#288 | Roundtable: Postpartum Grief and Rage

Postpartum rage is a form of emotional upheaval that many mothers experience but seldom feel comfortable discussing. Today's episode aims to break the silence and offer a compassionate and supportive look into the real lives of two mothers living with these intense emotions. Corrine lost her own mother the day after her son was born. Angela, a mother of five with number six on the way, lost her sister unexpectedly in a car accident on her way to help Angela with childcare. In today's episode, Angela and Corrine, who never met before today, share the unexpected ways grief and rage impacted their postpartum experiences from never wanting to have another child to throwing and breaking things. This heartfelt episode brings you close into the minds of women suffering with grief on top of the classic postpartum isolation and overwhelm that all mothers can immediately understand.

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Transcript

I felt like for that whole time period, I would go to bed every night hating myself. I just remember every night like that inner critic coming out and saying, you're such a bad mom. You are such a bad mom. How could you do that again? Am I ruining my children? That was the hardest thing for me to to confront.

This is my job. Now I'm a mother, and this is what I wanted. So how can you be so unhappy when this is what you wanted? This is what you dreamed of your whole life. This is what you prayed for a healthy baby. I can't imagine him not having a sibling, but I don't ever want to experience this again. I'm terrified.

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.

Angela and Corinne, thank you so much for joining me and Trisha today in this conversation about your postpartum experience. Corinne, you're in my current Postpartum Support Group and you're I know you're a client of both mine and Trisha's. Trisha, of course, with respect to breastfeeding and Angela, you responded to our stories about postpartum rage, this has been the hot topic of the season in our community. It's very underserved, and we have no plan for this episode other than to have an open conversation about your experiences. So why don't we begin by having Angela and then Corinne, introduce yourselves. Tell us where you're from. You can leave out your last names if you prefer whatever you want, how far out you are postpartum, et cetera. So Angela, hi. Well,

thanks so much for having me on. It's truly an honor. I I guess to begin I am a mom of five, and I am currently pregnant with our sixth I'm due in a couple weeks here. So I appreciate you shifting the calendar schedule to accommodate me, to make sure I'm not in labor or with a newborn when we do this interview. But yeah, so with my fourth that's when I experienced probably the worst postpartum depression I have ever experienced. And my husband is a lineman. We've been married for 11 years, almost to be 11 years next month, and his job is very demanding, which, you know, has its own challenges. And I'm really excited to talk about this, because at the time, I thought I was like, the only person I hadn't I hadn't talked to anybody else who had experienced rage the way that I was experiencing it, and I just there was so much shame associated with it. And, yeah, I'm just, I think it's going to be a great conversation today. So thank you so

much. Great. Karen. Yes, I'm Corinne guys. This is, this is so weird to me, because I remember being pregnant and listening to this podcast every single day on my way home from work. So this is like just a surreal moment, but I'm Corinne. I am 34 I live in New Jersey. I'm originally from New York, but I live in New Jersey for the past six years. Now, I have a four month old baby boy. His name is Aiden. My husband and I have been together probably, I think, six or seven years, and married for almost two, and honestly, I'm probably the last of all my friends and family to have children, and I've worked with children for years, 1015, years, I've worked in childcare with a nanny. I was pre K teacher, and it really shocked me, all of the emotions postpartum, I really never knew, and I actually sometimes I feel bad because, like, I used to, like, get on my sister, she has two children, and she's older than me, and like, she would complain about being pregnant and complain about the babies, and I always thought she was, like, Dramatic, and I really never knew how hard it was just to deal with the newborn, your first child, and I didn't understand how you can be home with your baby every day and be so happy and in love with your child and also be so Sad and so lonely and so depressed, and my situation is a little a little different, too. I lost my mom the day after my son was born. She had cancer. She was diagnosed. I was 16 weeks pregnant, and changed my pregnancy for sure, because as soon as she was diagnosed, she was she. She started chemo, and that's really when I felt like I lost her because she the chemo. It was like I was grieving her while she was already well, she was still alive, because she was never the same when she started her treatment. And she couldn't enjoy my pregnancy, she couldn't be part of it. I couldn't have a baby shower. I couldn't do all the things that you do. She never saw my son's nursery, things like that. So grieving her while I was pregnant, and then she was put on hospice the week before I gave birth, and then she died the day after he was born. So grieving her and then dealing with all the emotions postpartum brings in a normal situation have been extremely rough, and definitely took me by surprise. And it really, really helps to know that. I mean, obviously everyone's situation is different. Not everyone is grieving postpartum, but it really helps to know that you are not alone in feeling what you're feeling, and the support group has done wonders for me. I can't even tell you, I joked with one of the girls, and I said, like, every postpartum woman needs a Cynthia and a Trisha, every single one. Because I really, I am, like, so grateful to you both. So I'm so happy to be here.

