Birth Journeys: Lifting the veil on the birth experience
Did your childbirth experience go as planned? Then The Birth Journeys Podcast® is for you! We share powerful and transformative birth stories that illuminate the realities of childbirth. Hosted by a labor nurse and prenatal coach who specializes in transformational coaching techniques, this podcast goes beyond traditional birth narratives to foster healing, build trust, and create transparency between birthing individuals and healthcare providers.
In each episode, we dive into essential topics like birth preparation, debunking common misconceptions, understanding hospital procedures, and promoting autonomy in the birthing process. We also bring you the wisdom and insights of experienced birth workers and medical professionals.
This is a safe and inclusive space where every birth story is valued, honored, and deserves to be heard. Join us in exploring the diverse and unique experiences of birth givers, and discover how transformational coaching can empower your own birth journey.
Contact Kelly Hof at: birthjourneysRN@gmail.com
Birth Journeys: Lifting the veil on the birth experience
Embracing Postpartum Emotions with Emily Finnell
Emily Finnell returns to the podcast, sharing her deeply personal and emotional journey through the postpartum phase of motherhood. With a background as a certified HeartMath coach and former special education teacher, Emily opens up about the emotional turbulence she faced post-C-section, grappling with isolation, self-doubt, and societal pressures that often push new mothers to "bounce back" too quickly. Through candid conversations, we explore how connecting with one's own body can bring peace and alignment, and Emily shares the tools she developed to cultivate self-trust and well-being in both parenting and personal relationships.
Listeners are introduced to the transformative practice of embracing and naming emotions aloud—a potent method for navigating the intense feelings that arise during motherhood. Emily shares how acknowledging emotions without getting lost in their narrative can lead to clarity and calmness, even in high-stress situations. We also discuss the importance of community support and its impact on mental health, contrasting the security found in shared experiences with the isolation that can occur without a supportive network.
Emily's insights extend to the power of heart coherence, emphasizing personal empowerment rather than controlling others. She shares a heart coherence exercise, illustrating its benefits in everyday life, such as setting boundaries or calming heated discussions. The conversation moves towards accepting a "new normal" after life changes, with Emily introducing her coaching services and courses aimed at helping individuals align with their purpose through somatic and emotional work. From the spontaneous formation of friendships through "stroller chasing" to the significance of small supportive actions, this episode highlights the resilience and growth possible through intentional efforts and community support.
Connect with Emily: https://www.emilyfinnell.com/
Get in Emily’s Unstuck Program: https://www.emilyfinnell.com/Unstuck
Join the Bump & Beyond Online Community for moms & moms-to-be!
Coaching offer
Kelly Hof: Labor Nurse + Birth Coach
Basically, I'm your birth bestie! With me as your coach, you will tell fear to take a hike!
Connect with Kelly Hof at kellyhof.com
Medical Disclaimer:
This podcast is intended as a safe space for women to share their birth experiences. It is not intended to provide medical advice. Each woman’s medical course of action is individual and may not appropriately transfer to another similar situation. Please speak to your medical provider before making any medical decisions. Additionally, it is important to keep in mind that evidence based practice evolves as our knowledge of science improves. To the best of my ability I will attempt to present the most current ACOG and AWHONN recommendations at the time the podcast is recorded, but that may not necessarily reflect the best practices at the time the podcast is heard. Additionally, guests sharing their stories have the right to autonomy in their medical decisions, and may share their choice to go against current practice recommendations. I intend to hold space for people to share their decisions. I will attempt to share the current recommendations so that my audience is informed, but it is up to each individual to choose what is best for them.
Hello, Today I have with me Emily Finnell. Emily lives in Kansas with her husband, Dan, and their two sons. She transitioned from a career as a special education teacher to leadership and sales in network marketing. As a certified HeartMath coach, Emily is also completing her Coaching Mastery certification through the Institute of Coaching Mastery. She creates impactful training content, leads courses and workshops and offers one-on-one coaching to help clients find peace, alignment and their purpose in their lives. Today she's talking about her postpartum experience and how to help you feel empowered and not alone through the hormonal experience of postpartum. Emily, welcome and thank you for joining us again. This is your second time on.
Speaker 1:Yes, and I think it's so fitting right now, this very second. We just finished airing your first, the very first episode of this podcast, which is your episode of this podcast. It was the first one. I don't know if I knew that it was the very first one. Yes, it's also our top performing episode. Let's do it again.
Speaker 1:It's very fitting at the beginning of season three that we're doing our next interview and I'm so excited to talk about your postpartum experience, because we didn't get into that. The first episode was mostly your transition from your first birth and then the complications of your second pregnancy and what led to your adoption journey, which I think is so exciting, because I want to validate mothers who become mothers through adoption. I feel like that's a birth journey in and of itself as well, because if you have fertility issues that lead to needing adoption, that's a whole other birth journey. It's the birth of yourself as a mother through adoption and the birth of this new child in your family. So I think it's just really exciting that you're here again to talk about your postpartum journey.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I'm actually really passionate about this, especially just recently, as I am in the Institute of Coaching Mastery and we're doing a lot of more somatic work, which I wasn't really aware of somatic work and definitely wasn't aware back 15 years ago when I gave birth or had a C-section and had Everett. So I am so passionate about this topic because I straight up thought I was going crazy after I had a baby and I felt betrayed by everyone who had ever had babies that they didn't tell me that I was going to feel this way. Yeah, it's a lot, it can be, and that's the thing. Everybody's postpartum experience is unique, and so I think, in a way, we don't want to scare people and be like, oh, you might feel crazy, because what if they don't? Because then I remember seeing my sister-in-law. She was like so chill and relaxed after she had her first baby and I'm like what is that? What are you doing? How are you doing that? What are you doing? How are you doing that? Because it just wasn't my experience.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I was just a mess. I felt so invalidated by people that were just relaxed and in their element. I'm like how are you not panicked?
