#286 | Facing Childhood Trauma Through Birth: Courtney's Story

Emotional trauma is stored in the body and can lead to a host of health issues if left unresolved. In this episode, Courtney shares her deeply personal journey of navigating the effects of a controlling and emotionally abusive her mother -- so controlling, in fact, that her demanding mother caused early marital issues for Courtney and her husband. Further, due to being placed on hormonal birth control at a young age, Courtney developed a belief that she couldn’t ovulate or conceive naturally, leading her to IVF when she and her husband were ready to start a family.

As she recounts her experiences—including distressing moments during her hospital care that triggered her childhood coping mechanisms of freezing and disassociation—Courtney describes the thought process of being coerced by and ultimately succumbing to a doctor while in labor. Courtney herself is a hospital-based medical professional who was accustomed to doctors and hospitals in her everyday life, so the betrayal and intimidation she experienced came as a genuine shock to her system. After her first birth experience, Courtney shares the heavy emotional work she did to reframe her trauma and establish strict boundaries - for the very first time - with her mother. Courtney went on to have four children in all, ultimately experiencing spontaneous conception and a completely empowered, peaceful birth with her fourth at home.

Courtney's story sheds light on the complex interplay of early trauma and birth, and how embracing physiologic birth can facilitate healing and restore trust in the body’s innate capabilities. Tune in for a heartfelt discussion about resilience, healing, and the journey to reclaiming one's body and mind.

@_holisticourtney

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Transcript

I had gotten out of the tub and got on the bed, and he put his hand on my vagina and said, if you push you will rip and tear all the way to your anus. When a provider in this vulnerable state is in your space telling you something like that, your trauma is brought up again, and all of a sudden, you're that little child who needs to people please, for the love of of your parents, you will do anything for that love. I realized I had given my body and my power away to my mother. She controlled my life so fully, and I had been so conditioned to dissociate and numb out when stressors or hard experiences arose.

I'm Cynthia Overgard, owner of HypnoBirthing of Connecticut, childbirth advocate and postpartum support specialist. And I'm Trisha Ludwig, certified nurse midwife and international board certified lactation consultant. And this is the Down To Birth Podcast. Childbirth is something we're made to do. But how do we have our safest and most satisfying experience in today's medical culture? Let's dispel the myths and get down to birth.

