Hi mamas. Today on the podcast I’m joined by Haylee Collins, who is a book publisher and creator of the magazine, Howl, which is how I came to know her. Howl is an incredible magazine that explores the intersection of motherhood and creativity, and was born out of her own observations of watching and speaking to other artists, writers, designers and photographers who are also mothers about how they occupy both of those identities at the same time.

In this episode we discuss Haylee’s experience of becoming a mother and, in particular, her experience of contending with maternal rage. This was exacerbated by postpartum depression, being robbed of the experience she had hoped for by the pandemic, and the let down from the romanticism of the notion of motherhood that society so often creates.

We also discuss this in the context of the anger we observed and were at the receiving end of from our parents when we were children, how we relate to this now, and the need for compassion for them and for ourselves as we navigate this with our own children.

We also discuss:

• Raising boys as a feminist and having to unpick the one dimensionality of masculinity that is pushed onto boys early on, as well as how to add nuance to some of the shorthand we apply to feminism with regard to girls which excludes boys from the conversation.

• Choosing to have no more children and the factors that play into this decision, including the need to honour our own boundaries, energy and capacity. We discuss the weight of this decision and the helpful and not-so-helpful advice around this subject.

• Haylee’s experience of pandemic parenting and the loss of the opportunity for her to share her son with her loved ones due to the restrictions, which was further heightened by her decision that this would be her only child. We also discuss how this played into the anger she experienced.

This is such a raw conversation and I’m so grateful to Haylee for sharing her experience so candidly. I hope you get as much from listening to this conversation as I did from having it.

Here is where you can find out more about me (Yara), how to work with me and some resources:

Why Am I So Angry Workshop

*** Waitlist for The Rebirth, Group Coaching for Mamas ***This is my signature 3 months online group coaching container for mothers which covers family of origin, inner child work, nervous system basics, anger, boundaries and much more.

@lifeafterbirthpsychology

www.lifeafterbirth.com.au

Free Inner Critic Workbook

Free Values Aligned Living Workbook

Find out more about Haylee:

@hayleecol

www.howlmagazine.com.au

www.hayleecollins.au

Looking for support for anger while you mother? To access my Why Am I So Angry Workshop click HERE

Hi mamas. Today on the podcast I’m so happy to be joined by my lovely friend and podcast host, mother, writer and producer, Lucinda McKimm. She is the host of the podcast Ready Or Not, and the co-host of Witching Hour, and a mother of two.

In this conversation, we discuss Lucinda’s experience of becoming a mother and how, despite her expectations that the day-to-day of the role would be challenging, she was not prepared her for the emotional intensity of motherhood, in terms of the rawness of the experience, the increased sense of vulnerability and exposure, and the shedding of layers that motherhood can catalyse within us. We also reflect on our own growth through our respective motherhood journeys, on our increasing resilience and perspective, and our newfound appreciation for our capabilities.

We also discuss:

• The impact of parenthood on relationships and how, even with a supportive and present father, so much of the physical and mental load falls to the mother, and the nuances in how us and our partners can experience the same things so differently.

• The transition of going from one to two children, something Lucina has recently experienced since the birth of her second child, and the feelings of overwhelm and guilt this can create.

• The importance of self-compassion when we go through hard times and how, although others may be suffering, this doesn’t negate what you might be going through, as everyone has different access to support, different nervous systems, different past experiences and capacities.

And so much more. We touch on so many facets of motherhood in this episode and Lucinda shares so much wisdom. I hope you enjoy listening to this conversation today as much as I enjoyed having it.

Here is where you can find out more about me (Yara), how to work with me and some resources:

Why Am I So Angry Workshop

*** Waitlist for The Rebirth, Group Coaching for Mamas ***This is my signature 3 months online group coaching container for mothers which covers family of origin, inner child work, nervous system basics, anger, boundaries and much more.

@lifeafterbirthpsychology

www.lifeafterbirth.com.au

Free Inner Critic Workbook

Free Values Aligned Living Workbook

Find out more about Lucinda:

@lucindamckimm

@readyornot.pod

Listen to the Ready or Not podcast - Episode 4: Dropping The Plastic Balls and Talking Relationships, Parenting & Career with Psychologist Yara Heary

Looking for support for anger while you mother? To access my Why Am I So Angry Workshop click HERE

Hi mamas. Today, I’m excited to have Joy Netanya Thompson on the podcast. Joy is a writer who covers the intersection of motherhood, culture and identity and whose writing has appeared on sites like Parents, Motherwell, Romper, Coffee & Crumbs, and she’s also the author of the substack newsletter, Midweek Joy. She lives in LA with her husband and 8-year-old daughter.