Speaker 2:I felt fear and a lot of self-judgment.
Speaker 1:Yeah, same and shame. I felt like I was doing it wrong.
Speaker 2:I think my core thought was there's something wrong with me, which was think about how that plays out right, because then it's just everything I did. It was like what's wrong with me, why would I act this way, why am I feeling this way? And it just spiraled. I would just spiral. So many spirals of anxiety and fear and judgment and all that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I felt misunderstood. I felt like why don't you understand why this is so hard, like why don't you understand what I'm going through? Can't you see? I just had a baby, and I think this is pretty common in society, where it's okay, you just had a baby, move on, you can go back to work tomorrow.
Speaker 2:Exactly, and the truth is it's like, physically, your body is doing things where you're like is this normal? Is this normal? Is this supposed to happen? It just feels. Yeah, I just remember feeling isolated, fearful, uncomfortable, and I'm hopeful that, when I share my story and what I know now, that whoever's listening to this will now have tools in their tool belt for how to handle some of the things I felt.
Speaker 1:Yeah, me too, and I love that you're the person doing it, because I feel like you have so many tools and I'm really excited about it.
Speaker 2:I do have a lot of tools and a lot of work. I love to have the best toolbox.
Speaker 1:I will tell you my toolbox.
Speaker 2:I wish I could hand out my toolbox to people and be like this is the gift of peace in your life in your marriage, in your parenting, in your any sort of relationships that your friendships, all of it, like the same toolbox works and it really is about getting out of your head and getting down into your body and trusting. That, I think, is a big piece. That I was missing postpartum was this sense of trust. I had no trust in myself. I felt like the answers were in books and I needed to just read enough books to make me feel safe. And I didn't feel safe in my body because my body was different.
Speaker 1:I remember your dad said that you were reading too many books.
Speaker 2:Yeah, my dad was like you need to put down the books, and I think I talked about that in the first one. You did.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he said trust yourself.
Speaker 2:And now I've been on a journey of trusting myself and I'm like. Now I have the toolbox.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I want people to trust themselves. Your dad lit that spark for you.
Speaker 2:That sounds like something my father would do.
Speaker 1:I agree, very wise.
Speaker 2:But, yeah, just learning. I really want people to know that, yeah, they're not alone and there is so much power in getting out of the head and into the body and they're simple things, the power and getting out of the head and into the body, and they're simple things. The tools I'm giving you are not going to be complicated and difficult, they're very simple. But I think I want to share a little bit about because in the first, when I've shared before, I shared the whole traumatic second pregnancy. But the first pregnancy it was really challenging because I think I thought that I was going to have this baby that was going to be like a six month old baby, you know, like you could take care of and like. Instead it was like this teeny tiny. How do I keep this alive? And then I think the part that nobody prepares you for is the hormones Agreed and I cried a lot.
Speaker 2:I just remember feeling these waves of emotion. I couldn't even pinpoint why I was crying. It was just almost like a detox cry. Everything was just like rushes of hormones and what I remember distinctly the beginning. Just I felt incompetent. I felt like I didn't. I should know, and there's so much judgment, I should know how to do this. Why does it feel so hard?
Speaker 1:You were shitting on yourself.
Speaker 2:I should. I was shitting all over myself. You have no idea the shitting that was happening and what that. What it created, though, was so much insecurity that it was like I needed my husband there all the time, and he felt overwhelmed, and I think, in a way, he was kind of like, dude, you're okay, why are you so freaked out? And he was trying to be so gentle, and my husband, he's so kind and he's so sweet, but I think, in a way, he was like whoa, dude, you're good. Like, why are you acting like this? And I had so much judgment around the nursing part and it not working the way that I thought it should. And again, the shoulding.
Speaker 2:And, anyway, I distinctly remember I had signed Everett, my oldest, up, for it was like one of those baby swimming classes, and all I had to do was drive him there and you put him in his little swim diaper, you get it.
Speaker 2:I don't remember how old he was, but I distinctly remember getting him, got the diaper bag packed up, had him walking out the front door of the house and feeling a sensation in my body that felt like it felt foggy. I felt my heart was racing. I can now look back on it and see I was having a panic attack, but at the time I was convinced it was neurological and I thought there was something very wrong with me. And I remember walking, turning around and going back in the house and sitting on the couch and just bawling and I'd get emotion just thinking about it because I just want to hug that version of me and be like oh my gosh, you're okay. Because I was scared. I just felt what is wrong, why? Because I felt I don't know if you ever had a panic attack and it felt almost like visually it felt like kind of things were like zeroing in a little bit.
Speaker 1:I can't explain it but, like I said Like tunnel vision, yes, like tunnel vision and it felt Like the symptom of a panic attack.
Speaker 2:Neurological.
Speaker 2:And I was like there's something wrong with my brain. I remember calling my husband at work and saying I think I need to go to a neurologist. I think I'm dying. She was like, okay, here we go with the crazy again. What is she even talking about?