My name is Courtney. I am an OB nurse, anesthetist. I am a wife and a mother of four, and I'm six months postpartum with my youngest, and my story starts with me as a really little girl who, in the face of trauma, learned how to dissociate. I grew up with a mother who is an alcoholic, a narcissist, among many other mental health issues, and actually a aunt of mine recently just shared a story with me she lived in our basement for a time when my sister and I were little, and she would hear my mother screaming at us often, and sometimes she said it was really scary to hear how Loud she was screaming. And there was one particular day that she said she needed to come upstairs because she sounded like she was going to have a heart attack. So she came upstairs and found us in the playroom, and my mom was screaming so loud, she said she could see her neck veins bulging, and she was screaming at us, it's all your fault. It's all your fault. And I was on the floor staring at the wall, singing, A, B, C, D, E, F, G, and that was really hard for me to hear, and also it was such informative information, it was so important to hear because I had no memory of that. If you've been through childhood trauma, you might understand I don't remember most of my childhood, and many times the child's brain and nervous system does that as a protection mechanism. So this story, while crushing to hear, really helped piece together a lot of issues that I had later on in my life, I continued to be very disconnected my whole life. Growing up, I was very controlled by her. From what I wore, my clothes were picked up by her, my phone conversations, she was always in the room for if you remember AOL chatting, she would pull up a chair behind me and tell me what to say and watch what I would say to friends and boyfriends. My life and my body were not my own, and I got my period for the first time around 14 or 15, and it was irregular for a month or two, and she said, you know, you're not really going to get your period regularly or going to go to the gynecologist and go on birth control, and that's what I did at 15 years. Old, and stayed on it until after I was married, and that just became my story that I don't I don't get my period, and so I'm on birth control. Once I was married and came off birth control. I was still not getting a period, and I started to dive into health and wellness. Then the diagnosis infertility really was a blessing, because for the first time, I started looking at my body, and truly I had never really looked at my body as my own in my entire life. And around the same time, right after we got married, my husband started waking me up to the world I had been living in, telling me, you know, what you experienced is not normal, and this was abuse, and this was a really hard time in our marriage. We almost got a divorce. I was extremely defensive. We started therapy and for our marriage, but I wound up staying because we realized that I was the problem and I needed to be there, and I was waking up to a lot of things. And eventually, after a few years, I did, we did start the process of IVF, because I had still not regained a cycle, and went through that process, and I wound up with the very rare complication of ovarian hyperstimulation. It's very rare, I think only point 2% of everyone that goes through IVF, but it is extremely dangerous. And after the retrieval, I passed out. I was taken to the hospital in an ambulance, and I was in the hospital for a week. I was on Lovenox around the clock so I didn't form clots, and undilauded for pain, and they removed five liters of fluid from my belly after, like the third day, and again, after a few days, removed about one and a half liters. So you basically third space, all of the fluid that's supposed to be in your cells, into your belly. And I recovered and came home, and I just innately knew that there had to be another way, and there was a piece missing, and I just felt like I was searching for something, but I didn't know what it was, and I became pregnant at one of the embryos did work from that process, and we became pregnant, and I was still in therapy. Almost immediately after finding out I was pregnant, after lots of healing, physically after IVF and emotionally with therapy, I made a statement to myself that I wanted to feel and experience every single part of this pregnancy and birth, because I had never really felt anything in My life, and I had been so conditioned to dissociate and numb out when stressors or hard experiences arose, that I was so ready and excited to feel and I read einemeese Guide to childbirth from front to back in one sitting, I devoured it, and I immediately signed up for Cynthia's hypnobirthing class, and that was just so wonderful. And gained so much knowledge there too. My OB, my OB that I was seeing was not present at my birth, which came to find out that was probably a blessing in disguise, but I did give birth in a hospital. I was very comfortable in a hospital. I I'm a nurse, anesthetist, like I said. I worked in the ICU for years, and then went back to school for my master's in anesthesia. So I felt like I spent more time in a hospital than not. So it wasn't a stressful or scary environment for me. It was actually comfortable. And never once during that 26 hours of labor did I question my decision. I