Latest / The Cyclical Doula Podcast: Fertility Awareness, Charting Cycles, and Reproductive Health Education / Caring for Moms First: Wellness, Loss & Longevity with Shelly Jefferis
Transcript
- emmamma: Today I am joined by Shelly, wellness educator, mentor, podcast host, and the founder of Moms Who Flourish. ⁓ brings over four decades of experience in health and wellness, along with a deeply personal story that includes infertility, miscarriage, and the realities of motherhood. Her work is rooted in helping moms care for their health, not just to get through the day, but to live with energy, vitality, and longevity. Emmamma: Thanks so much for being here today on the cyclical doula podcast. If this episode resonated with you, the most powerful thing that you can do is to share it, send it to a friend, text it to your sister, forward it to that group chat. This is how conversations about our bodies start changing, quietly, organically, woman to woman. you are listening and thinking, ⁓ ⁓ want help applying this to my emmamma: I am so excited to have Shelly on. Thanks so much for coming here. Can you tell us a little bit more about who you are as just a human being? Emmamma: I offer free cycle clarity calls. It's a relaxed conversation over Zoom we talk through your goals, your charting practices, and kind of support that would actually make sense for you. can book one at emmamma.com / free. And if you already, make sure you're following or subscribe to the Cyclical Doula - podcast so that you don't miss future episodes. Shelly Jefferis: Well, thank you so much for having me on. I'm really excited to be here. I've been looking forward to this and thank you for the very nice introduction. And yes, I've been in the wellness, health, fitness, nutrition, all of the above industry for many, many years. And, you know, like anything, ⁓ it's evolved. It's evolved through the years. the majority of the time I've spent as a college professor in the area of kinesiology and health, and I learned Emmamma: And if you feel called to leave a rating or review, it genuinely helps more women find this work. So thank you. You deserve to understand body. You deserve to feel confident in your reproductive choices. And you ⁓ have to figure it out alone. I'll see you next week. Thanks for being here. Shelly Jefferis: a ton. I still do a little bit of teaching on the side. However, I've really kind of done a I wouldn't say a pivot, but I really, really focused more on to the entrepreneur side these last few years, 10, 20 years or so. And so that's what led me to starting my podcast and led me to creating the community for moms that's really focused on wellness and motherhood. And we can dive into that more if you'd like a little more information about that. But I just felt like, you know, I know for so many moms, we tend to put our fitness, our self care, whatever it looks like for us a little bit on the sidelines or back burner during motherhood. And I realized that I was hearing it a lot and also seeing a lot of the reasons why, time, feeling guilty and various reasons. And I felt like let's create a movement, let's create a community that can. emmamma: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Shelly Jefferis: that can support moms along not just their wellness and their health goals, but the different phases of motherhood. And that's really how Moms Who Flourish came to be. emmamma: Yeah. That's amazing. I love that. think like what absolutely like more moms need all of that support for sure. I also feel like it like motherhood can be so isolating if you don't have that space to to connect with people and to find some community with that for sure. Shelly Jefferis: Well, and I realized that too, and I think, isn't it kind of a, I don't know if dichotomy is the correct term, but I think, okay, we are in this together as moms. It's like a sisterhood, like no other, yet like you're saying, there are many moments where you have that feeling of being isolated. emmamma: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And you're a mom yourself, you have a few kids, right? Shelly Jefferis: I do. have three kids. Yes. And my husband and I recently, and I say recent, a year and a half ago became empty nesters. So our are little older. emmamma: amazing. That must be such a different season of motherhood to go through. Shelly Jefferis: It really, really is. I, you know, we can maybe dive into that a little bit more, but it's definitely, it's, it's, it's, are challenging moments, but it's honestly, it wasn't initially as hard as I thought it would or could be. And so there's definitely, definitely different emotions associated with it for sure. emmamma: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah, I mean, you're welcome to share as much of that as you want. ⁓ As we're getting started, I'd love to just hear what you, in your seasons of motherhood where you were, your kids were home and little Larry, what did you need in those seasons that you wish more moms had access to now? Shelly Jefferis: I think the first thing that comes to top of my mind is, and I don't know how you would really approach this because as a mom you become very, you are very protective of