[00:00:00] Emily Race-Newmark: Welcome to This Is How We Care, a podcast where we look at what it means to embody care, not as an individual practice but a collective one, and to see what kind of world emerges from this place.

[00:00:12] Emily Race-Newmark: Thank you for being here. I am your host, Emily Race.

[00:00:16] Emily Race-Newmark: This conversation is with Jenny Tucker.

[00:00:19] Jenny Tucker: We've convinced mothers that the work of motherhood isn't of value compared to other things in the world. Constantly convincing moms and women that who are we to step into our power and use our voice or take a different path or re imagine the world.

[00:00:35] Emily Race-Newmark: Jenny is a certified school counselor, yoga teacher, mom of two, and the founder of the Centerline Community, a support community whose mission is to empower moms to reclaim their motherhood experience and step into their own innate wisdom and intuition. 

[00:00:50] Jenny Tucker: I'm Jenny Tucker. I'm the founder of The Centerline Community, which is the support community for new and expecting moms that I facilitate and nurture that started when I was pregnant with my son, Bowen, he just turned three. He was born September, 2020. 

[00:01:03] Jenny Tucker: I found out I was pregnant February 2020, and then the COVID shutdown started. We were like, "Oh, by summer this will be over." When my son comes, I don't need to worry about any of this. Then that was just so the opposite. Instead, that time in the world, really took over my whole experience. And so many moms that are listening to this and part of our community, I know had a similar experience. We're just now able to maybe start processing that experience.

[00:01:25] Jenny Tucker: When my son was born, he was breached. So I had a scheduled C section and like many of us with the first child, didn't know what to expect and like I have my whole life, went along with the rules or the way that the people that I let be in charge, or that I thought were in charge of the situation.

[00:01:43] Jenny Tucker: You go into an operating room, you put the surgeon in charge, which makes sense. That is that person's expertise. I was just like if my baby is healthy, I'll be fine. And then you guys just tell me what the protocol is and I'll do what you say, kind of thing. 

[00:01:54] Jenny Tucker: But at the same time, I could picture myself in the operating room and feeling like when that baby came out that I wasn't standing in my power. 

[00:02:02] Jenny Tucker: There's a photo of us with him in a blanket and us cheek to cheek. I'm crying tears of joy. And then for reasons that I still don't know why and I dug through my medical records so there's still nothing, they took him to the next room while I laid there alone and got sewn up. 

[00:02:16] Jenny Tucker: I was still like, "Oh, okay. They said everything's fine." But of course that fear of, "Okay, I'm laying here on the table being sewn up. Where's my husband? Where's my baby?" 

[00:02:23] Jenny Tucker: And that was my introduction to this questioning that I had never done up until that point in my life. I had always been rule follower, good girl. "I'm going to be polite no matter what."

[00:02:34] Jenny Tucker: The birth of my son I still participated in that way of being and tolerated all these things around me, but for the first time I questioned it. 

[00:02:40] Jenny Tucker: Because of these groups that I was leading through Centerline and the guest speakers we had sharing their wisdom. Even though I was holding space for moms all that time, I was really being held by these speakers in this community as well. I was evolving as a mom, through this community evolving. 

[00:02:54] Jenny Tucker: Around eight or nine months after him I was like, " I'm done suppressing these instincts and my intuition that have been bubbling up from inside me." I believe that that birth of my son was the portal opened for me for this repressed self to come out and be like, " I'm not going to tolerate all this bullshit anymore. That you—as a human, as a woman, and now as a mother—have been tolerating." Like, "We're done with that."

[00:03:14] Jenny Tucker: If we fast forward to the birth of my daughter, she was a C section as well, she was breached. But I came into the operating room the second time as a completely different person. .

[00:03:22] Jenny Tucker: I chose to have my doula and friend Krista, who served as my doula and advocate in the room because I had brought up my plan to my doctor and it wasn't an astounding, "Yes,, we support you." 

[00:03:33] Jenny Tucker: I remember going in to see my doctor and saying my plan in the operating room was for my baby to come straight to me. I understand that she'll come out of my incision, and that you'll need one minute to make sure she's breathing and then to milk the cord. And then I'd like her to come straight to my chest. And the response was like, "Hmm, that's not really how it works."