never thought I can't do this or that I needed an epidural. I give them. For a living. That's what I do. But I just knew in my body so deeply that it wasn't my path she was born. It was so empowering. My body and mind, for the first time, work together. And I think I can't think of another situation where that is truly a requirement for your body and mind to be in alignment. And the fact that I was able to do that just I was so thrilled, because while the birth was amazing and I had an amazing little newborn, it also showed me that I was getting there and that, you know, my body and my mind were doing this beautiful dance that it's meant to do. And so eventually we wanted another baby. And during this time, I had been breastfeeding and stopped breastfeeding and still had not gotten a cycle, and it had been months and months and months, and I had done all of the things. So for those of you listening who have struggled with infertility, you know what I mean, I had done chiropractic and acupuncture and cranial sacral therapy and the Mercier method and seed cycling I'd taken Vitex. We even did, like, six rounds of IU eyes. We did all of the things. And then, you know, said, Well, you know what? Maybe we should give IVF another try, even though it was dangerous, we just didn't really see another option. And had an appointment for that. And in the meantime, I was doing a meditation, and the guided meditation was about stories that you tell yourself. What story are you telling yourself? What story are you putting out into the world? My story was, I don't ovulate, I don't get my period. That was such a wake up call for me, because I would tell that to anyone who would listen, my friends, my husband, my doctors, I don't ovulate. And the meditation went even further to say, when did this start, and why? I realized then that I had given my body and my power away to my mother. She controlled my life so fully, and placing me on birth control was not only another control move, but in a way, it was almost keeping me a child in her realm, in her grasp, under her control, metaphorically, not enabling me to become a woman. And I was obedient to that my whole life. And I remember sitting up from this meditation, it was the biggest wake up call. I ran downstairs to my husband, and I felt viscerally and unlocking. I knew that I had just unlocked such a deep knowing, and it's hard to describe, but I knew something changed. And like I said, we had had that appointment for IVF coming up, and it was three days before our appointment that I was at work, and I just had a feeling, and I took a pregnancy test and it was positive. Again. I was thrilled that I was pregnant, but even more elated because I knew that I was getting so close to this connection with myself and starting to truly trust my intuition for this pregnancy, I went back to the same provider, to the same hospital, and I started really mainly working in OB at this point. So I had been seeing a lot and questioning a lot about what I was seeing, just the all the things that we talked about, and you guys talk about the gas lighting, the rhetoric. I had a really traumatic event happen at work. One of my patients had an aFe, amniotic fluid embolism. And I think you guys did an episode on that. They're very, very rare, but also usually fatal. And so I had a patient who had that, and luckily, we resuscitated her, and she did well. But throughout this whole pregnancy, I, you know, really confided in my OB, and we kind of talked shop during my appointments, and kind of formed like this relationship that I really felt. Was a comforting trust relationship. We had work to talk about as well. And when it was coming closer to birth, you know, he again, said, Yeah, you know, do whatever you want. You've had one birth already, unmedicated like you. You do whatever you want. And he said, in fact, you know what, just so we ensure that I'm there. Why don't you come to my office at 7am come through the back door. I'm going to keep it unlocked just for you, and I will check you, and if you're just a little bit dialed, I'll do a sweep, and that will ensure that I'm there for your delivery. This is another piece as to where I feel like, you know, this is a trauma coming up again. In these moments, I was feeling like this was nurturing and comforting, and he was going out of his way for me, and he cares about me so much, and especially for someone like me who never had that, it felt good, and it felt like, wow, like, look how much he cares about my outcome and and being there for me, I felt, you know, extra taken care of, and so I did that. We went at seven in the morning, I was a few centimeters dilated. He did a sweep. I walked across the street to the hospital, and I was starting to go into labor. And He came into the room and sat down, and he said, I really want you to have an IV. And I said, Oh, I I didn't have my NIV for the last time. It was a 26 hour labor, and I don't really think I need one. And he came close to me, and he said, You know better than to ask why I'm telling you you need this IV. You remember what you shared with me. You remember what we talked about? You know why I want you to have an IV? Suddenly, all of the conversations that we had that made me feel like we had this great trusting relationship were being kind of held against me.