your children. And I find that my husband was even more so than me. And so what I find that we didn't do very much as young parents is we did not go out very often. We did not get a baby hardly ever. And Emmamma: Welcome to the Cyclical Doula podcast. I'm Emma, a certified fertility awareness educator, miscarriage doula and the founder of Emmamma emmamma: Yeah. Mmm. Shelly Jefferis: You know, thankfully when my mom was still living, didn't live in town close by, but when she would come into town, she would be like, okay, you two go out, enjoy yourself, go to dinner. And she would watch the kids. And I always felt like, okay, know, leaving the kids with her, we were always like totally fine with it. And I don't know what the answer is to that. I don't know if there really is one because when you're, you you're trusting these little... emmamma: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Shelly Jefferis: you know, your little creations with someone and I guess it's maybe finding a community where you can come together and I'm sure this exists nowadays, but maybe have a group of moms who can share watching each other's kids or maybe you have a community where you start to bring in those who might watch your kids or be babysitters and maybe come to know them and trust them and have them come spend some time at the house before you have them watch the kids. I mean, emmamma: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Emmamma: This space is for women who want to understand their bodies deeply, not just memorize information, but actually feel confident in interpreting their cycles. Here we talk about ovulation, hormones, cervical mucus, basal body temperature, and all that's messy in between emotional layers that come with being woman. We talk about trying to conceive, avoiding pregnancy ⁓ hormones. Shelly Jefferis: You know, for some, maybe they're thinking, oh my gosh, you know, just let someone come in and watch the kids. But it's not really that easy. It wasn't for us anyway. I mean, for some parents, maybe, you know, if you find someone that's a friend or a friend of a friend, but it still is something you really want to make sure you can fully trust that person. And that takes a little time. emmamma: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. So you work a lot with women who are working on like self care and movement and all of those things. What is your, like some myths that you feel like you want to dispel around how women approach movement and self care and Emmamma: postpartum transitions, pregnancy loss, perimenopause, and everything in between. Because body literacy isn't just about charting. It's about the autonomy. It's about informed consent. It's about not outsourcing your reproductive decisions to guesswork or fear. Each week, you'll hear conversations with women's health professionals, ⁓ workers, ⁓ Shelly Jefferis: That's a great question. I would say first and foremost, a myth that it takes a lot of time. One thing I will always share is it doesn't have to take a lot of time, even if you have a day that's really jam packed and you can just give yourself five minutes to step outside and just have quiet time for five straight minutes and just take some deep breaths in, right? Or maybe you can just do a brisk walk around the block for 10 or 15 minutes. Like literally, emmamma: Yeah. Emmamma: and researchers along with solo episodes where I teach practical skills you can apply to your own cycle right away. if you have ever felt like you should have learned this information sooner, if you have ever felt disconnected from your cycle, emmamma: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Shelly Jefferis: Those little amounts of time add up and there are some days where you just have to give yourself grace and know, okay, I'm not gonna have time to go for my full 30 minute walk or whatever it is that someone might do for their routine. And again, it doesn't even have to necessarily be exercise, right? It doesn't necessarily have to be that. can, like I said, just be a matter of getting outdoors and being out in nature for a few minutes or taking a ⁓ bath and having some quiet alone time. I mean, there's so many different emmamma: Yeah. Emmamma: If you want to raise the next generation without shame around their bodies, you are in the right place. So grab your tea, open up your notes app, and let's build a cycle confidence together. emmamma: Yeah. Shelly Jefferis: ways we can look at self-care. you know, so I believe that that's the biggest myth that I always like to kind of break is that it doesn't have to take a lot of time. emmamma: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah, that's so good. Because I think this idea, especially for moms who are in the trenches of little kids, of just trying to schedule in time for themselves sounds exhausting in itself. That doesn't then seem like something that's attainable. And that just makes it even harder for sure. Shelly Jefferis: It does. when you put a time frame on it, and I used to tell my college students when we were teaching, when we were in person teaching in person, I would say, you know, for a long time, the recommendations was to get out three days a