Breaking Taboos: Open Conversations About Women’s Health
Lauren: I think part of it is like it’s interesting because I went to a party the other day, the other afternoon and one of the women there were like, oh, so what do you do? And I was like, oh, I’m like a vagina worshiper. I was like, I worship vaginas. You know, I was just being playful. And because I am often very playful. Right. So and I love to joke. And so I was just being kind of kooky. And she was like, wait, what do you mean by that? And I was like, she was like, wait, are you serious right now? And, you know, it was a party of like very more conservative females, but conservative females who I think are open to being less conservative. And she was like, what do you mean by that? And I was like, well, I just think that the vulva is like this magnificent body part that’s been really underserved. And I think that like so much of our contextualizing around it anyway. She ended up like kind of parading me around the party. It was very uncomfortable. But what was uncomfortable was to witness her discomfort.
So it was interesting, like it was uncomfortable that she was parading me around being like, tell them what you do. Tell them what you told me. Like she was as if like the trick pony in the room. Like I was the trick pony in the room because I was so open about my love for the vulva. And on the other hand, I was uncomfortable watching her so in her discomfort condition. She wasn’t uncomfortable introducing me. Yeah.
And it but but on the other hand, I was like, well, this is what it takes to change the narrative. I’m happy to be your trick pony. Like you want me to be your trick pony and like shared it all the people in the room that I love vulva. So you can all kind of, you know, laugh and giggle and get uncomfortable and then want that makes you want to know more. Great. Let’s do it. You know, so I have dealt with a lot in my life and I have learned how to care and not care at the same time. And so I, I think it takes a specific kind of person who’s comfortable being like I worship vulvas. I think they’re incredible. Like I’m not ashamed. You know, so it’s like to begin with, I’m a person who’s not feeling any level of weirdness around vulva. Like zero.
And so I think that like it’s very disarming to people, but it’s also comforting, but it’s also weird. And for me personally, how I handle the pushback is sometimes I get upset because people can be very mean to me. A few weeks ago, I spoke to teenagers who are 18 years old and by the time they’re like 15, they’re fantasizing about sex. Now they were 18. And we had a frank conversation about masturbation on my Instagram and I was reported. People tried to like they told me they called the police on me. They called DSS. They were reporting me to the cops. They were like I was running a pedophile ring like suddenly. And like so I did end up getting a bit upset and defensive. Like sometimes people will they don’t see who I am and they don’t like they don’t it’s OK to not understand another person. It’s not OK to be so like nasty. And so I’m great. I’m great at handling all of it. I’ve really done my work, but I’m also a person who has feelings where I care. And I think that’s the challenge, right?
Sarah: Yeah. Like when you step up above the crowd, you’re setting yourself up for the tomatoes to be loaded, you know, for shit to get in your head. Everybody else is in the herd and staying down. That is the risk of it. But at the same time, you’re the one. I don’t know why I have this like vision of like being like in a herd. But we’re the ones that, you know, you can like steer the you steer the ship and you’re telling everybody like go this way. But it is it’s very uncomfortable. And when you say things that they especially when it pushes up against conditioning and there’s so much with women and staying small.
Lauren: Yes.
Sarah: That I think what’s revolutionary about a lot of your work and some of the people that I love and study under is this idea of the softening as well as the tightening and the whole thing. Will you just share with everybody like, you know, the benefits of having both of having both, you know, and I don’t tight. Do you mean like physically like a tight vagina?
Sarah: All of the above. Not not as like a tight vagina, but like softening, for example, on an inhalation, allowing the belly to expand, allowing the pelvic floor to expand.
Lauren: Yes.
Sarah: That exists, you know, and yeah, and that there that there can also be that alternate right that there is the other side. I’d love to hear about that.
Lauren: I mean, listen, have you seen people who do like a lot of bodybuilding and they end up kind of walking around like this? And no, I’m not. I’m not saying that’s bad. I’m just like body is adaptation, right? Like what is body? Body is adaptation.