This is a rich and raw episode where Joy shares with me her experience of becoming a mother, the traumatic birth of her daughter and how this, amongst other factors including postpartum depression, shaped her decision to have no more children. We discuss the inner conflict this decision has brought about for us both, the considerations of both our own needs and those of our existing children in this decision, and how the lack of societal and personal support plays a role in this too.

In this beautiful conversation, we also discuss:

• The journey to knowing yourself better through motherhood, in terms of the mirrors your children hold up which allow you to see yourself in a more honest and truthful light than what you might have experienced before. We discuss parts work and the journey of seeing and accepting the different parts of ourselves that live within us and have been shaped by our own childhoods.

• Our experiences of mothering without a blueprint, how this can play out with regard to our desire to parent differently, and the process of reparenting while parenting.

• Joy’s experience of birth, her feelings of failure surrounding it and her journey towards acceptance. We also touch on her experience with EMDR as treatment for this trauma.

• The beauty of the moments where we delight in our children, the honour of having a front-row seat on our children’s lives, and the importance of them feeling this love above all else.

And so much more. I hope you enjoy listening to this conversation today as much as I loved having it.

Here is where you can find out more about me (Yara), how to work with me and some resources:

Why Am I So Angry Workshop

*** Waitlist for The Rebirth, Group Coaching for Mamas ***This is my signature 3 months online group coaching container for mothers which covers family of origin, inner child work, nervous system basics, anger, boundaries and much more.

@lifeafterbirthpsychology

www.lifeafterbirth.com.au

Free Inner Critic Workbook

Free Values Aligned Living Workbook

Find out more about Joy:

@joynetanyathompson

www.joynetanyathompson.com

Looking for support for anger while you mother? To access my Why Am I So Angry Workshop click HERE

Hi mamas. Today on the podcast, I’m joined by Jacqueline Kelly, a matrescence coach who supports mothers who feel like they’ve lost themselves in motherhood. Founding Our Brave Hearts, Jacqueline works to challenge the unrealistic standards of motherhood that we are encouraged to aspire to and to support mums in rediscovering and reclaiming their confidence.

In this beautiful conversation, Jacqueline reflects on her own journey of matrescence and her transition from the freedom, adventure and spontaneity of living overseas to having her sense of self imploded when she became a mother. We discuss the romanticism of her notions of motherhood prior to having children, the identity crisis she experienced within the reality of it, where she has experienced the most growth along the journey, and the duality of the joys and the losses of motherhood.

We also discuss:

• The experience of meeting yourself in motherhood by seeing parts of yourself in your children, the complexities of this and how the parts of our children that we struggle to hold are often the very things we never had held for us in our own childhoods.

• Privilege and how the abundance of the times we live in allow us the space to have awareness and insight to be intentional on how we raise our families and create a different future for them.

• The complexity and the emotional load of motherhood and the importance of having safe spaces to talk and work through these feelings, voicing our lived experiences in order to survive in, and surrender to, the process.

• How deeply entranced idealised values and norms around mothering still are, and how the patriarchal structures of the societies we live in are so inextricably linked with our experience as mothers in this world.

And much more. I hope you enjoy listening to this conversation today as much as I loved having it.

Here is where you can find out more about me (Yara), how to work with me and some resources:

Why Am I So Angry Workshop

*** Waitlist for The Rebirth, Group Coaching for Mamas ***This is my signature 3 months online group coaching container for mothers which covers family of origin, inner child work, nervous system basics, anger, boundaries and much more.

@lifeafterbirthpsychology

www.lifeafterbirth.com.au

Free Inner Critic Workbook

Free Values Aligned Living Workbook

Find out more about Jacqueline:

@our_bravehearts

Our Brave Hearts website

Looking for support for anger while you mother? To access my Why Am I So Angry Workshop click HERE

Hi mamas. Today on the podcast, I’m joined by Penny Moodie, a writer, OCD advocate and mum of three. In 2023, she wrote the incredible book, ‘The Joy Thief’, sharing her personal journey and the stories of fellow OCD sufferers, exploring OCD stigmas and treatments with raw honesty and zero judgement.