week for at least 30 minutes. And over time, they kind of adjusted that they really didn't put a specific time on it. It was more like without most days of the week, get your body moving. And I used to tell them, I said, sometimes when you hear a number like 30 minutes, you. emmamma: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Shelly Jefferis: you stress out just by hearing that. Go like, don't have an extra 30 minutes, right? So, you know, the point is that, you know, it doesn't have to take that much time. But on the other hand, you do have, you do want to have days where you can spend a little bit more time because you do want to be able to get your movement in and get to a point where you are challenge your body physically to get the proper amount of movement and exercise. But there are days where it's okay to me. emmamma: Yeah, yeah. Right, right. Mm-hmm. right? Shelly Jefferis: A little bit is better than nothing, I always say. emmamma: Absolutely, yeah, for sure. Amazing. So you had mentioned to me that you have gone through ⁓ infertility and miscarriage. You're welcome to share anything about your personal story, but how do you also see that affect the way that you're supporting moms currently? Shelly Jefferis: Well, I can share that in our most recent wellness, our moms who flourish wellness, we have an in-person wellness event and I bring in speakers and it's a full day event. I really, this particular most recent one decided and wanted to share a little bit more of my personal journey so that other moms feel like, ⁓ okay, she's gone through this too. A really big goal for me is to help, again, moms feel emmamma: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Shelly Jefferis: supported and feel included and feel like they're not the only ones going through these different experiences. you know, when it comes to having a miscarriage, for example, it's not always talked about, or at least it wasn't when I went through it. And I think it maybe is talked about a little bit more, but it's like one of those things where if you start to share about it and you start to learn how many moms, women have gone through the same thing and emmamma: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Shelly Jefferis: We don't always talk about it. I don't know why. maybe it's just because it's just so personal and it's painful. I mean, I can share with you that this was, so our youngest is 19, almost 20. This was over 20 years ago. And I still have moments where I start to feel this, you know, little bit of these emotions well up inside of me. And it's not something you forget. emmamma: No, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Shelly Jefferis: It's not something you forget. ⁓ And not to say that, my gosh, know, having our children and then our third baby came after our miscarriages and he's just amazing. All of our children are amazing. So you have so much joy in that. But I think point is, that everybody has a story and we all have experiences we go through and certain things can bring that back up. And I think that's just normal. emmamma: Yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah, absolutely, for sure. And I think there's that space of being able to like hold the grief and the hard moments with the joy. Like you were saying, like, you know, you love all of your kids, your kids are amazing that you have here living on earth. And also this miscarriage that has this weight of the grief of that too. And I think the more that we can talk about that just in general as mothers and human beings, it becomes more normalized and safe for people just to share how they're feeling around all of that. Shelly Jefferis: Yes, for sure. And you know, I love more than anything being a mom and people that know me, it's not a secret that family is everything to me. so, you know, I felt also like, this wasn't necessarily an easy journey, know, none of this came easy to us. And ⁓ we struggled a little bit with our daughter, our firstborn. And then our second boy, Cody, was all of a sudden I was like, ⁓ my gosh, I'm pregnant, which was amazing. And then after we had our second ⁓ was when we started experiencing some challenges. And those challenges went on for five years. a long time, we went through more than one. We went through a few miscarriages. And then it came to, then I ⁓ wasn't. emmamma: Yeah, which is a long time. Shelly Jefferis: getting pregnant at all. So we went through a whole journey and did end up getting some infertility help and ⁓ our third baby arrived because of that. And so I wouldn't do it any other way even though there were definitely very painful moments, but you can look back on it and go, okay, it was all very much worth it. emmamma: Yeah, absolutely. So I wonder how is the work that you're doing now, how do you feel like that can support women who are going through these challenges of infertility? Shelly Jefferis: I think it comes back to what I mentioned earlier, having a safe space to be heard and just feel supported and to feel like, okay, I'm not the only one going through this. And honestly, I get it. I know when you're going through anything in life, many times you feel like you're the only one. You feel