Birth Trauma, Advocacy, and Empowered Birth Experiences with Hihi Stewart | Ep. 583

Episode 583

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Friday Podcast, episode number 583.
Today’s episode is all about birth experiences, birth trauma. I’m joined by Hihi
Stewart. She is a house in the birth world and we are really talking about a few
different concepts. I’d say one of the concepts we’re talking about is knowledge and
empowerment in terms of preparation for many women, especially with their first birth
that maybe they’re only experienced with birth in a hospital setting or a home
setting or whatever the case it is. And there’s a lot of different aspects of birth
to navigate. There’s a lot of different care provider, a lot of different
expectations, both on your end and the end of your care providers. And navigating
through that process for the first time without support could be incredibly
challenging. And so we talk about the importance of having support, the importance of
education, being aware of what to expect, not only on a personal level in terms of
the experience, so preparing for labor and the different challenges around that, but
also preparing for some of the challenges you may face within a hospital setting or
even in a home setting. And if you do have certain preferences or certain
expectations or certain plans that you’d like to have honored, even just understanding
how to navigate those within the different settings and context. So there’s a lot
there. And as someone who has had three children, I’ve birthed my three babies at
home. When I’m speaking to women who have had birth experiences in the conventional
setting and hospital setting, I find that I feel like my experience is opposite in
many ways because there’s a lot of fights I didn’t have to have. There was a lot
of discussions and conversations that aren’t even a challenge outside of the hospital
setting because you’re at your home and it’s a little bit more relaxed in some
ways. And so there’s certain preferences, certain requests that I would have liked,
but I didn’t really have to fight for them. Just by definition, being in my house,
there are certain things I could just, it wasn’t a big deal to wait to have the
cord cut or for my husband to do it several minutes after the baby was born or
whatever. It wasn’t this big thing that I had to advocate for. But what I’m
speaking with women who’ve birthed in the hospital setting, often these are bigger
challenges. It doesn’t mean they can’t be done, but often it just requires a lot
more effort, a lot more conversations, and just a lot more advocacy to just anything
that goes outside of the typical procedure that’s done within those settings, a lot
more rigid, obviously. It requires a lot more support and advocacy. So we talk about
the role of education and knowing what to expect, having somebody there to support
you who’s been through it. So the value in actually having a birth work or somebody
who, for example, if you’re birthing in the hospital setting, having somebody there
who’s done that many times with various clients so that they can really help you,
support you, inform you, educate you about different aspects so that when you’re
going into it, you’re informed, and also if you do have certain requests, finding
the best possible practices for advocating to have those requests honored, things like
that. So we get into that, we talk about birth trauma. Before we jump in, I’m just
going to take a moment to share a little bit about my guest. Hihi Stewart is the
founder of Tranquility by Hihi, maternity Concierge and the creator of the BirthLounge
membership. With a master’s degree in human development and over a decade in life
education and family life education, she helps parents prepare for birth with research
-backed data -driven support, promoting informed, confident births free from fear and
coercion. HeHe advocates for patient rights and autonomy in birth and also guides new
parents through postpartum, infant feeding, and newborn sleep. She hosts the Birth
Lounge podcast featuring top experts in pregnancy, women’s health, and early parenting.
So without further ado, let’s go ahead and jump into today’s episode with Shiji.
And I’m excited to be here today with Kiki Stewart. Thank you for coming on the
show. Hi everybody. Thanks for having me. I’m stoked to be here. Yeah, I’m really
excited to have you. Well, before we jump into the topic of the day, I’d love for
you to share a little bit about your background for anyone who doesn’t know you.
Yeah, absolutely. Thanks for asking. So my Masters is in Human Development and Family
Studies, and I started my career actually in early childhood education. And so I got
well familiar with those first births through three years old and I really was able
to observe family systems in that time and how did families interact and what was
that immediate postpartum like and I got to really step families through that child
development in those first few years. The deeper I got into that work, which I had
my master’s at that time And so I understood very deeply the time that led up to
that postpartum time, and the deeper I got into that work, I started to realize
that there was so much work that could be done pre -baby that would make postpartum
easier, smoother. The transition didn’t have to be chaotic and kind of pretzled,
if you will. it could be joyous and harmonious and really grounded and the two
parents in the home could actually work together as a team if they were set up
properly and someone had taught them to communicate and if they have the proper
education about what was coming their way they wouldn’t find themselves filing so
often because they could have been better prepared and so the more I looked into
birth in that pre -baby era, I started to realize, holy cow, in America,
we just have so much work to do in this area and this arena is just,
there’s so many gaps. There’s so many gaps for women and women’s health and birth
particularly, maternity care is just filled with gaping holes of where women fall
through the cracks and and we ultimately are the ones that pay the price, not the
system that drops us. – Mm -hmm, absolutely. When you were talking about that, it
made me think about why is it like this? Why is it so hard for women? Do you
haven’t, I mean, I don’t know if anyone has an answer for that, but I would love
to hear your take on it. And one of the things that came to mind was, they
historically, women used to have more babies and we used to be around more families
and children. So even for myself, when I had my first son, I was an only child. I
did not have a bunch of babies in my house or my world. And I’m like a bomb went
off in my house. I had a steep learning curve when I kind of exploded into
momyhood. And I feel like a lot of women can relate to that. So I don’t know if
that’s part of it, but I’d love to hear your take on like, why is there such a
disconnect here? Yeah, I think there’s so many facets to this. So I think that
disappearing village has a lot to do with it. So you’re right. We used to live
around our moms and our grandmas and our aunties and we had that village built in
our family. We stayed close to and so that village, it was there and they helped
us raise our babies. And so we had the freedom and almost the luxury to have
three, four, five children and And childcare, I think, was just part of that
community that was around you. And now you’re paying upwards of, you know, $1 ,000 a
week for childcare for a newborn in public childcare. So that’s really demanding on
families. I think that women wanting to be outside of the home has impacted it as
well. I think when women have figured out that they can have their own identity
outside of motherhood, it really kind of impacts how many children that we want to
have. I also think that we would be remiss to have this conversation and glaze over
the fact that gynecological care was built on the backs of slaves of black women.
