Overcoming Motherhood Identity Shifts with Julia Sparkman

ABOUT THE EPISODE

Julia Sparkman, podcast host and mom advocate, is joining me today on The Motherscope Podcast. In our conversation, Julia shares her perspective on overcoming the shifts that come with becoming a new mother. The way that she views motherhood is so aligned with what we believe here at Motherscope. Julia consciously practices radical motherhood, and I’m so excited for you to hear exactly what that means. This episode is for you if you’re struggling with postpartum anxiety or depression, or if you’re preparing for the birth of a new child. Enjoy!

 

TOPICS DISCUSSED

  • Learning to overcome the identity shift that happens during motherhood

  • What postpartum anxiety and intrusive thoughts looked like for Julia and how she learned to deal with them 

  • When Julia shifted away from hypervigilance and became more comfortable with life outside of the home 

  • How the COVID lockdown impacted Julia’s view of herself as a mother and led her to seek out talk therapy and healing

  • Being grateful while also recognizing the privilege of therapy and other healing modalities

  • Something that Julia does for herself now that she would have never done in the past 

  • The differences between preparing for your first born and your second born 

  • Julia’s solicited motherhood advice – take a break from social media

RESOURCES MENTIONED

THIS WEEK’S WRITING PROMPT

  • What is something that you do now that the old you didn’t think was possible?

ABOUT JULIA

Before JULIA SPARKMAN moved on to motherhood, she was a full-time yoga teacher, a marketing consultant, and a storyteller. Since college, Julia had believed that homemaking was the antithesis of feminism. Consequently, she entered motherhood with strong feminist beliefs and zero homemaking skills. 

Once her daughter was born, Julia made the decision to be a stay-at-home mom - until her kids are in school. Therefore, she enormously wrestled with her decision to stay home and she struggled with the domestic responsibilities of being a SAHM.

After overcoming a birth that did not go as planned and 18 months of serious postpartum anxiety and depression, Julia realized that conscious motherhood is a wild, radical revolution. And she has devoted herself to telling her stories and stories of other moms on her podcast, A Podcast for Moms. Please join her to revolutionize the World through radical motherhood.

  • Jackie Leonard 00:05
    Hi, Julia, welcome to the podcast.

    Julia Sparkman 00:08
    Hey, Jackie, thank you so much for having me. I'm very excited to be here today.

    Jackie Leonard 00:13
    I'll probably share this in the intro, but it's pretty, pretty fun to turn the tables because I was a guest on your podcast that I'm sure you'll share more about later. But to be able to hear you share your story, through this podcast is gonna be really special. So thanks for being here.

    Julia Sparkman 00:31
    I know it's fun to be on the other side. And I'll do a little nerve wracking. It's so interesting. When you turn the tables, it's like, Oh, okay.

    Jackie Leonard 00:40
    Yeah, it's totally a different mode. I've been listening to Bernays Brene Browns podcast, unlocking us and her sisters are interviewing her now. And they were just saying, like, Oh, it's so different. We usually go on and and she takes over and when asked to think about it, and to kind of flip the script,

    Julia Sparkman 00:57
    is that different role? For sure.

    Jackie Leonard 01:01
    Yeah. Can you share a little bit about yourself? For those listening?

    Julia Sparkman 01:04
    Sure. Yeah. Um, my name is Julia Sparkman I'm currently a stay at home mom to my two year old daughter, SLon. We were speaking for a moment Jackie and I before and I've been making sure to say two and a quarter because you know, to it's so broad, of an age rat gap that, you know, she's just turned two in August. And I'm also 30 weeks pregnant right now. So if I sound breathy, at any point, it's because my lungs are a bit cramped at the moment. As Jackie mentioned, I'm the host of a podcast for moms. And we'll talk about that more later. However, I'm excited. We just released our 15th episode. And we're gonna release two more before I take my maternity leave in January.

    Jackie Leonard 01:54
    Yeah. And, again, to be pregnant and have a two year old is a very special experience. It's a challenge, special and challenging. And so I commend you for, you know, taking the time to be able to sit and do this. So thank you. Yeah. Today, Julia, you're going to share a little bit about the question, what's the biggest hurdle you've overcome as a mom? And what you learned from that experience?

