201. Healing Grief, Fear and Loneliness after Pregnancy Loss (Iris Josephina Verstappen)

The Menstruality Podcast

A few months ago, our guest today, the founder of Cycle Seeds Iris Josephina Verstappen, was hosting a retreat in a goddess temple in Malta when she began to miscarry. Having accompanied many women through pregnancy loss, both as a doula and a holistic hormone and cycle coach, she’s witnessed the storm of emotions that can arise with miscarriage, as well as the taboo surrounding it. So she decided to publicly share about her experience with her 60,000 followers, to be a permission slip for others, so that they don’t have to suffer in silence.

In our conversation Iris shares generously and vulnerably about how she has navigated the grief, loneliness, confusion and earth-shaking fear that it could all happen again, as well as the paradoxical feelings of love, possibility, and gratitude for how the experience of pregnancy opened her up. Our hope is that if you’re one of the one in four women and people who experience pregnancy loss, this conversation helps you to feel less alone with whatever you’re feeling.

We explore:

• The imposter syndrome that arose for Iris when she tried to go back to work, and found herself questioning how this could have happened to her when she was doing everything “right”, especially as an educator in the field of cyclical living and women’s health, and how the antidote was simply to lie with her belly flat on the earth.

• The lack of community support around grief and loss, but especially in the post-partum window after miscarriage where the body is still recovering from the pregnancy, and Iris offers some great ideas for how to support a friend going through this.

• How Iris is navigating the identity crisis that comes with inhabiting the liminal space between maiden and mother, between becoming and unbecoming, as well as being in a body that looks and feels different after her pregnancy loss.

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Social media:
Red School: @redschool - https://www.instagram.com/red.school
Sophie Jane Hardy: @sophie.jane.hardy - https://www.instagram.com/sophie.jane.hardy
Iris Josephina Verstappen: @cycleseeds - https://www.instagram.com/cycleseeds