Previa Alliance Podcast
There are few experiences as universal to human existence as pregnancy and childbirth, and yet its most difficult parts — perinatal mood and anxiety disorders (PMADs) — are still dealt with in the shadows, shrouded in stigma. The fact is 1 in 5 new and expecting birthing people will experience a PMAD, yet among those who do many are afraid to talk about it, some are not even aware they’re experiencing one, and others don’t know where to turn for help. The fact is, when someone suffers from a maternal mental health disorder it affects not only them, their babies, partners, and families - it impacts our communities.
In the Previa Alliance Podcast series, Sarah Parkhurst and Whitney Gay are giving air to a vastly untapped topic by creating a space for their guests — including survivors of PMADs and healthcare professionals in maternal mental health — to share their experiences and expertise openly. And in doing so, Sarah and Whitney make it easy to dig deep and get real about the facts of perinatal mental health, fostering discussions about the raw realities of motherhood. Not only will Previa Alliance Podcast listeners walk away from each episode with a sense of belonging, they’ll also be armed with evidence-based tools for healing, coping mechanisms, and the language to identify the signs and symptoms of PMADs — the necessary first steps in a path to treatment. The Previa Alliance Podcast series is intended for anyone considering pregnancy, currently pregnant, and postpartum as well as the families and communities who support them.
Sarah Parkhurst
Previa Alliance Podcast Co-host; Founder & CEO of Previa Alliance
A postpartum depression survivor and mom to two boys, Sarah is on a mission to destigmatize the experiences of perinatal mood and anxiety disorders (PMADs), and to educate the world on the complex reality of being a mom. Sarah has been working tirelessly to bring to light the experiences of women who have not only suffered a maternal mental health crisis but who have survived it and rebuilt their lives. By empowering women to share their own experiences, by sharing expert advice and trusted resources, and by advocating for health care providers and employers to provide support for these women and their families, Sarah believes as a society we can minimize the impact of the current maternal mental health crisis, while staving off future ones.
Whitney Gay
Previa Alliance Podcast Co-host; licensed clinician and therapist
For the past ten years, Whitney has been committed to helping women heal from the trauma of a postpartum mental health crisis as well as process the grief of a miscarriage or the loss of a baby. She believes that the power of compassion paired with developing critical coping skills helps moms to heal, rebuild, and eventually thrive. In the Previa Alliance Podcast series, Whitney not only shares her professional expertise, but also her own personal experiences of motherhood and recovery from grief.
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Previa Alliance Podcast
The Questions You Shouldn't Ask... And What Happens When You ARE Asked...
Ever been caught off guard by a seemingly innocent question that hit you right where it hurt? Join Sarah and Whitney as we explore the unspoken rules of conversation, highlighting questions that should never be asked and the emotional turmoil they can cause. By discussing personal experiences and setting boundaries, we delve into the importance of empathetic communication.
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Hey guys, welcome back to Preview Alliance Podcast. This is Sarah, and I'm with our favorite therapist, whitney. Hey friends, so, whitney, yes, so we've overcome, you know, holidays last year. We're getting back to life, things are going great, and then we run into someone a co-worker, family member, a friend, or we still might be reeling on a conversation that happens over the holidays, where someone has asked us something that they should not and it has brought out a pain point, it has brought something up and we are here just to talk about the things that should not be asked absolutely yeah.
Speaker 3:Don't ask someone if they're pregnant. Do not do. I don't care if you think that they look like they are ready to pop, I don't care if you knew that they were doing ivf or I don't ask them if they're pregnant because if they are not and you do, you're going to upset them. If they are and they're not ready to tell other people, you just put them in a really sticky situation. Or now they're going to lie Right, or they may have lost the baby, and you know the bump does not just immediately go away. So now you've hit a grief trigger point for them, because maybe they were not ready to talk about it, maybe they weren't, and so never ask someone if they're pregnant. And to piggyback on that, don't ask someone when they're having a baby or another baby. Please don't. Because, again, you don't know somebody's full story, you don't know if they're having to go through infertility treatments, you don't know if they're unable to have their own biological children and they're processing that grief. Please don't, please don't. Someone else's uterus is not your business.
Speaker 1:No, and it's to the point as well, you know, and I am thinking back and I'm like I've been asked if I was pregnant. When I was not pregnant, we weren't trying and then I became super insecure. I'll never forget we were traveling overseas, we had just had a meal and, to my defense, this was like, literally, it was one of these sushi restaurants where, like they, like constantly, like they just it was like they kept serving it and it was like this sit down meal, I probably ate like 16 mini bites of sushi. Okay, and I was wearing a jumpsuit and we took a picture with the chef and immediately after he pointed to my stomach and said pregnant, no, ma'am.
