Introduction and Welcome
Britta: Hello folks, and welcome to Transformed by Birth, a podcast about the rite of passage of pregnancy, birth and new parenthood. I'm your host, Britta Bushnell, author, mythologist, childbirth educator and all around deep diver with a side of goofball. I'm so glad you're here. Today's episode is all about the darker side of motherhood. So grab your cozy beverage, your cup of tea, your coffee. I've got coffee today, folks. Or take us along for a walk as we dive into the shadows of motherhood. Before we begin, we start the way we always do by lighting a candle. If you'd like to join me, please do so. Or just take a breath as I light mine. Today's candle we light in honor of the underworld of motherhood.
Motherhood has a way of forcing us to become shadow seekers. The guilt, grief and anger that regularly comes served up on the platter of new motherhood can shock the unexpecting parent who has been prepared for motherhood with images of blissful baby snuggles and the idea of falling ever more in love with our partners, when instead new moms find themselves filled with rage and sadness. The incongruous nature of these feelings against the backdrop of their anticipated fantasy can add an additional darkness to these shadowy areas, but these darker feelings actually occupy seats of consequence in the journey of becoming even if they are often unwelcome attendants at the postpartum party. We've got to be talking about the shadow in conversations about new parenthood, especially new motherhood. That's why I reached out to my friend and beloved colleague, Stacey Ramsower, to join me for this conversation today.
So who's my guest? This is Stacey. Stacey is a women's somatic coach with a background in yoga, Ayurveda, depth psychology and birth work. She works with women to alchemize the darker emotions of motherhood in service to creativity, intimacy and resilience. On a personal note, y'all, I love this woman and her work. We co-facilitated an online workshop a few years ago titled Descent to the Underworld. And descending into the underworld is what we're going to do today. And I'm telling you, as strange as it sounds, I know it's going to be a fun and powerful journey. Welcome, Stacey. I'm so glad you're here. Thank you. Thank you.
Stacey: It's so good to be here. I've been anticipating this conversation because it's been so dark, and I think one of the most precious gifts, and certainly something that I have sought to create with my work, is a safe place to go with the darkness, like a place where it's safe to name what's dying and writhing and snarling and driving us crazy, for there to be a container, a place to be with that. That is the problem in our culture. There's no place to bring that and be seen. And by and large, you know, most of our families, our communities, don't have the capacity to be with that, which is not even like a blame thing. It's just how we've all emerged in this kind of vacuous culture where we don't grieve and we don't tell the truth about what hurts. So this, you know, tiny corner of the internet where you and I get to be together today in our little Zoom rooms just feels like blessed holy ground.
The Darker Emotions of New Motherhood
Britta: Oh, I feel that. I feel that, and I do. I feel the importance of making space to have these conversations about darker emotions, that underworld domain. So what are some of the darker emotions that you see hidden in the shadows of new parenthood, especially new motherhood?
Stacey: The biggest one for me is rage. That was one that really caught me off guard in my second postpartum experience, and it's something that I think most women feel a lot of shame about, and there's especially little containment, or, you know, context for a mother's rage. We're still doing a lot of like explaining it, which is like one of my biggest passions - I would like for us to dispense with explaining ourselves and just move through this. Just say the fucking thing, express it, acknowledge it, and get to the root of it, which is most often grief, which I think can be really confusing as a new mother, because there is so much often to be grateful for.
But that's the thing. In this culture where we misunderstand grief so much - there are lots of different teachers who have said this, so I'm not quoting any one person in particular, but the saying is, grief and gratitude go hand in hand. I think it might have been Francis Weller who said grief and gratitude are sisters, and it's, you know, two sides of one coin, two faces of one being. It's part of it. And to get to the place of authentic gratitude, genuine gratitude that you experience in your body, you have to feel and express the grief and acknowledge what sucks, what you wish had not changed, what you didn't want to give up and were forced to. And when we don't have a way of grieving or someone to witness our grief, that's when it becomes rage. That's my understanding of it. You know, there's so many other ways that we can talk about rage, but that's sort of the thread that I follow.
Britta: And so is rage, in some ways, trying to get our attention?
