S3E1 - Welcome to Season 3: Stories of struggles, strength and connection

We're back with Season 3 - and this time, our guiding word is connection. In this heartfelt episode, we explore how connection ties into the themes of our previous seasons: showing up and being bold and authentic. We share our recent (and not-so-recent) experiences with mental health struggles, particularly around postpartum, loneliness, and identity.

From stopping breastfeeding and hitting a low point, to finding unexpected support through Facebook mom groups, we talk about what it really means to feel seen, and how even small moments of shared understanding can make all the difference.

May is Mental Health Awareness Month, and a perfect time to remember: you're not meant to do this alone. Let's reconnect.

Don't forget to like, follow, and share our podcast! We'd love to hear your thoughts and questions, and if you have ideas for future episodes, drop us a line.

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Ksenia's Instagram: shantiscience_yoga

Reach out: moms.mats.manuscripts@gmail.com

Transcript

Ksenia: 0:00

Hi, we're Ksenia and Ivna and this is Moms, Maths and Manuscripts,

Ivna: 0:04

a podcast where honest conversations flow freely.

Ksenia: 0:07

We talk about yoga, motherhood, science and all the messy moments in between that shape us.

Ivna: 0:13

So grab a cup of your favorite drink, settle in and join us for today's episode. Hello, welcome back. Welcome, it's new season.

Ksenia: 0:23

Yeah, so as we discussed the previous two seasons for each set of episodes for each season, we're choosing a word that is our theme, our unifying sort of thread. And yeah, this time it was very easy. It was just, it's right there. I

Ivna: 0:39

It was building up through the season one, season two, and we have it. So maybe short recap, season one was about showing up. It was... maybe challenging season in our lives with little babies. So we decided to show up anyways. We were quite regular, no matter what happened. Then the season two was all about being authentic, being bold, being ourselves. And I think now we can unravel the word of the season three. So Xenia, you have the honor.

Ksenia: 1:13

Yeah, so the word for season three is connection. And I think it does relate also to the previous two seasons, the vulnerability, the authenticity, the boldness and connection in the end is uniting all of that all nicely together because we do need to be vulnerable. We do need to be authentic. We do need to show up in order to experience true connection and true benefits of connection. And This season, I think we're bringing all of this back sort of in one theme. And we're talking again about mental health and we're talking about our experiences. We're also inviting guests. So we will also learn from stories of other people. And this is how connection is going to show up in this season.

Ivna: 2:13

I'm really excited with these guests. It's something new that we haven't done before. I think it will be even more interesting to connect with others, to hear other stories, to build bridges between us and to really, in the end, become closer to who we really are and to feel more connected.

Ksenia: 2:36

Yeah, to feel more like we are indeed, you know, as we hoped from the beginning that you as our listeners will feel like you're here with us, like you're just grabbing a cup of your whatever it is, coffee or something else. And you're joining us for a chat over this drink. And, you know, we're just here talking about our experiences and Maybe what we talk about will help you feel less alone or less like, you know, am I the only one experiencing this? Probably not. So, yeah, we're here for that, for these conversations that make us feel together, less lonely, less alone.

Ivna: 3:19

That's right. And the month we're recording this in, now it's May, and May is Mental Health Awareness Month. And I think mental health is something that we mention in basically every episode in this form or another form. And I think it would be nice to dedicate a few episodes, maybe with more focus on mental health, what it is for us, maybe our recent or not so recent examples, how we handled some difficulties or feeling alone or struggling. So maybe that can be a golden nugget for today's episode from you and me.

Ksenia: 4:02

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So and it does also relate with the topic of connection because feeling isolated, feeling lonely is such a big factor in mental health struggles or declining mental health. So not, you know, I think we often hear it in connection with older people, but I think it's like that for everybody, from kids to adults, and we see it a lot nowadays. So, yeah, this is why we wanted to talk a little bit about maybe our experiences, our recent experiences with feeling lonely, with feeling isolated, and... I don't know if you want to discuss experiences in motherhood or experiences in academia, but I think this can happen in all sorts of contexts that we found ourselves in throughout our life. So what's your recent story with disconnection?