Speaker 2:And it's because I had no concept of getting into my body and finding peace or even allowing the sensations that were happening to happen. I was creating so much resistance to the sensations that it was exasperating the sensations, right, all of those thoughts. I shouldn't feel this way. What's wrong with me? All of that felt like resistance, and more of it would come up to the point where I was sitting on the couch rocking and feeling like what's wrong with me, what's wrong with me, what's wrong with me? And then looking at this baby and being like I can't do this. And this was and here's, the worst part about this. When you are feeling that way and in that kind of a spiral, the last thing you want to do is tell anyone that you feel that way because you are embarrassed and you feel crazy. In fact, I've never even shared this with anybody.
Speaker 2:Really Wow Because it felt so embarrassing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I can really relate with that, because I just felt, I felt very similar, but also just, I didn't want support, but I didn't feel supported. It was like, no, I have to do this my way. Can you just be ready to help me? And I didn't even.
Speaker 2:It was the fear of again, what's wrong with me, that it was like I wanted to stuff it in the closet and close the door and pretend like it wasn't happening. But again there was so much resistance and what I want people to understand is what you resist persists. If you're resisting something, it's going to keep coming up and it's almost like a toddler being like mom and they just keep until you stop and say yes, that's what you have to do to your emotion. When the emotion is coming up, the fear, the shame, whatever, like when you stop and just and unplug from the story around it and actually feel the sensation in your body. That changed my entire life.
Speaker 2:When I learned to do that, yeah, and I remember distinctly the first moment that I really did it. It was just I don't. I feel like it's been like a year or two that I've been doing this work and I remember my younger son, who can be very challenging. I don't even remember exactly what he did. I think I was giving him a direction in the kitchen hey, will you please put this away? Or something like that and he it was met with a lot of no, I'm not like attitude whatever, and I remember, instead of responding, I took a breath.
Speaker 2:This is when I was going through my heart math certification, because it's part of what we do in heart. Math is just dropping down into your heart and getting into something called heart coherence, and it was just this pause that I gave myself Before I reacted. It was this pause and within that pause, I felt for the first time, truly felt just the sensation purely sensation of anger, felt like a wave coming through my body, from my head all the way down, and it felt like tingly oh, I can feel that and fiery yes, you could feel it. Right, I know exactly what you're talking about it was this wave?
Speaker 2:And what the crazy part was is once I leaned into it and just felt the sensation, felt the wave go through my body. I was able to look at my son and respond from a grounded place and I was like whoa, I feel like it's like body hacking. Yes, I feel like holy crap. I can just feel into a sensation and get to the other side of it and not react from this heightened emotional state where we all escalate. It was so powerful. And then when I learned that you actually cannot feel a sensation of an emotion for more than 90 seconds in your body unless you're looping in a story. So if you unplug from the story, like in that moment with him, whatever he did to trigger me, I felt the anger. I stopped thinking about I should make him do this. Instead, I just felt the sensation. It washed through and then I was able to ground in two.
Speaker 1:It's like when you stub your toe and you try not to scream.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yes, let it out.
Speaker 1:Feel it? Yeah, just sit there and be like.
Speaker 2:Yeah, or I like say it out loud. Sometimes I'll be like that really hurt.
Speaker 1:I feel it in my toe and it really hurt.
Speaker 2:Or yeah, speaking it out loud In fact, if I went back to that day, that version of me who was sitting on the couch crying, thinking that there was something very wrong with me, that I couldn't go to the baby and me swim class, if she would have just said, wow, I feel like I have tunnel vision, my heart is beating really fast. I feel unsafe in this moment. If she would have been able to speak that out loud. It's it again. That's like turning toward the toddler and saying I see you.
Speaker 2:I see you. It's okay, you're safe. The sensation is safe in my body. There's nothing wrong with me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think that's so great. I feel like there's times that I've had to I haven't been able to like really generalize it, like I haven't even thought about generalizing it because, like when I do feel triggered or like upset about something, I haven't actually approached it that way. But I do that when there's an emergency at the hospital and I have to jump in, it's like that feeling can't be here right now, so the only way through it is to just go through it. I take a big deep breath and then I'm like we're going to be okay.
Speaker 2:So do you feel like you compartmentalize that in the hospital when you're in the hospital? I think so.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's fascinating. Anytime there's an emergency. I learned this in college. Actually, that's how I learned that I needed to do something. Along the lines of just that has like the high adrenaline because we had an emergency at the dorm and I just remember panicking at first, then taking a deep breath and then like feeling just like a wave of calm and then the adrenaline that kind of just keeps you in the emergency and keeps you thinking and focused that kind of kicked in. And then it was. I kept it there until the emergency was over and then I crashed later Fascinating.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know what that reminds me of. My older son would get really frustrated at baseball games and he would get messy and aggressive and I remember Dan taking him in the backyard one day and he said to him I want you to watch this. And he took a soda can and he shook it up and then he opened it and the soda went everywhere and Dan said this is your anger right now. And he said now I want you to watch this. He took another soda can, shook it up and then he took an ice pick and stuck it in the side and it shot out Right. And Dan said which one do you think? The soda went further and was more efficient?
Speaker 2:And Everett's like the one that you stuck a hole in. And he said yes, he said so you can channel that anger. You can channel like what you're doing in the hospital. You are channeling that adrenaline into sharper focus, right, like you're getting into a coherent state. And when you said that deep breath is getting you more into a coherent state where you're able to do the ice pick, right, like you're channeling that adrenaline. And he's channeling the anger and adrenaline in the game.
Speaker 1:And I think it's such a fascinating thing.
