Postpartum University® Podcast

EP 176 Healing Naturally: Overcoming a Crisis in Paradise

August 06, 2024 • Maranda Bower, Postpartum Nutrition Specialist

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Ever wondered how to handle a medical emergency while exploring a remote paradise? Join me, Maranda Bawer, as I recount an unforgettable 10-year anniversary trip to French Polynesia that took an unexpected turn when I developed a severe eye infection. This episode will take you on a journey through breathtaking landscapes and vibrant local culture, but also through the intense experience of navigating medical care on a secluded atoll.

Why Listen?

  • Unconventional Remedies: Discover how we managed a health crisis with surprising natural remedies like a hot-cold regimen and a potato poultice. Learn how these unconventional methods, combined with persistence and communication, played a crucial role in my recovery.
  • Resilience and Preparation: Hear how our journey tested our resilience and reinforced the importance of being prepared for emergencies, even in the most remote locations.
  • Holistic Health Insights: Gain insights into how this experience deepened my understanding of holistic health and nutrition, and how these lessons can be applied to your postpartum journey.

What’s In It For You?

This episode provides a unique blend of travel adventure and practical advice on handling health crises while abroad. You'll learn about the power of holistic remedies, the critical role of communication, and how preparedness can turn a challenging situation into a profound learning experience.

Exciting Announcement

Stay tuned until the end for an exclusive announcement about Postpartum University’s upcoming Postpartum Nutrition Certification Program. Discover how you can access invaluable tools and knowledge for postpartum healing and learn about our upcoming certification program. Your support means the world to us, and we hope you’ll leave a review if you find this episode inspiring.

Tune In Now

Don’t miss out on this captivating episode that blends adventure with essential life lessons. Visit www.postpartumu.com for more information and join us next week for more empowering stories and insights.

Tune In Now

Don’t miss this essential episode packed with crucial health information and practical advice. Visit www.postpartumu.com for more details and join us next week for more empowering content. If you found today’s episode helpful, please leave a review and share your thoughts. Your feedback helps us reach more listeners and refine our content. Thank you for your support!

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Speaker 1:

Depression, anxiety and autoimmune symptoms after birth is not how it's supposed to be. There is a much better way, and I'm here to show you how to do just that. Hey, my friend, I'm Miranda Bauer, a mother to four kids and a biology student turned scientist obsessed with changing the world through postpartum care. Join us as we talk to mothers and the providers who serve them and getting evidence-based information that actually supports the mind, body and soul in the years after birth. Hello, hello, welcome. It's Miranda Bauer, of course, and oh my gosh, I have such an incredible story to tell every one of you. You are not going to believe what has happened and transpired.

Speaker 1:

So my husband and I, we went on our 10 year anniversary and it was a big trip and we've never done this before. Like to to say that it was a big deal is an understatement. Nate and I, 10 years married, we have never had any time away from the kids. We've never had a trip away. Our children have always been with us. Even on our honeymoon, we didn't get any time whatsoever. We had my nine month old with us and then the next day he flew out to MIT where he's a graduate. He was in the graduate program at the time and he spent a week in school. So when we got from the time we've gotten married to, you know, our 10 years together, we have never had a trip without children, never been by ourselves. So a couple last week we just returned. We went to for two weeks to the French Polynesia and it was absolutely phenomenal. We trailed through mountains, we hiked waterfalls, we danced with locals, we swam with marine life, there was dolphins and sharks and stingrays and turtles, and it was just absolutely incredible. But I will tell you what it didn't go without challenge, and one of those challenges not only tested my resilience but also really deepened my understanding of holistic healing, and today I'm going to share with you that story and how it connects to what we do every day here at Postpartum University. So get prepared for a wild story.

