Social cues are circadian cues.

We were never meant to spend our days alone with our babies.

This is one of many things that has gotten easier as my family has grown.

Reading or hearing first time moms sharing their experiences brings me back to those long, painful days.

Thirteen hours alone at home with a new baby in a new town… gosh those were the loneliest days of my life just waiting for my husband to get home.

Three things that changed:

1. We moved back to my hometown

2. We decided to homeschool and networked with amazing women ahead of me

3. We had more children—with a teenager and four younger ones now, there’s hardly a dull or quiet moment and I am surrounded be hilarious social chatter all day, everyday

My energy and sleep have never been better; I feel strong and amazing.

When I have low moments, as we all do, I have the mental ease to just sink into them with the full confidence I’ll be cared for and on the upswing in good enough time.

Some other things that have really helped:

• Circadian and light practices for mood

• Root Cause Protocol and supplementing with topical magnesium, magnesium baths and adrenal cocktails with real fresh citrus

• Getting better at work from home, entrepreneurship and budgeting and the family having more stability thereby

I hope this is helpful to any of the mamas out there who may be feeling unstable and lonely.

Get out there and find some mothers ahead of you to make friends with!

And one last pro tip: frequent the park, playgrounds, library, museums etc while school is in session—families who are there at that time are likely to be homeschoolers who are as eager for connection as you are!

Enjoy!

Babies are born equipped to absorb UV light much more rapidly than adults through two mechanisms:

1. Lower melanin levels, so they have less shielding

2. Higher vellus hair content (the super soft, uncolored hair or “peach fuzz”), which may absorb UV light approximately 250x as fast as normal hair

These physiological conditions seem to allow babies to meet their UV light requirements in a very short amount of time without experiencing dehydration, heat fatigue or sunburn

In un-supplemented individuals, solar-derived Vitamin D is thought to make up approximately 90% of serum levels1.

And yet it is common to find even highly educated researchers making claims such as “low compliance…

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“lucky” “privileged” “elitist”

Yes, I have had all these names thrown at me for shring my reasons for avoiding daycare.

Online anyways, and especially on mom-Substack.

In real life, people don’t tend to be so quick to call names and throw labels.

But what does daycare have to do with my mission here?

Daycare, even high quality daycare, seems to disrupt the circadian flow of cortisol for the majority of youngsters1.

And unnatural cortisol patterns and circadian disruption in early life are correlated with lifelong outcomes, especially mental health outcomes.

Inside my circadian pregnancy & babyhood workshops I teach how the first 2-3 years of life are foundational for circadian rhythmicity across the lifespan.

The patterns set at this time tend to be carried forward for the rest of life.

I wouldn’t ever take daycare away from those who want to use it.

But to say daycare is always a good and necessary thing is absolutely a slap in the face to the intelligence and resourcefulness of mothers.

Mother…

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Here’s an easy strategy to help your baby understand the difference between waking up from a nap and waking up in the middle of the night:

• if it is daytime, bring them outside right away for a minute (or more) of natural light

• if it is nighttime, keep the lights dim (under 1 lux, and definitely no more than 5 lux)

Fine tune or amplify the strategy:

You can reinforce the daytime signal in many ways.

You can speak up joyfully when they wake.

Tell your baby how happy you are to see them awake, and even sing them a bouncy wake up song.

If you are brave enough to do elimination communication (EC) and have a private yard, this is an opportune “pottytunity.”

This is because for most of humanity we voided outside and babies are still primed that way.

When they wake up, if you take their diaper off outside, the light and air will very likely help cue them to void in their potty.

When they wake up in the dark, there are also multiple ways to amplify the signal to go back to sleep.

Keep your voice low …

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Children don’t think in clock time.

This is a big cause of bedtime battles.

They are fully in tune with their body clock.

So instead of speaking to their mind, speak to their body in the language that controls their sleepiness: darkness.

Clock time doesn’t dictate bedtime—the light outside does.

The sun is going behind the horizon… time to light the candles and turn off the lights.

