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173. MyMaine Birth: Lilly's two autonomous Maine Medical Center Birth Stories · MyMaine Birth

• 0:00
  Lilly: So I am the oldest of five kids, and my mom gave birth almost in a variety of ways.
• 0:07
  Lilly: None of us were the same.
• 0:09
  Lilly: She did not have any cesareans, but she did natural, she did epidural, she had um, I forget what the name of it is, but it's kind of like a partial epidural where she was only numb from like her belly was numb, but it so she talked a lot about birth and she didn't ever speak of it negatively, but she definitely did say that it was painful and say that everyone was different.
• 0:31
  Lilly: Every, you know, she couldn't really predict.
• 0:33
  Lilly: My sister came super fast, some of us were slower.
• 0:36
  Lilly: But when I was talking, I became an adult and like hearing, you know, I have adult friends who start giving birth.
• 0:42
  Lilly: And a lot of them, I don't know that their births were traumatic, but they spoke of it like maybe it was.
• 0:48
  Lilly: Just the pain was way more than they expected, and they don't know how anybody could ever do it naturally.
• 0:56
  Lilly: They, you know, they got in there and they immediately had to get the the epidural, they couldn't handle it, it's just too much.
• 1:02
  Lilly: And one of my friends who did get an epidural is like, you still feel everything, and so there's no right answer.
• 1:08
  Lilly: So that was kind of the, but it's all just you know, girl talk, and that's the conversations that come out.
• 1:13
  Lilly: And I think it's very easy to find that narrative with people who maybe just have never been exposed to someone who did it naturally and enjoyed the process of doing it naturally.
• 1:24
  Lilly: So that's what I started to try to seek out was those stories and those that that narrative was what I wanted to be.
• 1:30
  Lilly: That's what I am accepting as truth, and that's what I am going to go through.
• 1:34
  Lilly: So listening to some of your episodes too, and even the women who have talked to you before and went the epidural route or went, I felt like everyone came from such a place of like compassion towards other moms and how they chose to go about it.
• 1:48
  Lilly: And very few of them spoke about like being in a fearful place going into labor.
• 1:54
  Lilly: And so that was just no matter how their story played out, really struck a chord with me and being like, okay, no matter how this plays out, I can be in charge and I can make decisions that are right for me.
• 2:06
  Lilly: So thank you for this.
• 2:09
  Lilly: Thank you for this.
• 2:11
  Lilly: Because it really was just very powerful to start hearing birth talked about differently.
• 2:17
  Angela: Yeah, like you've got this.
• 2:19
  Lilly: Yeah.
• 2:20
  Lilly: Yeah.
• 2:20
  Lilly: Your body knows what to do.
• 2:22
  Lilly: You're, you know, and it's it all can be normal.
• 2:25
  Lilly: There's a huge range of what is normal in giving birth.
• 2:29
  Lilly: And as long as you and your baby are healthy, how you get there is up to, you know, you can choose, and there's no wrong answer.
• 2:39
  Angela: I'm Angela, and I'm a certified birth photographer, experienced doula, childbirth educator, and your host here on the My Main Birth podcast.
• 2:48
  Angela: This is a space where we share the real life stories of families and their unique birth experiences in the beautiful state of Maine.
• 2:56
  Angela: From our state's biggest hospitals to birth center births and home births, every birth story deserves to be heard and celebrated.
• 3:05
  Angela: Whether you're a soon-to-be mom, a seasoned mother, or simply interested in the world of birth, these episodes are for you.
• 3:13
  Angela: Hey everyone, welcome to episode 173 of My Main Birth.
• 3:20
  Angela: As a reminder, I share all different types of stories that are submitted to me.
• 3:24
  Angela: Hospital births, birth center births, all different types of home births.
• 3:29
  Angela: Whether your story was positive, negative, or anything in between.
• 3:33
  Angela: This is a safe space for you to feel seen and heard.
• 3:36
  Angela: And if you're pregnant or planning on becoming pregnant, I personally think it's really important to listen to a variety of different birth stories so that you can start to focus in on what pregnancy and birth path is right for you.
• 3:51
  Angela: Because as I'll continue to say, it does not look the same for everyone.
• 3:57
  Angela: And women today are making a wide variety of choices when it comes to their pregnancies and births.
• 4:02
  Angela: And ultimately, you are the authority in your birth experience.
• 4:07
  Angela: And the choices are up to you.
• 4:08
  Angela: If you want to connect with me, if you're interested in doula support, birth photography, or if you want to share your birth story here on the podcast, you can do so through my website, mymainbirth.com, or you can always message me over on Instagram at MyMainBirth.
• 4:26
  Angela: Our closing song is by Kate Sutherland.
• 4:29
  Angela: Kate's community songs and deep nature connection work can be found over on her website at katSutherland.ca.
• 4:35
  Angela: Today's birth story guest is Lily, and she is here to share her two autonomous Maine Medical Center birth stories.
• 4:45
  Angela: And the second was with loving support from her midwife.
• 4:49
  Angela: All right.
• 4:51
  Angela: Hey Lily, welcome to my main birth.
• 4:53
  Angela: Thank you.
• 4:54
  Angela: Thanks for having me.
• 4:56
  Lilly: So to get started, would you share a little bit about you and your family?
• 5:00
  Lilly: Sure.
• 5:01
  Lilly: So I was born and raised in Maine.
• 5:05
  Lilly: Um I went away for college and came back when I was ready to start my family and was lucky enough to meet my husband like within a year of moving back.
• 5:14
  Lilly: So goal achieved.
• 5:16
  Lilly: He came with two bonus kiddos for me.
• 5:19
  Lilly: So I have two stepsons who are soon to be seven and five.
• 5:23
  Lilly: And then we have two girls together.
• 5:26
  Lilly: One is almost two and a half, and then Elizabeth is four and a half months.
• 5:32
  Angela: Amazing.
• 5:33
  Angela: So yeah, jumping into birth, do you want to share about how you found out you're pregnant and what your thoughts were in choosing your care?
• 5:43
  Lilly: Yeah, sure.
• 5:43
  Lilly: So the first time I found out I was pregnant, we were actually on our honeymoon.
• 5:47
  Lilly: We were one of those that started right away when we got married.
• 5:50
  Lilly: And we I wasn't expecting it to happen so fast, but we were fortunate enough that the first time it took.
• 5:57
  Lilly: So when we were packing for the honeymoon, I packed the pregnancy tests just in case.
• 6:02
  Lilly: Um, but I found myself getting very nervous about taking like that.
• 6:06
  Lilly: Seems like a very big, daunting thing the very first time.
• 6:10
  Lilly: And so I was like, you know what?
• 6:11
  Lilly: I'm just gonna take one.
• 6:12
  Lilly: We're a couple of days out from when a positive should show.
• 6:16
  Lilly: So let me just take one real quick.
• 6:18
  Lilly: I'm about to hop in the shower, and then I can, you know, I did it.
• 6:21
  Lilly: And then when I'm really ready to test, Chris will be here, my husband, and we'll find out together.
• 6:26
  Lilly: Uh, that is not how it worked out.
• 6:28
  Lilly: That very first test that I took uh had a very clear positive before I got in that shower.
• 6:34
  Lilly: And so he was actually the Airbnb we were staying at.
• 6:36
  Lilly: He was out in the sauna, and so I went running out like in my towel with the test.
• 6:41
  Lilly: And I was, I feel like there were so many emotions that come with that first positive of just like pure excitement because I've always wanted to be a mom.
• 6:51
  Lilly: We were so excited to grow our family, but also, you know, some fear, so you know, there's a lot of unknowns that come with being pregnant and giving birth, and you hear all these things, and now that's going to happen to me, and what's that going to be like?
• 7:07
  Lilly: So there was a lot of things happening in my brain and in my body, but mostly excitement.
• 7:13
  Lilly: I was really ready to kind of take on what I viewed almost as a challenge, you know, to get through, get through and have the the baby at the end, you know.
• 7:23
  Lilly: Yeah.
• 7:24
  Lilly: And you wanted me to talk a little about my care.
• 7:26
  Lilly: So I my husband, having gone through this twice already, I asked about his experience, and um the boys go to Intermed for their pediatrician, and that was where they had gone for um when their mom was pregnant with them.
• 7:40
  Lilly: And Chris had nothing but great things to say about the providers there.
• 7:44
  Lilly: And since I I'd kind of had I had one OB appointment in Maine since moving back.
• 7:50
  Lilly: Um, and so I didn't really have an established care team here.
• 7:54
  Lilly: So I was totally open to it.
• 7:55
  Lilly: And I went to Intermed and I loved it from the very first appointment.
• 7:59
  Lilly: Like I loved the OB they paired me with, and I all their staff was so friendly.
• 8:04
  Lilly: Um, the facility is very nice in there.
• 8:07
  Lilly: So I felt quite comfortable very early on, and that's where I decided to stay with them.
• 8:14
  Lilly: And they deliver at Maine Med exclusively.
• 8:17
  Lilly: So that is, I felt good about that too, because one of the things I'm a very type A person.
• 8:23
  Lilly: I like to be in control and think about, you know, outcome A, B, and C ahead of time.
• 8:30
  Lilly: And main med seemed like a really good option for me.
• 8:33
  Lilly: I feel comfortable in hospitals.
• 8:35
  Lilly: I know not everyone does, but I felt comfortable in the hospital and being at the place they would take me if something went wrong.
• 8:41
  Lilly: And I'm already there.
• 8:42
  Lilly: I'm already where I would need to be.