Stacey: I believe it is. There's a teacher named Bonnie Badenoch, and she really sort of like flipped the script in my head. She writes about brain science, and in the brain, we have these survival instincts, and care is our first instinct, right? A baby is seeking care. It's seeking your eyes, it's seeking your nipple, it's seeking your touch, seeking care. And when we don't receive that care over time, that's where grief comes from. Obviously, grief can also be the loss of someone that we did have care from, but it's the loss of care, the severance of a connection. And when that grief goes untended, rage is this sort of last stop, this last ditch survival attempt to get connection together, to get the witness.
Britta: Okay, say that last piece again, that when grief goes - you just got to say that part again, because that was so...
Stacey: When grief goes untended, when grief goes unmet, it will lead to a survival-based attempt to get connection at all costs. So it's not actually a desire to hurt or harm. It is, if you don't see me, I will die and I will do anything. It's like, to me, rage is like in my own body and in the women that I've worked with, it's like the most beautiful, triumphant "I want to live. This will not kill me. I cannot. I won't go out like this." You know?
Britta: There's a sacredness to the rage.
Stacey: Oh yeah.
Britta: But we haven't been modeled that relationship. I mean, I know that through my life, I would say anger and rage in particular, have been the hardest, most sublimated aspects of my upbringing, like this is not allowed.
Navigating Rage Safely
Stacey: Yes. And it's scary, because there's no space for it. What often does come out is violent, is oppressive, is scary. It's used as a threat, and so it's very confused and tangled with our worst fears. And so then women assume if I express my anger and my rage, I'm going to terrify my kids, I'm going to, you know, my community will leave me. And that's, you know, it might be the case, but by and large, it's also like absolutely necessary to your survival to have access to these things.
Britta: So then, how do you access in a way that is - I'm hating using the word, but I'm trying to speak it - that's safe? Because there is something about expressing rage that can be unsafe, totally. So help us unpack this so that we're understanding what we're talking about.
Stacey: My sort of view on this will come from a somatic experiencing or nervous system place, and that is titration. When there are these big, sublimated emotions that can create collapse or sort of like, you know, literally knock the wind out of us and leave us shaking in a corner for days, so guilt ridden, shame ridden, we really have to go slow. So it's allowing ourselves to meet, you know, relatively minor disappointments fully, to fully feel it. You know, this disappointment or irritation, even like, you know, because we have the same birthday, I'm a Capricorn. I like to be here on time, because to me, that is coupled with dignity, respect, being a competent human being. You show up on time, and that means early.
So I got a call from the kids' summer camp when I was pissed, you know, and I've practiced enough to notice that I'm getting hot, to notice that I'm shaking a little bit, and to let it run through my body, and to experience the pure sensory nature of it, while also, you know, looking out the window and seeing that the sun is shining at the same time, and that I like that. So now my nervous system is having this experience of like the anger and the irritation and the stress, but also the ease and the no big deal and even the pleasure. I mean, it's a skill for sure, and the only way to master that skill is to start the smallest place where we can really see that process through to the end, and then we start to have capacity for something bigger and less expected, or, you know, just something higher stakes.
Britta: And as it is a skill, it's one you have to hone.
Stacey: Oh, yeah, and it's not something - because this is something critical for the work that you and I do - so much of what I outlined with like when care goes unmet, when grief goes unmet, doing this practice in relationship, letting somebody see you, hear you talk about how you were affected by this. You know, this is the benefit also of our circles of women, the presence of wise women and as a postpartum non-negotiable, to tell the truth about your experience. But what I think is still not quite there in the spaces that are held, and maybe this is less true in sort of the alternative spaces that you and I occupy, women are still seeking a lot of time like permission or an assurance that it'll go away at some point, you know. And this is like the problem in my mind, with the rush to medicate women.
Britta: When you say that it will go away, that the rage, the anger will go away, or the sadness will go away - the dark emotions - hoping that that'll go away, the rush to medicate, that there's a problem in its own right?
Stacey: Yes. Purely experiencing "I'm so fucking angry. I hate being locked in a house with my kid all day. I hate it." And no one, you know, in the mainstream is holding space for that to be normal, and holding space for a woman to experience that down to the bottom of herself, and all the ways that that connects to overriding her needs and preferences for a lifetime, right? And this rush to medicate women - and I didn't get to say it, I want to be explicit here - all of our interventions have a place. We overuse them, and we misuse them. And so this rush to medicate women out of the pain is rushing women through this opportunity to know who they are at the bottom of themselves, in order to stand fully in the truth of who they are as mothers.