[00:03:57] Jenny Tucker: I was like, "Oh, okay, let me like, go double check my research, because I'm pretty sure that's what I want to have happen." 

[00:04:03] Jenny Tucker: And then tell my doula about it. And she was like, "If you're comfortable with me coming with you, I'd like to help you advocate for what you want in this because you're right, that's not okay." So we go back together and there was like clear tension in the room of me bringing an advocate. All three of us were coming with our defenses up to be fighting for our position, which was so weird because I was like, "Isn't the doctor on my side?" 

[00:04:23] Jenny Tucker:  I respect the hell out of doctors and OBs and people who've gone to medical school and who are helping save lives and keep us safe. She's cutting into my stomach, I have to trust her and respect her. At the same time, " don't you represent me? Aren't you on my team?"

[00:04:36] Jenny Tucker: So that was this misalignment I felt of like, " whose team are you on, and who are they?" 

[00:04:40] Jenny Tucker: I felt that in the medical system, that pushing. It was like, "No, be quiet. This isn't the way we do it." And I was already awake to so much of this that I was like, "There's no going back. now I have to keep fighting even though I'm exhausted and this is infuriating I can't not." 

[00:04:53] Jenny Tucker: When I went in that room, I really had Krista help me, like, wed did grounding work before my birth and we're like, "If we're doing this coming in with defenses up to get my baby out of my body and straight onto me, we're going to have to go in fighting." We both decided this has to be a loving fight.

[00:05:10] Jenny Tucker: if our attitudes are like, "Screw the man. Screw the system." Which it is, but we're there participating in it. I'm there needing surgery. I can't fully turn my back on it. But I need to come in with this loving fight. We are here to do this, but we come in peace. [Laughter] But like, "This is what's going to happen because this is my body and my baby."

[00:05:29] Emily Race-Newmark: Thank you for sharing all of that. For another version of that same dynamic, I had a home birth, and I too, my first birth was like giving away my power.

[00:05:38] Emily Race-Newmark: Cause I'm like, "Oh, these midwives know better than I do around birth. Like I've never done this before. They've witnessed it." And as a result, I ended up giving birth without anyone there because all the experts around me were like, "Oh, you have plenty of time." I knew something didn't feel like that, but I didn't vocalize that with the same amount of advocacy for myself, because I just was like, "These experts know best."

[00:05:58] Emily Race-Newmark: There's the systemic issues that you navigated, and then there's internal piece that we are navigating as well to look at.

[00:06:05] Jenny Tucker: That's been really the way we've been taught since we knew our name.

[00:06:10] Jenny Tucker: One of the missions I am setting forth with Centerline is this advocacy and societal change.  Before you get pregnant, to bring these things into awareness before you're there on the frontline having to fight. That's not a lot of time to prepare your heart, your body and unlearn all these things you've been conditioned to believe your entire existence. 

[00:06:30] Emily Race-Newmark: First met Jenny when I lived in Santa Barbara, where my daughter was born. Another mom-to-be in my birth class Centerline Community, which Jenny started, as a resource that offers postpartum groups and mommy meetups. 

[00:06:43] Emily Race-Newmark: I signed up for the postpartum group which included bi weekly Zoom calls.

[00:06:46] Emily Race-Newmark: I remember joining from my bed where I was often resting my healing body, nursing my newborn, who would fall in and out of sleep as I sat on the call. 

[00:06:55] Emily Race-Newmark: The group was a welcome checking in point for me to connect with other moms who were navigating these early days of their own postpartum experience.

[00:07:03] Emily Race-Newmark: Even though in some cases our experiences were very different, there was a lot that united us. We would spend time discussing prompts that Jenny brought to the table about motherhood and postpartum, and then hearing from different experts in the birthing and postpartum space on topics such as pelvic floor health, lactation, nursing, and mental health.

[00:07:23] Emily Race-Newmark: In Jenny, I saw a mirror for myself, someone who saw a need for community, for discussion, for processing, and was doing her part to facilitate that space into being. 

[00:07:33] Emily Race-Newmark: I also recognized that Jenny, too, was on her own postpartum journey. She would very much bring her humanity into the fold, in the groups and in her shares on the Centerline Instagram account.