• 8:44
  Lilly: So that was kind of the driving factors of choosing was taking a recommendation, trying it out, and then feeling very comfortable with that after meeting with them.
• 8:55
  Angela: Yeah, that can be really comforting for a lot of people.
• 8:58
  Angela: Like you said, even if you're like delivering at mercy, like if something were to come up with the baby, like they would be transferring over to main med, and then you would be a different hospital.
• 9:06
  Angela: And yeah, there's just it can be like really comforting to have all of the things at the place where you're birthing.
• 9:11
  Angela: Exactly.
• 9:11
  Angela: Right.
• 9:12
  Angela: Um yeah.
• 9:12
  Angela: Do you care to share who like your favorite OB was there that they paired you with?
• 9:17
  Lilly: Uh so with my first was um Dr.
• 9:20
  Lilly: Pofal.
• 9:20
  Lilly: I am blanking on her first name now.
• 9:22
  Lilly: She is no longer practicing there.
• 9:24
  Lilly: By the time I got pregnant the second time, um, they paired with another doctor, Dr.
• 9:28
  Lilly: McCune, who was amazing.
• 9:30
  Lilly: So those are the two that I've worked most closely with.
• 9:32
  Lilly: But um, with my first pregnancy, I feel like I've met everybody on staff there.
• 9:36
  Lilly: I had to go in several times during my third trimester.
• 9:40
  Lilly: I didn't go more than a week without AUTI or a yeast infection in my third trimester.
• 9:47
  Lilly: So I met everybody there and everyone was so nice.
• 9:49
  Lilly: But Dr.
• 9:50
  Lilly: Pofal was just the best.
• 9:53
  Lilly: She was so, I don't know, she felt very familiar from even the first time sitting down with her and just she was open to whatever I wanted my plan to be.
• 10:05
  Lilly: And um, I wanted to try to go natural with my first, and she was totally for that and giving me advice on you know, different classes I could take or books that I could read.
• 10:16
  Lilly: Um, and one of the things I'd been nervous about with going the OB route was being pushed more into interventions or, you know, get the get the epidural.
• 10:26
  Lilly: And but it I did not have that experience.
• 10:28
  Lilly: Um, she was really just great.
• 10:30
  Lilly: She was great.
• 10:31
  Lilly: But Dr.
• 10:31
  Lilly: McCune with my second, she was amazing as well.
• 10:34
  Lilly: Same thing, just that same vibe to her, which I really appreciated through through everything.
• 10:40
  Angela: Yeah, that's really awesome to hear that because yeah, like the first thing is oh, if you go to the the, you know, the hospital route or with an OB, like you're gonna have this super medicalized birth.
• 10:50
  Angela: And maybe like that can still happen, but it is nice to hear that the doctors are supportive of you know, natural birth.
• 10:57
  Lilly: Yeah, yeah.
• 10:58
  Lilly: It was uh one of the biggest like weights on my shoulder going in, and it was completely lifted as soon as I met them.
• 11:04
  Lilly: So I was very, very grateful for that.
• 11:08
  Angela: Awesome.
• 11:08
  Angela: Yeah.
• 11:09
  Angela: Cool.
• 11:09
  Angela: So, how are you feeling throughout your pregnancy?
• 11:11
  Angela: Like in the beginning, there, like, were you feeling good?
• 11:14
  Angela: Like, how yeah, with your pregnancy?
• 11:16
  Lilly: Yeah, I was definitely sick the first trimester, but not like the I expected the sickness to be a lot of throwing up, and it wasn't.
• 11:25
  Lilly: It was just extreme nausea all day.
• 11:28
  Lilly: There was no, you know, you don't even get that relief of the throwing up.
• 11:31
  Lilly: It was just, I am nauseous.
• 11:33
  Lilly: That is me.
• 11:35
  Lilly: Um, so I was very nauseous with my first and the second trimester hit and I like rode that high.
• 11:41
  Lilly: I loved being pregnant.
• 11:43
  Lilly: I love, I love the feeling of the baby.
• 11:46
  Lilly: You know, you start to get those kicks and the movements, and I loved having a little pregnant belly.
• 11:50
  Lilly: I always think pregnant bellies are so cute and so finely having my own to, you know, dress up and style.
• 11:56
  Lilly: I thought that was I loved it.
• 11:57
  Lilly: I love being pregnant.
• 11:59
  Lilly: Um, and then yeah, in the third trimester, still loved the feeling of being pregnant, but didn't love some of the side effects that came with it.
• 12:06
  Lilly: I had a lot of like pelvic pain going on, and like I had mentioned a little bit ago, I literally a UTI or yeast infection.
• 12:12
  Lilly: I was on several different medications they tried, and um, it was kind of just like you, you're probably just gonna be uncomfortable for the last bit here.
• 12:21
  Lilly: So I was, but I um I hadn't really thought about that in a long time until I was rerunning, you know, the first pregnancy in preparation for this conversation.
• 12:30
  Lilly: I was like, oh yeah, I was a little miserable at the end there, just back and forth.
• 12:34
  Lilly: I was at Intermed probably once a week for that stuff.
• 12:37
  Lilly: So just comes with the territory sometimes.
• 12:43
  Angela: Yeah, yeah, I can.
• 12:44
  Angela: Was there anything like that you they thought was maybe causing that more like than normal?
• 12:49
  Lilly: Or they just said that it can happen.
• 12:51
  Lilly: There, you know, there's changes all through your body when you're pregnant, and some of the bacteria I had a history, like I get more yeast infections than the average person in my past already.
• 13:01
  Lilly: So my microbiome is already a little out of whack, I think.
• 13:05
  Lilly: And pregnancy just exaggerated that.
• 13:08
  Lilly: And then um, you know, we'd take care of it and it just would keep coming back.
• 13:13
  Lilly: So I don't know, but it's as soon as I had the baby, they stopped.
• 13:16
  Lilly: So I had no issues after pregnancy.
• 13:19
  Lilly: So, like, we'll see how it goes because this is what we think is causing it, and sure enough, it was just baby.
• 13:26
  Angela: Yeah, that's really interesting.
• 13:27
  Angela: Yeah, I think you're thinking about that.
• 13:29
  Angela: Yeah.
• 13:30
  Angela: So, how were things looking?
• 13:33
  Angela: Is there anything else like that you want to mention about your pregnancy?
• 13:36
  Angela: Like, were you kind of going through like the gestational diabetes testing and the GBS, like basically like all of the like standard of care things?
• 13:44
  Lilly: Yeah, and I was lucky enough to have like I have a very healthy pregnancy.
• 13:48
  Lilly: The baby was always great, she was always uh, you know, right at the perfect level for everything they ever checked.
• 13:56
  Lilly: Um, and I was very grateful for that too.
• 13:58
  Lilly: Um, but yeah, and we found out she was a girl and it was so exciting to be able to tell like family and tell her brothers.
• 14:05
  Lilly: And um, I my sister has one daughter who she had had before I found out I was pregnant, and then she found out she was pregnant a couple of weeks after I did.
• 14:15
  Lilly: So we actually have girls who ended up three weeks apart.
• 14:18
  Lilly: Um, but it was fun to be like pregnant with my sister, and she had a natural birth, her first one, and she was the first person I ever heard talk so highly of having had a natural birth.
• 14:31
  Lilly: And if it was not for her, I don't think I would have pursued that for myself.
• 14:36
  Lilly: But she spoke very highly of it.
• 14:37
  Lilly: And so I read, I forget uh Birthing from Within was one of the books that she recommended.
• 14:41
  Lilly: So I read that, and then I also found a book on Spotify, and I'm going to blank on the name, I will find it.
• 14:49
  Lilly: But um, mindful birthing.
• 14:51
  Lilly: That's literally what it is called, mindful birthing.
• 14:53
  Lilly: And it just talks about the mindset around giving birth, and it's not necessarily geared towards having a natural birth, it's just teaching mindset going into labor because it is intense.
• 15:04
  Lilly: So I spent a lot of my first pregnancy preparing.
• 15:07
  Lilly: Like I said, I'm very type A.
• 15:08
  Lilly: I like to be in control.
• 15:09
  Lilly: And for me, being armed with knowledge was the best thing I could do for myself.
• 15:14
  Lilly: So that's what I was doing throughout pregnancy was trying to get myself in the space.
• 15:19
  Lilly: I have a like a low pain tolerance.
• 15:21
  Lilly: I've been kind of afraid of giving birth all my life.
• 15:24
  Lilly: And so to be going into it thinking, no pain meds, just let me at it was terrifying but exciting.
• 15:31
  Lilly: And um, I really, by the time my due date came around, I was ready to go.
• 15:35
  Lilly: You know, that last week I was feeling prepared.
• 15:39
  Angela: Like, let's do this.
• 15:40
  Lilly: Yeah, exactly.
• 15:42
  Angela: Awesome.
• 15:43
  Angela: That's that's great, and that's amazing, you know, that your sister was so supportive and like sharing those stories and going through that experience and recommending those books.
• 15:51
  Angela: Um, do you care to share like any other like maybe stories or like that you might have things that you might have heard about birth growing up or and the like kind of your mindset going into your like adulthood about birth?
• 16:04
  Lilly: Yeah, sure.
• 16:05
  Lilly: So I am the oldest of five kids, and my mom gave birth almost in a variety of ways.
• 16:13
  Lilly: None of us were the same.
• 16:14
  Lilly: She did not have any cesareans, but she did natural, she did epidural, she had um, I forget what the name of it is, but it's kind of like a partial epidural where she was only numb from like her belly was numb, but it so she talked a lot about birth, and she didn't ever speak of it negatively, but she definitely did say that it was painful and say that everyone was different.