like nobody else is going to understand. I totally get that, right? I just think... emmamma: Yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Shelly Jefferis: My goal is to offer those times of comfort, encouragement, whatever it looks like. ⁓ I was just sharing another, I shared on a post the other day, but I also shared this at my event. Another whole other side of this is when our kids are older and they go off to college or they go off and start their own lives and emmamma: Yeah. Yeah. Shelly Jefferis: That's a whole other experience in itself. And I was saying the same thing. Like I am working on opening up the conversation about it so that maybe it can help another mom feel again, the comfort that, okay, she gets it. I'm going through the same thing. And I shared a brief post the other day and so many moms go, I know I'm going through the same thing. I get it. emmamma: Mm-hmm. Yes. Mm-hmm. Shelly Jefferis: you know, and I've cried for a week after dropping my child off at the airport, all kinds of different things. And everybody's going through it, not everybody, but many moms. And that's just how I hope that they can feel the encouragement from me and know that they're not alone. That's really the bottom line. ⁓ It's just, I'm really motivated to open up. the conversation to, especially when it comes to dropping our kids off at college. I mean, when we first did it with our youngest, we had no idea what to expect. It was not even a discussion. And I don't know why, again, it's one of those things where it just doesn't seem, it doesn't come up. don't know why. And, you know, not that I think it would have made it less painful had we had a conversation with other parents. emmamma: Yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Shelly Jefferis: However, we could have gone into it kind of being prepared to experience it, where we had no idea. mean, I'm not, ⁓ there's nothing more I can say. We drove on and our daughter's sitting there or standing on the sidewalk in front of her dorm and we're backing away and it's waving goodbye and I'll never forget that moment. Like I could cry thinking about it and then we... emmamma: Hmm. Yeah. Yeah! Yeah. Shelly Jefferis: cried in the car all the way home. You know, and was a long time, 12 hours. So that's another part of this is here, let me share what my experience was. Maybe you went through it too. Maybe you're not there yet, but whatever I can do to help it be a little. emmamma: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Shelly Jefferis: I don't know, not less painful, but help maybe you know what to expect so that when you're through it, you know, we really truly had no idea. Had no idea. emmamma: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I feel like just like having the knowledge base of what situations could or possibly are going to be like just helps people be able to like know how they can best prepare and support themselves through that. What now that you've been through it multiple times with kids leaving your house and What is your like go-to advice to share with people who haven't yet have their kids flenched out of their house? Shelly Jefferis: My number one piece of advice is in addition to being kind and giving yourself grace, give yourself time. I learned a long time ago that when we would come back home from either dropping them off at college or dropping them off at the airport, like we just did a couple days ago, I said, you know what? I'm gonna give myself a day. emmamma: Mmm. Yeah. Shelly Jefferis: to just be and just whether I need to like cry, sit on the couch, go for a walk, whatever that looks like. And that has really, I believe, been very beneficial. And that's my biggest recommendation to other moms is, know, many times, and I've heard a couple moms do this, they say, you know, I just get back and I get busy. I get busy, I get doing this, do this. Yeah, you get busy, sure it's gonna take your mind off of it for a little while. emmamma: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Shelly Jefferis: But guess what? It's gonna come back and get you when you least expect it, like anything that we go through in life, right? We don't like go through the emotions. It's gonna come back at some point. And it's not to say that maybe I'll be, I that I'm not gonna be sad again in a couple days. ⁓ It's not even that. It's not like, okay, I'm good, I'm good. I had my one day, but it definitely helps. it just, I think it's just giving us. emmamma: Mm-hmm. Shelly Jefferis: giving us that permission maybe to go. It's okay to do nothing. It's okay to feel sad. ⁓ It's okay to go through all the emotions ⁓ and then you know for some you know get back into the routine but but go back slowly. emmamma: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah, absolutely. I think that's what an amazing way to be able to buffer that into just your life of being able to focus on yourself and taking care of yourself and and how we all can do that better of just really, really scheduling the time in to just like breathe and and be and rush back into life or try to fill up the space with with all of those things, because I think that's something that generally as a society