A Cold Rage: Debunking Motherhood and Childbirth with Lucy Jones’s Matrescence

We’re thrilled to welcome Lucy Jones, a celebrated writer and journalist, to the Postpartum Production podcast to discuss her latest book, Matrescence: On the Metamorphosis of Pregnancy, Childbirth, and Motherhood with us. Lucy’s work draws on deeply personal experience as well as a diverse range of disciplines - neuroscience and evolutionary biology, psychoanalysis and existential therapy, sociology, economics and ecology, to illuminate how the changes in the maternal mind, brain and body are far more profound, wild and enduring than we have been led to believe.

Lucy’s acclaimed career includes roles as Deputy Editor at NME.com and work with The Daily Telegraph. Her earlier books, Foxes Unearthed and Losing Eden: Why Our Minds Need the Wild, have received numerous accolades, including awards from the Society of Authors and long-listings for prestigious prizes. Her latest collaborative work, The Nature Seed: How to Raise Adventurous and Nurturing Kids, offers a radical vision of a new kinship with nature, one that helps us expand, nurture and deepen our wild life. 

In this conversation, Kaitlin and Lucy explore:

• The concept of "matrescence" and why it remains underacknowledged (even flagged as a spelling error in word processors).
• How existential psychology offers a lens for understanding the upheaval and transformation of motherhood
• The interplay between motherhood and time, from the fleeting nature of childhood to the visceral awareness of life’s impermanence
• The critical need to normalize the emotional and psychological shifts that accompany childbirth and parenting.

Lucy’s most recent works include:

• Matrescence: On Pregnancy, Childbirth, and Motherhood 
• Losing Eden: Our Fundamental Need for the Natural World and Its Ability to Heal Body and Soul 
• Foxes Unearthed: A Story of Love and Loathing in Britain
• The Nature Seed: How to Raise Adventurous and Nurturing Kids

Also mentioned in the podcast:

• Rozsika Parker, Torn in Two: Maternal Ambivalence 

You can find more of Lucy’s work at:

• Website: https://lucyfjones.com/

Instagram: @lucyfjones