61. Revillaging: Maternal, Cultural, and Planetary Wellness are One - Rachelle Garcia Seliga

We cannot talk about collective health, planetary health, or the health of future generations, without talking about the health of mothers. As Rachelle says, “The dysfunction and disharmony within our human environments is manifesting through the vulnerable bodies of postpartum women. In fact it is through the bodies of mothers that humanity is being alerted to the urgency of our collective need for change.”

IN THE INTRO:

• The reaction to my previous episode on parenting without a village

IN THE INTERVIEW:

• Our culture is set up to fail new families/parents, and pathologizing the postpartum period overlooks the fact that it’s our social structures that are the cause of the immense emotional and psychological pain most postpartum mothers feel
• Mama- it’s not your fault
• New moms lose up to 700 hours of sleep during the first postpartum year
• The baseline of normal is that human babies need care 24/7 (your baby is not “high needs”), what’s not normal is living in isolated nuclear families
• Postpartum care cannot happen without community, and community is the one thing we are all lacking
• Why it’s so hard, when it’s what we all deeply crave, to recreate the community living of our ancestors/how the colonial mindset keeps us mired in separation and distrust
• The pelvis as the seat of trauma for most every woman, and how we can begin to heal that
• How we feel in our pelvis is how we feel in our life- the connection between mental and pelvic health
• Intergenerational trauma and clearing the “bad medicine” that was embedded in the bodies of our female ancestors and passed down to us
• Anchoring in what we actually believe about ourselves, our bodies, this life
• Women are, and deeply feel, unsafe in our culture
• The incredible responsibility of raising girls (and boys tho!) in this culture, and how Rachelle and I navigate talking to them about the realities of patriarchy in an age appropriate way
• Teaching our kids to respect their inner authority first and foremost
• Reproductive and environmental justice are one and the same
• It’s time to grow up and do the work- our primary responsibility as adults on this planet at this time is to caretake life
• One simple way we can create community and support the parents of little ones
• If we can’t be resourced horizontally (by the folks around us), we can be resourced vertically (by our well ancestors) and by the land
• The sacrifices we make as mothers are a holy offering to life itself

LINKS:

• The Innate Traditions website
• Innate Traditions on Instagram
• Medicine Stories Patreon (podcast bonuses!)
• Related podcast episode- Without a Village: Isolation, Honesty, and the Paradoxes of Modern Motherhood
• My website MythicMedicine.love
• Take my fun Which Healing Herb is Your Spirit Medicine? Quiz
• Medicine Stories Facebook group
• Mythic Medicine on Instagram
• Music by Mariee Sioux (from her beautiful song Wild Eyes)

Mentioned in this episode:

• Vagina: A New Biography by Naomi Wolf
• I’m a 37-Year-Old Mom and I Spent Seven Days online as an 11-Year-Old Girl. Here’s What I Learned.
• A mom’s response to a stranger insisting her daughter speak to him (seems the original post is no longer available, this is a summary)