Knowing Ourselves Fully
Britta: Okay, wait, so knowing ourselves fully, including knowing our dark emotions, is helpful in knowing who we are, as women, as mothers, as parents, as individuals.
Stacey: Yes. Crucial. I would say it's absolutely vital to having, to being able to then construct and direct a life that we can be proud of.
Britta: But it's scary.
Stacey: 100%. But it's so scary. And then there's also like a tiny human that you have to keep alive, who needs you all of the time. So of course, we want to run for a quick fix. And of course, like, sometimes there's a time and a place for just like, can I just get a life raft until I get some more solid ground under my feet? Like, again, all the interventions have their place, right?
Britta: Because sometimes we can't actually expand our capacity for our own dark emotions when we are ourselves drowning. We need the life raft.
Stacey: 100%.
Britta: Yeah. No, that makes a lot of sense.
Understanding Phases and Timing
Stacey: Remember when you and I taught our course together and we had this discussion, who is this for? And I was like, it's not for mothers of newborns.
Britta: Talk about that, because I do think that thinking about this in a phasal or cyclical kind of understanding has value. So as you're talking, say more about that, like, who is this understanding of the darker emotions for? Is that for the parent who's just come home from the hospital or welcomed a baby into their home, like they are in true straight up survival mode?
Stacey: Yes. And I think there's a lot to be said for the lack of preparation that a lot of couples find themselves experiencing, you know, like, "Oh, it'll be fine. He's got two weeks off work" or "she gets paid leave for this long," right? Well, actually, that's the least of your worries. Like, you can't understand how impossible it is to do a load of laundry, how impossible it is to have a conversation without getting constantly interrupted. And like, what that does on a brain level when you're not prepared to...
My only piece of advice that I always give is prepare to need more help than you've ever needed in your life, and to have people that are safe to call when you're at your worst. Know who those people are, write their names down and then ask them, before you're in that crisis place, if they can be accountable, if they can hold that for you, so that you know in your mind this person gave me permission to call them when I need help.
Britta: And pick those people carefully.
Stacey: Carefully, wisely, who don't expect anything in return, because that's not the phase of life you're in.
Britta: Or who will listen with empathy, compassion, warmth, curiosity.
Stacey: Curiosity, but maybe not solutions to fix it.
Britta: Or pity.
Stacey: Oh God, please, definitely not pity. You know, but that solution, like, "have you talked to your doctor? Have you..." you know, like, there's a time and a place for that. Again, I want to be really explicit, but I think there's such tremendous value for women... it's a fine line. Maybe we talk about this like the fine line, because there's a story that has haunted me since I learned about it, and I don't know that this is the time to get into the details, but it's a story of a woman who went into psychosis and killed her children. And I read the article multiple times, and every time I read it, I was like, she was clearly not well. And there were so many points at which a larger intervention might have taken place.
And so I think it's a fine line, and I don't want to bring that up to instill fear, but it is such a profound psychic transformation, such a profound stress on a family unit. And it's not something to be taken lightly, but it's also something to be... I think about like river stones or something, and just this like tumbling refinement process. There's going to be layers of you that are stripped away. And so how can we talk about this in a way that allows folks to really prepare for the inevitability of more difficulty than they can imagine without also setting it up as like, "Oh, this is going to be awful, and you're gonna suffer," but like, it is high stakes.
Britta: And also giving space and understanding for that fine line you spoke to, because that's the other place, right? Is how to navigate and dance with, is this - I want to put it in air quotes - is this normal, or is this a situation that needs greater intervention than calling my safe person?
Stacey: Right. And it's really how to have that discernment.
Britta: That discernment is a piece that is extra tricky when you're in a place of hardness, suffering, struggle.
A Grounding Practice
Stacey: I want to invite everyone listening to just physically look back, if you find yourself leaning forward in anticipation, if you find yourself in a mode of busyness. If it feels difficult to engage with this part of the conversation, I really invite you to notice where the ground is for you, whether that's the physical earth, the ground of your chair, the ground of an object that feels good to you, that is beautiful, and just give yourself a moment to come back into your body and have the experience of being physically supported, and let yourself be affected by that, and notice how you are affected by that, because I want us to have the capacity to engage with the mystery of this conversation, the bigness of it, and also learn how to take care of ourselves when it's hard to stay present.
