The maternal pain project

I have to be real with you: This idea came to me as I was swimming laps.

I have been having some really delightful conversations with people in the maternal health space recently. Big shit is happening! And I have found myself, more than once, advocating for pain symptoms to get a little love when it comes to long term health assessments.

Thank fucking god, there is a lot going on in the discourse about maternal mental health. There are honestly too many great substacks to list here, but I highly recommend the aptly named The Maternal Stress Project, Matriarchy Report, and The Mother Lode.

• Here’s why everything hurts. On chronic pain, neuroplasticity, and why it’s not in your head.

• Can you really re-process pain? On pain reprocessing therapy, how I practice it differently, and how it all matters.

• The second baby question. This post most directly addresses what we get into here — the unpredictability of birth and its huge potential consequences. I have so much content on birth — please search “birth” in my archive for more!

We could have a multi-pronged conversation about this, and I want to. But I am particularly interested in folks who incurred an injury directly from pregnancy or birth, and how this experience shaped the immediate and indefinitely ongoing postpartum period.

Frequently, but not always, physical birth injury and birth trauma travel together, and the effects are compounded.

So that’s where I want to begin. Trust me, I see you chronic illness baddies — the ones who fought to get pregnant despite illness and/or pain, the ones whose illnesses cropped up or got so much worse in the postpartum period. I see you!

For now, I would like to focus on the concrete “I got hurt while a baby emerged in some way from my body and it has felt not-quite-right ever since.”

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I have a lot of professional observations about birth injuries and pain postpartum. I can tell you that it’s common for these experiences to affect child-parent bonding, maternal physical short and long term health, maternal mental health in both the long and short terms, sexual health, future family planning, any athletic or movement goals, and — perhaps most importantly — body autonomy.

Just being in a body can feel deeply challenging after that type of an inury.

So today, I’d love to hear from you, if you’re up for it.

I want to be so incredibly clear: You do not owe me your story. You do not owe me your participation. This is not mandatory trauma dumping.

So! If you experience or experienced maternal pain, I’ve got a bunch of concrete questions for you. You are also welcome to either share more details via a reply email or comment. Everything is optional. Your responses are anonymous in Substack, and you can choose to remain anonymous if you contact me via email.

Please share as I would love to get as much data as possible! I do not know what this will become — maybe a post, maybe a series, maybe a book, IDK! But I do believe it’s really important, and I’d be honored to have your voice.

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If you decide to answer these questions, know that they may feel tricky and challenging. Please be kind to yourself. Get yourself a treat afterwards. And you won’t offend me if you skip it!

If your pain is past-tense, feel free to answer these questions from your past-tense self — from the peak of discomfort and challenge.

Who’s ready for a treat!? GO GET YOURSELF A TREAT.

If you have more you’d like to share for this project, you can respond to this email. It goes straight to me. Please let me know if it is okay to quote your story in the future, and if so, how you’d like to be identified (anonymous is perfectly fine).

You can also leave a comment if you would like to speak publicly!

Thank you for participating, thank you for sharing, and thanks for being a part of this rad community. Let’s help de-stigmatize what so many birthing folks experience and start helping folks get the wraparound care they need and deserve.

I am rooting for you.

Adventures in Vaginas (and other parts) is my labor of love, dedicated to you.

If you want to support my work and mission to expand access to quality pelvic health education that is gender inclusive and shame-free, please consider sharing this post or becoming a paid subscriber.

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To learn more about my 1:1 practice and request a free 15 minute consultation, click here.

Tidal Work is my therapeutic movement platform for body autonomy. Everyone is invited to dive in there.