The Power of Secure Attachment: Supporting Maternal Well-being for Stronger Families & Communities

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Lisa Danylchuk (00:03):
Welcome back to the How We Can Heal podcast.
Today, we welcome back Dr.
Kathleen Kendall Tackett, whois featured on the show in
season four.
She's a health psychologist andan American international
board-certified lactationconsultant, specializing in
women's health research,including breastfeeding,
depression,psychoneuroimmunology, and

(00:24):
trauma.
Today, we focus on maternalmental health, what it means for
children, families, and societyat large, and how we can shift
systems in simple, practicalways to support the health of
mothers and developing children.
Dr.
Kendall Tackett has authoredmore than 490 articles or

(00:44):
chapters, and has authored oredited over 40 books.
I read and loved her recentbook, Breastfeeding Doesn't Need
to Suck.
And today we get a chance tochat a bit about that, as well
as about the fourth edition ofDepression in New Mothers, which
is now out in two volumes.
Dr.
Kendall Tackett has woncountless awards, is a past

(01:06):
president of the AmericanPsychological Association's
Division of Trauma Psychology,and is chair of its publications
and communications board.
Dr.
Kendall Tackett is alsoeditor-in-chief of two
peer-reviewed journals, ClinicalActation and Psychological
Trauma, and is the owner andeditor-in-chief of Proclaris
Press, a small pressspecializing in women's health.

(01:29):
I met Dr.
Kendall Tackett over a decadeago, and I've been a fan of her
work ever since.
Her recent publications onmaternal health and
breastfeeding were timed quitewell for me personally.
And I hope this episode helpsher work reach the people who
need it the most right now.
I'm so grateful to have herback on the show and to share
this conversation with you.

(01:49):
So please join me in welcomingDr.
Kathleen Kendall-Tackett to theshow.
Dr.
Kathleen Kendall-Tackett,welcome back to the How We Can
Heal podcast.
I'm so thrilled to have youback here.
As I've said many times, I canjust interview you once a week,
and that could be the podcastbecause you have so much
information in that beautifulbrain of yours.
So thank you for being here.

Kathleen Kendall-Tackett (02:11):
And thank you for having me back,
Lisa.
It's always delightful to talkto you.

Yay.
I wanted to start by asking youjust how you came to specialize
in maternal mental health.
Oh, it was an interestingjourney.

I was trained in developmental psych,
but with a real focus on familyviolence.
And that's actually been myarea of specialization for a
long time.
That's where I first started.
And it started with working ata rape crisis center when I was
in my master's program.
And that opened up doors andopened up opportunities for
research.
And it was a topic I justreally connected to.

(02:46):
You know, and like back in theearly days, I mean this was back
in the 80s, and that was backin the days when the whole idea
of child sexual abuse was reallya new field, and there was just
so much stuff going on.
And you start feeling like,wow, I could actually contribute
something here.

Yes.

And so I was working away at that and
then finished up my PhD programand had a baby a month later.
And which is not a great way todo it.
It really isn't.
But I just really felt like Iwanted to be finished with
school first.
So I mean, I was just likeflying through.
But I had really difficultbirth and there was no one to

(03:23):
help.
Absolutely.
I told people, and everybodyjust they had no idea what to
do.

Wow.

I thought, okay, I'm gonna do what
I'm trained to do, which is I'mgonna read research.
That's what I'm gonna do.
Yeah.
Because that's that was mytraining.
My PhD is from a tier oneresearch institute.
I'm not I'm not a clinician.
Uh so I thought I that's whatI'm gonna do.
I'm gonna look at theliterature.
And it was interesting becauseit was a revelation because all

(03:49):
of a sudden I'm reading and I'mthinking, this is very different
than what the quote expertswere saying.
Interesting.
We're really emphasizing at thetime.
This is all due to estrogen andprogesterone, and we need to
get people on estrogen patchesand progesterone suppositories.
I mean, this was the emphasis.
And I remember even asking,Well, what about family
violence?

(04:09):
You know, what about sexualassault?
And they said, That has nothingto do with it.
Interesting.
Of course, it's one of thebiggest risk factors.

Yeah.

You know, and so as I was looking at
this, I got an idea for thefirst book.
I thought, I'm going toactually show what this research
actually is.
And for the most part, thething with estrogen and
progesterone was largelydisproven, mainly because uh
almost everybody in the worldgoes through that same shift.
And yet not everybody getsdepressed.

(04:39):
Right.
You know, so how do you explainthat?
Yeah.
It's kind of like obviouslysocial support was a huge
modifier of that.
Yes, you know, and so it's likeif this is strictly a
biologically predetermined kindof response, then you know, uh
everybody should have it.

Right.

And you don't, it's not even close.
And so that was actually a realrevelation to me.
The people who were theso-called experts, I I thought
honestly had it wrong.

Yeah.

With all the confidence that you feel
has a new PhD, which you knowyou do.
Um, but yeah, I got a book uh,you know, called How to Write a
Book Proposal, and I wrote myfirst book proposal, like with
the book open and like yeah,sent it off.
And that was how I startedworking in this area.
And then I kind of went off andI did other things, and I came

(05:28):
back, and I've come back a totalof five times now.
The book is in its fifthedition and is now actually
split into two volumes.
It changed titles, so it's nowcalled Depression and New
Mothers.
I just felt that that was moreaccurate than calling it
postpartum depression, becausepostpartum really actually
refers to that first six weeks.
And really, it's a misnomerbecause when you really read the

(05:51):
research literature, they'relooking at the first year.
Yeah, you know, I'll havepeople say, clinicians say,
Well, you know, she can't havepostpartum depression because
her baby's nine months old.
It's like that's rubbish.
And actually, one thing I foundis like, especially in cases
where like a mother say has ababy that's premature or in the
dink you for whatever reason, orthe neonatal intensive care
unit.
Oftentimes those mothers getdepressed later.

(06:14):
It's not usual for them to havea delayed response because
everything is focused on keepingthat baby alive.
The baby that's what the allthe worry is going to.
And then usually once thebaby's out of danger, cross
through that, then all of asudden that's when they start
feeling the symptoms.

Right.
Because they're having anactivation stress response to be
there and do things and makechoices and move forward.
And then once there's somelevel of safety, then yeah.

Yep, that's exactly it.
Yeah.
That's a good way to put it.
They feel safe.
They feel safe to do it so thatnow that suddenly they can
collapse.

Yeah.

And yeah.
So, you know, it's like you youstarted seeing stuff that
really contradicted.
So interesting.
Yeah.
You know, because some hormonesare important in this.
Stress hormones are important,oxytocin is important, but the
drop in estrogen andprogesterone, no, largely not.
You know, there's a couple ofstudies that have shown that for
some susceptible women, maybe.

(07:10):
But see, it led us down a wholeline of like interventions that
were really not very helpful.

And sometimes that happens.
We find something that'sworking for someone or a subset,
and then we apply it in a largeway, and then that's when we
learn, oops, nope, that doesn'twork for everyone.

Kathleen Kendall-Tack (07:24):
Honestly, based on things we were talking
about earlier, one of thethings that happened is the
models of care really got set upfor white middle class women.
You know, the white middleclass women are the ones who
actually will go to apsychiatrist and wean the
babies, take a bunch ofmedications, because it was a

(07:45):
pile of medications at the time.

Yeah.

And they'll do this.
And it's like there's a lot ofcommunities absolutely who will
not ever darken the door of apsychiatrist alone take all
those drugs.
They just won't do it.

Yeah.

So you can have a whole bunch of
people that are being left out.

Right.
So culturally, it's kind ofself-selecting.

Very much.
Very much.
The good news is there's justso many other treatments that
you can use.

So let's back up a little bit.
Why does maternal mental healthmatter at a societal level?
It's so common for us to justget nitty-gritty and like which
hormone and which pill.
And I want to get right backthere.
But I think there's thisbroader interconnection of
mothers in the world and mothersin society, and and just with

(08:29):
all your depth and experience,why do you feel that maternal
mental health matters to all ofus as a global?

I absolutely feel like it matters.
Because it really kind of comesdown to it's something that
really influences the securityof that mother-infant
attachment.
Yes.
You know, and it's like we areas a society are treating our
children worse and worse.
When the original adverse childexperiences study came out,

(08:58):
they found about 50% reportedone or more adverse childhood
experiences.
The most recent CDC survey,64%.
Wow.
We're not going in the rightdirection.
We're going in the wrongdirection.
And I think part of it isbecause we treat our mothers so
poorly and they disconnect fromtheir babies.
They go off in a different way.