• 16:36
  Lilly: Every, you know, she couldn't really predict.
• 16:38
  Lilly: My sister came super fast, some of us were slower.
• 16:41
  Lilly: Um, but when I was talking, I became an adult and like hearing, you know, I have adult friends who start giving birth.
• 16:48
  Lilly: And a lot of them, I don't know that their births were traumatic, but they spoke of it like maybe it was just the pain was way more than they expected, and they don't know how anybody could ever do it naturally.
• 17:02
  Lilly: They, you know, they got in there and they immediately had to get the the epidural, they couldn't handle it, it's just too much.
• 17:08
  Lilly: And one of my friends who did get an epidural is like, you still feel everything, and so there's no right answer.
• 17:14
  Lilly: So that was kind of the, but it's all just you know, girl talk, and that's the conversations that come out.
• 17:19
  Lilly: And I think it's very easy to find that narrative with people who maybe just have never been exposed to someone who did it naturally and enjoyed the process of doing it naturally.
• 17:30
  Lilly: So that's what I started to try to seek out was those stories and those um that narrative was what I wanted to be.
• 17:39
  Lilly: That's what I am accepting as truth, and that's what I am going to go through.
• 17:43
  Lilly: So listening to some of your episodes too, and even the women who have talked to you before and went the epidural route or went, I felt like everyone came from such a place of like compassion towards other moms and how they chose to go about it.
• 17:56
  Lilly: And very few of them spoke about like being in a fearful place going into labor.
• 18:03
  Lilly: And so that was just no matter how their story played out, really struck a chord with me and being like, okay, no matter how this plays out, I can be in charge and I can make decisions that are right for me.
• 18:15
  Lilly: So thank you for this.
• 18:17
  Lilly: Thank you for this.
• 18:19
  Lilly: Because it really was just very powerful to start hearing birth talked about differently.
• 18:25
  Angela: Yeah, like you've got this.
• 18:28
  Lilly: Yeah, yeah.
• 18:28
  Lilly: Your body knows what to do.
• 18:31
  Lilly: You're, you know, and it's it all can be normal.
• 18:34
  Lilly: There's a huge range of what is normal in giving birth.
• 18:38
  Lilly: And as long as you and your baby are healthy, how you get there is up to you know, you can choose, and there's no wrong answer.
• 18:46
  Lilly: So yeah, awesome.
• 18:49
  Angela: Well, how were those final weeks and then days leading up to like when your labor started?
• 18:54
  Angela: And yeah, how was your birth?
• 18:56
  Lilly: Yeah.
• 18:57
  Lilly: So the last weeks were great.
• 18:58
  Lilly: I felt amazing, other than like pelvic pressure, and you know what we talked about.
• 19:02
  Lilly: Uh otherwise, I felt great.
• 19:03
  Lilly: I had energy.
• 19:04
  Lilly: We were running around playing with the boys, life went on as is normal for us.
• 19:11
  Lilly: Um, I had no Braxton Hicks, I had no anything leading up.
• 19:15
  Lilly: So I was like, for sure, I'm going to carry over.
• 19:18
  Lilly: I am not expecting anything before.
• 19:21
  Lilly: And then two days before my due date, I was woken up at like 1:30 a.m.
• 19:26
  Lilly: by what I know now was my first contraction.
• 19:29
  Lilly: I was kind of like, oh, that's interesting.
• 19:30
  Lilly: That's probably Braxton Hicks.
• 19:32
  Lilly: Cool.
• 19:32
  Lilly: Finally got my first one.
• 19:34
  Lilly: Go back to sleep.
• 19:35
  Lilly: Like an hour later, another one.
• 19:38
  Lilly: I was like, oh, interesting.
• 19:39
  Lilly: Okay, I'm gonna start getting them more frequently.
• 19:41
  Lilly: Great, go back to sleep.
• 19:43
  Lilly: And so that was kind of the pattern for the morning, and nothing really intense, and nothing obviously regular, or it wasn't getting closer together.
• 19:53
  Lilly: They weren't getting stronger.
• 19:55
  Lilly: So I lived that day just normal.
• 19:58
  Lilly: The boys were with us, and then by the afternoon, they did start to get a little closer together and pick up a little bit.
• 20:04
  Lilly: And so we had called their mom to come pick them up because it seemed like it was trending in that direction.
• 20:09
  Lilly: And we didn't want to have to call her in the middle of the night if we could help it.
• 20:13
  Lilly: So she came and collected them around dinner time.
• 20:16
  Lilly: And at that point, we were pretty sure that it was labor.
• 20:19
  Lilly: It still was like maybe 10-15 minutes apart, but they were pretty consistent.
• 20:24
  Lilly: Um, and I was having more trouble moving through them, like still being able to go a little bit, but I had to stop and breathe instead of just continuing whatever activity we were doing.
• 20:32
  Lilly: So they got picked up.
• 20:34
  Lilly: We, you know, cleaned up the house, finished everything up that we might want to have done if I do have the baby that night.
• 20:39
  Lilly: We sat down on the couch to have some ice cream, and maybe 10 minutes in, I had not finished my bowl of ice cream and my water broke on the couch.
• 20:48
  Lilly: And I was like, oh, that was my water.
• 20:52
  Lilly: Okay, let's go.
• 20:53
  Lilly: We're ready to go.
• 20:54
  Lilly: So we grabbed our go bags, put our you know, our ice cream in the sink and got on the road.
• 21:01
  Lilly: And we live an hour from main med.
• 21:04
  Lilly: So we had already talked to them about what timing would look like when I would come in.
• 21:09
  Lilly: My contractions never got close enough for us to worry about that.
• 21:12
  Lilly: But once my water broke, we wanted to get there.
• 21:15
  Lilly: And I was not prepared for how intense my contractions got after my water broke.
• 21:22
  Lilly: It was, I felt like I was doing really well.
• 21:24
  Lilly: I was feeling really good about where I was, and then my water broke and we got in the car.
• 21:28
  Lilly: And those two comp the combination of those two things, like now I'm uncomfortable because I can't be in whatever position I want to be in.
• 21:36
  Lilly: And my water is broken, which makes it a lot.
• 21:41
  Lilly: So that ride, I just I've blocked out most of it.
• 21:45
  Lilly: I do remember at one point on the drive because my husband was DJing, I wanted some music on, and he played push it, and he was like, Is this too on the nose?
• 21:52
  Lilly: And it was like a good little laugh for me in the moment.
• 21:56
  Lilly: But I could, I I I was just in my old.
• 21:59
  Lilly: Little world, just trying to breathe through.
• 22:02
  Lilly: And I started to get like the, especially as we got closer, starting to get a little more nervous.
• 22:07
  Lilly: And I felt that worry and the fear of like this baby has to come out of me.
• 22:11
  Lilly: I forgot about this part a little bit, and now it's real.
• 22:14
  Lilly: Here we are.
• 22:16
  Lilly: Um, but yeah, it was a very, I just remember being a very intense car ride.
• 22:21
  Lilly: And I'm sure half of it is just blacked out from my memory.
• 22:24
  Lilly: My eyes were closed.
• 22:25
  Lilly: I was in birth land, just trying to get through.
• 22:29
  Lilly: Got to triage, they checked me, and I was only four centimeters dilated.
• 22:34
  Lilly: And so I felt like a little defeated in that moment because my water's broken.
• 22:39
  Lilly: This feels really intense, and I'm only four centimeters, and I've been having contractions consistently for the entire day.
• 22:47
  Lilly: So, what is this gonna be like?
• 22:49
  Lilly: And it's the middle of the night now.
• 22:50
  Lilly: Now I'm also supposed to be sleeping, and this is happening, which I guess you're not really thinking about the sleep in that moment, but you start to feel tired, right?
• 22:59
  Lilly: And so they admitted me because my water had been broken.
• 23:02
  Lilly: Um, they checked me a couple more times and it was really progressing pretty slow.
• 23:06
  Lilly: I was there through the whole night, and at about 2 a.m., I started to just be like I was hitting a wall a little bit and feeling like I don't know that I can do this.
• 23:17
  Lilly: And so one of my when I was trying to go natural, I was like, okay, if I have to have anything, I'll try nitrous.
• 23:23
  Lilly: I know people say it doesn't really work, and it's just to help you focus on your breathing.
• 23:27
  Lilly: And I tried it and I won't do it again because it did not a lot.
• 23:31
  Lilly: I think I was already breathing pretty well, and so it just didn't do anything for me.
• 23:36
  Lilly: I know some people who like it a lot, but it was a no-go.
• 23:40
  Lilly: So then I was like, okay, that didn't work.
• 23:42
  Lilly: And now it's getting even more intense.
• 23:44
  Lilly: And everybody was, you know, looking to me like, what do you want?
• 23:48
  Lilly: Do you want to keep going?
• 23:49
  Lilly: We're here for you.
• 23:50
  Lilly: What can we do for you?
• 23:50
  Lilly: My nurses were great.
• 23:52
  Lilly: They like set up, they came in and put all the candles that they had in the room.
• 23:57
  Lilly: They turned the lights off.
• 23:59
  Lilly: Um, I did not want to get in the tub.
• 24:02
  Lilly: I just wasn't feeling I needed to be laying in the bed.
• 24:04
  Lilly: I had trouble kind of moving around.
• 24:06
  Lilly: So they're just trying to make me as comfortable as possible in the bed.