Speaker 1:

So again, I want to say, before I tell you this about how I literally almost lost my eye, I want to say how much I absolutely loved this trip. I'm not going to pretend that I'm some world traveler. This is the first time I've ever had an international trip and it was the time of our lives and I ended up with a crazy eye infection and it did not stop us at all, but it seriously brought up questions for me about the quality of life, and I'm gonna tell you this before I dive into what happened with my eye and how we managed this in the middle of nowhere, everyone. It was just absolutely insane. I thought, and I'm still thinking, like how in French Polynesia, there's this quality of life, of living that we have no recognition of, no understanding of here in the United States period, and I know that this is probably the same for other places around the world. But these people, who are some of the nicest people in the planet, I will tell you, were so incredibly chill and relaxed. They like knew how to have fun. Every single day was fun. Waking up early was like the easiest thing in the whole world. It was so easy for us and the whole culture to just wake up well before the sunrise and just enjoy it Like it was. It was really crazy Like I am not going to lie, I struggle with getting up in the morning, but I also live in Alaska. It's cold, it's dark, it's not that easy and it was like it was like nothing in the whole world and and everybody was just so fun and so chill and relaxed and just like living life, and I'm just so great, I'm so grateful for that opportunity and I will tell you we were okay.

Speaker 1:

So we went on this far away trip to French Polynesia, and around day three I started noticing that my eyelid was swelling and I was trying to manage it myself. I was putting on like little heat packs and I had cordial silver with me, and so I was putting that on my eye and using it, and it was like legit, the only thing that I had brought with me. I didn't have any herbs, I didn't have anything with me, and none of it worked. And by day six the swelling moved to the surrounding area of my eye, including my nose and my cheek, and that's really when I started to kind of panic. I knew the seriousness of this and I suspected orbital cellulitis and I freaked out.

Speaker 1:

Honestly, this was probably the most difficult part of my trip and we were about to fly out to this really small, small atoll. If you don't know what an atoll is, I highly recommend looking it up. It is like a sunken island, and so there's only a ring of land and in the middle of this ring of land is a lagoon, and so you're surrounded. You've got the lagoon and then there's like a ring of land and then you have the ocean surrounding you. It's absolutely incredible. You see nothing but water everywhere. And we're flying out to this place. That requires like a small jet plane, and then when we get there, we have to take a uh, a boat to the other part of the island. There's only 200 people on this, this part of this atoll, and it was.

Speaker 1:

It was magical, but I knew that I was not going to have any medical care. There's no medical care, and we were flying out that day to this, so I had next to nothing for treatment. I had no herbs, no tools that I normally use, like I was in a different part of the world on top of it, so finding local herbs I knew nothing about and I did not have any idea of where I could find that. Now I looked, I just didn't. There was nothing that was coming up and I didn't speak the language, so there's a language barrier. I didn't know who to ask, like, where do I find the local herbs? And then where do I begin? Right, and it was just not something that I was able to find on my, my trip.

Speaker 1:

So right before we left, I was able to get into a doctor and he very confidently told me that it was a chalazon and he gave me an antibiotic ointment and one. I was desperate to try and tell him, otherwise I knew what a chalazon was. My daughter has had those and I and we treat them very easily here at home. And it wasn't, it wasn't that in the least bit. And I was trying to tell him what it was and y'all my concerns were literally lost in translation. I'm trying to communicate with this French doctor. I was using chat, gpt, like I was doing all the things and I and it wasn't, it wasn't it.

Speaker 1:

And of course I I don't use antibiotics ever Like that is not a thing for me. I have mastered, and I shouldn't even say mastered, I'm still very, very much learning. But my family, we use herbs for everything literally, and I'm not opposed to using antibiotics in serious situations, and this was one of those very serious situations. I've got an eye infection that could have me lose my eye and worse, my life if I don't take care of this, and so I again, knowing the seriousness of this situation, I was like give me those antibiotics, I'm going to use them and I just prayed that they were going to work, and they didn't. They absolutely did not work. It was getting worse and worse and I woke up the next morning and the swelling was even more intense. I legit cried at this point, but only one eye could actually release tears. Y'all it was bad. It was really really bad.

Speaker 1:

And so, anyway, this is the craziest part of the story, and I will tell you so much about how this relates to postpartum universities, where I actually managed to get in touch with my doctor here back home in Alaska, and this was like a miracle right here, because my doctor was also on vacation out of the country and the owner of the place, which is it's like this beautiful birth center, and then I have a doctor within that birth center and she offers like family care and things like that. And the owner of the birth center answered the phone and she said you know what I get, how serious this situation is. She really understood what orbital cellulitis is and she tried to see if she could get a tele-appointment, so she was going to text the doctor to see if she can get us connected. Miracle, absolutely miracle, we were able to get connected. We were a couple hours later. We finally connected and, of course, she cannot diagnose me. I'm literally sending her pictures of my eye via phone because we couldn't get a tele like a Zoom call or anything like that. It was crazy, but she saved my behind and I'm gonna tell you this is what happened.

