Not A Mama Yet

In this episode, I had the pleasure of speaking with Astrid Schanz-Garbassi, the CEO and Co-Founder of Agni. Having experienced the power of home remedies and food healing as a child, Astrid has dedicated her career to helping people access foods that can nourish them during important life moments. Working with health practitioners, medical experts, and nutritionists from around the world, Astrid has built three businesses to-date focused on the healing properties of food and good nutrition.

Agni’s goal is collect all of the information and wisdom about healing through nutrition and to turn it into delectable healing foods.

Replenishing the right nutrients at the right time can work wonders for human health. It can balance hormones, shorten the length of surgery recovery, and help new moms produce a higher quantity and quality of breast milk. It can improve sleep quality, reduce anxiety, and even reverse cognitive decline.

To make this happen, Agni built a Medical Advisory Board and assembled a team of food geniuses to create foods and drinks that wow your body and your taste buds.

On this episode, we discuss how Agni came to be, their approach to wellness and the development process of their products, balancing our hormones and supporting each moment of our lives through nourishment.

I hope you enjoy this week’s episode with Astrid!

Today on the podcast, I have the pleasure of speaking with Andrea Ippolito. Andrea is the CEO and Founder of SimpliFed, a virtual lactation and breastfeeding support service. Their mission to make this type of support more accessible in every way, from affordability to connecting with an expert quickly in the comfort of your own home. There are so many questions that can come up when breastfeeding and pumping, so SimpliFed is making it so much easier to get the answers you need when you need them.

Andrea Ippolito currently serves as the CEO and Founder of SimpliFed. Prior to joining SimpliFed, Andrea served as the Director of the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Innovators Network within the VA Center for Innovation. In this capacity, she designed and oversaw the creation of a $10.5M program that provides the tools and resources to VA employees to develop innovations that improve the experience of Veterans and their families. Prior to that role, Andrea served as a Presidential Innovation Fellow based out of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy and General Services Administration.

In this episode we talk about why instant, private, expert lactation support is so important, the scope of practice of lactation consultants, and the ideal schedule to begin working with one. We also discuss how lactation consultants are now covered by insurance so more people will hopefully begin to take advantage of that benefit when they need it most.

I hope you enjoy this conversation with Andrea!

First podcast of 2022 is with Million Marker’s Founder and CEO, Dr. Jenna Hua. Jenna, as she prefers to be called, is a registered dietitian and environmental health scientist by training.

Jenna’s extensive experience as an academic and health advocate led to her founding Million Marker in 2019, shortly after completing a Postdoctoral Fellowship with Stanford University’s School of Medicine. Throughout her career in academia, Jenna has researched and published numerous studies that largely focused on citizens science, general health, and the impact of food consumption on a person’s well-being.

Jenna has been a Project Manager for UNC’s Carolina Population Center, a Graduate Instructor and Research Assistant at UC Berkeley, and a Project Manager at UCLA’s Center for Population Research. She was also a US Fulbright Fellow at the Institute of International Education in Kunming, China. Jenna holds a BS in Nutrition and an MPH and PhD in Environmental Health Sciences from UC Berkeley.

So, we are in good hands when it comes to understanding how to minimize toxins in our homes and in our lives. In this episode, we discuss how Million Marker’s home test kits can help you eliminate toxins from your home, why this is so important when trying to conceive and while pregnant, and how to start taking small steps to lead to big change in your life. I encourage you to head over to the Million Marker’s website too, as it is full of incredible resources including approved product lists for every category and articles covering everything from toxic free guides to fertility tips and more.

I hope you enjoy our conversation with Jenna!

This week on the Not a Mama Yet podcast, I’m so excited to share my conversation with Jessica Diamond. Jessica is a registered dietitian nutritionist specializing in moms, kids, and babies, and a mom to 1.

When Jessica became a dietitian in 2009, she noticed a disconnect between the complex concepts she studied and the kind of nutritional and parenting information available. All the information existed, but it wasn’t easily accessible to the majority of families. She has done an incredible job breaking down these complicated principles into easy-to-understand practices.

Her passion is teaching parents how to raise mindful children and how to feed their kids through a simpler approach that creates less picky, intuitive eaters.

On this episode, we talk about reproductive health, foods and tips that support fertility on your pre-conception journey, her manageable tips and tricks truly make you feel like you’ve got this, which is her go-to affirmation for all people, clients, and especially fellow parents.

We also discuss prenatal vitamins, detoxing, postpartum hormone balancing, and releasing control.

This is a great episode I know I will continue to come back to and listen to over and over again.

Check out the podcast notes on how to get in touch with Jessica on her website and podcast with Haley Hubbard, Meaningfull Living. That’s meaningful with two L’s.

Without further ado, I hope you enjoy this episode of Not A Mama Yet with Jessica Diamond!

LINKS:

Today on the Not A Mama Yet Podcast I am speaking with Caroline Sanchez!

Last year, Caroline left her 9-5 job as a graphic designer and decided to establish her own business educating individuals on the importance of living a more non-toxic and sustainable lifestyle. Her partnership with Enagic and her social media presence sharing the importance of knowing what’s in our drinking water, sparked my interest in wanting her on the show.

On this episode we discuss important facts about water you might not know, tools to educate yourself on finding out what’s in your water based on where you live, the surprising statistics about bottled water, and how to pick the best water filtration option for you.

