About Feral Mamas Club

We're all about embracing the beautiful trauma of motherhood, one moment at a time.

Based in the PNW with roots in Ireland, we're working to elevate hard truths of what it means to mother during a difficult time on the planet, and striving to build community that celebrates our efforts.

A little backstory...

In October of 2023 we welcomed our first baby (and now likely, only) baby into the world. My pregnancy was spent drowning in birth story podcasts, carefully monitoring my diet, exercising and taking every supplement, tea, or herb under the sun that could in any way benefit my baby. I had planned a homebirth that was going to be done by twinkle light with records being spun and baby being born in a watertub in my living room. 

But when you want to make the goddesses laugh, as they say, make a plan. 

Florence was instead born in a hospital by emergency c-section, after just about every medical intervention to avoid it. Her entry to the world was not at all how I had wished, imagined or planned for it, but she was here. And I was shattered. A shell of my former self and embarrassed to meet my beautiful girl in such raw shape.

For the first few days I could hardly move. For the first few weeks I was in a type of shock that made it hard for me to speak. Tears spilled easily from my eyes, as though I was constantly on the verge of a meltdown. Every attempt at a latch, every diaper change where she was crying, every step of the triple feeding process (what fresh hell is THAT!?), I felt more and more adrift. Not because I didn't have a solid set of anchors --- thank you to my husband (Duane you are my hero!), closest friends and family for keeping me tethered, but because I was so traumatized by how different the reality of entering motherhood had been from my expectation. 

Not only that, in the immediate days following her birth, we were seeing news reports of women in Gaza receiving pamphlets on how to give birth ALONE. Without support or medical intervention available. I just couldn't comprehend it. After what we'd been through with all the support I had available, and feeling as I did, I just didn't understand the cruelty of our world. And frankly, I was worried I had made a mistake bringing a precious new being into it. 

That is my first hard truth. Despite wanting to be a mother since I was basically a baby myself, I was doubting if we had done the right thing. If this was a terrible mistake. 

It took weeks before I could do a number of things – walk around the block, go out without a diaper on (not just for babies as it turns out), or even just get through the day without crying.

But then something strange happened. I started to feel more like myself because of this beautiful trauma motherhood. Even though I had a raucous start, it was forcing me to evolve into a better version of myself, not just for me, but for Florence. I started to care less about how I physically show up in the world and more about how I energetically show up.

Am I being kind? To Florence, to myself, to my partner? Am I slowing down to breathe deep, even when it feels like I'm at my wits end? Am I taking time to connect with people who are also feeling a little feral? Who love their babies but also resent that they won't sleep. Who eagerly await bedtime while also staying up late to look back on their best baby photos from the day? 

I found myself out in the world in messy buns and with no makeup, all cellulite and baseball caps, grimacing until the next latte hit, and hoping for the next nap to give me a reprieve. Unraveling and getting more and more feral, but by embracing all of that, I was embracing myself. Fully, unapologetically, and authentically.

Grateful to be living in my skin, mothering a wild baby who was waking up to our upside down world with a lens of joy that refreshed my own perspective. Accepting myself more fully than ever before, not just because of the incredible feat my body had just been through, but because this body is solely that – a wonky meatsuit that carries my heart, my soul, my hopes and my spirit. My little girl deserves to see me doing the best I can – not wishing for a different "better version" of me, simply meeting myself where I am, right now.

The Feral Mamas Club is a celebration of all of this. The good, the bad, the downright soul destroying and also affirming.

Welcome, we're so glad you're here.