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Hi friends, welcome to the Pain Free Birth podcast. I'm your host, Karen Welton, a certified doula childbirth educator and mother of three. In this space, we'll hear positive, supernatural, and yes, even pain free birth stories from women just like you. We'll explore the deeply spiritual side of childbirth and how God designed women's bodies brilliantly for birth. Let's get started.
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Welcome to the show, mamas. Today, I am so excited to interview two of my favorite midwives, Kelly and Tiffany from Beautiful One Midwifery. If you guys are not following them yet on Instagram, go right now, open up your Instagram account and follow them because they are some of my favorites. They are so funny, so informed, and just incredible at what they do. And we often share each other's memes and reels, so you have probably seen them pop up on my page or in my stories.
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They are midwives in Southern California. They keep very busy. And so I'm so honored to have them here to share with you guys all about home birth, this elliptical birth. And I think they have some incredible stories to share as well. So welcome Tiffany and Kelly. Thank you so much. We are so excited. I'm so excited that you even started a podcast like to be able to share in this new medium. And we're just super thankful to be a part of it. Yeah, it's been a long time coming. And
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You guys have a podcast as well, is that right? What is it called? Beautiful One Midwifery as well, or is it different? We call it At Home with Kelly and Tiffany. Awesome. Make sure you guys check out their podcast as well. Yeah. And so this is our first time actually meeting. I count this as meeting because we've tried to meet up at different points when I was in California and we talk in DMs a lot. So this is like our first official meet and greet. And I'm so excited. I think we're all fangirling a little bit. So.
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Tell us a little bit about how you, your background, what you do and like, yeah, what you do. Tell us what you're about. Yeah. So we are two home birth midwives in San Diego. We have a private practice where we get to support women prenatally, during the birth and through postpartum. We actually, as a part of creating our practice five years ago now.
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we knew that a big part of what we wanted to do is postpartum care. We wanted to do that differently. And so we actually offer extended postpartum care, which is a full year into that whole postpartum year that we offer. Wow. Support as well to our clients. And then we also have really discovered this love of just women's health in general, hormonal balancing, all of that good stuff. So a large portion of what we also offer is kind of well-women care and support for.
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all different seasons from puberty all the way up through menopause and, you know, trying to conceive and pap smears and all kinds of things in between as well in order just to give women alternative options where they can feel heard and listened to and supported and just given options that they often aren't given in other spaces. That is so beautiful. I adore that. And I've loved seeing some of your posts recently on
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like nutrition and health and hormones, because it's so needed in this space. I'm so glad you guys are doing that. And what a beautiful way to merge your expertise that's already in midwifery and home birth, and to then be able to support women afterwards in the postpartum. I think that's brilliant. Like what, I'm curious like practically what that looks like, because obviously like midwifery and home birth has its own like container.
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Do you guys charge separately for that extended postpartum support? And are you out of pocket? Do you work with insurance? I have a lot of listeners who are home birthers and about, it's like half and half, half home birth, half hospital. And there's a lot of people in that middle ground who are considering home birth. So I'd love to even just talk about like the practicalities of what that looks like and how you guys are doing it differently in your practice. Yeah. So our postpartum care is included in our package. And
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Everyone gets to decide how they want to take advantage of that. Some moms who, you know, live 45 minutes away, don't want to come in for those extended visits just out of practicality with their five kids or whatever. And they're like, no, I got this. I'm good. I'll let you know if I need anything. And then some moms take advantage of every single appointment. So we do the standard six weeks of care that most women are familiar with in home birth, except for we do
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all those first six week visits in women's homes. So a lot of times midwives will come for the first week or two and then have their client start to meet them back in the office for their appointment. And that just did not make sense to us that we would ask, that we would tell women that they need to be home and resting, yet please do pack up your entire family for your midwifery appointment and come to us. So we have structured our practice in order to be able to provide those first six.
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weeks of appointments in women's homes. And those are, those are six visits that are lasting like about an hour. That we do in midwifery care. And a lot of people who are familiar with midwifery care know they have context for that, but if you're birthing in the hospital, if you have a C-section, you'll get two of those visits with your care provider in office, usually at like two to three weeks and then six. And if you had a vaginal birth, you only have one, you'll have one six week visit.
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Yeah, which is completely inadequate, of course. And that visit consists of usually a 15-minute appointment where your OB or your doctor says, okay, what are your plans for birth control? Yeah, that's about it. And they might check your swelling or how your stitching is healed if you had stitching, but usually they don't even do that. So like what you guys are saying is like mind-blowing even to me because I had midwives and I had home births for my three births and I didn't have a midwife appointment every week for six weeks. I can...
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guarantee that. I had, she came the next day to check on me, which is amazing. That doesn't happen with a doctor at a hospital. She came to my home. I think that alone is like mind blowing for so many people. Like, oh, you mean I don't have to leave my house? Yes, of course not. You shouldn't have to. So she came to me and then I think she came again, maybe once more, but, and then at six weeks. So I probably had two or three postpartum visits, but that is...
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Incredible. Now, what do you do in those visits? Are you doing breastfeeding support? Is it everything and anything? It kind of is everything and anything, right? The first week, especially, just to stop, like a lot of the visit ends up being about breastfeeding and about encouraging rest and just like leaning into that laying in idea. And oftentimes it is, you know, kind of centered around feeding, gaining weight, all of that good stuff. So for the first six weeks we can offer well.
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baby care as well. And so moms do not need to, if they choose not to, they do not need to leave in order to go to a pediatrician visit either. So we can take all the baby titles and weigh the baby and just ensure that things are going smoothly. Obviously, if something was out of that normal sphere, we would encourage them to utilize the extra care that they have available. But yet sometimes it is sitting there processing the birth. Sometimes it is...
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chatting with the other kiddos and allowing them to be a part of the visit in hopes of kind of helping their transition into older sibling-dom, whatever they're going through. Sometimes it's making food, sometimes it's sitting and just listening to somebody talk about how beautiful it is or how hard it is or both of those things at once, right? And so part of it is certainly clinical care and part of it is friendship and relationship and...
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counseling and kind of everything in between, honestly. And just to kind of round about to your question about insurance, just so that everyone's sort of aware. Midwives run differently, like different practices may have different situations, but we personally use a medical biller and our fee is global and is potentially reimbursable. So depending on people's plans, are they PPO, HMO?
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What their deductible looks like, all of those pieces. But we utilize a biller who can run a verification of benefits so that the client knows, okay, in general, it looks like we're just paying all this out of pocket. Or in general, it looks like we have a pretty good plan and we should anticipate getting this amount back after the fact. But we certainly needed, we knew that we needed to utilize a biller because insurance is not the easiest thing to navigate. And even as, even as a mom myself.
