The word every mother needs to hear

0:07Hey and welcome to this episode of Motherkind. It is me your host Zoe Blaski. We are sponsored by Wild Nutrition Women's Supplements. And this is the show that is going to support you through the wild ride that is modern motherhood. I want this podcast to help you feel seen, to feel validated, understood, and give you so many expert-backed tools and ideas that will help you feel like the most confident, regulated, happy version of you that there is. Thank you so much for being here. And I can't tell you what it means to me that you let me into your world. and I promise I will keep doing everything I can to make this podcast better and better.

0:48Next year will be 10 years of the Mother Kind podcast. Can you believe it? And one thing that helps me to keep doing this work is you, my community and my listeners. When you share an episode, when you tell someone at the school or nursery gates about it, when you subscribe, I cannot tell you the different it makes. So thank you so much for helping me in getting these important conversations to reach more and more mothers who need to hear them. I remember the first time I heard the word matrescence. Honestly, it changed everything for me. I went from feeling like I was doing it all wrong for the first time, really realizing that the early years of motherhood are actually meant to be a time when everything gets thrown up in the air and just like adolescence it is a process of huge change and adjustment and so from that moment I went on a mission to spread the word about the word matrescence not only of course the word itself but the concept and what it really means and to share tools to help us navigate this time with far more ease and self-compassion which is what every single mother going through their matrescence needs.

2:03Self-compassion. I believe that in the core of my being. This week's episode is a conversation I had as part of this mission with my friend Helen Marie. She's an incredible therapist and she invited me onto her podcast to share what I'd learned about matrescence and I wanted you to hear it too. So here it is.

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3:55Zoe, welcome. I'm so delighted to have you on the podcast. Oh, likewise. Thanks for having me. Because I was actually a guest on your podcast. Yeah. Was it your first ever podcast? And it was my first ever podcast. And you were amazing. I didn't feel it. I remember feeling so nervous about it. And I'd never done one before. and you invited me on to talk about my book and I was like okay I'll do it I'll be brave and it was wonderful and you're such a pro at your podcast it's wonderful and I felt so at ease so thank you oh no I loved I loved your book and I loved your work so I thought let's get Helen on having no idea of course that you hadn't been on a podcast before so I'm glad it was a good first experience it was and I'd already been to this studio because this was where I'd planned to record my own podcast and you had no idea so the whole of it was such a beautiful synchronicity i love moments like that it was those little nudges that you're on the right yeah it felt right so um yes but beautiful to have you here on my podcast talking about your book which is i'll hold it up for the camera beautiful cover which you said your husband designed yeah he ended up helping with the design yeah beautiful and it's called mother kind which is the name of your podcast yes a new way to thrive in a world of endless expectations sunday times bestseller yes incredible i know incredible i know so happy endorsements you got from around the world were incredible so many experts so many i mean it's just full of expert advice isn't it yeah i mean that really it was a culmination of the seven years on the on the podcast and what was actually specialist I had to re-contact every guest that I've had over the years even though they've been on the podcast and and you know check with them that I could use their words and it was so incredible because I think we have over 100 experts in the book and every single one of them said absolutely yes and you know we've got Glennon Doyle and Gabor Marte and Mel Robbins there's some really big people who could easily have just ignored the email but I think that's testament to how passionate people feel about supporting mothers and on the podcast people you say to me how even when it was smaller how are you getting you know Gabor Marte and Rangan Chastity and you know some really Mel Robbins and some really big guests and and the short answer is I think that so many people can see how difficult it is for mothers today and parents in general and don't often get the space to talk about their expertise with that lens and I think that's why the podcast has done as well as it had.

6:30And I always wanted to do that. I always wanted to get really heavyweight well-being, mental health experts, but to talk to mothers and motherhood, because I was really, really into self-development and growth and healing. And then when I became a mum, I felt like none of it fit anymore. Like I'm not gonna have time to meditate for an hour. What are you talking about? Or do a morning routine. I was like, my morning routine is like, Where's the morning? Where's the night? It all blended into one. And I felt really frustrated by it, which is one of the reasons I thought, OK, well, let's get some of these people on and ask them, how does this apply to motherhood?

7:08What are we supposed to do? How are we supposed to handle all of these challenges? And so many of them were parents as well. And I think that's why it resonated so much is it was almost like they could come and talk without that lens of their profession. Exactly. Yeah. And the realness of motherhood. Tell me a bit about your background, because how did it all start? Were you a coach before you were a mother? So I went to Leeds Uni and I did economics. Oh, I went to Leeds, but I didn't do economics. Which was really challenging for me. I loved economics in so many ways. It was so difficult. But I'm definitely the sort of person who I really like rising to a challenge.

