Speaker 1 (00:01):
Stories, teachings and guidance. Welcome to the Women's Moon Wisdom Podcast with your host, Rebecca Rankin.
Rebecca Rankin (00:18):
Welcome back to the show. I am so excited for you all to meet our guest today. Our guest today is a very dear friend of mine that I've known for decades at this point, and she's gonna share with you all about postpartum care and postpartum doula. Welcome to the show, Jessica Glose.
Jessica Glose (00:39):
Thank you so much for having me, Rebecca. It has, It's an honor to be on the show today. I'm really excited to have this conversation with you today about postpartum care and what a postpartum doula does, and just to share with your listeners more about what it looks like to care for women after birth.
Rebecca Rankin (00:57):
Yes, such a fantastic topic. And Jessica, so Jessica and I, we have gone back, like I said, years and years. We used to co-lead yoga teacher trainings together kind of around the world. And now you are a postpartum doula. Can you tell us just a little bit about yourself, a little bit about your journey into being a postpartum doula? What did that look like? Where did that journey lead you?
Jessica Glose (01:25):
Yes, absolutely. So like you mentioned, for over a decade, I have been a yoga teacher, a teacher trainer, and leading retreats all over the world. And it's really beautiful how my work in yoga and my path there sort of led me to my path to postpartum care and postpartum work. I was able with my yoga work to travel and spend extensive time all over the world in many different countries and really see firsthand how other countries and other cultures live and how they cared for their mamas and how they cared for their women. And so after many years of traveling and teaching, I moved back home to my hometown of Buffalo where I reside now, and it was in a teacher training here in Buffalo that a doula had come to one of the trainings. And this was sort of my first experience and interaction with an actual doula.
(02:24):
And that was really a pivotal point in my life in my career, and in my path. At that time, I was seven months pregnant with my first daughter, Emma, and of course with my pregnancy with her, I started diving deeper into the world of pregnancy, birth, and postpartum care. And during this time, one of my friends had introduced me to the work of Kimberly Ann Johnson. She wrote "The Fourth Trimester" and"Call of the Wild". So I had already had some information and some framework around what I wanted my postpartum experience to look like. And then I led this training and my friend, who also, her name is Rebecca as well, she was in the training and she was my birth doula for all three of my births. But originally I was in the traditional model of care and birthing at a hospital with a different provider.
(03:18):
And so at my eighth month of pregnancy, I switched providers and decided to birth at the Birthing Center of Buffalo with Catherine Morrison here in Buffalo. And I really feel like that choice really changed how my birth unfolded and how my care and what I experienced in the postpartum time, how my birth unfolded really kind of shaped and changed what my postpartum experience was like as well because I was able to birth out of hospital and have an unmedicated vaginal birth and really care for myself after and have different systems in place to really allow the nourishment and the care and the support that I needed to be available to me with what I learned through with Rebecca, what I learned through my studies and in my different teachings and whatnot. So through this experience with my first daughter, and then I ended up having two more babies.
(04:16):
I had four babies in three years. So I was really immersed in the postpartum time. And so with each baby, with each experience, I just dove deeper into what proper postpartum care looked like and really started to educate myself further on what we need as mamas and as women to really nourish ourselves. I mean, we create humans in our bodies, in our womb space with our bodies, and then we birth our babies, and then we often care for our babies through our breast milk. And so what are we doing as women and as mamas to replenish our body and our blood and our bones and our brain, and what are we doing to really care for ourselves to deeply again replenish and nourish ourselves from the act of creating and caring for our babies? So that again, just led me down the path to studying with many different teachers.
(05:14):
I was introduced to Rochelle Garcia Seliga of Innate Traditions, and I really resonated deeply with her work. It's all built around the framework of physiological design and what we need and what is nature's design and how can we really deeply nourish mamas through different forms of care. So I studied with her for about 18 months and again, studied with, I studied with Whapio for birth work as well, and just kind of looked to the really strong women that sort of helped to put postpartum care on the map here in America. When I was overseas, I was able to see firsthand how women's health and maternal health differed from what it looks like here in the States. So that was of my first experience. And then again, just looking to the other resources here in the States to further my knowledge to be able to not only support myself and my family, but then to be able to help support and educate other families around sort of the missing pieces here in the States about postpartum care and what that looks like.