Well, we're really just replacing, or, you know, substituting slightly, the village that women are supposed to have around them and don't have. So we're just two of the dozens that women should have around them, but every I agree with you, every woman should have support with lactation. Every woman should have the emotional support of like a postpartum group. Women need other women. Angela,
let's start with you a little bit, since you have such vastly different experiences and circumstances, which is the value of doing a roundtable episode, it's exactly what we want. And you two haven't met before today, so it's just always so interesting to bring women together and see that they have this in common, and the underlying details don't matter. But Angela, in your case, you mentioned that you It sounded like you were kind of sideswiped in your fourth baby experience. What were some of the like? How did postpartum rage creep up on you? Were you aware you had it? How did it manifest? Because they it can be an entire range. We can talk a little bit about that, but first talk about your experience with it. Yeah,
it, it's interesting, because I actually, I can relate in some ways, with with your experience. I lost my sister six months after I had my first and so I think my and my nervous system just has never, always struggled with regulation. And then I had my fourth child, and I home and do all the things, you know, I feel like kind of almost a stereotype. It's kind of a joke now, but, but I was home with all of my kids by myself, pretty much so often, and my my son, my fourth God. Bless him. I love him so much. But he, he had a lot of issues just with his own regulation, and I could not provide the the CO regulation that he needed, because he had oral ties, and what we were struggling with nursing and so a lot of it was there was a lot of failure in the medical establishment in terms of not recognizing what was going on. And it didn't matter how many times I asked questions. And I had similar issues with some of my other kids, but they were the most pronounced with him, and it wasn't until he was about six months old, I was like, I actually can't do this anymore, because he never stops crying. I was up all night with him by myself, for at least four hours every night with him, scream crying, and then trying to take care of other kids and and school. And I just remember I felt like a zombie. I mean, I just I remember driving home from our homeschooling Co Op and being like, am I going to am I going to make it home? Because I'm so tired, and I was, I was so tired I couldn't eat and and then the anger would come out, you know, the kids would be playing with the craft supplies and, and I remember I would just lose it, like sometimes screaming so hard that I I was scared of myself, or even one time I remember I grabbed a chair and I slammed it on their kids table, and I slammed it so hard that it bounced off the table and put a hole in the wall next to next to the table. And I remember being so ashamed of myself, like and, and just fearing, oh, my goodness, am I traumatizing my kids for the rest of my life, because I just can't get it together and, and I don't want my husband to look bad in any of this. I mean, he's alignment. He has a very dangerous job, so he couldn't be up all night with with him, because his job is dangerous. And so unless. He had a lighter workload or something, that's when he could help. But really it was, it was me. The burden of that fell on me. And then we started doing therapy and and getting his ties released, and doing all this integrative occupational therapy to try and help my son regulate. But he didn't regulate, probably until he was 15 to 18 months old, where he could handle other people holding him, and he wasn't crying all the time. And so there were just so many things going on at the same time, because even while we're doing the therapy, then that begins the the cycle of deep diving into trying to understand how this happened. What is MTHFR? How do like? It's just then, and then you drive yourself crazy too, because the puzzle pieces start connecting, and you realize how neglected you've been by the system. And then there's a lot of anger and resentment, and then you feel like you're crazy because you're making all these connections, and can't share that with anybody. So it was, it was so multifaceted, and it hit the core of, like, every part of my person, you know, mentally, spiritually, physically, and, yeah, I mean, it was, it was really hard and and the scary part of just knowing or wondering, Am I? Am I ruining my children? That was the hardest thing for me to to confront.