James Marion Sims, who is known as the father of gynecology, he tortured black
women. He tortured slaves and called it science.
There are so many practices that are around today that are still very barbaric and
they are rooted in racism. They’re rooted in misogyny and they’re rooted in the
hatred of women, of using women to get what you want and not give them proper
anesthesia and not consider what their experience is like and not ask them what the
mental load is of the procedure that they’re having. I mean, we see the roots of
what he did years and years and years ago still be present in gynecological care
today, by the way, that we place IUD and IUDs in women,
and we don’t give them proper anesthesia. The way that we tell women,
well, pubic synthesis is just part of pregnancy and hypermesis gravidium, so HG is
just part of it. You should just toughen up. You don’t need a work excuse. And
it’s the way that medical racism impacts black women and birds, and they’re dying at
a four times higher rate. I mean, We just see it in all aspects,
and so I think that has a lot to do with it. I think women are truly waking up
to, “Why would I subject myself to a system, an industry that has not only
traditionally, but still very much does not respect women and doesn’t prioritize our
needs when we are the consumers of that industry. I just have a couple of thoughts
when you were talking about that. And of course, historically, there was a whole
kind of community midwifery aspect to birth where it was largely kind of in the
hands of women, and then there was this point in time when things were more
medicalized and all of a sudden, that was outlawed, all of that knowledge and all
of that experience would have been lost and replaced by our very medicalized model
of birth. So that was one of the thoughts that I had around that. And another
thought that I had about that, that I’ve had throughout my life, was that birth is
positioned as a medical emergency, as opposed to like a natural process that unfolds.
And even the language around like the doctor delivers the baby, whereas like midwives
catch the baby. So it’s all very interesting to think about that. And this was
something that I was thinking about even like a young early 20s individual. I
remember being in my early 20s and one of my best friends is a labor and delivery
nurse. And we hadn’t, neither of us had had any children yet. And I remember
telling, you know, I read this, I read this book called Misconceptions and I believe
the business of being born, I don’t know if it kept coming out already around that
time. But for whatever reason, this was on my radar in my early 20s. And I
remember we had this conversation and I was like, well, you know, I want to have
my babies at home because I don’t want to be at risk for unnecessary interventions
and this kind of stuff. And she was, but she worked at a very high risk hospital.
And so she saw the worst things that could happen. And the only time she saw a
midwife was when something had went wrong. So she actually had a very negative
opinion about midwifery. So it was a very interesting, spicy conversation that we
were having. And I remember she was saying, she says, I don’t think I could ever
have a birth at home because I just know all the things that could go wrong. Now
years later, we ended up birthing in very similar ways because ultimately she ended
up having her hospital birth experience and then choosing to move away from that.
Personally, because she had her own experience then, of course I had all three of
my babies at home. So maybe share a little bit about just this concept of birth
trauma, like what is it? Can we hear people talk about it all the time? And I
will leave that open -ended and let you take that and then we can just explore it.
– Yeah, I think you did a really great job of kind of setting the scene that birth
is a natural event that sometimes needs medical intervention, but in the US
particularly, we treat it as a medical event that sometimes unfolds naturally and
that is just such a backwards view of birth. Our bodies were designed to do this.
It was meant to birth. Now there is a subset of the population that are high -risk
and they do need additional monitoring and they need higher skills of someone like
an MSM, a maternal fetal medicine doctor, who is an OBGYN, but and they have
additional training and credentials to see those higher risk cases. And I think birth
trauma happens, well, I don’t think. The data shows that birth trauma happens in
many facets. So there are some birth trauma that is unavoidable. So these are going
to be things like loss. Unfortunately, some losses are normal,
natural, statistical, that is going to leave someone with trauma, and they didn’t do
anything wrong, and they didn’t do anything to deserve it, and there was likely
nothing that could be done to prevent it. That is a unavoidable birth trauma.
Another one would be AFE, amniotic fluid embolism. It is very rare, but is where
amniotic fluid mixes into the maternal system, and then the belief is that The
maternal system then has an allergic reaction to the amniotic fluid. Very rare,
unpredictable, unpreventable, is going to leave someone with severe trauma.
Well, we see though the most is what I call avoidable trauma. And it is where you
are mistreated in labor in some regard. Now, sometime this is and mistreatment.
It is your provider coming to you saying, “If you don’t do this, I don’t want your
baby to die, and so you are a bad mom.” That’s horrible mistreatment. Sometimes it
is the medical racism that we previously talked about. Again, horrible mistreatment.
Sometimes it’s a little bit more sly though, and they are a little bit sneakier
with the things that they say or they do. It could be that you specifically said,
I’m not ready for ketosin, I’m gonna take a nap and then you were woken up by
horrible contractions and you look over and ketosin has been started without your
consent and actually against your consent. You explicitly said, I don’t consent to
this medication, yet while who were resting, a medical provider of some sort took
the authority to start a medication that you had not consented to. Bertrami can also
come from things like being operated on after telling your medical team that you
don’t have proper anesthesia coverage and you can in fact feel what they’re doing
and they continue with the surgery instead of giving you additional anesthesia. It
can also come from more kind of covert things telling you that you’re weak or
telling you, well, I had all three of my babies without an epidural, but if you
really need it, I guess we can call an anesthesia. So there are many ways,
it could be too, that an emergency like something that’s unavoidable and ASD happens
to you and the entire room is operating around you and no one takes the time to
say Lisa you’re experiencing something very scary it’s a rare complication you’re in
good hands right now we are trying to start an IV we’re going to get some
medication going in your system and Dr. Jones is joining us right now.
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That’s fertilityfriday .com /audible.
Right, that simple interaction with a medical provider explaining to you what is
happening can help not prevent all the trauma, but it can help prevent furthering
that trauma. It will help mitigate the amount of trauma that you walk away with and
then the amount of trauma that you have to cope with and heal from afterwards. And
so people will walk away with different levels of trauma. I’m a personality that
someone could look me me in the face and say, “Why don’t want your baby to die?”
