Postpartum University® Podcast

The Neurological Impact of Birth Trauma | Dr. Maya Weir EP 221

• Maranda Bower, Postpartum Nutrition Specialist

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Ever had a gut feeling that your client's postpartum depression or anxiety wasn't just about hormones? What if the real root is an unspoken birth experience, a wound that's been hiding in plain sight? This episode is a must-listen for anyone in perinatal mental health, functional health, or holistic postpartum care. Dr. Maya Weir peels back the layers of birth trauma, exploring its deep neurological effects, how it secretly shows up in the postpartum period, and why therapy alone often don't work. Transform how you support your postpartum clients, understand maternal trauma at its core, and add powerful somatic healing techniques to your toolbox. 

Check out the episode on the blog HERE. 

Key Time Stamps

  • 1:47 Redefining birth trauma as more than just emergencies
  • 3:00 Why grief is often at the heart of the trauma
  • 5:38 Trauma vs. mourning: Recognizing the deep emotional layers
  • 8:33 The surprising physiological & neurological signs of birth trauma
  • 10:17 Common hidden symptoms of living with unresolved birth trauma
  • 12:04 Misdiagnosing PPD/Anxiety when it's actually birth trauma
  • 13:54: Why talk therapy often falls short for birth trauma healing
  • 14:43 How somatic work helps the brain process trauma + bilateral stimulation and resourcing
  • 16:41 Exploring intergenerational healing and ancestral connections
  • 18:59 Why past traumas resurface intensely in postpartum
  • 20:10 Healing in parenthood
  • 21:27 Cultural wisdom about maternal healing and family patterns
  • 25:07 Integrating family constellation work
  • 26:09: A powerful somatic practice for any birth provider: 10-tap regulation.

Connect with Dr. Maya Weir

 Dr. Maya Weir is a clinical psychologist specializing in birth trauma treatment and the emotional landscape of early parenthood. Her own experience of becoming a parent revealed how physically, emotionally, and psychologically intense the transition can be. She helps parents make sense of their journey, heal from birth trauma, and find more grounded, connected ways to move forward. Website | IG



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Speaker 1:

The postpartum care system is failing, leaving countless mothers struggling with depression, anxiety and autoimmune conditions. I'm Miranda Bauer and I've helped thousands of providers use holistic care practices to heal their clients at the root. Subscribe now and join us in addressing what modern medicine overlooks, so that you can give your clients real, lasting solutions for lifelong well-being. Hey, hey, everyone, welcome to the podcast Miranda. Here and today I have Dr Maya Weir, who is a clinical psychologist specializing in birth trauma treatment and the emotional landscape of early parenthood, and her own experience of becoming a parent revealed just how intense and disorienting that transition can be physically, emotionally and psychologically. She also recognizes how little space our culture offers to process the full impact of those early parenting experiences, and so today she is helping us parents make better sense of our journey from healing birth trauma and finding more grounded and well-connected ways to move forward. Maya, thank you so much for being here.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, thank you, Miranda. I'm so happy to be here.

Speaker 1:

So we often think of birth trauma as something that only happens in extreme cases, like emergencies, cesareans loss, violence. Can you talk about how trauma can show up in more subtle or even quote quote unquote normal birth experiences?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I think it's interesting because I think birth trauma is one of those things that's really under-recognized. So it's. You know, even a few years ago I didn't really even hear people talking so much about birth trauma, which is, I think, one of the ways that a lot of people's experiences get minimized, because what birth trauma is can vary so much. And in the work I do, what I really try to do is expand the definition of what birth trauma is. So I'm not only supporting people with the birthing experience itself, but sometimes we're also looking at conception, pregnancy, the birthing experience and then postpartum. So it's very vast. For example, with conception, you know if someone went through fertility issues, that that can be a traumatic kind of thing. Or if there was a lot of conflict between partners at the time of conception, that can be part of it. And then during pregnancy, there's all different diagnoses that can come at that time and that can really prime the body with a lot of fear.

Speaker 2:

So that can also translate into the birth experience.

Speaker 2:

In the birth experience itself, what I want to say is that it's not so much what happened, like what intervention, like a C-section or this or that, but a lot of the times the birthing person has an idea of what the birth will look like and then it's very different and the grief around that is really at the heart of what I would call the trauma, is really at the heart of what I would call the trauma and reconciling what they wished and hoped and dreamed for versus what happened.