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home birthing and utilizing insurance. You know, I kind of handed that off to my husband and we both went around in circles for a long time trying to figure it out, which was yet another reason why we were like, we need to bring something else on board. And so there are options out there for women. There are options about different plans. And one thing I wanted to make sure that people were aware of also is that if you have a health share, those are like underutilized for those women who are wanting.
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prenatal services like this, if you are a part of a HealthShare, most of them you need to be a part of it before you get pregnant. Those have been incredible for our clients. They're great. They're amazing. I had those with my, I had one of those HealthShare accounts and it was, I think, Christian Health Care Ministries with my, want to say my second, my third, and they covered everything. I had, I didn't even have a copay of like $200. It was like 100% covered.
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And it's smart on their end because they're saving like 20 grand compared to hospital birth. So it's like, duh, all the insurance companies should get on board with this. But I've had a friend who I referred to them who hurt, she had a pre-char baby at like 26 weeks who spent like four months in the NICU and they covered that entirely as well. And that was like hundreds of thousands of dollars. But it was all shared and they were not on the hook for any of it. And it was so like low stress too. So there's a lot of ways that the home birth.
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And be covered if this is something that you're hearing about and you've been dreaming of and you've been thinking maybe, you know, this is, I would really love this kind of birth, but we just can't afford it. I encourage you to look into some of these options because you're right. It can be covered. It's wonderful. You do work with insurance as frustrating and stressful as that is. It can really open up opportunities for women who would not be able to afford it. Otherwise, definitely look into that if that's something that you are.
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interested in. Sometimes God just makes a way when we think there's no way. And I remember throwing that fleece out there to God and saying, okay, if I'm going to have a home birth with my first, this has to be covered by insurance. Because I don't want to be sitting there in the postpartum, you know, trying to learn how to breastfeed and healing and then fighting with insurance, the insurance company to pay the bill. Like this has to be covered. And it worked out. So, I mean, insurance is different now than it was back when I had my first baby, but it's worse looking into for sure. So I love the way you guys do things.
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A year of postpartum care is magical. I can't, that is just so magical. And I can only imagine like women, because I hear so many stories of women struggling in the postpartum with breastfeeding, and I did as well. Like is this normal? What's normal? How long should my baby be sleeping? How long should they be nursing and eating? Are they gaining weight? Are they getting milk? Like to have someone there that you can ask those questions to is so priceless.
11:39
Can you tell us a little bit now that we're on the topic of home birth, what does it look like as far as like the home birth portion? So it's a global fee, it covers everything. You meet with them prenatally and then you come to the home. Can you tell us a little bit about like how that's structured and what you look for when you're screening someone for home birth? Yeah, absolutely. So we meet women on the same schedule that obstetricians meet women in their office.
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but we just offer about a hundred times more FaceTime and compassion and informed consent and discussion and education and everything, right? So I think the average OB visit in the U.S. is like seven and a half minutes or something like that, that the FaceTime that people actually get with their care provider. And Midwives, we give every single prenatal visit one hour. So that is...
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You know, we can do our vitals and ask a bunch of quick questions about their health in about, I don't know, seven and a half minutes. And then we get to spend the other 52 and a half minutes talking about specific remedies for common complaints that they're going through, the transition that their family is having, how they're navigating this change with older kids, how they're discussing their
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plan for home birth with their family and friends, how they're just embracing this time and getting to know their baby and preparing for birth and sorting through the options and learning how to parent in a whole different way. We just want to be a part of constant empowerment in those visits asking women, well, what do you want? How do you see this playing out for you? And so those visits really like, like Kelly.
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described at the postpartum visits. It's really about relationship. And it's a huge benefit to us also because keeping relationship at the center of midwifery and making those connections and communication, the most important thing is what makes home birth work. It's what makes it safe for women. It's what makes it safe for midwives.
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It's what makes it fulfilling for women. It's what makes it fulfilling for midwives. It's what allows us to provide the scaffolding for the type of experience that the woman wants. And like, we have this idea like, oh, home birth, home birth family, home birth mom. She's this cookie cutter thing who just obviously wants this specific kind of experience. And that's not the case at all. We have clients who want to home birth for so many different reasons. And
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want to see that played out in so many different ways. And so we have an opportunity in those long prenatal visits to be building that relationship. So that on the day when we come and do the birth, you're being cared for by someone who deeply knows you, who loves you, who has figured out how to communicate best with you, who has already asked you a lot of questions about how you want this day to go.
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Who doesn't have to ask you a lot of questions and labor or have you fill out any forms or even check your birth plan because we all are on the same page already, right? So it's, I think it's that time. It's that proximity with one another and the, the frequency that just allows us to really capture the relationship part. I think.
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just kind of going off of that too, like in terms of that helping make it safe for both clients and for midwives, that's emotionally safe, but there's so much clinically that happens during pregnancy that we can speak into, okay, we know how this person, their particular way of eating, we know exactly what kind of supplements they're taking, we know how they are or are not moving their body and those types of things that we can speak some truth into and...
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not give them recommendations that go against, you know, their particular way of eating or whatever it is to help get things back on track for them in particular, depending on what we're seeing in their lab work or what we're seeing in their symptomology. And so that's a huge piece of why home birth is so safe as well is because it's not just about keeping the birth safe. Like it's not just about the birth itself. There's months and months leading up to the birth of being proactive.
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that midwifery care kind of prides itself in, that's what we love to do, is help keep things as low risk as we possibly can, right? And then utilize the tools we have to bring that back into normal if it starts to, you know, kind of get out of that sphere. And so there's a ton that we can do to help mitigate some of those complications that happen towards the end of pregnancy, at birth, postpartum as well, that we get to chat about and work through and talk about.
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in all of those hours that we get prenatally as well. And so that's, I think, kind of missed on some people, just because we think about things that happen at the drop of a hat at birth, but really there's so much preparation that happens beforehand that can help mitigate a lot of those issues. 100%. Yeah. And like what I'm hearing you say is basically you really take the time to get to know your clients. Not just clinically, but like...
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emotionally, nutritionally, like their body, their way they process things. You build that relationship, which means you're, you're much less likely to miss something, like if there is a red flag that pops up, it's not like, like you see it coming a mile away, whereas in an OB office, when you're one of a thousand and you're just a number in a chart, you show up one day, you have preeclampsia and it's like, oh, okay, time for induction. Like, but you're there like charting, checking in with them. You're talking about eating and diet. And.