This episode was pretty eye-opening to me and I hope you have some valuable takeaways as well.

I hope you enjoy this week’s episode of Not A Mama Yet!

Products and Links in the episode:

Hydroviv

This is the company that builds custom filters for you based on your zip code and the issues that impact your specific water quality.

Today on the podcast, I am speaking with Dr. Kristin Pauker.

She is originally born and raised in Hawaiʻi and became fascinated with exploring how a person’s immediate environment and culturally-shaped theories about race impact basic social perception, social interactions, and stereotyping in childhood and throughout development. She loves to discover new ideas through her novel research studies and applying those insights toward creating interventions to mitigate stereotyping, interpersonal friction, or persistently biased social perception.

Her research examines how motivations, social context, and individuals’ lay theories impact social perception and their resultant consequences for intergroup relations. Spanning both Social and Developmental Psychology, her research has been featured in journals including Science, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, and Developmental Psychology.

She was also my Psychology professor at the University of San Francisco and I actually assisted her on some of her research at the time, which we touched on in our conversation.

In this episode, we discuss the danger of color blindness, an interesting preschool activity that would definitely test any parent during an important teaching moment, a few of Dr. Pauker’s recent studies and the interesting findings that teach us more about the ways children think and perceive, and some moments she has had as a mom talking to her son about race and appearance. 

Enjoy!

Today I am speaking with Mr. Chazz Lewis. Mr. Chazz helps parents and teachers with their children. If you are already following him on Instagram, you know how enthusiastic he is to help parents, caregivers, and teachers so many great tools to break generational cycles and, in his words, SEE, GUIDE, and build TRUST with children.

I wanted him on the podcast because a lot of learning about how to be around kids and understand how they think and learn, requires adults to unlearn a lot of what they’ve been raised to think and feel. That requires hard work, patience, and practice people without kids can work on now. Understanding child development is so important to communicate and connect with your child, or any children for that matter! Of course, there is the intuitive part of this that can come naturally, but when it gets hard and you and a child are not seeing eye to eye, Mr. Chazz has great tools to take the pressure off and find smoother sailing going forward.

We discuss how kids think and that we have just as much to learn from children as they have to learn from us. We talk about ADHD and kids with more energy. We talk about modeling versus verbal communication and teaching. And we talk about his article on protesting with children and talking to kids about race and racism.

I really enjoyed speaking with Mr. Chazz on this episode of Not A Mama Yet. Enjoy!  Please find all the ways to connect with Mr. Chazz below and don't forget to DM him with your thoughts on the episode!

Today on the podcast I am sharing an amazing, super educational conversation about breastfeeding with International Board Certified Lactation Consultant and Lamaze Certified Childbirth Educator, Kristen A Rossi.

Kristen has her Master of Science Degree in Education and has training in Maternal & Infant Assessment, as well as the core areas of lactation. She was one of the lactation consultants at her local hospital and worked on the maternity floor for over 7 years before shifting her energy towards building her private practice. In addition to working with both in/outpatients, Kristen has been trained and certified in Lamaze, and has both written and facilitated a comprehensive and evidence-based childbirth education curriculum.

More importantly, she is the mother of three children and you’ll hear more about how she became so interested in this space after the birth of her first son, on this episode.

We talk about preparing for breastfeeding even before giving birth, the benefits of skin to skin after birth, a baby’s first feed, physiological scenarios that might impact breastfeeding, the truth behind lactation cookies and how to increase milk supply naturally, eating schedules, pumping and dumping, colic, and so much more! We cover ALOT and barely scratch the surface.

I have a feeling there are going to be follow up episodes to this one and I know I’d love to hear from everyone listening if that is something you would like too, because I know I would! Kristen really is a doula for breastfeeding in my opinion!

This week on the Not A Mama Yet Podcast, I am speaking with Kiara Orbe of Kiara Marie Wellness. Kiara is a Functional Nutritional Therapy Practitioner, Functional Diagnostic Nutrition Practitioner, and currently receiving her certification as a Root Cause Consultant to help her clients dig even deeper into different protocols. 

Kiara is not only so easy to talk to, she has been on the other side of the phone, the Zoom, whatever it might be, because she was the patient and she was not finding the answers or support she needed. She used to experience a whole host of symptoms including chronic GI pain, distress, hormone imbalances, anxiety, irritability, low energy, acne, infertility, and a sluggish thyroid, all of which ended up being the result of a wrecked metabolism. 

As a Gut + Hormone Health Practitioner, Kiara teaches women how to restore their metabolisms, terminate digestive issues and balance their hormones using real food to step into their true power. 

In this episode, we talk about inflammation and the different ways it can appear, some might surprise you! We talk about our liver, hormone detoxification, the various labs that can help you and your care provider see what’s going on inside your body. We also talk about fertility, pregnancy and postpartum support by someone like Kiara, as you all know, my favorite three topics to cover wherever I can are fertility, pregnancy and postpartum. This is a great episode, and you can check out the podcast notes for all of the books we mention and the different ways you can connect with Kiara! 

One last thing before we get this episode going, I have a favor to ask! My 30th birthday is in two months. The only thing I want is to hit 5000 subscribers on this podcast. In order to do that, I need your help. If you like this episode and have been a listener of this podcast, if you can please head over to the Apple podcasts app and rate and leave a review, a nice one please!, that would mean the world to me! And one last request, please share it with a friend. It helps so much and I love doing this and would love to keep doing this for a long time! 

