Postpartum Production

Hello, dear listener, and welcome back to Postpartum Production! We are thrilled to begin Season 3 of the podcast, and to be in community with you once again.  Before we kick off Season 3, Kaitlin checks in to provide an update on the podcast, a peek into what we’ll be exploring together this season (more on that in a moment!), and some heartfelt reflections on the never-ending challenges of...

In this episode, we look back at a few of the themes that emerged from our conversations this season and take stock of what this means now; looking back and also looking forward to the work we all have to continue in our examination of this intersection of caregiving and creativity. We’re incredibly grateful that our guests could take the time to sit with Kaitlin, and for their honesty and vulnera...

We are capping off our season of conversations with Ben Berman, the author of three books of poems and the new collection of humorous and literary essays, Writing While Parenting . Ben ​has ​won ​the ​ Peace ​Corps ​Award ​for ​the ​Best ​Book ​of ​Poetry, ​has ​twice ​been ​shortlisted ​for ​the ​Massachusetts ​Book ​Awards , ​and ​has ​received ​awards ​from ​the ​Massachusetts ​Cultural ​Counci...

" I think about rage as containing information. I talk about anger as a weathervane pointing you towards the places that need attention and healing. So I think rage can be useful in that way of teaching you what needs to change in your life. And it might be that you need more support or you need to not be in charge of bedtime every night or whatever. Rage is also useful in giving you the energy to...

“The way that we think about art, about care work or housework or maintenance labor is interconnected in the sense that these are spheres of society that are often deemed unproductive. Obviously, first and foremost, we need to resist that notion because it's the most important work that we do. I do think of writing as a kind of care work in that sense. It's like a tending. It's tending to our narr...

“It's like all of the pressures of everything happening build up inside you, and if you don't write it down or put it somewhere— I just couldn't even handle it. I had no other coping mechanisms left. I came to poetry when I was younger as a coping mechanism, and I think I still do sometimes. Some poets like to pretend that it's a totally intellectual practice and that there's no therapeutic benefi...

“I remember saying to my husband, I wish there was some sort of machine where I could attach a keyboard to my limbs and learn to type differently through my body so that the writing was a physical dance; instead of just my fingers dancing, it was my whole body dancing. I want to feel, not just sensations in my body, but feel my body in motion as I am writing.  And so a lot of what I do is rec...

**This episode is brought to you in partnership with the With Her and Mind Awareness Campaign of Mindful Philanthropy . Learn how you can act ‘with her in mind’ by visiting www.withherinmind.org .** _-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_ "Throughout life, we need people who are responsive to us, who listen, who think we matter enough to be listened to and who support us. And we also...

This episode is sponsored by  Needed,  a leading women's health supplement brand. ( You can save 20% off your first order of any vitamins or supplements at thisisneeded.com with code POSTPARTUMPRODUCTION .) AND Better Help , the world's largest therapy service 100% online. ( Go to https://betterhelp.com/postpartumproduction for 10% off your first month of therapy with BetterHelp and get...

This episode is sponsored by  Needed,  a leading women's health supplement brand. ( You can save 20% off your first order of any vitamins or supplements at thisisneeded.com with code POSTPARTUMPRODUCTION .) AND Better Help , the world's largest therapy service 100% online. ( Go to https://betterhelp.com/postpartumproduction for 10% off your first month of therapy with BetterHelp and get...

“Having something that you keep for yourself can actually be the most revolutionary and important thing that you could do in your postpartum journey.” ~ Kimberly Seals Allers We are thrilled to share with you this conversation with Kimberly Seals Allers , an award-winning journalist, five-time author, and founder of Irth . A leading voice on the racial and sociocultural complexities of birth, brea...

“It's okay to struggle in a society that doesn't support you. It's okay to be like, this doesn't work and I have to get some stuff done. The question is then, how do you approach those changes that you have to make with your family in mind [...] while considering everyone? So it's also looking at your child and saying, Yep, this may not be ideal, it may not be what I want it to be, but how do I do...

“I think of the boundary as in the pause. So your boundary is in the space between when someone asks you for something or offers something and you take your pause and then you can say yes, you can say no, or you can negotiate. So the boundary isn't the no, the boundary actually is the space. And then you decide how you're going to move. It's not a brick wall.” ~ Dr Pooja Lakshmin We’re really exci...