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habits and daily lifestyle choices, like those kinds of things, you're catching that before it even becomes a problem. And you're creating the security and safety and relationship with your clients so that they can come to you. And all of those things reduces the risk of something going wrong in labor, because you're there. Like you're seeing things ahead 10 steps ahead instead of reacting to them and then just immediately, oh, we need to do interventions.
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Tell me a little bit more about that. What kind of things can you treat in this home birth setting with your clients that would typically be a reason for just induction or intervention later on? Yeah. So you had asked us before about the screening process of good candidacy for home birth. And so that's a piece of it is when we meet with women over COVID, a lot of midwives got into this really lazy habit of...
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of continuing on with virtual interviews and stuff. And there's just so much that gets missed in that kind of context. So we always meet with people in person. We always give them a free hour of consultation and we always let them know, this is going both directions. Like you are seeing if we're a good fit, we're seeing if you're a good fit, this is a mutual decision. And part of what gets discussed in there is can we imagine ourselves working together on a team, right? And...
19:04
let's unpack your health a little bit and let's see what was potentially happening in your life, you know, even just on paper before this happened and what's going on with you. And so we ended up taking care of a lot of women who felt blindsided by their first birth in a hospital because suddenly something came up and they had no options. So we work with a lot of women who had preeclampsia or some other condition that has, you know,
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come up that really changed everything for them. Gestational diabetes is another huge one. And I think that we miss in our culture that these things are preventable, that you can actually apply some, some science, some logic, some natural and holistic concepts to taking care of the body in a way that it doesn't create that same symptom picture, and we have done that across the board.
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We have prevented hypertension. We have prevented preeclampsia. We have prevented gestational diabetes. And sometimes that comes up for the first time in midwifery care. And we didn't, we weren't able to necessarily like enact certain protocols in order to prevent a specific thing. But it comes up and we can handle it. And 90% of the time we can keep things low risk just because, you know, we catch it pretty quickly. And yeah, you're working on prevention. What in what, how would you treat preeclampsia?
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or gestational diabetes, for example. Cause I think some women, this concept alone that you could even prevent it is new. Yeah, absolutely. And it's not meant to be like, you should have done something differently in order to have prevented that, right? But it is just, I think it gives so much hope and encouragement, whatever we share about that on social media, it probably gets the most interaction because people are like, oh my gosh, I actually can write a new story for myself. I can reimagine.
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you know, this experience that I thought was going to be lost on me forever, right? I never thought I could have a home worth because of this particular experience or something like that. But we have, we are just so consistent in our, in our first visit, especially we go really deep into pieces of nutrition and supplementation and things like that for kind of like this baseline foundational piece. But then we can talk about if somebody has had that experience before.
21:23
Okay, when we talk about every single visit from here on out, when we talk about how much protein you're eating, we just be prepared for that, right? When we talk about when you reach about this point in your pregnancy, let's run another lab just to kind of see how your liver is working, how your kidneys are doing, all of those pieces, just making sure we're not missing some of these really vital pieces that can
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especially herbal protocols, we are big on, you know, nutrition always should be like the foundational pieces of how we treat what's going on in our bodies. That's not always feasible or the case or sometimes we just need a little bit extra, right? So then we're like, let's bring in some supplementation. Let's bring in these herbs in order to just support whatever it is. And usually that ends up being liver support, the thing that just kind of gets really taxed in pregnancy in particular.
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And so we find that when we care for that, like those pieces really well, especially at the beginning, we start well, we can oftentimes finish well. And so maybe we do need to kind of ramp up some of those pieces towards the end of pregnancy just to kind of get the body over the finish line. But we've also had situations where things have been, I wouldn't say dicey, but just, oh, it's kind of interesting to see what's gonna happen in labor and we need to keep an extra eye on this piece. And we've been able to enact some things that like,
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Your blood pressure was pretty high when we first came here, but then, you know, we kind of put you on this protocol, we suggested these particular things and an hour later we're already seeing a change in that, whereas if we weren't seeing that, we'd probably be having a different type of conversation right now. And so we care about the outcome of each birth, right? We care about the outcome both physically and clinically, but also emotionally and spiritually. And so...
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In order to actually do that, we need to put ourselves out there with our clinical skills and our, I don't even know what you would call those, the extra skills that we have developed and the extra education that we have attained in order to help give this family every chance that they have at having the type of experience they want. So they can always look back, no matter what happens, right? They can always look back and be like, well, I was supported.
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I was heard, I was trusted, we did everything that we could, again, no matter what the outcome actually ends up being. But it's pretty incredible when you have somebody on your team who actually can speak into some of those things and then you tangibly start to see things change in your own body. Me being one of those people, like my third pregnancy had a lot of issues and being able to be cared for by somebody who could be like, okay, here's what we're actually going to do because I know this is important to you.
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rather than, well, we have an OR down the hall and, you know, a live baby is all we want, right? And so live baby, that's like, that's the lowest bar that we have is everybody is standing by of like, yes, that's just a given, right? But what can we do to help flourish that experience is what we're into. Yeah, I love that. Have you seen like,
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preeclampsia pop up and then we're able to reverse it or prevent, you know, a hospital? No, that is it. That's an excellent point that you have made. We have seen some things come up that looks like the liver is a little irritated or it looks like blood pressure and is starting to creep with a couple of other weird symptoms. And we can stop it at that point and keep people in midwifery model. And if they're very diligent in that, then
25:14
That sometimes is a really hard conversation because you're like that you are going to have to work so very hard for the remainder of your pregnancy to stay low risk. But once we actually, actually have the diagnosing criteria for preeclampsia, there's nothing that we can do at that point in order to bring her back into a low risk category. So unfortunately we do have to transfer, but like Kelly said, there's so many pieces that.
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we can, that we have in play or that we have offered, have play to women, this is how you stay low risk. Yeah. There's a formula there of how to stay low risk into a free care. So you're actually, in most cases, sounds like you're treating like the pre-eclampsia, like you're catching it before it's even pre-eclampsia, before it's eclampsia, which is life-threatening. And there are certain things that are legitimate reasons for induction and medical intervention.
26:08
preeclampsia is one of those things. But it sounds like because you're doing so much due diligence ahead, looking at the labs, the liver, their diets, like high protein, I've heard that's a really big thing to help push that off. And getting good nutrition, like you said, supporting the liver, doing those things and having an eye on those things, you're supporting women in a way that they're not getting that kind of support at an OB office. It's like you either get it or you don't and it's random and we don't know why it happens and we can't help you if you do. Like, so...
