Mark
This podcast was produced by New Leonard Media. NewLeonard.com for all things audio, video and podcast related.

The Pursuit Podcast: a purely guest centric show focusing on people and organizations that advance positive change. Positivity can be anywhere and in a time of vast discord. The pursuit of this finding those who champion its causes loudest. Join us as we sit and learn about the pursuits of local leaders in their communities.

00;00;32;00 – 00;00;32;17
Mark
Let’s go.

00;00;33;29 – 00;00;45;16
Ryan
Hello good people and welcome to the pursuit of podcast where it’s truly not us, it’s you. I’m Ryan Buck, Artist Development, New Leonard Media. And with me is The Boss, Mark Wilson, President, New Leonard Media. How are you?

New Leonard Media.

00;00;37;12 – 00;00;42;09
Mark
I’m doing well. Very well. The studio lights are looking for everything.

00;00;42;18 – 00;00;54;07
Ryan
That is enough of that about us. Our guest today is Angie Sanchez, PhD, student Department of Geography, Environment and Spatial Sciences and founder of the Nooni Project. How are you, Angie?

00;00;54;10 – 00;00;55;23
Angie
I am great. How are you?

00;00;55;24 – 00;01;06;08
Ryan
I’m good. Thank you for asking and thank you for being here. You look lovely. This is one of the times where it’s being not a visual medium can be tough, but you are very radiant and looking very awesome today.

00;01;06;09 – 00;01;07;17
Angie
As per usual. Thank you.

00;01;07;17 – 00;01;07;28
Ryan
Yeah.

00;01;08;11 – 00;01;13;24
Mark
Anybody that’s known or heard of Angie, her makeup game precedes her. Her reputation?

00;01;13;24 – 00;01;14;02
Angie
Yes.

00;01;14;07 – 00;01;16;25
Mark
Is known throughout. You d.

00;01;16;29 – 00;01;17;12
Angie
I try.

00;01;17;29 – 00;01;39;15
Ryan
Well, we’re not letting anybody down, but, you know, we’re here to talk about the Nuna Project, among other things. But from the Facebook page, I just wanted to read this. The Nuna Project is a grant funded by the Michigan Health and Endowment Fund that will work to increase breastfeeding rates in six indigenous communities in Michigan by bringing the Indigenous Breastfeeding Counselor training program to each community.

00;01;40;05 – 00;01;46;18
Ryan
So that sounds pretty simple. But first the name. What inspired the name?

00;01;47;03 – 00;02;09;20
Angie
The Nguni project was named actually by my friend, a good friend of mine, Melissa. I consider her sister and she’s actually a role model of mine when it comes to lots of things motherhood, parenting, etc.. And I just put a call out to Facebook people because the name that we gave it when we were applying for the grant was really long and obnoxious.

00;02;09;28 – 00;02;30;05
Angie
And when I was writing the grant in my head because I was a first year PhD student and this is the first grant that I ever wrote for, and I was applying for a half a million dollars in my head. This was all just practice, right? There was no way I was getting this grant. I was just like, I’m just running through the motions.

00;02;30;21 – 00;02;45;23
Angie
So my advisor kind of threw this name in there, said, How about we call it this? And I was like, Yeah, sure, I signed off on it, and then we got it. And I was like, Oh, no, I can’t keep repeating this because it’s really long and obnoxious, so I’m going to shorten it.

00;02;45;23 – 00;02;48;25
Ryan
So what you went with was still kind of long ish?

00;02;48;28 – 00;03;14;25
Angie
Yes. Okay. You couldn’t change it like the application for the grant was already submitted. Wow. So in order to put this out to the people like to put the project out there, I needed to have a name that stuck and Nguni is a word in Ojibwe that describes the act of breastfeeding. Like I don’t think there’s like an actual director translation of it, but that’s essentially what it means.

00;03;14;25 – 00;03;16;26
Angie
It’s like the act of breastfeeding.

00;03;17;04 – 00;03;17;21
Ryan
Beautiful.

00;03;17;21 – 00;03;20;20
Angie
So that’s why I decided to go with it, because that represented it.

00;03;20;20 – 00;03;22;05
Ryan
I think it’s quite appropriate. Yeah.

00;03;22;05 – 00;03;25;12
Mark
So for our listeners, can we hear the grant title?

00;03;26;14 – 00;03;27;04
Angie
To be perfectly.

00;03;27;04 – 00;03;27;28
Ryan
Honest, write it down.

00;03;27;28 – 00;03;29;03
Mark
I don’t remember.

00;03;30;06 – 00;03;35;14
Angie
But it’s something along the lines of Michigan.

00;03;35;14 – 00;03;37;13
Ryan
It starts with Michigan. So it starts with the name.

00;03;37;13 – 00;03;42;29
Angie
Yes. A michigan breastfeeding initiative that embraces Native American culture.

00;03;43;12 – 00;03;44;28
Ryan
Rolls right off the title, doesn’t it?