    Julia Sparkman 02:25
    Yeah, so when you pose the question, I, it really gave me a pause. And I had to think about it because I'm like, How do I encapsulate it? How do I put it into words? And what I decided if I was going to have to label it as one thing is the biggest hurdle I've overcome has been a complete identity shift. And I know I've spoken you know, I have a podcast, I've spoken to quite a few moms now. And you know, speaking to moms, that on the podcast as well, everyone changes their identity. Yet, for me. I believe that identity shift was really prompted by my postpartum anxiety and depression. And that completely changed who I was prior to be like who I was before I was a mom, and who I became not only during my pregnancy, and after I was a mom, it wasn't just like, the titles that changed other responsibilities that changed. It was my energy changed and the emotions I experienced change in the way that I navigated through the world changed and how I interacted with other people started to change. And I've wondered, you know, like, chicken in the egg wise, like, was my postpartum anxiety and depression, as bad as it was because I was dealing with this, like, upheaval of identity, and all of a sudden, I had all this anxiety in comparison, and it was really like me comparing myself to others and self judgments and self criticisms, or did I have, you know, was it anxiety and depression that was creating all those things in my life, it's hard to say yet prior to becoming a mom, I was super outgoing. An average day would kind of look like me waking up at 530 in the morning, I would have a friend that I would often meet for a run at six. So we'd gone to run you know, from like, six to 645 and then we'd have coffee. We ended at a coffee shop and then I would go home, shower, eat breakfast. I always had kind of like a non traditional work life like I've had will call call my quote, real jobs. But normally I would do like a few different projects at a time I worked in marketing, I lead yoga teacher trainings, I taught yoga, how to workshops. So a lot of freelance clients and so do Some work and then I never really kept the traditional schedule. So it's like usually around like three or four, I would like meet someone to go hang out and go on a walk. And then I'd go out to dinner. And it would often be like, lunch out to I did not cook at all. So it was like, I would eat breakfast at home, but usually lunch out, eat dinner out, go to some event at night time, whether that be like a woman circle or a yoga class or, you know, a movie screening, something like that, you know, like constantly out and about, and then wouldn't come home until like eight or 9pm. And then maybe like watch something or read something, go to bed at 10. And then let's start at the next day. So it was just like a very full day. Lots of things. I never just did one thing. So even if I had a full time job, I was teaching yoga to always kept up with the social engagements. And then all of a sudden, I became a mom. And I had rolled back all of the projects that I had done or was doing prior to the birth of my daughter. So I didn't have any projects lined up. And I became a mom. And immediately I was afraid to have people come to my house like this is before the pandemics my daughter was six months when lockdown happened. So even before the pandemic was even a thought in our heads, I was scared to have people come to my house, I didn't want people to touch my daughter. So I was this really outgoing woman. And then all of a sudden, I didn't want anyone at my home. And I used to be gone, I would say like 80% of the time. And then all of a sudden, I leaving my house was incredibly overwhelming for me going anywhere felt like the most impossible task in the entire world. Like if my daughter and I were home by ourselves, I was fine. Like I was like, okay, I can do this. But then to step outside, even to go on a walk felt like a big deal. And I'll never forget the first time that I took her to the grocery store by ourselves, she was probably three months old. And energetically, it felt the same as when I would travel internationally by myself. Like that's like the best way I can describe it like so before I had her. Um, I would travel all the time, you know, when abroad a lot. And I can remember my first time that I traveled internationally alone, it was to go to Cape Town, South Africa to study abroad. And I was like, This is what I feel like right now. Like I had the same like, needing to prepare