Rebecca Rankin (06:25):
Yeah, absolutely. I think it's so apparent, even just looking at the structure of maternity leave, what that looks like across companies, across all different fields in the work environment and how it's just set up to work against what women need in the proper time to heal and nourish and be able to nourish ourselves and our babies in contrast to other countries, it's kind of alarming and postpartum care is so necessary. And for our listeners, I feel like some listeners may know what a postpartum doula is, some may know what a birth doula is - I think maybe more familiar with that. Can you talk a little bit about just what a postpartum doula does? What role do they play?
Jessica Glose (07:18):
A postpartum doula plays many different roles, but I would say first and foremost, they provide support. They provide care, and they provide education to mamas, to families, to babies, and every family unit is very unique and what they need for support, care, and education. We all come from different backgrounds, different families, different jobs. And so I really think a role as a postpartum doula, I work with families to uncover the needs and educate them around what postpartum care looks like and the different elements. If we look to postpartum care across culturally, worldwide, we see common threads of care that sometimes are lacking here in the US. So by having just simple conversations with families, I'm able to see what their knowledge and experience is around maternal health, around postpartum care. I often find that most people don't even know what postpartum is or what postpartum means, right?
(08:24):
Often I talk with moms and families and often when it's baby two or baby three, they'll say, 'Oh, I had the postpartum with baby one'. So many people think that postpartum means depression or anxiety or a poor experience after birth, when postpartum literally means the period of time after a pregnancy. So a postpartum doula is someone who helps provide care, support and education in the time after birth. Now, once a woman is pregnant, the period of they will always be postpartum after they have a pregnancy. But the most potent time for postpartum care or for postpartum nourishment is really the six weeks after birth. So a postpartum doula may work with you longer than the six weeks after birth, but we as women have been gifted a golden opportunity to uplevel our health and the health of our families when we're cared for properly during the postpartum time because of the hormonal changes that we experience as women during pregnancy, birth, and postpartum.
(09:23):
When we're able to work with this time in a way that supports us as women, we are able to again heal and we're able to heal things from the past or we're able to create sort of ailments. So when we care for ourselves properly during the postpartum time, we're able to keep preexisting conditions at bay, right? Often if we don't care for ourselves properly, some of these things begin to flare up maybe in the immediate postpartum or in the time to follow. So when I work with families, I help to educate them around what this care looks like and uncover their needs of what support and care looks like for them, because something that's important to one family may not be important to another family. One thing that a mama may need or really feel valuable during this time, another mama may not even think about.
(10:16):
So sort of giving different threads of information to see what's important to them, and then educate them on things maybe that they're not thinking about that they may wanna incorporate into their plans. And then when I work with families, we come up with a unique specific plan for their own families, whether that's me coming in to do in-house care, whether that's setting up different food trains or meal plans or different appointments for body work or whatnot. And so just having a bigger picture around how to care for our mamas after we birth and after our pregnancies. So again, it can look like a number of different things just based on what's important to each family and what they need. Often I work with a lot of families that don't have support or they're not from the Buffalo area, or maybe families that just want additional support and offerings to really maximize this time.
(11:14):
They say that the postpartum time is exponentially better than any other time in your life to rest and to heal. And if we really care for ourselves properly during this time, we'll leave those immediate postpartum weeks, those six weeks postpartum, replenished and revitalized and rejuvenated instead of depleted and anxious and depressed, which is what we're seeing here so often in America. Like you said, the postpartum what we have for maternity leave in the states is crazy that some women are getting only six weeks time after a pregnancy. It's crazy to think. And I think I was very lucky in the sense that I didn't have to leave my babies and I created a system and a plan where if I did have to work, I had my babies with me or I didn't have to leave, and my husband and I worked out our schedules, but for the families that don't have the luxury of working with times and schedules and that they have to leave and go back to work, I would be anxious before my baby made its way Earth side thinking about having to leave in six weeks and then the pressure that puts on not only your duties of working, but then also caring for your new family. It's a lot.
