24 · What Does Disability Justice Have to Do With Postpartum Liberation? with Ziah McKinney (Part 1)

Rewind · Babies Know, Birthworkers Forget

What do babies know that birth workers too often forget? In this episode, we explore a truth that lives beneath technique, protocols, and performance: babies already know how they want to be born—and birth work is not about control, but listening. This conversation dives deep into the spiritual, emotional, and embodied dimensions of birth, womb wisdom, and transitional care. We talk about intuition as a skill, the womb as a living archive that keeps count of trauma and tenderness, and why not every doula is meant to practice the same way... or even practice in every season. You’ll hear reflections on: * Why birth is fundamentally spirit work, whether we name it or not * How trauma, surrender, and intuition shape labor and birth outcomes * The responsibility birth workers hold in protecting energetic thresholds * Why rest is not a luxury, but a requirement for sustainability * How birth work extends far beyond the delivery room into grief, menopause, rebirth, and life transitions This episode is for doulas, midwives, birth workers, healers, and families who are ready to move beyond surface-level care and into deeper listening—of the body, the womb, and Spirit. If you’re navigating burnout, transition, or the in-between spaces of life and work, this conversation is an invitation to pause, rest, and remember what you already know. Because sometimes the most powerful thing you can do… is listen. The Postpartum Liberation Podcast and content posted by Danielle Lyles Barton is presented solely for general informational, educational, and entertainment purposes. The use of information on this podcast or materials linked from this podcast or website is at the user’s own risk. It is not intended as a substitute for the advice of a physician, professional coach, psychotherapist, or other qualified professional, diagnosis, or treatment. Users should not disregard or delay in obtaining medical advice for any medical or mental health condition they may have and should seek the assistance of their healthcare professionals for any such conditions.

Rewind · Where Skill Becomes Ceremony

In this episode, we flip the belief most of us have been unconsciously trained into: that postpartum healing happens because we know “what to do.” No. Healing is not about information. Healing is about regulation. And regulation is created through ceremony. Inside this episode, we walk into the deeper truth of postpartum care — not as task, not as checklist, not as performance — but as the blueprint of nervous system safety, identity reintegration, and embodied skill. We will explore: * Why the nervous system doesn’t heal through thinking * Why repetition, slowness, and containment are the real technologies of recovery * How every traditional postpartum culture used ceremony as the primary intervention * Why your hands, your presence, and your pacing are the actual medicine * How Skill as Ceremony transforms technique into transmission This is the moment where we return to the rituals that heal us; not because they are poetic, but because they are physiologically necessary. You will leave this episode understanding why ceremony was always the answer… and why without it, postpartum care collapses into depletion, burnout, and chaos. 📬 Get on the waitlist for the next Postpartum Skill Drill: https://bloomingallover.myflodesk.com/waitlistskilldrill 📬 Get on the waitlist for my 9-month postpartum residency, Where the Roots Gather: https://bloomingallover.myflodesk.com/wtrg-waitlist 📬 Want to be receive weekly doses of postpartum wisdom and care? Join my newsletter, Rooted: https://bloomingallover.myflodesk.com/rooted The Postpartum Liberation Podcast and content posted by Danielle Lyles Barton is presented solely for general informational, educational, and entertainment purposes. The use of information on this podcast or materials linked from this podcast or website is at the user’s own risk. It is not intended as a substitute for the advice of a physician, professional coach, psychotherapist, or other qualified professional, diagnosis, or treatment. Users should not disregard or delay in obtaining medical advice for any medical or mental health condition they may have and should seek the assistance of their healthcare professionals for any such conditions.