26:37
the level of support you guys offer is like bar none. And I think women are often surprised when they enter the midwifery model of care and if they're used to the obstetric model of care and how radically different it is and how much more supported and known they actually feel in that model of care. Can you talk a little bit about home birth and is it safe and these what ifs? Cause everyone who I've talked to, the main reason they choose
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or they don't fully consider the home birth option. And it isn't for everyone. I'm very upfront about that. Home birth and hospital birth, I encourage women to pick whatever option makes them feel the most safe. And there are lots of options, birth centers and things like that. And so I'm never one to push people toward home birth, but I find that in this work that I do, that there's many women who desire home birth, but they rule it out because of the, what if something goes wrong?
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question. How do you guys address that? And what do you do in those situations when something does potentially go wrong? Yeah. You know, I think even just starting out, like, there's some level of risk in anything that we do in life, right? And there's some level of risk no matter where you have your baby also, right? So you do have to sort of weigh out what is important to you, what's your vision for that experience, what's your vision for the type of care that you want and the type of experience.
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not only you want, but you want your baby to have, and then weigh the risks that you recognize happen in a hospital also. Can that derail what you are desiring just simply by the type of care provider in the location that you're birthing in? But recognizing, again, there's risk just inherently in birth in general because birth is a part of life, right? And so- Yeah, you're never going to get a zero risk birth. No matter where you're birthing, something could go wrong, something could happen.
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and you have higher risks of certain things in certain locations, but it's never zero. Yes, absolutely. And so, not to like scare anybody off or whatever, and I completely agree nobody should be necessarily talked into home birth, but recognizing that when we're choosing where we're birthing, it's a huge shift in how you will be treated, how your labor will be managed, how your baby will be cared for. And so…
29:02
it's not just a flippant thing. So as we're choosing, you want to be able to choose with eyes wide open and recognizing that. And so we wouldn't be doing what we do if we thought home birth was not safe, right? We wouldn't want to put people in that position, nor would we want to put ourselves in that position. Right. Yeah, right. And so statistically speaking, yes, it is safe for low-risk women with low-risk pregnancies, right? And that kind of hurts back to what we were just talking about in terms of...
29:32
Um, assessing risk, but then also putting the work into stay low risk, depending on your situation. But the most, I think one of the questions that we would always get during our, those consultations, especially from dads, which like, gotta love them because they're like safety and money. That's all I really want to know about. One of the biggest keys is that most of the time, if we like look at birth in sort of a triangle, right.
30:00
The bottom part, that thick part of the triangle, is about like what, 98 or something percent of women who technically do have low risk pregnancies, right? That amount of women could probably be birthing at home with the right type of care, right? But if we go to the top of that triangle, that little teeny tiny tip, that's the amount, right, that really need the medical intervention. But what we're doing in our society now is that we're starting
30:28
we're like flipping those numbers almost, right? Like one to 2% of women are having home births in that huge part of the triangle of this is actually low risk, but we're putting all of these healthy women towards the top with lots of medical intervention. And so what we say to women is that you can start at the bottom of the triangle. The top of the triangle is always there, right? There's always the potential for getting more medical care if you need it. Especially in the fever, right?
30:58
If you are like, oh, I really don't want a hospital birth. I really want to have a natural birth, but I'm afraid, right? What if I really need an epidural? Well, guess what? The epidural is always there. We can always go get it. You just have to drive to it. No, you can go get it. But if you start your labor in the hospital and then say, actually, I want to check out and go hire a midwife, or I want to have like a no intervention birth in a hospital, that's a lot harder. A hundred percent. And so.
31:27
The most common reason for transfer, which is a first time mom who just has a very long, long labor that we have thrown everything at for the past few days. And what she really needs is just a good nap. A good nap and maybe an epidural. Yes, and to wake up and push her baby out, right? So it's very rare that something comes out of absolute left field that all of a sudden we are like, we need to get you to the hospital right now.
31:56
because we know normal so well that when anything pings outside of that normal sphere, we're very quick to see it. And so we communicate about that, hey, this thing's like kind of wonky, let's keep an eye on this. But then if the story that's being told by the labor is like things keep pinging outside of normal, we have that conversation of like this, it's not home birth at all costs, let's go to the next level of care. With that being said, in any location, of course there's something, there are some things that can happen.
32:26
out of left field too. I love what you're saying and I want to continue on that thread. Something I often say is like that home birth, if you have to transfer to the hospital and you're in a home birth, that's not a failure. And I think a lot of people look at it that way. But if we reframe it and we say it's not a failure, it's an appropriate use of resources. If you need medical intervention, go to the hospital and get it. If you're having a heart attack, if you break a bone, you're going to go to the hospital and get it. But normal women, low risk women.
32:54
don't need medical intervention in labor. Like you said, 90% of women could potentially, however, could be 90, could be 95, we don't know. But the vast majority of women can give birth without medical intervention, and yet in the hospital system, they treat 98% of women as if they need it, and an emergency could happen at any time. So most of them end up getting some form of intervention. But in the UK, they treat it more like, oh, this is...
33:22
a collaborative care and if you need it, we're just going to get those additional resources that are necessary at this stage. So not looking at it in terms of failure, but talk more about that. Like when you see things pinging outside of normal, what that might look like, maybe some examples and how you would handle that. Yeah. So I think like that piece of like, I mean, we always like, we always talk about this circle and we always make this shape with our hands because we're like...
33:51
This is normal. It's a huge part of the possibility is that everything is going to be normal. And the difference between the type of expertise that we bring to a birth versus the expertise that an obstetrician and trained surgeon brings to a birth is that we're trained in normal. We don't know every single detail about all of the crazy complications that could happen and how to handle those. Your OB also is not the expert in
34:18
normal physiological birth. I guarantee it. I can think of, I can think of maybe two or three obstetricians in our San Diego area that respect physiological birth, but it is still potentially not the majority of what they see. Right. So is the question, is the provider that you're hiring that you're choosing to be with you on that day an expert in normal birth? Do they completely understand what usually happens if we don't mess with it?
34:48
And if they don't, they will intervene because they will think this is not normal when it actually is. That's the caveat there. That is the risk of birthing in the medical model with an OB or at a hospital is that your range of normal most likely will not feel normal to a doctor. It will seem like, oh, we got to do something. There's rarely a time where they do nothing. Yeah.
35:15
It's reflected in women's stories. So people all the time, everything was fine until shift change and I got a new hospitalist or right? I mean, I had to start pushing and they told me to get on my back or yeah. Yes. We know that that setting is not set up to support a physiological experience because their policies don't reflect that. Right.