So like if you’re doing a lot of specific type of weight training and maybe not doing other types of training, you might end up like this. Right. And when people see that in like the body world, they might be like, oh, that’s not very balanced. So it’s interesting how when we see it happening in the limbs, like we talk about sitting as the new smoking. But the reason we talk about that is that because it creates this very specific adaptation.
So when we see adaptation in the legs or the arms, we’re automatically those of us in the body movement. And it’s like very biomechanically informed. Non movement teachers might look at that and be like, that’s not good posture. Right. That’s not good posture. Or if we see somebody who’s super hunched over or whatever. Right. We can call out and be like, oh, is that good posture? By the way, I don’t like allocating good and bad to posture and movement. But I’m just going to the cultural context around this.
Whereas with the pelvic floor and core, everyone’s expecting it to be tight all the time. But yet with the arms and legs and glutes and di di di, people are looking for balance. But when it comes to core and pelvic floor, that goes out the window. There’s no more discussion of it being like this balanced thing. And now it’s all about like, how tight can it be? Because tighter is better. And it’s very influenced by our, you know, our cultural standards and our norms for how bodies should look from the outside. And how a body should look from the outside should not dictate like beyond like what norms dictate should not dictate function. And unfortunately, it does.
So we need a balance, just like the arm needs a balance. It needs to be able to create tension. Needs to be able to release from tension slowly. It needs to be able to release not slowly. You know, when you’re on an airplane and you’re pulling a suitcase down from above your head, what stops it from collapsing onto your face is this ability to contract your muscles in a variety of ways in that given moment. And you’re not instructing. You’re not telling you, OK, arm, you’re going to tighten. OK, tricep, you’re going to lengthen under load. OK, bicep. Make sure you’re there’s no like you’re not telling your body what to do. It’s doing it reflexively.
The core and pelvic floor should be utilized reflexively. It does not. It’s not excused from the rules. There’s no reason for it to be excused from the rules of that. However, because we all want a certain look and because people assume that what feels better on a penis is a tight vagina or that if you’ve had a childbirth and now you have pelvic floor patterning, that what needs for that is tightness. None of that actually makes sense when you start looking at the physiology of that. It makes zero physiological sense. And yet we’re also stuck on it because the abdominals in the pelvic floor are not lever. Right. So we can’t you know, they’re not levers. So people are are judging it. They’re holding it to a different standard. Right. A lot of layers. I know.
Sarah: And I mean, I think talking about the patriarchy of it and talking about I’m sure you follow and probably know dearly Kimberly Ann Johnson. And she was talking. I’m going to be on her podcast in a few weeks.
Lauren: Yes. I love her so much. I’ll say hi.
Sarah: So, you know, she was talking recently about how like the ideal body is actually more of a male body that that like we’re even idealizing women to have more of that male body, that narrow, slender and you know, we’re a child’s body really with the removal of body here as well. Like that.
Lauren: Yeah.
Sarah: And but it always it comes back to me just feeling like and this is why I love your work as women. This is the social pressure to stay small, stay small, stay small. And what that leads to in mental health and what that leads to is like, no wonder I’m highly anxious if I’m constantly gripping my belly and not getting a full breath. And obviously I’m an Ashkenazi Jew. I am genetically Jewish. I’m genetically anxious. I mean, we’re all anxious. The whole house is anxious. My dog is on Prozac. Like that’s in my DNA. However, it is probably deeply contributing the fact that I for so long would never even let my belly let go. For so long, I’m gripping my pelvic floor, which is our muladara. That’s our root chakra. And then we’re told by everybody to do it. Right. That’s the instruction by everybody.
Lauren: Exactly. Exactly. And coming up against all of that. Yeah.
Sarah: So, yeah, I mean, it’s a whole wide world out there and that’s why I’m just so grateful to people like you and all of your teachings with that.
The Journey of Parenting Teenagers
Sarah: Let’s talk about your parenting a little bit and the balance of that.