There's there's typically a cycle with postpartum rage, which makes it special in the category of things that can affect women, postpartum being, OCD, anxiety, rage, all of the above. With rage, there is very often a trigger that sets us off, and it's often the same trigger that can set us off time and time again. Then there's the outburst, and then there is the overwhelming shame and guilt, and it goes in this pattern, and the guilt and shame lasts longer than the outburst. That's the really rough part of all of it. Can you talk a little bit more about experiencing that shame and guilt? Did you have a dent in the wall?

Yeah. I mean, my husband actually had to patch up the wall. And I remember I felt like for that whole time period, I would go to bed every night hating myself. And it it did develop into, like, a degree of suicidal ideation, a lot of dissociation from my life, and just sorry. It's hard to talk about. I haven't talked about it too much publicly, but this is why we're having this conversation, and I'm so grateful for it, but I just remember every night like that inner critic coming out and saying, you're such a bad mom. You are such a bad mom. How could you do that again? Or how could you scream at the kids again? Or, you know, and I was so exhausted, and I remember some nights I would just fall asleep for as much sleep as I could get before the screaming would would start up again. But every night, it was like this deep, seated shame that I could not shake, and it was like and at the same time, then that depression would creep into I wasn't completing my normal test, so like getting the laundry done, or the dishes and things like that. I mean, it was, it was coming out where it's very evident. It should have been very evident that I was struggling, and I just wanted someone to, like, see me, you know, and see that I was struggling. And eventually my husband was upset. He came home after a long day of work, and he was doing the dishes in the kitchen, and then he kind of blew up a little bit. He's not he's not very explosive. He's a very mild mannered guy. But he made a comment, and I just remember I looked at him and I said, I can't even effing talk about this right now with you, because how can you not see how much I'm struggling? And I walked away, and I just remember that was sort of like, that's when things came to a head finally, and it needed to Right. Like, sometimes there's that in our marriages, we're like, Wait, something has to come to a head for you to walk through it. And that was kind of that breakthrough moment where he wasn't seeing me as I was he was seeing, well, Angela, this overachiever is falling short, and which also increased the amount of shame I was experiencing. And he didn't see that. So, yeah, it was just a lot of shame. And going to bed at night, hating myself and and thinking about running away or or finding other things to do, go, go on a spontaneous trip somewhere I don't even know where I just would want to drive off and and maybe disappear for a while. But of course, that you're like, I could never do that. I love my babies, you know. But yeah, it was, and then being afraid to say anything, of like, What will people think if they know that these. Of the things that I'm thinking about, or will people be concerned and then want to call like CPS or something, because I'm so because I do have this rage that gets triggered, and I don't want my babies taken away from me, so I don't want to say anything either.

Yeah, women, women feel so guilty for having those thoughts as if they actually want to run away from their babies, but what they want to run away from is the lifestyle. Also, what they run want to run away from is the person that they are in that moment. You we want to run away in search of ourselves. We want to run away so we can find ourselves again. Because it's like, who am I? Who's doing this? I don't know who this person is, and if I can just remove myself from the the environment that's creating this, I will find myself again.

I have one more question for you at this time. Um, whenever Corinne shares what she experienced, I mean, you cried when you learned this a few minutes ago. Like everyone in our group gets so emotional, they almost feel like, I think they go through a moment where they feel like they don't have permission to have their own grievances in the postpartum group, and I give that permission because in a normal life, losing one's mother is said to be the most stressful thing we experience. So for Corinne to experience that on top of, literally on top of the other, arguably most stressful thing we can experience is unfathomable. But what you experienced by the loss of your sister is not in a normal life. We're not supposed to lose a sibling before getting old, before losing parents, and you, what you experienced wasn't normal. And I'm just wondering, because this episode is about grief and rage. To what extent grief takes years to process? Are you aware? Are you in touch with to what extent the grief over losing your sister played into your struggles postpartum? Are you not aware of that, like, Do you can you feel that the pain from losing your sister played into this at all?