00;03;45;04 – 00;04;02;16
Mark
Actually, that’s not so bad because I have participated in some research projects that were real doozies. It was a full paragraph for the title, you know. Right. And normally there’s like differences in outcomes between this many delineated men and women and. Yeah, Ryan’s glasses.

00;04;02;23 – 00;04;23;21
Ryan
Yeah, yeah. Just words thrown in there. And they were newness is what you said and what the mission is. I think the name having cultural relevance is important. But when you think about when you conceived of this through MSU and with your advisor, where are you now compared to where you thought you’d be?

00;04;23;21 – 00;04;50;18
Angie
Where am I in terms of like where we’re at with the project? Correct. So we’re in the very tail end of it. We had initially planned to do like three of the trainings in 2021 and then 2022, and then because of COVID and everything else, everything got pushed back. And the Indigenous Breastfeeding Counselor Training Program is the program that we it’s the training program that we are bringing to six different indigenous communities in Michigan.

00;04;51;07 – 00;05;11;18
Angie
And because of COVID their schedule, they had to cancel all their previously scheduled events. So to get on their schedule, we had to wait till they got through everything that got canceled on their schedule first and then we could get in. So we’re doing all of our trainings basically right now and the grant ends at the end of August or at the beginning of August.

00;05;11;19 – 00;05;17;16
Angie
Okay. We’re basically smashing all these trainings and at the end, wow, the grant. But we’re getting it done and it’s fine.

00;05;17;16 – 00;05;24;04
Ryan
So, so as it stands right now, how many are in the organization and isn’t just you pushing this all forward or is it.

00;05;24;06 – 00;06;04;21
Angie
For the grant? It’s just my advisor and me working through Michigan State. But the grant itself is I’m using the grant funds to pay for the Indigenous breastfeeding counselor training to come to six different Indigenous communities in Michigan and I’m a short in that to ABC just because that’s the whole ABC training. This was developed by an Indigenous woman who’s from Seattle and it’s an LLC that she started and she wanted to center Indigenous knowledge, Indigenous families, Indigenous people and Indigenous communities in teaching breastfeeding knowledge.

00;06;05;20 – 00;06;30;01
Angie
So they are involved. But that’s because, you know, they’re basically the experts and we’re bringing them in to do the training. What happens is they come in, they do 45 hours worth of lactation education, but like I said, centering indigenous knowledge and indigenous people. And then whoever is in attendance at the end of the course gets a certificate that says they’re a certified indigenous breastfeeding counselor.

00;06;30;01 – 00;06;30;25
Ryan
And that’s excellent.

00;06;30;27 – 00;06;32;02
Angie
Yeah.

00;06;32;02 – 00;06;51;14
Ryan
What I think is really interesting and what I think our listeners would really appreciate hearing is your advisor, Dr. Sue Grady is your partner in this, as you mentioned, and what was the process of pitching this? You mentioned a grant and half a million dollars. And for folks who may have similar pursuits, how did you approach this?

00;06;51;14 – 00;07;15;12
Angie
I do have to give a shout out to Michigan State Department of Geography. I myself have had a great run at Michigan State in the Department of Geography. I’ve had a lot of support from faculty there in the department. That’s not the case for all students, and it’s especially not the case for many Indigenous students. Many Indigenous graduate students struggle in graduate school.

00;07;15;27 – 00;07;33;19
Angie
They’re just not offered a lot of support. And like I said, this is just my experience. I don’t know if this is how it is at other universities or even within Michigan State. I don’t even know if other departments are the same way, but the graduate students are constantly, I’m going to use the word bombarded, but it’s in a good way, bombarded with opportunities.

00;07;33;20 – 00;07;56;12
Angie
So between the department chair and other faculty members within the department, even other faculty outside of the department, and our graduate advisor within the department, they’re constantly sending us emails and opportunities with fellowships, scholarships, work opportunities, research opportunities, grants, research funds, all these things.

00;07;56;12 – 00;07;59;05
Ryan
So it’s on top of everything else you’ve got to deal with.

00;07;59;05 – 00;08;21;25
Angie
Yeah. So we get all these emails and this happened across our email. One day the department chair said specifically called out to myself and Dr. Grady and said, Hey, this looks like something that might be up your alley. Take a look. So we looked at the grant and I looked at some of the previous things that the Michigan Health Endowment Fund, because they fund a lot of things.

00;08;21;25 – 00;08;53;05
Angie
But in this particular nutrition and lifestyles grants, a lot of the things that I was seeing in past awardees was like programs where they were giving folks coupons for buying food at a farmer’s market or exercise programs within a school or things like that. It was nutrition and lifestyle type stuff, right? I just said to where I think that I can frame breastfeeding in the way that fits what they’re trying to fund.

00;08;53;19 – 00;09;19;25
Angie
And this was all just based on my research, right? They’re trying to the Michigan Health Endowment Fund is trying to decrease health care disparities in communities that see these great disparities in health care. And so that’s what happens to indigenous people. We have great health care disparities. We suffer high rates of diabetes and suicide and addictions and depression and all these things while breastfeeding.