Bye bye, sun!

If the light is low, it’s so much easier to guide children to bedtime than if the overhead white light is on telling their bodies it is still noon!

How can your voice chanting a random number convince them their body is lying!? It can’t.

Speak to their body with dimness instead and you will have a much easier time.

This bedtime ease is all the more likely if you have brought them outside first thing this morning already to replenish their melatonin stores after the p…

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Mamas, please don’t watch the clock postpartum.

The clock helps us meet other humans.

It’s a communication tool.

When it comes to sleep and motherhood—especially in the early days (like the first 6 weeks)—the clock doesn’t really have a strong place imo.

The manmade clock is definitely not going to help you communicate more effectively with your baby in this stage.

Many women instantly understand this when I talk about circadian polyphasic sleep through the early postpartum.

You are naturally going to drift in and out of “clock time”, and if you are intuitive and have a natural light environment, your body clock will naturally take over and give you all the rest you need when caring for your baby around the clock.

However, if you resist your body clock and try to keep your sleep consolidated to the manmade clock, sure—your sleep may look more “perfect” and consolidated like you are used to.

But.

If you continue to live by clock time instead of body clock …

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Circadian health research is validating the old-fashioned advice to “sleep when your baby sleeps.”

But it feels impossible to so many of us.

Why?

because our bodies no longer feel the need to sleep.

The modern environment full of artificial lights and isolated from natural light with newfangled thermal & UV-blocking windows has made that advice feel nearly impossible to follow.

We just get ever-more wired-but-tired, even to the point that many new mothers (as well as the population at large) have diagnosable sleep disorders.

And when I bring this up, there are also many who just dismiss this because they “can’t.”

What would it look like to re-integrate napping in today’s world?

In non-industrialized areas, people sleep less, sleep less efficiently, and nap more.

Yet they show more robust circadian health!

I wrote about this earlier this year:

And what I know to be true is that even if we are living in …

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Period not returning after two years of breastfeeding?

While the common advice for bringing your cycle back is to wean, I’d like to use this space we have together here to give you some reasons to reconsider this option.

Not only do I know many women who have conceived while breastfeeding and gone on to tandem nurse(for tandem nursing support, I started a conversation here), but there are biological processes at play here with prolactin outside of the breastfeeding relationship.

The circadian rhythm of metabolic prolactin is operating independently of your breastfeeding1.

The body doesn’t need the excess prolactin to maintain your milk supply—it’s doing something else via the circadian rhythm and your metabolism to keep you and your family alive. This functionality is NOT directly tied to your breastfeeding relationship. This means you can lower your prolactin levels without stopping breastfeeding.

When I see this presentation:

1. Mama is breastfeeding a 2 year old

2. Mama is glowing with radiant skin

3. Mama is lean and her boobies look “skinny”

4. Her cycle hasn’t returned, but she has baby fever

5. Her toddler acts clingy and demanding in public, and wants to touch the boobies even when not nursing

6. Often (not always), this Mama also has low libido in spite of wanting a baby

7. Often (not always), this Mama also is very idealistic about her diet and very likely has been through a lot of trial and error to land on a “perfect system” and she may even have feelings of actual fear around even the idea of changes to diet

8. Often (not always), this Mama is facing some kind of additional stress at home—seems to often be either financial/business or security like an impending move

What I observe more than half of these in a fertility consultation, my instict usually says I am working NOT with a mother who needs to wean, but a mother who needs to nourish in a different gear than the (usually very good) gear she is currently pedaling in.

In this situation I just described, weaning for the sake of restoring fertility wouln’t get at the metabolic root of her issues.

What does high prolactin in breastfeeding really mean?

To the body, high prolactin is the body’s way of saying it is spring/summer now but I’m afraid we don’t have what we will need to make it through the upcoming winter. It’s saying, I’m afraid we are going to starve. In the animal kingdom, these seasonal prolactin cycles (dependent on circadian melatonin levels) are thought to regulate fertility and ensure babies are born in the correct season2.