• 24:10
  Lilly: And like if I could go back now, I would try to get up and move more.
• 24:14
  Lilly: Um, but in that moment, like I really, every time they tried something new, I could not bear it.
• 24:20
  Lilly: I couldn't deal with it.
• 24:21
  Lilly: So I did end up getting an epidural with my first, which in the moment felt a little defeating.
• 24:27
  Lilly: But then once it kicked in and I got to take a nap, it was glorious.
• 24:32
  Lilly: That was exactly what I needed in that moment.
• 24:35
  Lilly: And we reached 10 centimeters.
• 24:39
  Lilly: I had them wait a little longer because she was still pretty high up.
• 24:42
  Lilly: She was at uh, I think a negative one station.
• 24:45
  Lilly: So I was trying to wait for her to come down a little bit because I knew I wasn't going to be able to feel much to help her along.
• 24:51
  Lilly: So I wanted her to be able to kind of help herself.
• 24:53
  Lilly: We got to a plus two, and then I started pushing, and I pushed for two hours, which I didn't realize that that is can be normal.
• 25:01
  Lilly: I thought pushing was like, yeah, we're here.
• 25:04
  Lilly: Here comes the baby.
• 25:05
  Lilly: No, it was two hours.
• 25:07
  Lilly: Like five different people came to hold my legs at different points as I'm pushing, and it was a that was kind of a surprise to me.
• 25:15
  Lilly: But she would like the baby was doing fine, I was doing fine.
• 25:18
  Lilly: So that was normal and okay.
• 25:20
  Lilly: And then she was born.
• 25:22
  Lilly: It was rather anticlimactic because I had the epidural and it worked very well for me.
• 25:27
  Lilly: I really felt pressure, but I felt no pain.
• 25:31
  Lilly: So I could feel that she was coming, like I could feel that kind of like a bowling ball sitting down low.
• 25:37
  Lilly: And I felt the relief when she was out, but I felt nothing else.
• 25:41
  Lilly: Um, so it was the right choice for me at that point, and I feel fine about that decision.
• 25:46
  Lilly: I think it was the right call.
• 25:49
  Lilly: But she was born at 850 a day before her due date.
• 25:52
  Lilly: So she made an early appearance and she was a big, she's eight pounds, 10 ounces, so on the slightly larger side, but nothing too crazy.
• 26:01
  Lilly: And she was happy, healthy, nothing went right.
• 26:04
  Lilly: Like, really, I was so blessed to have everything that went right for me because I know there are so many points that it can go wrong, or you know, little things, but really we we were so lucky.
• 26:16
  Lilly: And we did golden hour, we waited for the cord to be white and limp, and then my husband got to cut the cord and we just snuggled and she was perfect.
• 26:28
  Lilly: Of course, they're always perfect, right?
• 26:29
  Lilly: Little baby have been waiting so long to meet.
• 26:32
  Lilly: Um, and then we got to be in our own little bubble.
• 26:34
  Lilly: But it yeah, it was so it I was glad I did all the preparation because I was educated on what my options could be, and then um I just hit that wall, and I I knew that for me the right call was getting some some help, some pain relief.
• 26:51
  Angela: Yeah, that's really like uh the biggest thing, you know, going into like a hospital birth, especially is to know the different things that could come up, to be educated about what your options are, and then to be able to choose them from an educated place instead of just like doing what everybody tells you to do, you know, like making your own decisions.
• 27:09
  Angela: Yeah, yeah.
• 27:11
  Lilly: And I I really felt in the first one, I wanted my husband to tell me what to do so bad.
• 27:16
  Lilly: But I that's not the right call.
• 27:17
  Lilly: You should be the one making the decision.
• 27:19
  Lilly: But I remember a point just before I said, give me the upper dural where everyone was looking to me and nobody's pressuring me, but they're sitting waiting to find out what I want to do.
• 27:29
  Lilly: And so yeah, there was, I mean, I had like a minute or two in between contractions to think, and then I'd have to go contract again.
• 27:37
  Lilly: And so that felt uh like daunting, but I just I wanted somebody else to make up my mind for me, and that's not gonna come.
• 27:44
  Lilly: If you're in the right place, that's not gonna come.
• 27:47
  Lilly: They want you to make that decision, but yeah, it was the epidural was right because I got some sleep and then we got the baby out safely.
• 27:54
  Lilly: So everybody was good.
• 27:57
  Angela: Yeah, and that's the thing of like going through those moments in birth is like that's the transformation.
• 28:04
  Angela: Like that's part of it, like a big part, you know, of like, okay, you know, like it sounds like you know, you're still reflecting on that moment of, you know, I have to make my own decisions and like even yeah, yeah, like it's a big deal, like life changing, like transformations, like birth is yeah, it is it is intense, is the right word for it, but it is also beautiful and amazing, and you you meet a side of yourself that maybe you didn't know existed before.
• 28:32
  Lilly: Yeah, exactly.
• 28:34
  Angela: So, how do you remember how the placenta came out, or was there any tearing?
• 28:38
  Lilly: I had a second degree tear, so they did have to do some stitches.
• 28:42
  Lilly: The placenta came out fine.
• 28:43
  Lilly: We did had no intervention there either.
• 28:45
  Lilly: It just came on out on its own volition.
• 28:49
  Lilly: But um, yeah, the second degree tear, and then afterwards, um, before they move you to mother baby, they want you to be able to get up and pee because I did have a catheter.
• 28:58
  Lilly: And um, I got up and I was so lightheaded I couldn't make it to the bathroom on my own.
• 29:04
  Lilly: So they had to turn me around and put me back in the bed before I would pass out.
• 29:07
  Lilly: And they tried again like 15, 20 minutes later, it's still happening.
• 29:11
  Lilly: I had lost, they said it was like right on the line of how much blood they would allow some or they would want somebody to lose.
• 29:18
  Lilly: I had just hit that line.
• 29:20
  Lilly: So they were pretty nervous about the lightheadedness, which ended up fine.
• 29:24
  Lilly: It just I had to sit in LD a little longer than maybe the average bear.
• 29:29
  Lilly: But yeah, otherwise it was good.
• 29:32
  Lilly: And the worst part of the epidural, by the way, was them ripping the tape off in Mother Baby.
• 29:37
  Lilly: That was terrible.
• 29:38
  Lilly: I I was worried about the needle going in.
• 29:41
  Lilly: I was, but no, in the moment, I have a my mom told me at one point that nothing sounded better to her than a needle in the spine when she called for her epidural.
• 29:51
  Lilly: And honestly, it's true.
• 29:52
  Lilly: I was like, you know what?
• 29:53
  Lilly: That and I I it was a pinch.
• 29:55
  Lilly: It was nothing compared to what I was experiencing.
• 29:58
  Lilly: So I was worried about the wrong part.
• 29:59
  Lilly: It's the after everything's good and you're feeling better, and then they come and rip this gorilla glue off your back.
• 30:08
  Angela: Oh my goodness.
• 30:09
  Angela: Well, that's great.
• 30:10
  Angela: You had that like little tidbit of advice from her, like in your head in that moment, too.
• 30:14
  Lilly: It sounds like yeah, oh yeah, it stuck with me.
• 30:16
  Lilly: And that I must have been a teenager when she said that to me.
• 30:19
  Lilly: And it's just always stuck with me.
• 30:20
  Lilly: Of I I thought I always thought before my sister, I thought I'll give birth with an epidural because my mom said that nothing sounded better in the moment.
• 30:31
  Angela: Yeah.
• 30:32
  Angela: Oh my gosh.
• 30:33
  Angela: Well, it sounds, you know, sometimes that's what you need when you've been like going all day and all night, and like you actually do need a nap, you know.
• 30:39
  Angela: Yeah, right.
• 30:40
  Angela: Yeah.
• 30:42
  Angela: Yeah.
• 30:42
  Angela: Um awesome.
• 30:44
  Angela: Well, so how was your like postpartum, like the rest of your time in the hospital?
• 30:48
  Angela: And yeah, when you went home.
• 30:50
  Lilly: It was the hospital was great.
• 30:51
  Lilly: We stayed only for one night because I was feeling great and baby was doing well.
• 30:56
  Lilly: Um, but her brothers got to come meet her at the hospital.
• 30:59
  Lilly: Um, and both grandmothers made it, and one of her grandfathers came and got to meet her in the hospital, which was so special and so fun.
• 31:08
  Lilly: Um, I remember my husband went and got breakfast from Tandem in Portland, and they have this banana bread that has like black sesame seeds on top and their breakfast sandwich, and it still just lives in my memory because that was the first big meal I had postpartum.
• 31:24
  Lilly: Um, and we've gotten it a few times since, and it just takes me right back to that hospital room in that special, special moment.
• 31:31
  Lilly: But um, so the hospital was great, and then we got home and the boys came back, they were with us the very next day.
• 31:37
  Lilly: We just kind of jumped head first right back into it because this is our new normal.
• 31:43
  Lilly: Um and yeah, postpartum was good.
• 31:46
  Lilly: Uh, my oldest, she is not a very good sleeper, she never was and still is not at two and a half years.
• 31:54
  Lilly: Um, so we were pretty sleep deprived for, I mean, still are someday.
• 31:59
  Lilly: We did we barely slept last night.
• 32:00
  Lilly: Let's talk about last night.
• 32:02
  Lilly: But um, yeah, the sleep was the hardest part of postpartum, I think.
• 32:06
  Lilly: Um because you're already like your body is adjusting to being not pregnant.
• 32:12
  Lilly: You're learning how to be a mom and you're learning this new person, and you're doing all that with next to no sleep, which take all of that out of the equation.