00;09;20;04 – 00;09;31;25
Angie
It reduces your risk for many of those things. It reduces risk of cancers in moms. It reduces risks of certain cancers in the kids. Right. It reduces diabetes.

00;09;31;26 – 00;09;55;07
Ryan
And that’s real. There are real issues at stake here because morality rates for indigenous mothers and infants are particularly higher in general. And that’s so there’s a litany of challenges that are present to an indigenous person, a new mom. Is that something that really fueled you in this, did you think? Because I know you also had a particular attachment to yourself, to this issue with your own son?

00;09;55;09 – 00;10;30;00
Angie
Yes. The mortality rates is a concern. Yes. But that wasn’t one of my initial reasons for applying for this and for even doing this research. My initial reason for getting into this was that I was just sitting one day after having struggles with breastfeeding. My own son, who is four, now realize that I had access to some resources to help me figure that problem out that I wouldn’t have had if I was living up here and living in my own community.

00;10;30;19 – 00;10;56;16
Angie
Financial resources, my husband having a really good job that we could afford at the time, $150 cash to pay for an ABC. LC to come to our house to do an evaluation of my son’s latch and just a bunch of other things that just started coming into play. And I was like, Is this happening to other women? Are they having struggles and not having access to resources?

00;10;56;16 – 00;11;18;07
Angie
I was in the Greater Lansing area at the time and there’s this thing called the Lansing Baby Cafe where lactation consultants volunteer their time. It’s every I mean, at the time it may have changed, but at the time it was every Wednesday morning. Right. You could show up and just get help with breastfeeding or breastfeeding concerns. And it was free and it didn’t cost anybody anything.

00;11;18;14 – 00;11;21;22
Angie
I don’t know of anything like that happening up here. Maybe it does. I don’t know.

00;11;21;22 – 00;11;23;08
Ryan
That’s called the Lansing Baby Cafe.

00;11;23;08 – 00;11;47;27
Angie
Yeah. And I was just like, how come we don’t have these same resources? And I was just thinking about my home community, which is up here in Northern Michigan and being a tribal member. And I also remembered even in the like in our tribal clinic, I don’t recall seeing breastfeeding, supportive materials, not even posters. Like there was a time back, you know, when we were younger, you would see these posters up on the walls about quitting smoking.

00;11;47;28 – 00;11;54;09
Angie
Sure, we had indigenous people, right? And my niece was even in one of them when she was a baby. Her and her mom and I.

00;11;54;09 – 00;11;58;15
Ryan
Was smoking and yeah, she wasn’t the one quitting smoking. Okay, gotcha. Yeah. Okay.

00;11;58;20 – 00;12;20;07
Angie
The second I was like, why don’t we have any of that? And even some of our own tribal health care workers don’t promote breastfeeding. And what’s the culture like promoting it in the work space? Do we give moms time to pump? Do we give moms time to breastfeed? There’s just all these questions started coming up, and it was a problem that I wanted to solve.

00;12;20;07 – 00;12;41;23
Angie
But prior to doing this, I didn’t have a health degree. My career had been spent in the business world and helping businesses make money. It was just very business oriented. It was not medical related whatsoever. Right. I knew I wanted to go back to school and I need to figure out a way to get some type of health related degree in order to be able to do this kind of work.

00;12;42;09 – 00;12;45;26
Angie
And this is just kind of where I landed, was in health and medical geography.

00;12;45;27 – 00;13;09;24
Ryan
Well, you mentioned your time with MSU. You have a B.A. in Communication Arts and Sciences, an MBA in business, administration management and operations, and currently pursuing your Ph.D.. Yes, that’s a lot of years of continuing academic pursuit excellence. So what was the end game early on when you started with that first degree? What was in your mind? What was inspiring you then?

00;13;09;24 – 00;13;33;24
Angie
Oh, gosh. So that was a long time ago. And honestly, what was inspiring that was I am not going to live the life that I was brought up in. I’m going to provide a better life for myself and any possible future family that I might have had no interest in having a husband and a kid at the time.

00;13;33;24 – 00;13;49;17
Angie
And I didn’t for a really long time. Sure, but I thought if one day I might have a kid or kids and a husband, I’d like to not be living the life that I grew up in. So I use education as my way to get out of it.

00;13;49;17 – 00;13;57;01
Ryan
So it was the idea was the idea of opportunity? Yeah. It wasn’t specifically one focus and it wasn’t going for that developed over time.

00;13;57;01 – 00;14;06;08
Angie
I honestly had no interest in communications whatsoever. I was initially a math major because I thought I wanted to be a math teacher and I went through the whole thing.

00;14;06;19 – 00;14;13;05
Ryan
And it’s going to be a first that anybody who did or just admitted that on our podcast and probably in general that they wanted to be a math teacher.

00;14;13;07 – 00;14;37;27
Angie
Yeah, I am like super, super good at math and teach and tutoring math. I’m very good at tutoring. That’s what I was like, Oh, well, I must be a teacher, right? Well, tutoring and teaching math are two completely different things. So I figured that out, decided it wasn’t for me. And I also was sick of Michigan State at the time and one of my advisors was like, You have enough communications credits to graduate next month if you switch your major.