Thank you so much!! 

This week on the podcast, I am speaking with Dr. Siggie Cohen, a Child Development Specialist and Parenting Expert, in some circles even known as The Child Whisperer. I had the pleasure too connect with Dr. Siggie and we covered so many topics in this episode, I learned so much. We chat about what we can be practicing before having kids on our own and with our partners, how to practice setting boundaries, helping children understand their emotions and flex their emotional muscles, taking care of yourself as a parent so you can be a better parent, the step parent and step child relationships and how to navigate that. We also talk about how to manage kids being bored and time using technology, adjusting your expectations to fit your child, not trying to adjust your child to fit your expectations, and then we get into a couple of questions from people in my network about limiting the tantrums when kids don’t get what they want and establishing those roles of parent and child where authority is understood while having mutual respect between parent and child.

So many of these tools, I may even say all of them, revolve around communication and these can all be applied to life before and without kids. These are so helpful to any adult. I hope. This episode inspires you so without further ado, my conversation with Dr. Siggie Cohen!

Enjoy!

Mentions:

This week on the Not A Mama Yet podcast. I am speaking with Aziel Rodgers, the lead esthetician at the Things We Do! She has been my go-to for facials since 2019 and I always leave her feeling so refreshed and my skin is so happy. We chat about when to mask, how to tone, she shares some tips about icing your face and how to facial massage properly too! We talk about brands we both love, the proper amount of sunscreen we should be wearing, which actually blew my mind, and when to get a facial based on where you are in your cycle! Oh! and my computers dies at some point so expect an awkward pause mid-sentence! Thank you powers that be for allowing that to happen, despite my computer being fully plugged into the wall when it happened!

Aziel’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/azielfaith/

The Things We Do: https://thethingswedo.co

Skincare brands Aziel mentions:

Skinceuticals: https://www.skinceuticals.com

Eminence: https://eminenceorganics.com/us

Skincare brands I use:

Averr Aglow: https://prz.io/mb1PD1h8

This week on the podcast, I am sharing one of my favorite episodes with one of my favorite people, and my birthday twin, Talia Caldwell. Talia and I attended middle and high school together and have been friends ever since. I have been lucky enough to be around one of the most impressive, kind, open, intelligent, and loving people for almost 20 years. I cherish any time I get to spend with her when she isn’t overseas playing professional basketball. On this episode we talk about community. How it shapes us, how it impacts us, and how we develop long lasting, meaningful relationships throughout the different seasons of our lives. Talia is endless wisdom in my opinion. In 2020, she started the Echo Park Fund supporting the unhoused in the Echo Park community with necessary resources. The continued success of the Echo Park Fund is a reflection on the impact she has had on so many people and spaces in Los Angeles. In my opinion, we need about 6 billion more people like Talia and this world would be a better place.

I hope you enjoy this episode! Please find all the ways to connect with Talia and learn more about the Echo Park Fund below. 

Please share it with a friend and submit a review! 

Thank you!

Natalie

Where to find Talia:

Her work:

Today on the podcast, I am honored to be speaking with Laura Lynne Jackson. If you are unfamiliar with her work, let me have the pleasure of introducing you to her! Laura Lynne Jackson is a Psychic Medium. She can feel, hear and see people who have crossed over to the Other Side, among many other abilities she shares with the world.

She is a Windbridge Certified Research Medium, one of 17 in the United States, at the Windbridge Institute which is dedicated to conducting world-class research on phenomena currently unexplained within traditional scientific disciplines.  She is also one of 25 certified mediums who offers their time at the Forever Family Foundation, working to protect the continuity of the family, even though a member has left the physical world.

She has read for hundreds of people and connected them with loved ones who have crossed.  If you haven’t had the chance to read her book Signs, I highly recommend it.  Her first book The Light Between Us is next on my list. She was also recently on the show Surviving Death on Netflix which I binged and thoroughly enjoyed.

In this episode, you’ll hear about connecting with your spirit baby before pregnancy, grieving while pregnant and parenting, and Laura's book Signs. Every story she recounts in this book is mind blowing. We discuss the first sign I asked for (hint: I asked and I received!) and who is on our Teams of Light.  You might even be connected to your role model if they have crossed!  

I hope you enjoy this episode! Please find all of the ways to connect with Laura Lynne Jackson below!

This week's episode is Part 2 with Dr. Amanda Cohen! We are taking a look at "In the FLO: Unlock Your Hormonal Advantage and Revolutionize Your Life" by Alisa Vitti. We are both big fans of Alisa Vitti's work. Her story is incredible and Flo Living, her company that supports women balance their hormones and change their life for the better by feeling better! I was first introduced to her work in late 2017 and it changed my life. I understood my body and how I can support it on a much deeper level then I ever had before.  Highly recommend every person with female physiology read her books, follow Flo Living, and maybe even schedule a consultation with one of their experts. Below are all of the links to the books we discuss in this episode and Dr. Amanda's contact information!

Books:

Today on the podcast, I am speaking with Dr. Amanda Cohen, or Dr. Amanda as her patients call her! Dr. Amanda is a Board Certified Chinese Medical Physician (L.Ac.) who is passionate about helping her patients achieve optimal well-being. She holds a Master’s and Doctoral Degree from Emperor’s College of Traditional Oriental Medicine, specializing in Integrative Medicine. She also has a Masters in Health Psychology from UC Irvine and a dual Bachelor’s Degree in Clinical Psychology and Cultural Psychology from Cornell University.