So, instead of weaning, here are the specific things I recommend to restore the body’s sense of safety and to lower the circadian threshold of prolactin to reboot fertility, all while maintaining the level of prolactin needed to maintain breastfeeding (if you choose to).

You can do this in addition to weaning if you feel it is naturally the time you want to wean anyways.

How to reduce prolactin while breastfeeding (or for a metabolic crisis, such as obesity):

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We covered a lot of territory, from home birth to home school to how our attitudes and perspectives have grown and evolved over time through parenting large families to how integral working Nature into our lives has been so transformational.

Jay and Jaydee founded an outdoor school during the lockdowns in North Carolina a few years ago, only to have it be forced to close in the aftermath of last year’s hurricane! They shared that story and how they are cultivating long-term, intergenerational resilience in their family and community during this interview.

I hope you enjoy it! You can connect with Jay and Jaydee through their Substack below:

Subscribe to Rising Sovereign Podcast

Thank you also to , , and many others for tuning into this live video with ! Join me for my next live video in the app. It will be with talking all about circadian rhythms and how we can improve lactation support on September 15th at 2 PM Pacific / 5 PM Eastern.

Get more from Nikko Kennedy in the Substack app

Available for iOS and Android

Get the app

New podcast with Nikko Kennedy and Dr. Tara Hogan

Listen to our light and motherhood conversation on Apple Podcasts (we are both mothers of 5–learn from the experience we have each gained as mothers and how we have addressed different health and wellness issues across our years):

Or you can listen or watch on Spotify—this was the finale of Tara’s first season, so there are some fascinating other guest interview to explore while you are there, (including Dr. Tamara Hussain, Dr. Lauren Kolowski, and Leah Barto from BirthFit):

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Sunlight supports infant development—here are ten evidence-based reasons to bring babies outside

1. Mothers who spend more time outdoors with their babies have lower rates of postpartum depression1

2. Sunlight supports healthy bilirubin metabolism in babies with jaundice2

3. Sunlight supports infant retinal development, and the first 6 mos of light exposure is especially important3

4. Sunlight supports infant motor development, which is especially relevant for infants of mothers with perinatal depression who have a higher tendency toward delayed motor development4

5. Sunlight exposure in babies reduces their risk of developing eczema and atopic dermatitis5

6. Sunlight exposure likely supports the second minipuberty, the process of sexual differentiation in babies where their hormones are significantly higher than they will be in childhood before teen puberty 6 (via sunlight’s modulation of the endocrine system7)

7. Sunlight-exposed babies can have better Vitamin D status than their mothers (especially after 3 months of age), possibly due to higher synthesis with less exposure and/or the prioritization in the mother’s body to increase Vitamin D levels in her milk faster than in her own blood8

8. My own speculation on fuzzy vellus hair, which some babies are born absolutely covered in, and the fact it actually absorbs UV light at a faster rate than normal hair9, suggests to me they are optimized to get the benefits more quickly

9. May reduce the risk of SIDS by facilitating more daytime wakefulness10 and age-appropriate sleep consolidation11

10. If you can’t bring your baby outside, brighter indoor daylighting and darker night lighting may still help entrain baby’s circadian rhythms12

Please avoid sunscreen use on your baby because they are not equipped to detox it and it does permeate their skin13 . Just stay in the shade when it is uncomfortably intense.

How much sunlight is safe for babies?

It’s hard to find a professional recommendation for how much sun anyone, but especially a baby, *should* get.

Here’s one recommendation I was able to find from a study done in Australia (cited in footnotes).

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Having recently been through the birthing portal, it feels especially poignant to now be preparing to teach in-depth on quantum health for labor and birth in the Circadian and Quantum Childbearing Year lessons for practitioners in the ⚛️ Quantum Practitioner annual tier here at Brighter Days, Darker Nights.

The ⚛️ Quantum Practitioner annual tier is where I teach at the level for professionals who want to learn this and implement it in their client practices—and we also have a few mothers and aspiring mothers and fathers doing intense wellness work with us (bravo to them!).