35:40
If that's what they truly believe, then their policy is, and all the guidance that they give women would be, would completely line up with women. The most likely thing that would happen in that setting is that women would have a natural undisturbed birth, if that's what was set up. That's not what's happening. So us knowing normal, there's a lot of freedom in that because we get to see a huge variation of normal.
36:08
We get to, you know, share, share some of those pieces with our clients while they're experiencing it. So especially first time moms, especially the dads of first time moms are, are, are very much wanting to check in of like, is this okay? Is this still normal? Are we on track here? And so we can let them know. Yeah, absolutely. This is a variation of normal. So when something comes out of that, it could be something as simple as.
36:35
an elevated blood pressure or a little bit too much variability in the baby's heart rate or a lack of progress in the labor for half a day or more, right? I mean, there's so much tolerance for some of these things until we actually just want to capture some of that information and intervene before it actually becomes a thing. So each midwife is going to kind of handle those outside of normal things differently, but we sort of have like a...
37:03
three strikes and you're out type of thing. Like when there's just one little thing that's outside of normal, it's like, okay, we're watching that. We're having a discussion about that. We're doing what we can to try to keep things on track. But that's not necessarily a reason for transfer. Oh, and then the second thing is coming in and we haven't actually resolved that first thing. And so now we're really paying attention. We're really having this discussion. These two things independently don't necessarily tell us that your home birth is not.
37:32
a safe place for you anymore, but now you just should know that like this story is starting to change a little bit for you. And then sometimes when that third piece comes in, that's when we're like, so technically you are fine right now. Everything is okay right now. But based off of what we're seeing, you know, of course wanting the best thing for you, here's, you know, some of these pieces to be looking at. However, most of the time when things peeing out of normal and we see that we catch it like, oh, that's not normal. We just work on it and we bring things right back into normal.
38:02
I think the thing that surprises women and their partners when they're considering the concept of home birth is that even though something might come outside of normal, it's not an immediate transfer. It's not an immediate panic. It's not an immediate emergency. Even when something more serious that like we absolutely have to respond to like a shoulder dystocia or femurage or neonatal resuscitation, like that's the stuff that you actually have us there for.
38:31
is to intervene in those kinds of ways. The huge majority of time, even when we're responding to an emergency, it does not mean that we're losing our minds and transferring and we wish that we were never doing this at home, that it was a terrible idea. Most of the time we respond and we bring things back into normal again and we all stay home and carry on with a continued low risk clinical picture. So.
38:59
Getting information about how midwives respond to some of the common issues in labor that are not a really big deal. Getting information from midwives about how they respond to true emergencies and what some of those protocols are. And then just understanding like what the midwives or the team or the practice that you're interviewing with or working with, what are their, what's their philosophy about responding to some of those things?
39:28
And what's their comfort? What are their limitations? Because Kelly and I will have a completely different way of responding to some of those things than another midwife who has had a different set of training, a different set of experience, a different, different concepts for how birth works. And so it just needs to be a conversation. And most consumers don't have the tools in order to have a conversation like that, because it's a brand new thing.
39:55
a brand new thing and they just don't even understand the nuances of some of those pieces. Yeah, for sure. What kind of questions do you recommend women ask a potential midwife that they want to hire? Yeah, it's kind of interesting because being on social media, we have a huge, like just a much larger reach than we could have of women who come into our office. And so many times we have heard, oh, I didn't even think to ask my midwife that, but then I realized after the fact.
40:23
this was her line in the sand or this was her thing or she didn't believe in this thing. And I wish I would have known that beforehand. And so we actually created an entire blog post with kind of a downloadable freebie of questions to ask midwives as well. Basically born out of the questions that we not only were being asked often, but that we think that we should be being asked. So sometimes we'll sit in consultations, be like,
40:49
Okay, I hear you saying you don't have any more questions, but we haven't talked about this and this and this. And let's just share just so that you again have eyes wide open as you're making this decision because not all care providers are created the same and not all midwives are the same and not all home birth is the same. And so that in and of itself can feel daunting because a huge portion of choosing home birth is responsibility on the mom and dad, right? It is a huge responsibility.
41:19
biggest part of their risk and their outcome, you know, like all of those pieces, they're taking on responsibility that basically when you go into a medical care provider's office, like an OB, they are, the assessment is that they are in charge there, they are taking the responsibility. And so they're, you know, much more aware of liability and policies and all of those things. And so people usually don't ask them questions, right?
41:47
It's just, is my insurance covering you? Great. You are my person now. And so I wish more people would ask these same questions to providers of how they respond to certain situations or what if, right? And just to kind of get an assessment of how they view things. And so I really think that part of the interview process should be relational. Like, are you picking up the comfort level of desiring to work together? But then some of the pieces as you assess and learn more about birth.
42:17
Or even maybe you don't have any learned anything about birth yet, but you have this vision, right? You're sitting in a midwife's office interviewing them. So you have at least a general idea of some things, thinking of the actual vision that you want, how you want to be treated, how you would desire your baby's experience, like what you would desire that to look like, and kind of base some of those questions off of that. What does immediate postpartum look like? How do you handle longer labors? Those types of things that...
42:46
again may look really different depending on who the midwife is, but there's a lot of power in knowing what kinds of questions to ask, which again is why we kind of put some together because so many people were asking us or telling us their experience of not really knowing and us just wanting to put more confidence and empowerment back where it belongs, which is with mom. Yeah. There's so many variations in how midwives practice and what they consider.
43:14
high risk and even in how their state regulates midwives and whether that midwife is practicing like, you know, with their license or maybe they're unlicensed and they're, you know, not practicing according to the state laws. There's lots of states that don't even allow home birth. And so, but they find midwives that are sort of underground midwives. Like there's so many differences and considerations that you have to take into account. Like at what point would you transfer me?
43:44
as a mom, like is it when I hit 41 weeks or 42 weeks or when this thing happens in labor? You know, if my labor goes so long, and obviously so much of that is case by case if we're looking at what's going on in labor. Like you said, you're taking into account different risk factors and different things that might appear high risk and different midwives are going to interpret those signals differently. But all midwives, none of them want a dead baby, right, for anyone ever. So we're always...
44:14
operating in the best interest of the client and like what is the most safe option and like you said at the beginning of this interview, you wouldn't be doing this work if there was if it was dangerous and risky. But that is how the doctors and society at large really approaches home birth is that it's dangerous and risky and you're either selfish or like, you know, ignorant for wanting out for choosing home birth. And it's time to redefine that because
44:43
There's so much we don't know about home birth and how experience and how much expertise you have in this and how you literally can bring almost a hospital to moms in labor at home. You can treat hemorrhage. You can treat an unresponsive baby or baby that's not breathing or transitioning well. I'd love to hear a little bit more about some of those specifics for those parents, maybe especially the partners who are still on like concerned about the what ifs. What if...