Speaker 2:When we're able to zoom out and see our emotions in this way, we can leverage them in different ways. But that mental clarity that you feel is because you're channeling the adrenaline.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I agree. So cool, that's the only way.
Speaker 1:I'm good at that.
Speaker 2:Well, I was going to say but neuroplasticity says that's something that you're capable of. You can bring that into your marriage.
Speaker 1:You can bring that into your family life.
Speaker 2:Butness is the first step, right You're like oh wow it's happening Now. How can? I bring that into this. Yeah, super cool though.
Speaker 1:Yeah, all right, so then where were we? We were talking about postpartum. So in your postpartum journey you have the panic attack, you have the tunnel vision and you wish you could go back and talk to yourself and tell yourself to name the emotion, or name the feeling, not the emotion, detach it from the story. And name the feeling, yeah, and feel the sensation.
Speaker 2:Yeah, speak it out loud. It's like name entertainment, right, like as soon as you say it out loud, now it's not as scary. So I think that is one tip that I would give is just to start speaking out loud if you're having these kind of spirals, like I was. Another thing I think it's funny when I look back and see how I did act at that time. What I think what created a sense of security for me was to not be alone. I tended to want to parent with other moms. If I was with another mom, I felt more grounded in my body and I felt more capable and I needed another adult. I don't know, it was weird, but yeah, when I look back, that is how I coped was having all of these friends with babies and we would wake up in the morning and meet at somebody's house and spend all day there. Oh, wow, that's how, really, when I look back at that baby stage with Ev, it was 100%. We called ourselves sister wives because our husbands were all working and we were home a lot together.
Speaker 1:Wow, it's amazing that you have that. I was the only one around with a baby when my first was born. We were in New York and for the four months we were the only person in the building that had a baby.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so that's super isolating it was and I worked nights and it was like, oh, what's going on. But we did have. The saving grace was there were people that were willing to babysit, because we had some huge dog so we would have to go out. When it's like at night baby's asleep, somebody please come sit in the house or the apartment. But that's so interesting because I wonder what it would have been like if that had been like normal, like if that had been, if I had friends around that I felt like I could do that with yeah, I will say it did, but I even didn't tell them.
Speaker 2:I was embarrassed to tell them that I was struggling so much because when I was around them I didn't struggle as much. Yeah, it felt like I could put my attention on something else. I could just hang out with them and we could talk and whatever. And I don't know, I think I'm just extremely social too and I'm not extrovert, you are, yeah, but yeah, I think that there still was a lot of judgment. Even it was like a coping mechanism.
Speaker 2:Being around other people didn't solve the problem, it just got me through and then, of course, when I went through what we talked about in the first podcast, the second, pregnancy, and then the adoption, all of that, it was all. Throughout that entire journey there was so much self-judgment and so much fear and so much pressing down at these sensations of emotions in my body that I didn't want to feel and having them continue to come up and spiral. It really was how I lived my life and I think a lot of people do. I don't think people realize that they are capable of feeling the sensation that there's other options.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yes, I agree. I feel like until I started really just being like, how do I fix this other than medicine? And it wasn't in my head, it was like therapy and supplements.
Speaker 2:I think therapy absolutely has its place. It does it's more in the past, and that's why I chose to dive headfirst into coaching, because coaching is about the future, it's really about getting results, the results you're looking for.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's what worked for me, and I want to say therapy works for a lot of people and there's lots of great types of therapy and exploring the source is a great part of therapy. But for me, I always needed a very solution-focused therapist, because I've just got to move through, I've got to figure out the solution to the problems and, yeah, I think that was what turned everything around for me. It's what is happening with me and how do I fix it? Because I can't fix anybody else. I can only change my reaction to everybody else. I have say what you want and feel what you want about Dr Phil, but he always said the only person you can change is yourself. And so I get that stuck in my head where it's like okay, well then. So what am I going to change? What am I going to do to stop letting the circumstances control my reaction? Because clearly I have free will. So how do I exercise that free will so that I'm more mentally?
Speaker 2:healthy. We talk about manual work a lot Like we have a manual for everyone in our lives how they should act. And the manual is how we would act. So I have a manual for the lady who checks me out at the grocery store and bags my stuff. She should put all the cold stuff in one bag. That's my manual for her.
Speaker 2:And if she doesn't do it, I could sit in judgment or roll my eyes like she's doing it wrong. And then our manual for her husband is a phone book so long, so big, but the thing is, nobody's read your manual Exactly.
Speaker 2:And so you have to understand, and the thing that I've been playing around with lately and realizing is when I'm sitting in judgment or frustration trying to control somebody else like when you change then I can be happy. When I'm doing that, my power is all outside of me. But as soon as I'm able to give them permission to be exactly how they are, but as soon as I'm able to give them permission to be exactly how they are, like oh, they just have a different way of doing things or they have different values than me as soon as I realize that and I give them permission to be exactly who they are, all of a sudden I take my power back and now I get to decide how I want to handle that. Yeah, do I want to put up a boundary? Do I want to not spend as much time with that person? Do I want to? Like, I get to make decisions when I get my power back to me. But if I'm sitting there judging everyone else, it's like I'm handing my power out to everybody else because I need them to change. That was a big aha for me.
Speaker 2:I took a class. I think it was 2020. I was in that struggle spot and I took this class online. I reached out to two girlfriends that I really wanted to get closer to and I said would you guys want to take this class together? We started taking it online and we would meet every week and discuss, and in the class, this woman, jess Lively, ended up introducing this thing called heart math. Have you ever heard of heart?