7:50I there was no part of me that thought I'm going to quit this. I just thought I'm going to master this kind of who I am for better and worse. I think that push through mentality is quite strong in me. So I actually ended up doing really well in that degree. And then I got on a graduate scheme, a big corporate and went into marketing and did that for 12 years relatively happily. But always on the side. I was really, really, really obsessed, I'd say, with self-development and healing and cycle breaking. so I actually got into therapy really young I think I was 21 when I first went to therapy and then I got into 12-step healing I got into meditation I got into kundalini some quite wacky things I just loved but I sort of felt like I was living this dual life because I would go in in a suit Monday to Friday and on the weekends I would be doing you know God knows what in a child healing retreats and everything like this and I consistently kept getting the feedback that the thing I was best at was managing and coaching my teams.

8:52I would get that pretty consistently. I was okay at marketing, but I was far better at supporting team members. And often I would coach team members to leave if I saw they had a bigger dream or if they weren't aligned. And obviously from a business perspective, not always great, but I did do coach training in every one of those jobs. I managed to get some sort of, you know, training in management or leadership training or leadership coaching. So, but in no way did I ever really think that I would make it my profession. I just thought this is going to be my kind of outside of work passion and hobby.

9:30And then I left corporate world. I actually could see that many of the women who were mothers who were super senior in that corporate world, I could see that that wouldn't be the life for me. You could see it in front of you. I could see it. So there were many mothers there. That's something I faced as well. Yeah, it was never said, but I could see it. And I think that's because I'd done so many years of, you know, I'm very empathic and I learned how to tune into what wasn't being said and how people felt. And I could see just the stress and the burnout and the push and the bull. And I thought that isn't for me.

10:01So then I, before I had children, I left and I started my own little marketing consultancy, which was very small. It was just me and I would you know go in and support brands and I and I loved that and I thought I'll just continue doing that I'll become a mum it'll be great I'll have some time off and then I'll just go back to doing that but what happened on my time out of paid work wasn't really a maternity leave because I wasn't being paid by anyone and it definitely didn't feel like leave felt more like service I love this reframe at the moment where it's maternity service why have I missed that I I have not even heard it.

10:36Yeah. Yeah. It's an incredible reframe. Gosh, no, I've missed that. So we're now framing it as... Well, there's a book, Emma Barnett, who's an amazing journalist. Oh, I have seen it. I love Emma. I've just seen her book. You're right. She's just recently just continuing to talk about that phrase because I think it's really powerful. This idea that you have that year off paid work and it's kind of, you know, luxuriously pushing a buggy around a sunny park is not the reality for many mothers. For some it is, of course, not every experience is the same, but for many, many, many. And for me, it wasn't that experience at all.

11:11I thought I'd be OK because I'd done so much work on myself. And I think I had a therapist at the time, but it just it wasn't OK. I felt really broken by the experience. I felt that I loved my little girl so much. And what came up for me was all that perfectionist, hard on myself. My inner critic raged because I struggled with breastfeeding and I struggled with bonding with her. And I felt really broken. What a word, though. What a word to say. Yeah, I did. I did. Because I think I had these expectations of how it was going to feel. and no one had really or certainly I hadn't found the people or the places or the information we were talking about how it could feel and so I looked online I assumed that there would be books courses podcasts retreats just like there was in my previous life that would support me with this and I found nothing really that this was a decade ago say how old is how yeah nearly nearly 10 so So how much has changed in 10 years?

12:21Oh my gosh, it's phenomenal. Because what was at 10 years ago, the bestselling book in motherhood was called Hurrah for Gin. I was sober. I was like, well, great. I'm really screwed. If our solution is gin and I don't drink, I haven't drunk for many, many, many years. So I was like, okay. And it was the rise of the mummy blogger. And there was a huge focus on fashion and kind of being cool. and it just didn't fit with me and I really wanted the depth I really wanted to say this is normal or this is what's going on or here's what you can do to help and I didn't find it so but because I'm such a push-through person I was as I was talking about before I can see where it comes yeah I I thought I'm just going to research this myself and I started learning about so many fascinating things I started learning about cycle breaking I started learning about how your child or your baby will bring up all the unhealed areas of you will bring up how it felt for you being a baby will bring up you know those parts of you that maybe you've tried to overcome the perfectionist the hard on yourself side I learned that I was being so hard on myself because I cared so much and that was just a huge relief.