and being there, I felt like a fish out of water. And this was a grocery store that I had been going to weekly, sometimes more than once a week for years at this point in time. And so it wasn't just like, oh, now I'm not working. It was literally how I moved through life and how I experienced the world completely. Didn't want at almost overnight. Like I was pretty anxious during my pregnancy, but not how not the level of anxiety that I experienced when I after I had my daughter. And then I also kind of mentioned comparison and judgment and self criticism. And before becoming a mom, I happily beat it to my own drum. And I actually really prided myself on the fact that I did things my own way and differently. Like I've never done things like other people i i never followed like a similar trajectory, I always kind of had my own way of doing things. And that was something that was like, almost a badge of honor for me. And then all of a sudden, there's so many decisions to make as a mom, right, like, very highly controversial, like vaccinations, sleep, you know, co sleeping, sleep training, and breastfeeding and all of the activities that you're taking your kids to. So I would look to these other women that I really respected. And I was doing things differently than them. And instead of being like, Yay, me like following my own path. I was like, Oh my gosh, why am I not doing this? Like them? Like what's wrong with me? What's my problem, and I would be very judgmental and self critical of the decisions I was making, even though they intuitively felt really right. Like I couldn't trust my intuition anymore. And I was I knew I wanted to take a break. I knew I wanted to stay at my stay at home with my daughter for a good period of time. Yet, all of a sudden, it's like after the three month mark, a lot of people kind of go back to work at three months and I wasn't anywhere near ready to do that nor had the desire to. But I started becoming so critical of myself like I couldn't follow my own To North, I had no desire to do any type of project. I didn't want to go back to teaching yoga. But I was so hyper critical because I was watching all these other women go back to work, do amazing things out in the world. And I still had not left my daughter for more than 45 minutes. Like, I don't think I left my daughter for more than two hours until she was closer to a year old. I we were, I mean, shelter never took a bottle. That's an entirely different story. But we were so I mean, the pandemic, and there's a lot that wraps up into it. But I was, I've judged myself, but I also didn't feel ready to leave her at the same time. And so yeah, my biggest hurdle was I completely I went from this really confident, outgoing, over involved individual to a complete homebody that had no sense of self conscious competence, and doubted myself, every step that I took, and really lost a lot of my social circle because I was unavailable, I wasn't wanting to go and do a lot of things. I didn't want to leave my daughter at nighttime, I couldn't leave because she was still breastfeeding. And so I missed that, you know, I really missed a lot of opportunities to engage. And yeah, it was wildly painful, is the best way to describe it. And yeah, I don't really know how else to summarize it, because there's so many intertwinement of things within that, yet. I sit where I'm seated. Now, the feeling completely different, thank goodness, I felt even a year ago at this point in time. And I look back, and I'm like, can I swear? Oh, totally. What happened? You know, I'm just like, Oh, my God, like, how did that happen? How did I go from being like the leader take charge. I'm really not afraid of anything to like, not being able to go to the grocery store, not wanting to have people come into my home, when someone would try to pick up my daughter. It was like, someone was like, trying to take my arm off my body. It's like, how, where did how did I get there? And I mean, trust me, I've done a lot therapy. So I understand, you know, how I got there now, from a hormonal standpoint, a psychological standpoint, but that was a really that was my highest hurdle to overcome. And, and I've shared a lot in my podcast, like, I did not have an easy life, like, I want to put it out there. So your listeners know, I'm sober. There's a lot of like mental health issues in my family. You know, I've definitely overcome a lot of things. Yet my postpartum experience was by far the highest hurdle that I have had to overcome in my life.