Speaker 2:

It's usually very powerful when we're able to recognize that and make space for the grief. That's a big part of the work. And then in postpartum and I see postpartum as a very lengthy, I'm not talking six weeks, I'm talking years but there's different things you know how they thought they would feed their child and then how it actually goes, what they thought it would be like to be a parent. If the birth was difficult for them, there can be a lot of feelings of I failed, I didn't do it right. They can translate into how they feel about being a parent and then also with the birth trauma piece, sometimes that can impact bonding with the baby. So there's really a lot to what birth trauma can be, and I think a lot of it is about how someone experiences what happened to them, versus just the facts of what happened.

Speaker 1:

I feel like we almost need to expand the term birth trauma to not be birth anymore, but maybe maternal trauma, because that is more of an encompassing term and maybe that's not even the right term. But I feel like if we say birth trauma, people think of trauma that happened in the birth room. We're not thinking about all of the other areas of trauma that may be present.

Speaker 2:

Definitely I love that Maternal trauma, parenthood trauma like, yes, the difficulties of what it means to become a parent the difficulties of what it means to become a parent.

Speaker 1:

Okay, so I have to go back to this idea of trauma versus mourning or feeling as if our experiences didn't quite go as we had intentioned or in planned for them to go. Would that period of mourning or sadness or frustration be considered trauma, or are we sometimes feeling as if those things are our trauma in itself, like, can you share a little bit more about that?

Speaker 2:

it's interesting because I feel like most of the people who come to me, a lot of the times they're not even recognizing to themselves or knowing themselves that they went through a birth trauma. And you know, like I facilitate free workshops about birth trauma and then, oh, that seems interesting. And then they'll come and be like, oh, that's me. And so the reason I'm saying this is because I think a lot of times the initial feelings are those of kind of the grief or disappointment, like people know that that's there. They don't necessarily think, oh, I'm a birth trauma survivor, so there can be both experiences simultaneously. But what people recognize to themselves tends to be more of the I'm sad about this, I'm disappointed about this. Those are the things that surface in a very natural way.

Speaker 1:

Is there a difference between somebody who's maybe have those feelings about a difficult experience versus someone who actually has trauma? Because trauma almost feels like a very heavy big word and I know a lot of women and a lot of families will actually downplay their experiences because, well, so-and-so had a much harder time. Or I know somebody else who had gone through this and I didn't go through that, so I should be grateful. Or my baby's okay, so obviously I shouldn't feel baby's okay, so obviously I shouldn't feel. You know, my, my story is maybe not you know, quote unquote traumatic, but it was still difficult. Is there a difference between the two or are they all kind of lumped together in the way you work with, with moms and families?

Speaker 2:

For me there isn't a difference, and I'll tell you why because birth is such an epically huge experience, one of the most life-changing, intense there's almost nothing like it. So what I see is that having the space to process it can be so important and even for someone where the birth went like amazing, this was great. Oftentimes, processing it can be really helpful. And, of course, those are not the people that come to me as often right, it's more when some things went badly. But I see quite a range of people, right, I see someone who you know had an emergency C-section, or someone who even lost their child, which those two things are obviously very different, but making a space for any of the types of things I see as tremendously important in healing and, yeah, it's just super, super important. So it doesn't matter too much to me if it's trauma, difficult, whatever we want to call it. I still think there's such juiciness in processing it.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, that's so true, and I feel at the same time like when we look at what is occurring within the brain and the physiological aspects of birth and things that are maybe deemed difficult or hard or trauma, they all kind of show up as the same symptoms. Is that accurate?

Speaker 2:

Totally. Totally, I mean on the body level. I think part of what we know now so much with trauma, research and the nervous system is how much the nervous system gets dysregulated by these trauma, bad experience, whatever we want to call it. And pregnancy and birth and postpartum is such a bodily experience right, it's one of the most intimate bodily things that can happen. So of course that the body is implicated in that, and the nervous system and the brain and our, our whole being and our whole system in that.