And Courtney, what was he referring to? The client who had an amniotic fluid embolism. Yeah, that had nothing to do with you. No, okay, he was implying that you were could potentially have one, and therefore you should have an IV in case. Yes, like, you know how, how things can go bad. Like, you need to list. Like, let's not you know exactly why I'm asking.

Could that prevent an aFe? Well, no, no, but, you know, I mean, I guess, like he's saying, you know, if you have an IV, it'd be easier to give you medication. It'd be easier to he's he, he was setting her up for, you know, if there's a potential problem, we want quick access to treat you doesn't and amniotic fluid embolism affect like, what is it like one in 50,000 women or something? Oh, yeah, it's extremely rare. He also could have been suggesting it for postpartum hemorrhage, or, you know, the need for emergency cesarean, all these other reasons.

But he got, but he got right in her face, and he Yes. He indicated the aFe, which is, yeah, very life threatening. Yes. Okay, so he definitely felt like an about face, yes.

And in the moment, everything had been going so smoothly in my mind, and I just said, Okay, I'll get an IV. I don't really care. Once again, I'm in the medical field. IVs aren't extremely traumatic to me. I'll get an IV for him. I'll make him comfortable, whatever put an IV in. They tried eight times, by the way, finally got an IV. Thank gosh, it was a Saturday. There really was no one around. They were short staffed, but he came in again when I was coming close to transition and really in the zone. So I don't even remember seeing his face, but I remember he was sitting right in front of me, and my head was down, and I heard his voice, and he was saying, Courtney, you're working way too hard. I want you to get an epidural. I remember thinking, How is this possible? Like, who is this person? And just, I never even looked up at him. I just was shaking my head, no. And he just kept talking and talking and talking about how I was exhausting myself. I needed an epidural. Finally, my husband got him out of the room, and before I continue, I just I really couldn't believe it. On reflection, oftentimes with. Trauma, we don't see our reactions or triggers in the moment, but rather in reflection and reflecting back on that, I just I can see so clearly and how so many people are in this situation, and especially who have had some trauma in their past and have coping mechanisms like people pleasing or a good girl complex or codependency. And when a provider in this vulnerable state is in your space telling you something like that, your trauma is brought up again, and all of a sudden you're that little child who needs to people please, for the love of of your parents, when when you're young, your your very existence is based on your Parents love for you, and your nervous system knows that you will do anything for that love, no matter what it takes. And that is why so many people have this people pleasing, or this good girl complex, or I just want, you know, to do the right thing and say yes and make things easy and make things comfortable.

And I don't want them mad at me, is a big one. I don't want them not to like exactly. I don't want them not to like me. Women say that about their obstetricians. Yes, that's and that's I don't want them not to love me. That's your child to your parents, and that is all brought up again, thankfully, with the work that I had done, the IV wasn't a big deal to me, but there was no way that he was going to make me a get an epidural, and by this point in my head, I had already seen what was going on somewhere in that labor mind of mine that I knew that this man was not to be trusted anymore, but I can see how it happens every day to women who haven't done that work. So we were alone, I was in the tub, and I felt her head, and I should have just pushed her out right there in the water, but it was hospital policy not to do that. I told my husband, you know, go get someone. She's coming. And about 15 people ran in the room, complete chaos. He ran in. He ran over to me. I had gotten out of the tub and got on the bed, and he put his hand on my vagina and said, if you push, you will rip and tear all the way to your anus. Do not push. And that was the most difficult part of all four of my labors, so that he can get his table set up. He wanted his mineral oil. He needed his gown on. They had to get everything ready, and he let go with his hand when he was ready. And she was born. And so I Yeah, and that was in your face, asshole, when Trisha gets mad, yeah, and what did he say to that when you had her so easily and presumably didn't tear Oh, yeah, no, um, you know he was, he was just, you know, so happy that he was able, you Know, he did. He used mineral oil for about 20 seconds. So I'm sure that he thought that that saved the day. You know, he came in like a night of Shining Armor with a mineral oil, and that's why we had a successful outcome. But that was the very last time I saw him, or, you know, gave birth in a hospital. I was, I was dumb after that.

I have a question for you. Courtney, yeah, when we have experiences like that, we have fantasies of what we would say to the person, what we wish we had said. I mean, I have no doubt you had that thought so many times, right?

Yeah.

What did you do about it? Did you come to peace with it and or did you say something? I imagine you didn't, because most of us would never in the moment, we're just it's like, Fine, the baby is out. Let me just be in my postpartum now. But did you ever assuming you never said anything to him about what he did to you? How did you come to peace with it?

The thing that comes to mind is that I feel like I'm very good at forgiving people without being asked to be forgiven. With my situation with my mom, I think that. But I've become good at really focusing on the fact that you cannot control anyone else, and you can't change anyone else. You can only, you know, focus on yourself. There's only the only truth is yourself and your reactions and visit the decisions and and choices you make next so I didn't say anything, and I just chose to go to a birthing center next time.

It wasn't necessary for you to say your piece, because you had your piece. You made your choice. Yeah, dude, was just going to be goodbye, cut the ties.