00;14;37;27 – 00;14;47;10
Angie
And I was like, Sweet, sign me up. So I just switched my major to communications because I had taken a bunch of communications classes. Sure. They just seemed too easy.

00;14;47;17 – 00;14;49;02
Ryan
Yeah. And it was about moving forward.

00;14;49;02 – 00;14;49;10
Angie
Yeah.

00;14;49;29 – 00;15;11;28
Ryan
And gaining that. And you mentioned your working career also very impressive. You’ve held elevated leadership positions with grand traverse resort and casinos, Grand Traverse Band of auto on Chippewa Indians, Consumers Energy. And again, you mentioned that there may have been some gaps, but were there things with that corporate and some government experience that Felt has helped you in this journey?

00;15;12;10 – 00;15;33;26
Angie
For sure, everything goal position that I’ve held, I’ve learned something greatly from that position a lot of times. It wasn’t until after I left. Sometimes that happened while I was there, but each one of them pushed me to the next step and was somehow, in some way probably a catalyst to moving on to the next thing. So.

00;15;33;27 – 00;15;39;10
Ryan
Wow. And you’ve been quoted as saying you’re a lifelong Spartan. What does that mean?

00;15;40;03 – 00;15;57;08
Angie
I have been a fan of Michigan State since I was a kid, and I don’t really know why I’m, you know, a first generation college graduate. And that wasn’t a thing for us as a kid. Like, we weren’t going to Michigan State games. Like, that’s where a lot of people get hooked on schools that they.

00;15;57;08 – 00;16;00;12
Ryan
Like their sports and their parents, you know, jubilation over.

00;16;00;12 – 00;16;17;01
Angie
Yep, exactly. And I didn’t have any that my aunt went to Michigan State when I was a teenager and I came and visited her a couple of times. But it still I don’t know where it came from. I just got obsessed with Michigan State and knew that’s where I wanted to go to school. And that’s what you did.

00;16;17;19 – 00;16;39;20
Ryan
You, Drew, on some of your experience with your own son. And in your particular case, there was also a physical condition that was that was mentioned. How often when you were trying to frame this, were you having to factor in those kind of things, whether there are physical challenges when you’re trying to help as many people as possible.

00;16;39;26 – 00;17;06;17
Angie
Physical challenges in breastfeeding is just one of many issues that come up that are kind of decreased breastfeeding rates, more that cause people to quit breastfeeding before they’re ready to to quit. It’s just it’s one in our particular instance, there was a tongue tie. There are things called tongue ties and lip ties. Most people don’t even know about them or have ever even heard of them.

00;17;07;01 – 00;17;12;00
Angie
And even if their child had them or if you had them right.

00;17;12;00 – 00;17;13;21
Ryan
And that requires a dental fix.

00;17;13;21 – 00;17;29;03
Angie
That’s yes. It’s either a dental pediatric dentist with experience in it or an EMT. And they both have to be regularly practicing in assessing for those and releasing them. You can’t just go to any pediatric dentist.

00;17;29;03 – 00;17;34;18
Ryan
And if I can ask how in general expensive is something like this when families are looking at these things?

00;17;34;18 – 00;17;54;29
Angie
So we use a pediatric dentist somewhere in the greater Detroit area and I had to pay out of pocket because it wasn’t covered by my insurance. Again, that’s another access thing. My husband was able to say, yes, here’s the and I think at the time we paid $600 to have his tongue tie released. It was literally a 32nd procedure.

00;17;54;29 – 00;17;59;17
Angie
Like they open up his mouth, lasered it, and within three part of.

00;17;59;17 – 00;18;03;18
Ryan
You thinking like, if I have the right tools at home, I probably could have pulled this off. But I mean.

00;18;03;18 – 00;18;15;00
Angie
Some midwives do it like, oh my goodness, with scissors, right? Oh, you can. Because you can. Most the release is either done with scissors or with a laser. So and they don’t numb the babies. So.

00;18;15;15 – 00;18;17;02
Ryan
Oh, just get right out, get right in.

00;18;17;15 – 00;18;20;02
Angie
That shot’s going to hurt just as much as the clipping is.

00;18;20;02 – 00;18;21;19
Ryan
So might as well.

00;18;21;20 – 00;18;22;25
Angie
Just do it.

00;18;23;20 – 00;18;35;13
Ryan
Looking at your own journey, how important to you and to the work was it that you became yourself an indigenous breastfeeding counselor in 2019? Was that critical to this journey or.

00;18;35;24 – 00;18;58;07
Angie
It was critical to the journey in terms of so when I was coming to Michigan State or coming to the point of like, I want to go back to school and figure out a solution to this problem. I wanted to use my business background to bridge the gap between the people that have the resources or the money to the people that need it.

00;18;58;27 – 00;19;19;09
Angie
It was actually pretty critical to the whole thing. I could have just as easily gone back to school to become a nurse. So then I could become a nurse practitioner and work in a pediatrician’s office or even become a pediatrician, or go get a second master’s degree in public health. I didn’t want any of that, and I also did not want to be a practitioner.