    Jackie Leonard 13:13
    Thank you for sharing this, I think I was kind of trying to retrace past episodes, because I don't think we've touched on the identity shift. In the postpartum phase, which I later learned after becoming among the there's like a name for it. Right? The mature essence. Yes. That Alexandria Sachs talks a lot about has focused on and brought back to kind of more public awareness, but I'm just hearing you share and recant. Your experience brought me like, right back to like those early. You know, a few months. I'm curious to start when did you feel like it happened like it's that shift happened? You talked about having some anxiety in your pregnancy, but that it really kind of exacerbated after becoming a mom, was it like, shortly after giving birth or was it kind of a delayed spike that you noticed?

    Julia Sparkman 14:12
    Yeah, so I mean, for sake of time, I'm my pregnancy was like healthy and I didn't have any complications. But when I arrived to give birth, I was hoping to give birth to my daughter. There's a hospital here in San Diego that has a birth center inside the hospital. And I was hoping to birth there, naturally unmedicated. And I arrived to triage and my blood pressure is super high. I had my labor triggered preeclampsia and so my labor and delivery went, I wasn't I didn't prepare myself for complications. I was literally just like one track mind like this is how it's happening. And then my blood pressure didn't go down. Like normally a lot of women They deliver their blood pressure goes down, everything's fine and mine didn't. So I had to stay in the hospital for five days. And while I was in the hospital, I was having panic attacks like pure panic attacks that I had not experienced in years like never have experienced panic attacks like that I can remember I asked for a towel and I was like, trying to do stretches on the floor of the hospital room, I had literally doused my pillow in lavender, because I was like, all the tools that I had, like I was listening to these like, guided visualizations, I was doing yoga, I was aromatherapy pressure points, everything that I could try to do to harness and alleviate some of the anxiousness that I was experiencing, and nothing was working. And when I left the hospital, it subsided. Quite a bit because when I was in the hospital, it was physical anxiety. I was literally panic. And then when I went home, it shifted from a physical sensation to all mental where I was just, my head would not turn off with intrusive thoughts and worry and over analyzing and yeah, it was it was pretty immediate.

    Jackie Leonard 16:19
    Okay, yeah. Yeah, I wondered. Because I, for myself, at first, I thought it was a very delayed thing. But when I walked back and thought from even the beginning of after I gave birth, it happened a lot quicker than I realized, like the intrusive top thoughts, like you, you described. And so I was curious if, if it was similar for you. Speaking to intrusive thoughts, I don't want you to, you know, share what you're comfortable with, of course, but I was wondering, when I loved the way that you compared going to the grocery store to, you know, international travel, because I could feel that, like it was like, oh, yeah, that's stressful. And to parallel those two was really, you know, really spoke to that. I'm curious, what were you able to figure out? In hindsight? What were the things that were keeping you from leaving the house? Was it like, a fear, like the intrusive thoughts, or did it just feel very hard to get out of the house?

    Julia Sparkman 17:17
    Both um, I mean, it felt hard to do that in the house, my daughter cried in her car seat. So whether that be in the stroller, or in the car, like I wore her in a carrier until she was over one years old, and she weighed 20 pounds at her five month appointment, so my poor back, but, um, she really didn't get over the crying in the car seat until closer to a year old. She just didn't like the car. So that was hard. Because every time I was already having anxiety, and then I'd put her in the car, and she would get upset. And truthfully, I was really scared of her getting kidnapped, or something happening to her. Like, I felt really safe in the house. And everyone kept sharing with me like friends like, Oh, you just you have to play in the party, you have to get used to it. Like if you just keep trying, she'll get more adjusted. And it took me a really long time to admit out loud that I was scared to put her in the stroller. And keep in mind at the time, I lived in one of the safest communities probably in California, right. I was worried. And I I know this sounds so ridiculous. Yet I know a lot of moms will be able to relate to me that someone if she was in the stroller, someone could run up and grab the stroller and run away with it. But if she was on my body in the carrier, then we'd be okay. And it took me probably until she was like seven or eight months old until I actually finally started saying, I don't like putting her in a stroller in public because I'm scared someone's gonna come and take the stroller from us. And it's challenging to admit that because I know it sounds so outrageous. I know that doesn't happen very often yet. And I listened to a podcast and premium the woman's name. She's like the free range parenting person and she breaks down like statistically how often people are asked kids are actually kidnapped by strangers. And it's so statistically small, and I understand that but that didn't. That didn't change anything. For me. I still had this wild fear. And that's another reason I didn't want to leave her with someone else and why I wouldn't leave the house is that it's like, I can't trust that someone's gonna watch her the same way that I do. And I was just too afraid to leave her because I was afraid of her being kidnapped or something happening to her when I wasn't around.