Ivna: 4:59

The most recent one I have is actually quite recent when I was stopping breastfeeding. It really hit me like I was not feeling well during that time. It's all the like tornado with hormones and everything, which really affects you. And at the time, stopping with breastfeeding made me feel extremely sad. I didn't have like any will to go out. I was just, you know, sitting on the couch watching some TV shows and I was barely existing there. And it was really hard to, you know, take care of the kid at the time and do like regular stuff, cook. I didn't have, my baby's worked up just. So I didn't feel any will to do stuff that I normally do. And I was reading a lot about it. But one thing is when you're reading, oh yeah, dropping oxytocin, la la la, can make you feel this way. But when you're going through it, I was feeling really lonely in a sense. I felt like no one understood me. And I think it was three or four weeks. And in the end of the fourth week, I decided to seek help. I went to my general practice doctor and tell her everything. And she was really understanding. And I think at this point where I shared what I was going through, I immediately felt lighter. And I really felt like one big part of this problem is solved. So there, of course, might be truth. They usually say that it lasts for three or four weeks, so maybe something again leveled up in a way that it's supposed to. But immediately sharing this with someone who understands it, who holds space for you, who listens to your struggles and really takes it seriously... especially because I have tendencies to just, you know, go through the hardships. I come from the region of the world where depression and the mental problems don't exist. You just need to go through it. And yeah, it was a big day, you know, verbalizing what you feel, sharing it with someone. And all of a sudden, what you're going through feels lighter because someone else helps you hold um this big part of your struggles

Ksenia: 7:43

it's pretty incredible that your doctor was that for you was able to listen and hold space and understand instead of maybe just you know kind of slapping a label and being like ah this is this is all normal it's it's gonna it's gonna get better soon just you know just wait it's rare and I'm so happy that you found that experience. I think it's not the most common with a lot of medical practitioners.

Ivna: 8:12

You're really incredible. I think that's the biggest problem, you know. It's normal. It's normal. Stopping breastfeeding, baby blues, things like these are normal, right? That's what you find when you Google it, when you talk about the others, right? But the true power holds in this that someone holds space for you and understands you and really acknowledges that, oh, shit, what you're going through is really tough.

Ksenia: 8:39

It's tough and it's valid. And yeah, even if, you know, somebody is going through similar things or somebody is going through more difficult things, it doesn't invalidate that you are struggling.

Ivna: 8:50

Exactly. Yeah. So yeah, that was my recent time where I felt really... Like a big, sad couch potato.

Ksenia: 9:04

Did you feel disconnected from your child to some extent as well? I think so. I mostly

Ivna: 9:10

felt like I couldn't offer him what I want to offer him. I don't have energy. I don't have capacity. I want to give everything, but I just can't. I don't feel capable of. So it was a really frustrating feeling. when you want to do it, but it's just, no, I just want to like die here on this couch.

Ksenia: 9:36

Yeah, this is, this is so difficult when it's, I think your child involved, right? It's, it's making, it's making it even tenfold or many fold more hard on you because you want to be there for them so much. And then

Ivna: 9:54

And you just can't, right? Yeah.

Ksenia: 9:57

Or if you are there, you are kind of just going through the motions and there is a fog veiling everything and you are not...

Ivna: 10:06

Yeah, of course, I, you know, tried to play. We did go out, but I wasn't there. I wasn't being a mother I want to be. I was just there physically. Mentally, I was in a, like, sad place.

Ksenia: 10:22

Mm-hmm.

Ivna: 10:24

And I think I'm not used to feeling that way. I'm usually a person who quickly reacts when something starts, you know, bothering me. But that was, I think, for the first time in my life, I felt helpless. And now I understand how difficult it is for some people who are maybe feeling like that for years and years and years to step out of it.

Ksenia: 10:54

Yeah.

Ivna: 10:54

Because it's not normal to feel that way.

Ksenia: 10:57

But it might start feeling like it is, right? That there

Ivna: 11:01

is no way out of it. It surely starts feeling. You know, day by day, you are feeling worse and worse and worse. And years go by. Yeah. And you find yourself being sad and suffering every day. But it's not normal. It's absolutely not normal. And you don't have to suffer, right? And no one tells you that. You don't know that when you're feeling like shit. You think it's normal. That becomes a new normal for you. Yeah, that becomes your baseline. Yeah. For me at the time was, okay, that's now how I will feel until the end of my life now, right?

Ksenia: 11:35

Yeah. Yeah, I feel like even if you know, like, I haven't weaned yet, so I haven't experienced that. No, thank you for scaring me. I

Ivna: 11:46

mean, I haven't had any baby blues or things like that. So it hit me only when I stopped breastfeeding before it was all the roses. So maybe for you it won't be... I think it's really different with everyone.