00;19;19;09 – 00;19;53;28
Angie
I actually don’t want to be a breastfeeding counselor. That’s not my specialty. It’s not what I want to spend my time doing. I want to use my business background to make access easy for indigenous people. How can I advocate for the things that they need if I don’t know what it is that the Indigenous breastfeeding counselor needs? So I did the training for the purpose of one learning and two, just learning about breastfeeding in general, but also learning about what communities need in order to support breastfeeding in their communities.

00;19;53;28 – 00;20;07;22
Angie
And that’s why I did the training. I do council women because people come to me all the time asking for advice and I have no problem giving it to them. I’m saying that’s not the work that I want to do. There are some women who this is the work that they want to do and that is all that they do.

00;20;07;22 – 00;20;21;04
Angie
And that’s great and that’s perfect for them. What I wanted to do is be the businessperson for them, connecting them to the people that need their help, but getting them paid and getting them the resources they need in order to do their work.

00;20;22;03 – 00;20;24;04
Ryan
The hustle. The real hustle.

00;20;24;11 – 00;20;24;24
Angie
Yes.

00;20;25;10 – 00;20;50;26
Ryan
You mentioned in general workplace and workplaces potentially. And you didn’t say this, but I’m just extrapolating on the thought of workplaces having a comfortable place for women to breastfeed and things like that. Are you finding that the conversation is still because it’s a difficult conversation, right in the workplace in general, even saying the word breastfeeding, it’s a hot topic.

00;20;50;26 – 00;21;02;09
Ryan
You have celebrities on TV where their opinions on it are you finding the conversation about it now is a little bit more open regardless, as opposed to, let’s say 5 to 6 years ago?

00;21;02;23 – 00;21;39;02
Angie
I would say that it’s probably a little bit more open in my world because I’m immersed in it. That’s all I see. So I’m not ever in spaces where breastfeeding is not a big thing. But I give an example. I’m in some of the Facebook breastfeeding groups that are like national groups where breastfeeding people come in there to get advice and whatnot and I follow them solely for the purposes of keeping my eye what’s going on in the world and learning about other conditions or other problems that people have with breastfeeding.

00;21;39;27 – 00;22;06;21
Angie
So in those groups you’ll see every now and then somebody will post, I really want to go to the restaurant, but I have my baby and I’m afraid to breastfeed while I’m in the restaurant because I’m afraid what my family’s going to say or what the restaurant is going to say. So those things still happen. And I’m sure if I’m not like I said, I’m immersed in a very pro breastfeeding world, so I don’t see that as often.

00;22;06;21 – 00;22;14;13
Angie
But I’m sure that it’s still out there. But also, yes, I still think the conversations now compared to five years ago are probably a lot more open and.

00;22;14;26 – 00;22;33;26
Ryan
A bit of a better place, but still a long way to go. Yeah, from a 2021 record Eagle article it stated and I found this really fascinating that, quote, Indigenous mothers and babies statistically represent one of the lowest exclusive breastfeeding rates at six months of age of any race or ethnicity in the nation. Can you explain why that’s important?

00;22;34;13 – 00;22;56;18
Angie
Yes. So it’s important because we need so we have great. And when I say we, I’m talking about indigenous people. We have great initiation rates. So most of us, after we have babies, will try like, well, immediately we’ll be trying to breastfeed. The problem is that within the first day, from day one to about day 14, somewhere in between there we quit.

00;22;57;15 – 00;22;58;28
Angie
And it’s because of that, just.

00;22;58;28 – 00;23;02;17
Ryan
Statistically what you found. Okay. And two weeks, two weeks.

00;23;02;23 – 00;23;21;10
Angie
And so it’s critical those first two weeks that mothers and breastfeeding and breastfeeding people are getting the support that they need during those first day one to day 14. The problem is we don’t necessarily have people giving us the right support. And so the data that I pulled out from was this.

00;23;21;10 – 00;23;29;05
Ryan
Is the acronym episode. This is a tough one, but you can see what folks like Angie have to deal with. Yes. In their lives in these pursuits.

00;23;29;09 – 00;24;01;11
Angie
So it’s healthy people, so healthy people that gov has these five year increments of goals that they want for people in the United States to reach. And so I was looking at 2015 data and what the goals were, and that’s where I saw the disparity. I saw indigenous people initiating breastfeeding, but then by three months we dropped significantly, whereas other groups of people white, Asian and Latin people are higher, they still decrease.

00;24;01;11 – 00;24;30;14
Angie
Everybody decreases, right? But our rate decreases at a much faster rate than other groups and the World Health Organization and other outside of the United States. Groups push breastfeeding for a minimum of two years. Here in the United States, they say six months, six months to a year. And so we’re trying to get indigenous people to be exclusively breastfeeding up until at least that six month mark.