As I’ve been working on the latest lessons in the program, one of the things on my mind is the conceptual framework of quarters.

A woman’s menstrual cycle is often described in 4 parts:

Follicular

Ovulatory

Luteal

Menstrual

Which are also likened to seasons:

Spring

Summer

Fall 

Winter

The birthing year can also be described with this…

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In my years of working with families through the birthing years, I’ve noticed that some couples conceive their babies easily, or even by accident.

Others spend years trying without success.

Labs & fertility treatments are expensive, and in many cases unscrupulous—not to mention still ineffective for many.

The future of humanity depends on us continuing to welcome new life and for families to be healthy and well-supported through these formative times.

In this small container, I invite you to explore circadian & quantum fertility with me and others aligned with the quantum paradigm of health and wellness.

This group will be appropriate for individuals as well as practitioners.

It’s not a crash course, and neither an overload of context-lacking jargon.

It won’t take all of your time, nor will it be super expensive. But there will be depth.

Instead of always increasing the pressure to learn more, do more, and …

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I worked with each of them through my 5th pregnancy, and want to share them with you in case they can be helpful to you or someone you care about.

First, the story that led me to connect with these powerful practitioners:

I was an athlete from middle school and through college… until injuries eventually forced me to slow down.

Back then, I thought being a whole foods vegetarian, waking up early, and doing “my best” at all times was the path to health & wellness.

Unfortunately, it actually was a path to circadian disruption & an annual burnout cycle.

I’ve healed a lot since then and have found lovely homeostasis with my feminine flows as a wife, mother and creative.

Can relaxin trigger old injuries to re-emerge?

One pregnancy pain I haven’t yet been able to resolve is a recurring injury from my sporting days.

This injury never bothers me until I get pregnant, but once the relaxin kicks in, I feel it in my right hip nearly 24-7 until I fully recover postpartum.

Each pregnancy, this pain has gotten worse and worse and hit earlier and earlier, and each pregnancy, I’ve tried different things to manage it.

With my first pregnancy, I just ignored it. That time, the pain didn’t start until the 3rd trimester, and I thought it was from something I had done recently—I didn’t realize then it would be a recurring problem

With my second pregnancy, I did Spinning Babies + walking. This time, I thought the pain was from my stairs and vowed never to have a pregnancy where my bedroom was upstairs and my bathroom downstairs. I still think that is a good rule for pregnancy, but following it didn’t stop the pain the next time.

With my third pregnancy, I did Spinning Babies + walking + hundreds of squats. This was when I realized maybe it wasn’t all the things I had been thinking the previous two times, and I remembered I had actually first felt this injury before I had had any pregnancies at all! Memory can be slippery like that.

With my fourth pregnancy, I did Spinning Babies + wore a belly band + miles of walking (not just my normal morning walks). I really was convinced I could just walk it off, or stretch it out, or get even stronger and have it stop hurting. This didn’t turn out to be true.

And alas, in my 5th pregnancy, the pain came on stronger (and earlier) than ever.

This time, I knew I wasn’t going to be able to ignore or out-smart the pain in any of the ways I had tried before.

If any of those things were going to work, they would have worked.

It was time for help. It was, honestly, probably long past time for help!

Keep reading for who I went to, how they helped, and why I recommend them to you.

In chronological order of who I consulted with, how they helped me, and why I recommend them to you…

1. Amy Jaramillo (pelvic floor therapist and health coach) of Body Motion and Love Mechanics

2. Lindsey Cantu (chiropractor and doula) of BirthFit

3. Amanda Conta (rhythmic movement trainer and health coach) of Horaios Wellness

And additionally, I consulted with my local midwife, my local naturopath, and my local pelvic floor therapist.

Click any of the links above to connect with these practitioners, or keep reading for my story below.

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What are the implications of melatonin being so effective at relieving the symptoms of menopause?

Why are melatonin levels low during and after menopause?