She practices at Source Point Wellness which offers primary care from the East-West Perspective, specializing in patient empowerment and healing the mind, body, and spirit to get to the source of health imbalances. They offer compressive treatment plans for the whole person and incorporate kind, compassionate and complete care with acupuncture, Chinese herbs, functional medicine, nutrition, telemedicine, massage, cupping, shamanism, and akashic record readings.

Today is extra special because my best friend, Madison Young, Owner of Open Eye Crystals here in Los Angeles, and the reason I was fortunately introduced to Dr. Amanda, is joining us for our conversation!

The three of us will be discussing, as Dr. Amanda calls it, preparing the palace, aka getting our bodies ready for pregnancy.  Madison and I have plenty of questions for Dr. Amanda, including what she is doing herself to prepare her body for pregnancy as well! Most importantly, this episode is full of information that should help you ask the right questions to your care team when seeking out help navigating this time as well. 

I hope you enjoy this episode of Not A Mama Yet. 

Today on the podcast I am sharing part 1 of my conversation with Anne Hodder-Shipp, a sex and relationship coach who also specializes in dreamwork, sex education and dating. In part 1 of 2 we focus on Anne’s background and sex education. You’ll hear us talk about ways our personal experiences with sex and relationships might come through in our conversations with kids about these topics. We go over how sex education is delivered in the U.S. and how parents can support their children in ways their school might not be.  In Part 2 we get more into her work with adults, breath work, and dream work. Stay tuned for that!

Below are links to connect with Anne, as well as the resources she talks about in this episode!

Today on the Not A Mama Yet Podcast, I am recapping my time in Mexico for the past three weeks with my cousin Dyani.

I was there as a source of familial support while also gaining invaluable experience for my postpartum doula training. A big part of the episode is going over sleep training and how Dyani did it with her first child and is doing it now with her newborn.

We get into the nitty gritty of being a parent and caregiver to two small children, I will warn you now that we do talk about baby poop and vomit, it just comes with the territory so if you get queasy or uncomfortable, this is your heads up!

I basically got to go through a three-week bootcamp on parenting and today we are sharing what that was like for both me and for Dyani. I say it in the episode, and I’ll say it again now, if you plan on having kids one day and have a family or close friend having babies, if you can offer any level of support to them I highly recommend it.

Learning daily routines, tips and tricks, and even learning what you might not want to do as a parent are all great things to be exposed to. I hope you enjoy this episode of the Not A Mama Yet Podcast!

Books we mentioned: 

This week on the podcast, I am speaking with Angela Setters Bessard, Founder and CEO of Conquer Credit Management, Inc, who is known as a pioneer in the credit industry. With a passion to help people understand how to leverage their credit as a tool to create wealth and attain financial stability, Angela has continued to educate consumers and change lives daily for more than 25 years.  Angela and I discuss her story emancipating herself at 16 years old and how she established a successful life and career since then.  We get into the nitty gritty about credit, building wealth, how to manage debt, and credit cards! I found it SO interesting to talk with her about how to pick credit cards and work the system in a way banks and your credit score will thank you! For someone who hopes to one day be in a position to buy a home, this was so insightful and educational. I hope you enjoy this episode of the Not A Mama Yet podcast! 

This week on the Not A Mama Yet podcast, I had the pleasure to speak with Toronto-based Naturopathic Doctor & Midwife Melissa Chan. With a specialized focus in fertility, obstetrics and female health, Melissa aims to address and treat the root cause of illness and disease and create healthy lifestyles all through research-driven integrative medicine. Today you’ll hear about her very interesting path to becoming a midwife and how she is bringing all of her past experience into her practice. Melissa has dedicated her career to finding the best of the best in health.  Hopefully you find this episode as interesting as I did! Her career path alone was so cool to hear about. Enjoy!

Today on the Not A Mama Yet podcast, I am speaking with Co-Founder and Co-CEO of Seed, Are Katz. Ara is on a mission to revolutionize the probiotics industry and overhaul the public conversation around microbiome health. Along with her team at Seed, Ara is pioneering the inquiry, application, and communication of microbiome science to improve human and planetary health.  We discuss some of the ways bacteria can help improve our daily lives in our bodies and on our planet.

Today on the podcast, I am speaking with Karalynne Call of Just Ingredients. You'll hear her amazing story going from a suicidal depression diagnosis to being on no medication today. She explains why and how she eliminated health-disrupting ingredients out of her life and her family's life and how you can get started too.  She also breaks down the labels we are all bombarded with everyday, Organic, Non-GMO, USDA Organic, and what they really mean. I highly recommend following her on Instagram, checking out her blog and her new line of products you know only have the best ingredients! I hope you enjoy this week's episode!

On September 5th, I hosted my first Not A Mama Yet Q&A Event in Los Angeles at Open Eye Crystals.  Dr. Carolyn Alexander and Dr. Layne Kumetz graciously donated their time to be there and answer all of the audience's questions.   