I recognize instantly I also don’t want my baby to die and you’re a bad provider.
I will not see you again. That was offensive language and it was fear -based. It
was coercion. I’m not offended by that but you have lost access to me as a
provider. Other people who don’t have my personality or maybe the education or the
confidence that I have would be traumatized by that because they might feel like,
oh my gosh, I’m a bad parent. Well, I don’t want my baby to die either. I should
do exactly what this doctor says, not realizing that maybe some medical manipulation
is taking place. And I’m not dismissing the fact that emergencies happen or that
babies don’t get in danger in the womb, but there’s a way to present that. A
better way to present that would have been to say, “Hey, Hee Hee, I know that you
really wanted a spontaneous birth.” I’m starting to get pretty concerned about your
amniotic fluid levels, and I was hoping that we could have a discussion that would
make us both feel better. And I can talk you through some options of not only what
I’m seeing, but some ways that we might be able to resolve this. And then if it
doesn’t resolve, I’d love to tell you what the next resolution would be, right?
there is a way to present very scary topics that you can help mitigate trauma for
your patients. And I think that has lost a lot of times in the hospital system.
– Oh, you said so much there. There was so much. It’s such a complicated topic.
And one of the things that strikes me when I have conversations with women who have
had births in the hospital. There’s a lot more discussions that have to happen.
There’s a lot more decisions that are just a big deal in the hospital that when I
chose to avoid that personally in my experience, that I didn’t have to have. So if
I try to word what I just said in a way that makes more sense, there’s a lot of
things that if you are more aware of the type of birth experience that you want.
If you have started to research on some of the different practices that are done in
medical settings and you’re not actually comfortable with some of those things, then
everything is a fight, it seems like, in a hospital. And what you described goes
beyond that to the level of like egregious, like abuse even,
to to be administering medications, someone who flatly said they didn’t want it,
or operate on somebody and they can feel it. And that’d be like the dentist
continuing to drill when you’re like, “I can’t.” Like that’s just obvious, that feels
like assault. So I feel like there’s definitely levels of it. And I feel like you
captured quite a bit of those. Like if there was a common thread, it would
essentially be the person’s wishes are not being followed. the person’s wishes are
not even considered valid, they’re overridden and it’s either they’re overridden like
totally overridden in like way that should be illegal or they’re just overridden in
the fact that they’re minimized and you’re just kind of coerced into doing what they
want you to do. So yeah. I had thoughts, can I share? Yeah, of course.
My first thought is that you pointed out that there’s almost this tension. There’s
this fight. There is a resistance in the hospital system versus in home birth. And
I think it’s really important to evaluate both of those approaches and clinical
models in home birth. And it’s not only in home birth, but with midwifery care
specifically versus the obstetrical model of care. The trust is often placed in the
mother in that person, in the person that is having that baby. Midwifery care and
homeburst care is very good about valuing and respecting autonomy.
They say, here are your options. Here’s what we’re looking at. What would you like
to do? In the obstetrical medical model of care, the trust is placed in the system.
And I can see that because they often present things as, well, this is hospital
policy, so you can’t make your own decisions. You can’t decline this.
You can’t go past your due date, where a midwife would say, well,
you’re approaching your due date. Here are the benefits to continuing your pregnancy
and waiting for spontaneous labor. Here are the risks to doing that. An alternative
would be to induce and you’ve got risk and benefits to that or we could go ahead
and schedule a C -section which one feels good to you. Or the hospital is going to
present it as well we don’t allow you to go past your due date so we’re going to
get an induction on the calendar for you. And you can see how the trust in those
two medical models in midwifery care is a medical model. They are qualified medical
professionals and I think people lose that sometimes but these two medical models
operate very different and so the trust is put into different places. I had a
second point but now I’ve rambled so long just trying to… Well,
while you think about your point, one thing I think it’s useful to say and I’ll
just say it is that I wouldn’t hate midwifery as perfect. I mean, there were some
things that, based on their experience, that they would be pushing a little bit to
me. And I would, how much do I want to talk about all of that,
those things on there? You know, I also don’t share some of the things that I’ve
done personally, because I don’t necessarily want it to, like, I don’t necessarily
think that anyone should do what I did or anything like that. But let’s just, in a
very general sense, say how many ultrasounds to have and how many pictures to take
and those kinds of things where, for me, I was comfortable with to a point, but I
had some concerns. And so I wasn’t necessary. So, but I guess what I’m saying is
that there’s always going to be negotiations when you’re having a baby, when you’re
working with a provider. There is always going to be negotiations because I am not
a midwife. And so I have not seen what could go wrong and et cetera. I’ve only
had my experience. You do have to have trust in the person that you’re hiring who’s
gonna walk with you through this process. And no matter who it is, you’re probably
gonna have some ideas that differ from theirs. I think the difference, as you said,
is that I was able to express some of those things and they were heard and then
it was a conversation. I I think that’s your main point about that. It was always
a conversation, but I just wouldn’t want someone to leave this conversation to have
this opinion that you could have a wonderful OB who is really tuned in and is
willing to listen to you to the extent that they can within that. There’s more
restrictions. I would never want to put that idea out there that all medicine is
bad and all midwifery is right? Because that wouldn’t be accurate. I think the older
that I get and the more experience that I have, a lot of it rests with the person
who you’re working with. And it’s either you have a really, really great provider
regardless of which profession, or maybe you don’t. So I just kind of would want to
put that out there. But certainly there’s always conversations. But certainly what I
found is that within the medical system, there are more rules. There are more
barriers. And there seems to be less of an openness. And it’s almost like, if you
don’t do it this way, you’re, should I say it, you’re like a crazy hippie.