(12:32):
So really helping families navigate this time and really helping them to find a way that mamas can make the most out at this time, to really allow themselves the time that they deserve to heal. Yeah, it's huge. You have babies. Think about what we go through as women in our bodies and in our bodies, in our minds, and in birth. There's a lot of work to be done around birth and postpartum in the states for sure.
Rebecca Rankin (13:04):
And I obviously so appreciate the work that you do - hence, while you're on the show today talking about it. You had mentioned about the educational piece. I think that that is huge to educate the mama as well as the partners, the families, even in the weeks to come. I'm not sure how you set it up, but I'm sure there's time while she's, while, mama's still pregnant, that you meet with the families to educate, even just the importance of this, that especially if it's your first child or even if it's your fifth child, the importance of having a support system, having that educational piece of why this is important because this helps prevent the anxiety, the overwhelm that leads to, can lead to postpartum depression and other just anxiousness that unfolds. And we know as mothers, those of us are mothers who are listening, when your baby's run, when you feel anxious, baby feels anxious.
(14:11):
When you're calm, baby can feel that, baby feels safe with you. It's such an important piece to have that support system in place. And with postpartum care you kind of touched on this a little bit, but I'd love to just get a little bit into the details of what that looks like. So you said the educational piece, so you mention about in-house care, let's say mama has her baby, she's at home now, postpartum doula comes, or I assume there's meetings ahead of time. Can you just lay out a little bit more specifically, what do you do ?
Jessica Glose (14:53):
Sure. So again, each family is unique in their needs and what they would want a postpartum doula to come and do. And so you really nailed it when you said prenatally, ideally, we are working with mamas and with families to educate them on the postpartum care and what that looks like, and then uncovering their needs of what is important to them. So some examples of different things that families or moms would need. And each postpartum doula has a different set of skills and a different sets of offerings that she comes to offer to families. And so my offerings and my services are really mothered centered in their care, meaning that when I come in to work with families, I really focus on deeply nourishing Mama. And ways in which that I would do that really can look like anything. So it's like what does mama need to feel deeply nourished and supported?
(15:49):
And so that may look like a warm home cooked meal that's nutrient dense and easy to digest. That might look like in-house massage. Maybe it looks like your dishes being done or your floors being swept. Maybe it's an hour shower or somebody drawing you a bath and you minding the baby while mama is taking that time for herself. I do services and things like yoni steaming, which really helps to heal the peroneum and really helps to absorb nutrients into the body to bring things like anxiety, depression at bay, and to deeply nourish mamas through that way. I do also different offerings such as moxibustion which helps to, moxibustion is used in traditional Chinese medicine. It is used to really help rebuild and nourish the spleen, which is highly deficient after pregnancy and birth. It helps with lactation, blood flow, anxiety, depression, digestion, it helps bring the uterus back to preexisting space and helps to heal the ligaments and whatnot.
(17:01):
So coming in and offering these services, doing things like closing of the bones to help bring your body back into alignment after birth and to help bring the pelvis in the hips back to its original placement. So these are some specific offerings that I come in and offer, but it might be, again, coming in and minding the baby. It might be coming in and cleaning the home. It may be coming in and doing different sort of errands or might be coming in and cooking in the home - certain things like that. It could be coming in and helping with lactation support is a big one. Helping mamas breastfeed, helping mamas learn how to use their pumps. You really also said it well when you said, when mama is anxious, baby is anxious. When Mama is calm, baby has calm. So we really focus on nine months in, nine months out.
(17:51):
The nine months in is just as important, and it's the nine months after birth. And mama's and baby's nervous system is still so highly connected through that nine months after birth. And so really postpartums doulas come in to co-regulate, right? So we come in and we co-regulate the home if, and help Mama again be calm, help work out any sort of issues that she's having, and support her in any ways that she needs. So again, it looks a little bit different for everybody. It might be doing the grocery shopping, doing the laundry. It might be doing cleaning, like house duties, helping mom with baby, and really just helping mom feel at peace and calm and rested. Often we see after birth that sometimes mom have these adrenaline rushes after birth and they have tons of energy the first like 48 hours to 72 hours after birth.