• Dr. Layne Kumetz is a Board-Certified Obstetrician Gynecologist and an Attending Physician at Cedars Sinai Medical Center. Her clinical expertise includes preventative medicine from adolescence through menopause, up-to-date birth control options, abnormal PAP tests, abnormal bleeding, infertility evaluations, cancer screening, pediatric gynecology and optimal obstetric care for both low-risk and high-risk pregnancies. She proudly delivers 98% of her patients’ babies. She is home-grown here in Los Angeles, and even volunteered at Cedars Sinai in the Maternity Ward in high-school.

• Dr. Carolyn Alexander has conducted extensive research on Polycystic Ovary Syndrome (PCOS) and specializes in the treatment of patients facing the diagnosis of PCOS and infertility. Her other clinical interests include the treatment of endometriosis, unexplained infertility, and recurrent pregnancy loss. She also works closely with oncologists on the fertility preservation of patients who are about to undergo chemotherapy.

Here is the audio recording of the event. I shared with the audience prior to starting the event that I would be audio recording it, so anyone that didn't feel comfortable asking their question out loud had the option to do so with notecards I provided to the guests. 

This episode of the Not A Mama Yet podcast features Green America’s Climate & Recycling Director Beth Porter.  Beth is the author of Reduce, Reuse, Reimagine: Sorting Out the Recycling System and through her work she has helped thousands of individuals and businesses live and operate more sustainably. Beth has spearheaded many campaigns that identify the waste of resources and energy in varying sectors and has authored comprehensive reports of proposed solutions. She loves to help people find answers to their recycling questions and try new ways to reduce waste, which is why I wanted her on the podcast! 

I spoke with Beth about the current state of our planet and what we can be hopeful for, initiatives she has worked on, and what we can be thinking about in our own lives to lower our environmental impact.  This episode is very educational and is so helpful in understanding recycling better.  Enjoy!! 

My main takeaways: 

Episode 12 feels like a particularly special episode.  I had the pleasure of interviewing Pamela Hunt.  If you have heard of the book Spiritual Midwifery or The Farm in Summertown, Tennessee, you may have heard of her.   In the 1970s, Pamela was part of a caravan of eighty school buses that went across the United States led by Stephen Gaskin.   Stephen was a teacher in San Francisco when his writing class evolved into a discussion group that grew to have 1500 students in attendance each week.  A lot of the hippies in attendance made up the caravan and their mission was to save the world!  As women became pregnant and started to give birth during their trip, Pamela and a group of a few other women including Ina May Gaskin, Stephen’s wife, fell into the role of the midwives assisting in the deliveries.  Over time and with the help of doctors across the U.S. who donated their time and resources to train them, Pamela, Ina May and the others became well-adept in handling various scenarios from hemorrhages, premature babies, breached births, and multiple births of twins and even triplets.   

Once they settled and established The Farm, they eventually opened the midwifery center, which still exists today.  People travel to be trained by Pamela and her team there and they come to be clients of the center as well.  When I was planning my trip to Tennessee in April, I found out I would be close enough to visit The Farm and immediately jumped at the opportunity.  Pamela was off-site that weekend for a training, but we managed to catch up over the phone and I had the pleasure of talking with her for the podcast.  This episode is so special to me because of all that Pamela has done for midwifery in the United States, including her assistance in developing the certification system for midwives today, and her vast knowledge on pregnancy, birth and helping women through it all!

My main takeaways: 

-Amish people have been practicing midwifery forever and Pamela still works with them to this day. 

-Frequency of appointments are the same with a midwife compared to an OBGYN, but the appointment is 1-2 hours long per appointment with a midwife and covers lifestyle, diet, physical health, and sex, among other things.  They start preparing women and couples mentally for delivery from the first appointment. 

-Midwifery is a huge commitment. If you have a family, it could be harder to do unless you have a solid support system of people around you who can jump in at any moment. 

-Pamela has tips on what women can do and what support they need to prevent postpartum depression. Sleeping 4-6 hours within the first 24 hours is crucial and having someone to watch the baby so you can do that is important.  Another is having someone take care of you for the first ten days so your only priority is being with and bonding with the baby. 

-Pamela helped develop the certification for people to become midwives in the United States. 

-Midwives stress health, nutrition, and good habits so women gain an incredible education by working with midwives that they can carry into motherhood and pass down to their child and family! 

You can find more on Pamela and The Farm here: 

I don’t remember how I stumbled upon Embrace Race, but I am so happy I did.  If you are not familiar with it, it is a multiracial community of parents, teachers, experts, and other caring adults who support each other to meet the challenges that race poses to our children, families, and communities. We welcome your participation.  I reached out to the Co-Founders Melissa and Andrew because I believe that while the work they are doing is invaluable for people who already have kids, people who don’t can still benefit greatly from their platform.  On one of the worksheets they have on their site, they say that talking about race, finding the right words and coming at it from a point of real understanding is like flexing a muscle.  It doesn’t happen overnight.  We can just expect to watch a video and be prepared to teach our children about equity and discrimination.  We need to be working on that now and always.  

As we are seeing that US racial divisions and inequities grow, Embrace Race is helping people start wherever they are and reverse this trend in our homes, schools, and communities.  Melissa and Andrew were kind enough to tell me that they admire the work that I am doing but I am nowhere near where I want to be and there are so many people out there doing much more impactful work in their communities like Melissa and Andrew so I hope you listen to this episode.  It is longer than my previous ones so break it up if you need to, but I hope you do listen to it! Please also spread the word about Embrace Race and check out their site below for more incredible resources they are constantly adding on there! 