[00:07:44] Emily Race-Newmark: We ended up getting together for coffee one afternoon to discuss potential opportunities for collaboration. I think we both saw in one another a shared commitment to the hard conversations, these reflections, the culture change. But it wasn't another year or so until we were actually able to make this conversation a reality.

[00:08:01] Emily Race-Newmark: I joked at the start of our recording session that we were very much on "mom time", which is not too different than the pace of nature itself. We plant seeds for ideas and we let them grow in the timing that they were meant to be.

[00:08:13] Emily Race-Newmark: Since the time that Jenny and I initially connected at that coffee shop to when we finally recorded this conversation, Jenny gave birth to her second baby, I got pregnant with my second baby, and we both left Santa Barbara and experienced an evolution in our own creations: Jenny with Centerline and me with this podcast.

[00:08:31] Emily Race-Newmark: Which Jenny will speak more to in our conversation and in our bonus content on Patreon.

[00:08:37] Emily Race-Newmark: Another fun fact about this interview is we actually had to record it over the course of two sessions, which you probably won't notice because of the way it's edited. But this was another testament to letting motherhood lead and letting timing unfold in the ways that it needed to. 

[00:08:51] Emily Race-Newmark: In our first conversation, Jenny ended up having to nurse her daughter, Leona, who was resisting her nap time. If you're a parent, you may be familiar with this experience.

[00:09:01] Emily Race-Newmark: And it became clear halfway through the conversation that it would be more supportive to all three of us, if we could pause the conversation so that Jenny could attend to their mutual needs. 

[00:09:11] Emily Race-Newmark: We later resumed the conversation a couple months later, and again, this is a testament to what it might look like to actually put into practice some of the ideas that Jenny and I discuss here today. Our first conversation was recorded in October 2023, and the second in December 2023.

[00:09:27] Emily Race-Newmark: I hope you enjoy this conversation. Let's dive in. 

[00:09:31] Jenny Tucker: Centerline Community is place where I can meet myself and find the grace to say "In motherhood, so many things are true at the same time." Which is like a really tough unlearning we have to do once we become moms and parents is unlearning that things are black and white. So many things can be true at the same time and that's okay. You can feel joy and pain and rage all in the same time in motherhood [Laughter] in the same moment. 

[00:09:52] Jenny Tucker: The Centerline has become the place where I can acknowledge both that the world around me is not set up to help me thrive as a new mom and really as a woman like it's actually set up to oppress me. 

[00:10:02] Jenny Tucker: And that is very painful but also lean into rules or practices in our modern world that I might need or want, even if it does fall in line with the patriarchal capitalistic society that we're in, because that's not changing tomorrow.

[00:10:17] Jenny Tucker: I don't have to feel bad if, fill in the blank, whatever parenting choices we make. It's removing the shame and guilt around any of those choices.

[00:10:24] Jenny Tucker: I want to help bring new moms to be like, "Hey, there's a bunch of deep, dark stuff that is not okay and we need to talk about it because there's so much beauty on the other side of it and we can move through together to change things."

[00:10:37] Jenny Tucker: But again, it's not happening tomorrow. So there shouldn't be shame or guilt or comparison in these choices we're making as parents because we're not functioning and living and existing in a world that's set up to support the very best biologically perfect scenario. 

[00:10:52] Emily Race-Newmark: It's so interesting because I've gone on those rabbit holes myself. And it still puts all the pressure and the onus on the mother to your point inside of an environment that is not set up to support the mother.

[00:11:03] " You got to do this thing. And if you don't, you're a bad mom." I just want to name, I've lived through that and I really appreciate also the shift you're naming 'cause with my first pregnancy and experience into motherhood, I was in the black and white space, even though I didn't want to be where I was like, "Oh, there's these moms who do this, and these moms who do that." The good and bad was underneath the surface, even if I didn't want to explicitly say that, because I was trying to orient who I was in that realm.

[00:11:26] Emily Race-Newmark: What I've evolved to discover, which you seem to also be pointing to is it's way more complex and messy within myself.