00;24;30;28 – 00;25;02;17
Angie
And it’s important for so many reasons that would take another hour of talking, but just the health benefits of exclusively breastfeeding our babies for six months. But the gist of it is it comes down to healing us and not just like from physical stuff. It’s the bonding and attachment that happens between a mom and a baby. And for me, it was just a first step in healing all the things that we as indigenous people are suffering from generational trauma that we’re dealing with.

00;25;02;27 – 00;25;05;09
Angie
This is one way of healing, some of those things.

00;25;05;11 – 00;25;24;09
Ryan
Absolutely. In that same article, it also mentions that only 25% of mothers overall reach the goal of exclusively feeding from mom for the first six months. So is a national conversation about this even good for what indigenous families are going through?

00;25;24;09 – 00;25;57;21
Angie
It can be a yes, but again, the focus nationally oftentimes excludes indigenous people and black people and our rates are the worst. So like really the focus should be on those groups and the national. I don’t think that the national focus is it’s just on breastfeeding in general. But we have specific needs, right? Both of our communities, the indigenous communities and black communities have specific needs for their groups of people that will help encourage breastfeeding in their communities.

00;25;58;00 – 00;26;14;12
Angie
And that is why one of the reasons why Cami started the Indigenous Breastfeeding Council training, because she was like, we need to address specific needs that Indigenous people have that you won’t get from just your average ABC or C training or whatever other lactation trainings are out there.

00;26;14;20 – 00;26;36;13
Ryan
So you’re an inspiring person. It’s and just because I’ve known you before, we’ve sat down here in many of these interviews, I’m meeting somebody for the first time, but you are very inspiring. Was there somebody along the way along your journey that inspired you to do what you’ve done and take the risks that you’ve taken?

00;26;37;11 – 00;27;03;16
Angie
Well, there were lots of people and there isn’t like one single person that I could point to other than my kid Frankie. He really was the catalyst for all of this. He is indigenous people. Oftentimes times refer to their kids as sacred bundles, right. Or like bundles of medicine. And that’s what he has for me. He’s been very healing for me personally.

00;27;03;28 – 00;27;25;08
Angie
He has been my yeah, for sure. My biggest idol even. Right. Like I’m trying to make a better world for him. And in order to do that, I have to be a better person and I have to be a better mom. And so I have to learn and unlearn some of the things that I learned growing up about parenting and about even being a friend to people.

00;27;25;08 – 00;27;47;19
Angie
I have to unlearn some of those things and learn new, healthier, right things, but then just have role models that are my friends who are the mothers, right? Like I take things from them, everybody, even my own grandfather, they’re just people who I’ve learned good things from. And then I take and learn from them the things that I need to learn.

00;27;47;26 – 00;27;59;26
Angie
And while they might not be overall like a perfect role model, you can also you can always learn something from somebody. So I take little bits and pieces from pretty much everybody I come in contact with.

00;27;59;29 – 00;28;25;27
Ryan
Well, how wonderful, because you have had so many people that you actively took inspiration from and I’m guessing you weren’t passive in this. So you engaged. But when you think about all those people and how they may have helped you, can you think back to one piece of advice you got along the way that at the time sounded insane but now made all the sense or makes all the sense in the world?

00;28;26;00 – 00;28;53;20
Angie
Oh gosh, no. There is like lots of small pieces of advice that people have given me and they all relate to different things. One in particular that happened with breastfeeding, since we’re talking about the project because I can give you some other quotes, is, well, two things, two very vital things happened early on in my breastfeeding and one was to not quit on your worst day.

00;28;53;20 – 00;29;18;21
Angie
So a lot of moms will quit when that’s the absolute worst. Like this hurts or I’m hurting, or while all these things are happening. So that was one is to not quit on your worst day and the other this was actually probably more impactful for me was something along the lines of, you know, breastfeeding is natural, right? It’s very natural, as natural as breathing is.

00;29;19;17 – 00;29;32;15
Angie
The problem is that it doesn’t come as second nature to us. It’s a learned thing. We have to learn about it. Some moms don’t have that problem. They can just pop the baby right out and they never have an issue. But for a lot of us, that’s not the case. And so it’s not.

00;29;32;15 – 00;29;34;12
Ryan
The technical term, right? Popping the baby on.

00;29;34;13 – 00;29;36;02
Angie
That’s what we say you are.

00;29;37;22 – 00;29;40;08
Ryan
You heard it here, folks had a baby.

00;29;40;08 – 00;29;41;14
Mark
A T-shirt. Yes.

00;29;41;17 – 00;29;42;26
Angie
I don’t use technical term.

00;29;43;01 – 00;29;45;26
Mark
It off at the mouth.

00;29;45;26 – 00;29;47;06
Angie
So wow.

00;29;47;15 – 00;29;59;13
Ryan
That was it can be easier for some but for others and you mentioned there’s there could be pain involved there are more challenges that these women are dealing with than probably anybody could know. Yep.

00;29;59;13 – 00;30;16;11
Angie
And a lot of them and I’m just totally making this number up, but it’s a number that lives in my head. So I’m going to keep it. 80% of breastfeeding issues are all up in the mind of the mom. We literally just need to talk somebody through an issue that they’re having.