I'm I'm done, and that was your piece. That was all you needed, yeah, and I became so passionate about advocating for women at this point at work, I just was shocked at myself, like I said it, it kind of really came so much more after in reflection, just how, how did I let him make me get an IV? How did I all of these questions was just I was, I was truly surprised with even me. You know how easy it was to want to be complacent and and, and say yes and, and I wasn't even in a position where someone was telling me that, you know, the risk of my baby, or, you know, my baby's health was at risk, that this is just small things, and I was already saying yes. So I just, I couldn't believe how easy it was. I had finally experienced what I was seeing, and I just tried to be more of an advocate at work. I tried to get to the room sooner, or just try to be there for discussions and just be a light in this dark and scary place. So I stopped breastfeeding, and for the first time, got a cycle and got pregnant again with my third on my own this time, for the first time, easily, and like I said, we we decided to go to the birthing center this time, and it was an amazing experience. It was really special for my husband and I. We were really the only ones there, and it was just the two of us. We didn't have a doula. Our midwife was in the other room, and we just did it together and had a beautiful birth. And it was just really beautiful, and a really special bonding experience for us. And at that same time, work really started to weigh me down, and I just kept thinking that I'm trying, and I'm catching these women in way too late in birth, in such a vulnerable, fear based place. And one story that really kind of pushed me over the edge was I was called at midnight for a patient that they wanted to section, and so I went to her room to pre op her, and I walked in, and she was hypnobirthing, crying, completely beside herself. And I said, What's the matter? And she said, they, they told me that I had I was okay to wait until the morning to reassess me and see how my progress was, but someone I don't know just came in the room and told me that they're sectioning me now. I looked at her strip. The baby looked completely fine. The mom's vitals looked completely fine. And I left, and I said, Hold on one second, and I and I went down the hall to find her OB and she was standing by the or doors with her hands on her hip, impatiently waiting. And I walked over to her, and I said, I just went to see the patient, and she is she's crying so hard, and she almost can't breathe. She's crying so hard. And she looked at me, and she said, that's her Mo and in that moment, I just I knew I I was done. It was too much. It was too much to bear, day in and day out. We went we went back. I asked her to come back to the patient's room. I said, Can we, can we talk to her together? And the three of us were there, and I said, you know, she's under the impression she could wait till the morning, and her strip looks completely fine, and she it looks completely fine. Are you okay if we wait till the morning? Can we? Can we do that? Like everyone says? She said, Well, in my professional opinion, I strive for a live, healthy baby, and my opinion would be to do a C section so we ensure that right now, if you really want to wait, we can consider that. But my professional opinion is that I want a live, healthy baby. There is no way that anyone, no way anyone in that situation would ever say anything but okay, there's just no way. There's no way. No and I just, and by the way, that OB is just saying that to cover her ass. She's saying those words so that if the patient declines, she's still covered. Yeah, it's just so manipulative. It really is. She knows every single woman is going to fold yes, that you bring up the health of the baby. I fold. Nothing matters. Mark me up, put scars all over my body, cut me open, do anything if my baby's health is at risk, that's all they have to say. And I the way she says it. I mean, in my professional opinion, I just have to say the health of the baby matters most to me. I Come on that. That's classic cya language. There was no indication that the baby was in any kind of danger, and, and, and what's so offensive about it, on top of everything else, is as if the baby's health matters more to the doctor than to the mom, like, don't even right? Don't even pretend. Don't even pretend, you won't get on with your life in 15 minutes. Yeah, that this is gonna, this will stay with me till the day I die. Is this the woman she said, that's her modus operandi. Is that the same woman that she or a different woman her ml, yeah, no, same person. Okay, so she did this to that woman who was so hysterical crying, yeah, and, and this is something that said, also, I would say 10 out of 10 times that we do C sections for reasons like this, for we're not sure we need to do C section. Let's just do a C section. I would say, maybe I'll say, 99% of the time when we're closing and it's over and surprised, the baby's fine, always, the surgeon comes around the drape, where I always am, and bends down to the mom and says, You know what? I would always rather have a healthy baby than risk not having a healthy baby. So that's what I always want to do. And the parents are always with their newborn, and out of it, oh yes, doctor, yes. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much.