Speaker 1:math. I feel like you've talked to me about it. I think at Christmas, when we were talking, you might have talked about it a little.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I probably brought it up because I think you would love it because it's so science-based.
Speaker 2:Yeah yeah, it's all about science, but it's all the stuff that I was learning to know to be true, which is the power of breath, the power of getting into your body, all of that. But they actually have all the science behind it. Oh, nice, actually have all the science behind it, and so I went through a certification with them and that's where I really that's, I think, the beginning of really me starting to dive deeper into this kind of somatic work. But I would say it's called heart coherence is what they teach, which is basically balanced state where the heart and the mind and the emotions are all aligned. Okay, so it really can improve your resilience, mental clarity, physical wellbeing. Honestly, it's what you're doing in that moment in the hospital. When you take that deep breath, you're getting into a heart coherent state. That's why you're able to channel all of that Right, and so, as a new mother or postpartum, being able to drop into your heart like that and be able to get in that heart coherent state, it really does help you with all of this.
Speaker 2:I think that's one of the biggest tools I want to teach people is getting into heart coherency and it's super, super easy to do. You can tell us how to do it. I can Do, you want me to do it and actually, because it's based in science, at HeartMath we actually have a scripted meditation to take you into this, and the whole point of it is to be able to do it in the moment, with your eyes open. So it's not like a deep meditative state, it's more of a. I want you to be able to access this at any moment so I can walk through it. But, yeah, I like to close my eyes. It's up to you, and if you're in a place and you're listening and you can do that, that's great. I also like to put my hand over my heart just to ground me there, and it's just going to take a minute.
Speaker 2:But all you're going to do is you're going to feel yourself drop down from your head and into your heart and you're going to imagine that you can breathe in and out of your heart, breathing a little bit deeper and a little bit slower than usual. You're just going to find a rhythm of breath that feels comfortable to you and as you continue, your heart focus, breaths. You're going to feel into a sensation of joy or peace by thinking about a person or maybe a place that you can tune into that feeling of peace or joy. Maybe it's picturing someone you love, their eyes looking up at you. Maybe it's picturing your favorite vacation spot and picturing yourself there, and then you're going to breathe into that sensation of joy, that sensation of peace into your heart and release any feelings that feel stagnant.
Speaker 2:You're ready to breathe out. So breathe in that joy, breathe in peace, breathe out anything that's ready to go. I'm just going to take another deep breath here, make this the deepest breath you've taken all day, hold at the top and then release, wiggle your shoulders, blink, open your eyes. So that was not exactly on script, but it gives you an idea of what it feels like to get into that heart coherent state. Could you feel any different, kelly?
Speaker 1:just doing that really quick, yeah, and I feel like that's what I do. It feels like what I did in the hospital, where I just take a deep breath and I'm like I am calm, I'm okay, I need to focus.
Speaker 2:But we do it naturally more than you realize. But when I realized that it was so funny when I was learning this and how to do it, I remember my family really well, my family debates for fun.
Speaker 2:We find it entertaining to play devil's advocate. It's like a psychological workout. We love to just talk things out. That's just how I grew up. That's what we do in my house for fun. But we get fired up. Yes, you do, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:And my father and I were having a heated discussion about something, and I remember it was while I was going through my training for heart math, and I remember just getting into a heart coherent state and it was fascinating. This is the coolest thing about it. And they have studies. You can you actually I would love for you to look at this. They have studies proving that this happens when you're in a conversation with someone. If you can get to heart coherency, it calms their heart rate down too. And so that's when I noticed dad and I were both getting fired up. It was a topic we both felt really passionately about and I just brought myself into heart and I didn't have to do the whole meditation, I didn't have to close my eyes, I just did those deep breaths really dropped down into my heart, and he calmed and we ended up having a much more productive conversation, and that is when I was like, whoa, what is this? This?
Speaker 1:feels magical.
Speaker 2:Sorcery, yes, and now I literally live my life in that state and especially, I know this is like a podcast for a lot of women that just had babies. Let me tell you, buckle up. For teenage years people, you need some heart. If you don't need heart, go see a heresy with a baby or a toddler. Just wait until the teen years, and it has helped me tremendously to be able to take those few deep breaths when they come at you with something where you're like I want to rain your neck right now.
Speaker 1:Having a nine-year-old girl. Oh, buckle up, girl a nine-year-old girl. Oh, buckle up, girl, I don't even have a girl. Yeah, I know, I hope whoa. I'm like I didn't anticipate it happening this early, but okay here we go.
Speaker 2:Kelly, you've got a lot because you.
Speaker 1:I know we're a lot, I know.
Speaker 2:So you are, you've got a lot coming at you, girl.
Speaker 1:I see it, I see it starting. I'm like oh wow, yep, all right, but hey, look at the tools you have in your tool belt that you're going to be able to handle that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and the truth is it's okay, they're okay, it's like you say to yourself in the hospital, I'm okay and honestly, I know it sounds crazy, but when something comes at you that feels triggering the words, I'm safe in this moment because I think we're so quick to spiral into stories and worst case scenario stories. It's for me, it's the teenager who makes a bad decision and you're like now you're going to end up in jail and you're the kind of what's with your integrity, all of this stuff? And it's like in the moment I'm like take a deep breath.
Speaker 2:We're safe in this moment, Like what a blessing that he's coming to me and we can have this conversation right Like what a quick shift that changes everything for us to move forward.