Speaker 1:

What does it actually look like when somebody is living with birth trauma? Are there symptoms or patterns that might be typical of these symptoms? And then, what might be surprising to providers or professionals who are in the field, or even moms themselves?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so there's quite a few types of symptoms that we could see. Overall, what I would say is that any reminders of the birth experience will be coming out as triggers. So let's say, you drive by the hospital where you gave birth and then your heart starts beating fast. You're triggered by that or any other reminders of the birth can be really triggering. So I think that that's one element of it overall, but it can manifest in a lot of ways feeling really anxious, feeling really depressed. Being very preoccupied with your baby's health is a big one. Sleep issues and I don't mean the kind that are connected to your baby not sleeping, which is just normal, but like even if the baby's sleeping, you cannot sleep wide awake that kind of thing Difficulties bonding with the baby or feeling connected with your child A lot of times.

Speaker 2:

I also see relationship issues coming up after it, especially when the couple hasn't been able to process what happens. It can create some disconnect or if there's anger or resentment about how a partner showed up in the birth, and then there can also be a lot of self-critic and inner critic, especially the birthing person. I failed, I didn't do this right, I should have done this. I could have done that. There can be a lot of that type of thing lingering.

Speaker 1:

That's so true and I feel like oftentimes for many providers and professionals, this is not something that we're trained to talk about or to even address in the least bit. You know, if you go see your OB, they're not going to ask you so how was that birth? Like that just rarely ever happens, and so oftentimes one thing that I see, and maybe you see as well, is like maybe a lot of these women are coming in with a diagnosis of depression or anxiety and postpartum, when really they have birth trauma. Oh yeah, and that's totally different, right? Like this is not something that we treat the same way, it's treated completely different. Is that accurate, totally?

Speaker 2:

And I mean big time once I got cause. I was not initially trained in birth trauma, you know.

Speaker 1:

I had a practice, nobody is right, yes, exactly.

Speaker 2:

And then now it's like if someone tells me that postpartum depression. First question how was the birth?

Speaker 1:

Always, always, yeah, yeah, and it's not just like there's so much more that we have to use in terms of treatment tools and support. That is way different, and I think it's one of the biggest things that we are lacking in our care for moms. So thank you for bringing that up. And that brings me to another point, too is that oftentimes, you know, not only do we not have trained providers, not only are we not talking about birth trauma, but also traditional talk therapy is often really not enough when it comes to healing from birth trauma, and I'd love to hear your take on this, because there's so much more, including somatic healing, which I know you do quite a bit of as well. So can you just like open up and share a lot about this topic?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, definitely. So I mean, that was my experience as a provider too, where I was trained initially as a psychodynamic relational therapist, which I still do and I love and I love talk therapy. So no shade about talk therapy. But what I was noticing in my practice so my practice is all focused on early parenthood, I work exclusively with parents, so that's just the bread and butter of everything I'm in and what I was noticing is that when it came to birth trauma, talking really wasn't enough. And then, just by coincidence, I met Gina McCarthy, who developed the model which I practiced, the somatic model, and it was one of those perfect timing things where I was like, yes, I want to get trained in this somatic amazing. And so what I do with people when they're coming to me with birth trauma is that they're.

Speaker 2:

We combine bilateral stimulation, which I'll explain in a second, and somatic resourcing. So this is very different than traditional talk therapy. The bilateral stimulation is basically tapping, like doing alternating taps, and the somatic resourcing is that we visualize different figures. So the figures that we visualize for this treatment are the protector figure, the support figure and the compassion figure, and the reason these are so important in birth trauma is usually the person needed more protection than they got, more support than they got. And for the inner critic pieces we were talking about earlier, where there's a lot of self-judgment, the compassion figure really helps. So basically, when they're coming to me they're going to be tapping the whole time.

Speaker 2:

They tell the story and we do a lot of check-ins about what's going on with sensation in the body and so the tapping really helps on a lot of different levels.

Speaker 2:

It helps with the brain processing, so we get to process at this deeper bodily level processing, so we get to process at this deeper bodily level. And it's kind of cool, like when I do the thing, when I'm doing this with people, it's almost a little bit like a kind of trance state where people can bypass some of their defenses that they would have if they were just talking and get into the deeper level of things. Because oftentimes, like when there's a feeling that they're describing describing either a bodily sensation or feeling like, you know, sad or disappointed or alone these feelings predate the birth trauma. They're actually about a trauma that happened earlier in life and so when we heal up that, then it heals up the birth trauma part two, because who we are in birth is a mirror of what we actually brought in before that in terms of who we are. So there's this really beautiful parallel that can happen with the tapping in terms of healing other traumas as well.

Speaker 1:

Even intergenerationally.