And like, it’s almost like, like, it’s not even, your ideas are not respected. So
as soon as you start asking about different interventions, as soon as you start
asking about like delayed chord, they’re kind of in their mind, you can almost see
their eyes roll back and like, oh, you’re one of those hippies. And they’re going
to try to tell you why none of that is valid and why you need to stop that whole
train of thought right now. Am I there go too far? No, no, you’re hitting the nail
in the head and I love how you say it’s very provider specific and that’s why I
do a lot of education about what I call your perfect provider and when I say
perfect I mean like as good as it’s gonna get. You have to understand we’re still
dealing with human interactions So you and your partner, like your romantic partner,
get along so, so well, but you still have your differences. You and your siblings
share so much genetic material and you’re so similar, but you still have your
differences. And so you mustn’t go into birth thinking, well, this provider is going
to just see everything that I see, eye to eye, and it’s gonna be absolutely
perfect. You should though feel very confident and safe to bring up your thoughts
with your provider and if you are not able to do that it’s probably an indicator
that you’re not with the right matched provider. Unfortunately in the US more than
50 % of our country is a healthcare desert and the further south and the further
inland you get in the middle of our country the worst the access gets And that can
really impede someone’s ability to be able to not only change providers but change
facilities. And so you may look around and realize, well, my nearest L and D unit
is a three and a half hour drive and they don’t take my insurance. And so it’s
not always possible to change providers. And so one of the things I really work on
in the education I provide is how do we meet your needs with the access that you
have? Whatever that looks like, you may be in LA where you have so many hospitals
and they’re all within 20 -minute drive from you and maybe not 20 minutes ’cause
it’s LA, but they’re the close. And then you may find yourself out in Oklahoma
where you literally do not have another hospital until hours and hours down the road
and so it is really important to find a provider that feels as aligned as possible
with you but more so that you feel safe with because that trust is going to be
what allows your labor progress to keep going. If you don’t feel safe your body is
going to know that your nervous system is going to pick up on that, and you’re
going to see stalls in your labor, and that’s really what we don’t want. >> Well,
I mean, so one of the questions that comes to mind, I don’t know that as you
said, there’s different kinds of trauma and some are unavoidable. Even with best laid
plans, I thought of this a lot during my pregnancies and births because when the
stars align, And you have built a relationship with your provider,
and they happen to also be the one who delivers your baby.
But even with midwifery care, I had a team. And I can tell you for my last birth,
the woman who came to deliver my baby, that was the first time I met her when she
walked in the door. So, yeah, because there were some changes happening in the
clinic, but also it was this person on the team. And then based on what I had my
appointments, I had literally never met this person before. Even when you try to do
everything right, you still can… Your OB could be called away to another pregnancy,
another birth that seems like right. So why don’t you talk a little bit about what
are some of the ways that we can plan? What are some of the things that we can
do? I mean, acknowledging that birth is just, I think it’s tricky and I’ve often
thought of birth, so to share like Alisa as I’ve often thought of birth as truly
the entrance into motherhood. And you want everything to be how you want it, just
like you want your baby to be how you want it. And then this child comes out and
they have their own personality. They come out in their own way and you welcome to
motherhood. You didn’t get to choose at all, you know? And now you have this little
person who has their own little attitude, and you’re just like, “Wow, this is
amazing. This is not what I thought it was going to be like.” You know, I think
flexibility in birth, and I think that was my second point a couple of minutes ago,
was that there’s often inflexibility in the hospital system, and it’s not always our
doctor’s fault. It’s usually the system’s fault. Your doctor is operating under the
rules that you mentioned too but you having flexibility in your expectations will set
you up so beautifully. So flexibility in the fact that maybe I’ll have a three hour
labor and maybe I’ll have a 43 hour labor. I don’t really know. I will be prepared
for both. I’m going to know what to do if I have a precipitous labor which is
really really fast to find a six hours or less or I will be prepared and I will
be prepared if I have a really really long labor known as a prodroma labor. I will
be prepared if my doctor is on call and I’ll be prepared if I get the moonlighter
that I’ve never met before and it just happens to be the way the cards fall. I
will be prepared if I get my spontaneous unmedicated vaginal delivery.
I will also be prepared for when I am ready for an epidural and that is so
personal. For example, one person may say if I have labored for more than 24 hours
and my baby is not here and I’m so tired, I’m going to feel confident in getting
an epidural. And then the next person may say, “I only want an epidural if I have
tried everything else and I absolutely just cannot do it any longer.” Those are two
different lines in the sand and only you know what’s right for you, right? And then
you’ll be also prepared that should not dismiss being disappointed, but prepared
should you need an unwanted c -section or an unplanned c -section.
I think that flexibility is absolutely huge. One of the reasons or one of the ways
that you can do this is making a birth plan. I actually call it a preference sheet
because, well for a couple of reasons, you can’t plan out birth. Birth is a natural
event. Nature has a lot to do with it, you have a lot to do with it, and then
your baby has a lot to do with it. And so if there are three parts to this pie
chart and you’re only in charge of one pie piece, which is yourself, make your
controls one and your baby controls one, there’s two thirds of this equation that
are totally out of your control. And so being flexible to what those two thirds
kind of throw your way is gonna be really key. The other thing is that it is
preferences. So these are the things that you want to happen. You want a spontaneous
unmedicated birth, but if at 36 weeks you develop health syndrome,
that will not be possible. That is an indicator for a medically indicated induction.
so you would need an induction. I think being flexible throughout this whole process,
even in your pregnancy, is a really great way to prepare yourself for motherhood,
because like you say, when these babies get here and you’re like, this baby’s going
to be so cute and sleep through the night, we’re going to have a beautiful
breastfeeding and then they get here and the only thing that’s true is that they
are cute and they do not sleep through the night and breastfeeding is really hard
and you needed a lot more support than you had first originally anticipated but
being flexible with all of that will really help you not spiral.
It will help you be open to asking for help and it will help you kind of go with
the flow of what is being thrown your way because remember we are creatures that
love control and we love rules and we love boundaries but that’s not always
possible. Sometimes we have to just throw up our hands and say you know what I’m
just going to be flexible and I’m gonna just go with whatever comes my way and
that can be really hard especially if you’re like me I’m very type A I’m a first
-born daughter I am an Aries I mean I just love structure in my life and it can
be really hard so I think practicing that flexibility from day one from the minute
you find out that you’re pregnant even beforehand and before you’re pregnant as
you’re trying to conceive can be just super super helpful.