In this conversation, we talk about Penny’s experience of becoming a mother, and in particular her experience of this while suffering with OCD. Undiagnosed at the time of her first child’s birth, she reflects on how the transition to parenthood prompted her to seek diagnosis and help, wanting to be fully present for her son.

We also discuss:

• Penny’s preparation for motherhood, and her reflections on how her OCD consumed so much of her energy and brain space that she spent comparatively little time thinking about and preparing for the shifts and changes that parenthood would bring.

• How OCD showed up for Penny in the early stages of her motherhood, and how perinatal OCD can affect both men and women.

• The significance of finding the right therapist, with the right interest or specialism in what you are seeking help for, and the importance of attuning to your intuition and sense of knowing when it comes to what is working for you, and having the confidence to seek an alternative therapist if you don’t feel it’s a good fit.

• The role of self-regulation in parenting and how, by nurturing this skill and the ability to repair when we don’t respond how we would like, we can see real change and growth. We also discuss this in the content OCD, and how self-regulation requires you to sit in uncomfortable emotions.

• Embracing failure as an integral part of growth, and therefore reframing hard and challenging experiences as ones that will ultimately help us evolve.

And much more. I hope this beautiful conversation lands with you today.

Here is where you can find out more about me (Yara), how to work with me and some resources:

Why Am I So Angry Workshop

*** Waitlist for The Rebirth, Group Coaching for Mamas ***This is my signature 3 months online group coaching container for mothers which covers family of origin, inner child work, nervous system basics, anger, boundaries and much more.

@lifeafterbirthpsychology

www.lifeafterbirth.com.au

Free Inner Critic Workbook

Free Values Aligned Living Workbook

Find out more about Penny:

@penny_moodie

Buy ‘The Joy Thief: How OCD Steals Your Happiness - And How To Get It Back’

The So OCD website

Looking for support for anger while you mother? To access my Why Am I So Angry Workshop click HERE

Hi mamas. Today on the podcast, I’m joined by Rachael Shepard-Ohta, who is a certified sleep consultant, a parent educator, content creator, podcaster, mother of three and founder of Hey Sleep Baby. I had the pleasure of being on Rachael’s podcast, No One Told Us, last year and I was so happy to have the opportunity to have another wonderful conversation with her here.

In this episode, we discuss Rachael’s expectations prior to becoming a mother and how her lived experience compared to this, and in particular, the relinquishing of control that comes with parenthood and how this can bring out a part of ourselves that we may not have had much contact with prior to becoming a parent.

We also talk about Rachael’s journey to starting Hey Sleepy Baby, following her own negative experience with sleep training her first child as a response to outside pressure surrounding her baby’s sleep, and the passion this ignited in her to challenge the status quo of baby sleep advice.

We also discuss:

- The versions of ourselves from before we had children, the transition parenthood brings and how, when we feel resistance or struggles in our mothering, it is often due to these parts of our former selves that are still there and are needing to be seen.

- The challenge of balancing the requirements of career and work alongside motherhood, and in particular both mine and Rachael’s experience of running our own businesses and the challenges this can present in terms of compartmentalising and being present with our children

- Rachael’s experience of postnatal anxiety following the birth of her first child, which was contributed to by the stress and external pressures surrounding her baby’s sleep. We reflect on the preoccupation with baby sleep in these early phases and how this stems from the lack of support within our culture.

- The power of trusting yourself, trusting your mothering, and knowing that nothing that you’re dealing with is forever.

And much more. I hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I did.

Here is where you can find out more about me (Yara), how to work with me and some resources:

Why Am I So Angry Workshop

*** Waitlist for The Rebirth, Group Coaching for Mamas ***This is my signature 3 months online group coaching container for mothers which covers family of origin, inner child work, nervous system basics, anger, boundaries and much more.