    Jackie Leonard 19:44
    Yeah, thank you for sharing that. I mean, you read about like, intrusive thoughts, but to like, put it more specifically I think I I've had all of those fears as well. I used to watch like Law and Order SVU and I like had to cut that completely like I couldn't watch it anymore because similar to you, like, very safe neighborhood, I would have fears of somebody breaking into my house and stealing them. And I couldn't sleep because I would be like paranoid that that would happen, or even driving sometimes would really freak me out because I'd be afraid of car accidents, or my son was a low birth weight when he was born. And I was terrified that my husband when he was carrying them in the middle of the night trying to put him to sleep might drop him. And I was like, what if he trips and falls and he falls over the stairs? Or, like I was just, and for whatever reason it, it felt like if I had him, it would be okay. You know what I mean? It's like this very, you know, when you say it out loud, it doesn't seem rational, like you were saying, you know, such a small possibility that that would happen. But I also felt like, sure enough, I'd see some random headline one day about some freak accident like that. And it would be like, look like this happens, this could happen, and it would totally just send me down that spiral. So you know, it's, I think it when I was in the throes of it, it would feel very, like, I'm the only one or I was crazy. And if I said it out loud, that somebody might think that I couldn't take care of my kid. It got to that point. So it can be very isolating. And even. I don't know, I don't know if it was through therapy, or just through close friends or whatnot, that you were able to finally say it aloud and you know, speak it. But I know for me that that was some thing that made it a lot less scary once you're able to kind of say it out loud.

    Julia Sparkman 21:32
    Yeah, I think that's what really helped is I internalized a lot of it for a while. And I didn't want to share it with people because I knew it sounded so irrational. But then once I started sharing the irrational thoughts I was having, they did lose some power over me when I was carrying them by myself and not sharing them. That was when they were impacting my ability to function and get out of the house. And one thing that I always say is like, Sloane probably had the best first year of life, because I just completely, you know, organized like, it wasn't like day to day, we had a good time. But that's because I structured around her and I wasn't like that for same but I wasn't trying to integrate her into daily life. Right? It was like we did everything that would be comfortable for whatever stage that she was at. And I didn't really push the boundaries. But within that I greatly suffered because I was isolated. I was not really socializing with a lot of adults. I wasn't doing things that I loved, because I was just making this really safe, comfortable environment. Overly safe and comfortable environment for my daughter.

    Jackie Leonard 22:51
    Yeah, I am curious when the shift happened for you, because you and also like what you've learned since then. Yeah. Because you talked about this wonderful first year for her and how great it was. And you said it was the biggest hurdle, obviously, you've overcome it in some way. So,