• 32:23
  Lilly: Next to no sleep is hard enough.
• 32:25
  Lilly: Um but I am my husband is an amazing partner and he's super supportive and helpful, and he wants to jump in there.
• 32:33
  Lilly: Um, and so I I think it would it could have been a lot harder and it could have been a lot worse.
• 32:39
  Lilly: He took very good care of me, and um, that allowed me the space to take really good care of her.
• 32:46
  Lilly: So yeah, it was it was a lot there, you know, it's it's a whole new world, and nothing really can prepare you for it until you're you're in it.
• 32:57
  Angela: Yeah, it's so true, especially those first few nights can be really intense, especially because like dad might even like want to help out a lot, but like he's tired too from birth.
• 33:07
  Angela: Yeah, yeah.
• 33:08
  Lilly: And sometimes like the we exclusively breastfed.
• 33:11
  Lilly: My daughter never took a bottle.
• 33:13
  Lilly: And so there's also only so much he can do when she wakes up in the night.
• 33:17
  Lilly: And then, you know, and once she started, we got through like the very first newborn bubbly phase, and she has had a strong preference for mommy ever since then.
• 33:27
  Lilly: So yeah, he but he like I said, he's done a good job of focusing on me and making sure I'm fed and hydrated and get rest when I can, um, so that I could really focus on her.
• 33:39
  Lilly: And I'm really thankful to him for that because it would have sucked otherwise.
• 33:44
  Angela: Yeah, that's really important, really important because yeah, like you have everything that your baby needs, but you are the one that needs support and yeah, like food brought to you those first few days, especially, and yeah, like helping out in the middle of the night just to bring baby to you and like little things like that, so you can and it's so easy, it's easy to forget yourself when you're so focused on the baby, like so easy.
• 34:08
  Lilly: I haven't eaten like all day.
• 34:10
  Lilly: Yeah, like oh, right, you're right.
• 34:12
  Lilly: I am hungry, thank you.
• 34:13
  Lilly: Yeah, I am I haven't checked in with my own body in hours.
• 34:17
  Lilly: Thank you so much.
• 34:20
  Angela: Yeah, awesome.
• 34:21
  Angela: So how um, like when did you find out you were pregnant for the second time now?
• 34:28
  Lilly: Yeah, so our daughter was, I want to say like 14, 13 or 14 months.
• 34:32
  Lilly: We started talking about it when she turned one because we wanted to at least wait until she was one.
• 34:36
  Lilly: Um, but the sleep was really like, how is this ever gonna play out with a newborn in there?
• 34:41
  Lilly: And then finally we're like, you know what?
• 34:43
  Lilly: We're just gonna let's do it.
• 34:45
  Lilly: We want our the siblings close together if we can, and maybe it'll take some time, so let's just get started.
• 34:50
  Lilly: And we were lucky enough again.
• 34:52
  Lilly: It was not the first month we tried, but the second month we were pregnant.
• 34:56
  Lilly: And this time I made sure that Chris was there when I took the test.
• 35:00
  Lilly: There's no more, no more of the jitters anyway, but um, and our daughter got to be there.
• 35:05
  Lilly: She didn't really understand what was going on, but just kind of special to find out with her there.
• 35:10
  Lilly: And we're like, okay, here we go again.
• 35:13
  Lilly: We're we're pregnant.
• 35:14
  Lilly: Here comes another baby.
• 35:16
  Lilly: Um, and with Amelia, we had waited, that's my oldest.
• 35:18
  Lilly: We had waited to tell people until after the first ultrasound.
• 35:22
  Lilly: And with our second, we just started telling family right away.
• 35:25
  Lilly: That's just what felt right to us.
• 35:27
  Lilly: Um, and so, like, the boys got to know pretty quickly, and we have all of our names written in the little magnetic alphabet on our fridge.
• 35:36
  Lilly: And so we added baby, and that was how we told the grandparents when they came to our house.
• 35:40
  Lilly: We're like, Oh, by the way, look what we put on the fridge.
• 35:42
  Lilly: And they were so excited.
• 35:44
  Lilly: So, there's a lot of excitement around the second baby, a lot.
• 35:48
  Lilly: Yeah, oh my gosh, so fun! Yeah, and our daughter was obsessed, still is obsessed with baby dolls.
• 35:56
  Lilly: So when she kind of obviously, if they don't fully wrap their heads around it, but she knew that she was getting a baby and the baby was in my belly, she was obsessed with my belly for the entire pregnancy.
• 36:07
  Lilly: Like her baby was in there, she knew there was a baby in there for her.
• 36:11
  Angela: Oh my gosh, that's so cute! Yeah, yeah, it was the best.
• 36:14
  Angela: That's adorable.
• 36:17
  Lilly: So, what were your thoughts in choosing your care the second time around?
• 36:21
  Lilly: I loved Intermed.
• 36:22
  Lilly: I loved my experience at Maine Med.
• 36:24
  Lilly: So I stuck with it.
• 36:26
  Lilly: I had just gone back to them for my annual exam when my daughter turned one.
• 36:33
  Lilly: And they were like, Okay, you're you're getting ready to try again.
• 36:36
  Lilly: We'll probably see you within the next year.
• 36:38
  Lilly: And then I was back like two months later.
• 36:40
  Lilly: Hi, I'm here.
• 36:41
  Lilly: Um, but yeah, I loved, I just loved my care there.
• 36:44
  Lilly: So I I stuck with it.
• 36:46
  Lilly: There was to me, there was no sense in messing with a good thing that works for me.
• 36:52
  Angela: Yeah.
• 36:52
  Angela: So how were you feeling as this pregnancy started out?
• 36:57
  Lilly: It was similar but different.
• 36:59
  Lilly: I had the nausea again.
• 37:01
  Lilly: We did some like traveling in the beginning.
• 37:03
  Lilly: My brother got married in California.
• 37:05
  Lilly: So very early on in my morning sickness journey, we flew to California and I was in a wedding.
• 37:12
  Lilly: Um, but there was a lot more activity the second time around to kind of distract from that sick feeling.
• 37:19
  Lilly: So it's it's kind of like a footnote in thinking back to those early days because I was chasing a very active toddler around.
• 37:26
  Lilly: We were traveling.
• 37:27
  Lilly: Um, this time around, I had been working when I got pregnant my first, and I worked until she was one, and then I was stay at home.
• 37:35
  Lilly: So this time I didn't have to worry about hopping onto meetings in between feeling sick, and I could kind of just we could get out of the house if we needed to, and we could go do distracting things.
• 37:46
  Lilly: Um, so the nausea was there, but I better like I knew better how to handle it and how to distract myself from it.
• 37:54
  Lilly: So I had a better experience, I think, this time than with my first.
• 37:58
  Lilly: I was like, I did not nap enough during my first pregnancy.
• 38:01
  Lilly: Like I'm thinking back, I have no time to nap or rest, or I'm always following her around.
• 38:06
  Lilly: I should have taken better advantage of that during my first pregnancy.
• 38:10
  Lilly: But no, and I again the second trimester hit.
• 38:13
  Lilly: I love the second trimester.
• 38:15
  Lilly: Uh, you know, it's you're riding the high of being pregnant through that.
• 38:19
  Lilly: You're over the morning sickness, you haven't gotten so big, it's uncomfortable all the time.
• 38:24
  Lilly: Um, and then with this one, my pelvic pain was terrible.
• 38:28
  Lilly: Like I could not sit down sometimes.
• 38:32
  Lilly: And so I was getting like um, I tried getting some massages and I tried I was stretching all the time, and even I think I stretched too much one time and hurt myself, but I just I was very uncomfortable just moving around, which is hard for me because I was pretty active, especially as a mom, very active running around.
• 38:51
  Lilly: And I love to be in the kitchen and cooking and going, you know, just chasing the girl, the girl around and the boys around.
• 39:00
  Lilly: And I couldn't do as much of that as I wanted to.
• 39:03
  Lilly: So I spent a lot of my third trimester sitting or laying down.
• 39:07
  Lilly: I tried to get in to see to do some pelvic floor PT, and they were booking out to seven or eight weeks after my due date.
• 39:17
  Lilly: So I put it on the calendar.
• 39:19
  Lilly: Like, let's get it on there, but I couldn't even get in to see anybody to get any help or relief before then.
• 39:26
  Lilly: So the last month and a half was miserable for me this time around.
• 39:32
  Lilly: Like still excited, loved, but I was ready to be done.
• 39:36
  Lilly: I didn't really experience that feeling in my first of being ready to be over, be over it, but I did with this one.
• 39:44
  Lilly: I was ready.
• 39:45
  Lilly: Get it, get the baby out of me.
• 39:49
  Angela: Yeah.
• 39:49
  Angela: Oh, that's so hard.
• 39:51
  Angela: So, were your doctors at least able to like recommend anything for like all of the pelvic pain?
• 39:56
  Angela: Or how does that yeah?
• 39:57
  Lilly: They were helping me like find different stretches and also like recommending some baths, putting magnesium in the bath to help with just help my body relax, right?
• 40:06
  Lilly: They were like giving me the thumbs up on getting the massages to help with some of the hip um tightness and the back tightness to try to help and support the the pelvis.
• 40:18
  Lilly: Um, but they're like we were kind of at a loss of we can't get you into PT.
• 40:23
  Lilly: So we're gonna have to try to find these alternative routes to relief for you in the meantime.
• 40:29
  Lilly: So yeah, it was it was all right.