Lauren: I don’t care. Let’s talk about it. Have these conversations.
Sarah: So and like I don’t know. Do you know Jane Austen? She’s based in NorCal. She’s a pre and postnatal teacher. Amazing, amazing. But she is also you know, she talks about she’s like this is a vagina. She has a giant painting of a vagina in her living room. Like her kids grow up with like these are anatomical. Yeah. This is my finger. That’s my vagina. This is my ear, you know. So I’m just curious in your household and all these conversations and what’s the breakdown of how many girls and boys you have?
Lauren: So I have three teenage daughters. My youngest is 14. Yeah. And my youngest is 14 and my oldest is 17. So I had three children in three years. And yeah. And since here’s the thing. I don’t know how to be a discreet person. That’s not who I am. I don’t know how to be, you know, anything other than me. And I think that like and it never made sense to me that, you know, I grew up with a Moroccan father. My father is Moroccan and my mother is American. And so he had a lot of ideas about, you know, how women should be proper. And, you know, and I grew up with a lot of religious Jewish religious family around me. And so it never made sense to me so much. The idea of like modesty, the modesty idea that because the ideas of modesty were not empowering. It was modesty to hide and shame and God forbid, God, God forbid, God forbid.
So it was like that just doesn’t make sense to my body. And what I saw was that like myself and all my peers and my sibling, my sister, like we all wanted to be extraordinarily sexual by 14. And like yet we were not being given information about how to do that and how to be that and how to explore that. And like I was never given permission to masturbate. Now, my mom is super cool. Like she took me for birth control the minute I started having sex. I started having sex in high school. She figured it out. She took me for birth control. Like my mom’s amazing. But it wasn’t like she was like, and one day you’re going to feel this like urge to touch yourself. And that’s fun and cool. My kids, on the other hand, like on a regular basis, they’re like, Mom, stop.
So I actually like I actually don’t. Contrary to what many people believe, I don’t actually like spoon feed my children’s sex masturbation. They are just living. It’s all around them. But I will say that having a mother who is so open, like when people are afraid of kids being immodest, you want you want your kids to rebel against you. Be the most sexualized mother. Like be so openly sexual, like pro sex and pro body and pro all of it and pro pleasure. Your kids will never use that to rebel against you because they know the minute they tell you they’ve had sex, you’re celebrating. Like I celebrate their sexuality and they know that. And, you know, I want them to be sexual and safe and I want it to be good for them. I want them to feel good when they’re having sex. Like, and I want them to have sex with themselves.
Sarah: Well, that’s the sorry. That’s the part that I I was just thinking about is like, I don’t I never got permission to masturbate. Nobody ever talked to me about it. Like, you know, and we actually went and saw Chelsea Handler last night who that was like a lot of her set was about discovering that at nine and 10 years old.
Lauren: Yeah.
Sarah: And, you know, that it was enough to make it a comedy set for 90 minutes. Right. Where everybody’s laughing about, you know, like she was so comfortable and then the inappropriateness, you know, the perceived inappropriateness within the family.
Lauren: Yeah.
Sarah: Being able to talk about that. And, you know, I love that it is this open conversation. So now that they’re a little bit older and they’re I don’t know, it’s a 17 year old going to go to college.
Lauren: Yes, my oldest is going. Yes. My oldest is going to college in Boston in the spring, in the fall. We’re very excited. She is too.
Sarah: And you are also like, you know, you’re so tuned in with yourself and your practices, but you’re still parenting teenagers and parenting teenagers can be unpredictable. So what are you doing for you? What are you doing to take care of yourself? Right. Of conscious parenting is like your own practices, your grounding. And I hear that, like I have my four year old who was like, wouldn’t get out of bed this morning. That they’re similar, like hormonal. I mean, I can’t even imagine yet, although I just remember my teens very clearly. So, yeah, you like what are you doing for you to fill your cup, to stay grounded and to take care of yourself?