[00:11:32] Emily Race-Newmark: I am not just one type of parent. I go through evolutions and the more I can allow myself to acknowledging that there is this context—the patriarchy, capitalism, whatever that we're existing in, then I have way more freedom to also be with other types of parents because I'm not no longer judging.

[00:11:48] Emily Race-Newmark: I'm no longer categorizing. I'm just like, "We're all doing the best we can, truly, and we need spaces to start unpacking, "What do we need?" 

[00:11:57] Emily Race-Newmark: Let's talk about matrescence. Maybe you can give more context on who it comes from. But you speak about it so often and I feel like it's a huge core of your philosophy view. So can you talk about matrescence and why it's so important to understand?

[00:12:09] Jenny Tucker: Yes. I was introduced to this term eight or nine months after my first, and once I learned about it, I was like, "Oh my God, everybody needs to know this."

It's the word to describe the transition that a person goes through into becoming a mother. At no specific point. It's not once you give birth, your matrescence begins. It's really an evolution that could start the moment that you picture yourself as a mom at one point, it really is so unique to the person.

Like adolescence, which is a great example for the reason that we need terms like matrescence to describe our experience because there's whole studies and schools and curriculums based on teaching people about adolescence. We all know what that is. You hear the word, the transition where monumental things shift, hormones happen, physical shifts, personal, spiritual, everything, right? Shifts when you go through adolescence and you're a child and you become an adult, right?

A lot of stuff happens, let's say, on that timeline. And yet, that's a blip compared to the timeline of matrescence, which is really from whatever spark that begins your matrescence journey until you die. Your postpartum is forever, you're a mom forever. And yet adolescence, this shorter phenomenon, we all have the science and data to back it, and we've known about it since we were young, since we were kids. 

Whereas matrescence, no one tells you. We find out about it, maybe a little later if you're lucky, you'll hear the word when you're pregnant. And it's mind boggling to be like, "How are we not taught that this is a thing?"

[00:13:29] Emily Race-Newmark: And naming it a thing, can you specify for yourself or what you're observing other parents? What does that open up? 

[00:13:35] Jenny Tucker: Oh, oh, like I even feel in my body right now. The validation and like somewhere to turn. 

[00:13:42] Jenny Tucker: The term matrescence gives you a place to land, which really a lot of our offerings through Centerine were built on, especially in the beginning. Acknowledging that this is a transition and we need support around it. Just like in adolescence, everyone has so much grace for teenagers., "Oh, hormonal, oh, acne, oh, this is the time for all these things." And for us, at least what I experienced and what I hear around me, there's no grace for us. It's like we're supposed to pretend it's not even happening besides the physical pregnancy and birth part of it. And then after a few weeks, you're supposed to fall back in with whoever you were before. Would we expect a 19 year old to fall back into their 12 year old self? 

[00:14:14] Jenny Tucker: The world continues to spin because we're birthing babies and yet, instead of celebrating it, and this is going to make me emotional I felt like myself and the moms around me we're forced to pack it up and forget about it. Or make it look like, or feel like, or sound like it didn't happen.

[00:14:29] Emily Race-Newmark: Can you talk about the mother-baby dyad? This is another term I've heard you talk about a lot. I think it's fascinating to explore this again within the lens of how patriarchy currently views mothers and then what a world that honors mothers and motherhood. 

[00:14:44] Jenny Tucker: The mother-baby dyad refers to the unit of mom and baby. If you think of getting pregnant, then the baby is in her womb. The baby doesn't exist without the mom until they're born. This goes with the problem too. When a baby's born, we think like, "Oh, now there's the mom and the baby as two separate people."

[00:15:01] Jenny Tucker: I'm not able to speak very eloquently on the biology part of it, is something I hope to be educated on in the future but mother-baby dyad is the unit that we exist as with our babies , I picture like a sparkling, gooey web that exists between us, that the world is not educated on, which is why so many things we're pressured to do as new moms don't necessarily feel right or go well. 

[00:15:23] Jenny Tucker: That makes all this so complicated because no one's educated on the actual biology of that dyad and how our nervous systems are connected for years. Things that we think might be normal of separating mom and baby because of the way our society is set up cause it's not set up for moms and babies staying connected like it wants to be.