• 40:33
  Lilly: I mean, it was painful, but there are worse things that could have happened too.
• 40:37
  Lilly: Um and we had one in my third trimester too during all of this.
• 40:43
  Lilly: I think it was in maybe I was in my seventh or eighth month of pregnancy.
• 40:46
  Lilly: I want to say seventh.
• 40:47
  Lilly: We went two days where I didn't feel the baby move.
• 40:51
  Lilly: And my babies are active in the womb.
• 40:54
  Lilly: I Googled with both of them several times.
• 40:56
  Lilly: Is it possible for a baby to move too much?
• 40:59
  Lilly: Like, can that be indicative of anything being wrong?
• 41:02
  Lilly: So to have no movement was uh worrying.
• 41:06
  Lilly: And I also, my mom uh had a miscarriage, her sixth baby.
• 41:12
  Lilly: She carried full term.
• 41:14
  Lilly: And then at the 41 week, they couldn't find a heartbeat.
• 41:17
  Lilly: And so she had stopped feeling movement in that last week and assumed, you know, the baby had kind of run out of space.
• 41:23
  Lilly: And that was not the case.
• 41:26
  Lilly: So I, when that happened, immediately went to worst case scenario in my brain.
• 41:31
  Lilly: And I called the OB immediately, and they were able to get me in that same day to go in and be seen.
• 41:37
  Lilly: They were going to do an ultrasound and kind of hook me up to the machines for a little bit to monitor baby.
• 41:43
  Lilly: Um, and my mom actually came with me, which I was like, please let this work out.
• 41:48
  Lilly: But also, she's the only person I would want with me if this goes the other way.
• 41:53
  Lilly: And luckily, like we got in there and they listened for the heartbeat and found it immediately.
• 41:59
  Lilly: So that was a relief.
• 42:01
  Lilly: And then the baby sensed that we were at an appointment for her and started putting on a show.
• 42:08
  Lilly: So it was like nothing was wrong.
• 42:10
  Lilly: But on the ultrasound, they did show I had low fluid.
• 42:13
  Lilly: So, like basically, she was curled around all of the fluid that she had.
• 42:18
  Lilly: And I was drinking a hundred ounces a day.
• 42:21
  Lilly: I was already tracking that, and they're like, you're gonna have to drink more.
• 42:25
  Lilly: So I upped my intake and I was doing um the labor aid, which is like the ginger and lemon and um salt, honey, water, chugging that every day.
• 42:38
  Lilly: One of my friends, Gloria, who you've actually spoken to before, um, she was the one that introduced me to that, that put me on, and she made me some and brought me some so I could have it.
• 42:47
  Lilly: Um, but just trying to keep my fluid up.
• 42:50
  Lilly: And once I started really like I was now drinking over 120 ounces a day, but baby was moving and happy and healthy again.
• 42:58
  Lilly: So that was like the one scary moment in the pregnancy, which I had not experienced with my first.
• 43:05
  Lilly: And again, I feel very fortunate that it went the right way, that she was okay.
• 43:12
  Angela: Yeah, yeah, that is super scary to not feel your baby move.
• 43:15
  Angela: And that's definitely something to pay attention to if you're at any point really in your pregnancy after you start feeling baby move, you know, like if you go a certain amount of time without feeling baby move, like that's definitely something to reach out for support about.
• 43:28
  Angela: So I'm glad you did that.
• 43:29
  Angela: Everything was okay.
• 43:31
  Lilly: Yeah, me too.
• 43:32
  Lilly: Me too.
• 43:34
  Angela: So, how was the rest of your pregnancy as far as did you just kind of do um like the standard of care for the different tests?
• 43:42
  Angela: And did you have like the UTI and yeast infection um thing come up again?
• 43:46
  Lilly: I had no issue with UTI yeast infections this time around, which was wonderful.
• 43:51
  Lilly: Um, we did I had all the standard of care.
• 43:55
  Lilly: We didn't do any genetic testing this time around.
• 43:57
  Lilly: It was mostly based on our insurance, didn't Cover a lot of it.
• 44:01
  Lilly: And for us, the results would not have changed anything.
• 44:05
  Lilly: So that was the one that we skipped with this one.
• 44:08
  Lilly: But otherwise, I had the the diabetes test, I had all that, and everything was great, was fine.
• 44:15
  Lilly: Um but yeah, the the really the the kicker with this one was the pain of just moving around.
• 44:22
  Lilly: That was awful.
• 44:25
  Lilly: Yeah.
• 44:27
  Angela: Yeah.
• 44:27
  Angela: Yeah.
• 44:28
  Angela: So how were those final like kind of weeks and then days leading up to when your labor started looking this time around?
• 44:34
  Angela: And how was your birth?
• 44:36
  Lilly: Yeah, I was ready.
• 44:37
  Lilly: I was ready to go.
• 44:38
  Lilly: I had really been prepping.
• 44:40
  Lilly: I listened to the mindful birthing book again to try to take more from it this time.
• 44:45
  Lilly: And that was in like my third trimester.
• 44:47
  Lilly: I started it so I could finish it as close to baby as possible to really retain everything.
• 44:51
  Lilly: And I focused a lot this time on getting through transition because I based on when I got the epidural before, I was eight centimeters by the time the epidural got to me.
• 45:01
  Lilly: So I was definitely, I think I was definitely in transition, and that's the wall I hit.
• 45:07
  Lilly: And I didn't have enough tools or enough um confidence in myself to get through that.
• 45:14
  Lilly: So that's what I really wanted to focus on this time was what to do when I hit that wall and giving my husband things to say and to do to help me.
• 45:22
  Lilly: Um so that's what I was doing leading up to it.
• 45:25
  Lilly: And I like I said, I was ready.
• 45:27
  Lilly: I wanted to have the baby out of me.
• 45:30
  Lilly: I wanted to not be in pain anymore.
• 45:32
  Lilly: So my daughter and I were doing as much as we could out of the house.
• 45:36
  Lilly: We were going to the library twice a week, and we were getting groceries twice a week, and we were going to my mom's house, like whatever we could do to get out and about.
• 45:44
  Lilly: And um, so our library does like story time Tuesdays and music on Thursdays, and we went to music on Thursday, and the moms were all shocked to see me there.
• 45:53
  Lilly: This is on my due date.
• 45:54
  Lilly: I'm there.
• 45:55
  Lilly: And they're like, We thought for sure, like my belly was huge, and they knew I was uncomfortable.
• 46:00
  Lilly: We can't believe you're still here.
• 46:02
  Lilly: And one of the moms was like, or I said, Yeah, I think I think I'm gonna carry over this time.
• 46:07
  Lilly: Like I'm just in that mindset now of this is how it's gonna be.
• 46:10
  Lilly: So we're getting out, we're doing the, you know, really selling myself on the positivity of getting through it.
• 46:16
  Lilly: And one of the moms said to me, She's like, Well, there's a lot of day left.
• 46:19
  Lilly: You never know.
• 46:20
  Lilly: And um, so we did, we went to music, we got groceries, we went home, we had a whole thing.
• 46:26
  Lilly: I made my did a bunch of baking and cooking that day, just trying again to distract myself.
• 46:33
  Lilly: But then that night my contraction started, and it was rather unexpected.
• 46:40
  Lilly: I I felt good after a day of being productive and just sitting, winding down with my husband.
• 46:46
  Lilly: And I don't know how much you go into on this podcast, but we did get intimate that night.
• 46:53
  Lilly: And I think that's what kickstarted it.
• 46:55
  Lilly: Honestly, I really think that I was just in a great headspace.
• 47:00
  Lilly: And then that time with him really just I felt so I felt more relaxed than I had in months, weeks, I don't know, a long time.
• 47:09
  Lilly: And like 15 minutes later, we're in bed, like lights are out, and I felt a contraction.
• 47:15
  Lilly: And I was like, Oh, okay, maybe that's my first, because I was getting like racks and hicks once a day.
• 47:21
  Lilly: But I told him, I was like, Oh, I just had a contraction, maybe it's a real one this time.
• 47:25
  Lilly: And he was like, Do we have the app downloaded?
• 47:27
  Lilly: Like, let's make sure just in case.
• 47:29
  Lilly: So I downloaded the app because I like to track them.
• 47:31
  Lilly: And then, like 15 minutes later, another one, 15 minutes, and these ones were like not like my early contractions with my first.
• 47:39
  Lilly: These were contractions.
• 47:40
  Lilly: Like I knew for sure this was the start of something.
• 47:45
  Lilly: And so he, I was like, You get some sleep, I'll wake you up.
• 47:49
  Lilly: Like if this turns into anything, because this could go all night with my first.
• 47:52
  Lilly: We went all day.
• 47:52
  Lilly: This could be all night that I'm doing this.
• 47:55
  Lilly: So I labored in bed for a while.
• 47:57
  Lilly: Then I ran out of water.
• 47:59
  Lilly: So I went downstairs to get some water and felt better standing up.
• 48:02
  Lilly: So I stayed out of bed.
• 48:04
  Lilly: And then they started getting closer and closer, and they were probably like eight minutes apart at that point.
• 48:09
  Lilly: And I went into the living room, put on a show.
• 48:12
  Lilly: They started like really picking up, they were going to be six minutes apart.
• 48:16
  Lilly: So I called the OB just to confirm like the timing.
• 48:20
  Lilly: And I called my mother-in-law to say, the OB says we better get ready to come in.
• 48:25
  Lilly: Cause they were like, Yeah, you probably want to start driving.
• 48:28
  Lilly: It's your second, and they're six minutes apart.