13:38I learned about this word matrescence but actually becoming a mother is as big a transition as adolescence. It's a huge life transformation and actually my experience I now know was kind of normal. It's kind of how it's supposed to be in so many ways. It's meant to be like a time of questioning and confusion. You are not meant to glide through motherhood all joy and florals and singing lullabies. No, I didn't either. No, and I think we've got this, you know, this picture in the media that we've absorbed in our subconscious. And, you know, as you'll know a lot about, that is what drives our beliefs and our behaviours.

14:18Well, it becomes our story. Exactly. It becomes an imprint, becomes the blueprint. Right. So I had this blueprint that, you know, if you don't feel entirely grateful and joyful all the time, you're doing something wrong. I now know that picture and that blueprint was the problem, not me. Yeah. So I started to feel incredibly passionate about this and would basically tell anyone that would listen. A baby group, can you imagine? And a very well-meaning friend said to me one day, you know, so I wonder if you should share this somewhere. I think they just really were like, whoa, this is a bit much because when I get into something, I am incredibly passionate, which is, I think, what's kept me going.

15:00no of course you can see that you can see that that that that um threads all the way through your work yeah i'm just really passionate about about it you are but you're passionate but you also really want to share it yes like you you really help people feel less alone in it yes but come back to that word matrescence yes because it's been around in your book you talk about it It's been around for 19, 20 years. Yes. My children, well, my oldest is 25. I had, I'd never heard of it for the whole time. Most people never have still. Where's it come from? So in 1973, there was a social psychologist called Dana Raphael who first coined the phrase.

15:43Then it's kind of was in academic circles and never made it into the mainstream at all. is only in the last decade. I mean, in 2019, it was added into the dictionary. Oh, OK. So it's very, very, very, very recent, you know, and I'm so indebted to some incredible people that have come on the podcast that have, you know, taught me about matrescence. Dr. Alexandra Sachs was a pioneer. I wanted to read something of hers. She has a TED Talk, which is amazing. I definitely suggest people go and look. I'll link it. Yeah, Amy Kabaz is an amazing journalist, actually, in Australia, who had very similar experience to me and has done a lot of pioneering work in matrescence.

16:28Lucy Jones here in the UK, she wrote a book called Matrescence. So it's really changing and growing. Even when I read that word, it felt comforting that something was being given to that stage in your life where you haven't ever experienced anything like that before. And then you're thrown into this new way of being where it's all about the baby. You are so lost in yourself. You've changed unrecognisably. And it can feel so incredibly lonely. And I was reading something, no, listening to something this morning about loneliness in motherhood. Reports were saying up to 70 % reported feeling lonely in motherhood because you just don't understand yourself.

17:16And when there's a lack of support, it's just amplified, isn't it, at that stage? And so much through your book when I was reading, I was, if there was support laced through all of these lines, through all of these words, if we dearly held on to this fact that we felt supported so much would make that matrescence easier yeah exactly and you know I talk about in the book Gabor Marte who's is an amazing amazing guy and he talks about how actually it's not so much what happens to us in our lives as to how it impacts us it's more about how supported we feel through what happens in our lives and that's really why I wanted to write the book you know ideally I'd go around to every mother and give them a hug and give them that support but I can't do that this is my version that is your version of it is to try and help someone feel supported and not alone I think you're right that word matrescence I think just lands with people so much because and I know when I heard it I just broke down into tears because it was one word and one concept that completely explained the just the the jigsaw of confusion and more joy and love than I'd ever felt but also So more isolation and loneliness and rage and fear and guilt and all of it.

18:35And it was all just in this big melting pot. And it's almost by putting a word on it, it normalized it for me. It made me feel like there wasn't anything wrong with me. And I really love the phrase where words make worlds, you know, without a word, it's very difficult to make sense of something. And I think that's why it's so powerful. I mean, I often think, imagine if we didn't tell teenagers that they were going to go through adolescence. If we just hid it under the carpet that they were one day going to wake up and their body would feel different and their brain was actually different, which is what happens in matrescence.

19:12And their identity would feel all shifting and everything would feel strange. Imagine if we just didn't mention that and we were like, just carry on. Silence. Can you imagine? Well, that's essentially what we've been doing to mothers and continue to do. It really is. And I love the way you said about the words, because we use that in therapy all the time about if you could give a name to this feeling now, if you could name this experience, the moment we put a word to it, it's like, oh, I can hold it. That's right. Well, in Buddhism, they call it name it to tame it, don't they? Yes. In mindfulness.