[00:15:41] Jenny Tucker: I was imagining the sparkly web getting shredded over time, which is totally what happens. Sometimes it just has to. We have to go back to work to make money to afford rent. Some of that goo or web stretches, but we can also keep other parts of it connected.

[00:15:54] Jenny Tucker: Again, with the Centerline, of acknowledging the in between of, I can acknowledge and know some parts of this mother-baby dyad and hold sacred some parts of it. And then other parts are going to have to stretch because the world I'm in isn't built for my baby to be on my body like they maybe want to be— for as long as they want to be. 

[00:16:11] Emily Race-Newmark: One thought I often dream about is, let's say that was widely known and accepted and supported in our society then even parental leave policies would look different because we would accept that as a need and maybe capitalism itself have a new shape or name, because we would have to acknowledge that surviving financially cannot come at the expense of surviving as a mother-baby dyad. 

[00:16:32] Emily Race-Newmark: Yeah, and also I'm remembering back, as time went on, the web for me was naturally stretching. I was like, "Okay, I'm going to take a little more space." fortunately because of my situation at the time, I didn't feel forced to stretch it sooner than I needed to. But I also felt guilty at times when I wanted space and that was like an important piece to name because again, our society puts so much pressure on the mother. But if you have a society that supports the mother, part of that nervous system regulation is acknowledging that you need to take some time to take care of yourself, so when you are physically connected to that baby they're feeling a resourced mother. 

[00:17:09] Jenny Tucker: Yes. Yes. 

[00:17:11] Jenny Tucker: It's just so emotional when you're talking about like the financial piece versus supporting mom and baby because it just makes me, ugh, it's like, " How did we get here where money is more important than human life?" Which that's an obvious thing in our world. Feeling it as a new mom in your body and having your baby here and being like the world cares more about money than me and this baby. We have to be having these conversations and we will get back there.

[00:17:34] Jenny Tucker: I was going to mention postpartum anxiety and depression, which I know so many of us experience. And for me also, I've been experiencing dysphoric malconduction reflux, which is another thing that's never talked about. 

[00:17:45] Jenny Tucker: Anxiety or depression takes a grip on your whole life, like your day to day or every moment [Crying] I just felt like a really big wave there. 

[00:17:59] Jenny Tucker: That it was for me, such a struggle to get help in those things and to end up going to therapy and taking medication. Because again, this acknowledgement, which I kept reminding myself, " come back to the center line where you can acknowledge that you're in a world where, it's okay to need Lexapro, because it's so messed up." 

[00:18:17] Jenny Tucker: I fought with myself to get help on these things that, were so heavy for so long because it was like, "Is this a chemical in my brain that's not functioning correctly because of postpartum happenings? Or is this the fact that the world doesn't care about me and I'm feeling that?" And I think it's both. 

[00:18:33] Jenny Tucker: And I don't think the answer forever is something like Lexapro, right?

[00:18:36] Jenny Tucker: But for me right now, I've started therapy and medication in May after I had a baby in November and that was like, "Oh my God, the best thing I could have done, but it was so hard to get to that point because it felt like I was letting these systems win, like saying, "Okay, I'll just go on medication and numb everything and then it'll be okay and I'll just push on through."

[00:18:57] Jenny Tucker: So, for me, it's been such a slow battle, I'm trying to not fix everything tomorrow because there feels like such an urgency for all this. If I don't rest and encourage other moms to rest too, then we can't continue to do it.

[00:19:09] Emily Race-Newmark: Yeah. I really, really honor you and appreciate you bringing us on that journey with you because I know in my heart, there are many people who are going to hear that and feel a relief, a release, some sort of weight lifted off from themselves.

[00:19:22] Emily Race-Newmark: I feel like these conversations, like you are saying, the more they're kept hidden or in isolation, then we're trapped in the systems even further. And you, Jenny, do not have to solve for the entire system. That would be impossible. [Laughter] 

[00:19:35] Emily Race-Newmark: I am that way as well. I'm like, "I have to fix it all and I have to be the change." We're a bridge between an old way and a new way. And in that transition we have to take care of ourselves and you're doing that. I acknowledge you for whatever it took to get to that point to receive the support you need because we need you to be cared for.

[00:19:55] Jenny Tucker: Thank you. 