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/workbook. Now let’s go ahead and jump back into today’s episode.
– Yeah, I love that. So important. And you had said something earlier about trauma
and essentially giving an example of the same event happening to two different
people. So it was kind of like, if my doctor does this with me because of my
experience, I might respond this way, but for someone else, they might respond the
other way. And I think one of the challenges is that we all probably do have an
idea of what we want. Now, what we want is very different for some, like if you
ask 10 different women, what their idea of a perfect birth, it’s going to be 10
different answers. But we all kind of have this idea of what we would like to
happen. And the question is like, how attached are you to that? And how much,
honestly, I would be really curious of your thoughts on, is it beneficial to listen
to a lot of birth stories before you have your own birth? So often when I’m
working with fertility clients and they get pregnant, it’s kind of like, So now I
need a new podcast to listen to, you know? And so I feel like just from my
perspective, I tried not to expose myself to a lot of birth stories when I was in
my third trimester and I tried to specifically, and I’m not saying this is the
right thing to do. I’m not. I’m just saying what I did. And I’m not attached to
it either. I don’t even know if it was like, but I guess I’m just giving this
example, right? But that’s what I did. And I specifically curated what I would look
at. So I only looked at like peaceful home birds and tubs. I didn’t look at
anything else. And that was what worked for me. But on the other hand, I also have
friends, lots of friends for nurses. I’ve heard lots of stories, some of the worst
possible things you could even imagine. And so I feel like I do have a sense of
what could go wrong already. So for me, personally, I didn’t necessarily need to
expose myself to those things in order to have a sense of what reality could be,
right? So I was more trying to like, you know what I mean, get in zone. So what
are your thoughts on that? Because I feel like it could actually be really positive
to hear a lot of different birth experiences, even ones that are not so great, but
only if it’s not going to freak you out, I guess. Yeah. So I think there’s kind
of a two -pronged thing. First of all, if you have the experience and you feel like
you know what can go wrong. I think that probably curating what can go right is
better. Manifestation and birth is so, so real. I also think your personality has a
lot to do with it and your past experience. So I’ve been a duel for 10 years. I’m
well aware of the things that can go wrong. I’ve seen so much that can go wrong.
I’ve also seen everything that can go right. I guess not everything. I don’t want
to say, you know, like everything definitively, but I’ve seen so much over the last
decade, both good and bad. So I feel very prepared. If you are someone who has
anxiety about the things that could go wrong, but you don’t necessarily want to hear
birth stories of things going wrong, consider taking an out -of -hospital childbirth
education course that is going to teach to in a very neutral way.
So this is how I do my education and we talk about complications that may arise
and that’s exactly how I present them. Here is a complication that may arise.
Here is how often it happens. Here are the risk factors. Here are the options if
it happens. Here’s what you can expect from the medical staff if it happens and
here’s what recovery will look like here are further complications that may arise
from that complication. Here’s how it will present in you and maybe impact your
baby. And so I think there’s a way for you to get very educated and confident in
the things that may go wrong without having to hear really traumatic birth stories.
But you and I are very similar in the regard that I want to only hear good home
birth birth stories because that’s what I’m planning for myself and not in the way
that I don’t wanna know what can go wrong. I already feel very equipped,
educated and confident in what can go wrong. Not only have I been stepping people
through this for the last decade, but I have witnessed so much of it that I feel
very confident in being able to handle those things and understanding them kind of
thoroughly. In this time in my life and my pregnancy, I am really trying to curate
that perfect homeburst because I do believe so heavily in the power of manifestation.
I believe that what we pour energy into will only grow and so I want to spend
time meditating with me and my belly and baby. I want to spend time visualizing my
births. I want to spend time putting together my perfect birth team and having these
deep discussions about what my preferences are in different scenarios and situations
that may or may not arise. And that way, not only does my birth team know what I
want, but my husband knows what I want. And that way, I, when I’m laboring, will
be able to stay in that birth brain, that that labor land, that very primal state
of being, and the people around me already know my wishes and my preferences. That
is a privilege that you get having a very one -to -one team, like a home birth
team, in a birth center or a hospital setting, it’s going to be less likely,
but not impossible. – Well, no, I appreciate that. I feel like that was really
helpful. And then the question that I had, as you were talking about that, is for
the woman who does want to have a hospital birth. I mean, this,
I understand already that this question is so variable because it depends on where
you live, what kind of hospitals are available. You know, some hospitals do have
kind of like a birthing word where it is trying to be the intermediary between home
and hospital. So you do get a little bit more flexibility there and those kinds of
things. some hospitals, the midwives or the doulas, might actually be able to attend,
whereas others, they wouldn’t have those privileges. So obviously there’s a lot of
complication anyways. But for someone who is wanting to, planning to have a birth in
a hospital, what if anything could, like, what would be your advice? – Yeah,
so I may be planning my own home birth, but for the last 10 years, I have
primarily worked with women who are birthing in the hospital system. So it is kind
of much specialty. Starting early with your questions, making sure that you really
find a provider that is aligned with you. If lack of access in your area is a
problem and is creating a roadblock with being able to swap providers, I really
encourage you having just a very true and transparent conversation with the provider
that you do have access to and just sitting them down and being very open. And the
conversation probably will sound something like this. Dr. Jones, I have been feeling
a little tension in our prenatal meetings because I can see that we’ve got very
different ideas of what birth maybe can be like and should be like. And I want to
be on the same team with you. I wanna make sure that you trust me and I wanna
make sure that I’m able to trust you and feel safe in your care. So I was hoping
today in this prenatal that we could have a really transparent discussion about the
things that are super important to me and why they’re important to me. And I’d love
to hear your thoughts about them and get some feedback. And maybe this is not the
only time that we talk about this. I’d love to continue this discussion in future
prenatals. But it is really important to me that we’re working together Because I
want the birth of my baby to be a joyous event that I feel really glad and happy
and supported by when I think about it. And I just want to make sure that the
tension that I’ve been feeling can hopefully be resolved as soon as possible. I