(18:45):
So they're at home doing all of the things right? Where really, the rule is after birth, five days in bed, five days on bed, five days near bed. So that first two weeks after your baby comes, it's stay in bed and really do nothing but lay in bed, do lots of skin to skin, and literally have your partner or your parents or your doula or your aunties, whoever is in your home, caring for you, bringing you a warm cup of tea every hour, bringing you bone broth, bringing you soups and stews and nourishing foods to help you rebuild your body from the loss that you've just had with the loss of all the fluids, baby coming, making its way earth side and just from the act of birth. So really taking time to literally wait on mom hand and foot. And we're just not used to that as women, we don't have any framework around being cared for around the clock.
(19:42):
I mean, maybe some mamas out there do, or maybe some women out there do. I know that wasn't my experience. Women and mamas today in the modern world take on so much. And because we don't have this framework and this platform around how to slow down and allow people to care for us, when we come to the postpartum time, we're kind of like a deer in headlights, or we're sort of uncomfortable with giving that control to somebody else to allow someone to care for ourselves. And so a postpartum doula does just that. We come in and we care for mom, we care for baby, we care for partners. We create a safe space where mom, dad, and baby can be together and have somebody come in and look after the other sort of things that you have to care for and tend to throughout the day.
(20:34):
So mom, dad, and baby or mom, partner and baby can be together and really enjoy this delicate, cozy bonding time together to create a strong foundation for your family to move forward and then to find a postpartum doula that you resonate with and that offers the care that you resonate with. Because not every mama and not every doula are gonna be in line with what they need and what they offer. So taking that time prenatally to speak with doulas, to speak with care providers that you resonate with, that are in alignment with your wishes, with your values, with your views, and to help co-create the postpartum experience that you want, that you desire, that you deserve.
Rebecca Rankin (21:24):
Loved how you phrased it, that the postpartum doula is there to help you co-regulate, right? It's there to hold space so that it can be vulnerable, so that you can be cared for. Most of us don't have the examples in our lives of that, of being cared for. We know probably from our experiences of other friends, having children of our parents, of our mothers, our culture, and in the United States is just, and I'm sure in other countries too, it's just not set up to care for mom in a way that we do have this time to just be nurtured. And this shouldn't be a luxury either. And this kind of brings me up to another topic that I wanna talk about, is that I think that postpartum doula, it can sound like, Oh, that would be a luxury. I, in fact, remember when I was living in the Netherlands and when my friend told me that in the Netherlands, they're how it's set up, they have some have a postpartum doula that's part of their kind of maternity leave is that you have a postpartum doula come in.
(22:39):
And I can't remember, I think it's for like 40 days or something after having baby, they come in and care for mama. And I remember thinking, wow, what a luxury that would be versus my, and I felt cared for ish. I had my mom come in and make some food, and then after a week she was gone. And that was like, All right, here you go. And it's looked at as a luxury, and yet it should be just a necessity. It really should be. And I mean, this is a broader topic of just the reform that needs to happen in maternity leave and paternity leave in the United States and probably among other countries as well. How do you bridge that gap of educating people that this is necessary, that this isn't just a luxury if hiring a postpartum doula isn't accessible? What does that look like? I just threw a lot at you --
Jessica Glose (23:38):
Yeah, I mean, you said it so well, postpartum care is definitely not a luxury. It is a necessity. And if you look to maternal health in the United States today and what that looks like, and the rates again, of depression and anxiety and of issues, I mean, we've literally changed the word postpartum to mean depression and anxiety because of what women and families are experiencing during this time. So I mean, that alone there should tell you that the way we view postpartum care needs to change. And just with looking again at the statistics and the rates at which again, depression and anxiety is climbing, but we are not taught as young women to care for ourselves appropriately and not just as women, as men. And that's where it really needs to start, is when we are young men and we are young women teaching our young people to, how to care for women during our bleeds and during our menstruation, because our bleeds are our mini postpartum times.
(24:50):
And so as young women, as young men, there, we should be taught on what happens in a woman's body and how the hormonal changes happen and how babies are brought into the world, and all of the education that's lacking around menstruation. And again, not only in the women with the men as well, because if we taught our young people how to care for ourselves and how to care for our women during these times when we enter the postpartum time, we would have such a strong foundation on how to care for our mamas. Because how we care for ourselves when we bleed is in alignment with how we care for ourselves during the postpartum period. And if we care for ourselves properly during our menstruation, we have the energy and the vitality to carry us through the month with grace, with vigor, with energy, with being resourced and being able to be out there in the world.