Speaker 2:

Sometimes we go back to the birth of ancestors. It's not only about what happened, know what happened here, or early childhood experiences or stuff like that. So, yeah, the tapping and the resourcing really works at this beautiful body, brain level. And the most amazing thing is that when people initially come to me, they're very activated and triggered by the experience and by the time they leave they're not.

Speaker 1:

I think it's so profound, like such a beautiful thing, that you are doing and helping these moms and and all of this, and you said so many things that I'm like, wait a second, we got to stop, we got to go back. You talked about tapping. You talked about these, zach, you talked about tapping, you talked about these role-playing and things like that. I'm also curious about EMDR.

Speaker 2:

Yes, so the person who developed this model. It's very similar to EMDR, but EMDR, I think, would be using eye movements as the bilateral stimulation, where I'm using tapping as the bilateral stimulation. So they're similar and I'm not trained in EMDR so I can't speak about it in an expert kind of way.

Speaker 2:

But I do think what I'm describing is very similar to EMDR and can have very similar types of benefits. I think another difference that I know from a colleague is that with EMDR the therapist would start with the symptoms and what with what I do?

Speaker 1:

I just go through the story, so we start with conception or pregnancy and we work all the way through postpartum the whole story it sounds like you're actually working with the neurological changes that are occurring in the brain, like you are literally rewiring at the brain level the birth story Is that accurate?

Speaker 2:

That is accurate and the really cool thing is at the brain level usually went with the trauma. Things get put into the implicit memory. So that's why they're coming out as these random little weird triggers, and then what we're doing through this process is we're moving it to explicit memory, which is where there's a meaningful, coherent story that someone can tell, and so that's kind of how we maybe track what's happening in the brain through that process.

Speaker 1:

You said something that just blew my mind and so I was like throwing these little questions at you. But I was saving the biggest for last here, these little questions at you, but I was saving the biggest for last year. I noticed this quite frequently over the last 15 years of working with moms, and not in a clinical sense in the least bit. I mean stories of women who come to me and said I'm postpartum, I'm in the first six months or the first few years, and all of a sudden I'm remembering what my dad did, what my uncle did, that time that I went to that party when I was 14. And I snuck out of the house and this thing happened and these very traumatic events the car accident, the house fire, like all of these things that happen and all of a sudden become very focal or a focal point for a lot of postpartum moms. What is happening here? Why are we remembering and not just remembering but almost remembering intensely the traumas that we've experienced before even having kids?

Speaker 2:

Ooh, I love this question.

Speaker 1:

And this is why I love working with parents in early in the early parenthood phase.

Speaker 2:

This is so juicy. So in the early parenthood phase, once the baby is born and in the first few years postpartum, all of the parents' attachment issues are coming up because they're providing attachment to their baby, and so this is such a juicy time in terms of what kind of healing can happen. Oftentimes the healing is not happening because in this culture, early parenthood is so under supported, which is very sad, um, but unconsciously, whatever age your child is at will bring up what was happening to you at that age, and so that is why so many new memories, new experiences will come up. And that's why I love doing this work at this time period, because I just feel like it's such a potent time to work on people's relational blueprints which are usually at the base of their traumas, and so when we do that, we can heal so, so profoundly, and the beauty of it too is that it translates into their relationship with their child, which can really help future generations. So there's this beautiful ripple effect and beauty in why those traumas get resurfaced at that time.

Speaker 1:

I got goosebumps because I remember hearing about so many cultures. I did a lot of studies of other cultures around the world, especially in relationship to birth and postpartum, and one thing that was clear is that this was a regular thing that happened, like if you experience something in your childhood which almost all of us have at some level, especially our generation, then something is going to come up and you're going to remember that trauma and it's not going to necessarily feel good, but the reason why it comes up is because you're being. You're given an invitation to heal. This is an invitation to heal because women it is believed in many of these cultures because of your connection, you're able to heal your body deeper than anyone else would ever be, and that's the gift of being a mother.

Speaker 2:

Yes, and you know, children are divinely tapped into that knowledge or that wisdom, right Like they are closer to the source, because they're closer to you know the beginning. And so sometimes children will just say the most amazing stuff that brings the parents into an invitation towards healing, sometimes not in an easy way either. And yeah, so there is this really beautiful invitation to heal, and I think part of that too is in the after giving. Well, giving birth splits us wide open to heal and I think part of that too is in the after giving. Well, giving birth splits us wide open to healing. It can, and then afterwards, if there's nursing and sleep deprivation, those things can really like break down some of our defenses in ways that are difficult, but also in ways that can also in a way promote healing, because there isn't as much of this like being in the intellect strong defendedness if that makes sense.