Main takeaways: 

Clarity on terms including: race, explicit vs. impact racism, and micro-agressions.  

Listen to your child. Don’t shush them or make any topic taboo.  Kids notice how adults react to things. 

Start flexing that muscle, talk about race in your community, and surround yourself with diverse people in your community. 

Melissa and Andrew mention these books, organizations, and people:

This week on the podcast, I am speaking with Carolyn Witte, one of the Founders of the Tia Clinic in NYC. At the Tia Clinic, you can get integrated gynecology, wellness and primary care under one roof and one health record.  They hold community events, offer same week appointments, which can be super hard to come by in the city, and they provide you with a care team.  Imagine a team of physicians and wellness practitioners talking to each other and understanding your health records together so they can understand the whole you.  Everything about this clinic is game changing and I can’t wait to see it grow to become a household name across the country. 

I loved speaking with Carolyn because you can tell how well she understands the healthcare industry and what the experience is like for anyone with a uterus to find proper care, book appointments, and actually get results that make an impact.  I learned so much in our conversation and I hope you enjoy it! 

My main takeaways: 

• Having a care team wherever you are will change the way you access and receive care. 
• Understanding the cost of care is important in order to consider healthcare in your monthly/annual budget. 
• Cycle connected care helps women see longitudinal data about their wellness and how it relates to their cycle.  This is helpful when trying to diagnosis Endometriosis and PCOS. 
• Women want to know why, not just what. 
• Learning how to be an advocate for ourselves in the care context is a focus at Tia. 
• Bringing costs of services down to make them more accessible is a priority at Tia. 
• Women show a reduction in stress when they are part of a community, which is why they have community events.  
• Carolyn says, “Don’t connect the dots forward, connect the dots backward.” This is awesome advice that I think about regularly since speaking with her. 

You can find Carolyn here: 

For this episode of the Not A Mama Yet podcast, I spoke with my cousin Andrew Wasser who is a Mindfully based Marriage Family Therapist.   Andrew’s approach to Psychotherapy is helping his clients discover and process their unhealthy patterns and finding new ways to change or alter them. Andrew has several years of diversified experience and specializes in families, couples and individuals with addiction, divorce, parenting and family crisis issues.  

I wanted Andrew on the podcast because I think a lot about how couples maintain a strong relationship after they have kids and Andrew and his wife are a couple I have seen go on so many fun date nights and solo trips without their kids, basically always making sure they carve out time for each other.  Also, I knew Andrew could offer some valuable insight considering his profession is helping families handle whatever issues they are going through.   

Today we are talking about parenthood, finding time for himself, and what tips he shares with families juggling kids, work, and all life throws at you.  

Main takeaways: 

• If you can’t take care of yourself, than you can’t take care of your kids. 
• Love your kids, but love each other more. 
• Your kids are not yours. 
• Being supportive of your child, even if you can’t relate to something they are going through, is what’s most important. 

Yesterday was Mother’s Day, so I thought today would be a perfect day to share Episode 9 of the podcast featuring Kira Cook.  My cousin is a close friend of Kira’s so when she let me know that Kira and her husband were fostering to adopt, I was interested to speak with her and learn more about that process.  Adopting has always been something I have thought about doing one day.  Our global population is growing at such a rate that we aren’t totally sure how we are going to feed the number of people projected to live on this planet in the coming decades.  So I always think about the children who are already alive whose parents are unable to raise them and are in need of finding a loving home they can grow up in and have a brighter future as a result.  Adoption is a very expensive process though, so a lot of people are unable to even explore that as an option for their family unless they can afford to.  Fostering to adopt might not come with a financial cost, but the emotional toll it can take on someone can be huge and Kira explains how it does become a full time job to manage the appointments, home visits, and more.  

In our conversation, Kira shares her experience from when she started exploring this option of fostering to adopt, how a close friend had been through the process before and his advice, and why this is an important cause more people should be aware of. 

I hope you enjoy this episode of the Not A Mama Yet Podcast! 

Main takeaways: 

-Her fear of childbirth based on stories she had heard first led her to consider adoption.  Fear of childbirth is something I am very interested in because I know it is society, movies, and TV that perpetuates this fear.  I have another podcast coming up with an amazing midwife who talks about how she helps her clients combat this fear from the very beginning of pregnancy. 

-Talking about kids by months might seem silly to people without kids, but within the first three years of life, a child’s development from one month to the next is drastic enough where specifying their age with months actually makes a lot of sense. 

-The Foster Care system needs more people like Kira and her husband! Each case worker can have about 25 open cases per day they are responsible for monitoring.  While the system is not perfect, it is set up to help children find better homes than the ones they were born into. 

Where you can find Kira: 

Today’s podcast guest is Kerry Buzzell, the Director of Alliance of Moms, a membership-based program that supports pregnant and parenting teens in foster care in Los Angeles County.  Kerry was born and raised in San Pedro, CA, by two parents who were civil servants in Los Angeles. From a young age, she has been exposed to the inequalities in our community and was always encouraged to help underserved Angelinos.

After earning a B.A. in Psychology and an M.A. in Education, Kerry began her career as a LAUSD teacher and taught throughout Los Angeles, until transitioning to marketing, brand association, and business development work with numerous women's athleisure brands.  It was after the birth of her daughter, Elle, Kerry knew that she wanted to utilize her professional talents to help mothers and children in Los Angeles who might not have the resources to find success. 