Ksenia: 11:59

Yeah.

Ivna: 12:00

But for me, that one was just hitting hard.

Ksenia: 12:04

If I look back at the early days of postpartum and how... I mean, I don't think that I had necessarily postpartum depression as we discussed, I think, in one of the past episodes. But I did... have some level of baby blues and anxiety and you kind of you know that in your head you know that it's going to probably go away because it's hormones it's you know your body is taking time to adjust your brain is taking time to adjust to this huge monumental change in your life right but then you are kind of feeling like oh my god this is this is not going to last forever I'm going to feel like this empty shell of myself forever and And yeah, definitely it does help to share and to talk to somebody already. At that time, I did feel like restarting therapy was hugely, hugely helpful because even just talking to somebody who... as you said, holds space and listens and understands what you're going through and doesn't immediately jump to try to fix it, which is the problem of husbands. Often they want to fix things, but they don't necessarily, you know, they cannot, sometimes they cannot, there is nothing to fix. It's just, you just have to

Ivna: 13:26

listen. Yeah.

Ksenia: 13:29

And yeah, it was, it was very, very helpful to have somebody to really just hold space for you. So

Speaker 02: 13:36

yeah.

Unknown: 13:37

Yeah.

Ksenia: 13:38

I can see that and I think this is maybe a little bit culturally difficult for us as some people coming from Slavic background or Eastern European background. not very common still to talk about these things and to share them and if you share them probably you might still hear things like I just snap out of it you know it's just everybody or people feel much worse or people are dealt much worse fates and they still get up and

Ivna: 14:14

your problems are like look at you you have food like

Ksenia: 14:19

yeah exactly so it is maybe a bit culturally also kind of because of our background it's a bit difficult to share and to to discuss this but we have experienced firsthand how beneficial it is and how much it helps

Ivna: 14:35

I think what was like even more frustrating for me in this period is I know what helps me when I feel down. So this is like regular physical exercise, no caffeine, good healthy food, going outside. And I forced myself to do all of this that I know worked for me. And it didn't work. At this point, I'm like, okay, I'm out of options, out of ideas. So this is real. Like I didn't feel better after working out. This never happens. So I think if you really know yourself, if you have a list of things that you do to do that make you feel better, if it doesn't work anyways, things you need to reach, talk to someone, to friends, to doctor, to therapist, to go to hypnosis, whatever, but something that you haven't tried before, because it probably won't pass. just like this. So I think it's a big call to get out of it if you don't feel well right now. Sometimes there's a long waiting period or something where you hear that you need to seek for help and when you actually reach for help. So I got like a recipe or doctor's note for a psychologist That was like a few months ago. I still haven't visited a psychologist right now. I'm maybe thinking maybe I could do it even though I feel completely okay now. I feel like myself again, but maybe this is also the right time to start working on your mental health because it's like physical health. You need to maintain it. You need to, it's not, oh, I'm healthy now. I'm mentally healthy now. I don't have to do anything right now. It's a process. If you Don't talk to your friends about your feelings for a long time. Maybe you have some garbage that collected inside you and that you need to release in this way or another way, right? Yeah. So I think it's really a process and it really takes a lot of effort to maintain your mental health at the level that feels good. And the worst thing is that you can get used to feeling like shit. It's a trap. If you feel like shit... It's not supposed... Life is not supposed to be hard. You're not supposed to be sad all the time. You're not supposed to suffer all the time. It's not normal. It's also not being happy all the time. It's like 50-50. But if most of the time you're not feeling great, it's a big call for help time.

Ksenia: 17:20

Definitely, yeah. And I think also, it's as you said, like we... have gone through this challenge or this huge change of having a child then postpartum and we maybe rebuild our physical or we thought about rebuilding our physical strength and physical fitness after pregnancy, after birth. And we don't see the mental health in the same way, but maybe we do need to bring it up to baseline or even improve it, go above the baseline, the pre-baby baseline. Especially so if we're thinking about maybe having another child or if we are thinking about some other next step, next challenge, we want to kind of Do the, in German, the Rückbildung, right? The return to strength, return to mental strength. Yeah, so I think this is a good time also to think about it and do something that maybe, even if you don't feel like you have to do it because you are feeling fine, this is a good time to work on it and make it maybe even better. Like, not fine, but great.

