Herbal Womb Wisdom

The sacred windows of our lives, whether postpartum or perimenopause or menarche or any significant transition, are portals of extra sensitivity. In some ways, they are a gift in that we can almost recreate ourselves from the ground up, renewing, and discovering a new version of ourselves. In other ways, they are tender, even vulnerable, times that require extra care and deep nourishment to replen...

In these wild times, so many of us are seeking meaningful ways to engage with our emotions in generative, life-giving ways.  As women and female-bodied folks, we have commonly been socialized to dampen our intensity, our ferocity, our tenacity.  To sit in patriarchal spaces that center the power of a leader on a pedestal versus the power of the circle itself. But what can a different way look and...

I had a conversation with a friend recently, and the topic of presence came up. Not from the lens of meditation so much as from the lens of what's helping us move through the wild terrain of life these days.  We talked about how easy it is to get drawn into the past - distractions, addictions, spirals of longing, attachment to old stories, replaying what's already happened - or the futur...

From the Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) lens, the first 40 days postpartum are a key time to deeply tend the body, mind and spirit after birth.  According to today's guest, Madeline Ishmael, this time is characterized by a need to replenish both the blood and qi -- and while there are a number of ways to do this, she focuses largely on deeply nourishing foods in her practice. She blends h...

So many of us feel deep grief, overwhelm and even lost in the midst of the ecological and upheaval we are facing collectively. It's not easy to know what to do, where to turn, what actions are meaningful and worth our time.  The truth is our nervous systems are not made for the level of constant stimulation and overflowing awareness that we are being exposed to. We need to honor our capacity,...

It's officially Springtime here in the northern hemisphere, which means so many of our plant friends are returning! Some of those wild weeds might be exactly the herbs that can help you as we transition from deep winter into the heat of summer. But the term "spring tonic" can be confusing and vague, like what does that even mean? And how can we effectively incorporate them into our...

Postpartum is an immense time of transition that includes not only having a new baby, but also navigating a massive hormonal cliff, recovery after birth, body changes, erratic sleep schedules, identity change and so much more. So where does pleasure, sexuality, sensuality and eroticism come in?  And how do we enter into that space with attunement, tenderness, self-awareness and... perhaps most imp...

What if relieving menstrual pain or releasing stuck emotions in our wombspace could be fun, engaging, and... include twerking? It can! To be honest, I've tried twerking in the past and maybe it's because I've compared myself to others but I just figured I was bad at it, and it wasn't for me. Today's guest, Twerk Temple teacher Abigail Morrissey, laid it all out in a way th...

Wait, what? The moon affects your hormones? Well, kinda. It can at least. In this week's episode I share both about how this works from a physiologic lens (yes there is actual reasons this can happen), but also how our bodies - so full of water - are obviously also impacted by the moon. Is the tides of the ocean can be pulled, why wouldn't the waters of our bodies as well? We are not sep...

So often when we hear the word "intimacy," we think of sexual connection or relationships.  It's so common to limit our sensual, emotional or physical closeness to our primary partnerships because that's really what we're socialized to believe is appropriate. But what if... there's more a spectrum around intimacy? And how could exploring this "platonic intimacy,&...

I'm sure every single one of us have experienced a craving for chocolate either during our premenstrual days or when we're bleeding.  Our bodies crave chocolate with an innate knowing at different times of our cycle, really. Mine does at least! But today's guest, founder of Emerging Wisdom Cacao Samantha Veitch, shares a much deeper story on the ways cacao can support us through eac...

Last week I read some quotes from Dr Rosales Mesa.  She said,  "The prophecy of a new ancient world isn't something we wait for. It's something we EMBODY TOGETHER... Your ancestors prayed for you to awaken the wisdom in your blood and bones. You were not born for colonial submission... Despair keeps us in the colonial story. Hope is ancestral." And my goodness, they resonated....