Yeah, I mean, that's, that's a really great question. You know, grief is, it's so it's not linear, and I think it's really hard for people to understand unless they've experienced that, that profound loss. I sort of describe it like peering into a hole that exists in your soul, and you it's always there, like there's this gaping hole where this person is supposed to be. And sometimes you fall into it and that grief just is overwhelming. And other times you sort of walk around it, but you learn to live your life walking around this gaping hole, and it's always there. And sometimes it's more obvious, especially when you're tripping into it, and then other times it's just there in the background. And you know, my my sister, she's she's on her way to my house when she passed away, she got into a car accident. And so there was a lot of layers to the grief and trying not to blame myself and wishing things were had just gone down differently that entire day. You know, there's so many things and, and, yeah, there's a lot of grief. There she was. She was the aunt that would have been helping at any chance she she would, that's what she was doing. She was taking her day off to come and and babysit so I could go to work. And that was just her personality. She She loved kids, and we were best friends, and so, yeah, I mean, there's always that. There's always like, gosh, she would have been a support system for me, and she's not here anymore, and she and she would have loved this she would have loved my kids. She it makes me sad that she will never get to know my my kids, and that she only got to know my first for six months, you know? So, yeah, I am aware of that. It didn't seem as prominent at the time, but I think that's just because it's always there, and not to mention, too that when we lose somebody like that, that is not supposed to be gone. There is anger, you know, there's you're you're angry, you're angry at the driver, you're angry at the universe, you're angry at yourself for inviting her over that day. And that anger sits with us for a lot of years, and underneath rage is anger, of course, underneath grief is anger and guilt, lots of guilt.

I'm so sorry you had any part of that loss and story. I'm so sorry. On top of losing your sister that she was on her way to your house. I just, it's, it's absolutely heartbreaking. I'm so sorry to hear that. Um, thanks for sharing that. Thank you. So many women have experienced loss during pregnancy and postpartum. Corinne, first of all, do you want to respond to any. Thing, feel free. And when did you start identifying the struggles with your emotions postpartum?

Well, I just want to say I have an older sister who I'm very close with, and she's my best friend. Also, I can't even imagine the guilt you must feel, especially that she was coming to help you. And I know how that feels, because I feel the same way about my mom, and it's funny, because before she got sick, me and my mom had our struggles, especially while I was teenager and young adult. But there was always, always the unconditional love was always there. I didn't know how much I would need her. So I can only imagine how that feels, too with your sister, because, you know, my sister has two kids of the road, and she helps when she can, but that has to be just so, so hard. So I, i My heart goes to you, but as far as my experience, I think, and we talked about this in group two. I mean, as for me, I don't know about other women, but I had very high expectations of what my marriage would be like after I had a child, and what my life would be like after I had a child, because I am a stay at home mom, and originally that wasn't in the plan. I mean, me and my husband have talked about it prior to getting pregnant, and we didn't think it was possible, he didn't think it was possible. And then my mom got sick, I took some time off, and I wasn't, you know, I was, I was unpaid, and, you know, we just realized, okay, maybe we can do this. And then, especially at the state of my mental health I was in after losing my mom, like my husband was just like, You know what, you're going to stay I want you to stay home. We're going to make this work. And I was thrilled, because it's what I always wanted, and I wanted to get pregnant so bad. I I have all these hormonal issues, and I didn't think it was possible, and my doctor told me it wasn't possible at medication, I was so determined to prove everybody wrong, and I wanted to be a mom so badly. And I think we have such unrealistic expectations that I don't know if it's society is to blame social media and because it's just not talked about like we've all said. But that was, like the biggest disappointment for me, because it's nothing like I thought it would be. My marriage is nothing like I thought it would make us better, stronger, happier, and that's just not the case. I mean, I love my husband, but where we were before I was pregnant, and where we are now is totally different place. And I know that that's normal, that that happens is like a really tough time, and especially when there's no sleep involved, and there's a lot of resentment. I have resentment, not only toward my husband, but I have resentment toward toward a lot of people. I have resentment toward my my my mother in law, simply because she's alive. I mean, I resentment toward my husband because he gets to go to work every day and socialize and have, like, a little bit of normalcy in his life, and he doesn't understand because, you know, this is my job. Now I'm a mother, and this is what I wanted. So how can you be so unhappy when this is what you wanted? This is what you dreamed of your whole life. This is what you prayed for a healthy baby. And I loved my job. I couldn't wait. I couldn't wait to be a mother. And the biggest trigger for me with rage is definitely sleep, definitely sleep. There are times in the middle of the night where I screamed, where I've thrown things, where I've hit my head against my headboard. I pulled my own hair. I literally felt hate for my husband, which I don't hate my husband at all, but in that moment, I felt hate for him. Actually have to go get Aiden. Can we pause a minute on that note Angela while Karen has to run to her son for a second, did you What did your relationship with your husband look like? Did you start to resent him for what you were going through? Oh, despite your understanding for his job, absolutely.

I mean, I think it was easy to resent anybody, any, almost anybody, became a target. If I felt like, why aren't you helping me? Like you? You could see that I have this child that never stops crying. Yeah, at the time, I did experience a lot of resentment, similar to what Corinne was saying. There were times when I was like, I can't believe he gets to go and leave. Every day he gets to sleep peacefully in our guest bedroom downstairs while I'm upstairs all night with this crying child, it was hard not to resent him, even though, intellectually, I'm like, he he needs to sleep. And so do I, you know, but so do i I need something. And so then, when I described that scenario where he sort of he tried calling me out, so to speak, about not getting the dishes done or staying on top of some of the chores around the house, the next day, I just wrote it all out in a big, long text message for him. He. It. And the first thing he did when he came home that day was he sat down next to me on the bed, and he put his arm around me, and he said, I am so sorry that I have failed you and and that's the exact that's what he should have done, you know, but, but I think sometimes it's hard for men to have the humility to accept that they have been failing. And that's where I'm really grateful My husband has. He's an extraordinarily humble man, if he is at time, times aloof, completely aloof. And so the then the next thing was solutions. What are we going to do to provide a solution so that you have more support, because I guess I haven't said at this time, I was pregnant with my fifth child, and it was an unexpected pregnancy, and I so I was resenting him for that too, because I was like, I'm I'm clearly not in a state. I couldn't even believe I got pregnant because I was like, I'm not even well, like my I was so depleted, I just could not believe that I was pregnant again. Are you willing to share? Can you share with us a few of the things that you wrote to him in that text message?

Oh, man, I remember writing out, you know, I like I know that I have not been able to do these things, but here's why. And I, I don't feel like you see me. I don't think you understand how hard this is right now by I'm not eating, I'm not sleeping, and I said, I need help. I just I and I did. I think it scared him because I said, I I'm thinking, I have thoughts of of harming myself because, because I'm I'm not getting any help and and I said, I just need something in place where I feel like I'm not trying to do this by myself anymore, because I am. I can't be a single mom. I can't and I think that's another place where a lot of us as moms, we can feel like we're a single mom or we're a roommate, that kind of a thing.

We'll get back to Corinne after my comment here, I have two thoughts after what you shared. One, we too greatly prioritize our husband's sleep, it's too great of a priority. Yes, if your husband has dangerous work, it's not for me to comment on exactly how much sleep he needs, but we are talking about four children in the full care of a human being who isn't eating and isn't sleeping at all. So you have five lives at stake in your job and yours doesn't come with reprieve. There's no break. He, at a minimum, gets a lunch break. We know that by law, he has to have a lunch break at a minimum, not to mention it's a finite period of time. But there is just even with the men I'm again, I'm doing this like heteronormative presumption that we see the vast majority of the time. Obviously, there are exceptions, but for the women who are home and the men who are working, they we too greatly prioritize that they need their sleep. It's baloney. I mean, for those who are in professional jobs, it's baloney. I used to work in a professional job. It was the cushiest thing I've ever done, compared to raising children to utterly cushy. Take a break when I want to take a break, be unproductive when I wanted to be unproductive, socialize with a co worker when I wanted to, yeah, sure that I have meetings important decisions to make whatever that my time was my own, my day was my own. And if I didn't sleep all night, I still went to work, I still managed. I we have to change this, this prioritization. The second thing I realized, the second thought that came to me listening to you, is, Isn't it incredible you were at this absolutely dire place, and you breathed your first sigh of relief when he simply acknowledged you. And I always say this, women aren't asking for 5050, they will truly tolerate too much. They'll do 95% but, man, they gotta get that five or 10% and they've gotta be seen and heard, and then they're gonna tolerate so much. But it is his job in every relationship. It is the partner's job to make sure she's eating. I don't care if he has to set an alarm and call her at 930 every morning, he has to make sure she's eating or make her breakfast before he leaves the house. He is the one who lives with her. He has to make sure she's eating and that she's sleeping. Horan, let's come back to you and your experience. Trisha, want to jump in with a comment I just wanted to I just wanted to re emphasize a point that you made that I think is super important, and that is no matter what the husband is doing, no matter how hard his job is, no matter how demanding, no matter how whatever it is that man, that person, has time to himself, whether he's driving in the car, like Cynthia said, having a lunch break, stopping somewhere on his way home and running an errand without four kids attached to him, and we can. Cannot underestimate how much that impacts a person, to never feel that they can breathe alone, to feel like they have a something that needs them incessantly, constantly with them. 24/7, so no matter what they're doing, you still are doing something way harder.

Corinne, so I was saying in in the middle of the night, it it almost feels like torture. When you're your eyes are heavy, your body's shutting down, and you you're fighting to stay awake. Also, if you're a breastfeeding mom, you feel so touched out. And I dealt with painful latches and low supply and pumping in the middle of the night. And when you feel like this, this baby just needs to be latched onto you all night to sleep. You know, you start sweating, and then you get itchy and and I look over at my husband and I and I, and he's willing to get up. I mean, he works a lot. He works seven days a week. He, he does. He he's a hard worker. And, you know, he's willing to get up with Aiden, but he can't soothe Aiden like I can. And he tries and he tries and he tries, but the baby cries so and also, that's another thing for me, listening to him cry like was a major anxiety trigger for me, almost just like, it's like, I know he's okay, but it's hurting my it's hurting me more than it's hurting him. And that's, that's what he does when, when my husband tries to soothe him back to sleep in the middle of the night. And so for me, rather than hearing that, I'm just like, give me the baby, I'd rather just take the baby and soothe the baby rather than hear him cry, and you help me, because they'll say, you'll just shut your eyes and go to sleep. I'll leave the room, but I hear him crying in the next room, so I'm not sleeping anyway. So what is it now I'm torturing myself even more.

Who's it even serving Exactly, exactly?

And you know, people have said to me, Oh, you gotta give him a chance. He's gotta get used to your husband. He's gotta, you know, but like, it's not going to happen, and it's just hurting me more. So anyway, like I was saying I I never expected to feel that way about my husband, and I get over it, you know, I don't feel that way 24/7, but in these moments where I'm fighting so hard just to stay awake, and my body is so tired, and I'm so frustrated, and I feel like a failure because I can't settle my my son. I can't make him sleep. He's, you know, he's not eating well, and this was like we were struggling with breastfeeding. You feel extreme amounts of guilt, and you just feel like a failure. I just feel like I am failing, like the basics, like a baby needs to sleep, they need to eat, they need to be clean. And like two of those three things I am failing miserably at, and I really never thought it would be so hard. But I also think a lot of it is social media too. There are so many accounts today on things that you should be doing with your newborn baby and or you shouldn't be doing. And a lot of it sets, like, a lot of like, unrealistic expectations when it comes to sleep, especially. And that will drive you crazy too, because my baby's not doing any of those things. Like, like, they say he should be doing. They should he should be doing.

Are you talking about things like wake windows and tummy time, sleep training, putting your awake. Don't feed to sleep. Don't nurse to sleep. Sleep associations, it's like we just consume all of it. Just to be clear, none of these things have existed in human history until social media. I mean, Cynthia, did you ever hear of a wake window when you were raising your baby's never.

Were you ever? I never heard of it. I never heard of it until we did our second postpartum roundtable episode in May of 2022, I said in that episode, what's a wake window? Did you ever, were you ever told that you weren't doing enough tummy time with your children. No, no, no holding your baby, being with your baby, breastfeeding your baby. These are the biological norms. This is all modern nonsense. It none of it's biological.