Creating a Balanced Parenting Partnership
Lauren: So I got very lucky in the partner department. I, I, my partner, he would have wanted 10 children and I was really, really done at two and then three came along. And he was like, listen, let’s have this child and let’s, I’ll do everything. And up until then, he was doing a lot because I was not a functional middle of the night mom. So, and he is, he’s like, he was, he’s, he’s way better with babies than I was. And I’m way better with teens and he’s learning.
So, so like we had these, you know, we had these three babies. He would have one strapped in here and one, like one strapped in there. Very early on, we created like the work balance load in our home where like I refused to be like the mom who does it all. Like I, you know, and I, I can take a lot of pleasure in cooking for an hour. Whereas he’ll take a lot of pleasure in like, I don’t know, reading them a book for an hour, which we don’t do anymore. So it’s like we split it based on what we knew we were really good at.
Now that we’re with teenagers, that has shifted a little bit, but like, so the culture of mom taking care of herself was there from day one. Like I wouldn’t have kids with him unless there was an understanding of like, what’s going to happen when we have kids is we’re going to split this like 70-30, 70 on you. Just kidding. I literally made it super clear that like this was never going to work and I was never going to have one of his children if he wasn’t willing to be all in and more. And he was all in and more.
Sarah: I want to pin in that real quick, real quick, just to, a lot of people have those conversations and then the baby comes. And the research shows that the gender divide happens. So the fact that I just like let’s honor how amazing it is that what you discussed prior was the same thing that actually happened afterwards.
Lauren: Well, and he worked full time at a bank. So I was with three babies under the age of four for many years, you know, and so I was lucky enough. We were able to get help. I got help, you know, for years we did have an au pair because I knew that I couldn’t do it. I just couldn’t do it. I couldn’t handle it all and have a business and do what I love. So and if I did not have like funding for these things, I would call upon friends and family. Like I set up my life so I could be supported. I’ve always been really resourceful that way, like making sure that like I’m never I can you know.
Yeah, there’s a limit to the amount of stretched thin I can be. My business really stretches me thin right now. So again, he does the morning routine with them. He makes them breakfast every day. I walk my dog for an hour. Like everyone knows that by five thirty, I’m out the door like walking my dog every day for an hour. If I’m like if I need I’m in my studio every afternoon, I do like an afternoon float. I go to the gym almost every day for another hour. Like self care is kind of like what I’m always doing. I don’t have a hard time with that.
And now he works. We work together and he works from home like carpooling a few years ago. I was like, I’m tired of that. He was like, I’ll do it all. So he manages the carpooling. He, you know, food shopping. I was like, I don’t really like doing that anymore. He does it all. I did the cooking. It’s never resentful. He’s never like I feel like you’re doing nothing because I do so much.
Of course, the doctor’s appointments and I do so much. But, you know, we have this great relationship where I do never I don’t ask him permission to travel. I let him know, hey, my friends and I want to go to Mexico. Like, can you clear your schedule? Blah, blah. Sure. No problem. Like we set up a lot of boundaries very early on because I knew what kind of person I was not willing to settle for. I was not willing to settle for anyone who stepped on my vehement independence of life. I am vehemently independent. And so he was the perfect partner. So I’m really lucky in that department. I am very. But I also know that I would never stick around with a partner who wasn’t this involved. It would never work. I’m too selfish. I don’t even call it selfish.
Sarah: Yeah. With your personality. And I’m also vehemently independent. But it’s like you want someone that’s going to comb your wings instead of clip some. Right. You want somebody that’s totally there. They’re allowing you to fly, but then you come back rather than putting a cage over you. So that’s a wonder. That’s wonderful to hear. And like we all like let’s just remind the world that we’re not meant to parent in a two family structure. Like that is unrealistic and horrible. Actually, when you look back at chimps are our closest primate relative. There is something called allo parenting. And that’s what you mentioned, which is having support around us. So whether it’s whether we have to hire help or it’s our friends.