Speaker 2:Sure, my website is emilyfinnellcom and I offer one-on-one coaching for six-month packages where we can really deep dive. I think I specialize mostly in helping people tune into their purpose. What is it that they're wanting to create? And then, like we were saying earlier about how coaching is more about it's really getting the results right. But the work I do, it's got the somatic, it's got the emotional work. What we're doing is we're getting to the root of why you're not getting the results that you want and helping you get those results. So that's what we do in one-on-one packages. My best friend and I also run a course called Know Yourself Deeply, which is where we bring in something on human design and then we do the somatic coaching like synergistically together, and it is truly a transformational course. We are having incredible results with that. So we start another one of those in January of 2025. So both of those are on my website and then you can move into the lesson.
Speaker 2:Yeah, okay, yeah, that's not how I wanted to handle that I find that like the more I and I think I saw this on some parenting podcast learning to not have a dramatic reaction like really keeping your face, and I'm sure you probably have to do that kind of stuff in the hospital. I'm okay with that every day. Yeah, all the time You're like interesting. Yeah, tell me more.
Speaker 1:Yeah, tell me more about that. Explain that a little, I'm not following.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:But it's a muscle you got to work out the calm face, exactly. Yeah, I love that, oh my gosh.
Speaker 2:Okay, so that's the dropping into your heart, and then I feel like there was something else that we we talked about talking yourself through. Yes, really, having what I call anchor statements right, like an anchor statement is like a statement that as soon as I start feeling this heightened anxiety, I'm able to and I am safe. I'm safe is a good one. Another one, especially, I think postpartum is is just understanding. I wish somebody would have said to me you're going to feel weird, everything is going to feel off.
Speaker 1:That's the whole thing about. There's a word and I'm not even sure if I'm pronouncing it right mattress sense or whatever where it's like I don't know this word. This word means the birth of a mother. Oh, so you're not just having a birth of a baby, You're becoming a whole new person, physically, emotionally.
Speaker 2:It's like an identity shift.
Speaker 1:It's like going through puberty immediately. Yeah, it's a greater shift than menopause. It's a greater shift than puberty.
Speaker 2:It happens that fast, instant, and you probably have expectations of how it should feel, yeah. And if you don't meet those expectations like you're not like some of those moms that are like, as soon as I saw the baby's face, I just and I always was like I felt, oh, I should be feeling something different. I remember that was my first thought. Should I be super connected? I don't know, but, granted, I had a C-section. I was all like. I just remember being like my mouth is really dry. Do you have milk or a baby? I'm like my mouth is dry, yeah.
Speaker 1:And I had all this judgment about myself.
Speaker 2:Yeah, a certain way, but wow, that is interesting I never thought about from the perspective of you are literally Becoming a whole new person.
Speaker 1:It's a whole new person. Yeah, you need to meet yourself again, you need to figure out who you are and you need to tie who you used to be into who you are now and all of the things you're feeling and all of the physical changes, and figure out how to move forward with that person and take care of a tiny little alien, so tiny yeah, I think that's what it is, and it's just knowing that whatever you're experiencing is going to be unique to you.
Speaker 2:But it's okay, you're safe, you're okay, you will recalibrate. It's that recalibrating that feels so weird. But when you know that, when you're able to look at a mother of a two-year-old and a mother of a 10-year-old and mother of a 15-year-old, and you're able to be like she's okay, she has recalibrated, and you continue to recalibrate, but it's that initial recalibration that feels so crazy.
Speaker 1:Because you don't realize. You're going to have to do it. You're going to have to figure out who you are. You're going to have to figure out how to get to know yourself. You just expect you're going to take yourself into this other situation just like you have for the previous lifetime, right? You're not. Yeah, you're meeting a whole new person, not just your baby you, and you don't know who you are yet.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and think about how that impacts also your partner, your marriage, yeah, yeah. Sometimes they don't react well and looking back, I just remember Dan being like this seems like a different person. I remember him feeling I don't understand who this is because, she's so insecure and so fearful and has so much judgment toward herself, and that's not the woman that I married.
Speaker 1:Who is she?
Speaker 2:It's so fascinating when you Nate was just like why are you such a bitch?
Speaker 2:I was like you knew, I was a bitch, come on, and that's another example of how we do show up differently, because I wasn't really bitchy. I was so insecure, I was just. I was so fearful. I will describe it as a shell of myself. Yeah, that's who I was. Yeah, but it was the thought there's something wrong with me and I shouldn't be this way that made it so much worse. And so that's what? If you hear nothing else in this podcast, the one thing I want you to hear is that you are okay, even that recalibration when you feel wonky, you're okay, you're not always going to feel this way, right, and with the caveat that if you need help or if you feel like you're not okay, reach out.
Speaker 1:It's okay to reach out, it's okay to get help, it's okay. We all pretty much go through this whole, what is going on with me. You're not the only one, and the isolation or the not talking about it is the shame. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. I think I'm glad that you brought that up, because you're right, because there is. I think that shame makes us not want to say to someone I don't feel okay.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and so I feel like sometimes I didn't know that I didn't feel okay. Like the, I do a lot of powering through, and then somebody would say something that I think, as Instagram has started to like, really go from pictures of food to like life lessons At least, that's what my algorithm is.