19:49It's exactly that. And it's that word just helps. It helps soften, doesn't it? The experience. And there is, you know, from past generations, such a pressure, don't you think? Such a pressure to just get on with it. I mean, when I put this out on my Instagram story, inviting questions, which we'll go to a bit later, people were messaging me saying, I can't believe you're talking about this. This was just never spoken about when I had children. We didn't feel safe to say we were struggling. There was so much shame attached to struggling. I mean, that's across the board as well, isn't it? I feel like we're in such, I feel so grateful to be alive at this time, you know, at any point in history, because I feel like there are so many things that were once so shameful that actually now not only are accepted, but are being more supported like menopause.

20:40I mean, it is wild to me that in many ways, it's very similar parallels with with matricence. We just let women. I actually said sorry to my mom. I said, I'm so sorry. I had no idea what that must have been like for you. Even in our family, we completely ignored ignored it. Just it wasn't a thing. No, I know. I know. And just that understanding. I think who was it? I can't remember who it was now. someone on Instagram the other day was walking around and asking, I think it was Emma Neville, actually. She's doing a lot of work, Gary Neville's wife on menopause. And she was asking men in the street, what do you know about menopause?

21:19Nothing. That's it. It can feel like in our Instagram world, because everyone that I follow is, you know, wonderful people like you, pioneering, honest, passionate. I think when you step outside of that, you realise actually we've got so far to go. and I went onto the street and asked people if they knew what the word matrescence was. Did you? I didn't know. Yeah, and no one did. No one. It was actually hilarious. People were saying, is it a mattress company? One guy said, is it a sport in the Olympics? No. Okay, we've got a lot of work to do. Yeah, but see, for me, that fires me up. Yeah, no, I love that.

21:58You're doing the work. But your book, let's come to a bit more about your book because there's some beautiful parts in it that I wanted to read out and look and you did talk about Alexandra Sachs, Dr. Alexandra Sachs. Yes. And she wrote this beautiful part. Too many women are ashamed to speak openly about their complicated experiences for fear of being judged. This type of social isolation may even trigger postpartum depression. Imagine if you were supported through this. I think they're your words actually. And it's what I was saying, how is your matricence going? Do you have enough support? Now, when she talked there about not speaking openly about your complicated experiences, I was reminded of, and it's not just through those young years.

22:45So you talk about post-native depression, but actually I went through a really tricky time with the teenage years and I shut down. It's before I became a therapist. I shut down. I didn't know about this stuff. Couldn't talk to anyone because I thought no one's going to understand me. So much shame that I wasn't being the mother that I wanted to be or could be felt so unsupported. And that's a really lonely experience. Probably guides you to understand why I then trained as a therapist. We all have an experience is why we went through to it. But it's, she says so clearly and beautifully there, you know, support those mothers.

23:25Did you feel supported in those early years and through the years? I did once I started the, once I started Motherkind. Okay. I really did. Okay. I really did because I just immersed myself in honesty, really. Yeah. And you know, the community's grown and, but in the early days it was, you know, very few listeners and it was just DMs back and forth and it was, it was a lot of, yeah, I did feel, I did feel supported. Not before I started, I felt, you know, That's one of the reasons I started it. I definitely felt that loneliness. I was searching for it, weren't you? And I was searching for that community where I could talk about these deeper, more complex feelings without judgment.

24:09I love that. And you talk about identity as well. How did that affect you? Because that's one of the big things, isn't it, of motherhood is one moment you're not a mum and you had your corporate work or whatever you were, you know, your new business. And then the next moment you are a mum and everything changes. Yeah. But we're expected to be who we were before. Yes, exactly. And that's, I think that's one of the things that I love most about matrescence and that word and the work that I do in my coaching practice is, is helping people work through that identity. Especially if you're someone like me, you know, I was really, my identity was really wound up in who I, what I did and how successful I was.

24:52and I was always someone who was quite controlling and hyper-efficient and organized. And I think those are the types of mothers I've seen in my coaching practice over the years that often struggle the most in those early years of motherhood because babies and toddlers and young children are the opposite of all of those things. You know, really uncontrollable. Your time is not your own anymore. It's really hard to be efficient and organized. And if you think you don't have that foundation within yourself, which I didn't have I now do of I'm okay regardless of whether I get dressed today or how much I do today or whether my kid has seven tantrums in the supermarket I know that I'm doing okay without that I think that's where so much of the pressure and the comparison and the just kind of grabbing for things like you know set structures of what we should be doing and all of that I think comes from that place of you know that unraveling in in identity and it's really difficult I think if your worth has been based on external things particularly in the world of work and that changes for you which it does for most women that how their your relationship to work will change I think it's I think it's really difficult but I think if you're supported through which is what we what I do at Motherkind is support mothers through that process in terms of asking yourself some super simple but really powerful questions like what matters like what matters to me now what are my priorities it's amazing how many people haven't thought about that and in many ways why would you have you know you're sleep deprived and if no one gives you the idea of thinking well hang on a minute what what has changed in you how are you different what qualities have you developed and how why are those important to you and what what type of a person and mother do you want to be and what does success mean to you now because for most women and actually most parents their version of success will change but I think if you haven't got that defined and you haven't got that clear it's so easy to just keep trying to go back I just want to get back you're right it's the going back yeah because it feels like a safety net like when you know the cheese the seas are choppy and you don't know who you are and you're in your matrescence you're in that kind of no man's land of figuring it all out it's like a life raft to go back I'm just going to try and get back to the old me but that old you's kind of sailed on in the same way your teenage self has sailed on as you went to adulthood you you would never say to a child struggling through that adolescence don't worry you'll get your old self back.