Britta: It's so important to stay present, even when staying present is selecting to check out.
Stacey: Yeah, to know, to be clear what we're doing.
Britta: Yeah, because sometimes checking out is the self-care intelligence.
Stacey: Yeah, it's intelligence.
Britta: There's this, there's so much noise in the sphere that kind of hyper celebrates the sticking in it and through it, through the hard conversations. And being like, "you're checking out," it's like, well, there might be some really brilliant intelligence of your body that is supporting a checking out. And it might be a habituated response. And one of the only ways we can know if it's a habituated, you know, not necessarily helpful response, or a helpful response is to slow down and do what you just did, which was to remind us to come back in to the body and take a moment. I'm so grateful for that. You just role modeled what it is that we're talking about and that matters for all of us who are navigating this landscape, this forest that sometimes feels like it doesn't have a trail or clarity, where, God, there's a desire to get through the forest to the other side, as if the other side exists.
Stacey: And as if the other side is without peril, right?
Britta: Like sometimes the forest is actually supporting us and protecting us. And on the other side, where there might be light, there might also be a savannah covered in lions. Okay, now I'm getting myself lost down in this metaphor, but I do think there's this energy of slowing down and checking in and understanding that sometimes going through the journey can be hard.
Building Capacity Through Practice
Stacey: You know, take a step back and notice, you know, in this relatively low stakes moment of listening to a podcast where you find yourself a little bit triggered, like, that's a low stakes, titrated opportunity to practice the skill of feeling your ass on the floor or the chair and just asking yourself, like, what else is going on besides this activation? And that's literally the way that we cultivate our capacity to stay more present when things are high stakes, to things that are difficult, with our center, and not just the sort of steamroller survive energy.
You know, I can't tell you how many times, just even the beginning of the summer, we've got all sorts of shit. Just everything, everything I don't want to happen is happening this summer, and at some point I had to... you know, my husband has a lot of capacity for disarray. And he's like, starts tearing up the floor because our tile cracked, because there's a crack in the foundation. He just starts like, immediately, ripping up our floor. And I was like, he was like, "what? I'm just going to get it done." And I'm like, I can't, I can't explain to you why this is a no, I need you to just stop, because I'm going to lose it.
And sometimes that's all we have. And this really overarching impulse for me right now is, how do we get into expression - expression of the limit, expression of the desire, expression of the need - versus explaining it and wasting our precious energy to kind of feel it and stay with it and honor it and not know what it is fully, but just know it's a limit. Like, that's really important to me. And it was that moment where I was like, "Oh, cool. I'm getting better at this," where like, I felt safe enough to say, "you have to stop. I can't explain it right now."
I mean, I think that's a huge edge for a lot of women where, like, patriarchy has demanded that we explain it to death in order to have a valid enough reason to feel, to need, to want. And like, again, all of that comes back to this very basic, almost like, seemingly too simple, practice of just noticing the initial moments of discomfort or shut down, being like, "Huh? That's interesting. Where's the ground?" Pause for 30 seconds and then notice, can I go forward? Or no? Do I need to look at my phone and scroll for a little while? Or, like, go outside for a walk? Or not talk about this for a few days, but be conscious of it.
Britta: Conscious of it and not in some way making it into a problem itself, right? Because one of the things that we do is, or I do, I don't know, maybe this is just me, but I don't think so...
Stacey: Lots of Capricorns on Earth.
Britta: Where there is that part of having a response, and then the self judgment about the response.
Stacey: Yes, oh yes.
Britta: Something is not okay about the fact that I'm having this response, and that then becomes the problem. It's the second arrow piece, right? There's the response. That's the first arrow that, in its own right, is not a problem. But we shoot a second arrow back at ourselves. This is a Buddhist principle - beating ourselves up for the response that we had to a situation that asked for our response, our reaction. And that is so often a place that I think is really a cutting edge place for practice. Can I be curious and kind to the part of me that is responding, however I'm responding? Can I go, "huh? What is that? I'm shutting down right now, I'm scrolling." Scrolling, in its own right is not a problem.
Stacey: There's nothing inherently problematic about it, right? That's like, my favorite teaching from Ayurveda - there's nothing inherently medicinal or toxic. It's how you're affected by it. It's your relationship to it.
Britta: Well, that can be extrapolated into a lot of things. And so that feels really connected to how we are sort of reprogramming and relearning being with some of the darker emotions.