• 48:30
  Lilly: So it's probably about time.
• 48:32
  Lilly: So I'm on the phone with my mother-in-law, waiting for them to call me back to confirm, like, come in.
• 48:36
  Lilly: Like, it's the call you've been waiting for.
• 48:38
  Lilly: I need you to come watch Amelia.
• 48:40
  Lilly: And she lives an hour away, and we're an hour from the hospital.
• 48:43
  Lilly: So I was like, Yeah, probably you can drive here, and then we'll drive to the hospital.
• 48:47
  Lilly: But I'll let, like, I'll text you to confirm you get ready to go.
• 48:50
  Lilly: And the OB was like, No, you are coming to the hospital.
• 48:53
  Lilly: Like, let her meet you here.
• 48:55
  Lilly: So by the time those phone calls were done, they were um five minutes apart, my contractions.
• 49:01
  Lilly: So I went up to wake up Chris because now is the time to wake up your husband.
• 49:06
  Lilly: Let's go to the hospital.
• 49:07
  Lilly: I woke him up and he was baffled that I hadn't woken him up sooner.
• 49:12
  Lilly: In hindsight, sure.
• 49:15
  Lilly: But I knew we wanted to wait as long at home as possible so that I could go natural if possible.
• 49:19
  Lilly: So he woke my daughter up.
• 49:20
  Lilly: We got her in the car.
• 49:21
  Lilly: She was awake the whole car ride to the hospital.
• 49:23
  Lilly: And I just remember treasuring that last hour as our little family of three, and her being awake and like knowing that we're going to have the baby, and she's gonna get to hang out with her Gigi.
• 49:35
  Lilly: And she had these her brother's old ninja turtle sunglasses on in the middle of the night.
• 49:40
  Lilly: We're driving to the hospital, and she just like looked like such a little toddler in that moment, but she was she was ready for her for her.
• 49:48
  Lilly: We didn't know it was a sister, it was a sibling.
• 49:50
  Lilly: We knew her sibling, her baby was coming.
• 49:53
  Lilly: Um, and that ride to the hospital was much more chill than the first time.
• 49:58
  Lilly: My water hadn't broken, and I think I also just was breathing through them better.
• 50:03
  Lilly: And I didn't want to scare my daughter.
• 50:04
  Lilly: I'm a very vocal person during birth, and I didn't want to be making all that sound and worry her because she's so excited.
• 50:11
  Lilly: But I think that was actually helpful for me to be able to stay more internal and not let that side win out.
• 50:17
  Lilly: So we got to the hospital and my in-laws were already there waiting.
• 50:21
  Lilly: They brought Amelia back home.
• 50:23
  Lilly: We went inside, and I'm like, okay, this is like feeling more intense, feeling more regular for sure.
• 50:29
  Lilly: I my guess was five centimeters.
• 50:31
  Lilly: My husband was like, No, you're like six or seven, like, I know it.
• 50:34
  Lilly: I'm like, no, I'm like five.
• 50:36
  Lilly: They checked me.
• 50:36
  Lilly: I was four.
• 50:37
  Lilly: They had no room in LD yet.
• 50:39
  Lilly: So they said, you have a few options.
• 50:42
  Lilly: You can labor here for two hours, and we'll check you again after two hours just to make sure that it is progressing and that it's not false labor.
• 50:50
  Lilly: If you haven't progressed, then we'll basically send you home or like go labor somewhere else and come back.
• 50:58
  Lilly: Basically, is how it felt.
• 50:59
  Angela: And this was the triage room that you were in.
• 51:01
  Angela: They were like, This was in triage.
• 51:02
  Lilly: Yeah, in triage.
• 51:04
  Lilly: And so they they said we can do that.
• 51:07
  Lilly: We can we can let you labor here for two hours.
• 51:10
  Lilly: You can go home and come back because you're still pretty early on, or we can technically admit you, you'd still have to stay in triage until we have an L and D room available.
• 51:20
  Lilly: But basically, even if this is false labor, you're gonna have the baby because we will augment your labor or whatever.
• 51:28
  Lilly: And I was like, okay, I'm staying here for two hours and you can check me in two hours.
• 51:33
  Lilly: Like, I need that space.
• 51:35
  Lilly: I'm not comfortable with being admitted just yet because based on that verbiage, I don't, I want to avoid that if possible.
• 51:42
  Lilly: So, like, okay, cool, we'll check on you.
• 51:44
  Lilly: You know, the nurse came in and out just to adjust the monitors, make sure everything was good.
• 51:48
  Lilly: But I went into labor land, I was listening to music in my headphones, and we were just chit-chatting.
• 51:54
  Lilly: We hadn't, we had not settled on the names either way, and we didn't know if this was a girl or boy.
• 52:00
  Lilly: We had no name going in.
• 52:01
  Lilly: I had like the lists, so we spent some time going through the lists and we decided on what it was gonna be if it was a boy or a girl.
• 52:08
  Lilly: Um, and so they came back, the nurse is starting to prep me because the OB is gonna come back and check my dilation and see how we're doing.
• 52:15
  Lilly: And I was standing up for one of those contractions while she was in the room, and I felt my water break.
• 52:21
  Lilly: And I was like, oh, that's my water.
• 52:23
  Lilly: And so she came over and there was some meconium in the fluid, which luckily in the books that I had read, I also read um birth vibes leading up to this one.
• 52:34
  Lilly: It's a newer book by Jen Hamilton.
• 52:36
  Lilly: And so from her book, I knew that that can be normal and that doesn't mean anything's bad, but probably Nikki's gonna be at the delivery because baby can come out having trouble breathing.
• 52:47
  Lilly: So I knew all that.
• 52:48
  Lilly: So it wasn't a scary thing when she started saying that in the room.
• 52:51
  Lilly: I was so grateful to have read through that because I think otherwise I would have immediately gone to my baby's not okay.
• 52:59
  Lilly: But it was, yeah.
• 53:01
  Lilly: So she's calling, she says there's meconium, they come rushing in to check my dilation and make sure there's no cord prolapse or anything, and everything looked good.
• 53:12
  Lilly: I was only five centimeters, but because my water had broken, they were going to admit me.
• 53:17
  Lilly: And then, like five minutes later, they had a room available for me.
• 53:20
  Lilly: So at this point, it's 6 a.m., getting ready to go.
• 53:24
  Lilly: We were walking over to LD.
• 53:26
  Lilly: I had like two really big contractions on the way.
• 53:29
  Lilly: Again, my water broke, so they things got hot and heavy.
• 53:33
  Lilly: I got into my LD room at 6:15.
• 53:37
  Lilly: They were filling up the bath for me.
• 53:39
  Lilly: Um, I had two nurses, one was like the standard nurse, and another one who was um actually studying to be a midwife.
• 53:46
  Lilly: So that was kind of cool that she was there.
• 53:48
  Lilly: Um, she had just transferred over to LD because she started studying midwifery.
• 53:53
  Lilly: They checked in on me.
• 53:54
  Lilly: They're like pumped that I'm gonna be trying to go natural and they're really supportive.
• 53:59
  Lilly: But I was I was hitting that wall of transition again.
• 54:03
  Lilly: And I went like to the bathroom to go pee and I had a contraction on the toilet that like put me over the edge.
• 54:09
  Lilly: And I was feeling a little bit fearful because things were felt like they were moving very quickly this time, and just I hadn't experienced what the pain of the baby actually coming out last time had been like.
• 54:22
  Lilly: And so in the bathroom, I convinced myself that I needed an epidural, but I came out and they had sent the midwife on call in, and she was my savior in that moment.
• 54:33
  Lilly: Her name is Maud, she is amazing.
• 54:35
  Lilly: I sang her praises the entire time I was in Like she came in and she liked she came in with the energy of you are so powerful and you are going to do this, and it is hard.
• 54:46
  Lilly: And she had been there, she she had two kids, one with an epidural, one natural.
• 54:51
  Lilly: She's like, if I could go back or if I was doing it again, I would do it natural every time.
• 54:55
  Lilly: It's going to be intense, but we're here with you.
• 54:58
  Lilly: Like, she's saying all of the things that I needed somebody to say in that moment.
• 55:03
  Lilly: And she is the reason that I successfully gave birth naturally this time.
• 55:07
  Lilly: I was, and I told Chris after she left the room, like, I was gonna come out here and ask for an epidural.
• 55:13
  Lilly: And she literally she came in as I was leaving the bathroom.
• 55:15
  Lilly: I can't, whatever fate stars lined up and made that happen, it was meant to be that she came to check on me.
• 55:23
  Lilly: So they got my bath filled.
• 55:25
  Lilly: I got in the bath and I had, I loved the bath.
• 55:28
  Lilly: I did not want to give birth in a bath, but I loved being in the bath.
• 55:32
  Lilly: It was so relaxing.
• 55:33
  Lilly: Still contractions hurt, but it was what I needed.
• 55:37
  Lilly: And I had, I don't know, I was probably in there 10 minutes.
• 55:40
  Lilly: And then I started feeling like I was going to poop all in the tub, which is why I didn't want to give birth in a tub.
• 55:46
  Lilly: Something about that to me, that more, you know, more power to you if that's your thing, not my thing.
• 55:52
  Lilly: Um, so I was like, I think I'm gonna poop in here.
• 55:54
  Lilly: Like, I can we get me out?
• 55:56
  Lilly: Like, what's happening?
• 55:57
  Lilly: And then I had a contraction.
• 55:58
  Lilly: The nurse was like, that sounded really pushy.
• 56:02
  Lilly: How like you have to poop poop.