Speaker 1:

This is blew my absolute mind. Her recommendations okay. Now, keep this in mind. She could not give me anything. She could not diagnose, and I am in the middle of nowhere in my location and access to healing resources is next to nil. Hey, and keep in mind, too, that I don't even know how I have internet connection. Okay, so here's the fun part. She's gave me two recommendations. One was a 30 minute hot cold regimen. So take extremely hot water as hot as I can physically stand it and put it on my eye this was my recommendation for three minutes and then immediately follow it with ice cold water for 30 seconds, and then you rotate that eight times. So you start with hot and then you end with cold, and what this does is it creates a really healthy blood flow that brings white blood cells and oxygen to the area, and it helps flush the infection out by creating a pulsing effect with your blood. So I was able to do this once in the morning and then again once at night, right before I would go to bed. Hey, I'm gonna be a hundred percent straight with you.

Speaker 1:

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Speaker 1:

Her second recommendation was potato. For serious y'all, I peeled potatoes. You can find potatoes anywhere in the world. I found potatoes at the local little supermarket and I peeled potatoes to make a poultice and I put it on my eye all night long and anytime during the day when we weren't doing anything. I would put this on over my eye and I had like a little, you know, like this little night eye things that you put over your eyes so it blocks out the you know, sunlight or any light whatsoever. So I had that. I was traveling so I had that um, and I would push it off to the side so that it would only cover like one eye, and I would put the potato right underneath and so I would have like this eye patch. It was actually really funny.

Speaker 1:

My husband and I had so much fun with this. We, uh, we would like I would say our matey all the time and whatever, and he would be like how's, how's captain doing, you know, and it was just like it was super fun, like we had, we had a blast. There was a um, uh, ship that we had to take a taxi on all the time, called the RMA T I'm not kidding you, the RMAT, right, and so I'd be like RMAT, we're going on our ship Like it was. It was super fun, like we made the absolute best of it. But I legit, anytime we weren't doing something, like I didn't go out in public with it, although I probably could have, I just used my sunglasses anytime I went out in public and we had the time of our life Again.

Speaker 1:

We never missed a beat on our trip, but all night and anytime we were home or at the place that we were staying, I would put on this eye patch. And this was absolute shocker to me because, y'all, it's potato, it's potato. But it worked. And it works by pulling the infection literally out and within three days I was able to see my eye again and 80% of the swelling and inflammation was gone. It was absolutely gone.

Speaker 1:

I had asked Nate, my husband, what the chances of me having like this crazy issue when we're on an international flight traveling or international trip traveling in the middle of nowhere? And he said a hundred percent. And it's so true, because leave it to me to discover some new healing power of food. And for the last several years and still today, I have the only functional nutrition certification program designed and dedicated to the year's postpartum, and I have never felt more pumped and fired up about nourishing foods in my life. And now, on top of it, I have this whole new understanding of what it means to use food to heal deeply. Honestly, I am blown away at my experience and I'm left wondering. I'm wondering what else is it that I don't know? And this is truly the start of a new journey for me. I am finishing up a degree in biology with it's an emphasis in neurobiology. I'm finishing that up this year and in no way would this teach me this kind of stuff in the least bit. And I have been through so many trainings and stuff in my life and never in a million years I actually asked my doctor.

Speaker 1:

So I came back to the States. I got she was. We flew out the exact same day, which I found out later. I was able to meet with her a day after we got back from our trip and I had asked her like how did you know about potato? And she said, well, obviously never learned that from her medical degree. And she had said she straight up told me y'all, if she could do it again, she would never have gotten the medical degree, because everything that she knows and everything that she uses has come from self-study. Everything that she uses has come from self-study, like it never once came from some degree or some certification or anything like that, which is crazy to me. She's gonna be teaching classes here soon. I told her to sign me up. I will pay right on the spot, like do whatever, I wanna learn everything. It is to learn about how to do this. And she was telling me about the. You know onion and garlic and you know I knew a lot about those, but potato I had no idea about potato.