(09:19):
And so at a societal level, wepay the price for that.
You know, and if we were toinvest in helping establishing
that secure attachment, thatcreates resilience and that
could head off so many problems.
It predicts things like successin school.
If you don't think that that'simportant, I mean, that is super
important.
Yeah.
Success in school, success inrelationships, having a secure

(09:42):
attachment a lot of timespredicts your adult health.
I mean, so all these thingswe're going to either pay for it
now or going to pay for itlater.
And we're going to pay a lotmore for it.
So on a kind of like a broadsort of macro level, we should
look at our child data and bevery, very worried because we're
doing something wrong.
And what I'd like to see peopledo is do something right.
Let's head in the rightdirection.

(10:03):
Let's invest the money now andthe effort now so that we can
actually improve the health.
Because it's not just like whenI work with breastfeeding
mothers, I tell the providers alot of times, you're not just
showing a mother how to feed ababy.
This is actually also helpingher establish that pattern of
responsive parenting that leadsto secure attachment.
But that's important even formothers who aren't

(10:25):
breastfeeding.
So it's kind of like, okay, ifbreastfeeding didn't work or
wasn't chosen for whateverreason, we still got to end up
end up showing and modeling thatresponsive care because that's
going to make a difference interms of that security of an
attachment.
You know, it's like, okay, soif that didn't work out, okay,
we should be talking about babywearing.
We should be talking aboutinfant massage, we should be

(10:47):
talking about paste bottle fee.
These are all things that weknow that establish attachment
because of responsive care.
And that's really the crux ofit.
And then it was like I said, ifwe don't pay for it now, we're
going to pay for it later.

Right.
And so you're talking aboutprevention, right?
You're talking about beingaware of how the connection
between a child and their motherimpacts their development,
impacts their choices in life,their position in life.
And you're talking about evenfrom a sort of political
standpoint, well, are weinvesting in young people and

(11:22):
mothers and parents, or are weinvesting in fixing problems
later, which is more expensive?
Right.
And I think it's hard to getthat aggregate data and really
like put a graph in front ofsomeone, but it makes so much
logical sense.

To me, a metric of that is the adverse
childhood experiences data.
But I think we can look at itin terms of okay, let's look at
our health problems.
Yeah.
Let's look at the rates ofcardiovascular disease and
diabetes and all of these thingskind of related.
Yeah.
Let's look at the huge mentalhealth crisis we have.
Yeah.
Let's look at how many peoplewho have been in combat who have

(11:57):
come home and killedthemselves.
Right.
You know, and it's kind of likeoftentimes when you really look
at those combat veterans'histories, what you actually
find is oftentimes they have ahistory of adverse child
experiences before they comeinto the military.
Right.
That creates a vulnerabilitythen to combat stress.
Now, combat stress, of course,all by itself can cause

(12:18):
problems.
Oh yeah.
But are there any protectionsor are they coming in more
vulnerable?
And we especially find this forour female soldiers.
They even have higher ratesthan the general population of
intimate partner violence,adverse health experiences.
And then they get into thatmilitary culture, and then
they're very susceptible toharassment and even sexual

(12:39):
assault.
Yeah.
Really high rates.
It's called military sexualtrauma.
It's huge.
And so again, like I said, Ithink actually we're just not
looking at this and tracing itback.
There are people who are.
And they talk about the firstthousand days and all that stuff
and how important that is.
I absolutely agree.
I 100% agree.
But I think it's going to beinvesting in some pretty big

(13:03):
changes.

Yeah.

I would say it would even start
with, say, for example,providing competent lactation
care.
I just honestly don't think alot of our major health
institutions have the will to doit.
It starts with not havingenough staff.
Yeah.
That's it's it really comesdown to that.
And also, what happens whenyour staff gets really burned
out?
And are you checking for that?

(13:25):
Are you checking for the mentalhealth of your staff?
So there's just all kinds ofsystemic things that we have to
address.
But yeah, I think we can pointto a dozen different metrics to
say, no, look, we're in trouble.

Yeah, absolutely.
So, what other systemic actionshave you seen that support
maternal mental health?
You mentioned lactationeducation, which along with
that, supporting people who areproviding that, you know, making
sure those systems are healthyin terms of burnout and stress
and adequate numbers of staff.

That's kind of a key thing.

Yeah, and that all makes so much sense.
What else have you seen thatreally powerfully supports
mothers and maternal mentalhealth from a systemic
standpoint?

I will use Pittsburgh as an example.
Okay.
I think that they have anamazing system there.
And it's all down to a fewproviders who got together and
decided to do something.
And so they have the mostincredible network of maternal
support systems and groups andclasses and things that they can

(14:25):
go to and just ways to connect.
And unfortunately, it doesn'tprobably catch everybody.
Yeah.
But it can catch a lot ofpeople.
And I think it really does.
And just kind of again thinkingon like a smaller level.
It's like a lot of times when Igo out and lecture, you know,
I'm at hospitals.
Yeah.
And then I'll run into somebodyfrom that hospital later and
they'll say, Since you came, westarted doing something where we

(14:47):
get the mothers together, weget them outside, they're all
taking omega-3s, and we go takea walk.
And they said they found theirdepression rates going through
the floor.
Nice.
So it doesn't take a lot tomake a difference.
If you wait for these bigorganizations to catch on,

(15:08):
you're going to be waiting along time.
I really think actually we needto start at the grassroots
level, and I think it's going toflow up.
Okay.
That I think it's going to beconsumer demand.
I think that's been the caseall along.
Because I've had people say,Well, what can we do to get the
doctors on board?
I think unfortunately, withexceptions, of course, but I
think oftentimes they're thelast of the party.
I was looking at the mostrecent ACOM, which is American

(15:31):
College of Obsetrix andGynecology.
I was looking at theirpost-prime depression
guidelines.
And they're not great.
They're kind of like, well, youcan screen if you want.
You know, it's like they'revery vague.
I just can't even imagine that,you know, somebody is gonna
that's somebody's gonna benefitfrom that.
Yeah.
And somebody's gonna actuallydo it because there's no

(15:52):
instruction.

They have to actually do it.
I remember getting a screening,you know, just a paper checkbox
screening.
And there was one of them thatI was like, well, technically,
yeah, on that one, I kind ofhave a story to go with it, but
I'm gonna check it because Iwant to talk to the provider
about it.
Like I was actually likefeeling okay overall, but I
checked the box, nothing saidanything.
And I was like, you know, thisbox is pretty broad.

(16:14):
I can't remember what the topicwas, but it was like for you to
not respond to that or ask mewhat I mean by that or what's
going on is a big miss.

I think so too.
I 100% agree because I, youknow, I can't believe the number
of people, and in fact, thesecond volume of my book, I
actually really come down onthis heart because it's all
about screening, assessment, andtreatment.

Yeah.

And so I go into kind of details about
okay, what are the barriers toscreening?
Why aren't people screening?
But also this idea that justgiving somebody a packet of
information that includes an Edand Burrow postnatal depression
scale is not an intervention.
No, it's really not.
Most of the time they don'teven do anything about it.
Yeah.
Then why do it?

(16:56):
You're just creating anexpectation that there's going
to be some help and there isn't.

Or even normalizing.
I mean, I was like, I'm gladI'm me and I'm surrounded by
mental health professionals.
And if there is anything I'mconcerned about, I feel like I'm
fully supported and I have athousand places to reach out.
But it's like, what if somebodyelse had checked that box?
And what if they were in like areally severe, like they had
some shame around it, but werescared and decided to check it
because it was so bad, right?

(17:20):
Like the scenario could havebeen very different.
And I feel like I've workedwith a lot of people that would
fit that bill really want tosay, but maybe I really need
help.
So okay, I'll check one box,right?
And then nothing.
Nothing.
And then and then the messagethat could send, which is, oh,
it's not a big deal, or you'renot important, or this isn't
important, or you should justsuck it up, or whatever, right?

(17:42):
People are gonna make their ownsense of it, but not
responding, we fill in theblanks.

