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Nourishing the Mother
Nourishing the Mother
Author: Bridget Wood & Julie Tenner
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© 2025 Nourishing the Mother
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Mothering can be an inspired journey to our most glittering, authentic, passionate, creative and connected selves. Through the mirror offered to us by our children, we are taken to every hurt, unmet need, and also every joy and excitement we’ve ever experienced. We want every woman and mother to give themselves and those around them the compassion, love and healing they so readily offer their children, but rarely allow themselves. Journey with us as we discuss the many layers of being a mother today, where we have come from and where we want to go. Learn tools to connect with yourself, offer compassion to those parts we’d rather deny and get back in love with yourself, motherhood and who you are as a feminine woman.
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In the final week before Christmas, when the lists are finished and the adrenaline drops, many women don’t feel relief…they feel flat, teary, irritable or quietly undone. This episode is an emotional temperature check for overstretched mothers asking, “I should be happy… so why do I feel empty?” Julie and Bridget name the invisible load women are carrying and explore why Christmas becomes the moment everything catches up. This isn’t about fixing yourself, it’s about naming what’s real instead...
The festive season looks magical on paper: twinkly lights, long lunches, sparkling moments with kids… but for so many families, it’s actually a sensory avalanche waiting to happen. In this episode, we unpack what’s really going on beneath the meltdowns, the indecision, the clinginess, the crankiness, and the “I can’t do this” moments (from kids and parents). We map nervous systems, explore individual sensory needs, and name the pressure cooker that December becomes — especially when you’re ju...
Resentment is quiet… until it isn’t.And when it leaks through your tone, your silence, or the way you half-turn when he walks in the door, it can change the entire ecosystem of your relationship - even when you don’t mean it to. In this episode, we dive into the real energetic difference between speaking from bitterness and speaking from love. We explore why so many long-term couples get caught in confirmation loops, scorekeeping, and micro-withdrawals… and how the smallest shift in tone, so...
Julie and Bridget dive into why mothers so often feel their children’s birthdays in their bodies - not just as a date on the calendar, but as an emotional echo of who they were when that child arrived. They unpack the surprising way the body holds onto birth memories, how milestone birthdays can reopen old wounds or tender places, and why perimenopause, identity shifts, and grief can hit hard in the background of these celebrations. Together, they explore the collision of timelines: ou...
This week, we’re opening the door on one of the most invisible seasons of womanhood — being in ‘the sandwich generation’. The stretch between raising children and caring for ageing parents can feel like living two lives at once: one full of growth and beginnings, the other shaped by endings and decline. In this conversation, we unpack the exhaustion, the guilt, the grief, and the quiet unraveling that happens when you’re holding everyone else together — and explore how to navigate this...
If guilt were cardio, every mum would be an Olympian. But what if guilt isn’t proof you’re failing — it’s proof you care? In this episode, we unpack the emotional weight mothers carry and how “mum guilt” has become a badge of honour we never asked for. From the cultural conditioning that tells us a good mother should give everything, to the quiet courage it takes to choose ourselves without crumbling under judgement, we explore how to move from guilt as punishment to guilt as guidance. You’ll...
In this episode, we discuss what to do when your child slams the brakes on; from “I’m not going to school” to daily battles over getting dressed or leaving the house. We explore how to stay grounded when their storms threaten to pull you in, how to use play and connection to move through resistance, and why your regulation is the most powerful parenting tool you have. We unpack what happens in your body when you feel backed into a corner, how to find your anchor, and the small moments of humo...
In this episode, Julie sits down with Fertility Coach Liz Walton to redefine what fertility really means. Liz, founder of the Australian Fertility Summit, brings her own lived experience - ten years of “failed” IVF rounds, deep personal healing, and eventually conceiving her daughter naturally at 46 - to shine light on what so many women long for but rarely hear: that fertility isn’t just medical. It’s emotional, relational, spiritual, and deeply personal. Together, we explore how to hold wom...
What really turns mothers on isn’t roses or lingerie….it’s partnership. It’s not having to carry everything alone, not having to think about one more thing, not feeling swallowed up by kids and needs with no solo time left. In this episode we explore why sharing the load is the ultimate aphrodisiac, how appreciation and acknowledgement fuel intimacy, and why true partnership is so much sexier than performative help. When you feel like it’s not all on you, when you’re a team doing it together,...