Speaker 1:

Anyway, it was diagnosed everyone as a bacterial infection. It was not a chalazon and my eye had almost completely healed by then and it's actually. I wanted to know what kind of bacterial infection it was, but because my eye had already healed so much, it would be really invasive to try and determine what kind of bacteria it was, and so I just I didn't want to do that in the least bit. But we do know that it was a bacterial infection and likely very much cellulitis that was occurring.

Speaker 1:

And the only thing that I can think of was that on day two, like the day before the swelling happened, a bug flew in my eye. It was like a little gnat. We were out of this waterfall. There was a bunch of other people. You know it was kind of it was like one of those little hot touristy spots and you know there's people everywhere and I got some photos of me, you know, playing with the waterfall. Nate was playing with the waterfall. There's actually like photos of me like swatting bugs, cause I'm like he's trying to take a multitude of photos and I'm like smiling and then I'm like swatting because they were so much. It was just like the one place and literally like there was hardly any bugs anywhere in the whole entire Island except for that one location and one flew in my eye, got it out really quickly, but you know, never. You never know. And there's no bump, there's no inflammation anymore. My eye is a little weak. I noticed that sometimes it just has a hard time seeing for a little bit, but it's likely because I've had it covered for so long on our two-week trip, because I kept doing it, because I wanted to make absolute certain that that infection was out, probably overdid it, but it was scary, right?

Speaker 1:

Anyway, I have so much to say about this and I really want to know, seriously, send me a message on Instagram If you know anything about, or have an experience about, potato or onion or any other food that is beyond, like some sort of healing for the body, beyond you know, ingestion and what it does to help us, you know, be healthy and whole. I want to know. I want to know, tell me. This trip was such a stark reminder for me of the individual and credible healing power of food and and holistic practices. And really I again I've been running the only functional nutrition certification program designed for and dedicated to the year's postpartum, and my experience in French Polynesia just reinforced that passion for the nourishing foods and that holistic healing and really opened my eyes to the new possibilities and my commitment to using food as medicine. There's only one takeaway from this and it's that this traditional wisdom and these natural remedies hold this profound healing potential. And again I'm I'm reignited in this passion and we're actually gearing up for the next postpartum nutrition certification cohort. I could not be more excited for this.

Speaker 1:

This program is perfect for postpartum professionals, health coaches, doulas, anyone who's passionate about supporting new moms through nutrition, and it's opening enrollment in September. But if you're on the wait list, if you're on the wait list, you get early access in August with exclusive early bird discounts. So make sure that you're on that wait list. I'm gonna drop that in the show notes and if you're not sure, if you're on the wait list, just register again, like it's not going to hurt. You're just going to make sure you're on the list, and what makes this program incredible is that it is again the only one out there, only one on the planet, and it's a culmination of over 15 years of education and study and real world experience. There's nothing else like it, and by joining, you're not only investing in your own professional growth, but your own healing and wellbeing as well, not to mention the countless women and families who are going to benefit from this. So don't miss your chance to be a part of this revolutionary movement and postpartum care.

Speaker 1:

I know that things in this program are about to hit another level on top of it, with this whole potato thing. Like, my eyes are wide open that pun is totally intended Wide open to the possibilities of what's coming. So, again, if you have stories about the healing power of food or natural remedies, I want to hear them. This is a collective journey and together we are going to unlock these secrets of really nature's pharmacy right, and the simplest solutions like potato can be some of the most absolute powerful. Anyway, thank you so much for listening into my story.

Speaker 1:

Dm me on social media. Make sure you are on the wait list that is coming up here very soon for the certification program and I cannot wait to connect with you more Chat soon. I am so grateful you turned into the Postpartum University podcast. We've hoped you enjoyed this episode enough to leave us a quick review and, more importantly, I hope more than ever that you take what you've learned here, applied it to your own life and consider joining us in the Postpartum University membership. It's a private space where mothers and providers learn the real truth and the real tools needed to heal in the years postpartum. You can learn more at wwwpostpartumucom. We'll see you next week.