Today we are talking about her work with Alliance of Moms, motherhood, and how having mentors at every stage of your life if important especially during the transition to parenthood.  Listen as we talk about her childhood and path to Alliance of Moms where she is helping further their mission of helping people in foster care in Los Angeles navigate parenthood, setting them and their children up for success and breaking the cycle of foster care.   

This week’s episode of the Not A Mama Yet “Podcast” is with Danielle Cuccio!  Danielle is the CEO of her brand Cuccio Somatology, she is a private yoga Instructor, and runs her website, The Beauty Blender, where she brings you beauty, wellness and happiness all in one place. 

I had the pleasure of first meeting Danielle through work last year and we have become fast friends.  I was so excited when she agreed to be on the podcast as she had recently shared the news of her pregnancy with the world and I wanted to sit down to talk about her experience getting pregnant and her pregnancy so far!  In our conversation, she shares her experience with different doctors, fertility, procedures she had to go through, and more.   I’m so thankful Danielle was willing to share everything she went through to get pregnant because so many women go through a similar experience or may have to one day if they decide to have a baby, so it’s important we share our stories while educating and supporting one another too.  

I hope you enjoy this episode of the Not A Mama Yet podcast! 

My main takeaways from this episode are: 

-You always have to be on top of your care and advocate for yourself because doctors are overwhelmed with patients and things can get lost in the shuffle, even though they shouldn’t! 

-Finding the right doctor is so important. Ask around, get advice, and find the right person who is giving you the level of care you need. 

-While someone you know is going through infertility struggles, just being there is the most important thing to do for them.  Letting them know it will happen at the right time is probably not what they want to hear when they are doing everything they can to get pregnant. 

-Going off birth control isn’t always a seamless process and if you have been on it for 5+ years, it could take a long time to get a regular period again. 

You can find Danielle at the links below: 

For this episode of the Not A Mama Yet podcast, I’m speaking with Pelvic Floor Physical Therapist Rachel Gelman.  Rachel is a Bay Area native.  She received her bachelor’s degree in Biology from the University of Washington in Seattle and her Doctorate in Physical Therapy from Samuel Merritt University.  

I reached out to Rachel during a trip to San Francisco a few months ago to talk about the pelvic floor.  It is a part of the body I’ve become increasingly interested in because of its role in our everyday lives and also pregnancy and labor.  For anyone who isn’t familiar with the pelvic floor, pelvic floor muscles function to support pelvic floor organs, assist in urinary and fecal continence, aid in sexual performance (orgasm), stabilize connecting joints and act as a venous and lymphatic pump for the pelvis.   

This is a great episode for both men and women to listen to because the pelvic floor muscles play an important role in our everyday lives.  It’s really as simple as not peeing our pants, we can thank our pelvic floor for that. 

My main takeaways from this episode are:

-Everything in our bodies is connected! It might sound silly to think your ankle can impact your pelvic floor, but it can!

-Your pelvic floor influences your daily life from going to the bathroom to having sex.  

-After pregnancy, your abdominal muscles can separate resulting in something called Diastisis Recti.  Closing that gap between the muscles is important to focus on. 

-Contract (Kegel), relax, and lengthen are the three ways to work your pelvic floor muscles. 

-Just because something is common, doesn’t mean it is normal! Don’t accept pain or discomfort because many people have similar issues.  

You can find Rachel here: 

For this episode of the Not A Mama Yet podcast, I’m speaking with Lina O’Connor.  Lina is a serious #girlboss and mom of two boys who are 8 and 10.  Growing up, she was never sure of what she wanted to do but each step she took in school while attending the Cornell University of Hotel Administration and post-grad while working at Wolfgang Puck and Marriott International led her to become one of the first employees of Tender Greens where she is now the CFO.  Just last year she received the Rising Star CFO of the Year award from the Los Angeles Business Journal. 

I wanted Lina on the show to discuss how she built her career while being a hands-on mom, to hear more about her two drug-free deliveries, and what it’s like raising boys in 2018.  She inspires me to approach pregnancy and motherhood in a way where I really trust my gut and follow what I feel is best for myself and my child. She was adamant about doing everything she could during her pregnancy to set herself up for a drug-free birth and she was lucky to have that happen twice.  She knew what she wanted out of her career and made it happen and now she is doing that as a mother.   In addition to a great conversation, she really reminded me that women can have it all in whatever way they define it without making themselves crazy to make it happen!  

My main takeaways from this episode are: 

-Even if you are at a really great job where you are comfortable, something exciting can come along and taking the risk to give it a shot can be totally worth it! 

-The most successful founders hire people who can challenge them. 

-I really need to watch “The Business of Being Born” because a few people have now brought it up to me! 

-The Bradley Method is a husband-led method of delivery that is described on their site in the following way, “Natural childbirth is an important goal since most people want to give their babies every possible advantage. Without the side effects of drugs given during labor and birth. The Bradley Method® classes teach families how to have natural births. The techniques are simple and effective. They are based on information about how the human body works during labor. Couples are taught how they can work with their bodies to reduce pain and make their labors more efficient. Of over 1,000,000 couples trained in The Bradley Method® nationwide, over 86% of them have had spontaneous, unmedicated vaginal births. This is a method that works!”