(25:56):
And I know I love all the work that you're doing around this because it is so needed. Because if we could just, again, educate at an earlier time, then when women came to the postpartum period, they would understand how important it is to care for ourselves because we have all these mini experiences with it. And then we'd get to the postpartum and it would be no problem to stay in bed. And it would be no problem to allow people to wait on you. Yes. And it really does start there. We are taught to scoff at our bleeds and to be like, Oh, oh, and it's so beautiful. It is part of the creation of life. And we were all born, we were all part of this. So to have such shame around this time of the month and this part of us as women, it that needs to change.
(26:56):
And I really feel like the more we educate people on what that looks like and how to care for ourselves during this time will really help us change how we care for our women postpartum, how women view postpartum care. It will just really change the narrative. And people will look at this time a lot more seriously. Again, I had mentioned before that the postpartum time is a golden opportunity to uplevel our health, but there's three golden opportunities for women to uplevel our health. And that's menrach, which is our first bleed, the postpartum time, and then menopause. And if we work with this time appropriately, again, we will have more strength and vitality and energy. Our preexisting conditions will be at bay. We're able to heal lifelong ailments, or we're able to create them during this time because of the potency of it.
(27:54):
And this is information that is not being shared with us as women, as men, as partners, as fathers, as whatever, just as humans in general. So really starting and continuing the conversation around appropriate care. And I felt very well educated and resourced and supported because I had so much knowledge. I knew some of the major players in postpartum care before I was even pregnant. I had traveled the world and experienced different cultures and spent extensive time. I'm not talking a week vacation overseas. I'm talking months and years that I've spent immersing myself in other cultures and in different ways of life to really see and experience firsthand what different care looked like. So then to come home to Buffalo, which is a bit less progressive than some of the other places I lived, I lived in California for many years, where again, there's just more knowledge and awareness and conversation around all of these things.
(29:04):
So the buy-in is easier. Women are like, 'Yes, I deserve this. I need this. This is my life. This is how I'm gonna move forward with my family, with my babies.' And it's like women don't feel like they deserve it or that they need it or that they can afford it, but yes you can. There is always a way, there is always a way to afford it. Even with my retreats and in the trainings, money was never an objective. It's like, what are the things that are holding you back from moving forward with this? Money was never an issue. I always can make the money work. We can always find a way to incorporate and to put together a plan so women can be served and supported and cared for. There's, that's never an issue. It honestly has never been an issue. The real issue is the education piece around people not knowing.
(30:05):
You think about this continuum of care. You, you prepare for your pregnancies or sometimes, you know, just get pregnant, but you move through your pregnancy and you're going to the doctors and you're eating specific foods and you're caring for yourself in a certain way. And then you spend tons of time planning your birth and how you wanna birth and what your birth will be like. And you have your baby shower and you have all the gadgets and all the gizmos and all of the things to move forward. But the real big piece that's missing is, who's gonna care for me? What do I need? And so again, just continuing the conversation and the more women and the more families and the more people that we can get on board with this postpartum movement to really uplift how we care for our women. Because the health of mom is the health, the family.
(30:58):
When mom is healthy and well, and when we center mom, everything else falls in place. And that's really what it looks like. And how as women just really stepping into that space of allowing people to care for us because it's not how we've been cared for. That'sr not sort how we were educated growing up as women. So doing work around whatever needs to be released or whatever we need to unblock to again, allow p44eople to care for us. And then in the time preparing for the postpartum time, just creating time for self care, creating time and space to do more things that help you thrive. So when your baby comes, you already have a foundation and a framework around giving yourself time and space to nurture yourselves in the ways that you need.
Rebecca Rankin (31:52):
It starts well before even the thoughts of getting pregnant is, just allowing yourself this A. First this connection with your own cyclical nature, your own womb wisdom, and establishing that so that you know, honor the fact that you were born in this body, that you have a uterus, that you have this ability and uncovering just that deep wound that we've all, as women, have carried for centuries and centuries, that somehow were inherently or innately 'less than' the male biochemistry. And when we honor the fact that we bring life to this planet, we bring life, human life, earth side. And rather than feeling the shame, the inconvenience of having a cycle, like you said, even just looking at your cycle as these mini postpartum times, these small snippets where your body is literally asking you to just rest, to rest, nourish, replenish, so that you can have more, can have more energy, better moods, and feel more resourced going into your next cycle.
(33:08):
And the same thing zoomed out a little bit during pregnancy. The amount of, yes, you nailed it. The amount of time that we think about in preparation for baby, in preparation for a baby, you do baby showers, you get the gifts, you do all these things, and you spend a lot of time and energy on creating this beautiful space to hold life, prenatal care. And then poof, baby happens. And for the most part in the United States, it's like, all right, yeah, you get six weeks, we'll see you back at work, and it's this huge just cliff that you drop off of care. And yet it's so necessary to thrive, to feel a resource to step forward as this foundation for your family versus going moving forward in a place of depletion, of scarcity. So it's beautifully said. Thank you for sharing that, Jessica. It really is just an essential part of the puzzle, right?
(34:12):
It is. And it's the missing piece that a lot of us said in the United States, many other countries too, that it's been forgotten. For what it's worth, our system that we have here is just not in place for supporting us. So it takes us right, to be the advocate for our own selves, for our own health, for our own wellbeing. And that's sometimes the barrier that needs to be crossed, it's that self-worth of, this is how I want it done. This is, I wanna feel resourced. And that's a lot, that barrier is sometimes just the educational piece. So that's, again, thank you for sharing what you are with this world.
Jessica Glose (34:58):
When you think about it, so many people take classes on birth education, you take a lactation class, you learn how to swaddle your a baby, and you take all these different classes prenatally to prepare. But where is the postpartum education piece? It's like a gap in the continuum of care that desperately needs to be filled and to be recognized and to be looked at
Rebecca Rankin (35:22):
And a lot of it in the, I'd say in the hospital kind of traditional model in the United States, it's literally like what the hour before you leave with baby, someone comes in, they're like, 'Here's a squirt bottle for your perineum, here's a little sitz bath, you're good to go!' And meanwhile, if you don't have that education, you're like, 'Okay, I've got a baby, I've got a squirt bottle, I've got a sitz batt..Okay?"
Jessica Glose (35:50):
And what happens is then you go home with your baby. And when of what I find is once women are already postpartum, it's very overwhelming. You're already so overwhelmed with your new family and with your new role as a mother and with all the things that you have going on, in your body and with your baby and with your partner. And so when we are reaching women already postpartum, it's too much information to process. And often women aren't bought into why they would do these things. Well, why would I do that? Well, that's not really important to me. But it's like, Well, you're telling me that you're feeling depressed and you're feeling anxious, but you're eating bread and you're not sleeping and you're malnourished and you're not sleeping. And all of these other things that are contributing to it, it, it's sort of hard for them to draw the parallel as to why these things would be happening. And so we're in such a state of depletion after we birth. It's like, what is the symptomology of of being deficient in vitamins A, B, C, D? What does that look like? How do these deficiencies show up in our body? And it looks like perinatal mood disorders, and again, anxiety, depression and things like that. So the education piece is so important prenatally for the postpartum time, because again, I find it's just too much information for mamas and families to process once you're already there.
Rebecca Rankin (37:25):
Yeah, I mean, can you even think when there's a crying baby and your breasts are leaking, you're trying to, especially as a first time mom, you're trying to figure out all those things. The educational piece is essential prior to baby's arrival. I think for a lot of us women and mothers who, who've had babies and perhaps a lot of us didn't experience that type of postpartum care. In a way, there's a part of me that wishes I had a postpartum doula. I did not. And although I had a drastic difference of care between my first and my second child, I felt very well cared for in my second birth. For those of us who didn't experience that type of postpartum care, I feel like I either read it or it was in a conversation with you. You and I had Jessica about doing a postpartum care well after baby has been earth side, Right? This is something that we've talked about, correct?