45:13
the baby's not breathing, what if there's a shoulder dissociation, what if my wife hemorrhages? Would you treat that differently than they treat it in the hospital? And what do you do? Or is it just like, oh no. Like we think it's oh no, something bad happened like you said. But you said, well, we never regret it. Like, no, we treat it. And that's kind of the answer. You know, it's like, well, what would happen if? Well, we treat it. I'm curious how that happens. How you guys treat it in a home birth.
45:41
Yeah. And we love to have an ongoing discussion about safety stuff. I think it's lacking a little bit. I think midwives are potentially not broaching the subject because it makes them nervous or makes them look vulnerable, maybe, when we talk about safety stuff. Or they think that like we're emphasizing a fearful perspective too much. That's like, well, no, I mean, like, this is just this is why you're hiring us.
46:09
Right? Like if you didn't want someone there who was able to respond to some of the things that can go sideways, then you would pick a different, you pick a different set up for yourself. And so we're really there to just be watchful and respond when we need to. But we talk with all of our clients in the, in that very first consult, that very first interview, we say, here are our limitations and most of them are based off of our state law. We practice in California. And so we have really clear law here. Whether we like that or not.
46:39
We follow it for the most part, and we need our clients to know this is not reflective of our philosophy. We think it would be perfectly fine for you to go past 42 weeks in most situations, but it is not lawful for us to attend you at home after 42 weeks. So this is what we're going to, you know, do about that together. So we go through all of those things together so that they know exactly what they're signing up for by being cared for by licensed midwives.
47:07
And then it's an ongoing discussion. And so we really welcome people to bring those questions in because we know what's happening as they go through their pregnancy, letting some people know that they're having a home birth of people, other people's immediate response is, Oh, well, I know somebody who blah, blah, blah. And as they weren't in the hospital, everybody would have died. So it was always horror stories. Yeah. You need to bring those to us so we can talk about them and unpack them. Sometimes really, really bad things happen.
47:36
And we don't have an explanation for that, but most of the time we can, we can unpack the story a little bit and say, okay, so potentially what happened here is, you know, this, this is how we would respond to that. And then at the very end of pregnancy, we do a home visit, like around 36 or 37 weeks where we go to our client's home and we call it like a dress rehearsal where we like make sure that everyone's on the same page with how they want their experience to go and.
48:03
the supplies that they have on hand and we're organized and everybody's needing everybody who's gonna be at the birth. And a part of the thing that we discuss is, let's talk about the most common complications and how you will see us communicating, how you will see us responding to that. We wanna show you some of our equipment right now so that if you see this come out at your birth, you don't automatically think that everything's wrong. You know exactly what we're going to use this bag and mask for.
48:29
on your baby, not necessarily an emergency, it's just to help them inflate their lungs. So we're trying to provide educational piece all along the prenatal time to provide context to this is how, this is our job. This is how we keep you safe. Because when we set that as the baseline, like this is just expected. There's so much more that we can build on top of that. So once we've established that this piece of like, here's our limitations, here's our capabilities, here's what we want to do in order to keep you safe. Then there's room for.
48:59
everything else, all the other things that are important about preparing for birth and parenting and so forth. Yeah. I think you also mentioned what we bring to births. And I love having the opportunity to share that with people because I don't think that they realize, again, we're in California, licensed. We have the ability to carry certain medications that potentially other midwives in other states either may not have the legal ability to or the comfort level to.
49:29
you know, whatever, but we feel really confident in what we're able to carry our anti-hemorrhagic medications, the herbal, you know, assortment and homeopathic medications that we carry and oxygen and IV fluids and all kinds of things that we can bring to a person's home and enact, you know, their use at the appropriate times, usually having some space to be able to discuss it. But in that...
49:57
visit that Tiffany was talking about, we also say, like, sometimes we are going to say, hey, here's the situation and here's what we need to do. This is why you hired us. So we're going to do it and we're going to communicate with each other. We're going to try to communicate with you, but we do just need to kind of do the next right thing in order to bring things back to normal or stabilize things as much as possible. But hemorrhage, shoulder dystocia, neonatal resuscitation, those are kind of, I don't want to say common because it's not like they're happening all the time, but if there's something that's going to go sideways,
50:26
At a home birth, it's oftentimes one of those three things. And because of that, because we want to be able to bring everything back into normal, we're very skilled in those complications and in witnessing some of the signs, the precursors to those things and responding immediately to doing so. It's one of my favorite things about having a joint practice though, is that I trust Tiffany so much that sometimes all it takes is just eye contact.
50:56
or a certain movement that we're both like, okay, yeah, this is what we need to do or we're pushing ourselves into this next level of care from providing the patient watching scaffolding that we were doing before that now we actually are needed in this clinical space. But each time that we have needed to intervene on those things, we've been able to bring them back into normal. And I think something like that does blow people's minds. And it definitely is.
51:25
I mean, it's my personal feeling that I have witnessed shoulder dystocias at home. I've witnessed shoulder dystocias in hospitals. I would end all, you know, right, neonatal resuscitation, hemorrhage, and the way that midwives respond to them, I believe is the much more preferred method. I would agree with that. Yeah, simply because it is still steeped in midwifery care in the, it's responsive.
51:55
certainly, but it still has the space to communicate as much as possible and still holding the experience as much as possible as well. Absolutely. I totally agree. When I've seen and witnessed or whether on video or like in person, like shoulder dystocia is being handled in the hospital, it's so aggressive. It's so damaging to mother and baby. And at home, it's simple. It's communicated clearly. It's handled swiftly.
52:25
before you even realize something's wrong. And it's using different positions and techniques that are more effective and safer for mom and baby. And then with hemorrhage, you mentioned carrying different herbal things. Do you also carry like miso or pitocin as well? Yeah, so you've got the medicines like that, the same medicines the doctors use, but you're also using different levels of care with like, well, let's give you some herbs. See if that doesn't work. OK, then it's this. And I think we have this misnomer in our heads where like
52:53
Hemorrhage means you just flush out all your blood all at once and you're going to die within minutes if you don't treat it. And it's not usually—like that's not really the case. It takes hours of internal bleeding in order to create—for someone to die in labor. And it's usually—when you hear about it in the hospital, it's usually like a medical malpractice. Like they blatantly ignored a woman having bleeding when you hear about it in the hospital. And so I've seen it treated in the home birth setting where there was different measures taken.