Ivna: 18:35

Exactly. I think you can always be physically healthier, but also mentally healthier. There is a point where you feel comfortable. And it's good to be on that point. But if you have capacity, why not to expand it and feel even better on this level or another level. And I think May is somehow good month for mental health, like spring is coming, this spring tiredness is more or less done. And then summer and usually people have more energy and more will to do stuff. So why not to work on your mental health for a month or even longer?

Ksenia: 19:06

Yeah. And it does feel like the whole nature, the world around you is supporting you in this. There is more light. There is more greenery. There is more sun. Like all the, I don't know, seasonal fruits and vegetables are coming up. The strawberries are good for my mental health at least.

Ivna: 19:25

Yeah. I love the season. Yeah, definitely. Like winter for me, at least it's not a good time to feel the best, right? It's more introspective time where you're quiet and thinking about some things, but now it's more about doing. So whatever it means for you, going for a run, I think it's good for physical and mental health as well. talking to a friend, sharing your insecurities, sharing all the garbage that collected in you through the winter. Things like that. Like we're doing spring cleaning. Why not to do spring cleaning of our mind? Of our brain and nervous system. Yeah,

Ksenia: 20:13

exactly. I mean, this is a good time and I think it's also, yeah, it is very necessary. Like this is how in a way it's supposed to be like in spring we're supposed to feel a sense of renewal and rebirth and yeah why not start with a clean slate also in in our brains

Ivna: 20:33

yeah yeah is there a story that you uh wanted to share um

Ksenia: 20:41

yeah i mean i do think that um It's also connected, in my case, the recent feeling or, well, not so recent anymore, of feeling disconnect and loneliness. It's also connected to postpartum period and having a child. Because, yeah, if you have a child in a country where, like, you're not from this country and you don't have your family around, you don't have maybe friends with kids around, it's becoming also much harder because of that. And I... also had a child that was not easy by any standard. So I was feeling really like buried deep in just diapers and sleepless nights and things just kind of not working the way I maybe envisioned them. And I, last year when my son was about seven months old, I accidentally found on Facebook in a group of moms in Austria, I found a post by a girl who had twins. They are three days older than my son, so pretty much exactly the same age. Twins, a boy and a girl. And I imagined that my life was hard, her life was infinitely much harder with two kids at the same age. And she managed to create a sort of a support group for international moms in Vienna. And I went to a few meetings at the very beginning and then we kind of stopped and then we did maybe a couple of picnics throughout the spring and summer. But even just this few meetings with them and it somehow just coincidentally happened that our kids were roughly the same age, six, seven, eight months. And it was so helpful to just sit there on the floor. I was in a yoga studio and we were just sitting there on the floor with kids crawling around and playing with each other, like chewing on each other's toys, as disgusting as it can sound. We were just sharing the day to day and the struggles and the happy moments and the sad moments and how we're feeling. with you know complete strangers just sharing so vulnerably and talking about things that we might not even feel comfortable to talk about with our husbands or with our friends with our families and even these few meetings were instrumental I think in feeling like okay you know I'm not the only one I'm not the only one going through this shit and through this really murky muddy period where I'm feeling like I'm moving through some I don't know thick substance I'm not even feeling like myself I'm not moving like myself I'm not doing things like myself I'm just kind of slowly swimming through mud and yeah it was feeling heavy and then this just really took things off my shoulders and it did give me perspective also seeing how much this girl was um struggling and how much she was also managing to do with twins because I was like, okay, if she has twins and she manages to do that and hold space for us, I should just stop complaining. So it did put things in perspective a little bit, but also, no, I mean, as I said at the beginning, the struggle of somebody else doesn't invalidate your struggle and your feelings. So I didn't feel like I should... should shut up because somebody else is going through more complicated stuff but yeah it was incredibly helpful and Even these little things, like it doesn't have to be a full-blown support group or somebody professional doing it, a therapist, a postpartum mental health specialist. It doesn't have to be that. It can be really just moms taking or whoever in the same boat taking initiative and talking. And it's already... a lot it doesn't feel like it but it's already so much

Ivna: 25:11

it's like there is a hidden power in such situations where you just say something out loud it can just stay in the air or someone can acknowledge it but immediately you feel lighter yeah and at the same time you you had a person that inspired you you for sure inspired others and that's only uh bonus that you get from opening yourself and showing up exactly where you feel like you need to be so what it takes is to go there to share it's it's incredibly powerful to even surround yourself with a woman that are going through the same thing maybe even more powerful than than telling your problems to a 60 year old therapist or whatever I think just something, when you see a mother having a kid, it's like plus or minus two or three months of age difference. It's some new connection. You don't have to explain things to her, right? You just get it. And she gets you. Indeed, yeah. And this is this. This is connection. And we are social beings. We need connection. We need high-quality communication. Not even high quality, but we need connection regularly.