we're not really good at doing. We're not really good at sitting in those uncomfortable feelings and how much powerful and more regulated we can all be when we allow ourselves to sit in those feelings for time too. Shelly Jefferis: It's so true and I mean it's like anything that we go through in life, like the loss of a loved one. I mean I still give myself time on the anniversary of my mom and my dad's death. I still give myself a day around that and I'm really grateful that I learned or had the wherewithal to do that. Many years ago I started doing that and ⁓ emmamma: Yeah. Shelly Jefferis: You know, was sharing this with another ⁓ girlfriend of mine and she was like, kind of like what you're saying. She says, well, kudos to you for doing that because many people don't take that time to give themselves that mental break or space, right? And somehow I learned at a young age that, like I mentioned earlier, if we don't go through it or... emmamma: Yeah. Right. Shelly Jefferis: or experience those emotions, they come back at some point. And we don't know when that's gonna happen or what that looks like, but. emmamma: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Do you have any advice for people who like when it does come back hard for like how to how to be kind to themselves in those those moments? Shelly Jefferis: say the same thing. Maybe it's not necessary to take a day, but when you feel the emotions come up, I mean, I'm not a therapist, but I would say, know, them, right? Go through it. Like I have no problem crying. I'm not afraid to do that. I'm not that kind of person. My husband doesn't cry a lot. I cry and that's okay. We, you know, yin and yang, right? ⁓ But I think that's the main thing. emmamma: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah? Shelly Jefferis: Like when you feel it come up, and honestly, I will have a song that will come on that will all of a sudden bring tears to my eyes, you know, and I think that's kind of a normal thing for, if at least for us moms, I think. So I would just say the same thing is give yourself that moment to go through it and feel the feelings. emmamma: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. sure. Yeah, that's so helpful because I think there's so many things that we can take in, I think just hitting on the feeling, the feelings is so good. Is there any other patterns that you're seeing with moms that you're working with that you just in general that you want to talk about, that you want to bring up? Shelly Jefferis: Bye! think it's just kind of the overall theme of what we've been talking about is just helping them to feel like they're not alone. ⁓ emmamma: Mm-hmm. Shelly Jefferis: I have a friend who she's attended my wellness events and she even shared, she wrote a really, really nice testimonial and she said that she was kind of new to our area a few years back and she just never really felt like she kind of fit in until she came to my event. And I mean, when I read something like that, I'm like, wow. emmamma: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Shelly Jefferis: Part of me is sad that she's gone through that, but then on the other hand, I'm like so, so happy to be able to offer something that can have that impact on someone. And I feel like I'm just getting started with this community. I just have so much more I want to do with it and to build it and to grow it. And I really do believe it can be a benefit to moms. it, I mean, any age. emmamma: Absolutely. Yeah. Shelly Jefferis: an empty nester so I can relate and share it, you know, in that capacity into that population. But it doesn't mean that we can't have younger moms that come in and join and come to our events. And I have a mentorship coaching program where we cover all different areas of wellness, in addition to supporting moms during different phases of motherhood. again, it's going to be different for all of us, right? And just being emmamma: Mm-hmm. Right. Yeah. Wait. Shelly Jefferis: to have a safe space again to share and to feel supported and to know that, you know, they're not alone. emmamma: Mm-hmm. Yeah, that's so good. Where are you located for people who are listening and so that people could come and join these events that you host? Shelly Jefferis: I'm actually in Southern California and our next event is going to be in October. And initially when I put on my first event and I just said, let's get one, I just want to get one under my belt and just do it. Right? And I loved it so much. So my initial thought was we'll do this once a year. Well, when I did my first event, I'm like, ⁓ my gosh, I love this so much. So about five or six months later, I did another. And then I went, okay. emmamma: Yeah! Yeah. Shelly Jefferis: let's come down a little bit because it's a lot of work. And I decided let's focus now on once a year and then expanding my offerings throughout the year of how I can serve moms. And so that's where we're at now. it's, yeah, I just, you know, and I can't say enough great things about the speakers I've had. mean, that's been a... emmamma: Yes. I love that. Amazing. Mm-hmm. Shelly Jefferis: a huge blessing. mean, they've just been such amazing women who are also moms. And, you