Not sure I've ever gotten so vulnerable on a podcast to date.  First of all, we are essentially celebrating FOUR YEARS of this podcast this week. Weekly episodes. A true labor of love. Secondly, I have a very vulnerable ask I share within the first 7ish minutes. If you'd be open to listening to that and perhaps sharing my work, this episode, the video, or the Natural Contraception progra...

I read a post this morning from someone in Slovenia who said we are "underreacting" here in the United States. In some cases, this may be true.  But I also see a lot of people highly reacting to the immense onslaught of too much-ness that we're navigating right now. And in that reacting, it could be actively doing things, but it may also look like reactively numbing or shutting down...

Many of us are feeling the wobbliness of the world right now. It's not easy to know what to say, how to engage with our daily lives, or really what's going to happen. And while that can feel destabilizing (obvs), it can also be a really good time to consider our own personal resilience -- to honor that, listen within, and build towards greater capacity. This is not the same for every per...

How do you relate to the fierce intensity that is rage? So many of us are socialized to dim this part of ourselves, to tuck it inside, that it is NOT welcome in the world. For women and female-bodied folks, it is common to be labeled "hormonal" or "hysterical." And what does that typically mean? Anger, irritation, rage... This is so deeply embedded in our cultural ways of knowi...

How can the wheel of the year support your inherent wellbeing?  Not just seasonal connection, but actually feeling into the qualities the season offers and intentionally working with some of that energy to enhance your life... Today's conversation with Corinna Wood explores this topic as she describes the Wise Woman's Needs Wheel she developed at a time in her life when she was walking t...

What if your cycle was a storyteller? An oracle? A guide to help you more deeply understand what your body is telling you? This is exactly what your cycle is, whether you're in your peal fertility years, have irregular cycles, hormonal imbalances, are perimenopausal or beyond.  And while for some people, hormonal birth control is an important ally, for others they were put on the pill to &quo...

What is arousal and how is it related to your vagus nerve, past trauma or feeling unsafe, your stress levels, or even your body just being built differently? In today's medley episode we explore all of these concepts.  In this liminal time out of time that is "holiday season" there is often an overstimulation happening, but also an invitation to slow down.  I heard recently that thi...

What can it look like, even in the fullness of the holiday season, to orient to restorative practices for deep wintertime wellbeing? What if we treated this time as the transitional rite of passage that it is along the sun's path of rebirth into the new wheel of the year? In this week's medley episode, you'll hear about practices from Ayurvedic, Traditional Chinese Medicine and West...

So many of us live with some form of chronic or acute pain. We get used to it, we look for ways to relieve it, we may find some things that work - temporarily or long term.  Sometimes that's movement practices, sometimes it's bodywork, sometimes it's structural adjustments, etc.  But more often than not, we're not actually looking to the root of the pain.  And unfortunately if...

It is a total MYTH that nursing is birth control, so if you've heard that I'm sorry to say, you're out of luck. It is true that for some people, lactation may deter ovulation for many months or years. But it is NOT true for everyone, unfortunately. This is why there are so many unexpected pregnancies that come soon after a previous one. And honestly, unless you are planning on that,...

How does living in deep relationship to the seasons and cycles of nature impact your sense of belonging on the earth? Today's guest, co-founder of Moon Seeds planner - Erica Ela Bartoli, spent some formative years traveling and living in intimate connection with the elements, first in a yurt and later as she traveled around Africa, with the sky often as her ceiling. During these "rewildi...

So much of life these days seems to be polarized. As if the world is black and white, right and wrong. And this is no different in the birth world. As social media reach has taken hold, I've been watching the rise of polarity especially in the "free birth" community. Honestly, I had friends freebirthing before Instagram existed, but I also trained in homebirth midwifery for 5 years....

Holy mama! This week is monumental and I want to honor it with you because this podcast would be nothing without the community of thousands of listeners who have tuned in over time. THANK YOU. Today marks episode 200!!  So I decided to craft a simple episode highlighting the power of celebration -- to embody the practice of celebrating (including 2 of my biggest celebrations from this podcast jour...