really mean having this transparent conversation. Go into your provider and lay it
out on the line. They will appreciate that. If you are feeling the tension, So is
your provider they can feel the same tension. They are human too and so I Really
think that there’s so much disconnect between providers and patients and some simple
very clear honest kind Respectful Conversations can really mend a lot of that
relationship if you are unable to find a happy medium with the provider that you’re
with, consider changing providers within that facility. And if that’s not an option,
I would get really, really, really confident in advocating for yourself, because
sometimes we just find ourselves in a situation where we aren’t going to be able to
see eye -to -eye with the providers that are available to us. And unfortunately,
that’s just a downfall of our current health care system and fingers crossed that in
the years to come, we are able to close those gaps by increasing midwifery care and
increasing labor and delivery units across our country and increasing access to
maternity care across our nation. As you were talking about that, it made me think
also about how important it has to be to find out what is actually possible. So to
really get clear on what the actual restrictions are, and then figure out if there’s
a way for you to kind of do what you need to do within that. I feel like my
perspective, and I feel like a lot of things I say are controversial, but if you
are choosing to have a birth in a hospital or if it’s not even a choice and
that’s how it has to be, you are actually submitting to their rules. So you have
to find a way to make peace with that and to determine what those rules are, like
how much give there really is. And sometimes the give is dependent on the person in
front of you because obviously, and I think that’s for me, that’s one of the
hardest things ever to know that the person in front of you could just be kind of
a jerk and they’re gonna say no because they want that power and authority and like
it’s literally having a power trip all of your day. And that if you had a
different person in front of you, this thing wouldn’t be a problem. So sometimes
that stuff is really, really hard, but I feel like if that was something I had to
navigate, it’s like just the biggest pill to swallow, but it would kind of have to
be like, you know that you’re submitting to their rules. And I feel like this
applies in situations outside of birth. If you have a period issue, like chested and
true issue on fertility Friday and you go to your doctor, they’re gonna tell you
about the pill and they’re tell you about, it’s paying there and tell you about
paying killers and, or the pill, it’s always a pill. And you kind of have to know
that. So if you’re going there, like my classic example, like if you go to
McDonald’s and you’re like, I need you to change my tires, then you’re going to end
up on TikTok. Because if you’re the crazy person yelling at the person, not
McDonald’s saying, you changed my tires, then someone’s going to record you now and
put you on TikTok. And it’s going to be like, well, why is this woman asking for
a tire change in McDonald’s. Like obviously she should go to Mr. Looper or
something. I think you hit the nail on the head in terms of when you walk into
the hospital, you have to be okay with you are walking into a facility that serves
a specific type of experience. However, you do still have some control.
So hospital policy is not law. So they may have a policy that says Patients are
not allowed to eat and drink in labor, but you know that as a low risk laboring
person, you have the right to consume nourishment and nutrition during labor.
And so you just simply tell your nurse, nurse Lisa, thank you so much for informing
me on what the hospital policy is. I’m choosing to decline that. And I wanted to
let you know, I have eaten this granola bar or I’m going to eat this turkey
sandwich. And so there is a line of how much hospital policy can actually dictate
what you can and can’t do. Hospital policy was written for the hospital staff to
prevent the hospital from ending up in litigation in legal trouble. Whereas hospital
policy is very rarely written in terms of improving patient outcomes,
right? Or actual safety. And when we look at a lot of maternity care policies, they
are almost always very outdated. We see the same thing with things like V -BAC bands
or hospital that won’t, quote unquote, won’t allow women to have a vaginal birth
after a cesarean. So instead, they engage in forced C -sections, right? The other
thing to know is while you may not be able to change providers in your area,
because there’s a lack of access, what you won’t have a lack of access to is
nurses on that unit. And so if you have a nurse that’s in front of you that’s
being a real jerk, or she’s just not your vibe, or you just find like every single
thing I say, she just is being hard to deal with, just ask for a new nurse.
You can have your partner, your hula hoovers with you walk out to the middle and
say we are requesting a new nurse. You can tell that nurse you know what we really
enjoyed our time or not so much with you but we would like to get a nurse in
here that maybe is a little bit more aligned with us or if confrontation is really
not your style you just simply request the charge nurse to come and speak with you
or a patient advocate all Hospitals will have a patient advocate center and our
department and they can come in and you simply just say We would like to request a
new nurse and we’re hoping they are a little bit more aligned with X Y and Z
because those things are very important to us Mm -hmm. Well, that’s such good
information because the whole thing about self advocacy is it’s so hard in many ways
It’s so unfair. I feel like it’s so unfair because if you don’t work in the
medical field and you’re having a birth in the hospital, then you’re like never at
the hospital. So you have no idea how it works and what the policies are and
you’re being told that you have to do this and you have to do that and then they
throw in that. And if you don’t do this, your baby might die stuff and then all
of a sudden everything is just awful, right? And having these conversations
beforehand, I remember what I wanted to say before because you made such a good
point about How you can inform yourself about the complications that can arise in
pregnancy and how it’s just not like at the end of the day I don’t know if anyone
if everyone who’s listening has ever heard like the most horrific birth story from
somebody But at the end of the day like those birth stories that don’t go out I
mean Even if like you don’t have the information in a non Like in an objective
fashion you don’t understand even what complication was sometimes because a person is
telling you it from their perspective and they may not even be Explaining fully what
the actual issue was with the birth You’re just hearing that the traumatic fallout
of it So I really liked what you said about that where because we did birthing
courses as well. And I feel like I did. The midwife was very helpful at going
through a lot of the different complications that could take place. Because let me
tell you, my husband was not interested in doing the birth at home. So we had the
midwives held this information session, and they answered a lot of the questions. And
I always joke, I’m like, “What did you think? She was going to come to the forest
with like a stick or something?” Like, she has a medical, not a medical degree, But
she has a midwifery, which is equivalent to a nurse. I’m like,
come on. And so that was really, really helpful in terms of, especially if you find
yourself in a similar situation, even if you just don’t want certain interventions