    Julia Sparkman 23:13
    yeah, so right around the time that she was probably like, five months old, I started to like, um, like, shimmy my shoulders. I don't know what word used to describe that. But I'm like, okay, like, I started feeling a little bit better, we'll say. And I signed us up for a music class, we had a music class that we'd go to. And we will go to two different storytimes libraries. And I was taking her to the grocery store more. And I know, Jackie, because we're both from San Diego. So I'm going to shout out a local San Diego place. I would regularly take her to good Anya cafe, just the two of us like once or twice a week, I would take her and go and either eat there with her. I mean, because it's really easy actually to take baby. It's much harder at the toddler. You know, I thought it was harder back then. But little did I know. And so we would go and I would like eat lunch and she would sit with me at the table. And soon it's like I started getting out and it was good. And then the lockdown happen. And that oh boy, like pushed me so far back because I had such intense fear around COVID I had a very unhealthy fear of COVID when it first started. And so I went from like making strides to not going as bad as I had been, but practically in terms of like fears, as bad as I had been so COVID the lockdown started like, right when she was six and a half, almost seven months. And then by the time that she was about eight months, I was like, I can't live like this anymore. I can't. Because one thing that I really struggled with was comparing myself you know, not only to other people's, but comparing myself who I used to be and who I thought I was going to be as a mom. And I knew that no matter what, how I was showing up, I was like, I cannot live like this. Like, I felt like I was suffocating. I felt like I was drowning. So my first step was, I started working with a therapist to talk therapist. And then I started working with a woman who she had studied spiritual psychology, but she was also a Reiki practitioner. So we were kind of doing more like, Reiki, somatic spiritual healing. So that was happening at the same time. And I had really bad diastole, I'd always been very athletic. But with my Vastus, I didn't know how my body just felt. So my body was just all out of sorts, after I had hurt, but I really started pushing myself to exercise regularly. And so it was like, right around that time that I, you know, made the shifts of therapy, you know, working with someone spiritually, and then also starting to move my body. And so that's kind of when the shift happened. And what I really learned from the experience was, it's kind of twofold. One is the need to seek out help and how important it is to really express where you're at and seek out help, and it's not. And I've said this before, several times, if I would have just gone to therapy, I don't think I would have made the progress. It's like I needed the mind, body soul healing to happen all at once. And I also have to say, I was incredibly privileged to do that. And that's something I think a lot, I think about all of the time, it took a lot of resources, a lot of financial time, you know, there's a lot of investments that were made, and my heart breaks for women who don't have the time and the opportunity and the resources to achieve that. So I wanted to call that out as well. So it was really, you know, going to therapy, but it was also like learning grace. And that was something that I never had for myself, I had a little bit more for others. But I never realized what high expectations I had for myself, and I had some pretty low lows in my life, but it's like, I bounced back. And it's like, I would hit the bottom. And then I would like hit the ground running. And I hit bottom. And I stayed at bottom for a long time, like once in months and months. And so what helped me kind of get to the other side, and what I learned was self compassion. And, and yeah, really like self compassion and to love myself and to kind of almost like nurture myself in a way where it was like, instead of being so hard on myself, and so critical of how much I was struggling, I really started using like, positive, respectful parenting myself, where I was like, oh, man, Julia, like, this is really hard right now. And you're doing a good job. I mean, like, I had to have that self talk. And so yeah, that was kind of what I learned was how to fully ask for help and to surrender to that help. And then to just have like, so much grace and compassion for myself, and I never, ever had that in my life.

    Jackie Leonard 28:21
    Yeah, it's so important that you highlighted the, the well rounded the wholeness of the care that you were able to give to yourself, because I think sometimes, you know, I just think of the past my past self, and I did personal training, before I had kids, and I felt like oh, this is my therapy, I used to think like, you know, design working out my body was really good for my mental health, I felt like and I think just going to talk therapy, for example, for the same reasons that you said, Isn't isn't going to be as fulfilling as you need it to be if you're not really integrating it with other other tools. And as you highlighted, that's not something that's accessible to most people right now. And to see how much of a need it was for you, and for me to, you know, is, I guess we could go on and on about the injustice of that, but I'm, I like to think about the growth or like, before we finish, I want to talk about kind of where you are now. And with all the work that you put in to overcome the hurdle that you shared a little bit about what is like something that you do for yourself now that you, you know, past Julia would have been like, I can't do that.

    Julia Sparkman 29:42
    That's such a good question. Um, I would have to say, honoring and viewing arrest as equally important as output. And really, when I feel like when You look at all the buckets of your life, right? It's like what I used to accomplish personally. And when I say personally, because don't get me wrong, I'm working harder than I've ever worked in my entire life to be a mom. But when I think of like my creative output, or my spiritual output, like what I'm doing for my self care practices are Meditation yoga. So my own personal bucket, I'm probably doing as much in a week as I used to do in a day, right. And I used to judge myself about that. But now I have. What I'm doing for myself is setting really realistic expectations. And so being excited about that five minutes, I get to meditate instead of judging the five minutes. And then also giving myself and like scheduling in I don't have the same energy or the same time to output like I used to. And so realize realizing that when I'm taking downtime that is equally as important as when I'm working on my podcast, or when I'm doing any other output type of exercise that those two things share equal weight in my life. So I think that's what I'm doing for myself today. Because I didn't realize how burnt out I was in my past life. And now I feel internally almost better than I've ever felt before. And that's because, like, I've taken my goals, and I've stretched them by like five years, right? It's like, I used to want to accomplish something, and I wanted it to happen in six months. And now I'm like, Oh, I'm going to do this. But I'm going to do this three years from now to give myself space to both do it. And then to also have time to read and to relax, and to take leisurely walks, not you know, just like go out there and like bang out a workout. It's like, take a stroll. That's, I think what I'm giving myself today.