Let's talk about what your children actually need. They actually need what you're doing. They need to have their diapers changed. When it's time to have a diaper change, they need most of the time being. Most of the time they need to be held, right? I don't Okay, so wet diaper middle of the night. Okay, fine. You've got your exceptions, but they need to be cared for. They need to be touched right after that, that's the most important thing they need, a well mother. And what that means is a mother who is nourished, a mother who is supported, a mother who is rested, and like God forbid, we try to recall that you actually deserve to not hate your life. Never mind that. You need to occasionally shower and you need to eat and sleep, but it's a fair question to say, Oh, by the way, when was the last time you laughed or had a meaningful conversation with a friend? We need these things in our lives, and you know, it's there. We have to get away from this notion of someone sending you out for a manicure, like big book that's over in 30 minutes. Doesn't do much. Versus a massage, what you need is support morning and night. If your partner has to get up in the morning and prepare your breakfast before going off to work, then he needs to do that. He's got to be more tired too. He also has a baby. It doesn't mean he has to do 5050, he's got to make sure he's taking care of you while you take care of your baby. And then every single night, there has to be someone you can turn it over to. There has to be an end to the work coming soon. Every day, it can't be like, Oh, you can sleep in on Saturday. No, I'm trying to get through today so as soon as you can get into your life a daily break. I mean, we had Corinne, who was it in our support group yesterday, 30 minute bath. It was, oh yeah, it was Emily was talking about. Emily was saying, like she was experiencing rage at her wits end. She's a mom in our support group from California, mom of two now. And she said, like she went into a pattern with her husband of just doing a 30 minute bath and reading her trashy novel, she said. And she said she actually started to miss her family in that 30 minutes, and she came out like a different person. That's not asking too much, and every day, all she has to do is hold out for that bath, and that makes the whole family more well, how easy is that? And if it's impossible for your partner to do it, then who's going to do it? There's a limit. There is a limit. How do you each feel at the notion of having another baby? Like because women get scared. I was going to bring that up too, because I feel so much guilt. I mean, my son is only four months, so it's not in the plane anytime soon, but I always wanted to have more than one. I'm one of three. I can't imagine him not having a sibling, but I don't ever want to experience this again? I'm terrified. I'm terrified of the rough pregnancy. Number one, I'm terrified of I'm even more terrified of after because it was so hard. And imagine doing it with a toddler. So I mean, you, I can't even imagine how you do it with five, six. I mean, I can barely handle one. I don't know if I can ever do that. And my husband is kind of in agreeing to me, like, how can we do this again? Like, I never want to see you like this again. And it's scary to me, because I feel I feel so guilty.

Well, Angela, you did it.

Did it? Yeah, I've done it when I have gotten pregnant again, like I did when I was in the throes of this horrible postpartum depression and rage and anxiety with my fourth It was terrifying, and there's a lot of surrender involved. Over and over again, parts of myself that sort of have to surrender.