Well, our people that you know they
feel like they've done their duediligence in this, and it's
like, no, you haven't evenscratched the surface of it.
Yeah, and this is actually onething I found is you know, these
quote educational kind oflittle handouts do zip if you
just do them by yourself.
I mean, they have no effect atall.
Even if you have somebody say,here's a handout, we're gonna

(18:08):
talk about it for a few minutesbefore you're discharged.
Yeah, no, doesn't have anyeffect.
Now, can that be useful in thecontext of a bigger program?
Yes.
Okay.
But there's lots and lots ofthings that can be done at
community levels that justaren't.
We still release mothers ontheir own and they just are
there to flounder around aboutsix weeks.

(18:29):
One thing that Jack Newman,he's a kind of a famous
pediatrician up in Canada, andhe's also a lactation
consultant, but he's actuallysaid, you know, if we had every
single person who saw mothersand babies know how to assess
the latch and to know whatshould be pain-free, and to
actually know that that baby isactually getting milk, drinking
milk from the breast.

Yeah.

If we could do those, if everybody
could do those two things, hesaid, we would prevent so many
tragedies.
But again, that's just anexample of where people a lot of
times are missed.
You know, nobody mothers aresent home and then they're sent
home and they're in pain andthey're thinking, oh, I can't
tell anybody this because Iquote should know how to do
this.
Right.
Even people I know who arereally pretty educated and who

(19:13):
I've actually given my homephone number to and said, call
me, please call me.
First sign of trouble.
I want you to call me.
And then I find out six weekslater that no, they actually
have been in just an agony andthey can't stand it anymore.
I'm like, why didn't you callme?
Yeah, yeah, called me six weeksago.
It's like, you know, so there'sjust we leave mothers just

(19:34):
struggling with this stuff, juststruggling and struggling,
struggling.
One of the things I talk aboutin my book, Breastfeeding
Doesn't Need to Suck, is uh lovethat book so much.
And that title is just I can'ttake credit for that.
My editor came up with that,but um, I talk about what we
call the five eyes ofmotherhood, and I think this
affects everybody, this idea ofidleness and isolation and
intensity, and it's like yourbrain plays a lot of tricks on

(19:59):
you during that time.
If you spent a lot of alonetime in that postpartum period
and you're like very isolated,and I think we've had a big
experiment with what happenswhen we isolate people.
Yes, it's called the COVIDlockdowns.
Yes, you know, and if you'reisolated and you're struggling
in your body, I mean your mindcan play all kinds of tricks.
Oh, yeah, and can be tellingyou, oh, I'm my life is never

(20:22):
gonna be the same.
I don't know how to do this,this is too much.
I've made the hugest mistake ofmy life.
That's not conducive to goodmental health.
No, and considering prisonersare isolated as punishment and
considered cruel and usualpunishment, right?
Why would we expect new mothersare gonna do better with that?

Right.
Yeah.
So how do you feel likecommunities can support maternal
mental health?
I'm thinking of this mom alonein their house feeling all these
thoughts, and and they've leftthe hospital and they're not
maybe in a program anymore.
So they're they're just outthere and they are isolated.
Exactly.
So if you're you mentioned youspent a lot of time training at
hospitals, I'm thinking abouthospitals, I'm thinking about

(21:00):
any community programs.
How can they provide somethingor do outreach to try to
mitigate that isolation and allthose all the eyes that you just
described?

I think some of the ways is to be
able to talk about it and evenmaybe even have some virtual
groups or example for motherswho just can't quite get
themselves together to get outthe house, which you know that
happens.
You know, you just sometimesjust feel really overwhelmed.
But maybe you can click on alink, right?
Or maybe there's some videos,you know, to just at least

(21:34):
normalize it and say, hey, look,many mothers experience this.
It does not mean that you'renot a mother because people say,
Well, I don't have motheringinstincts.
What does that make me?
Normal.
A person, a person with a baby,you know, because
unfortunately, a lot of thethings that our instincts get

(21:54):
suppressed by a lot of thethings that we do in hospitals.

Interesting.

And so, and it doesn't necessarily
mean you can't learn them.
It really is part instinct partlearned.
And if you don't see iteverywhere, you don't get that
body memory of it, you know, soyou know that body knowledge of
it by just observing it all thetime.
You know, so that I think is abig part of it.
So I would say these communitygroups, these grow up in

(22:19):
programs, I love baby cafes.

Yes.

And they're actually starting to do
a whole thing with mentalhealth, they're doing outreach
with that.
I've been training Wiktorcounselors for years, yeah, to
kind of be aware because who arethey gonna talk to?
Right.
Who are these mothers?
They're not gonna can you see alot of these moms going and
knocking on the door of apsychiatrist?
Not gonna happen.

Absolutely not, especially amidst all of those
potential emotions and feelings.
It's not necessarily the placeof, oh, I really feel empowered
to reach out right now and Ihave time to make a phone call
and an appointment, right?
Like from that place.

So you know, the Office of Women's
Health actually did launch areally good program called Talk
PPD.
Okay, and it really was verygood because they reached out to
all these different communitygroups and organizations.
So they reached out to thelactation consultants and the
childbirth educators and the allthese different doulas.
These are all kind of naturalconnections, you know.

(23:14):
But even again, doing somethinglike that hospital, like
getting the moms back togetherand don't call it a depression
group.
Nobody wants to go to that.
I find so many people that say,Oh, yeah, I used to run with
nobody'd come.
Say, you know, coping withthese huge changes, you know,
call it something like that,something attractive that
people, well, yeah, I am supportgroup, right?
I am coping with some hugechanges, you know, and and and

(23:35):
maybe do a little bit ofeducation around it and then
have some conversation.
And oh my gosh, you've beenexperiencing this too.
And again, sometimes groups canbe not very helpful just
because they can getcompetitive.
So I think it's important thatleadership kind of keeps an eye
on that and keeps things andknow this is not kind of okay to
act and talk because it gets tobe a race whose baby's sweeping

(23:56):
through the knife.
It's so nuts because none ofthat matters, none of it.
Right in the end, nobody cares.
Yeah.
When you oh, you have to hoveryou.
We've got this whole generationof others now feel like I gotta
hover over everything, youknow.
And it's just like, oh my gosh,you're making me exhausted just
listening to you.

But I feel like some of that comes from the fact
that I mean, we're startingtalking about the macro level of
like how can systems, how cancommunities support others?
And I feel like because thatsupport isn't integrated and
strong, that leads to theisolation, that leads to feeling
like I have to do everything.
I have to absolutely on, I'mthe only one, like all those
types of things.

You know, I think that honestly is a
real problem.
I think it's very patchy.
Yeah, I see that with mentalhealth support, I see it with
reducing child abuse, and I alsosee it with lactation support.
Those three things, if you cangive mothers good support, all
three of those things getbetter.

Right.
And you're and we're focusingon what can hospitals do, what
community programs who arealready working with pregnant
and postpartum women.
But then I'm thinking about youmentioned baby cafes, and I'm
thinking about early on when Ihad to maybe like pick up dry
cleaning and drop off UPSreturns and wanted to coffee.
And it was like, oh, the babyfell asleep.

(25:09):
I'm not doing it.
Right.
These things in the world thatjust go on and aren't thinking
about parents that just have ayoung kid with them, and and you
don't notice it until you havea young kid, and that's your
primary responsibility.
You're like, well, I can't dothese things, or I can't be at
this event, or I can't.
In one case, there was a race Iwanted to run and we didn't

(25:31):
have child care.
It's like, I can't run thatrace, like I can't run it with
my child.
And some of that is justpractical and just is how is
what it is, and you deal withit.
But there's some things where Ithink we're just not thinking
about it enough on a communalsystemic level.
Oh, I agree.
How do you make it so motherscan bring their babies places?
Yeah.

And yet still kind of meeting the
needs of other people, like forexample, at church.
You know, can you have a cryingroom so mothers don't have to
leave their babies if they don'twant to, but they can still
participate and listen, right?
But then everybody else doesn'thave to hear all the baby
noises, which sometimes can bedistracting.

Right.
Or like we we go to the libraryand there's a silent section
over here, a m section in themiddle, and the kids section on
the other side.
And kids are not quiet, andthat's okay because it's
practically a separate, it's aseparate side of the building,
and there's kind of a littletransition in the middle there.
So they work that out.
And so everyone's welcome.