Speaker 2:Same Mine's, like all somatic work and deep thoughts.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's like mine's motherhood, like this validating motherhood, but I had friends that would say, oh, I just feel whatever way this day, and I would be like, yeah, why won't anybody get on board with our needs? And it was like that kind of thing. It was like I got validated from moms that were going through the same thing, even if they weren't close to me, because I didn't have a ton of moms close to me that I was really good friends with, but they would still. We would message and we would validate each other's feelings and I think that's really important to say, oh, I'm really grumpy today, or I couldn't stop snapping at people, I was just on edge, that kind of stuff where it's oh huh.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I felt that way too and I felt a lot of shame about it. But maybe there's something we can do. Maybe we need to reach out and get some. Maybe we need to be on medication for a little bit. Maybe it is. Which irritability is a sign of postpartum depression and anxiety, just FYI. And I definitely felt that Just not really not feeling like yourself and not being able to feel like you're calibrating, like you're talking about, like not being able to get there. You might need a little bit of help.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I do think that we're at a new age. I think I've got teenagers. It was a long time ago and I think that nowadays it's so much more talked about People don't have that shit.
Speaker 1:But I still see moms in postpartum that are just like what's going on?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:This is new normal. And I had somebody that told me that my friend, who's now a midwife but was a doula, helped me prep for delivery. She came over because she knew I was in Washington Heights and she was in Queens, which that's a pretty big hike if you live in New York. Physically it's not a big distance but it's a big hike. Then she came to see me after my first was born and she was like, yeah, I was like how do you get back to normal? And she's like, oh no, this is new normal, you'll just get used to it. Welcome.
Speaker 2:Yeah, thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 1:Okay, Emily. So before we go, I want to be able to tell my audience how to connect with you. So what do you have going on and how can we connect with you and get plugged into that? And I was like, oh, that changed my expectations a lot. How did that make you feel to hear that Terrified? And then I was just like time to buckle up, yeah.
Speaker 2:It cuts you off from that graspiness of what was yeah, right, like that moment she was able to cut you off and then you're able to shift and refocus into what is now?
Speaker 1:Yeah, because I was trying to hang on to everything and it was like no, let go, move forward. This is new normal and that was just such a healthy thing, a concept for life, essentially because there's so many new normals, right, okay, here we are, let's go. Yeah, I think that was probably the most important thing that somebody said to me, and then bringing me food was the second most important thing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. I think for me, going back to the way that I did cope, should I tell you the stroller chasing story.
Speaker 1:I think so, but you didn't tell it on the podcast.
Speaker 2:I'll tell you this story because it changed my life. It was that isolated feeling that I struggled with. And there was this woman who was also walking around our neighborhood with a little stroller, with a baby around the same time and it was a little tiny baby. And I remember driving past this woman and Dan and I were like is she a nanny or is she the baby? And I remember driving past this woman and Dan and I were like is she a nanny or is she the mom? And I was like there's no way she's a mom, she's too skinny.
Speaker 2:This story is actually crazy. But we were home on a Sunday, dan was mowing the front lawn and I had just put Everett down for a nap. And I walk out into the living room and Dan busts open the front door and he was like it's Sunday, she's not the nanny, she's walking past the front of our house. And I run out of the front of the house like dead sprint toward this woman, okay, and she's just standing there with her stroller and she's like deer in the headlights because she's watching as a man mows the lawn and then stops and runs in the house. And then a woman runs out at her like aggressively lawn and then stops and runs in the house and then a woman runs out at her like aggressively. We love this story because this woman has been my best friend for 10 years now, but or 15 years now.
Speaker 2:But I ran up to her and I was so desperate for another mom friend. But then I'm face to face with this woman. I didn't know what to say, so I just stared and I looked at her and I was like do you have a baby? And she's, yeah. I was like I have a baby too. And she was like really. And I was like I literally was like do you want to be friends? Like I literally said, do you want to be friends? And she was like yeah.
Speaker 2:And we stood there and talked forever, found out our. She didn't say no, she said yeah. And she told me that she went home and cried after that experience. Her husband was like I have a friend and we she's actually who signed me up for Plexus. I know, isn't that so funny? We and we joke about that story now because our kids have like grown up as brother and sister, those two babies. But it's just. I guess what I'm saying in that is, if you feel lonely and if you feel isolated, make some choices, like even be crazy, like I was crazy and I made a friend. But I don't. I'm so proud of myself in that moment for being bold and for being vulnerable.
Speaker 1:Honestly, it wasn't even bold, it was vulnerable.
Speaker 2:It was me saying I'm struggling and I need a friend.
Speaker 1:And I see that you ripped your heart out and just handed her your beating heart at that moment.
Speaker 2:Do you want to be friends? Who says that? But she was like. I still think about that moment and it changed both of our lives. I don't know what I would do Literally every way. So anyway, that's just, and we ended up. Then it actually became a term in our neighborhood. We started doing it and we stroller chased and we ended up bringing this huge group of women together because we started stroller chasing, which is when you chase after somebody with a stroller and say do you want to be friends?
Speaker 1:So we are highly recommending stroller chasing If you're feeling isolated in postpartum or if you're pregnant and you see someone who's got a baby that's a couple months older than yours and yours is going to be. Start stroller chasing, man.
Speaker 2:Stroller chasing. You know what it's going to catch on. Hashtag stroller chase, yes, but it did. It created an incredible network in our neighborhood in Dallas at the time, and those women we still have the deepest friendships after all these years. Because I will say, if you are feeling isolated and alone, chances are so is she, someone else is, and that's why Stacey and I connected in that way, because she was feeling all the same things.