“The thing that has not changed for me is the need to protect the time that I need to achieve my creative goals. But the biggest barrier is [that] there's always more to do in that busy household. So you have to make a concerted effort to set aside that time.” ~ KJ Dell’Antonia In this episode, Kaitlin is joined by KJ Dell’Antonia, the New York Times best-selling author of The Chicken Sisters , In...

This episode features Kaitlin speaking with author and essayist Jazmina Barrera. Born in Mexico City in 1988, Jazmina is the author of four books in Spanish, Cuerpo Extraño , Cuaderno de Faros , Linea Nigra and the children’s books, Los Nombres de los Animales and Punto de Cruz , a recipient of the Latin American Voices prize and a finalist in several awards. She’s the editor and co-founder of Edi...

We'd love to highlight this episode’s sponsor, a product and company that's working to build technologies to assist caregivers in the early phases of postpartum and caregiving— the Bonoch Long Range Baby Monitor.   The Bonoch Long Range Baby Monitor is perfect for larger houses and bigger families so you can effortlessly hear your children when they wake and ensure they're cared for. Follow t...

“I feel like I have the most internal struggle when I recognize that my work doesn't have value in a traditional sense and that my creative work and the work I do as a mother is not valued in this system. And trying to remind myself of the values of that, trying to say, Okay, I'm going to spend time today working on this literary fiction that I know will not pay our bills. Does it matter?”  ~...

"What an immense privilege it is to be able to put words on paper." ~ Annabelle Kim  This episode is a special dedication to a dear writer-mother-friend, Annabelle Kim , who passed away in September of 2021 after a battle with stage 4 cancer. Annabelle, a mother of four, was a mechanical engineer, an inventor, and a novelist. She was the author of Tiger Pelt , published by Leaf Land Press, a smal...

**This episode is sponsored by  Full Spectrum Features , a nonprofit social justice organization that uses film to inspire dialogue and create impact. They’re a Chicago-based 501(c)(3) committed to driving equity in the independent film industry by producing, exhibiting, and supporting the work of women, BIPOC, and LGBTQ filmmakers. You can find out more about Full Spectrum Features and their...

This episode is a quick update from Kaitlin in which she checks in with you, dear listener, and shares what’s on her mind and what creative and early postpartum challenges she’s grappling with. If you’re a regular reader of our Substack newsletter , you’ll be familiar with her “Recent Musings” section; this is an audio version of the same. And if you have no idea what we’re talking about, no need...

A wonderful resource that's come up on the podcast is the  Artist Residency in Motherhood  organization, which  artist and mother, Lenka Clayton  started in 2012. Kaitlin didn't know much about the organization until last year(2021) when a fellow writer and mother, Amanda Montei mentioned it  in a class of hers  Kaitlin was taking, and then alerted the class of a Face...

“There's a tendency when talking about narratives of female empowerment to want historical figures to be wholly good or wholly villainous. And I think there's not always enough opportunity to look at people [for whom] maybe it's a bit more of a grey area, perhaps— they're complicated. They did some things that we could admire and maybe some are not so admirable. To me, that wasn't really an issue....

“I'm still trying to make sense of a culture of caregiving that ‘good mothers’ are good caregivers…A ‘good mother’ is someone who doesn't question or resist caregiving, whereas men are never socialized into that narrative.” Namrata Poddar Namrata Poddar writes fiction and non-fiction, is an editor for  Kweli journal  and teaches literature and writing at UCLA. Her work has appeared in se...

"I think of all the arts, poetry is a really good one to pair with motherhood, because you can do something that feels complete in the fractured time you have, and then you can revise it in fractured time." ~ Emily Pérez Have you ever been at a conference, totally energized and excited, but you leave and have lost all that momentum? Thankfully, this was not the experience for poets Nancy Reddy and...

“When I became a mother and the work deepened and changed, part of that was because if you're gonna spend the time on a project, it better be worth it. It better be important.” ~ Nora Fiffer Nora Fiffer is a writer, director, actor, and producer based in Chicago and New Hampshire. In New Hampshire, Nora co-founded  Firelight Theater Workshop , dedicated to creating innovative theater experien...