27:33You would never say that. It sounds insane. But that is what we say to mothers. That's what we say. Completely missing out this developmental phase of matricence. And so I say it's not bouncing back. You're not going to get the old you back. You're going to grow forwards. You are becoming, you are becoming the woman that you are meant to become and your confidence and your clarity is going to come but you have to engage with it in some way by you know reading the book or listening to the podcast or i have little kind of 60 minute online courses you do super accessible from a time and a price point because i just want to reach as many people as i can watch that or even put it in your ears and answer some of the questions because clarity only comes from taking a pause yes you know that right that's what therapy is it's taking that pause And getting that clarity.

28:25Perspective. Exactly. Setting back.

28:34I love the way you, throughout the book, you put those questions in. And I love that question you said there. And I think that's really grounding for a lot of mothers. What really matters to you? Exactly. You know, and the reason that we get caught up in all the other pressures is outside noise. Exactly. And you have a chapter on that, I think, don't you? I do. Yeah. So there's a whole chapter on called Take the Pressure Off, which is about so much of the pressure that we feel. Well, there's two ways that we feel the pressure. One is the external pressure, which is what you were talking to there, which is I should be doing it this way.

29:08And it should look like this. And my house should look like this. And I should look. That's all that external pressure. How does your nervous system feel? Oh, God, it's stressed. You can see it. Look at that. You did the dysregulation. Exactly. The body language. Can you see it? It's just the should. I really felt that when I read that. You had that whole list of I should, I should, I should. And it is. It's fear, isn't it? You're either, how do I do that? It becomes too much, doesn't it? Well, it's impossible. It's impossible. It's impossible. You know, because we're battling those subconscious ideas and those blueprints, as you would call it, and the stories of how it should be and, you know, all the way that motherhood is portrayed in the media and, you know, it's a huge amount.

29:49It actually takes a huge amount of confidence. And that's what I tried to do in this chapter was to teach people, actually, let's look at where all that external pressure is coming from. And some of it might be important to you, but some of it won't be. So let's kind of a lot of it won't be. But, you know, let's let's work through that together and, you know, pick out and throw away the things that that don't matter. And then there's internal pressure. You know, I have to do this perfectly. I can't make a mistake. You know, and often that comes from much before motherhood. You know, those are old patterns.

30:24And that's why I talk about motherhood is such a time where you can start to shed some of those old ways that actually weren't serving you. think about okay what would it look like if I could just take some of that pressure off myself if I could be kinder to myself if I could start to notice where my critical voice gets loudest and how might that look to reframe it how might it be if I started to feel more worthwhile just for being me as opposed to what I can achieve and that's really big you know I'm still on that path that's huge but you can start it you can start it yeah yes I wished looking back I wish I'd been a lot kinder on myself.

31:03I think there was an awful lot of shoulds of how I should be bringing up my children. And I know the question you asked me at the end of your podcast, you know, advice for mothers, and it was to parents so much more intuitively with what felt right for me. And I think that's a big piece of advice for people is that actually what feels right for you, quietening down that outside noise. Some people don't have the experience of a kind, loving background. Some people do have the grade, but for some people, they come into motherhood and, you know, we see this online and it's being talked about so much more.

31:39Dr. Caroline Boyd talks about it a lot, that motherhood can bring up a lot of old wounds for you, can't it? A lot of old wounds. And with that, a lot of grief for what should have been in your childhood, that you can see is missing in your childhood, that you so desperately want to give your children. And with that comes a whole foray of emotions and feelings. Exactly. And that's that internal pressure. That's right. But if you don't know that, I think that can feel even more isolating and confusing. And actually, it's it's kind of deeper than that, because the age at which your children are will start to trigger that age that you were.