53:22
She didn't have the herbs like you guys do, which is awesome. I love that there's different, you have those as well, but she had Pitocin. And then when that didn't work, she did anal mesoprosil, I think it was. I may have that medication wrong, but I think it was anally inserted. And so they were very, I was a birth, I attended as a doula and she was on the ball with making sure we stopped this bleeding because there had been a good bit of it in the labor. And so it's the same often.
53:52
protocol or medication you would get in a hospital just done with much more love and care and communication and informed consent in a home setting. And same with the fetal resuscitation, like you're not cutting the umbilical cord, which is also a source of oxygen for the baby and taking the baby away from mom, creating trauma. You're often resuscitating right there next to mom with the umbilical cord attached, which is so important.
54:16
Yeah, so like we can acknowledge that sometimes things go sideways. We're not here to say like, oh, home birth only works if everything goes smoothly. We'll all regret having a home birth if some blip comes up because we don't actually have control over that in any setting, right? But the reason that our response works so well is because we keep physiology in mind and we are constantly working on restoring that when it's broken. So even though we don't have control over sometimes when things go.
54:44
sideways, our goal is to get things back in on the physiological track. And that might be something as simple as just acknowledging where mom's hormones are at. Yeah. Yeah. Reducing the stress. I was going to mention that. And I think that is so key. And I actually like, this is my soapbox, you guys. I feel like so many emergencies are created in hospitals, not even just because we're doing more interventions, but even before that happens because we're creating an environment of stress and anxiety.
55:14
that's going to spike adrenaline, spike cortisol, decrease oxytocin. So then labor is more painful, labor stalls, and women hemorrhage if it's after the baby was born. If you don't have that surplus of oxytocin, you're more likely to bleed out. And we're creating this environment of stress, whereas like just the approach we have toward women and the way we treat them in labor.
55:36
is enough to alter their hormones and to interfere with the physiology of labor. And we don't realize how much of an impact that has. And you have that in mind. Most doctors do not, and they are not trained in physiology at all and how it plays out in birth. So everything you do is with that in mind. How is this going to be interpreted by mom? How is her body going to respond? Is this facilitating love and care? And you're also using your skills and the tools you
56:06
quickly, but doing it in a way that's like bringing her back to homeostasis, which that alone can move her away from that high risk or emergent category. And this is such an important conversation to have, like how you are treated and how you feel in labor has a massive impact. It's not just selfish for wanting a home birth. It literally could mean the difference between an emergency happening or not based on how it affects your hormones.
56:35
And I mean, I think it's I think it's missed on a lot of people, but that's really just the difference in foundational pieces of how does your care provider view birth? Yeah, right. If we see it as a normal physiological event, we can treat it as such and manage the pieces when they do go out of that normal sphere. But if you're viewing it as something that needs to be medically managed because you aren't ticking time bomb, and here's the hundred things that could go wrong. So let's try to put you inside of this box.
57:04
push all of these things on you to keep your quote risk down, then right, then you just see how those two very opposite polar experiences that you're going to be receiving from your care provider. And so again, I never tried to like, convince somebody to have a home birth by any means. And I know that people have chosen hospital births with their eyes wide open all of the information and that felt like the right decision for them.
57:33
but I think what's being missed is, how do you view birth and how do you want your care provider to view birth? I think that will change everything, right? If you went to see a trained surgeon for a very normal birth, that is totally your prerogative, but you have to recognize what you're walking into. Like you just have to, because I think it's really traumatizing a lot of women.
57:59
to be like, I want this normal experience. I really want this unmedicated birth as empowering experience. But you're walking into a location and just a philosophy of birth that you are going to have to fight against that because it's pretty much counter to what you're desiring. And that's really what kind of brought us both into midwifery from being doulas before this is recognizing...
58:24
Oh, but being invited into home births and being like, Oh, this is what women are wanting. This is the experience that they're trying to get in the hospital. But there's there's really not it really Apple. It's apples and oranges. Like it's it's kind of hard to get what you are desiring. Yeah. Even if you are low risk and they don't and there's nothing wrong that happens, there's still protocols they do even with nothing's wrong that you might not want them to do that they're just going to do usually without even asking you in labor.
58:54
clushing after baby's born, like, and those things could cause hemorrhage and distress to baby and trauma, like, all in of themselves. Not even to count the, like, oh my gosh, something horrible happened. Just the normal protocols they have are, I think, personally kind of traumatizing, you know, if we were to look at, like, the the fetal mis- the, what do you call it, the frontal mis-age and pulling on the cord to, like, detach the plis- like, it's just so much. It's like, just keep your hands off.
59:23
Like the physiological birth actually works quite well without your involvement. And I think like we hear from women all the time who are like, well, actually had a great hospital birth. I got everything I wanted. It was a lovely experience. And I want that for women. I want no matter where they give birth, walk away and feel like it was a wonderful experience. But the only thing I can ever think of, and of course we're home birth midwives, we champion for, for women to.
59:52
consider and experience home birth, we do think that that is the best place for most women, even though we recognize it's not going to be the best place for all women. I just have to preface that because I'm not shitting anyone for their experience. This is just everything to us, right? When I say that women who have had a wonderful birth in the hospital are just at the tip of the iceberg for what is possible, most women don't even get that.
01:00:20
But if you had a wonderful birth in the hospital that you were very satisfied with, and it was a fulfilling experience, you just missed out on about 90% better experience in a different setting with a different care provider. And so, why is it okay for us to settle for not being traumatized, not being abused, not being coerced into something and allowing our bodies to work when there's actually something so much above and beyond that?
01:00:49
available in different settings. Yeah, and until you experience it or witness it, it's really hard to understand that. And I think that's why a lot of women see the birth videos I show, and they watch them week after week after week. And then at a certain point, they're like, I want that. And I realize I can't really get that in a hospital setting. It's not that it never happens. It does happen. It's very rare. And there's a lot of work that goes into that. And the right provider and all that, you know, I teach that. I have a class on that in the hospital.
01:01:19
in my course, but it's a lot more work. And it's not even a guarantee then. But the women watch these videos after video because we're not exposed to, we don't know. This is actually what normal birth looks like, normal physiological birth. And they go, oh, that's actually what my soul is craving. And those are the women that I know. Yeah, you can have this. And that's just my message is like, you can have this experience.
01:01:43
And you deserve this experience. And that doesn't mean every woman should birth at home. Like you said, like some women simply are too high risk to do that. And, and they need to have a hospital birth, but there's a lot of women that discard it, write it off before you actually look it into and considering it seriously. My hope for that is that this discussion helps women answer some of those question marks and fears that might have been lingering or keeping them from looking into this, because I think it is an option. I agree with you that it.