Those kinds of things again, like
libraries, that's a greatresource.
Yeah, and they have programs.
So sometimes, like anindividual community, it takes
sometimes just one person or agroup of people looking around
and saying, you know what?
We need to do better with this.
And they start liaison with theother groups in town.
Okay, who are some otherpeople?
How can we do some outreach?

(26:46):
How can we make this coffeeplace baby friendly?
Yeah.
Is it okay for a mom to sit inhere and nurse?
Yes.
That's a kind of a huge onebecause that can keep people
pretty isolated.
They may feel uncomfortablewith that.
But again, it really comes tonormalizing having mothers and
babies out in society where theybelong.

Yeah, I'm thinking about a cafe nearby
that has like a little back toysection that's so I've actually
nursed my child there becauseit's facing in a way that's a
little more private.
There's blocks and stuff.
The time that I was nursing inthere, there was no one else in
there.
So I felt totally fine.
And then I think about myfriend who's a lactation
consultant.
In her home, she has hugephotographs and paintings of

(27:26):
women breastfeeding.
And I feel so grateful that Iwas exposed to that.
I mean, I think I've thoughtabout those paintings as I've
been breastfeeding and thinking,like, oh, I'm so glad I saw
that.
I'm so glad that was integratedinto my daily life and
awareness.
And can you imagine in a cafehaving a kid area, having a
picture of a womanbreastfeeding?
You don't even have to havelike, here's the section, or you

(27:47):
know, having a drawing of a momwith a baby.

Well, here's where kind of it gets to
be like it's in the culture.
So you put us in the culture.
And again, just even havingplaces where moms could bring
babies or talking to moms aboutsaying, okay, now with your
baby, it may be hard for you toget out, but here's some places
with drive-throughs.
Yes.
Here's some places where youcan actually get stuff
delivered.
Actually, in some ways, it's somuch better that way than it

(28:12):
was when my kids were little.
Um, I envy that.
Yeah, you can actually pull upand have somebody put groceries
in your car.
Yes.
So I think the more that we cando with that, but again, some
of it is just can we pull groupstogether and have a
conversation and figure out howto kind of okay, you know, with
this mom, what kind of servicescan we help her plug into?

(28:35):
And so again, it doesn'tnecessarily even take a lot of
money to do something like that.
Because people say, Oh, wedon't get any money for this.
And it's like, well, is it thatmuch harder to like connect,
start connecting these differentorganizations and saying, hey,
look, we got this, or hey,listen, we've got this group for
new moms and go, you know,leave some handouts, you know,
at the local doctor's office.

(28:56):
And a lot of times they'rehappy to pass those out because
they think, oh, how do I I can'thandle this, but I know
somebody who can.
Yeah.
So again, it's really about howcan you think differently and
trying not to feel so stuck withthe idea that your culture
can't change.
You can't change a small partof it.
And I really think that thosekinds of programs are the ones

(29:17):
that really make a difference.
And it's really lasting.
And that's such animpressionable period that
actually I think help that yougive, people remember that
forever.

Yeah, and to your point, it's not just the
mother who's receiving thatsupport, the child is benefiting
directly from the societybenefiting.

The whole family is benefiting term.
Yeah.
Because unfortunately, mentalhealth has an impact on
relationships, it has a realimpact on friendships.
So it cuts it oftentimes, itcuts mothers off from their
normal sources of support.
But if we could come along andsay to the say the partner, hey,
you know, if you can go todoctor's appointments with them
or help them find this.
If they need help, you're theperson to go find this help.

(29:56):
Don't put this all on themother.
Here's some really Reallyconstructive ways you can help
in this situation.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So how can friends and direct family
support maternal mental health?
What are tangible things you'veseen people do that have been
preventative or been healing forsomeone struggling postpartum?

I think probably one of the
biggest things is to actuallyjust treat her like a queen.
Don't expect her to come backand just jump into normal life.
She needs a few weeks to justdo nothing but care for the
baby, care for herself, makesure she has clean clothes and

(30:38):
clean sheets on the bed andwhatever support she needs.
If she needs a warm drink, ifshe needs somebody, if she needs
company, if she needs a stackof DVDs from the library to
watch, but whatever she wants,make her and really reinforce
the importance of what she'sdoing.

Yeah.

The fact is, any interaction that
mom and that baby are havingthat laying down those neural
pathways, and that's what theytalk about that first thousand
days was three years.
You're talking about threeyears.
It's like that baby's brain isso malleable.
So every interaction, so howcan you support that?
Make the mother happy, make herfeel like she is a queen.
Do things like, okay, would youlike a hot pack for your

(31:16):
shoulders?
That releases oxytocin, youknow.
How can you actually make surethat the area around her is
orderly?
Yeah, she's not sitting therefretting about it.
I hear stories about mothersthat one actually was a high-up
person in the government and shecame home from after a
C-section and is throwing inlaundry in the into the water.
That's ridiculous.
Yeah, no.
You know, if she had a herniasurgery, they wouldn't let her

(31:38):
do that.
Right.
So why is this different?
You know, and it's like Ireally think that one of the
things that really does make adifference is doing things like
having clean clothes every day,having the opportunity to go
take a shower.
And you know, if you startgetting into that, my baby needs
me.
Okay, here's the thing feedyour baby, and then pass your
baby to a trusted adult, and yougo take a shower.

(32:00):
You can do that.
Yeah, yeah.
That person can actually bethere to maybe give mom a break.
Yeah.
I wouldn't recommendnecessarily that they step in
with feedings because uh thatcan actually really lead to
premature breastfeedingcessation, which sometimes can
make the mothers more depressed.
Okay, so that sometimes issomething that people think that
helps, but I would probablykeep that as an emergency.

(32:21):
Now, if the mother's made thedecision that she doesn't want
to fully breastfeed, then thatis a different story.
But if her goal is tobreastfeed, then we don't want
to do that, but let's supporther in every other way we can.
And actually, one just littlepro tip too, with like nighttime
feedings, get some red um nightlights on because those don't

(32:45):
wake up your brain.
Yes, those actually go to therods in your retina, not the
cones.
The cones are your daytimevision, the rods are your
nighttime vision.
And what they used to do istrain pilots uh for night
missions with red light.
They'd be in a room with redlight so you can still see, but
it's not waking up your brain.
So if you are up in the middleof the night and you're nursing

(33:05):
your baby, then you don't you'renot completely waking up.
And that's really gonna help.
And also, too, I would saylet's make sure that that baby
is nearby.
Because this idea of gonna ohhave somebody else handle
nighttime feedings, that worksgreat until they both go to
sleep.
And it's mothers who wake upfirst.

(33:26):
Right.
But I think like in our survey,we found that 80% did not have
anybody who could actually helpwith that.
Yeah, so that's suggestion.
Not terribly practical in mostcases.
Now, under certain emergencysituations, if you go to a mom
that's really, really tired,exhausted, she's hanging on by a
thread, you can do that as anemergency strategy.

Yeah.

And you want to aim for like about a
four-hour stretch.

Okay.

Okay, so what I suggest is that you
start that four-hour stretch atsay eight o'clock, eight to
midnight.
That way the person who is youryou know, caregiver can
actually still get enough sleepto go to work.

Yeah.

They need to.
Because again, like I said,trying to think about practical,
what can you practically do?
But I would say pamper just itdoesn't mean expensive spa days.
It doesn't mean anything likethat.
It means like show her youcare, tell her what what a
fantastic job, how proud you areof her.
Make sure she's comfortable,make sure she has things that
she needs, and that she's notsitting there having to worry
about getting some groceries inwith a newborn.

(34:22):
I every time I go to thegrocery store and I see that I
just want to weep.
Yeah.
I'm like, where are the peoplethat are supposed to be helping
you?
Yeah.
It breaks my heart.
Yeah, sometimes you need to dothat just to get out of the
house.
Now I get that.
Right.
But a lot of times it's notthat, it's like they don't have
anybody else.
Yeah.
You know, but one of the thingsthat we learned in COVID, a

(34:42):
very interesting paper that wepublished in Psych Drama, and it
was was talking about people'sideas about time and how that
got distorted during thelockdowns.
Yeah.
You didn't have the normalmarkers going to work and your
weekends, there wasn't adifference between your weekdays
and your weekends, everythingkind of ran together.
Well, I thought, yeah, doesthat sound like another group we
know?
That does a lot.