[00:19:55] Emily Race-Newmark: Thank you for listening. If you like what you're hearing so far, there is more content from this interview with Jenny over at our Patreon. 

[00:20:03] Emily Race-Newmark: All contributions, no matter the size, are a massive help to fund the production of this podcast. And as a . thank you, you will receive extra bonus content such as:

[00:20:12] Emily Race-Newmark: Jenny's experience of wanting to have a VBAC, or a vaginal birth after cesarean, with her second baby, and some of the challenges she faced within the medical system. 

[00:20:22] Emily Race-Newmark: Jenny's experience of wearing so many hats and having challenges taking a break from the weight that is recognizing where injustices against mothers, babies, and women exist in our current systems.

[00:20:33] Emily Race-Newmark: And more of the history behind Centerline's evolution from a counseling service to a community that's helping moms find the center line within themselves.

[00:20:42] Emily Race-Newmark: Again, thank you so much for being a part of this community, for sharing and supporting conversations like this one. 

[00:20:48] Emily Race-Newmark: Now, let's go back to Jenny as she shares her take on the problem of our time, as well as her vision for the world.

[00:20:54] Jenny Tucker: We've convinced mothers that the work of motherhood isn't of value compared to other things in the world that matter more than ourselves and our babies and our families and our communities. 

[00:21:06] Jenny Tucker: And all these other functions and systems constantly ripping moms and women of their power and convincing them that who are we to step into our power and use our voice or take a different path or re imagine the world. It's not that, that we need feminine to take over. It's that we need, like you said, a bridge. And we need to be taught that femininity in all its forms is just as valuable. 

[00:21:31] Jenny Tucker: When you think of femininity, that includes mother-baby dyad and our power as women with sustaining, creating life with our bodies. And problem of our time is that we've been convinced that other things matter more when nothing matters more. 

[00:21:45] Emily Race-Newmark: I'm so fascinated with the balance of energies, whether we call it masculine, feminine, or whatever it is.

[00:21:50] Jenny Tucker: Yeah. 

[00:21:50] Emily Race-Newmark: I also, over time, have really have felt the importance of like de gendering it because it's like we need to honor that. The feminine is an energy that's been associated with female, and it's not gendered. [Laughter]

[00:22:02] Jenny Tucker: Right. I know we were talking, mom, woman... And I think the vision for solving this problem is even gender, not being a part of it. When we say honoring the mother-baby dyad, it's honoring humans over anything else, human in life.

[00:22:15] Emily Race-Newmark: Our need for connection.

[00:22:16] Jenny Tucker: Our connection to each other. 

[00:22:19] Emily Race-Newmark: I want to make sure I hear more about your vision because we're talking a lot about some of the challenges. And also, you are leading the way by creating spaces of what could be. And you're also working with so many other leaders in this space, so I'm curious from that your direct experience what you want to see more of, what does a world that supports mothers, humanity, like families, what does that look like?

[00:22:40] Jenny Tucker:  A world that truly had the mother-baby dyad recentered as something of value.

[00:22:46] Jenny Tucker: And the other thing that came up, I was two nights ago at a restaurant with a friend and I had my baby who's scooting on her bottom and she's learning words. So she's yelling "no" and "up" and "dog". 

[00:22:55] Jenny Tucker: We're out on a patio at this very kid friendly place. And this older couple was openly glaring at us, I don't know why, but I would think maybe the toddlers were playing with monster trucks so happily, so wonderfully, I was like, "This is the best scenario ever. I'm sitting by a fire pit drinking a beer with a mom friend. My baby's happy. The boys are happy." She's like, "They won't stop staring at us." 

[00:23:14] Jenny Tucker: So I think a world that we changed the way we care for new moms, early postpartum all the way into all different phases of motherhood would be like, those people would acknowledge that they were at the beginning once too. They were a baby too. They cried. Their mom took them to a restaurant where they were allowed. 

[00:23:29] Jenny Tucker: That's not something that shouldn't be happening. 

[00:23:31] Jenny Tucker: What shouldn't be happening is me staying home alone with my baby because I have too much to juggle to go out and enjoy the world with her. Or I feel pressure taking her to places because I'm going to have to breastfeed her.