Media and Blame
Stacey: Yeah, I mean having some... I think there's some beauty in the increased conversation and like ways that we can express and communicate because of media. And then there's also this shadow side to media, of course, which is like a lot of disoriented, disorganized beings, just sort of like fanning one another's flames.
And in this place of being with the darker emotions, it is that second arrow metaphor really works for me, because when we make the thing the problem, I think that's actually one of the biggest reasons for blame, which is not to say there aren't people and institutions to hold accountable, but it is to say that it's a wildly circuitous and often dead end way to address the dark emotions that we're experiencing, to go into blame. Who's to blame for why I'm unsupported, for why I feel this way, for why, you know, being gaslit. And that reckoning has to come after we've established more of a sense of dignity inside of ourselves, that this is my experience, and this is true for me.
Britta: Yeah, there's an element of we're often looking outward to try and have somebody out in the sphere reflect back that my experience matters.
Stacey: Yes, yes.
Britta: And what I'm hearing you say is the importance of the self acknowledgement, that my experience matters and has value to myself. And that's something that I do feel that those enculturated in a female body have often been trained to not do.
Stacey: Yeah, I mean, it's that first level of "your experience is problematic. Your experience is dangerous. Your experience doesn't matter. And if you want to get anything done or want to get any kind of attention, you've got to make it make sense to the people who told you that it doesn't make sense to begin with."
Britta: So that gets back to the part you were talking about around explaining. And what I'm hearing you say is name without a need to qualify. Name, own, feel as truth in its own right.
Stacey: And I'm not suggesting that that's an easy thing to do, but I am suggesting that it's essential. And then, of course, like that's why there are a variety of therapeutic modalities, a lot of which, you know, you employ, and I employ that we've worked with together, like expressive arts therapy. I feel like it's a critical way of moving through dark emotions. Because, you know, what I love about art is you don't have to explain it. It just gets to exist, and it's so much for the artist's satisfaction.
And like every single time I work with expressive arts practices like making an image, or even just working with a particular medium, like the frustration of watercolor - the uncontrollable reality of watercolors, where I'm like, this has been the best psychological practice for me this summer, where it's like, okay, I meet this medium of watercolor knowing that I can't control it, and I'm already surrendered to that, and that's a huge exercise for me, and it's been very therapeutic.
And then there's this element of like, something emerges that I didn't even really know was there. Or I get to have an experience of myself that's sort of adjacent to the really acute pain, you know? It gets to be just something a little bit... it runs parallel to the emotion, but it's not just digging into the feeling like talk therapy often does. And it's so important. Again, it's like a titrated way of being with the pain.
Expressive Arts and Movement
Britta: I had a similar experience recently. Took a pottery, a wheel, pottery class on a wheel and it was such a mirror for what was going on in my body and in my heart and my frustrations and my nuances. So I agree that the expressive arts are phenomenal, and one of my favorite expressive arts for connecting into my darker emotions, sadness and anger in particular, both of those in particular, is through expressive movement, putting on music. And I, we've talked about this before, but putting on music and being guided through or just doing it myself, where it's letting it out.
And recently, I've really identified that, for me, the doorway that actually unlocks the connection to that is through sound while moving. So it's not just movement, like if I'm moving, it's like I'm moving and I'm doing it, and I may be raging, and I might be having a sad experience and moving sadness through my body. But it isn't until I open my mouth and let sound come through that I actually tap into the texture and quality and juiciness and therapeutic quality of those emotions.
Stacey: Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's like the wisdom of those emotions where you're like, "oh, wow, this is like, I could kill somebody with this rage," or "I'm so lost and helpless. It's anguish that I'm moving through." You know, like it gives... when it comes out, you have more information. And I find myself using this phrase a lot in my somatic sessions with people, like, you know, connecting to an emotion or a sensation in the body. What sound does it want to make? And it's not always accessible, because that's so weird, right? We're not allowed to do that. We're not supposed to be loud or make strange noises, but there's such a huge amount of benefit, and again, titration towards being able to do it by just imagining the sound. Can you hear it and stay with that?
And I've had moments where that has just completely cracked me open, even just hearing the sound in my own mind and recognizing how much pain is actually - I think you use the word in our conversation - sequestered. I use this... I know I was editing a video yesterday. Steven Levine, who's a grief therapist and expressive arts therapist and Buddhist, I believe also, he has a quote about sequestered pain, and that if sequestered pain made a sound, the universe would be humming all the time. And I just love that.