I agree with you, like you saved my baby. I'm sorry, yes, yes. Thank you for getting my baby here safely, as though the doctor gets the credit for that, rather than nature, rather than the circumstances within the mother. Yes. So can't imagine, from your perspective, Courtney, with all of your life experience, which is so specific and unique, I can't imagine how that is for you, seeing all that, having had manipulation in your childhood, and having gone through the birth you did, and then being a professional in the room all the time, I just cannot even imagine how that made you feel. Because as a nurse, you know, what do you what? What can you do in that situation? You you want to advocate for the mother, because you know her rights, but from the hospital's perspective, you better get along with the doctor. What? What kind of suffering does that cause inside of Yes, well, it did it. It slowly. It slowly. Was a slow, you know, I kept trying to convince myself like, Well, if there's one, if I can help one woman, just, you know, realize her power, or just, you know, say no to something like, maybe it's worth all of the weeks and hours and days and years that I'm here if I help one person, but it became to the point, like around this time, that I it was too painful for me. And I actually, right at this moment, I again, stopped breastfeeding, got my cycle, and I got pregnant again with my fourth. I did you want to ask my comment was I was simply going to say, ultimately, it led to you having to leave your career.

Yeah. It was that hard, yeah, yeah. It was that painful to see it day in and day out, and to feel that you couldn't do anything differently about it, yes.

So when I yeah, when I. Got pregnant, I knew I was going to have a home birth finally, and I knew the first thing I wanted to do was to not walk back in that hospital, because I just wanted to give this experience and this baby and this time in my life what it deserved, and it had just become too much to endure these women's pain day and night, and it just didn't seem like there was any way I could, I could help them anymore, which was so much more painful. And so I did. I left and had an amazing experience with my home birth. Um, brought my my girls. I have three daughters, so I they all came with me to my midwife appointments, and we didn't plan any childcare. We were planning for them to be home. And we watched a ton of home birth videos. And I specifically looked for ones that weren't, like, really pretty with like music dubbed over them. I looked for like, the raw, unfiltered, like screaming ones to get them prepared for that, too, and they they became obsessed. They called it baby videos. They wanted to watch every night. And yeah, my dream was just to watch them, watch what their bodies, what every cell in their bodies, were made to do. And they made these beautiful affirmations and pictures and scribbles, and we put them on the wall, and it was a dream. It was amazing. My daughter was there. My oldest daughter, it was late overnight, so she got to be there, and she cut the cord, and it was just it was wonderful. And we have videos from my younger too, but I've been doing a lot of reflecting, and I think that there, there is a lot more trauma than we're aware of. And I think when people hear childhood trauma, they might think of something huge and awful, like a rape or abuse violence or something like that. And yes, those are huge things that happen, but there are a lot of things that are traumatic to a child that the child's nervous system and brain cannot handle. And it doesn't have to be something like that. What it is is the worst thing that's ever happened to that little child, and when they form a coping mechanism like dissociation, like I did, the connection between mind and body is completely severed. I think that happens a lot more than we realize. And I've been spending a lot of time thinking, how can I help women? How come this seems so hard for so many women, and how come the the phrases that we try to tell people, trust your body, trust your intuition, how come that only goes so far? And I think it's because when we're saying those things, you know, for a lot of people, for me, included. If there's no connection between your mind and body, there's no way you can trust your body. Forget about having an intuition, a knowing, a deep knowing. And I think that there's a big piece there that I feel like if we, if we were able to do more work on before, you know, pregnancy or birth, it would change a lot of outcomes. I think whenever, whenever you are able to kind of do that work. It's valuable, because I think, you know, motherhood is another huge time when all of these triggers show up. So I don't think it's ever too late, but I think there's a piece missing there. I think a lot of times it's even subconscious, and people aren't aware that they have these mechanisms, coping mechanisms, from from traumas, but maybe they don't, they don't really remember, but they might have an anxiety disorder and they're on meds for anxiety, or they have an autoimmune disease or IDs or digestive issues or sleep problems. And all of these things are your body trying to tell you that it needs help, and maybe something happened. I just think we're really not great in our culture at addressing those things. Well, you brought up a good point in the beginning about you getting on the pill very early on, and forming a belief around your body that your body doesn't ovulate. And so many women are started on the pill as teenagers. And when you do that for whatever reason, you do it, maybe because you have painful periods, maybe it's for, you know, pregnancy prevention, but it absolutely does create a break in the connection between the mind and the body, and it begins there. I mean, as young girls, we have to start to learn to trust our bodies, to listen to our cycles. There is a rhythm that happens in the body when you go through your menstrual cycle. There's there are mood changes, there are body changes, there are creativity changes, there are energy changes, there are sleep changes. When you tune into that, that's your body's you know, when you tune into that, you can start to build that trust and respect for your body and listening to your body. And when you have that shut off the same way as if you get a headache and you just, you know, mask it with an Advil or Tylenol all the time. You're not listening to what your body's trying to communicate with you, and that's how we break down. Instead of building up that trust between our mind and our body, it starts with becoming aware, listening and then resolving and learning you know what triggered it and how to overcome it, but we live in a society where we mask, right? We mask, we mask, we mask.