This week’s episode is featuring my good friend of 15 years, Sara Rajo Miller.   She grew up living all over the world in Germany, Israel, London, and Mexico, before moving to Los Angeles at the age of 12.  I remember when I first met her, I could not believe she had already lived in all of those places and I had lived in the same house for pretty much all of my life. 

Growing up, her parents who are both foreign correspondents taught her that life is all about relationships and, as a result, she developed an affinity to interacting with different people early on.  She fell into wealth management after a college internship at a stock analysis company, Miracle Mile Advisors, and never left!  It felt like a natural fit from the beginning and now, six years later, Sara has worked her way up to a Senior Financial Advisor position and manages hundreds of millions of dollars in assets for over 70 families.  I’m always so impressed by that considering I can barely manage my bank account that is pennies compared to that! 

Sara works closely with clients to design and implement customized investment plans based on their unique needs. As an Investment Advisor, she constructs detailed investment and cash flow models, asset allocation recommendations, wealth transfer structures, pre-transaction planning recommendations, and a variety of other life planning strategies.  Sara has even been recognized by Forbes as one of America’s 200 Top Women Advisors and Top Next-Gen Financial Advisors. 

So, you can probably understand why she is the first person I called when it came to talk about financial planning.  In school, we aren’t ever taught how to balance a checkbook (sounds pretty old school at this point) and we definitely aren’t taught about building a retirement fund.  As someone who is still in my 20s, I never realized how much I could be doing now to set myself up to be very comfortable in my 60s until I spoke with Sara! I hope you learn as much as I did in this episode!

*I also wanted to preface this episode because at one point a man entered the conference room next to us and decided to talk very loudly so you might pick up on that background noise and I apologize in advance! Like I said in my first podcast post, I am no sound engineer!

My main takeaways from this episode are: 

-Understanding finances first will help you make better decisions about money later.

-Age is our biggest asset! The power of compounding really does work! 

-Open a Roth IRA like yesterday and put in as much as you can each month, up to $5500 a year, for tax-free growth and withdrawal! Don’t sleep on that one!

-If the company you currently work at offers a 401k, take advantage of that!

-There are three options to go about managing your money: Financial Advisors, Robo-Advisors, or managing it yourself on sites like TD Ameritrade or E*Trade.

-Talking about budgeting and taxes with your kids is a great way to prepare them for supporting themselves later. 

You can find Sara here:

For this episode of the Not A Mama Yet “Podcast”, I’m speaking with Laura Ellis.  As a student of the well known Institute for Psycho-Structural Balancing, Laura was trained in the energetics of the human body including Aromatherapy, Polarity Therapy, and Sensory Repatterning.  She originally started her intuitive training in 1995 with Jim Self where she learned how to read the Aura.  She then went on to further her education in the healing and intuitive arts training in Los Angeles, where she was certified in various subjects such as Master Crystal Formations, Transcrystal Therapy, Reiki, Akashic Records and Advanced Channelling. Laura is a certified Crystal Therapist and Teacher, Reiki Master, Multimodality Healing Practitioner and Intuitive Reader.

Attracted to crystals at the age of 15, Laura started her work with the mineral kingdom.  After 25 years of practice, training and teaching about the benefits and uses of crystals, minerals and gems, she has formed a special bond with these healing and spiritual tools.

I first met Laura in the fall of 2015 through a friend of a friend who recommended I go see her for an intuitive reading.  We will talk about what that means in Laura’s own words, but let me just say it totally changed how I think about energy, past lives, and trusting my intuition.   Taping into this world has been important for me to be more mindful about my life and what I want to get out of it.  While I am not obsessed by any means and definitely have plenty more to learn (basically everything), it’s always interesting, in my opinion, to learn about different ideologies and schools of thought.  When I am a parent, I hope the interest I have taken in different people, places and ideas will only help me share the world with my kids. 

My main takeaways from this episode are: 

-Everyone is an intuitive! 

-Connecting with your baby while pregnant can be a pretty miraculous experience. 

-You can have birth with dolphins! 

-Having a birth plan can bring you peace of mind going into labor, but it’s important to remember anything can happen after your water breaks.  

-I loved her words to live by, “In order to calm down, you need to slow down”. 

You can find Laura below! 

This episode features a conversation between me and Dr. Sanda Moldovan. This is going to sound so LA, but she is my dentist who is also a nutritionist.  Dr. Sanda (as she likes to be called)  is an award-winning Periodontist and Nutritionist with her own practice in Los Angeles, CA.  She is an internationally recognized speaker, author, and television personality consulting on oral health, periodontics, nutrition, and anti-aging. Dr. Sanda is the ‘go-to’ oral health expert for the Emmy-award winning television series “THE DOCTORS” and is a widely sought after oral health expert by NBC and CBS. She just launched her wellness brand, Orasana, and released her book: “Heal Up!: Seven Ways To Faster Healing And Optimum Health”.  Originally from Transylvania in Romania, Dr. Sanda has worked extremely hard to build up her robust practice where she is helping transform her patients’ health and their lives. 

I’m obviously biased when I say I love her, but she has totally changed the way I feel and think about my oral health.  She taught me the importance of how our mouths are gateways to the rest of our health and immune system, which is why taking care of our teeth and gums is a crucial part of our daily routine we should not skimp on.  

I was excited to talk to her about her new book, preparing your body for pregnancy, and how nutrition and healing are so important throughout that process. 

You can find Dr. Sanda here: