Meet Michelle Noble

We were lucky to catch up with Michelle Noble recently and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Michelle, really appreciate you opening up about a very personal topic with the hopes that it can help someone out there who might be going through it. What can you share with us about your journey with postpartum depression and how you overcame PPD? For readers, please note this is not medical advice, we are not doctors, you should always consult professionals for advice and that this is merely one person sharing their story and experience.
By the time my first born was 6 weeks old, my husband and I were exhausted. My daughter was sensitive and colicky and overall just hated being a baby! We’d started out with a long and difficult delivery and with my baby’s seemingly constant crying and the impossibility of extended sleep, we both felt like we were sinking. We had no idea how to help each other or ourselves.

In hopes of getting a break from pacing our own hall (and maybe even a break from each other) my husband went on a multi-day hiking trip with his buddy, and I took the baby to visit my parents on the other side of Washington state. What was normally a four hour drive there turned into a seven hour slog, with constant stops to try and soothe my screaming infant. I’d tell myself, “If she’s still crying after 20 more minutes of driving, I’ll stop again and try to feed her/change her/burp her/something…

It was awful

The week with my mom was sort of a break: she and my sweet step-dad fed me, reassured me, held the baby. But still the constant interruption of sleep, the painful breastfeeding…of course there were moments of beauty and awe, but I was just soooo tired. Mamahood wasn’t what I expected and I’d expected I would know what to do.

On the way home I pulled into a rest area, called my doctor and left a message begging for a prescription for an antidepressant. She had one waiting for me when I got back, along with a follow-up appointment within a few days.

That was the beginning of a long journey (even longer than that miserable drive to Spokane!) of learning to ask for help, letting go of trying to get motherhood “right”, and coming to a place of trusting myself as a mom.

The medication and the counseling were a stepping stone. So was joining a new parents’ group with my husband and seeing we weren’t alone in our struggles. It was also about letting go of control and perfectionism. A huge piece was learning to stop putting everyone else’s well-being ahead of my own. That perhaps has been the longest road.

But the biggest turning point didn’t happen for four more years, when I was due with my second daughter and I discovered a set of tools called Access Consciousness®. Access made such a difference for me in every area of my life, that about two years later I turned my massage therapy practice into an intuitive transformation, energy therapy and life-coaching business focusing on helping pregnant and new moms have more ease and joy in their own motherhood journeys.

Thanks, so before we move on maybe you can share a bit more about yourself?
I had already been a massage therapist for over a decade when I first became a mother, so I already had a deep understanding of how the body functions and I’d trained in how the emotional and spiritual state of the being can manifest as vitality, healing, pain or disease in the body.

When motherhood knocked me flat and I had to find a way to get back up again, I noticed that many of the women I talked with had similar stories: they were struggling as moms, felt like they were letting their children down in some way, and felt that if they could just get things “right” then things could be easier.

As moms, we were judging ourselves constantly, putting ourselves last, and holding ourselves to some mythical standard of perfection that we wouldn’t have visited on any other person. We were so mean to us!

When I discovered the tools of Access Consciousness® and started melding them with my own knowledge as a mother and a healer, using them to transform my own experience and find more kindness and joy, I saw a way to transform motherhood.

I also began to see how much we were robbing our children and the world of our gifts by our self-abuse. We were also teaching yet another generation that “love” means putting you last. I made the demand of myself for something different for me and my kids, and to offer a different path to other women. A path that, as they say in Access®, “includes everything and judges nothing,” including ourselves.

That’s why I created The Calmer Mom Project. My way of working with clients includes gentle work with their bodies to unwind tension, relax the nervous system and clear old beliefs that are stuck in the tissues. It also includes practical, everyday tools to change what isn’t working and embrace new possibilities. By including the being and the body, things can change more easily and completely on the physical and emotional level than with most other approaches I’ve come across. My target with clients is always to empower them to know they can create magic for themselves.

I think the motto of The Calmer Mom Project says it all, “What if being you is a greater gift to your child than being perfect?”

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?
I was so fortunate to become a massage therapist in my mid-twenties. It gave me an opportunity to learn about these miraculous friends we get to co-create with throughout our lives, called our bodies. It also meant I got to have long conversations with, contribute to, and learn from people of all ages and walks of life.

I’m also not much for accepting “this is just how it is” as an answer. I’m always looking for a greater possibility. Even with things people tend to see as inevitable, like aging, money struggles, never enough time, or that motherhood is hard. I’m always thinking, “There’s gotta be something better. Now what would it take to find a way?”

That curiosity has served me well to be happier and healthier at 51 than I’ve been at any other time that I can remember. So my advice to others? Never give up, never quit, stay curious, ask more questions. Then ask for even more!

Is there a particular challenge you are currently facing?
I recently posted a video talking about “The 3 Things You Need to Give Up to Be a Happy Mom”: 1. To be a happy mom you have to give up being a “good” mom.
2. You have to give up being a problem solver.
3. You have to give up making yourself responsible for whether or not your kids (or anyone else besides yourself) are happy.

These three truths are still things I struggle with giving up every day.

Even though I’ve spent the last fourteen years learning to trust myself more and more as a parent, I still have that voice sneak into my head sometimes comparing myself to other moms, wondering if I’m “getting it right”, and brooding over whether there’s something more I should be doing for my family.

I know that voice is a liar and those worries are lies designed to knock me out of being me and being present, the two things my children actually require more than anything else I could do or give them.

I used to put on job resumes that I was a “problem solver”. And any issue that comes up around my house the first call you’ll hear is, “Hey Mom!” I’m good at it. I love the puzzle and the sense of victory even as I whine about the constant interruptions and wonder why they won’t just figure it out themselves.

But here’s the thing about valuing oneself as a problem solver – it means there always has to be a problem so you can prove you’re value. Aaack!

And the last one is my biggest challenge of all: letting go of making myself responsible for other people’s happiness, even my two magical daughters that I love so much. But if I make their happiness my job, that means I have to judge myself and feel like crap when something is hard for them. It also means I’m teaching them love means co-dependence. And most importantly, if I don’t see them as powerful creators of their own happiness, then I’m blocking their opportunity to put all that magic into play and choose a joy-filled life, if that’s what they would like to have.

What I know to be true is that being a happy mom is a huge contribution to my children. And it’s not all about them – it’s about me too! I have gifts to give, fun to have, and change to be in the world. It’s way easier to do that from happy!

So every day I pay attention. When I get stuck or the voices and judgements get loud, I ask questions. I use the tools I teach my clients. I reach out and get support for myself from other Access Consciousness® facilitators, because they’ll see things I’m missing and remind me of what I’m forgetting.

I’m not a perfect mom. Thank goodness! What good would that do? Instead I practice giving myself the grace I hope my kids will someday give themselves when they are beautifully imperfect too!

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