Speaker 1:

there can be more of a softness to actually get into things yeah, and I think oftentimes and I can speak for myself, like I wore so many masks of who I thought I was and and what it meant to be a woman and what it meant to be a mother and what it meant to be a wife and you know all of these things and when you have children, they really help you process, like, what does it actually mean?

Speaker 1:

And is this really the truth?

Speaker 1:

And I think one of the most beautiful stories is, just, like you know, we see this often for women who are, like you know, maybe they're a little bit more shy, and they go into their labor experience and then all of a sudden, they're like stripping naked at, like you know, because they're eight centimeters or whatever, and they're like, I don't even care anymore, like you know, this doesn't matter to me, that it's, it's off, right, and of course, that's a different part of your brain and, and maybe a terrible example, but I find it oftentimes this is what occurs in motherhood as well, where our children just help us.

Speaker 1:

You know, they deliver a new story, one that's closer to the truth, that allows us to like shed a lot of these stories that have been playing out, sometimes generationally, sometimes stories that don't even belong to us. Maybe they belong to our mother, maybe they belong to the way in which we were birthed into the world and that we didn't even heal from Like. There's so many different layers, which is so nice to have the support person someone like yourself to like help through all of these different layers of being, which I think is beautiful.

Speaker 2:

Yes, no, totally. I mean I think we get the children we need to grow in the way we need. Like, my son is my biggest teacher. I mean I can go on and on about that. He's just like he was meant to be here to teach me so, so many different things. And I think sometimes also in the work like what you're saying, that we can do this generational healing. There's these ideas also in the work, like what you're saying, that we can do this generational healing. There's these ideas from family constellation work, which I also integrate, love that work.

Speaker 2:

Yes, we can say thank you to you know, thank you to my parent for this, and I'm giving back what belongs to you. Like, I make it specific to the person, but, you know, I'm giving you back the anxiety that I don't need. I'm giving you back the anxiety that I don't need. I'm giving you back your anxiety about this. Or I'm cutting the cord with, like you know, if there were many generations of people who had C-section but then some woman wants to have a vaginal birth, what does it mean to? You know, I appreciate you, thank you to the previous generations, but I'm cutting the cord because I'm ready to have this different experience.

Speaker 1:

As we wrap up today, what is one practice that you wish every birth provider or therapist or person of expertise who's working with moms and families, what do you wish they had in their toolbox to help clients who maybe had a really difficult or traumatic birth experience?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, well, I think that the easiest one to explain through a recording like this is that I talked about ongoing tapping earlier, but also tapping just 10 times can have a very regulating effect, like a calming effect, and that's something I tell clients to do in between sessions when they're feeling triggered by something is to imagine one of their resources and tap only 10 times, and that's very simple but can be very profound. You know, think of a support, something that feels supportive, like a supportive figure. It could be a tree, a person, animal, spiritual figure, whatever feels supportive to you, and then tap 10 times. The same thing could be done with a compassion figure, a protector figure, and just that small practice in the day-to-day can really help offset some of the triggering that might come as a result of a birth trauma experience.

Speaker 1:

This is beautiful. Thank you so much for all of your wisdom and for sharing this amazing work that you're doing. Where can people learn more about you and find your work?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so I have a website and if you go on the website, you could sign up for my newsletter. I send out birth trauma healing resources every month all different types of stuff, so my website is thrivingcacom.

Speaker 1:

Wonderful and of course, we're going to have that link for you here as well. So take a look at that in the show notes and thank you so much from the bottom of my heart for being here. I appreciate you.

Speaker 2:

Yes, thank you so much, miranda, bottom of my heart for being here. I appreciate you. Yes, thank you so much.

Speaker 1:

Miranda, it was a blast. Thanks so much for being a part of this crucial conversation. I know you're dedicated to advancing postpartum care and if you're ready to dig deeper, come join us on our newsletter, where I share exclusive insights, resources and the latest tools to help you make a lasting impact on postpartum health. Sign up at postpartumu the letter ucom which is in the show notes, and if you found today's episode valuable, please leave a review to help us reach more providers like you. Together, we're building a future where mothers are fully supported and thriving.

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