[00:23:40] Jenny Tucker: So the world would look like people celebrating and interacting with these kids and acknowledging me for being out with two kids and this other mom being with hers and us being together instead of hulling up in our homes. 

[00:23:52] Emily Race-Newmark: I've had glimmers of those interactions. I went to this gathering called Spirit Weavers Gathering, women elders and mothers with their children got to cut the line to eat first so you don't have to wait in line. So that was an example of what that looks like. 

[00:24:05] Emily Race-Newmark: I still was so uncomfortable thinking, "Oh, can I receive support?" But what I started experiencing over the four days was another woman or another person would come in and play with my daughter or say, "Hey, can I hold her?"

[00:24:16] Emily Race-Newmark: They were receiving joy from the experience of being in her presence whether they were a mother in their own life or not. And I felt like, "Oh, my God, this is what the world could look like where I don't feel like I'm taking up too much space or bothering someone, I'm actually providing an opportunity for other people to be in the presence of the joy that is childhood, and in doing so I'm getting support." [Laughter] 

[00:24:36] Jenny Tucker: I felt like my body relaxed when you described that. Not only just people around you and have those glimmers of those experiences, but imagine if the whole world held you? 

[00:24:45] Emily Race-Newmark: Yeah. Yes. 

[00:24:48] Jenny Tucker: All the tears today. 

[00:24:50] Emily Race-Newmark: I feel you. I wanna keep dreaming, and I wanna ground it in this idea that we talked about as being the bridge. So how can we be the bridge? If folks were to pause or end this podcast right now, and they could just take a very simple action to support this vision, what would that be?

[00:25:04] Jenny Tucker: That's the first thing that comes to mind is the simplest action tell a mom or a woman in your life that you love her and she's enough and she's doing a great job. 

[00:25:11] Jenny Tucker: And especially, I don't know, but we'll hear this before holiday stuff, but it makes me think of the biggest, most beautiful times are so much harder for moms. Even if you don't understand it or feel these things in your bones like we do and like so many moms do, trust and listen to the moms in your life and the women in your life and honor what they have to say and share. Rather than I think the default. 

[00:25:35] Jenny Tucker: The default is to disregard or really dismiss, ignore. And then even beyond that, we don't even know when we're shaming and putting them down and really doing damage. And they don't know either is the thing without this context to realize what's happening around us, we just think it's normal as new moms. And without these conversations, we'll continue on like that and then teach our children the same thing.

[00:25:58] Jenny Tucker: The action could be like listen, pay attention. 

[00:26:02] Emily Race-Newmark: It's such a beautiful and simple action, and it does so much. 

[00:26:06] Emily Race-Newmark: Thank you for bringing your full self and your real experience of motherhood and also your experience of supporting other moms and what you've witnessed and learned for yourself throughout that.

[00:26:14] Emily Race-Newmark: I just am so grateful to be in community with you and to have you on this podcast. Thank you for your time. 

[00:26:20] Jenny Tucker: Thank you. I'm so excited to see the shift from Founding Mothers to This Is How We Care and just acknowledge you for doing exactly what we just talked about, like listening to your inner knowing and responding to what you see the need for. It's not easy to do. 

[00:26:33] Emily Race-Newmark: Thank you so much. 

[00:26:36] Emily Race-Newmark: Thank you again for listening. If you enjoyed hearing from Jenny, be sure to check out Centerline's all new membership offering called the Mothership. Listeners can use the code "CARE" to access $20 off your first quarterly membership fee, and in doing so, you'll contribute to the production of this podcast through our affiliate model.

[00:26:53] Emily Race-Newmark: For links to The Mothership and Centerline's Instagram, head over to our website in the show notes. And don't forget, there is more great content from Jenny over at pateron.com/thisishowwecare

[00:27:04] Emily Race-Newmark: Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for all of the ways that you support this podcast, whether it's through Patreon contributions, listening and leaving reviews, sharing episodes with the people in your life or subscribing to our newsletter and Instagram to be a part of the conversation. 

[00:27:18] Emily Race-Newmark: This episode was produced by me, Emily Race, co produced by Kimberly Anne with audio by Andrew Salamone and music by Eric Weisberg.