Speaker 1:And I think, like literally one of the photos after the little photographer guy that was taking a liquor with my cell phone kept taking the pictures and like, literally, you can see my face completely drop because I was like cool, I look pregnant and I am not pregnant. And then it really, I mean I remember starting to cry as literally was walking back to the hotel and I was just like and I really haven't wanted to wear that jumpsuit again, and that was not even like post miscarriage or post like struggling to get pregnant, and I can't imagine how much more. Because I have been asked that post miscarriage I've been asked like arecarriage, I've been asked like are you pregnant? When I was actively miscarried, you know, and it's like the sting of it, and I mean, one of my boys is preschool teacher, I was convinced she was pregnant and she was and she just delivered.
Speaker 1:But I did not ask that woman until she told me she's like I'm going on maternity leave and I was like congratulations, because it hurts. And then on the other side I know if you may have said that to someone like, oh my gosh, are you expecting me you?
Speaker 2:know you're excited.
Speaker 1:And you feel so bad if you've done that on accident, you know, and you hopefully never do it again. But I think another thing people I have been told, and I'm sure you've been told, were you disappointed you're not having a boy, whitney? Are you disappointed? You didn't have a girl, sarah? I mean about the gender Gender you can also.
Speaker 1:you can grieve wanting to have a different you know if you're like, oh my gosh, I really wanted, yeah, I wanted a girl this time. That's something personal you and your partner can talk through and that's totally acceptable. Old, this time that's something personal you and your partner can talk through and that's really acceptable. But we're talking about someone who has no part to come in and ask you well, you know, when you have two girls, when you want a boy.
Speaker 3:Yes, I was definitely asked that because I was never a girly girl growing up. I was, you know, more into sports and athletic and all that kind of thing. So even when I got pregnant with my oldest I was like, oh, I wanted to be a boy, wanted to be a boy, I want to do all the sports things. And it was a girl and so naturally I was kind of like, oh, that's not what I expected. So I did have to kind of, you know, cope with that disappointment or maybe just kind of how I felt about that. But now I'm like, no, I love my girls, like I wouldn't change it for the world. But I've had so many people say, well, don't y'all want a boy, don't you want to know what it's like to have a boy? And that's when I just look at them and I say I'm really happy with my life.
Speaker 1:I can even have control.
Speaker 3:I mean besides?
Speaker 1:IVF, and that's not guaranteed either. Like but it's like I have no control.
Speaker 1:You know I am not the chromosome decider in this relationship, right? So let that one go. And then, something we can also talk about is are you breastfeeding? Yep, you know, did you try to breastfeed? Right? There is nothing wrong with formula. There's nothing wrong with breastfeeding. How you feed your baby is no one's business, and the questions of like that is to me, it's wild that we're living in 2025. And this is literally what I'm asking. How a woman feeds her child is none of your business. I think it can even be. Are you homeschooling? Why are you homeschooling? Why are you sending your kid to school in this day and age? Right? Like the questioning that people sometimes go down, or if you say I am doing X and they question you and you're questioning your decision to me, how someone raises their family is their business. It's not my business.
Speaker 3:No, I will say. I feel like there's a slight caveat to that, because whenever I've met people that homeschool like our neighbors across the street, we were over there one night just hanging out and this is the first time we really got to know them and all that. And I asked oh well, where do your kids go to school? And she goes oh well, we have school. And I was like, really like, do you use such and such? That's kind of like a co-op school that's really popular around here. And she said, no, we actually use such and such curriculum. And I was like, oh, that's really cool. I've heard good things about them. You can show interest without judgment correct.
Speaker 3:Because let me tell you, in this day and age, if I thought I was capable of homeschooling my children, I might, I might, but I'm not capable of that and I understand that that is absolutely outside of my scope. But when people address it I'm like, wait a second. They seem normal, like me. They don't seem like this mathematician, like they must understand to a degree to be able to homeschool their kids.
Speaker 1:Thinking. That is where you know you can be curious, respectfully right, without judgmentally going ahead and saying why you, you know there's a big difference of like anything I could do, support you in that, or you know that kind of decision.
Speaker 3:How did you get to that conclusion, like, what made you feel like brave enough to do that? Yeah, because I tell people I'm like, I don't feel like I'm equipped. How did you get to the point where you felt like you were able to do that for your kids?
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, I totally get that, Whitney. Is it that time of the month or are you going through the change?
