Whole Mother Show – Whole Mother

Marya Axner and Tresa Elguera

Marya Axner has spent the past 30 years as an activist working against oppression of all kinds. Recently she has been working to address the climate emergency and ending societal divisions that hamper solving this challenge. She speaks and leads workshops on the topic of anti-Semitism and racism on college campuses, at social justice organizations, and at worker organizations. She also works as a parent educator. Fifteen years ago she was the director of a parents program in the Somerville public schools, supporting parents to be involved in their children’s education. More recently, she was the director of the New England Jewish Labor Committee, where she organized the Jewish community to stand up with workers for their rights. Marya Axner has taught listening skills through Sustaining All Life/United to End Racism, projects of Re-evaluation Counseling. Sustaining All Life is an international grassroots organization working to end the climate emergency within the context of ending all divisions among people. United to End Racism is group of people of all backgrounds in many countries who are dedicated to eliminating racism in the world.

Tresa Elguera is a community activist, teacher, staff developer, and parent. In the past 30 years, she has worked as a Latinx community organizer, specifically focusing on developing community among Latinx young people. She has a degree in bilingual education and taught dual-language elementary and high school Spanish. She currently works as a trainer, teaching teachers to support the social-emotional development of young people in the classroom and developing capacity for conversations regarding race, class, gender, climate, and more. Tresa works with Sustaining All Life and uses their climate tools in other climate work as well. She helped found 350Brooklyn Families so that she had a place to engage in family friendly climate work, and participates in Fridays for Future strikes with her climate activist children (ages 11 and 13). She engages in climate activism with them and separately as well, both because it matters and because it matters to her children.

Sherry Duson, M.A. LPC-S, LMFT-S, PMH-C and Emily Blessinger, LPC

Sherry Duson is a Texas and an Arizona Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist in private practice, and the Founder and Director of The Center for Postpartum Family Health in Houston and The Woodlands, Texas. Since 1999 she has focused her practice on helping new mothers and the needs of young families. In 2014, she opened the Center for Postpartum Family Health, using therapists training under her supervision, to provide services on a sliding scale to the community. The center is a counseling center specializing in perinatal mental health, addressing all mental, emotional and relational issues related to reproduction. It is a place for all new mothers in Texas to find help, solutions and support. Sherry is a graduate of UH-Clear Lake Family Therapy, and is certified in the perinatal mental health specialty.

Emily Blessinger is an Licensed Professional Counselor Associate who joined The Center for Postpartum Family Health in 2021. Emily comes to CPFH with inspiration from her personal experiences with parenting and motherhood and a desire to help support women and their families through the joys and challenges parenting can bring. Her personal background includes becoming a mother at a later age, and experiencing perinatal loss, which have shaped her perspective and led her to this specialty.

Emily helps lead the weekly online support group for new mothers, and sees clients in person in the Houston office and through teletherapy. She has additional training and certification in EMDR, Perinatal mental health, and couple’s therapy. Emily practices under the supervision of Associate Director, Kim Jones.