Speaker 1:And the other thing is it's nice even if you don't stay in day-to-day contact with that person, because you're likely going to be in class like the kids are going to be in the same class, likely going to be in class, like the kids are going to be in the same class or in the same grade or close to the same grade Moms that I met. So we moved from New York to Virginia in the dead of winter and I had a baby and I didn't know anybody and nobody was coming out of their houses because it was winter, no chance to stroller chase Right. But once the spring came, we had a little playground and so I would notice when parents would bring their kids that were my kids' age and I got to know who they were, Even the ones that are a couple years older. I found out they had siblings when the park was a little bit farther away, so they didn't necessarily bring the siblings. And I still, we're still here, we still are friends with those people that I met and I remember that.
Speaker 1:I'll say I used to play with that little boy or girl at the playground when you were little and she would say, oh, okay, and then she's really social, so she'll go and she'll say my mommy says that we played at the playground when we were little and then I still see these people, I still wait for their moms. I was just on a field trip with some of the moms that I only see like once a year during Girl Scout cookie season. We all know Kelly during Girl Scout season. So, yeah, it's really funny because it's like you have that connection and for me that's hugely important to be able to like where do I know you from? How do we like connect? Because I'm not the best at remembering people's names.
Speaker 2:Oh, I'm horrible at names, but the thing is, I think the point is you need a tribe during this season and it was a lifeline for me, but it took my intentional effort. Like it's not just going to happen.
Speaker 2:You're not just going to make new mom friends, you have to push yourself a little out of your comfort zone, and what I started doing was once we stroller chased and we had a few that we actually would do in my friend Joanna's backyard. We called it bring your own triple B or something it was. Bring your own baby blanket and beer.
Speaker 1:Did you guys walk around the neighborhood with beer, like strollers and beer?
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, for sure, but no, we would all walk with our strollers over at yeah, everybody does at Halloween, right, we would walk over to Joanna, had this big backyard and we would put blankets out and we would lay our babies on the blanket and the husbands would come home from work and they would come over and we had such a. We really had a community there and that is that was how I made it through and that community was there for me, especially with the second pregnancy. All of the things that happened. Those people were my rock, Because my family was in Kansas. I was in a different state, but it never would have happened without that intentional effort. And you could do it neighborhood website, whatever, book club, bunco Just put yourself out there in a way. That's hey, I'm looking for people to connect with. Like, book clubs to me are still a go-to. I love doing book clubs.
Speaker 1:I never. They stress me out. I love reading books, but like having a deadline.
Speaker 2:I'm like, no, you crack me up, yeah, I. But I will say this about every book club I do, even my team, my leadership stuff I do. I'm like, read it or not, it doesn't matter, just come to me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you're going to you're going to have an opinion about the book.
Speaker 2:Even if you didn't watch it, read it. To me, it's about the social experience. It's about connecting with other humans, because that is what made me feel less crazy. A lot was being around other moms and hearing their stories, and I will never forget. We were all over at Stacy's one day and all the babies were so little but they were at that age where they're not really walking yet but really wiggly and I remember watching one woman try to change her baby's diaper for like 20 minutes and the baby kept rolling and like crawling and I remember just sitting in that space and feeling so much peace in my body and feeling like I'm not alone. This is what it is. They're little, crazy babies right now and I would always feel like, why is this so hard for me? But when you see other moms in that same boat, you're like, oh yeah, because it's hard.
Speaker 1:We're in this together, yeah.
Speaker 2:This is the way it's supposed to be this season is hard.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, is there anything else that we didn't touch on?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think the last thing that I will leave you with is an anchor statement that really got me through. I called it my magic words. But when you say the words of course, of course I'm feeling this way, of course this is happening right, it immediately puts you in a space of compassion for yourself.
Speaker 1:That's really funny, because I say that to other people. I just hadn't thought of saying it to myself.
Speaker 2:Of course I'm feeling this way and that's totally okay. Of course I'm feeling anxious. Of course I'm snapping at my husband. I'm recalibrating my body's, recalibrating. Everything is different and I'm okay and I can apologize.
Speaker 2:If you have rupture, have the repair, be able to say I'm sorry, but I just want to free women from the judgment and shame. I'm not saying it's all going to be perfect. I'm not saying that it's going to be smooth sailing all the time. But if you can have those ups and downs, and especially in the downs, have compassion for yourself and stop fighting the reality. Instead, get into your body and feel it all. I'm telling you right now, the experience will change Without the resistance. The experience is so much more present and peaceful, and so that's really what I would want to offer people is just, if I can do it, you can do it, because I've been through a lot and I feel like I was an extreme case in a lot of this stuff and I'm just living in such a peaceful place right now because of these tools. So, yeah, I just want to help people feel better. I love that.
Speaker 1:So, before we go, I want to be able to tell my audience how to connect with you.
Speaker 2:Sure, my website is emilyfinnellcom and I offer one-on-one coaching for six-month packages where we can really deep dive. I think I specialize mostly in helping people tune into their purpose. What is it that they're wanting to create? And then, like we were saying earlier about how coaching is more about it's really getting the results right. But the work I do it's got the somatic, it's got the emotional work. What we're doing is we're getting to the root of why you're not getting the results that you want and helping you get those results. So that's what we do in one-on-one packages. My best friend and I also run a course called Know Yourself Deeply, which is where we bring in something on human design and then we do the somatic coaching synergistically together, and it is truly a transformational course. We are having incredible results with that. So we start another one of those in January of 2025. So both of those are on my website.
Speaker 1:Awesome. Okay, that will also be in the show notes, emilyfennelcom. Click on it in the show notes, emily, thank you, it's always a pleasure and we definitely need to schedule some time to chat.
Speaker 2:I know We've got lots to catch up on. I know.
Speaker 1:All right, thank you so much.