and your partner’s like, no, you need to do that, to have an advocate who can
explain who is within the system, who can just provide that information to you. And
so one of the things I was thinking about as well is If you are a little bit
more on the natural end and questioning certain interventions and if you know the
whole controversy of delayed cord clamping, I mean, that’s even just when the baby
is born in the hospital. I don’t know what they do in the hospital because I don’t
work in the hospital, but I’ve heard a lot about how one of the first things they
do is they cut the umbilical cord. And if you look at the research about how the
umbilical cord continues to pulse for a while and that brings in and so many
nutrients to the baby and if you cut it immediately, that kid was just not optimal
really from the standpoint of I never had to have those kinds of conversations
because I didn’t have to have it because I maybe I’m as much as I seem
confrontational on the podcast. Maybe I’m more nonconfrontational. I didn’t want to be
in the building. Like I don’t want to have the conversation if I would have had it
if I needed to have the conversation because I will. I’m not bad afraid of
confrontation. I will do it. But I guess what I’m saying is that in addition to
all of the other things, having an advocate, because you’re just not going to be in
top form when you’re in the middle of having a baby to really be able to have
these conversations at your best. You might be tired. You might be emotional. You
might be scared. You need an advocate if you’re really trying to go against the
brain. Yeah. Well, that’s kind of the thing, right? Is that in an ideal world, we
would be walking into a system that you didn’t have to have these conversations. And
instead of having to advocate hard for yourself, they would be taking the onus to
say, “Lisa, when your baby is born, before the placenta is delivered,
there is a time that your baby is still connected to you through your vagina by
their umbilical cord and there are a couple ways that we can manage this. Let me
talk you through these options and you tell me which one feels best to you. I can
talk you through the benefits and the risk of each of the options and then let’s
have a discussion on which one you would rather. That’s not what we find right and
so you the onus is put on patients and I feel much like you that it’s very
unfortunate that the onus is put on patients because if you’ve ever had a baby,
you’re not in the place to advocate for yourself and you know that. You are in
that birth brain, that labor land, that very primal space where you just want to go
within, within yourself, within your own brain, within your own soul. It is such a
transformation and having to step outside of yourself and think logistically and have
logistical conversations is just so disruptive to the birth process.
And so having someone there to advocate for you is gonna be super beneficial. And
it does have to be a doula, but if you are someone who is a little bit more
reserved or you are someone who does question the system a lot or you are someone
who maybe you know that you are gonna to stay in that first brain and your partner
is a little bit afraid of confrontation or maybe even they’re uncomfortable in the
medical settings. That would be someone that you should highly consider having a
doula they are present with you because a doula’s role is to be this neutral third
party. They work for you. They don’t have any loyalty to the hospital as long as
they’re not a hospital assigned doula, which which do exist, some hospitals have
programs where they will get you a doula. But if you hire a doula that’s privately
hired by you, that doula is there to truly advocate on your behalf and to keep
your preferences and your wishes centered around all the decisions that are made in
your labor. And that can be really, really pivotal. – There’s one thing that came to
mind when you said about which is before I had my babies, I would have thought
that the midwife’s role is kind of what you described. The midwife is there for the
baby. Now, the midwife is there for you too. The midwife is there to ensure that
the baby is healthy and born safely. And so if you have all these dreams of having
someone rubbing your back and like doing all this advocacy and stuff, the midwife is
busy with the very specific things that need to be done for the baby. So I think
That’s just something that I learned along the way as well, where I never had a
doula, but if anyone was with a doula, it was the husband, it wasn’t the midwife,
because she is there to make sure that the birth goes smoothly, and she has a
whole list of things that she’s working on, and it’s not quite what you might
think, I guess, if you have this kind of romantic notion of the midwife rubbing
your back and stuff like that. Not to say the thing, “What it?” I’m just saying
that I think – The third time is filled with other things. – Yes, exactly, ’cause
they’re on a specific task and it’s very involved. – Yeah, I mean, they’re medical
providers. So the same documentation, the same monitoring, the same medical procedures
that you see in the hospital, your midwife is doing the same thing,
whether that be in the hospital home birth or birth center setting. Your midwife is
doing the same thing. They have documentation. They have monitoring that they need to
do. They are medical providers. You are more likely to have them rub your back. But
again, when it’s time for them to listen to your baby’s heartbeat, they don’t have
the option to say, “Well, we’ll just do it later.” No, it’s on a time schedule.
They have to do it then and they have to document, not only that they did it, but
what was the reading? And then what did that tell them about your birth and the
progress that Mm -hmm. Well, he he I mean this conversation has been so fascinating
and I honestly could continue to pick you The afternoon but I suppose it’s time for
us to start wrapping up But honestly, this has just been so fascinating I feel like
we’ve covered a lot of ground and we went in a lot of different areas I still
have a hundred questions in my mind, but I will save those potentially for another
time One of the last questions I want to ask you to wrap up Given everything we’ve
spoken about today and for the woman who’s listening who may be pregnant or may be
planning to conceive or may be very Pregnant and delivery is eminent. What would you
want her to take most from our conversation today? You deserve to have the first
day one You deserve to like be supported and to feel safe and you deserve to have
care that makes you feel empowered in the choices that that you are making and I
want your birth to be everything that you want it to be and that’s possible and
you deserve that. So don’t let anybody tell you that you can’t achieve it or that
that’s not possible or to make anyone or to let anyone make you feel as if you’re
not worthy of that because you absolutely are. Your birth is your right and it is
your entrance into motherhood so you should make it everything that you want it to
be. – Love that so much. Well, thank you again for being here. Tell us where we
can go to learn more about you and what you do. Tell us where you are on the
socials and if you have anything exciting happening on the horizon. – Yeah,
absolutely. Well, if you’re interested in unbiased, non -judgmental childbirth education
that’s going to present things in a very neutral way that gives you all the risks
and the benefits and the alternatives and then leaves it up to you and respect your
autonomy. You can find that at thebirthlounge .com. There’s also the BirthLounge app
which is going to give you childbirth education delivered straight to your phone. And
on socials, I am Tranquility by He -He and that will lead you to everywhere else.
