just a similarity in some traumatic event can just show up.
SPEAKER_00It's so common with my clients for when they see their child at an age where they experienced really hard things, and then their child is that age, and they're just thinking, Oh my gosh, I lived this whole life thinking I deserved that. When I'm looking at my daughter at X years old, and she is so innocent. There's nothing she could do in the world to deserve that. So it makes us have to reparent ourselves, and and pregnancy itself amplifies our past. It all does, and everything after.
SPEAKER_03Um yeah.
SPEAKER_00So I think to myself, I'm like, of course, this is the most fascinating part of human development to study as a therapist. Right? Yeah. Um I mean, imagine how much changes from conception even to birth and just that baby's. That's why we come back around to like this is the most vulnerable time in a woman's life. Um and fascinating then to think about menopause. Oh, I'm thinking about it. Yeah. Yeah. We I had mentioned yesterday about how I had recently learned from a TED talk that um whales are one of the only other mammals that have menopause. And at that toothed whales, so norwholes.
SPEAKER_03Is that the one of the type? Um beluga's orcas. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Um other mammals outlive their fertility, but they don't menstruate, so it's not called menopause. Whales do. I didn't know. I had no idea that whales menstruate. Nobody is, I have never once seen like the underwater beautiful picture of whales with like a huge blob of menstruation. Like they skipped that. We could make like we could make sex ed so much more useful and fascinating in school.
SPEAKER_01Yes. Have you seen I I just recently saw videos, they could be AI, I don't know. Okay. Of um a whale, like a humpback whale, yeah, feeding its young and it's just dumping milk, and the whale just opens its mouth and sucks it into its like fascinating. I don't know if it's real or not.
SPEAKER_00Is it AI? Is that real? No, I think it's absolutely real. Okay, yeah. Um, whales breastfeed for sure. I don't know if it's called breastfeeding, nursing. I don't know. They they have breasts, uh nourish their young. Yes, exactly. I don't know. Exactly. We have so much to learn from nature.
SPEAKER_01It's it almost looks like it's just an opening that opens and here comes the milk, and then they and then the milk's like in the water underwater. So it's like, what are they even but supposedly it's really thick, so yeah, the cholesterol the the baby like slips it up, they just get milk and they don't get the salt water. I don't know. Fascinating though. Fascinating. Yeah, and I want to hit one more thing about breastfeeding that I I hope that most women know, but I I I love this about breastfeeding is that your breast milk knows what your baby needs, and your breast milk, your body will create a special formula if your baby's starting to get sick. You like if you pump, you really can see this because it changes color as things are happening with the baby. Um, but to know that your body is such a miraculous vessel that create can create this special formula for this itty bitty tiny baby to keep it alive. Exactly what's to give it exactly what it needs. Yeah. Anytime if they're starting to get sick, let's pump it full of of antibodies to help this baby stay healthy.
SPEAKER_00They communicate, like their cries, their latch, they they're communicating with what even just touch to skin.
SPEAKER_01Like there is no denying that a mother and a child, yeah, there's an instant bond there, especially when you breastflip. But they were connected literally. Yes, but like as your child grows, that doesn't have to go away. That connection can stay, and actually experience figured breastfeeding has caused me to have the relationships with my children that I have that are so close. Because that bond that happens is unbreakable. Yeah. And like with my daughter, it took longer and it took more work, it took more effort, yeah, and it took more time for us to bond too. Yeah, and that was very hard for my heart. Totally. But we did it. Yeah, we're in a good place now. She's 22 years old, and and she calls me her bestie, which I think is so sweet. But it's just breast milk is just one of the most miraculous liquids in the entire world, as far as I know.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah. And so many moms think I'm empty, they're not getting enough. Like, okay, your breast's never empty all the way. It's it's the um ice maker in the fridge. You know how the ice maker works.
SPEAKER_01Give it a minute.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, when you take some out, it's dumping more in already. So that's literally how the milk production happens. Well, and um, I'll mention with breastfeeding that to think of to just think about our babies can make a letdown happen. Hear a baby cry in the store. Imagine what our other thoughts do to us. I love that. Like it's it just puts it in perspective so powerfully. But no, yeah, it's it's the biggest mystery of the world, I think. Still, this whole perinatal phase and matrescence, and it would be really cool to see because things are developing fast.