(35:04):
So again, having those markers,like, and I think one of the
markers is okay, you get up andyou put on something clean.
Yeah.
I don't care if it's a t-shirtand yoga pants, something clean.
Yeah.
Make sure that you actually aretaking care of yourself every
day.

And so that leads me to my next question.
How can moms themselves makechoices to support their health
and well-being?
And I'm I'm noticing as we'rethinking about this, there's so
much, you know, you and I areboth in the mental health space
where there's postpartumdepression is a big issue for
moms.
There's also just, I alwaysthink the word mental health, it
doesn't actually mean mentalillness, even though we kind of

(35:41):
treat it like it does, right?
Like we're talking about beinghealthy.
So whether or not a mom isexperiencing postpartum
depression, what can that mom dofor themselves to invest in
their health, to boost theirhealth?
You just mentioned a reallypractical example.
Put on some clean clothes,right?
It might seem like, oh, I don'tneed to, I'm just gonna be home
all day, right?
My hair, but there's somethingit's gonna do for you that's

(36:04):
actually gonna be helpful.
It's a small enough thing, itdoesn't take so much time.
Hopefully, physically, you canget in and out of your clothes
on your own.

Well, and it marks day and night for
you, you know, so it's not allrunning together into a thing,
you know.
And I mean, I think that thatkind of stuff is important.
I would say try to get outsideevery day.
Even if you're just walking outto your backyard or down to the
mailbox or something, just tryto do that because it's
sometimes that breaks that.
Try not to have really longperiods of silence.

(36:33):
I think that's when your mindstarts eating at you.
This is the way your life isgonna be forever.
It's never gonna get better.

It's always gonna be like, I mean, that's
how I feel right now whenIsabella has the wonky donkey on
repeat.
Shout out to Craig Smith whowrote The Wonky Donkey.
It's a very amazing book andsong, but she will put it on
repeat.
It was my most played on myiTunes thousands of times.
And there are moments whereit'll be on repeat, and I'm
like, I'm gonna go insane if Idon't stop this song.

(37:01):
And I literally will just takeher out on the porch and start
naming all of the flowers or youknow, oh, look at the lemons
and look at the leaves and lookat okay, headphones.
Right?
Yeah, I mean, uh, we don't giveher headphones yet, but oh man,
like tempting, tempting.
So tempting.
So I think there's somethingreally to that about just

(37:23):
breaking up monotony, whetherit's silence or it's a certain
song on repeat or it's beinginside all day.
I think it's just breaking thatisolation in a way.
Yeah.
Remembering that you areconnected to a larger group.
Yes, you're connected to thistiny human who is dependent on
you and is amazing andchallenging and bundled up into
all this wonderfulness, andthat's yours most of the time,

(37:46):
depending on your caresituation, but breaking that up,
noticing the changes of day,because sometimes a day can just
start and bleed into night andyou don't even know who or what
or where.
So the red light at night, thechanging of clothes, the
stepping outside, all of thosethings.
And I love that being treatedlike a queen, that to me

(38:08):
communicates value, right?

Yeah, absolutely.

What you're doing is so important.
And I think that's a piecethat's missing on a lot of these
layers.
Like we started broad and we'regoing more narrow.
We started more collective,going more individual, but on
all these levels, just reallyvaluing like this is so
important.

Well, one paper that came up really
kind of changed the picturecompletely for me.
It was an anthropology paper,and they were talking about what
they call social structuresthat protected new mother's
health.

Oh.

And they said across all these
different cultures, that ofcourse they varied, and not all
postpartum rituals were actuallyhelpful.
Some of them were pretty piad,you know, like trying to
determine if the baby islegitimate or not.
By, you know, I mean, yeah,some of the stuff is actually
pretty, pretty rough.
So you want stuff that'sobviously supporting the mother,
but one of it was therecognizing that this is a

(38:58):
unique time.

Yeah.

We don't do that.
I think it started because it'slike we went into the hospital
for that, and a lot of times wewere there for a long time back
in the day.
That wasn't necessarily alwaysa good thing, but I think that's
when the quote lying in perioddisappeared.

Okay.

And so then all of a sudden we get in
shorter and shorter and shorter,shorter hospital stays.
And some people have argued,yeah, there's some benefit for
that, but the problem is mothercomes back and she's bam, right
back in her life.
There's no marking of it.

Yeah.

And yet for the mother, this has
been this cataclysmic change.
Every aspect of her life haschanged.
And everybody's like, Yeah, youhad a baby, you know, I've I've
had five, you know, it's likeokay, good.
I see to help your empathy.
Right.
Yeah.
But it's this gigantic change.
And so, like that recognition,and also too, that there's like

(39:45):
a isolation from unhelpfulpeople.
That's something that again, apartner can be really helpful.
Screening, screening laws,screening people, like say
mother or mother-in-law is beingvery unhelpful, kind of
hovering over her shoulder,saying, Is that baby eating
again?
Didn't he just eat?
You know, they think they'rehelping, they're not.
That's not helpful.
So, again, being like mindful.

(40:06):
Again, so part of it is thatshe has the right to not have
unhelpful people around, andthat includes family, and that's
a little tricky.
So, that could be somethingthat maybe like a post-partum
dual or the partner can helpwith, yeah, but just really
having that in the mind thatthat's an okay thing, you know.
And then they did this umceremony, you know.
I I actually have the storyfrom like Uganda, this tribe

(40:28):
would do this stepping outceremony after and they're
treated like warriors returningfrom battle.
That's amazing.
Can you imagine us doingsomething like that?
So, again, that could besomething like on a community
level, it could be done.
Like, for example, hospitalsmight have a stepping out
ceremony.
They might have something thatsaid, Hey, you did a great job.

(40:48):
I think all of these things arereally important.
Giving mothers a littlecertificate that said, Hey, you
did it.
It seems like a small trivialthing, but it does actually
become very meaningful on thatcontext because what it does is
it recognizes, it recognizesher, you know.
So it's like if you have thesesocial structures in place, your
perinatal mental illness ratesgo way down.

(41:09):
I would also recommend kind ofon a physiological level that
mothers take omega-3s and theythey check their vitamin D.
Yeah.
Make sure that that's sobecause so many of our mothers
are deficient, and that reallycan actually increase her risk
of depression.

Yeah.

You know, and so I would take a look
at those things.
Those are some simple thingsthat that mothers can do and
they can do on this onthemselves, you know.
Very straightforward.
Trying to get some exercise, Ithink, is a good thing.
Exercise has gone head to headwith Zoloft in randomized
clinical trials.
It's as effective asantidepressants.

Yeah.

But it is sometimes hard.
You know, if you're depressed,it's hard to do that.
But sometimes just takingsimple steps, like, okay, I'm
gonna walk outside to my mailboxtoday.

Exactly.

You know, I'm gonna use a baby
sling, which I think is one ofthe most useful inventions.
That's probably the only pieceof baby gear I totally
recommend.
Yeah.
One of those is it's likebecause you know, there's I
mean, there's so many people whowant to sell you crap.
Yeah, it's like a lot of it isnot particularly helpful.
And we've made mothers sonervous about everything.
Right.
Somebody told me, and actuallyI've started hearing this, that

(42:12):
now the big thing going aroundTikTok is mothers are worried
about the elasticity of theirnipples.
Oh, really?
Interesting.
And it's kind of like nipplesare elastic, they're supposed to
be because I mean, you know,and so they're worried about
everything, and they're worriedif they don't do everything
right, that the baby's not goingto develop.
I a lot of times joke when Igot out of school, I said, you

(42:33):
know, my PhD wasn't very helpfulbeing a new mother, and in a
lot of ways it wasn't.
I mean, it didn't tell me howto cope with what was happening
in my life, but what it did dois it gave me absolute
confidence that babies develop.
Yes, and so a lot of the adviceand the stuff that people were
telling me I had to do, I knew Ididn't have to because I knew
that they unless you put rockthem in a closet, they're gonna

(42:55):
learn to speak.
Yeah, they're gonna learn.
I mean, there's it's just it'swired into them, you know, and
you don't have to hover overthem to so they learn to use
scissors.
They usually figure it out,especially when they're a little
bit older, they figure it outreally quick, you know.
Yeah, you know, so letting momsa little bit off the hook on
this, you know.
What they just need is you tobe there and to be responsive

(43:17):
and have interactions with them.
And you don't have to beperfect, you don't have to be
perfect looking, you don't haveto actually have everything but
your hair and nails, try to seeif something that's a little
more simple regimen, so youstill feel good.
But um, they just want you, youknow.
Yeah, your baby to your baby,you are the best person in the
whole world.
They know you above everybodyelse, and this whole idea of

(43:41):
when mothers get this idea, mybaby doesn't like me.
Because sometimes babies likeresist when you try to put them
to breast.
But if they've learned thatit's a frustrating experience,
sometimes that happens.
Right.
Or if like in the hospital, godforbid, I've heard this too
from mothers, you know,somebody's pushing the baby's
head.
Yeah, yeah.
Babies do not like that, theyactually have a reflex that if

(44:01):
you push on the back of theirhead, they go back.