Lauren: Totally.
Sarah: Also have the, you know, you could have an amazing partner if you happen to be in a partnership, but really we need as much support as possible. So it’s wonderful to hear that you were so grounded in that and that you guys. The other thing, too, that was cool to pull a thread from if we can talk about partnership, is that partnership is not 50-50 at the moment. You’re looking at your how long have we been together now?
Lauren: I would assume 20 years this summer.
Sarah: Oh my gosh. Okay. You know, like that’s like to say that we’re coming up on our 10. I’m like, 10 years, like I thought 10 years ago, 90. But like remembering that over that time, right. It changes over that time. It’s not going to be 50-50 at the moment. And I think that’s where we also get caught up. It’s like, remember, like, okay, this is a phase and it’s great that you can look back now and see in the teen years that it got adjusted and it changes.
Lauren: For sure. For sure. And I definitely put in, I would say that, like, yes, he put in a lot of effort when they were babies. And I’m putting in a lot of effort as teens, but that’s also hand in hand with what we desire. I desire to really be around teens. I do not connect to babies that well.
Sarah: Did you know that you were like, connect to teens? You knew that teens would be for you?
Lauren: Oh, for sure. I would like taken many more like, and that’s the house we live in. The house we live in is all the kids are in my house all the time. The doors are open. They all have a key. Every teenager camps out in my house. Like we are, we are like the teen home and I love it. And the more the merrier. My daughter had like 10 teenagers sleep over the other night upstairs here. 14 year olds, a bunch of boys, a bunch of girls. They were all sleeping up here. I literally felt like I was in heaven. I woke up in the morning just feeling like I was in heaven and then looked at my husband and was like, go make them breakfast. But the truth is like, I love being around teenagers. I find them amazing. They’re amazing. I did not love being around babies. It wasn’t for me.
Embracing Teen Energy at Home. The Rewards of Parenting Teens
Sarah: You study or follow, or maybe you’ve been on her podcast, Lisa Demore.
Lauren: No.
Sarah: She just wrote a book. I mean, she’s written many books. She’s a psychologist called like the secret license of teenagers. But she similarly focuses a lot of her practice on teenagers. And there’s so much within the mindfull parenting communities and just in general where we are all, I was thinking about your pelvic floor the other day, but you’re talking about dissing, right? Like disempowering teenagers so often.
Lauren: Totally.
Sarah: Actually this is an amazing opportunity and time in their life and the brain development and the explosion and like what’s going on and how very in the moment they are. And like that is actually a really special, special time. Definitely a reason that we don’t just stick them in front of us. My nieces and a couple of my friends’ kids are like, we’re entering that phase right now. I was one of the last to have kids. So we’re entering the phase and I’m looking forward to it for sure.
Lauren: It’s a lot. It’s a lot. But it’s also so amazing. I found them. Yeah. I love being the parent of three teenage girls.
Sarah: Well, I want to personally honor our time. Yeah. I know you were a busy, busy woman. What is coming up for you? You have your teacher training and you share about the teacher training and the different offerings for everybody. And maybe for me, because I literally keep clicking the link. I’m like, I think I want to take that. It’s just always so hard to predict. But tell us about the tiers, like how people can go in under the 200. But then you also have the option to be a trainer. And yeah,
Lauren: I don’t like traditional yoga stuff like 200 hours, 500 hours. I do.
Sarah: Yeah, I know. No, it’s fine.
Lauren: I just left that mold. And so the mold that I do like is if you have an existing movement practice. Well, I’ll say about my teacher training in general. The thing that I love about it the most is like it’s really based on it’s kind of what I am. It’s really based on like I love knowledge. So I’m really big like I pride myself on like it’s important for me to be smart. Like I really value intellect and I value learning and I value studying and I value being able to talk about my trade and I value questioning and critical thinking and I value being questioned.