    Jackie Leonard 31:57
    Yeah. And I also hear that you're learning how to kind of enjoy the process of these longer term goals, right? I think maybe in our 20s are just in a different mindset. We think once I get to this goal, I'm going to feel so great. And it's like, no, let me like, stretch it out and enjoy the process of getting there and and care for myself along the way. So I can actually feel it and enjoy it and 100% there. Yeah. I thought of one more thing I wanted to ask just because I think like you said, this is such a topic that we really should spend a lot of time talking about. Now that you're about to have your second. How do you How are you preparing for this period of time that was so difficult for you the first time around?

    Julia Sparkman 32:46
    So I'm so happy you asked that because I know you're ending questions, and I was gonna offer that. But I'm like, No, this would be too long, because I made my answer more sustained. However, I felt going into my first pregnancy, I prepared for the pregnancy, right? Like, that's what I prepared for I parent prepared for birth. And that was it. It was like, after that, yeah, I had bought the stuff that I knew I needed to buy for a baby. And I read the book. So I thought I was ready. But I really didn't have the pieces of the puzzle in place to support myself in the ways that I needed to be supported. And so this time around, what it looks like is I am writing for my husband, a Google Doc that says these are the meals that I'm going to need. And this is how you prepare them. And so I don't have to step by step hold his hand to do it. You know, while I'm like with a toddler and a newborn baby, and I already have a therapist in place where I didn't before I already have an acupuncturist in place, right didn't before. I'm working with a midwife this time that's going to continue to support me postpartum, not just at the six week visit, right? It's like last time I worked with the midwife but it was a midwife to a healthcare system. So this time I'm working with a home birth midwife. So whether I transfer or if I have a complication I have to transfer or if I do end up having at home which I desire. I am working with a midwife that's going to check in with me a day after three days after a week after two weeks after six weeks month. You know, it's like continuous support and care that had not received and also my husband's going to take a longer paternity leave. He took three weeks last time and I often feel very guilty sharing this but I want this to be the norm so I'm going to share it with like excitement. My husband's taking six months off. That's I really feel the biggest difference. Yeah, your jacket was just snapping. It's like that is going to be the night and day difference is integrating the whole family into the postpartum experience and having that support and I get that is a luxury that very few people have. We are just fortunate that he works at a company that privileges paternal and maternal leave. And so, yeah, I'm gonna have him around. I have a lineup of incredible women, you know, midwife, therapist, acupuncturist, I have a doula that will come back around and support me after the fact. And I think that's the biggest difference where it was like, I literally had the baby, I was in the hospital for almost a week after I delivered, my husband stayed home for two weeks, we had nothing planned after that, it was just like completely on my own. And this time around, it's like, 180 difference in terms of like, here's my structure, here's my support, here's my nourishment. And so yeah, I feel very different going into this postpartum, because I have I, that's what I'm focused on, I'm like, the baby's gonna come out one way or the other, we're gonna get the baby out of the body, I'm not focused on that, this time, I'm focused on what we're going to do. And the days and weeks that fall.

    Jackie Leonard 36:03
    Yeah, and I love hearing this, like release and control in the way that you've also prepared and that you don't know what's going to happen, you know, exactly, you don't know, uh, you know, any of those things that can happen. But you have such a team and a sub sort of support system and all this things in place that will be there to assist you and be there to help you along the way. You've created that foundation. And I think that's like the kind of preparation that you know, comes from a place of knowing also, this is your second time around, but also just like, a different awareness of what's important. So thank you for sharing that. And yeah, just, I want to highlight that even though it's not common in our country, it is more commonplace some of the things that you're describing in other countries. So it's not something that that needs to be the way it is. Well, I, again, could talk on and on about this, because something I'm very, very passionate about, especially the postpartum period. But to wrap up, there's three questions that I want to ask you to end our conversation. The first is, what is a song that you would use to describe your motherhood experience.

    Julia Sparkman 37:21
    This is kind of like the ideal. It's Trevor Hall, everything I need. When I take a step back, that's when I'm like, I have everything I need. I don't have to seek out another expert. I don't have to buy anything else, you know, it's like we have everything we need.