01:02:12
A lot more women are eligible or qualified, I guess, would be another word to say it, for a home birth that may not have considered or may have ruled it out for themselves. You mentioned a couple stories of things that were going wrong or where some interventions, almost supernatural intervention happened. I'd love to end with what you've seen in the home birth setting that just blew your mind. That even surprised you with all the births you've seen.
01:02:41
Either God intervened or like something shifted when it was something you'd never seen before. Yeah. I do want to share one story that I had mentioned to you before, because it just, as soon as you had said, well, I love to share stories. If you know anywhere, like God just really showed up. I have one particular story in mind and it fits so perfectly with what we're talking about because it was a true emergency and we were helping a mom. It was her first home birth. And it was for her.
01:03:11
third baby, but her first home birth. And she was really excited about it. And through the labor, it was much more difficult than she was expecting. And so we were supporting her a lot, but it finally came time to push. And she was doing a wonderful job. And it wasn't until the very end that we started to see signs of shoulder dystocia and the midwife that I was there with, we had a third midwife in our practice during this time.
01:03:36
the midwife that I was there with was working to resolve it. And so when we resolve shoulder dystocia, we have a certain set of instructions and protocols and such that we go through to just try to resolve it as quickly as possible, but with as little damage as possible. And she was going through those and the shoulder was not coming, was not resolving. And so-
01:04:04
Yeah. And, and so then she asked me to step in and I did. And I was like, Oh, I see why this is so difficult. That baby was really, really, really stuck. And I mean, I do know it was the Lord, because I don't remember making a conscious decision to do this, but I broke that baby's clavicle and he came out right away, but we, he had already been stuck for like six or seven minutes at this week. And so he came out and he needed to be.
01:04:34
The dad started praying as soon as the baby came out and he just was declaring in the entire room, God's power over this child. And for him to, you know, just be speaking that and praying that out loud, instead of freaking out or asking us what was happening or calling 911 or all those things like that would have all been completely appropriate because it was a true emergency.
01:05:00
But while this other midwife and I were working on this baby, this baby just came around. And by the time EMS had arrived, we had that baby fully stable again with our resuscitative efforts. And because we, as we were assessing the baby, we were like, okay, you are actually stable right now. But because we had to do...
01:05:21
a resuscitation on you. And because I know that he broke your clavicle, you need to go in and get seen by somebody little buddy, like let's just make sure you are okay. Let's have somebody in the NICU take a once over on you and give you guys, you know, some instructions on how to care for this baby while he continues to recover. And so we stayed home with the mom and the dad went in with the baby and it's different in every single community. But.
01:05:50
we were expecting that to be a hot mess for them, for the transfer, for them to be received poorly, for them to come up with all these reasons why they should keep the baby, why they need more interventions. We were expecting, you know, phone calls from us of like, how could you... Nicole Ingle It's getting reported and have police, like... Ashley Absolutely. Nicole Ingle CPS, yeah. Ashley Yeah. Which of course, we understand that as a part of what we do that there's...
01:06:18
There's adversity and there's not collaboration in our community all the time. And so we accept that as a part of what we have to deal with. And ultimately, it doesn't matter to me as long as I get everybody where they need to be and everybody's okay. Like you're going to put me in jail for that or you're going to take my license away. Like I'm okay with that. I mean, it's in God's hands, right? But that baby got checked out, got a complete bill of health. They said there was absolutely nothing wrong with the baby. Just you know.
01:06:45
support his arm as his clavicle heals, et cetera. And they came home within like an hour and a half of being out. So I just saw God's provision and, you know, just mercy all over that situation. And just hearing those dad's words that can just even hear in my mind right now of his prayer, just lifting up this child and how God was so faithful to provide.
01:07:11
in a situation that we have seen and could have easily gone just completely differently. Yeah. Wow, like, that's amazing. Like, God intervened and that he used you, like, knowing this is—you knew, like, in this moment, whether that was Holy Spirit or your expertise, like, this is what I need to do to get this baby unstuck. And for those that might not know, the risk of shoulder dystocia is a lack of oxygen. And so it can be life-threatening if that baby does not come, because they can be—
01:07:41
not getting the oxygen they need. And that's when the shoulders also are stuck. So the head is typically out, but they're not able to rotate to release the shoulders. That's why breaking that clavicle or collarbone is often what is needed. And that is like the last step. I think that would have happened in the hospital or maybe even been even worse had it happened there, but they would have done probably different positions.
01:08:08
that probably may or may not have helped as much and eventually had to do the same thing in the end with probably a lot more trauma. So like, I think that just goes again back to your point of like, this is why we have, this is why we hire midwives. Like, this is why you're there. You have the tools, you have the training to know how to help. And that's like the rare case where it truly is an emergency. And in many of the other cases you can resolve it before it becomes that.
01:08:32
And so I just want to thank you guys for what you do, for how you support women in the home setting, for bringing this information, this knowledge to the forefront. Because we, you know, we're so afraid of home birth as a society and especially the medical field. So you go to your doctor and they tell you all these horror stories and how stupid it would be. And then you talk to your midwife, you're like, oh, okay, but okay, I'm getting that. So we need that good information out there so that women can make true informed decisions.
01:09:01
also knowing it is not 100% risk-free. Like things do happen, things do go sideways, but how are you gonna treat that? That's the next question. How are you equipped to handle a shoulder to shoulder hemorrhage, fetal distress? Like what would you recommend in that situation? And the SQA will be the same thing. Like what happens? And if you need a transport, the epidural's there at the hospital, the OR is always there, you know? And so I think having a good understanding of normal
01:09:31
what is physiological and how we treat things in a home setting, how we treat things in a hospital setting and how why we might need to transfer. These are all like really important conversations to have. I'm so glad you guys are doing what you do and came to share about this to women and partners that are preparing for a birth because it's life changing. Birth is life changing. It's transformational and getting this information into their hands to give them.
01:09:57
Like you, I love what you said, Kelly, about like making that decision with eyes wide open because it is a big decision. So thank you guys so much for coming on. I love that story. I'm still like thinking about it. Like what a miracle. And yeah, I hope to have more. I hope to hear more stories too. I'm sure you have a treasure trove, but just for time's sake, we'll probably end it here. Hope you guys got a lot out of this and we'll see you next time.
01:10:25
Thank you for listening to this episode of the Pain Free Birth podcast. If you were encouraged, it would mean so much if you left us a five-star review and shared this with your community. I'd love to connect with you on Instagram at PainFreeBirth. To learn more about the Pain Free Birth e-course, free resources, private coaching, and upcoming events, find out more at painfreebirth.com. See you next week.