Speaker 3:Oh, you had to bring that one up. That was fun.
Speaker 1:You know that was fun and you know, that is something I think like. Is it that time of the month, I think that started, since we were way younger. Is it that time of the month, I think, that?
Speaker 3:started since we were way younger. I remember hearing that, definitely before preteen Probably. I'm going to say like 10, 9 or 10. I remember hearing that, yeah.
Speaker 2:Or.
Speaker 3:Aunt Flo was coming to visit. I remember that was like in sitcoms, yeah.
Speaker 1:Like it was. It was like boys making fun and like, if you like, disagreed with someone or if you spoke your mind or assertive, or you know anything with it set a boundary right we can't do anything, because that's how we actually think and feel.
Speaker 3:It all has to get blamed on our periods and hormones, yes, or in my situation, referring back to the change. So our listeners understand that little bit of an inside joke was I went through some scary medical things over the summer. I had a week-long migraine that landed me in the emergency room twice, and so after that, you know, working with my PCP, and then my OBGYN had lots of blood work done and I told my OB I was like you know what, if it's perimenopause, I'm 38. Like, maybe it is, you know. So of course they give me like this gamut of questions of like, well, what are you experiencing? What makes you think that? Which is appropriate, okay, that's appropriate for my OB to be asking me those things. Turns out I pulled a muscle in my neck and it was spasming. Come to find out it was not my hormones. My hormones came back all normal. But my mother-in-law asked my husband remind me how old Whitney is, maybe she's going through, in all caps, the change and then asked him to not say anything to me about it.
Speaker 1:We can break down that communication cycle there too, of that you know, that is.
Speaker 3:My husband did tell me about that. Well, I say he was like I don't really know how to respond to this and just handed me the phone. So I read it and I was like tell her, I'm 38.
Speaker 1:And that's it. I was like I don't know that.
Speaker 3:I really need to give any more information for that, because we don't really have a diagnosis at this point. All we know is, at least the second time I went to the ER they did a CT scan that ruled out all the scary things like a stroke, a tumor, brain bleed, like all the big scary things got ruled out. And we had said that like well, we had imaging done, it's nothing there. And I see, you know, was set to see a neurologist a few months later because neurology just books out so far in advance. But it was like, well, we're just kind of waiting to see. You know, all this different lab work and blah, blah, blah. And then it got brought up Is it the change? And I was like number one, why are you calling it that? Call it, call it menopause, call it perimenopopause, but call it by its actual name. Quit being old school boomer. Also, don't say, don't tell her. I said this. Unless it's a surprise birthday party, I want you to feel like I'm.
Speaker 1:There's supposed to be a secret to be kept, because we don't in my family well, see, that's how I, the whole I I mean I was a, I was like she said what, and then B, I was like she's told him to do what, Because. I that was the key is, if secrets are something that that person keeps, don't put that on my marriage or me and my children or my relationships, because the same way we don't do that and again you should not be asking these questions or if she did, whitney, how can I? I'm concerned about you. Is there anything I can do to help?
Speaker 1:you know, none of that. You would say I'm good, we're moving on. I think another one that we just have to say that it's like don't comment on people's weight gain or loss.
Speaker 3:Yes, yes, you know.
Speaker 3:You never know the guy behind it, you never know if you're trying to lose weight for whatever reason they so choose, which I'll say this like if you want to lose weight and you do it in a healthy way, congratulations, absolutely. But please do not starve yourself or make yourself throw up to lose that weight. Please don't do that. But also, you never know if someone has a thyroid problem, that can contribute to their weight, if they have PCOS, if they're diabetic or pre-diabetic Like. We don't know that and it's not ours to know.
Speaker 1:They're going through IVF that makes you gain If you're in grief if you go off for big cancer. I mean there's so many things that you know. Grief, if god forbid cancer, I mean there's so many things that you know and I also I think too, you have to realize your words really matter and you know words to people when you, you know, say she's suffering right right they're challenging, so it's challenging. You know no way someone who has a new baby could be depressed with me or you know no way.
Speaker 1:Yes, you know, I understand. You know mental health conditions. What do you mean there? You know they're they're causing pregnancy related deaths. That can't be like all that. So words matter. So if someone is experiencing something you cannot give them, you're shutting them down. So if I tell you, if you're saying to me in anxious I'm like there's no way, this is this bundle of joy, this is the best time of your life, whitney, then I'm not going to be that safe place to you, and then you may think that that is what everybody else thinks and it's a you thing, correct? So be very, very careful what you're saying with your words, and if you're uneducated about something, it's best just not to speak about it.