I’ve read several theories and I think it’s likely a combination of factors:

1. The drop in melatonin levels is physiological, since reproduction is ending and there is less need for melatonin to scavenge free radicles in the reproductive system

2. The drop in melatonin is due to accelerated calcification of the pineal gland from modern lifestyle stressors such as fluoride exposure, sedentary lifestyles, and unnatural opening of voltage-gated calcium channels from electrical devices

3. The drop in melatonin is due to oxidative stress at this life stage and the resultant additional burden on the endogenous antioxidants (melatonin, but also glutathione and others)

Question for you: …

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When I first created my Quantum Newborn Jaundice mini-course, the most difficult part to research was not bilirubin cycles or understanding the dangers of intensive phototherapy—the research on all that is quite clear!

When I investigated bilirubin and phototherapy, I found out we really need to start working in pregnancy to avoid the trouble altogether, so that’s a huge focus inside the current version of the mini-course because I don’t see very many people talking about newborn jaundice prevention.

And of the people taking the course, several have already reached out to me telling me that after implementing the recommendations in the course, they have successfully had babies who have not needed phototherapy! Even though for these women, they have previously had one or more babies who did require the phototherapy.

These stories are so wonderful to hear, and exactly wh…

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As I write this post about the third trimester, I am cozy in the second trimester. The second trimester I always find to be so comfortable… belly getting round, feeling sensual, and with appetite running high. The second trimester holds some of the sweetest golden days of pregnancy for myself and many women.

I find the first couple of weeks of pregnancy secret and lovely.

I have also really struggled with morning sickness and trying to understand how to get around it. I find it amazing the women who do even throw up still are able to make it through! I have been through 5 pregnancies now, plus a number of miscarriages, and never thrown up! Yet, I still find morning sickness to be the worst part of pregnancy.

When pregnancy is smooth, quantum health offers a lot. I shared about this in my Lesson 09: Quantum Health in the First Trimester inside the Practitioner learning program.

When pregnancy is complicated, we can also gain a lot from the integration…

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We all want to avoid the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU), but sometimes despite our best preparations and intentions, the NICU is where we spend the first days, weeks, or even months of life with our babies.

I experienced this when my 3rd child needed respiratory support (she was born during the height of the lockdown and after we had been evacuated due to wildfire—two very stressful situations that contributed to a highly stressful 3rd trimester, precipitous home birth, and subsequent respiratory distress, hospital transfer, and NICU stay).

Reading about NICU experiences, or even supporting someone else through them, is nothing like going through it yourself.

If you are in the midst of it, please reach out to me or for s…

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Is morning sickness today worse than it was for our great-grandparents?

I am investigating this because:

1. I hate morning sickness and want to do everything possible to reduce this my own pregnancies

2. I’ve seen morning sickness absolutely ruin pregnancies, not only for the suffering, but for the concurrent health issues down the line if it continues into a diagnosis of NVP or HG, risking co-morbidities and even the lives of mother-baby

The new research on this topic is massive, but everywhere I look, I only see the same tired recommendations for morning sickness.

We can’t truly improve care and outcomes for ourselves (or the women in our care) if we don’t look outside the boxes we’ve been looking in already.

The fact is, the modern environment has changed and we are all exposed to things we never were in the past.

We must address these changes if we want the things that used…

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First, I learned I needed 12+ hours in bed each day in the first trimester in order to have good sleep and readiness scores.

It seemed that I could either do one extended sleep, or I could do a normal 8-9 hour sleep and take a late morning/ early afternoon nap to get the total.

If I did either of those sleep patterns, my scores would stay pretty high.

More importantly, I wouldn’t feel as nauseous or tired on those days!

But if I pushed myself to be “normal” and only get 7-10 hours of sleep, everything got worse.

Next, I learned third trimester sleep interruptions are significant!

But since I had already learned so much in the first trimester about how important it was to stay in bed as long as I felt like I needed, these sleep interruptions weren’t as unpleasant as they might seem.

Actually, since this was my fourth baby, I really enjoyed all these middle of the night wakings to en…

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