    Jackie Leonard 37:40
    That's beautiful. The next thing is what's some solicited mom advice or a mom hack that you would like to share with other moms?

    Julia Sparkman 37:49
    Yeah, so it was funny because I was going back and forth where I really wanted to like rally cry around, take care of yourself postpartum, like have a postpartum plan, like spend more time on your postpartum plan, but I decided to go with spend time off social media. And that's a hack for me, because there's so much greatness that comes from social media, like that's how I was connected to you initially, you know, there's so many valuable resources, knowledge connection, yet, when I can unplug from social media, I find that I have more energy, I'm comparing myself less to other people. I'm not bombarded with information. So it gives me an opportunity to really get clear on what I value and what's important to me and what my daughter needs from me and what I need as a parent. And then when I'm able to go back on I have better discernment and better regulation, and then I fall off the rails and then I pass again, it's what happens.

    Jackie Leonard 38:53
    Yeah, it's a little bit of a cycle. But uh, but it's, I think it's something that is very normal. And you I've noticed that it loses its power when you are able to step away. And so yeah, you're so right. Yeah. What we stimulate like, are the different stimuli that we surround ourselves with. has an effect. So we should be sensitive to

    Julia Sparkman 39:14
    that. And I think particularly as a new mom, I think you know, moms who are like maybe into it more years, it's not as like woe to them. But as a new mom if you're following these like parenting accounts, it's like so much information coming at you and I think sometimes you just have to figure out what works for you and stop seeing you know, all these like sleep accounts and feeding accounts and positive parenting accounts and just take a step back and allow yourself to find your own path.

    Jackie Leonard 39:42
    So good. The last question is, what's something that you watched listened to or read recently that you would love to recommend to us?

    Julia Sparkman 39:53
    Well, obviously my mother scope you know, scenes that I get I'm in the mom slang club so highly rated Man that. However, one thing that really rocked me was the show made on Netflix. I watch, it took me a while to get through it. Usually, it's like when I find a new show, I can kind of like plow, but I needed some space, which I mean, it was emotional for me, yet watching that it helped me reframe my own experience as a parent. And it also reminded me and inspired me of how much work we have to do to build in the support network for families in our country. There's so much lack that I would say a majority of families are receiving. And yeah, really lit a spark in me where I'm I mean, I'm 30 weeks pregnant. I'm not like galvanizing in any directions right now. But that's, you know, a direction of work that I can see myself going into in the future is creating better support networks for families in need.

    Jackie Leonard 41:01
    Yeah, well, I will say you are using your voice through your podcast, a podcast for moms, I'd love for you before you go to share a little bit about that. And then how people can connect with you. After listening.

    Julia Sparkman 41:12
    Yeah, so podcasts are moms, I came up with a name and I was exhausted and not really feeling creative. It's like, I want to do a podcast or moms and I can figure out a name. So I was like, I'm gonna call it a podcast for moms. So that's exactly what it is. It's a podcast for moms about motherhood. I have a few solo episodes, but a majority of the episodes are me interviewing other moms. Jackie is a guest. Her episode is episode six. So definitely go and check that out. We talked about the power of writing and also the importance of centering moms. So our conversation was amazing. Thank you. And you can find it at a podcast for moms on Instagram, a podcast for moms calm. And then also, we're on all of the major and main podcast listening platforms. So there's a lot of podcasts out there for mom. So if you have a hard time finding, I think the best way is just to go to the website. So you can click directly to the episodes, or Instagram.

    Jackie Leonard 42:17
    Yeah, and I highly recommend you listening to it. When I when I saw that Julia was starting it so much of what she used to describe the podcast talking about radical motherhood and just leading from a place of motherhood being different than what we've had a perception of it before just really resonated with the work I've been doing through mother's scope. And so for anybody's list that's listening, that's going to totally be your jam too. So check it out. And thank you for creating that space and also for sharing your story here, Julia.

    Julia Sparkman 42:56
    Of course, thank you so much for having me today.

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