Speaker 3:I agree. Well, and as a therapist I've had people come in who are of different belief systems than me or different cultures than I'm from, and I frankly tell them I'm sorry, I'm very naive on that. Am I allowed to ask questions about that to get an understanding? So if you're naive and you really feel like getting information will help you better understand that person and their culture so that you can better be there for them, say it, ask for their permission, but also don't be nosy just to be nosy.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Now, Whitney, what do you advise your clients and you do in your day to day when we're ultimately asked one of these questions that should not be asked how to respond and how to process that when it does bring a really bad hurt.
Speaker 3:I think part of it is know who you're talking to.
Speaker 3:It's like, sarah, if I came up to you and I said, oh, did your IVF work this cycle?
Speaker 3:And I'm excited for you and I mean it genuinely and you understand that I do, but I actually hurt you, I unintentionally hurt you by that, then you can say, no, it didn't, I'm so disappointed. Well, now I know I'm going to scale myself back. Yeah, so read kind of the audience that's there, kind of know the person, know their motive, figure out if they're genuine or not. If they're going to celebrate with you, if they're going to grieve with you, they're going to, they're going to match you. Okay, if that person is not being genuine, if you think they're being malicious, if you think they're being nosy, if they're not going to match you, that's when you just say, oh, not right now, and then you just drop it and then, when you have a moment to yourself, scream in your car, cry in your car, do what you need to do, but give them as little information as possible, because if they're doing it just to be nosy, then they don't need more information.
Speaker 1:I'm sorry, that is a boundary I share with the people I can trust If I cannot trust you, then I do not share with you and I think it goes back to if you got to categorize people in your life the bleachers of the sideline and those in the field with you, and to the point of who is in there in that huddle, who is on the field playing that game of knowledge of your life and will support you, will match you to the people that's on the bench that get to maybe know a little bit more right, they're on the same team but they're in the nitty gritty. And then you have the stadium people, which could be that aunt. You know who you saw over the holidays, who made that comment, but she has no clue that you've lost your third baby. She has no clue that you cry yourself to sleep every night about it. You know she has no clue. And as much as it does hurt, right, you have to recognize that person Right as stadium versus someone who they did know and was malicious about it.
Speaker 1:That's a whole different topic here, they're just being nosy and they might be a gossip. And that's the thing. Those people love to be in the stadiums, right? They love to peer down, judge your life, make comments about your life and spread that versus, and that's where you distance them. They're up there in the stadium. They don't get to know what the huddle knows about your life.
Speaker 3:Right, absolutely.
Speaker 1:But I think it's really important that when you do feel a hurt, don't shove it down Like what you said. Take that moment, cry yes, I mean, I was walking in a city you know a different country crying because that man had asked me if I was pregnant and I was not, and I needed to get it out. I'm a big believer that which we hold it so deep and it hurts so deep, it will come out one way or another.
Speaker 3:It will. And you know our body stores trauma, it stores emotions. We have to find ways to get it out, and I actually read something the other day that talked about how, when we cry, we're actually releasing cortisol in our tears. I never that, so consider me mind blown over that information. Mind blown. So when you feel like you need to cry, you let that cortisol out, you get it out that is now I'm gonna be like.
Speaker 1:I'm releasing cortisol. I am doing what my body needs to do.
Speaker 3:You literally are releasing that cortisol and you're doing something your body is designed to do by crying, because we have tear ducts, for a reason that is so true. We were not built to just contain it all. We can't.
Speaker 1:No. So when someone asks you a question, they should not ask you. No, so when someone asks you a question, they should not ask you.
Speaker 1:This is our permission to you to let it out and cry and know that you are not the only person that's been asked that and it hurts rightfully hurts so we, we hope, and you know what, if someone who keeps asking you inappropriate questions, you can always send them the previousview Podcast episode right here, and maybe that will help enlighten their social cues. So, guys, thank you and again, we're in this with you and we'll be back next week, see ya.
Speaker 2:Maternal mental health is as important as physical health. The Preview Alliance podcast was created for and by moms dealing with postpartum depression and all its variables, like anxiety, anger and even apathy. Hosted by CEO founder Sarah Parkhurst and licensed clinical social worker Whitney Gay, each episode focuses on specific issues relevant to pregnancy and postpartum. Join us and hear how other moms have overcome mental health challenges, as well as access tips and suggestions on dealing with your own challenges as moms. You can also browse our podcast library and listen to previous episodes at any time. Please know you're not alone on this journey. We're here to help.