Rewind · Rupture, Repair, and the Real Work of Postpartum

Postpartum is one of the most powerful laboratories of rupture and repair in a human life. In this episode, we explore why moments of misattunement, overwhelm, emotional tension, and nervous system spirals are not signs of failure, but invitations into deeper healing, connection, and transformation. We break down what rupture really is, why it happens so often in the early weeks after birth, and how repair becomes one of the most important postpartum skills a family can learn. You’ll learn how postpartum rupture shows up in partnerships, identity, lineages, nervous systems, and everyday life... and why repair has the power to interrupt generational patterns that have lived in a family for decades. This conversation blends Spirit, Science, and Storytelling to help birthworkers, doulas, midwives, and new families understand: * Why postpartum emotions feel so intense * How the vagus nerve and nervous system react to overwhelm * What unrepaired rupture does to the brain and body * Why micro-repair rituals build secure attachment * How lineage trauma resurfaces in postpartum * How to guide families back into safety, softness, and connection If you’ve ever wondered why postpartum feels so raw, or how to support families through the toughest emotional moments, this episode will give you the language, the science, and the spiritual grounding to meet rupture with tenderness and turn it into repair. 📬 Get on the waitlist for the next Postpartum Skill Drill: https://bloomingallover.myflodesk.com/waitlistskilldrill 📬 Want to be receive weekly doses of postpartum wisdom and care? Join my newsletter, Rooted: https://bloomingallover.myflodesk.com/rooted The Postpartum Liberation Podcast and content posted by Danielle Lyles Barton is presented solely for general informational, educational, and entertainment purposes. The use of information on this podcast or materials linked from this podcast or website is at the user’s own risk. It is not intended as a substitute for the advice of a physician, professional coach, psychotherapist, or other qualified professional, diagnosis, or treatment. Users should not disregard or delay in obtaining medical advice for any medical or mental health condition they may have and should seek the assistance of their healthcare professionals for any such conditions.

Rewind · What Holds You While You Hold Everyone Else?

What holds you while you hold everyone else? In this short solo episode, Danielle Lyles Barton speaks directly to doulas, birthworkers, healers, and parents who are carrying a lot — and quietly feeling the weight of it. If you’ve been feeling exhausted, overextended, emotionally full, or like your nervous system is still “on” even after the work is done, this episode is a gentle but honest invitation to pause and ask a deeper question: What is holding you? Danielle explores the difference between being needed and being nourished, and shares why support is not a luxury for birthworkers. It is actually sacred infrastructure. This conversation names the hidden signs of depletion, offers a meaningful reflection practice, and reminds listeners that sustainable care must include the caregiver, too. This episode is especially for: * doulas * midwives * birthworkers * maternal health practitioners * healers and space holders * conscious parents navigating burnout and overgiving The Postpartum Liberation Podcast and content posted by Danielle Lyles Barton is presented solely for general informational, educational, and entertainment purposes. The use of information on this podcast or materials linked from this podcast or website is at the user’s own risk. It is not intended as a substitute for the advice of a physician, professional coach, psychotherapist, or other qualified professional, diagnosis, or treatment. Users should not disregard or delay in obtaining medical advice for any medical or mental health condition they may have and should seek the assistance of their healthcare professionals for any such conditions.

25 · What Does Disability Justice Have to Do With Postpartum Liberation? with Ziah McKinney (Part 2)

What if postpartum care has been shaped by standards that were never built to hold the truth of real bodies, real needs, and real lives? In this two part conversation series of Postpartum Liberation, we begin a powerful conversation on the intersection of disability justice and postpartum care. We talk about what it means to support people after birth in a way that moves beyond checklists, assumptions, and one-size-fits-all care. Together, we explore the quiet violence of ableism in postpartum spaces: the pressure to “bounce back,” the masking of needs, the myth that healing means returning to who you were before. We name how postpartum bodies are changing, vulnerable, and worthy of care that is responsive, flexible, and deeply human. This conversation is an invitation to slow down. To listen better. To meet people where they are instead of where systems expect them to be. 📬 Learn more about Ziah McKinney: https://www.ziahmckinney.com 📬 Get on the waitlist for the next Postpartum Skill Drill: https://bloomingallover.myflodesk.com/waitlistskilldrill 📬 Want to be receive weekly doses of postpartum wisdom and care? Join my newsletter, Rooted: https://bloomingallover.myflodesk.com/rooted The Postpartum Liberation Podcast and content posted by Danielle Lyles Barton is presented solely for general informational, educational, and entertainment purposes. The use of information on this podcast or materials linked from this podcast or website is at the user’s own risk. It is not intended as a substitute for the advice of a physician, professional coach, psychotherapist, or other qualified professional, diagnosis, or treatment. Users should not disregard or delay in obtaining medical advice for any medical or mental health condition they may have and should seek the assistance of their healthcare professionals for any such conditions.