Yeah.

So you tell first of all, you don't
want to do that, but if you havethis attitude that it's the
same as bottle feeding, itisn't.
Relationship, you relax, youtry to, you know, be cool, but
we've got it all up in ourheads.

Yeah.

So we just make mothers so so crazy
with all the stuff we tell themI have to do.

There are so many things that I've been given
or got that I'm like, I don't,I don't need this.
There's so many times I justend up sort of DIYing it, doing
it my own way.
Well, yeah.
Yeah.

And honestly, this whole thing with
the lactation cookies.
And at first I thought, okay,well, I guess those are
harmless.
Well, then I'm hearing aboutmothers taking money out of
other parts of their budget topay the $80 a month for these
cookies because they have tohave them.
No, no, no, you don't.
First of all, no evidence thatthey actually help.
But if you want those, there'slots of recipes online.

(44:50):
Yeah.
You know, have somebody whip upa little batch.
If you want a couple ofcookies, go for it.
Yeah.
You're nursing a baby.
They're not magic, though.
Yeah.
You know, so it's just we put alot of pressure on mums and we
isolate them.
So again, I think probablywhere we really need to start is
actually pulling in differentcommunity groups, getting them

(45:11):
talking about mental health.
I mean, happy to see thatstarting to happen.

Yes.
Yeah.
And some of the things you'vedescribed, I'm like, I've seen
some of that.

It's taken a while, but people have
said, you know, there are somethings we actually can do.
And I said, I love the hospitalexample when they tell me that.
And I've heard several hospitalpeople have told me that from
different hospitals.
Something so simple.
They're walking, they'regetting sunshine and light,
they're getting exercise, andthey're getting social support.
Yes.
And they might not talk aboutreally anything, it's just

(45:38):
sometimes being in company andkind of like, okay, yeah, this
is fun.
Yeah.
You know, I remember one timewhen I was the coordinator of
leaders for Lola Julie of Mainein New Hampshire.
So we'd had a lot of snow thatyear, but I had a mama who was
like upstate Maine, like nearback four, which is way the heck
up there.
Anyway, we had down or us likeover a hundred snow that year.

(45:59):
So they would have had evenmore.

Yeah.

And she's home with two little kids
and she was losing her mind.
I bet she generally, I do notsay that in any kind of funny
way.
She was losing her mind.
Yeah.
And she could call me and shewould just be beside herself.
And I was just like, Listen,you have got to get out of that
house.
Yeah.
Promise me that you'll put yourkids in their snowsuit and
drive to McDonald's.
Go through the drive-thru.
But you need to get out of thehouse for a little bit.

(46:22):
I said, You're going a littlecrazy here.

Yeah.

And so she finally did.
But she, you know, she had ababy and was very fussy and
wouldn't take a bottle.
And so she didn't feel like shecould go any place.
And I said, Okay, just go inyour car.
Just break this cycle, thismonotony that's in your house.
Because I mean, it was bad.
And unfortunately, that snow isnot helping.

Yeah.
That isolation, right?
It's adding to that.
Absolutely.
It really, it really eats atyou.
I'm laughing because I can hearmy daughter in the other room.
She's crying.
Like thinking of maternalhealth, right?
It's disability.
My mom's hanging out with her.

But yeah, no, maternal mental
health, it just has such a hugeimpact on the culture in
general.
It really envelops everything.
And so people are like, Well, Idon't see why this is a big
deal.
It is a big deal.
It's a very big deal.

Yeah.
And I think when you understandattachment, so much of that
becomes obvious, right?
It's kind of impossible not tosee.
But I don't think, you know,not everyone in the world and
not even everyone in the therapyworld really is focused on
learning attachment or applyingit.
So thank you for drawing all ofthose connections and exploring

(47:29):
each of these layers.
I know you just redid this is afourth edition of your book.

And they're calling it the fourth.
It's technically the fifth.
It's because I changed thetitle.
So yeah.

Oh, right.
Yeah.
Yeah, right.
So, what's something you'velearned recently that changed
the way you're thinking aboutmaternal mental health?

You know what's interesting because
I've been working on somethingwhere I'm looking at that link
between no sleep andbreastfeeding and depression.
And what's interesting is I hadto do a talk for the UNICEF
group in Britain, and uh theywanted me to do something about
is it ever too late for braindevelopment?
Interesting.

(48:09):
Yeah, it was actually reallyinteresting.
So I found myself digging intothe intergenerational trauma
literature, and I was also kindof looking at how does this
stuff get passed?

Yeah.

And I really was trying to get down to
a nitty-gritty of it, you know,and one of the ways is what
happens during pregnancy tothose babies.

Yeah.

So if mothers are depressed or have
anxiety or PTSD, you know, theirbabies tend to actually be very
poor sleepers when they'reborn.
And crying fussy babies is oneof the things that we know that
causes depression.
So this reinforcing cycle.
And so you can see how thiswould get passed down through
the generation.
So a baby who is raised by adepressed mom is more likely to

(48:53):
be in depressed adult.

Yeah.

Okay.
And then they start the cycleagain.
They have a baby.

Yeah.

I mean, so it's like you can see
how this gets passed down.
People say, Oh, it's genetic.
Well, I think there can be somegenetic changes.
You know, this is the wholefield of epigenetics.

Yeah.

But I think it's also really very
specifically environmental.

Yeah.

So part of it and part of the way
to intervene in that cycle is tosay, okay, how can we help with
that baby fussiness and themother's perceptions of it?
Because that seems to be key.
I was actually looking at astudy about that, and it was
looking at anxiety and mother'sperceptions about her baby, and
then whether she's more likelyto continue exclusive

(49:33):
breastfeeding.
Because if a mother thinks ababy's a poor sleeper, she's
more likely to stopbreastfeeding.

Interesting.

Yeah.
And even though objectively thebaby may be not a poor sleeper,
but their belief about it.
And again, it comes down tothis idea.
Mothers have sometimes theseideas about what babies should
do.
And they should be crossing allthese milestones.
And you know, a lot of thestuff is just fiction.
Yeah.
It's like the dirty littlesecret is that there's a lot of
babies that don't sleep throughthe night until they're two or

(50:00):
three years old.
Yeah.
But it's not the same asinfancy.
You know, so this race to keepsleeping through the night, why?

Yeah.

What we have to do is help that
mother cope with that.
And like, okay, this baby isbeing very fuzzy.
How can we help?
Okay, so first of all, let'ssee if we can address this
anxiety, depression, or PTSD.
But also, what are some ways tocalm a baby?
And this could be a place wheresomebody, a support person,
could step in.
Okay, can I take the baby for alittle bit?
You feed the baby, and thenI'll take the baby for the next

(50:32):
hour or two.

Yeah.

Give me a break.
Because that's intense.
It's really intense.
Yeah.
If you have a baby with thatkind of temperament thing, I
would actually want to make surewhen you hear a baby that's
crying a lot, you want to makesure first this is my lactation
consultant hat on.
But we want to make sure firstof all the baby's getting enough
to eat.
That's critical.
Yeah.
Okay, so let's say the baby'sgaining wealth.
So we know they probably didn'tneed to eat.
But then we want to rule outalso too, does the baby have

(50:55):
some kind of physical injury?
You know, because they do, theyget injured in birth.
You know, it could be it's justtheir little heads are like a
little the head bones and it'sgiving them headaches, or that
maybe something happened totheir call.
I mean, this happens all thetime.
So infiropractic is superhelpful.
So again, kind of stepping inat each stage of that.
Okay, so the mother's anxiousduring pregnancy.
So let's see if we can addressthat during pregnancy would be

(51:15):
ideal.
If the baby's fussy after,okay, how can we help the mother
cope with that?
How can we bring in her supportnetwork to cope with that?
How can we help treat heranxiety?
And how can we also make thewhole sleep situation easier?
You know, as long as having thebaby nearby so she doesn't have
to completely wake up toaddress, you know, nighttime.
So these are some environmentalthings.
But what I'm really struck byis it's a very complicated

(51:38):
relationship between infantsleep and breastfeeding and
mental health.
It's not quite asstraightforward and it's
different than people expect.
And actually, and I have putthis in writing, so I can't take
this back, but it is actuallyin an article that I published
because I said, you know, it'skind of strange, you know, that
exclusive breastfeeding mothershave lower rates of depression
because they wake up a lot more,they don't get as much sleep.