Come on over and join the party. It’s a fun time. I spend a lot of time on
social media. I love the crowd that I have grown there. The audience is really,
really fun and filled with a lot of personalities and a lot of people that have
way different births and you just feel safe there. We talk to people, each other
with respect. We talk about our birth experiences. People are really open. They’re
open to sharing what worked for them, what didn’t work for them, and what they’re
doing differently this time. And I just think that’s a really beautiful community.
Oh, that’s and we’ll make sure to link all the places on the podcast. And one last
thing I’ll say is congratulations, Hihi, because this podcast will be aired after you
make your official announcement. So so excited for you to be able to finally apply
all of your amazing knowledge to your own bird. – Thank you so much. I’m so excited
to share this pregnancy with everybody. – Amazing. Well, thank you again for being on
the show and we will be thinking wonderful baby just fantastic, perfect birth story
thoughts for you throughout the remainder of your pregnancy. – Thank you. – Thank you
for listening. If you enjoyed today’s episode and you’re wanting to share it with a
friend or you’re wanting to grab any of the links that we talked about, head over
to fertilityfriday .com /583. I hope that you enjoyed today’s episode with He -He.
It was such a treat to have her on the show and to have the opportunity to dive
into this conversation about birth. This is a conversation that I’m always thrilled
to have. I find just talking about birth to be so fascinating. And as I shared in
the episode, because my own experience of birth was limited in some ways because
I’ve never experienced birth in a hospital, it obviously has shaped my perspective of
it. And it’s interesting to think about how your practitioner’s experience is gonna
shape their opinion of it too. So if you are working with an OBGYN, who’s attended
thousands of births in hospital, then what they think of as a normal birth
experience is gonna be very different to, let’s say, a midwife who has experienced a
significant number of home births or births in birthing centers or births outside of
the traditional hospital setting. If you speak to these two different individuals,
they are going to potentially paint a different picture of what a normal birth looks
like. And so I feel like the themes that really came out in today’s episode are
the importance of education and empowerment, really understanding the process as much
as you can before you go through it, and also having that supportive person to help
you to advocate. And I would say especially for women who are birthing for the
first time. If you’re doing anything for the first time, you haven’t experienced it
yet. So there’s a lot that you don’t know about it. And having somebody who has
experience within these settings, who can support you and help you to create a birth
plan that makes it more likely that you will have your wishes honored. I think that
that is really important because there’s certain things in certain situations that are
really hard to advocate for. Think about your experience. Just this week I was doing
a presentation for women’s health professionals and I asked this question.
I asked how many have either personally had this experience or a client had the
experience of going to their care provider and having some issues with their
menstrual cycle and seeking support, right? What are we always told? We’re told to
go on the pill. Sometimes we’re told that the problem can’t be that bad or you’re
too young to have this problem or whatever. So half the time we’re kind of
gaslighted and not listened to. And then the other half, we’re just shuttled on to
some birth control situation. Advocating in those situations is not easy.
So imagine how much harder it is to try to advocate for some sort of natural
intervention or if there’s an intervention that you don’t want in a hospital while
you’re in active labor. And this is the first time you’ve ever given birth and this
is the first time you’ve ever been attending a birth in a hospital and it’s your
own and you’re not Able to advocate for yourself properly because you’re literally in
the middle of giving birth, right? So this is a huge takeaway from today’s episode,
which is that it’s really worthwhile to consider having support and Thinking through
what it is that she want – Birth is a very interesting experience and you’re
bringing a new, tiny human into the world. And I often say that whether it’s the
experience of the experience to conception, so for women who’ve experienced more of a
delayed journey to conception that they wanted to, or your experience of birth, I’ll
often say something like it’s a metaphor for motherhood as children come out with
their own personalities and all of these things that you thought it was gonna be
like this or my baby’s gonna be like this or whatever, you just, there’s some
little that you have control over because it’s a whole human. And then you really
have to adapt and welcome this person and get to know them and get to know what
they like and what they don’t like and all of the different things. And often it’s
very different to what you thought it was gonna be like. And so while I think it’s
important to have a plan and to have a clear vision of what it is that you want
and a good plan to try to make that as likely as possible. There are certain
elements of birth that you can’t control and you don’t necessarily know how they’re
gonna go. So you wanna have that autonomy and plan and honor that as much as you
can, but still have some flexibility for what may come. I think the biggest factor
in my and for whether or not you look back and think it was a good birth
experience, is whether or not you felt like you had autonomy and whether or not you
felt that your wishes were respected. And so having support is one of the best ways
to, for that to happen. Because even if the birth doesn’t go exactly what,
how you wanted, but you had a plan and you understand why things had to change and
you still felt like you were making decisions and you still felt like you were, you
had that autonomy, then even when it doesn’t go the way that maybe you would have
wanted, like you still had that autonomy, you still felt respected. And the birth
trauma part of it arises often when women don’t feel like they had that control and
when they feel that things were done to them and or that things happened and they
didn’t understand why, and they didn’t understand what was going on until later, or
they weren’t given a choice, or the doctor just did something, and there was an
intervention that was done. That wasn’t explained to you, and consent was, you know,
all the things, right? So I will stop there. I mean, there’s something about this
topic that I can certainly talk about it for quite a while. I have been working on
recording this summary for a little while, and obviously have a lot to say about
it. But like I said, I hope that you enjoyed today’s episode. If it resonated with
you, feel free to share it with a friend. FertilityFriday .com /583. And with that
said, I hope that you have a wonderful weekend whenever you’re tuning into the show.
And of course, as always, until next time, be well and happy charting. If you’re
loving the podcast and you’re ready to apply fertility awareness strategies in your
women’s health practice, then I know you’ll love our Fertility Awareness Mastery
Mentorship. It’s a nine -month immersive experience that will completely transform the
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That’s fertilityfriday .com /f -a -m -m -l -i -v -e.