know, again, the idea is to share our expertise in wellness, but also share our journeys of motherhood. you know, feel supported. So. emmamma: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Absolutely. That's amazing. think like what a... I feel like it's just, it's refreshing to be at events like that where there's all these people who have so much knowledge base that can really bring in that support, but also that we can just kind of feel... I feel like for so many women, especially women who have young children, that they can just be like, ⁓ like I'm a woman, I'm a human being, and I can like learn other things too ⁓ and connect with other people versus just focusing on... the littles all the time, which is good and important, but I think having both is beneficial for everyone. Shelly Jefferis: Well, and I'm so happy you bring that up because I think that's another huge part of this too is the identity that we have as moms. again, part of this is also to encourage moms if they have a dream or a vision or maybe a business they want to start, support them, right? That's a whole other part of this. again, yes, we have our identity in being moms, but we also are women and maybe business women. ⁓ emmamma: Yeah. Mmm, yeah. Shelly Jefferis: wives, friends, whatever, you know, whatever direction we are at or headed towards. And maybe, you know, for this, this, this stay at home mom, that's amazing too, you know. ⁓ And it doesn't mean again, it needs to end with, with being a mom, we can still pursue dreams even once they are out of the house. Maybe there's wanting to do and we pursue it once they've moved out and, that's, I mean, you know, emmamma: Mm-hmm. Absolutely. Shelly Jefferis: That's admirable too. Like a lot of times moms are like, I'm gonna put my dreams on the back burner because I want to focus on my kids. And then once they move out and you know, and I understand that. also understand if you have the desire to do both, if you want to, you can. emmamma: I it. Right? Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, there's so much power in just being able to feel supported through all of that to make those decisions that work best for the individual for sure. Shelly Jefferis: for sure. emmamma: Amazing. ⁓ When, what is something that you just hope everybody who's listening takes away as they're listening today? Shelly Jefferis: The main thing is to take time for you and when you do that, you are filling your cup up first, which means then you're going to have the ability to fill the cups of others and your loved ones. When you take time for you, you have more energy and that's always been my goal is to educate empower others to take care of their wellness, their self care. So they do have that energy and that vitality and that longevity. And that's all to me, things we can pass on to our children, future generations. And so that's ultimately what I hope, I hope your listeners will come away with. emmamma: Yeah, absolutely. for sure. I love that. think like what a powerful statement, what an important thing to say. I think especially that people who are like, this is not a priority yet, you can still still taking the time to do it now. And there's so much benefit as you were just saying about the next generation that like when kids see. us taking care of ourselves, then they know how to do that well too and can respect other people taking care of themselves as well. Shelly Jefferis: It's so true. Yeah, that's such a great point. It's so true. emmamma: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Awesome. Well, is there anything else you want to share? And how can people connect with you? Shelly Jefferis: I would say, I would just encourage any moms that are listening, if you have questions about my program, Moms Who Flourish, my community, or any upcoming events or mentorship and coaching, feel free to reach out, even if it's just a question. I'm happy to answer any questions. I think the best place to find me is probably on Instagram, and I'm at Wellness with Shelly J, and I'm also at moms who flourish. And those are two places where anyone can reach out, especially moms. listen, any question is okay. I, you know, I guess that's one thing I'm, as a teacher, you know, you learn there's never a dumb question, right? There's never a dumb question. We tell kids that, but it's same thing with us adults. There's never a dumb question, right? And so. ⁓ emmamma: For sure. Yes, yep. ⁓ for sure, yeah. Shelly Jefferis: I want to encourage anyone that's listening, if you have questions about your own journey of motherhood or your personal wellness journey, health goals, whatever it might be, feel free to reach out. Maybe we can hop on a call and see if my mentorship is a good fit for you and we can go from there. I just, my whole goal and my passion is to serve moms in whatever capacity that I can and whatever that looks like for others. emmamma: Thanks so much for being here, Shelly. Those who are listening, all of these links to Shelly's information will be in the show notes and please give her follow and reach out to her. Shelly Jefferis: Thank you so much for having me on. I so appreciate it. It's been great. emmamma: Absolutely.