And so it’s really an intelligent program, fueled by anatomy and based on anatomy. But then it’s so somatic and embodied and like and so you just get this array of tools of how to deal with clients. You learn how to see the body in front of you from a very biomechanical way. But then you also learn what to do with the information that you see and how to kind of help people repattern what you see. Not because you’re going to fix them, but because patterning is amazing and our brains love new patterns.
Lauren: Or you can come in and learn to teach the Restore Your Core® teacher training method as well. So it just depends on what people want to do if they want to teach Restore Your Core® or other movement. But if you’re an existing movement teacher and you have the how, but you want to understand the what and the why, then it would be that method training.
Sarah: I mean, beyond your humor, your sense of humor, and you’re showing up as real as you are, I think what you do so beautifully is that pairing together of anatomy and embodied movement. Because we can say, here’s the structure of your pelvic floor, but to actually the way that you describe it, like, for example, you were talking about, you know, the unfurling of your anus, the tailbone, and actually feeling your tailbone move as a finger. I’ve never heard that in my life. And I was like, I could feel that right. I was like, Oh my gosh, I can actually get my tailbone to move. Of course, it’s been moving. It’s been moving this whole time. But the way that you describe things is just, it is that, you know, you’re so in your body and you help bring people into their body. So I think that one of your great skills is tying of all those worlds together.
Lauren: Thank you. I love that part of it. I love finding creative ways for people to feel their body rather than just telling them what should be and what is. And then they’re like, that’s not my experience. Am I messed up? And, you know, when we leave we leave so much. We leave so much to their imagination, like all I saw. I don’t understand what she’s telling me, you know, or we go to. Yeah. Anyway, so I do love that. And I appreciate that you appreciate that, too.
Sarah: And I think that’s like a good point to end on what you did. That is the empowerment piece, right? Like it’s not. And that’s another thing that you do amazingly well is like you’re like, if you don’t feel it, you don’t feel it. Like that’s it. And I think especially as movement teachers, when we’re going deeper into these things, like I taught a pelvic floor workshop a couple of weeks ago and I had a couple of yoga teachers in there and they were like, it’s too subtle. And that’s your experience, right? Or when we do body dance, for example, and you’re leading someone through like yoga nidra and they can’t feel a certain part and then they get frustrated. And you’re like, no, but that is the experience. And that’s what you do so well within your trainings is like, OK, you’re not feeling it. Like, note that. That’s it. And then like, and it might change in a few weeks. I keep coming back to it.
Lauren: The thing is, people try something once. They don’t get the outcome they want. They’re not there. They feel disincentivized to not try it again. And it’s up to us as the practitioner to figure out how to give them the tools to try it again.
Sarah: Yeah. And encouraging them to come back and do it again and do it because that’s the normal experience. Like if you go rock climbing.
Lauren: Well, I adore you. I’m so glad that we’re connected.
Sarah: Thank you. I feel the same way. For like everything that I write. And it’s so funny, like I knew your name. And then another senior teacher up here who’s been teaching literally like for like 30 years. She’s like, do you follow this person? Because she knows I’ve been in the pelvic floor like deep dive the last couple of years. And then I was like, what? Like, how do I not? Anyway, and now this has been a wonderful year of me taking every program that you put out.
Lauren: Oh, amazing.
Sarah: And I share you with every single person. Like when people ask me for pelvic.
Lauren: Thank you.
Sarah: I’m like, I don’t know. I send them to you and I send them to my teacher. You really make a parent at Ruth Health. And I just I want to say thank you for all of the free resources. You’re so generous with the information that you share. But also like anybody that can take this training that’s interested in going deeper with Lauren. I would highly, highly recommend it. I may be in there in September too. I’m trying to play on that.
Lauren: Yes. Do it. Love it.
Sarah: Yeah. Would love that too. Thank you so much. Thank you for your time. Thank you for everything that you do. And thank you everybody that tuned in today and wherever you are, whenever it may be.
Lauren: Agree. Thank you. Thank you. It’s been amazing. Bye.
Sarah: Bye