Jessica Glose (38:34):
Yes, yes, absolutely. Cuz once you have a pregnancy, after that pregnancy, you are postpartum for life. No matter what happens throughout that pregnancy, no matter again, no matter what happens, you are a postpartum for life. So if you didn't have the postpartum experience you wanted after your pregnancy, you can recreate that experience. You are postpartum for life and repair work can always be done. Again, I had beautiful births and pregnancies and postpartum experiences. I had so much knowledge and information and resources, but I still felt cheated because there was so much that I didn't know. There were so many things that I did not do that I learned after the fact. And again, I felt cheated. I was like, Why didn't anybody tell me that? And so through my studies and through my teachings, I learned that repair work can always be done. You can always take that time back.
(39:30):
You can always replenish your body in the ways that you didn't during those six weeks after birth. Now the most potent time is the six weeks after birth. But if you're two, three, four, ten, even 15 years away from your pregnancy, from your births, you can still incorporate these postpartum practices and get almost a do-over to help replenish your body in the ways that you didn't during those six weeks. What we go through as women to create these beautiful little beings is so magnificent and so intense on our bodies. And so taking the time to take those six weeks back and to put yourself on a plan that you're gonna deeply nourish yourself in all the ways that you didn't during the postpartum time. And that can look like going for extensive body work. Again, really deep nourishing foods. It can look like just doing closing of the bone ceremony.
(40:28):
Closing of the bones is a traditional practice to use throughout the world. And again, it works on 11 different points of the body to close us up after that expansive experience of birth and pregnancy. And that is a super nourishing ceremony that you can create for yourself after and any time after birth. That's a really beautiful way to sort of honor your journey and your path as a mother. And even though I loved my postpartum experience as I still did this after my studies, I took 18 weeks and I nourished myself in all of the ways that I didn't, and really took that time back to honor myself and to honor my babies, and to honor my body and my family. And it was really deeply nourishing. And I was yeah, I really benefited from taking that time.
Rebecca Rankin (41:25):
I love that. Oh, that's so beautiful. Thank you so much for sharing that. And it gives, I think, a lot of us who didn't experience having a postpartum doula, it gives, it's empowering for us to know that repair work can still be done. That's so beautiful. What a great phrase. So as we end our time together, is there one last thing that you wanna share with our listeners?
Jessica Glose (41:52):
You are worth it. You deserve it. You deserve it all. You are an amazing, incredible being that, like you said, brings life to this planet that is so huge. Every day, every minute women are having babies all over the world. So we act like it's this just thing that happens all the time and we don't, there's not as much honor and sacredness around it as I feel there should be. And so just to all the listeners, not just the mamas, not just the women, but the men too. What we do as women is absolutely miraculous and incredible. And if you are a mother, if you know a mother, if you have a mother, honor her, love her, nourish her. Not only in the time after birth, but always. I'm gonna get emotional because what we do is incredible. And so just as we off uplift one, we uplift ourselves, we uplift each other, and with this rising vibration of how we care for ourselves and how we view maternal health, one person can make a difference. You deserve it. You are worth it. Take that time for yourself to educate yourself on what you need, because this is your family, this is your life.
Rebecca Rankin (43:26):
Oh, that was so beautifully said. Thank you for sharing that, Jessica. Yes. How can our listeners find more of Jessica? Where can we find you?
Jessica Glose (43:38):
So you can follow me at Beyond Birth Wellness, on Instagram and on Facebook. I'm still working on my website. That should be hopefully up by the end of this month. That is my goal. And that is at www.beyondbirthwellness.com. So you can check me out on Facebook or Instagram until then and then yeah, hopefully the site will be up soon. So more information. I lead postpartum education classes online and in person prenatally - four classes prenatally, one class in the postpartum time to honor you and your family and your experience. They're highly informational and informative. They include postpartum planning. So two postpartum planning sessions within that to help create the plan and the experience that you desire and deserve. So check me out there for more findings, more information, more knowledge on how to be health, healthy and well yeah, during your motherhood experience.
Rebecca Rankin (44:42):
Oh, thank you, Jessica. And thank you so much for sharing all your knowledge, all your wisdom with myself and with our listeners. Thank you for being on the show.
Jessica Glose (44:51):
Yes, thank you so much, Rebecca, for having me. So honored to be here. So just grateful to share in this conversation with you, to educate the listeners out there. And yeah, it's been an honor. Thank you.