@lifeafterbirthpsychology

www.lifeafterbirth.com.au

Free Inner Critic Workbook

Free Values Aligned Living Workbook

Find out more about Rachael:

@heysleepybaby

@noonetoldusthepodcast

Listen to my episode on No One Told Us

www.heysleepybaby.com

Looking for support for anger while you mother? To access my Why Am I So Angry Workshop click HERE

Hi mamas. Today on the podcast, I’m joined by Chrissy Powers, a licensed marriage and family therapist, mum, wife, writer and embodiment coach. I’ve been following Chrissy on social media for quite some time and I just love her beautiful, authentic, warm presence, which shines through in this conversation.

In this episode, we discuss Chrissy’s background and some of her early internalised ideas of being the ‘good girl’, how this showed up in her adulthood and her mothering, and her departure from this archetype over time, allowing her to redefine herself according to her own ideals in her thirties and into her forties.

We also discuss purity culture and Chrissy’s experience of growing up in a small evangelical Christian church, the ideals that she was raised with, and the shame, guilt and isolation this culture can create. We discuss this in relation to Chrissy’s experience of parenting her children, and where the line is between what is and what isn’t our job as parents.

We also discuss:

• How our children shouldn’t and can’t be the complete source of our fulfilment, and our experiences of needing work and other pursuits to feel fully whole, which ultimately then allows us to give more to our families and connect with our children in a more present way

• Chrissy’s traumatic birth experience and the start of her mothering journey, and the disparity between what so many of us expect motherhood to be, and our lived experiences of it, and the significance and importance of having support in those early stages

• Consciously choosing to parent in a different way to how you were parented, and the immense work involved in having to heal the parts of ourselves that may still be hurting from our childhood experiences, to then allow us to parent in a different way for our own children, to imprint a new legacy into our family.

• Getting rid of the ‘good child’ archetype, which is fed into by the ‘good girl’ archetype and the thinking that our child’s behaviour reflects on us, which is not a responsibility for our children to hold

And much more. This was a beautiful conversation and I hope that you enjoy listening to it as much as I enjoyed having it.

Here is where you can find out more about me (Yara), how to work with me and some resources:

Why Am I So Angry Workshop

*** Waitlist for The Rebirth, Group Coaching for Mamas ***This is my signature 3 months online group coaching container for mothers which covers family of origin, inner child work, nervous system basics, anger, boundaries and much more.

@lifeafterbirthpsychology

www.lifeafterbirth.com.au

Free Inner Critic Workbook

Free Values Aligned Living Workbook

Find out more about Chrissy:

@chrissyjpowers

https://chrissypowers.com/

Looking for support for anger while you mother? To access my Why Am I So Angry Workshop click HERE

Hi mamas. In this episode of Life After Birth, I am joined by Ali Heppell, a postpartum doula, matrescence educator and guide, and women’s circle facilitator. She is also a wife and mum to two boys.

In this conversion, we discuss Ali’s experience of becoming a mother after losing her own mother to cancer just a few years prior. We discuss Ali’s experience of the grief of losing her mother, her honouring of this grief and how it shaped her own mothering journey. Ali shares her immense loss and longing for her mother, and her journey of going inwards and seeking solace and comfort in parenting herself.

We also discuss:

• Grief, how it changes and evolves over time, and the power of self-compassion, mindfulness and sharing, to connect to the shared common humanity of the experience.

• The ‘unravelling’ and the ‘becoming’ of matrescence, and how motherhood can so often catalyse a huge journey of growth, a shifting of priorities and a change of identities, and the parallels of this with grief.

• The seasons of matraescence, and the power of knowing in the darker and more challenging times, that things are everchanging and it won’t always feel this hard.

• The power of self-compassion in motherhood; mothering yourself, being kind to yourself, and gently nudging your inner voice in a kinder and more compassionate direction.

This is a beautiful, vulnerable and raw conversation, and I hope it brings comfort and strength to you mamas.

Here is where you can find out more about me (Yara), how to work with me and some resources:

Why Am I So Angry Workshop

*** Waitlist for The Rebirth, Group Coaching for Mamas ***This is my signature 3 months online group coaching container for mothers which covers family of origin, inner child work, nervous system basics, anger, boundaries and much more.

@lifeafterbirthpsychology

www.lifeafterbirth.com.au

Free Inner Critic Workbook

Free Values Aligned Living Workbook

Find out more about Alison and access her resources in these places:

https://aliheppell.com/

Ali on Instagram

Looking for support for anger while you mother? To access my Why Am I So Angry Workshop click HERE