(51:59):
It's actually not true.
They do wake up more, but theyget more sleep.

Yeah.

Yeah.
And I think it's because whathappens is it takes them less
time to get back to sleep.
Yeah.
And so that's, I think, thekey.
They don't have to turn on thelights, clean a bottle, put it
in.
Yep, yep, yep.
And so if we can intervene,kind of every step of that.
But I think part of it is justthis is where I think
practitioners do need to kind ofstep up.
Is like, okay, you haveanxiety.

(52:24):
What are we gonna do about it?
And medications are onetreatment, but there's lots of
other things.
There's you know, all kinds ofapps that help with anxiety.
There's cognitive behavioraltherapy, is very effective for
it.
So again, a lot of timesthere's interventions that we
can do that don't necessarilyinvolve medications.
But address it, but address it,assess it, and okay, you got

(52:44):
it.
Let's look, you know, let's seewhat we can do about it, let's
take some steps.

And I love that you're emphasizing too, just the
importance of sleep and that itdoesn't have to be eight hours
straight through.
It's just, are you gettingenough?
And I I know last time you werehere, we talked, we were
talking more about pain andchronic pain.
And you mentioned that peoplecould induce pain in the body or
chronic pain, you know,fibromyalgia sort of scenario by

(53:09):
depriving them of sleep.
Well, waking them up every timethey hit that deep sleep.
Waking them up every time theydid deep sleep.
So it's so interesting becauseI've internalized that so much
that I when I wake up in the ifit's morning and I wake up and
I'm in pain in my body, I go, Ijust need more sleep.
I will tell my partner I needanother hour instead of oh fine,

(53:29):
I just gotta get up now.
I just know, I just and andit's magic, you know.
I get another hour or two ofsleep and my body doesn't hurt
and I can wake up and do my dayand have a totally different
disposition with my daughter,and it's so worth it.

So I you know, I think that that's a
great application of it.
And you know, I think part ofthe thing too is like, you know,
like it where you are in yoursleep cycle, a lot of times you
can tell by how easy it is foryou to get up, right?
You know, so if you're awakenedfrom deep sleep, you're like,
and and I've learned that onetoo.

I feel like like I just got shot in the brain,
like it's happening right here.
Like, oh, it's so painful.
And it is deep sleep, it isearlier in the night, right?
Because it's usually like I getwoken up 20 minutes after I
fell asleep.
I'm like, you I can't even tellyou what day, I have no idea
what's going on.
I not making any sense.
It is so painful.
And hopefully I can get backthere, right?

(54:21):
And get back to sleep.
But yeah, there are momentswhere I'm like, I'm remembering
the information you taught meand I'm applying it.
And so I want to thank you forthat.
I'm really actually I don'thave enough brain power to
consciously think of you in themoment, but overall, you
definitely improve my life withthat information.

Well, you know, and it's like we think
about kind of how can we applythis some others?
You know, how can we likepartners to do what your partner
is doing?
Yeah, you know, to like let youhave that extra bit of sleep so
that you can actually functionand feel better.
And how can we do that?

And tie it together so they know what that
means too, right?
Understand it's not just ohyeah, like we're all tired, we
all need more sleep.
It's like there are momentswhere it's like, you know, this
is really crucial for me.

Well, and it's kind of like I always
say there's there's thedifference between tired and
more tired.
Yeah, and like when they get tothat more tired, you know,
they're hanging on by a thread.
That's when we need to step inand don't say something dumb
like, well, everybody's tired,right?
No, okay, yeah, but this is alittle bit extraordinary.
And this is when we want tostart maybe thinking about like
that emergency strategy, makesure she gets like a four-hour

(55:23):
stretch.
You know, and so you want anawake partner for that because
otherwise the mom's gonna wakeup, she's gonna hear that baby,
she's the one who's wired, she'sgonna wake up and hear that
baby, you know.
And so what we want to do ismake sure that the whoever is
kind of helping is there to takecare of that baby so quickly.
Yeah, and again, this is notsomething you have to do every
single night, but you want toget it to a point where there's

(55:44):
like a bit of a catch-up, yeah.
So try it for a few days, youknow, and see if they're feeling
I mean, and I think sometimesthe first time you get a
four-hour stretch when you're inthat phase, you wake up the
next morning and you feel likeyou're born again.

I mean, it's just it's amazing.
I remember sometime in thefirst three months, I got six
hours straight once, and I feltlike I had just been given the
most powerful drug.
I was like, this is amazing,and I feel great.
Wow, that's what sleep does.

Oh, this is good stuff.
This is really good.
So, I mean, yeah, it's amazing.
We can help with that, but atleast thinking about you know
how even in pregnancy, yourmental state actually influences
how your baby sleeps, so italso influences how you sleep.

Yeah.

If you have these conditions, chances
are your sleep is gonna be poor.

Right.

So it's kind of like that's why
it's important to address thosethings.
Yeah, and I don't mean justhanding somebody a depression
scale.
I mean, okay, let's go overthis and okay, here are some
options for you, and let's checkback in a month and see how
you're doing.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.
So is there anything you'reresearching now that's like a
curiosity or a question or athing that you want to learn,
want to know about maternalmental health?

You know, one of the things I just
wrote a paper on, and I have toadmit, I've been really I won't
say depressed about it, but likevery saddened by is that
research I've been reading aboutmothers in the military.
And I want to know what we cando to make that better, because
most of these military branchesactually have family advocacy

(57:14):
programs and stuff, and yet therates of depression are just sky
high.
And that's without militarysexual trauma.
Okay, so the national rate is13%.
Okay, but for mothers with nonwith no military sexual trauma,
44%.
But you add military sexualtrauma to it, 77%.
77% are reporting depression ortesting depressed.

Wow, yeah, that's high.

That's that's so high.
That is so high.
I mean, and and I want to kindof know why, because it's not
necessarily just combatexposure.
There's something in thatculture that's not very
supportive, even though I knowthey're trying.
I mean, I know that I've workedwith some of these programs,
and they've got these visitingmoms programs, they've got all
these, you know, things to help,and yet they're rates, and it's

(58:04):
like we saw that consistentlyacross like four studies with
good-sized samples.
I was just amazed, and itcontributes to negative birth
outcomes.

Wow.

I think at one study found
something like 28% had pretermbabies.
Oh the national average is 11%.
So it's giving an idea.
This is not this is not good.
So I think that that's one areathat I've been kind of looking
into.
It's one of the reasons I wrotethat paper.
So then I decided to track itback.
Like what kind of histories arethey coming with?
Because I have seen articles.
We get articles like that inthe journal I edit.

(58:35):
And, you know, looking back andsaying about different veterans
and soldiers that oftentimescome in with histories of
adversarial experiences, or inthe case of women partner
violence, you know, and you comein with these histories, then
there's a the add addedvulnerability of the culture,
plus also sometimes combat ontop of that.

Yeah.

So that's one area that I've been
actually quite concerned with.
Yeah, I've been reallyintrigued with some of the
alternative treatments that areon the horizon.
Like this repetitive transmagnetic stimulation.
It's amazing.
It's amazing.
It's got a great track recordfor treating depression in the
general population.

Okay.

Just starting to use it now with
pneumons.
Okay.
So it's basically a cap you puton.
It's got these little coils,and it what it does is it puts a
gentle, very gentle electricalcurrent through the brain and
kind of like basically sort ofdown regulates the parts that
aren't supposed to be as activeand up regulates the parts that
are.
It changes the brain, the waythe brain is functioning on MRI,

(59:32):
and actually stops depressionpretty quickly.

Interesting.