Britta: Yeah. And there is an energy of expressing through voice, through sound, through movement, whatever it is. There's a lot of that that can be really pent up, sequestered, that we've been praised for holding it back.
Stacey: Oh yeah.
Britta: We've been praised for polite behavior.
Stacey: I mean, we worship and idolize the women who seem to keep it all together, whose bodies are like strong, fucking tight. You know, there's like, nothing getting out of there. Like we worship those women in our culture. It's insane. I mean, I understand where that's coming from, but I just want to say I think there's a lot to be worked with in this conversation.
Again, I just feel like this strong call to offer our conversation is also like a practice. Again, just notice where, how you're affected by the conversation, by the talk of wailing and screaming or keeping it all together and being wound tight and feel into what's also happening around you that's spacious or neutral, like looking around in the room, allowing yourself to look out a window, to notice movement on the horizon, so that you can hold this lightly, you know, hold it in a way that's sustainable, hold it in a way that fosters curiosity. I think that's the most critical word that you and I have used in this conversation, approaching all of this, our pain, our quote unquote problems with the capacity for curiosity, so that, you know, that's another part of that expressive arts like, to get information that we didn't have before, to see something we didn't see before. What else is possible here?
And that's often not how, you know, Western culture, and Western medical culture is not curious. It's pathological. We're looking for the problem to root out. And I think there's just an unbelievable amount of information in these things that we collectively refer to as problems, how to course correct that we routinely just don't pay attention to.
I lived through Hurricane Harvey and Hurricane Ike in Houston and Hurricane Sandy in New York. I felt like I was the reason for most of these weather problems. I moved to Houston and Hurricane Ike hit, and then I moved to New York and Hurricane Sandy hit, like within months, and then I had been living in Houston for several years by the time that Harvey hit. But I've lived through these catastrophic weather events. I lost my home in Hurricane Harvey, and there's, you know, these horrific... by the time you and I are talking, these horrific floods in Kerrville in the hill country in Texas. And it's something to be grieved.
And like when I think of grief, I think of being prostrate on the earth, and like digging hands into the earth and listening for what comes next from the earth. Like, what comes next? What do we do? What needs to change? What has to happen? Not so that we don't feel this pain anymore, but like, how do we keep going? And we can't keep going if we don't pay attention to these huge ruptures.
Britta: We won't be able to keep going. And so paying attention and tending to our capacity is essential, not just for our own body, but for the continuing process of bringing justice to the world and creating a world we want our children to live in.
Partnership and Dark Emotions
Stacey: Absolutely. And, you know, partnerships that can hold a child.
Britta: And partnerships that can hold a child. And let's go to that place for a bit, because sometimes the dark emotions... I was working with clients earlier this week, and one of the things I said to them was that so often when things are really hard in our lives for whatever reason, and we are around our partner while things are hard in our lives, we start to associate hardness with our partner.
Stacey: Guilty by association.
Britta: Guilty by association. Life sucks right now, and here you are, motherfucker. And it's tough, because when we are struggling, we're mad or we're sad, and we have a partner who is doing their partner life the way they do their life, it can feel like you must be at fault for this, because this sucks.
Stacey: This sucks, and you're supposed to be the one who fill in the blank. Like, so amazing how quickly we fill in these blanks with like, this is... this is why I love my work so much. Wow. I didn't know all that bullshit was in there. I'm carrying a lot of baggage for you, sir. There's like, wow, these stories I have about my husband and what he's supposed to do for me and who he's supposed to measure up to. And like, it's wild, right?
Britta: And it's measure up to in your own fantasy world, as well as the fantasy world we've been spoon fed says that you are going to fall more and more in love with your partner when they become a parent, your co-parent, than you've ever felt with them before. Okay, you've been spoon fed that fantasy, and now it's hard, and your partner is there and they're doing or not doing what it is you want them to do, but it's hard. The fantasy crumbles and rage and disappointment and sadness can fill in. And it doesn't... I was just gonna say it also doesn't necessarily mean that it's their fault, nor does it...
Stacey: Doesn't necessarily mean that it's not workable, right?
Britta: Or that there isn't some responsibility in some aspects too.