I'm so curious to ask you, Courtney, when we started this call, your mom tried calling you Yes, and you still have a relationship with your mom, and can't help but want to ask you, because there's so many women listening who are maybe 10 years younger, they're starting out in this process. When you get the insight that you get after doing all that work on yourself, I guess my question is, what does your relationship with your mother look like? How is it possible to maintain a relationship with your mom? What does it take to maintain a relationship with her so she doesn't have to be completely out of your life? Like, what did that look like for you?

Um, well, I think at least for me, um, it it definitely required a distance and and really removing her from my life for some time to do the real work, and I was in pretty intense therapy, where we were doing EMDR a lot, and I don't think that it would have been as helpful if I was still talking to her and having a relationship with her. I think sometimes it is necessary, at least for some time, to distance yourself. And I think that I learned to how to have a relationship with her with very, very strict boundaries. And that was a lot of learning through therapy too on how to do that. And so now we have a relationship. It's, it's very superficial, it's mostly for my kids, and I don't see her that often. You know, we were when I was growing up, and even when I moved out, I was talking to her multiple times a day. And, you know, really regulating her emotions. All very interesting.

I just want to slow down, and I have everyone really hear that it's one thing to be close to your mother, but for a grown woman to be speaking multiple times per day to her mom, that's sometimes worth exploring, because when you're really close with your mom, you might have days. There might have a day like that, but that also might be worth exploring. In your case, what were you saying that you were taking care of her? It can also just be an invasion into your life. I mean, yes, it's like a boundaryless situation. Oh, no, boundaries. Yeah, I had to answer the phone. I had to answer that phone. And that was, you know, that hard part of that early marriage where, you know, my husband was just blown away, like, what is going on here? But I was scared to death not to answer that phone and be on the phone for hours for as long as she needed me. Yeah, and, and, and that's why I think that it does require some major distance, as far as really cutting someone off for some time to do. At work and she she still does drink and so, you know, we do. We have very strict boundaries. If that's the case and she's in that place, we just don't talk to her. So sometimes there's years, like a year or two will go by that we don't speak to her. I usually am the one she would never, ever say she's sorry to come back. I am always the one that finally breaks down and calls her after two years. Because usually it's because I've had another baby, and some deep part of me feels like bad for her, I've gotten into a place where I have compassion for her, and I know that she has her own demon demons, and you know she didn't have the tools or the strength or the opportunity, for whatever reason to to change the pattern like I did, so I really have forgiven her, um, and that's how I'm able to have some sort of a relationship with her. Courtney, what would your advice be to the mothers out there listening who are hearing your story and saying, oh my gosh, this is relatable. You know, I have similar childhood trauma, or some childhood trauma, maybe not the same thing, but knowing that they sense that they may be bringing some of this into their birth experience. What would you tell them? What would what can you What would you tell them to do to start to work on that?