Bridget is a full-time working mother navigating the reality of decreased time and increased pressure — which demands a new level of discernment about what can and can’t be held. In this episode, we explore how to protect your energy, bring more equity into your relationship, and create room for your dreams without over-functioning to keep the peace. We talk about holding your partner accountable, building flexible rhythms that support the whole family, and why truth-telling, shared responsib...
So many of us step into business with huge hearts and deep skills, then crash into the reality of motherhood — where hustle culture doesn’t work and “balance” is a myth. In this episode we explore what it really takes to grow your business as an intentional mother: creating rhythms that fit your season of life, using small windows of time to move the needle, building in alignment with your values (not someone else’s), and letting business become something that not only sustains you, but actua...
This episode is raw, tear-filled, and honest as Julie shares what it was actually like to say goodbye to Heath as he left for the United States — the pride, the ache, and the messy middle. We walk through the good, the bad, the ugly, the learning, and the letting go. It’s matrescence at the other end of parenting, when identity is cleaved and you gather the pieces to remake yourself, and when love and intimacy are invited to mature. In this episode we discuss: - Letting go of a son to the w...
Sometimes, being in relationship feels heavier than doing it all on your own. In this episode, Julie shares a raw revelation: while solo parenting her girls, managing sport schedules, interstate travel, and two national award wins — she realised that, in some ways, it actually felt easier than being in partnership. We unpack why long-term relationships can feel harder than parenting solo, what this means for intimacy, and the practical ways couples can shift from tension and resentment into...
Your relationship is a living mirror — not just of your partner, but of the parts of yourself you’ve hidden, avoided, or outgrown. In this episode, we explore the conscious relational tools that don’t just keep your love alive, but help you grow as an individual within it. Because love isn’t something that just happens — it’s something we do, on purpose. We’ll unpack how high-functioning burnout, stress, and survival mode quietly kill intimacy, why polarity and independence are essential for...
Everything you have right now was once a dream — the relationship, the home, the family, the love. But when life becomes a checklist and connection becomes transactional, we forget what we once longed for. In this episode, we take you inside the three relationship habits we see drop off the most in long-term love — and why they’re the very glue that keeps desire, appreciation, and intimacy alive. This is your reminder that disconnection doesn’t mean you’re broken — it means the relationship ...
In this episode, we explore celebration as a radical act of receiving; not just balloons and bubbly, but a mirror for how safe you feel to be seen, acknowledged, and loved. We unpack why so many of us deflect recognition or wait for others to validate what we struggle to honour in ourselves, and how that can leave us quietly starving for emotional nourishment. We talk about how to host gatherings that feel like love (not performance), how to work with social anxiety (yours or your guests’),...
In this episode, we unpack the complex, emotionally loaded space where your child’s bids for connection meet your very real, very human need for separation. Whether it's bedtime, the end of a long day, or another moment when you feel like they’re clawing at your leg and you just have to get away, we go deep into the internal and external pressures that make this one of the most painful tensions in motherhood. We explore how unmet needs, maternal conditioning, nervous system dysregulation, a...
Life moves fast…and if you’re not careful, it’ll pass by in a blur. In this deeply heartfelt episode, we share how presence is what makes a moment last, and how the simple act of breathing it in can transform the ordinary into the unforgettable. Drawing on a powerful message from a Honey Club member, this episode is a call back to what truly matters; not the roles we play, but the memories we feel. This one is for the part of you that craves slowness, sacredness, and the kind of life you’ll ...
What happens when your heart is at home, but your body’s at work — or when your head’s in the spreadsheet but your child’s in tears at daycare drop-off? In this episode, we explore the inner tension so many mothers feel between being present, connected parents and being purposeful, ambitious humans doing meaningful work in the world. It’s not just about time management — it’s about the deep, identity-level stretch of holding two powerful callings that often ask for completely different parts...
So many couples find themselves tangled in the same painful dance: pressure, predictability, and the slow death of desire. In this episode, we’re unpacking why your sex life isn’t just about sex - it’s the meeting place of both your worlds. Why men often feel sex as devotion (and rejection like a dagger), why women need connection to even want sex, and how survival mode and arousal simply can’t coexist. We’ll explore how to stop counting acts and start cultivating an erotic climate where yo...




A beautiful podcast on all aspects of motherhood and womanhood. I recommend this to all my mum friends as it has brought me alot of wisdom, peace and reassurance.