Herbal Womb Wisdom

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...

What does it mean to connect with your inner wild woman (or wild womb)?  And how can you more fully embody this innate creative, sensual, generative, wisdom-keeping part of yourself in ways that feel inspiring and unique to you? It can be easy to look online at social media accounts painting with menstrual blood or embodying some fierce quality of themselves with animal hides and think... "th...

Navigating the whirls and twirls of perimenopause can feel like a wild ride.  But amidst all of this transitional terrain, what if there was also a potential for immense power? There is! And this is a lot of what we explore in this week's episode. Business mentor and life coach Olivia Bowen shares about everything from how her births supported her spiritual growth to how her surprising entry...

So many of us are walking around with the beliefs we created in childhood running the show. And almost always, we are unconscious of it. Largely because we have other parts of ourselves protecting us from feeling or becoming aware of the hurt parts of ourselves. These "parts" protect us, or try to, and in a way cause us to act and react to everything from social interactions to work to r...

Let's be honest that most of us are poorly informed about all the non-hormonal birth control options we have.  Our providers basically tell us we should either choose something they have on offer (whether that's IUD's or hormonal contraception of one kind or another), and dismiss the efficacy of the myriad non-hormonal birth control options we have access to outside of the medical s...

Nearly all of us have experienced some kind of menstrual, sexual, pregnancy loss or release, birth, postpartum, womb or other pelvic trauma. And most of us just sort of... live with it. Or we find pathways to healing.  Today's guest, Catherine Simone Gray, speaks to her personal journey of reclaiming her pleasure, growing into her power, and healing through her painful (and transformational)...

Wait, what? Astrology can give you insights into your reproductive, sexual or menstrual health?  I know it might sound a bit wild, but astrology has actually been revered for not only divination but also for understanding tendencies towards physical, mental, emotional and spiritual weaknesses and strengths for hundreds (perhaps thousands?) of years! And our charts can actually give us useful infor...

The transition into autumn is always a bit of a shock to the body.  Shifting from expansive heat to cool and dry weather, the leaves falling, the plants going dormant, shifting their vital force down into their roots, the turning inwards. So how can you tend your body, mind and whole being in this time?  And especially with all the instability -- of Vata season and our collective global experience...

What if pleasure was not just something that feels good, relaxes us, helps us feel connected to something greater but ALSO had potential to be therapeutic - like physiologically? Wait, whatttt?  So much of our clinical training - whether in the medical or alternative health fields  - tells us to stay away from pleasure when working with people.  And in a way that makes sense. We need to create som...

Have you ever woken up from a dream and wondered, "what was THAT about?" Maybe this happens to you all the time, or maybe you barely remember your dreams. Either way, we all dream. And learning to work with our dreams from a more intentional or even therapeutic lens can be incredibly supportive in navigating complex mental or emotional states or even past or recurrent trauma in our lives...

What does it mean to be "erotically alive"?  And how can connecting with the earth and your senses enhance that experience? Today's episode is a beautiful conversation with sex and relationship coach Usha Rose all about how to incorporate your relationship to plants, elements, seasons, the earth and more into your sensuality and sexuality practice. We talk what ecosensuality is, how...

What herbs can help bring your bleed on? This is a question I've been asked in so many ways over the years. Honestly probably one of the most common. And we ALL deserve access to this information. Especially in these... turbulent times. I'm not talking abortifacients, I'm talking when you are still in your luteal phase and would be expecting your menstruation in days or weeks. THIS...

How does Ayurveda view the perimenopausal transition?  And what are some of the tools and strategies that might be helpful to incorporate in this time to both reduce and prevent the common symptoms that show up in this time? According to today's guest, Ayurvedic Health Counselor Kristen Timchak, the perimenopausal transition is often characterized by qualities of Vata dosha. Irregular cycles,...

What if it's not your hormones? What if your hormones are actually alerting you to something deeper going on? Because, they essentially always are.  Today's guest, Rapid Transformational Therapy practitioner Natalie Ryan Hebert, speaks to the drop in estrogen in the luteal phase as a time when deeper truths (including core stories, trauma wounds, childhood imprints) may show up more prom...

Wait? So contraception can fail? I'm sure we've all heard the stories of folks using some form of contraception and still ending up pregnant, or maybe this has been you! It was a little uncanny to hear that my last two guests on the podcast BOTH had the experience of becoming pregnant while using contraception in their early years of sexual activity. So I thought it would be a great topi...

So many of us are taught to feel shame around our sexuality, orgasms, pleasure. What happens when we shake a little of that shame and modesty off and start to explore what's really possible? The truth is, there is SO MUCH MORE than most of us have any idea about. Today's guest, intimacy expert Susan Bratton, is a 64 year old woman who says she's juicier than she's ever been, an...

It's a bit of a trendy topic these days, especially in healing-centered communities, to speak about generational or even ancestral lineage healing.  But what does that even mean? And how can you begin to engage with it? And how does this relate to what you may be holding in your wombspace - physically, energetically or otherwise. While some people may have a very healthy relationship with our...