Ksenia: 26:38

Yeah, we need interaction and we need the shared space and shared thoughts, shared feelings. And

Ivna: 26:50

I think in motherhood more than ever, you know, when we went to college, there were There were friends everywhere because we were all in the same boat, living alone or more or less independent. We were like always going for coffees, for beers. You didn't have to search for connections. It's everywhere.

Speaker 02: 27:06

And

Ivna: 27:07

with motherhood, it can really get lonely because you are most of the time at home, even if it's winter or so, you are just changing diapers, playing with the kids or just going for a walk alone. And it's harder to... get yourself exposed and surrounded by other mothers but i think that's it's even more important to surround yourself with people then

Speaker 02: 27:29

yeah

Ivna: 27:30

it takes effort you of course don't have energy to put effort into it but you have to put effort to i

Ksenia: 27:38

think at some at some level i think it almost doesn't have to take energy in this case because if you are if you are looking for moms who are at the same stage or roughly the same stage of motherhood like new babies or you know at this point like a year and a half toddlers that might be starting kindergarten or whatever uh you as you said you get each other you don't have to explain things so it's almost like it's an unspoken thread that connects you and you are like Yeah? And she's like, yeah. And this is enough. And you almost feel like... If I'm talking to somebody who doesn't have kids or whose kids are older, I feel like I probably would have to put more energy into this interaction, into this conversation because there's more explaining to do and there's just these different life stages. But with people at the same life stage, you are just... exhausted and in the middle of a shitstorm together it's it's good

Ivna: 28:45

yeah i think then exactly then you don't have to put an effort to like explain yourself i think what i what i thought it is an effort to like go there the first time like to decide that you want to find a group yeah go up there pack your bag, pack your kid's bag. I think that's the most effort you have to put in. Sometimes that is also really difficult for me. For sure. Whereas going out with a kid were so difficult.

Ksenia: 29:18

I, at the beginning, I couldn't imagine going anywhere, even outside of the building, honestly felt really difficult because he was just crying all the time. He wasn't going in the pram. He wasn't going in the carrier. He wasn't doing anything. He was just crying. So I was telling myself to go for 10 minutes and if he doesn't fall asleep and if he keeps crying throughout the entire time and I'm feeling myself going completely cuckoo, I'm going to go back home. And then slowly, slowly you start building the tolerance. Okay, maybe it's 15 minutes now. Maybe I'm going two streets further away from the house and the safety of my four walls a little bit. Or maybe I'm taking a tram ride for the first time. Just one stop and then I'm going to get off if he's crying. So it was a very slow build-up of tolerance. But

Ivna: 30:05

you have to do it, really. You have to start this way or another way. It's best to start slowly, definitely. and build up your capacity

Ksenia: 30:16

yeah I think this this small steps and just telling myself okay you know really one minute two minutes ten minutes it's and then I will come back and and then ultimately it started being like okay I'm going out for ten minutes and he falls asleep in this ten minutes and I'm like oh I can I can go for a longer walk I can go around until he wakes up and yeah it does it does help with this little baby steps and um then things will you probably won't even notice but things will start getting better and better and better but then yeah first steps are difficult but they're going to be worth it

Ivna: 30:58

yeah I fully agree

Ksenia: 31:02

yeah well I think we did talk about our new season our new topic is there anything else you would like to add to this

Ivna: 31:14

No, right now I really feel that we covered mental health section, as we plan to. I think we can quickly come back to the idea that we are having more interviews this season, which I'm quite excited about. Some of them are already prepared and I'm looking forward to hear them because it was you who did the interview. Yeah. So I will be also one excited listener being excited for a new episode. And yeah, I really hope that this season will help us and all the listeners feel more seen, more connected, less alone. It will be a really fun season full of stories, full of maybe sharing the details that we haven't shared before.

Ksenia: 32:07

Yeah, and still, you know, as in previous seasons, still being vulnerable, still being authentic, still talking about things that are maybe sometimes a little bit difficult to talk about. But yeah, as we hope it will make us, all of us, both us and you, listeners, will make us feel seen, heard, held space for less alone. Thank you for listening and we'll see us here next time. Have a good day. Bye.