SPEAKER_01I think we're having more conversations for women now. Yep. When I was growing up and when I was having babies, like you only heard about it in those circles of other women in the same place. But I think now society is realizing we actually need to pay attention to menopause. Reluctantly, but yes. Yeah, well, that's okay. It just needs a few of us to be loud and annoying, and then they start. Exactly. And I'm okay to be loud and annoying. Yeah, we'll get there. It's kind of one of my purposes, maybe. I don't know. But I know that like I was given the voice in the platform that I have been because it's important for us to talk about a lot of these things. So I really want to thank you for coming on today and sharing your knowledge and your understanding of these things with us, and then talking about things that can support women through these times in their life until we have better support, there's the current support, which is still great. You just have to look for it a little bit more as a mother. And just know if somebody's coming to you and saying, Hey, I haven't seen you in a minute, are you doing okay? That's an open invitation to tell them if you're not.
SPEAKER_00Yes. Well, and I'll say on the other side of that, that if somebody in the perinatal period comes to you and and is really in a hard spot and asks for help, um, you know, send them to the PSI website for them to find a perinatal therapist um to get the help that they need, the help that will effectively work relatively fast. Um that might be the only chance, really, is what it comes down to. Like, yeah, it might be their only chance. Like it might be the only time they reach out to anybody. We don't reach out much, and it might be the only chance, and it will be really hard to know what to say or what to do.
SPEAKER_01Um just remember some of the support pieces we've talked about today, because I think that's like even if you're not in that phase of life yourself, I think it's important to always know about those things when you have people in your circles that are.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_01And to be that one that notices when a mama just had a baby and she's not around and she's not in the groups and she's not when she's not showing up to be. I'm already gonna know that, right?
SPEAKER_00Like, there's gonna be a place where she's not gonna be.
SPEAKER_01But it's okay to still reach out even if she's okay. It's okay. Like, I think that we just need to reach out more to each other so that we do feel supported and we don't feel like because sometimes like in our mind, oh yeah, we feel like oh, we just gotta it to say a phrase we use in our house, which is used as a joke most of the time, thug it out. Yeah, just like you just gotta figure it out on your own. Yeah, you don't, yeah, you don't know, you can't.
SPEAKER_03Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_01So thank you. Let's share with everyone. I want to give them just a list of these websites that you've talked about, and then where they can find you. Perfect, and then some of your socials if you want, and we'll also put them in the show notes.
SPEAKER_00Cool, cool. So Postpartum Support International is the main resource. Um countless specifics in them, but the place where you can find a perinatal certified mental health therapist, and that's postpartum.net. Postpartum Support International is on all kinds of socials, and it's um a great lead to find a lot of other really great resources as well. Starting point, it's a good, yeah, it's it's a great, you know, diving board to jump off of because what's on our feed really does matter, especially as moms, you know, just getting through the day. Um, and so there's a plug to just refine all of your follows while you're at it. Um, but postpartum support international. I always want to just shout it from the mountaintops because more moms need to know about it, even for the mom groups to be able to reply and say, here's the support for exactly what you're going through. Um, my website is Trinagrader.com. I'm located downtown St. George. Um, I do in-person here and online across Utah. Um, I specialize in perinatal, matrescence, and adolescence. Um with, you know, uh even more niching into advanced maternal age, birth trauma, and loss. Um and I'm also, I just resuscitated my Instagram and am using it again and renamed it. And so I'm really excited to introduce um check on the moms is the name of that Instagram handle. I love that. And uh every day I'm sharing um just the seemingly most basic information that needs to be common knowledge to everyone, not just moms.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Well, thank you. And thank you for taking your time today, and thank you for sharing your wisdom and knowledge with us because I I really love what you're doing, and I and I know that it's important. It's important to me, and so yeah, we're gonna just share this. And then when it posts, you get to share it everywhere too. So that's great too.
SPEAKER_00Awesome. Thank you so much. Thank you guys so much for having me. It's wonderful what you guys are doing and to have found you guys and to be connected.
SPEAKER_01Thank you. If you're experiencing um perinatal life and you need some of these resources, remember to reach out and you're not alone, and there's always someone there that wants to help. If a friend reaches out to you, tell them if you need help. Thank you and God bless.