Yeah, and it's a very non-invasive,
non painful kind of treatment.
Yeah.
Is actually showing somethingvery interesting.
They're using that again in thegeneral population, 500
milligrams twice a day.
Okay.
But it's anti inflammatory.
So that's going to be, ofcourse, it's going to work for
that.
I actually was convincedenough.
I started taking it myself.
There you go.
I thought, yeah, this is goodstuff.

(59:58):
Yeah.
Vitamin D deficiency.
I think is a big one to lookat.
So I'm really very gratified tosee so many great treatments
alternatives on the horizon.

Lisa Danylchuk (01:00:07):
Yeah.

Kathleen Kendall-Tacket (01:00:08):
They're coming.
You know, you can see it.
They're just starting to comeinto the postpartum space, but
they've been in, they've had atrack record.
You know, even like ketaminefor severe suicidal depression,
obviously under very closesupervision, you're not taking
it home.
You're using it in the doctor'soffice, but actually helps
break that really suicidaldepression.

Okay.

Kathleen Kendall-Tacket (01:00:28):
Really, that's exciting to me.
And that's a treatment that'sbecoming more and more
available.
Acupuncture with depression.
Very good, very good.
Because what we've startedgetting is review articles from
China.
So Chinese authors are able toread the Chinese literature and
then translate it into English.

That's amazing.

Kathleen Kendall-Tackett (01:00:46):
Yeah.
So there's some really goodexciting things.
So there's certain populationsthat are at definitely at high
risk that worry me a lot.
You know, but I see otherthings that are actually really
helpful.

Yeah.
It's great to just think of andhave that brainstorm of all
these things that are helping,all these options, right?
Just to hear that there areoptions can be and then to find
the one that's like, oh, thatsounds good to me.
I want to talk to my healthcareprovider about that.
Right.

Kathleen Kendall-Tac (01:01:07):
Otherwise, you know, if you if you only
present medication, then peopleare kind of like, I don't want
to do that.
I don't want to take that.
You know, and that happens alot.
You know, it could be part ofthe culture.
There's a lot of cultures thatjust don't trust, you know, what
one paper described as Anglomedicine.
Sure.
You know, or if you look in theAfrican-American community, a
lot of times there's a strongdistrust of medical

(01:01:30):
establishment.
They have a track record withthat.
There's been a lot of abuses.
And so again, they're veryleery about a lot of these
psychotropic medications, andthey're not really acceptable.
And it's like sometimes they'rethe appropriate treatment.
You know, if you got somebodywho's like absolutely adamant
against them, you know, we talkabout the plus SIBO effect,

(01:01:50):
there's no such a thing as a noSIBO effect.
No SIBO, too, right?
Yeah.
You can actually cancel, youcan cancel out the positive
effects.
It's amazing, actually, thatyou can do that with your brain.

Well, I want to thank you so much for coming
back and talking through all ofthese layers and all these
options.
I feel like not just formothers and for women, but for
anyone who's parenting.
Anyone who's parenting and justfor anyone who's a human and a
member of society, just continueto value and include.
Obviously, we all came fromsomewhere, but right.
I'm pretty sure that's someform of mom.

Yeah, exactly.
You know, I was watching a talkthe other day and they were
kind of like, How many of youare mothers or fathers?
And not very many people raisetheir hand.
How many of you had mothers andfathers?

People are like, yeah.
Do I have to still talk to themto raise a hand?
Yeah, yeah.

Right, exactly.
But you know, as we said, weall come from someplace.
I I really, you know, want tosee us take this as a really
important measure.
I would actually reallyrecommend that talk PPD by
Office of Women's Health.
That's actually a reallyexcellent program.
They did a bunch of great.
Yeah, so take a look.
That's a good resource.
And naturally, the veryexcellent book, Depression and

(01:03:00):
New Mothers.

Yes, very excellent.
Depression and New Mothers,Volume One, Volume Two.

Volume one, volume two.
Yeah, volume two is where weget into like the assessment and
all the treatments.
And you know, if you reallywant to know like the evidence
base for the various treatmentsand stuff, it's all there.

Okay.
And people can find you on yourwebsite.

Kathleen Kendall-Ta (01:03:16):
Absolutely, absolutely.

Kathleen Kendall-tack it.com.

Yep.
And we're posting uh we've beenposting some webinars and stuff
that we I've been doing.
So there's a lot of informationavailable.

Amazing.
Yeah, and I see you do thingsum specific to breastfeeding
there too.
So there's some resources onthat.

Kathleen Kendall-Ta (01:03:33):
Absolutely, absolutely.

Yeah.

And actually, as you mentioned, art.
If you would if any of yourlisteners would like some free
art, if you go to mypreclarispress.com and go to the
section mark art, there's a lotof free downloads.
Oh, nice.
There's some nice posters andsome, you know, things like um,
and if you have any ideas, youknow, let us know.
Because we take stuff.
And uh, we we a lot of times,you know, get pictures sent to

(01:03:57):
us of like this is my visionboard.
I use this for my birthdaymoms, and this is my nice.
Oh, that's got a lot on birth,and he's got a lot on
breastfeeding and you know, justkind of general kind of
postpartum.
So um, yeah, there like youknow, there's a lot of free
stuff.
There's some stock art that'sactually really inexpensive, but
the free stuff is like that'swhat I really want to read
toward.

And that's Clarispress.com.
And we'll put a link in theshow notes for that.

Yeah, that'd be good.

Thank you so much, Dr.
Kathleen Kendall Tackett, forbringing all of your brilliance
here and helping to support andvalue postpartum moms, new moms,
mothers, parents, people whoare raising children.
I so appreciate all your workand everything you've shared
with us today.

Well, thank you very much, and thank
you so much for the work thatyou're doing and like really
reaching across all thesedifferent groups to integrate
all this information and yoursupport of families, especially
going through this prettyvulnerable period.

Yes, thank you.
And I don't know if anyoneheard.
If you're on video, you mightbe able to catch a a glimpse of
a puppy who's been here thewhole time.
Oh, yeah, yeah, I saw being sogood.
Let's get Boomy on the screenhere.

Well, I actually have a cat laying
behind my computer.
He has actually been very good.
Oh, is he cute?
Wow, he's massive.

Cute, like 85 pounds.
He looks like an Irishwolfhound, actually, but I don't
think yeah, he kind of doesacross the face.
Yeah, he's got that big jaw.
Hey, buddy, you want to say hi?
Boomy bear.
What's his name?
Boomy, B-U-M-I.
Boomy.
Oh, isn't that cute?
That's a cute name.
I love it.
I love it.
Good boy, thanks for beinghere.
Yeah, you're good boy.
You're good boy.

(01:05:31):
Thank you so much forlistening.
Now, I'd really love to hearfrom you.
What resonated with you in thisepisode and what's on your mind
and in your heart as we bringthis conversation to a close?
Email me at info at how we canheal.com or share your answers

(01:05:52):
and what's been healing for youin the comments on Instagram, or
you'll find me at How We CanHeal.
Don't forget to go tohowwecanheal.com to sign up for
email updates as well.
You'll also find additionaltrainings, tons of free
resources, and the fulltranscript of each and every
show.
If you love the show, pleaseleave us a review on Apple,

(01:06:14):
Spotify, Audible, or whereveryou're listening to this podcast
right now.
If you're watching on YouTube,be sure to like and subscribe
and keep sharing the shows youlove the most with all of your
friends.
Visit how we can heal.comforward slash podcast to share
your thoughts and ideas for theshow.
I always, always love hearingfrom you.

(01:06:35):
Before we wrap up for today, Iwant to be super clear that this
podcast isn't offeringprescriptions.
It's not advice, nor is it anykind of mental health treatment
or diagnosis.
Your decisions are in yourhands, and I encourage you to
consult with any healthcareprofessionals you may need to
support you through your uniquepath of healing.

(01:06:57):
In addition, everyone's opinionhere is their own, and opinions
can change.
Guests share their thoughts,not that of the host or
sponsors.
I'd like to thank our gueststoday, everyone who helped
support this podcast directlyand indirectly.
Alex, thanks for taking care ofthe babe and taking the fur
babies out while I record.

(01:07:18):
Last and never least, I'd liketo give a special shout out to
my big brother Matt, who passedaway in 2002.
He wrote this music and itmakes my heart so very happy to
share it with you here.

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