00;30;16;11 – 00;30;37;14
Ryan
How often do you think and maybe it’s a scary thought to think about because of this being a sensitive issue, how many indigenous women are having a challenge and they just are ashamed to say anything. They don’t have support around them. What’s the way to to get to that person to say, it’s okay to say, I’m struggling with this.

00;30;37;22 – 00;30;54;21
Angie
So and I might be biased, but I feel like with an India with indigenous women that we don’t have those shame feelings. We have the I don’t know who to go to for help. So they just quit because they don’t have anybody to reach out to. You know, a lot of us were not breastfed and we didn’t grow up around breastfeeding.

00;30;54;21 – 00;31;19;14
Angie
People, whereas in other cultures and especially around the world, that’s the normal thing. So babies grow up seeing their siblings being breastfed, seeing other people breastfeeding out in public because it’s not a thing outside of this country. So it’s normal for people to grow up seeing that in the United States it’s a thing and people just don’t see it.

00;31;19;14 – 00;31;34;10
Angie
And especially in indigenous communities, I feel like we see it a little bit more, but we just don’t know who to reach out to when we’re breastfeeding. And that’s how it was for me. Like I knew ancestors were coming in when I was pregnant. This is what you need to do. But I was like, I don’t even know what I’m doing.

00;31;34;10 – 00;31;37;26
Angie
And I can’t ask my mom or any of my aunts because they didn’t do this.

00;31;38;03 – 00;31;42;07
Ryan
So has family is the first place you look typically.

00;31;42;08 – 00;31;42;21
Angie
Yes.

00;31;43;02 – 00;32;09;24
Ryan
And when you have questions and you don’t know that there are resources that can be very difficult. What I find very interesting about all this is Governor Whitmer has shown her support for breastfeeding. A proclamation was even signed. There is specific language that addresses some indigenous women’s needs. August 2020 was declared, I believe Breastfeeding Awareness Month. There’s a week dedicated to it all.

00;32;09;24 – 00;32;21;25
Ryan
That’s well and good. What’s your opinion on that? Is is buy in from states governor and months dedicated to it. Is that a good thing. Is that enough and how can you activate on that to make it worthwhile?

00;32;22;11 – 00;32;52;00
Angie
It is helpful. I was actually one of several indigenous people that helped get that to Governor Whitmer’s desk. Well, wow. Yeah. And to get that legislation or that proclamation signed, it seems small and it might seem like it’s not helpful, but really it is, right? It puts conversation out there. It gets people to understand. We’re one of there are few states that already.

00;32;52;00 – 00;33;09;01
Angie
So when you’re comparing states like we all vary greatly and like breastfeeding support, like an example where we’re Seattle that was Washington. Washington is a very pro breastfeeding pro dula pro.

00;33;09;08 – 00;33;11;17
Ryan
Seattle’s pro, a lot of stuff. So a pretty fun place.

00;33;12;01 – 00;33;44;08
Angie
And so they’re in a completely different space than we are. That’s where Cami lives, the one that did the ABC. Oh, my goodness. Wow. That built that program. But we’re actually trying to model other legislation, what they came up with in Washington anyway. Getting back to Governor Whitmer, it’s helpful. It brings the conversation to the forefront and it brings up some of the things that we’ve been screaming about for years about what our needs are and what we need, you know, in order to increase breastfeeding rates in our communities.

00;33;44;14 – 00;33;55;09
Ryan
Right. In a 2020 MSU article you were quoted and this is wonderful as saying breastfeeding in our communities is viewed as ceremony. Can you expand on that?

00;33;55;22 – 00;34;35;18
Angie
Yes. So breastfeeding generally is just looked at as like a thing that you do when you have a baby. Because another burden, that’s how you feed the baby. People generally view breastfeeding as ceremony because the act of breastfeeding itself, it’s not just getting milk from one human to another. There’s so many things going on physiologically, physically, emotionally, mentally that are going on between a mother and a baby during the whole entire breastfeeding duration.

00;34;35;18 – 00;35;02;08
Angie
Like not just the 20 minutes in the morning from the age baby first coming to this realm to when they start breastfeeding like that whole six months, a year or two months, however long that the breastfeeding journey is, that whole time is really sacred between a mother and a baby. And everything that they do. It’s a special time.

00;35;02;08 – 00;35;12;06
Angie
Like I said, it’s so much more than just getting milk from the mom to the baby. Things are going on physically, physiologically that even we don’t even understand. For the most part.

00;35;12;06 – 00;35;41;07
Ryan
I feel like that’s the more accurate way to sum it up. It really is. There is much more. It is a transference. I think there’s magic in there too. There’s something and it’s such. I was really taken by that because if you have to try to simplify the message, if you have to try to say this is why this is important, not because it’s helping our children grow up and live healthier lives, but it is a part of the fabric of who we are.

00;35;41;17 – 00;36;06;01
Ryan
Yes. And I feel that somebody can receive that a little better and go, okay, this is important. And somebody who’s struggling with this does need help. But when you look at all the support systems that are, you know, hopefully they’re specifically as we’re looking at indigenous moms and babies, what types of roles are the dads extended family playing in this specifically when there is a challenge present.