I want to add one other comment about this transition to motherhood. There are certain times in our life when we go through these big transitions. The biggest one of all is probably the transition from child to adolescent to adult. And we all accept that when an adolescent teenager is going through their teenage years, that there's a lot of emotional dysregulation, that there's a lot of push and pull, like I'm still a child. No, I'm an adult. I'm still a child. Now I'm an adult. We never acknowledge that when a mother goes from being pre mom to mom, she goes through the same process. Her brain literally goes through a transformation like an adolescent child does, and we're clinging to our old life, and yet we're thrown into our new life, and that that back and forth creates a lot of this problem in society doesn't talk about it, doesn't help us understand it, doesn't help support it, and makes us feel like we're failing because We should just embrace motherhood in the same way we had life pre motherhood, and be able to do everything that we did before with the baby and better, and we should just be thrilled about it. It's just not the reality. And part of you know getting around some of this challenge is accepting that it is not the reality. And at four months postpartum, you might be feeling like, there's no way I could ever do this again. This is horrible. This is terrible. I don't ever want to do it again. But if somebody could just look at you and say, every if everybody looked at you and said, don't think about that. Right now, you're supposed to feel like this right now. You're not supposed to get pregnant again right now. You're supposed to be in that push and pull. It is hard. It doesn't have to be as it is in this you know the scenarios that we're talking about, there are other things that have to happen to make it easier, but we are supposed to go through this process, and we do come out the other side, and you will feel differently in the future, and I'll. On that note, of this suffering that you're going through being temporary, I want to add that it is still a current problem, potentially crisis. Corinne, banging your head. I mean, there's a scale. Some women start swearing more than they used to once you start physically manifesting the rage throwing things. Angela, you put a hole in the wall, and you had to look at that thing. I mean, when we start physically manifesting it, we're in crisis territory. And even if nothing more serious ever happens, we have to stop with the threshold being like, okay, but you're not gonna actually, like, kill anyone. Are you? You're not gonna actually run away from home. Are you? We have to raise the bar way more than that. Once she's physically manifesting her rage, we need to all wake up, and your partners need to be spoken to, and they need to wake up. This is a family problem. And yes, we as human beings, we're totally personally responsible for what we say and what we do. But women are in extraordinary situations when this is going on, we can all break at a certain point, and if you start breaking, there is one adult who is living with you who is largely responsible for making sure you're okay. I mean, Corinne, you're in my Postpartum Support Group. We spend two hours together a week. Your husband is the eyes and ears to living with you. He has a responsibility in watching over you, Angela, not eating, not sleeping, that happened on his watch. So we have to give partners a much bigger responsibility in how mothers are doing no matter what it takes. I don't care if you have to turn off your cable. Nothing matters more than your emotional and physical health. I want to thank you both for being willing to come and have an open, honest conversation. This is not easy to talk about. You did this for one reason, because you care about other women. It is very, very hard for mothers to put themselves at the top, and if you don't put yourself at the top, everybody else suffers. Yeah, I just am so grateful to have had a chance to share a little bit today about it, and I do hope that it provides hope and healing to somebody who's listening. You won't be in this situation forever if there is an end, trust me, but you do have to put in the work, and you do have to have a plan in place. And so I think everything that you guys have said just Yes, that I can't say it enough. Yes, it's exactly what needs to happen. So thank you so much. Yeah, I agree. I agree. Like I said, the support group. I mean, I have support from my friends and family, but it's, it's different. With a support group, I can't, I can't really explain it. You need to reach out. Need to reach out. There's always help and something I wish I would hear more of, I would hear less of, and then hear more of. Also is the enjoy every moment. Enjoy every moment because it goes so fast. I think that puts a lot of pressure on mothers. Also, because not every moment is enjoyable, obviously, when we wouldn't be having this conversation and you can, I'm learning that you can still enjoy the good moments, and this can still be the hardest thing that you will ever do and and that's okay, and I wish we heard that more instead of, you know, it goes so fast, enjoy it all, and you can feel exactly the way you just described and still be a good mother, because every time you call yourself a mother who isn't good, you are sitting there lovingly, tenderly nurturing your son and your arms. Irony of seeing a woman nurture as tenderly as you do and keep calling yourself a bad mother, just women, these are two separate things. That's what everyone also needs to understand, this is not a referendum on the kind of mother you are. It's a referendum on the suffering you're going through and the lack of support you're receiving. Thank you both so much with us today and for sharing this.

Thank you for joining us at the Down To Birth Show. You can reach us @downtobirthshow on Instagram or email us at Contact@DownToBirthShow.com. All of Cynthia’s classes and Trisha’s breastfeeding services are offered live online, serving women and couples everywhere. Please remember this information is made available to you for educational and informational purposes only. It is in no way a substitute for medical advice. For our full disclaimer visit downtobirthshow.com/disclaimer. Thanks for tuning in, and as always, hear everyone and listen to yourself.

You I once put a dent in the wall and kicked in a door and Trisha can do it, anyone can do it.

Needs to be like a meeting. A meeting. Hi. My name is Angela, exactly.

I threw a sippy cup at the wall and put a hole in it. My husband had to fix it. When you said that, it reminded me of of that moment and you kicked, I kicked out a door, and that was like, I really wanted to get rid of this closet. So that kind of felt like a moment easy.

It was in a moment of rage around motherhood, childcare time. You know, I can look back now and very, very clearly see the triggers. I will tell you now that that feels like another human, another person. I don't even I couldn't ever come out of me now it just wouldn't, because I'm not under that pressure anymore. I'm not sleep deprived anymore. So it does resolve.