I think that for those women, and for even women who aren't really sure that they've experienced trauma or, like I said, you know, think like, oh, well, that's not me. I've had like, a somewhat okay childhood, and I don't remember anything crazy, but, like I was saying before, but I take meds for anxiety and I have an autoimmune disease, it's worth looking into, I would say, for those women, maybe look at some patterns in your life that are hard, or a relationship that you struggle with, or if there's a situation that is hard for you and you find, you know for some reason, You're always getting in an argument about this thing, I feel like life will present you opportunities to heal if you are able to be quiet enough and listen. I think therapy and for me, EMDR was so powerful. There are so many things that that your body hides from you to protect you, but you know, it's so powerful to release them. That was the most important thing for me. I think what's interesting about your story is that your marriage is what saved you, yes, because your husband knew immediately, even though you didn't, that there was no way he could have a bond with you. When you become a family with your husband, there becomes a new boundary around the two of you. And then when you have children, there's a boundary around you and your children. There must be one. There can't be this open spacing between your family of procreation and your family of origin, where it's like, oh, we're one big you have to have a boundary around your family of procreation. And even before you had children, he realized he could not have a relationship with you if you were going to have an open boundary with your mom. Yeah. So it caused that disruption in your marriage, and thank God you You did what you had to do to basically grow up into someone who could have her own family. It's interesting, because we think when we become moms, we're grown ups now, but for so many men and women, they really don't ever become grown ups. They still think of their parents as the authority figure in their own lives. Yes, and that was your period of really becoming an adult in the meaning of the word that our therapist, I remember the the main thing out of that therapy was this is you two against the world. Now it's the two of you that's, that's the new relationship. It's, it's you and your husband. That has to be the most important thing. That's what marriage is. That's the whole purpose of marriage. And that was that seemed impossible to me. Yeah, it was impossible. Yeah, yeah, under those. Circumstances, it was impossible. Yeah, she was your primary relationship. Yeah. How do you feel? Do you feel proud of yourself looking back? I mean, do you feel just like, what does it feel like?

Uh, yeah, I I feel so so happy and relieved that that the cycle broke and that my children can have a new life and a new, you know, legacy to look back on. Because I know I don't know the the specifics, but I know that my mom and her mom had a really horrible relationship, and I bet that my grandma and hers did too, and that's what I'm the most happy and proud of, is to give them just a calm, safe, happy life.

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I feel like there's so many things like I just want to help people with and help women with, but know that it will come and and also, like, just, you know, like I said, give myself like Grace right now, and know that you know, and I'm not perfect either. I'm still, I'm still, you know, healing and practicing things, but just being right now, like this safe space for my kids while they're young, seems so important to me, because it is, you know, that that's where I think so much of you know trauma happened to me. So I I just feel like it's so important right now, so I'm happy to kind of be in that in between space. But yeah, I'm also I don't know, I don't know what I'm gonna do. I hope, I hope it comes.

It will. It will in time, when the time is right, it will way back in 2020 when we started the Podcast, episode 22 was with Elena Tonetti Vladimirova. I know it sounds ridiculous for me to say her name, like I don't know how else to say her name. That's her name, and she's very well known internationally, and I've known her for years. She's one of the most in remarkable human beings I've ever known. She created birth into being. And she's originally from Russia, and their birth there was so torturous for so many years. Women in truly like enclosed in, strapped down. It was just a living hell. She talks about it in that episode with us, and she created birth into being after she discovered water birth, and then she created a camp where everyone gave birth in the Black Sea. Oh, wow. And it was remarkable. She had a movie. I used to show it in my hypnobirthing class years ago when I had time to show it, and it is incredible. But she talks a lot about the trauma that we need to release in pregnancy, it's a very spiritual approach into in midwifery, where you really heal the trauma that you can release before going into birth. And she also, I mean, because she's she's really doing such unusual work. She's all the way out there, one extreme of, she's the proponent of all this in the world, where your partner also has to do it. She also believes the partner has to do it. They have so much healing. So she has workshops all over the world. I had one couple once, after learning about her in my class, they flew to her next workshop, and it was in Hawaii. Oh my gosh. She's always in crazy places like Fiji, Hawaii, wow. I'll never forget she once wrote me an email, and she was like, I just stood naked on the thatched roof under the moonlight after journaling, like she just lives the most unbelievable life. Yeah, very spiritual woman. And that episode is it gets you in that space. She's really in that spiritual realm, and you listen to get lost in her world a little bit. Yeah, but I think you might really appreciate. Appreciate looking her up and learning about her work, because it sounds like that's where your passion lies. Now, yeah, yeah.