Interview with Tami Lynn Kent, author of “Wild Mothering: Finding Power, Spirit, and Joy in Birth and a Creative Motherhood.”

Author and women’s health physical therapist Tami Lynn Kent’s new book applies her groundbreaking women’s health approach to the journey of motherhood. Drawing from her work with thousands of women, she shares how to access the energy medicine within the female body in all stages of mothering.

Here are some insights from Tami Lynn Kent:

What does the term Wild Mothering mean?

Wild Mothering is a reference to the beauty and intensity of the experience of mothering. Rather than a prescribed set of actions, wild mothering is working with the natural creative currents in a way that mothering and creativity complement one another. This means resting when the body calls you to rest, lowering expectations for completing tasks at times, and realizing that there is a deeper aspect of renewal or inspiration occurring.

I learned about Wild Mothering while caring for women’s bodies after giving birth. I noticed that their pelvic bowls had wisdom and medicine precisely for the act of mothering. I utilized this inner energy current myself while mothering three sons, healing from birth and miscarriage, and continuing to hone my creative practice. The creative current within served to inspire daily life, solve mothering challenges, and bring necessary medicine to the heartbreaking parts of mothering.

Wild mothering is also a way to surrender to the mystery and call upon spirit for support. Surrender and spirit are words whose meanings are intimately connected. To know this is to know the heart of wild mothering.

How does deepening your relationship with your feminine essence aid in conception?

Establishing a relationship with the feminine means cultivating a connection to the inner wisdom and cyclical nature of the body. Being able to move from the internal rhythm, that ebbs and flows just like all natural currents, puts one in deeper contact with cycles of fertility and thus the time for conception. This plays a role beyond pregnancy — into the fertility and fruits of our families and creative lives. Women are the center of most families and even organizations. If they return to their own centers to feel the rhythmic flow within, they move more readily in ways that sync with natural rhythms.

Returning to the feminine within means that women can follow the flow and guidance that leads to conception but also creative fertility, visions, and inspiration. It can support a woman in knowing how to organize her day or her family life. The womb has periods where it is more receptive to conception and the female body also has times where it is more receptive to downloads or insights. The feminine is our clearest way to receive the guidance for conception and for cultivating the bounty of our wild mothering lives.

How can women best support their healing process from pregnancy and birth?

Wild Mothering has a whole chapter on healing the body and pelvis after pregnancy and birth that’s drawn from the wisdom of my profession as a women’s health physical therapist and that I learned while recovering my own body. The chapter includes all of the information that I wish I’d had right upon giving birth.

The first way to support the healing process postpartum is to rest and stay near the bed for the first six weeks. Women hear the information to rest, but they don’t always know why this is important. I explain how the uterus is still enlarged and the ligaments are lax, so rest allows for the body to adjust without causing harm.

Rest also protects a woman while the birth portal is still open and the body field is sensitive. Staying near the bed allows for the postpartum time to be a dream-filled and beautiful experience. It’s also wise to seek pelvic care from a skilled women’s health physical therapist. I share tips for doing this in Wild Mothering as well as on my website wildfeminine.com. Every woman benefits from pelvic care and pelvic floor massage after birth to support the healing process and proper pelvic realignment.

How does Wild Mothering aid in raising young people in these challenging times?

Wild Mothering shares energy medicine tools from our female bodies to support mothering in these challenging times. The pelvic bowl medicine is perfect for mending fractures, and women often build and mend the connections in community. We can tap this core feminine medicine for mothering our children and raising them in these fractured times because our energy is naturally creative and healing.

I share many energy tools that I’ve honed while working with women in their pelvic bowl to address the modern issues of life and mothering, which involve centering in and listening to the guidance within. I also share an energy technique for working with the medicine of the birth field of your child even when they are young adults. In fact, when our young adults are separating from us and forging their own pathways, we can’t always help them directly, but the energy medicine of the birth field is always relevant and perfectly designed as salve for the challenges of life.

Wild Mothering is an updated version of your classic Mothering from Your Center. What have you added to this most recent edition?

The updated version of Wild Mothering contains all of the information from the original book, such as healing your body from pregnancy and birth and utilizing the energy medicine of the pelvic bowl for mothering. Then I’ve added two new chapters from the perspective of the elder mother and the long path of parenting that acknowledges the real challenges but responds by going further into the mystery for answers.

Wild Mothering relays the tried-and-true wisdom of the elder mother learned by experience. I’ve also included diagrams that map the energy of the birth field and ways to access this medicine with energy-sensing visualizations. Wild Mothering is a love letter to mothers — honoring what they do and offering them more support and medicine to feel cared for along the way.

To learn more, visit wildfeminine.com.