Stacey: Totally there. And I haven't studied with him, so I have no expertise in this. But Terry Real is someone that I've really wanted to study with, and I just love his frank manner of speaking about marriage, where it's like, yeah, you're inevitably going to reach this place where you realize that this person isn't the answer to all your problems, and now you're stuck with them, like it's still all... they didn't fulfill the fantasy. They didn't do what your dad, you know, they aren't able to heal the wounds that your dad caused, or whatever the thing is. You're just stuck with like a flawed human being, and what, and then what? Like, and then what do you do?
And I think that there's a lot... you know, I come back often to the inadequacy of our current social structure in terms of supporting parents. And one of the most healing things and supportive things for my marriage, the season in our lives has been our kids' school community, where there's a couple who've like, really taken it upon themselves to ensure that the dads go out one night a month, and the moms go out one night a month. And it seems like a little bit, but it's a lot. It's a lot to just ensure and keep reminding people this time is important. We've got each other. We're going through this together. You're not alone in this.
And then I've noticed as that's been more consistent for the dads, especially, that there's this quality of like, oh, like expanding awareness and capacity for reaching out and creating more opportunities to be together and not feel so isolated in this hardness, because we actually... I don't feel any negative feelings toward Glennon Doyle, but I'm just sort of over the phrase, "we can do hard things," but it's actually true, like we actually can, but we can't do it alone.
And so the more we have this like, wider circle of support where we can remember and be reminded too, that our spouse or our partner is a person who's also lonely, who also just like, needs to blow off some steam and like be a person. Sometimes, I think it's helped to generate a lot more compassion and like perspective, whole person perspective, instead of being so locked in on this very narrow view of, like, this problem and how it's up to you to, like, you know, the nitpicky kind of and the blame that can really do a lot of damage in a short period of time.
Untangling the Yarn
Britta: Yeah, the blame, or the Drama Triangle, making a victim or the hero or the villain, and being in that dance. And speaking to that piece you just shared about what's happening in your school community with these different opportunities for conversation makes me think about like the role of having a coach, a mentor, a therapist, girlfriends, whatever it is to help in the process of becoming clear - is the wrong word - but untangling the yarn of thoughts, like, I kind of get that picture of a yarn ball all tied up together, and that feels sometimes like my thoughts, and it's all tangled up. And when it's all tangled up about my partner, it can be anger, it can be sadness, it can be disappointment, loss, whatever it is.
If I take that tangled up ball to my partner, it doesn't often go really well. But if I take that tangled up ball of thoughts and I connect with my girlfriends and be like when I start to pull the threads of the ball of yarn apart, I find that... I mean, this happened just this week. I met with two of my girlfriends, I untangled some stuff, and the very next morning, I had this unbelievable conversation with my husband where we were able to address some really difficult things that had I tried to do it prior to the yarn untangling the night before with my girlfriends, I don't think it would have happened in the way that it did.
Stacey: Totally, totally. There's something about the power of simplicity, I think, in addressing these challenges in marriage or partnership and parenthood, where like to me, it often just feels like an obstacle course. So the more that I can bring a simple statement or a very clear and explicit request to my husband, we are able to go much farther with that much faster, rather than like this dump, right? Because it does feel like you said, you just get so enmeshed and tangled up and like this day to day, mundane existence is so much, it's so hard. And then just what you described also was like a container to go and just like dump and sift through it and actually get the relief of putting it down somewhere, so that, you know, and this is why I also like ask people to stop and like, feel your ass and what is it doing? Because then there's some like, lifting of the head, and like taking a full breath and, "oh, actually, I know what the problem is," or "I'm a bit more clear what the thing is," right? Not all of these things.
Britta: It's not all these things. And sometimes I think this is maybe coming full circle, but that tangled yarn ball in the head can come out as explaining.
Stacey: Yes, absolutely yes, yes, exactly.
Britta: Once I've done some of the untangling in my space, in my body, in my conversation with friends, in the ways that help to just get it to be like, this is the yarn. This is the yarn. And now let's knit together. Shall we? That has a clarity that can be really creative and co-creative that has, yeah, that just is more effective. And I like that, and I find it more useful. And that doesn't mean that there aren't times when I want to untangle the yarn in my head with my partner, but I like to use very specific containers to then hold those conversations, so that we have a clarity of what it is we're doing.