00;36;06;14 – 00;36;41;16
Angie
In Indigenous communities? This is not like sighted research. This is just my own perspective when I’m out in the world because I spend time in indigenous communities not just doing this but in Indigenous communities, there’s so many more people involved in breastfeeding than just the mom and the baby dads are. They’re actually vital and critical to a successful breastfeeding journey moms or grandparents, aunts, uncles, sisters, siblings.

00;36;42;08 – 00;37;03;29
Angie
Because there are some things that are just like super simple that can help a mom that’s going to keep her off of that ledge of, you know, quitting. And it’s different for different people. Some moms just need the dude to be up with them when they’re in the middle of the night. So they don’t feel like they’re the only person having to lose sleep.

00;37;04;06 – 00;37;25;12
Angie
Sometimes that’s a it’s just a simple thing for the dude to just be right and not doing anything. Or for me, it was a lot of I spent a lot of time on the couch with the baby. And so it was like he was bringing me snacks and water and any thing else that I might need that I didn’t necessarily need to get up and do myself.

00;37;25;13 – 00;37;27;04
Ryan
And why was that essentially helpful to you?

00;37;28;03 – 00;37;36;16
Angie
Because I probably would have quit. Now, I say that, but I wouldn’t have. I was just so determined to do it. That’s why we were successful.

00;37;36;16 – 00;37;39;16
Ryan
Because you’re saying a simple thing mean a lot.

00;37;39;17 – 00;37;58;12
Angie
Yep. I had a friend of mine drive all the way over from Detroit, and, you know, what she did for an entire day was did my laundry. She cooked some food, she prepped some meals. And that was it. There was no like, I’m going to come over here and help take the baby weight so you can do things right.

00;37;58;12 – 00;38;14;04
Angie
She did those things and that was it. That was very impactful for me. Dads can do that and his uncles can do that. I had another friend who came over just to come talk to me about my mental health. She was like, Let’s go to breakfast. We need to talk about, how are you? How are you doing? And How can we help you?

00;38;14;08 – 00;38;33;15
Angie
This was before we Francie was his tongue tied was fixed when we were struggling. And just the like I said, that was the emotional and mental support that I needed. Anybody can do that. And the thing is, we need to equip people with that knowledge. So I feel like dads would be more supportive if they knew that. That helps.

00;38;33;15 – 00;38;42;17
Angie
That helps you to just bring her some water instead of saying, well, she could get up and get herself. Yeah, she can. She absolutely can. But be nice if you would just bring it to her.

00;38;42;17 – 00;38;52;05
Ryan
I think it’s probably good rural in general, not just within the confines of a struggling breastfeeding situation in general, just default to just do it just because.

00;38;52;05 – 00;39;23;06
Mark
Acts of service are always appreciated. Right? So I have two sons, both born at home. One didn’t take different mothers, but that’s just the situation and the other was breastfed for the period of time that you’ve suggested, like up to a year. And I can’t say for certain that there’s a direct correlation, but one was sick more than the other growing up and among other things.

00;39;23;06 – 00;39;49;28
Mark
But one thing that when you talk about things that husbands can do or be trained for is sometimes too understanding of peer pressure strength. Ryan I brought that up about the national conversation and to my shame, I admittedly was uncomfortable like at the mall, despite a blanket being covered up. But, but boy needs to eat and she’s going to sit down here and it’s like, can we get going first?

00;39;49;28 – 00;40;11;13
Mark
And then and that’s 15 years ago. But in that time, it took a lot of of learning on my behalf to understand how negative that was and how more impactful it could have been to sit there with her, grab her anything. Just with our head held high. Yeah. My boys eating like this should be normalized. Yeah. Yeah.

00;40;11;28 – 00;40;29;11
Ryan
Almost to a point of pride. Yes, in a way not to bring pride before a fall or anything like that. But, you know, to say I’m doing this. And but that’s a really great point. And I’m trying to think about, you know, those moments where I may have felt the same and it wasn’t as talked about as much when our kids were young.

00;40;29;11 – 00;40;50;06
Ryan
But I think it’s important. And you were also quoted in that MSU article as saying that this knowledge had been taken away from indigenous peoples through colonization. Yes. And you mentioned trauma before. Yes. And how much of that lingering kind of generational trauma is still present within the confines of these challenges with breastfeeding?

00;40;50;09 – 00;41;20;21
Angie
I think it’s very present, but I think the problem is that we don’t necessarily recognize the cause of it. So I very often make the case that we indigenous people are in the situation that we’re in now, having great breastfeeding rates, initiation rates and duration rates solely because of colonization. We can go back to the times. So as we were just talking about breastfeeding, it’s a community thing.

00;41;20;21 – 00;41;44;12
Angie
It’s not just between two people. Like it takes a lot of people to make this happen and to have it be successful. You need support, you need resources, you need knowledge. We have been stripped of our ways of living that we used to live in, where we had communities and we had like I said, these are in indigenous communities.