"Hey, I've got a big ball of yarn in my head that needs some untangling, and I'm wondering if you can sit with me and we can start to pull some threads together. And I'm not asking you to fix my pain or my anger or my whatever, but can you help me with this ball of yarn in my brain?" And I think we need that sometimes, right? For each other, we all do. I mean, that is part of the truth of all this is that being human involves navigating the dark emotions, not avoiding them.
Living With Reality
Stacey: They're going to be there no matter what you do. So why not live with reality? Robert Svoboda, he quotes his teacher all of the time, "you have to live with reality, or reality will come to live with you." Like they're here. And I have been obsessed with this movie for a long time, but now my kids got into it. They found the graphic novel at the library. It's called The Song of the Sea, and it's an Irish animated film about a selkie myth, and it's so beautifully told, and the imagery is amazing.
But there's this owl witch who tried to save her son, who had had his heart broken by taking away all of his emotions, and he turned into stone. He turned into an island in the middle of the sea. And she, you know, there's these incredible visuals of her slowly turning to stone, and she can't move anywhere, because anytime she feels anything, she puts it into a jar. And so her home looks like a hoarder's house, and it's like all these jars full of like little storms and rainbows and everything goes in the jar.
And when this little girl, who's half selkie, comes and finds her voice and the jars break - not to give everything away, but I guess the myth sort of is already out there - this witch goes through this like, very visceral, provocative experience. Like the way they portray it through image is so powerful, experiencing almost like all the emotions at once. And it's like, for me, such an incredible lesson when we sequester these things, when we keep ourselves from feeling things or pretend they're not there, it increases in its intensity and its enormity and its power over... like that's when things get really bad, for lack of a more poetic word.
Acting as though things aren't happening or aren't tearing us apart is a setup for something more catastrophic down the line. Becoming stone. There's so much information out there anymore about, you know, sequestered anger in women being part of the root of autoimmune dysfunction. And there's this great meme that's been floating around lately. It's like, "Babe, is it inflammation? Or have you been holding in a scream for 20 years?" Right? And also, like this is not just about now purging everything we've ever felt, thought onto everyone around us and pointing fingers. And you know, it's not that either. So how can we skillfully move with ourselves and find honor for these really dark places inside and approach them with curiosity instead of fear. That's the mission.
Closing
Britta: Oh, well, I think that's a beautiful place for us to put a pin in this conversation for later. Stacey, where can people connect with you? What are your offerings? Give us some of that.
Stacey: Currently, I'm on a little bit of a break from teaching and offering sessions, but my website is still active, and I'm on Instagram. My website is my name, StaceyRamsower.com and you can sign up for my newsletter that will be the first place to learn about when sessions are open again and other offerings. I'm active on Instagram. It's Stacey underscore Ramsower. And currently, what I'm doing is something I love so much. It's a free expressive arts and somatic practice. I call it the Dark Mother Art Studio, and it really just is a gathering. It feels very much like a circle to honor the dark emotions and work with them in a creative and somatic way, and then be together to bear witness. I'm offering those once a month, like I said, for free. It's the second Wednesday of the month so far, and again, either my newsletter or Instagram are the place to learn about it.
Britta: Oh, fantastic. I love that. So as we wrap up, I'd love to ask you one final question that I ask all of our guests at the end, which is, what's one thing you feel passionately about that you want new or expectant parents to see, hear, feel or know during this profound period of their lives?
Stacey: There is a power in the disintegration and just allow yourself to be tumbled like a river stone and also held. Finding a place to be held in your experience is essential. I think I said it earlier, like expect to need more help than you've ever needed before, and really lean into that part of the experience. It's not a problem. It is the experience.
Britta: Absolutely. Oh, beautiful Stacey, I'm so grateful for this opportunity to be with you. I always love my time with you. I know that to be true, so thank you so much, and thank you listeners for sharing this time with us. If something shared today impacted, supported or moved you, please share this episode with a friend. I produce this podcast myself, and your support makes it possible. To show a little love for the podcast and these conversations, please follow, rate and review. If you'd like to continue the conversation, please join us on Instagram at Transformed by Birth. I look forward to being with you again on the next episode of Transformed by Birth. Now let's gather what we want to take away from this conversation, this episode, and breathe it in with an inhale, before we blow out our candle with an exhale.
Until next time, bye, friends.