• 56:04
  Lilly: And I was like, Yeah, like their pressure's not going away.
• 56:07
  Lilly: Like, I'm pretty sure I'm just gonna poop all on this stuff.
• 56:10
  Lilly: I had no, my brain was not even in the mindset of this is the baby coming out.
• 56:15
  Lilly: I just was so focused on get me out of here.
• 56:18
  Lilly: So they called the OB back in.
• 56:21
  Lilly: I had wanted to try a birthing stool, so they sent one of the nurses to go try to find a birthing stool now that we're moving into this.
• 56:27
  Lilly: And Maud comes in and she checked for the baby, and she was like, The that's the baby's head.
• 56:35
  Lilly: You're having this baby right now.
• 56:37
  Lilly: And she said, Technically, we can't have water births in this hospital.
• 56:42
  Lilly: So, do you think you can get out of the tub?
• 56:44
  Lilly: Like, how are you feeling?
• 56:45
  Lilly: And I was like, I don't want to have the baby in the tub anyway, so we can try.
• 56:50
  Lilly: One nurse under one arm, another under the other, Maud holding what felt like holding the baby inside of me, right?
• 56:57
  Lilly: For the walk back to the bed.
• 56:59
  Lilly: I was nervous about being standing.
• 57:01
  Lilly: I wanted to get up on the bed, but physically I could not.
• 57:04
  Lilly: They called the nurse back that had gone to run for the birthing stool.
• 57:08
  Lilly: It was a whole like the it was like two minutes of just chaos in the room.
• 57:13
  Lilly: And then no, they couldn't get the birthing stool in time.
• 57:18
  Lilly: Like she went to find it and they had to call her back before she could even get anywhere.
• 57:23
  Lilly: So I'm and I couldn't get on the bed.
• 57:26
  Lilly: So I'm standing, and Maud, again, my hero, she was like, You are fine.
• 57:31
  Lilly: You will not fall because I'm I'm gonna fall, the baby's gonna fall.
• 57:34
  Lilly: She's like, You are fine.
• 57:35
  Lilly: I will be your stool.
• 57:36
  Lilly: I literally, I think I sat on her arm while I was giving birth to this baby.
• 57:40
  Lilly: Like I was leaning back and I felt the ejection reflex.
• 57:45
  Lilly: It was so powerful, incredible.
• 57:48
  Lilly: Our bodies are amazing.
• 57:49
  Lilly: That is a wild feeling.
• 57:51
  Lilly: And it was very intense, but pushing felt good to me.
• 57:56
  Lilly: Like after all of this, all these contractions, your body's doing what it knows how to do.
• 58:02
  Lilly: There's not much you can do but withstand that.
• 58:05
  Lilly: And now I can work with my body to help the baby come out.
• 58:10
  Lilly: I was loving it, but it was like two, three pushes, and she was out of me.
• 58:16
  Lilly: Um, crazy, crazy feeling.
• 58:19
  Lilly: I I really believe that I felt every facial feature leaving me, which was beautiful.
• 58:26
  Lilly: And in the moment, like so uh just I was so ready.
• 58:32
  Lilly: I'm getting like chills just thinking about that feeling.
• 58:35
  Lilly: And it was painful, but not any more painful than the contractions were to me.
• 58:41
  Lilly: It really was not, I was expecting much worse.
• 58:44
  Lilly: And it was my fears and my imagination was worse than what reality ended up being.
• 58:49
  Lilly: My body got me through.
• 58:51
  Lilly: So you got the baby, got to get up on the bed.
• 58:53
  Lilly: My husband told me that it was a girl, and so we knew we had Elizabeth.
• 58:58
  Lilly: There she was, and we did golden hour again.
• 59:01
  Lilly: We did, we waited till the cord was white and limp, and I was riding a high.
• 59:07
  Lilly: I I don't think I can really quite explain.
• 59:10
  Lilly: I knew that that would happen, right?
• 59:12
  Lilly: Because the hormones, the rushes, everything.
• 59:15
  Lilly: But I was a little chatterbox.
• 59:17
  Lilly: I was like thanking everybody for being there, and I really just did that.
• 59:22
  Lilly: And wow, we're our bodies are amazing, women are amazing.
• 59:26
  Lilly: Um, I tore again.
• 59:27
  Lilly: I had a second degree tear.
• 59:29
  Lilly: I did not feel that happen, but so they did have to stitch me up.
• 59:33
  Lilly: My placenta came out okay.
• 59:35
  Lilly: Um, I did have some, I bled more than they wanted me to.
• 59:39
  Lilly: So I did get a shot, I forget what the name of it was that they gave me, but just to help with the clotting, just so I would not bleed too much.
• 59:46
  Lilly: So they didn't do a lot of the fundal fungus, the fundal massages on your belly.
• 59:51
  Lilly: So pain.
• 59:52
  Lilly: I felt like she was pushing my spine like through my belly, but there was a lot that came out after.
• 59:58
  Lilly: So I was glad that they did do that.
• 1:00:01
  Lilly: And unlike the last time, I was up, I went pee.
• 1:00:04
  Lilly: Like as soon as golden hour is done, I got up to go pee and I walked over fine.
• 1:00:09
  Lilly: The pelvic pain was gone.
• 1:00:11
  Lilly: Like I felt better after having just given birth than I did in the two or three weeks leading up to giving birth.
• 1:00:19
  Lilly: It was it was wild.
• 1:00:22
  Lilly: Um, and so recovery was really a breeze for me the second time around.
• 1:00:28
  Lilly: I felt better immediately.
• 1:00:30
  Lilly: And then I also I think again, just you know what to expect the second time around.
• 1:00:35
  Lilly: You know what helped the first time, so you can do that from the start the second time.
• 1:00:40
  Lilly: Um, but yeah, overall recovery was really good.
• 1:00:43
  Lilly: By like two weeks, my husband went back to work at two weeks this time, and I felt like I had it under control.
• 1:00:50
  Lilly: I was up, I was taking care of the kids, and so it was very different, I think, from the first time where I felt like I I needed a lot of that support and care.
• 1:00:59
  Lilly: And I still did, right?
• 1:01:00
  Lilly: It's not like I'm missing dependent totally, but the second time around, I feel like I had a better handle on it.
• 1:01:07
  Angela: Yeah, that's cool.
• 1:01:08
  Lilly: And oh my goodness, so you both like standing up like next to the bed?
• 1:01:12
  Lilly: Literally standing next to the bed.
• 1:01:14
  Lilly: Maud caught Elizabeth standing on the side of the bed.
• 1:01:18
  Lilly: I couldn't believe it.
• 1:01:19
  Lilly: I was like in shock as it was happening, and even now talking about I'm like, I really did that.
• 1:01:25
  Lilly: I was standing next to the bed, and they were like so supportive of it.
• 1:01:30
  Lilly: Like, yeah, however, this baby's gonna come, this baby's gonna come.
• 1:01:33
  Lilly: And it looks like she's coming out while you're standing up right here.
• 1:01:39
  Angela: Oh my gosh, that is amazing.
• 1:01:41
  Angela: That is really cool.
• 1:01:42
  Lilly: And yay, midwifery care.
• 1:01:44
  Lilly: Like, I know, I know, and I I didn't even know they had them on call at Maine Med.
• 1:01:49
  Lilly: And but they do.
• 1:01:51
  Lilly: Although, interesting side note, um, starting this month, my sister's pregnant now and she just moved to Maine and she's going there.
• 1:01:57
  Lilly: Their midwives are only on call, uh, it's like from 7 a.m.
• 1:02:01
  Lilly: to 5 p.m.
• 1:02:03
  Lilly: now.
• 1:02:03
  Lilly: So like part of the time, but cool midwife option.
• 1:02:08
  Angela: Yeah, yeah, right.
• 1:02:08
  Angela: So overnight you won't have that option, but that's cool that you were in there, like they saw that you were like a low-risk pregnancy, and that they sent her in to you.
• 1:02:16
  Angela: And that was yeah, what you seemed like you wanted and needed.
• 1:02:19
  Lilly: I did exactly what I needed.
• 1:02:20
  Lilly: I like I really don't know.
• 1:02:22
  Lilly: I think I would have come out and asked for the epidural.
• 1:02:24
  Lilly: I really do.
• 1:02:24
  Lilly: And she was, I mean, it maybe if they had sent another provider in, right?
• 1:02:29
  Lilly: And that provider could have said something similar, but I really mod was sent for me.
• 1:02:34
  Lilly: I just know that.
• 1:02:35
  Angela: Yeah.
• 1:02:36
  Lilly: Oh, that's amazing.
• 1:02:37
  Lilly: What a sweet, sweet story.
• 1:02:38
  Lilly: Yeah, it was amazing.
• 1:02:41
  Lilly: It was everything that I had hoped it would be giving birth naturally.
• 1:02:45
  Lilly: And I really like I've been recommending it to anybody that wants to hear it.
• 1:02:50
  Lilly: Like, I want to be that person that doesn't, you know, spread fear about giving birth.
• 1:02:56
  Lilly: It it can be beautiful and it can be wonderful.
• 1:02:59
  Angela: Yeah, exactly.
• 1:03:00
  Angela: And that's like the energy that it sounds like she greeted you with when you came out of that bathroom.
• 1:03:04
  Angela: Like, you can do this, you are safe, and your baby is safe, and like we've got you, and it's okay to like let go, you know, almost and like let this happen, like let it come, like just allow it almost to just like be here because like you're safe and we've got you.
• 1:03:22
  Lilly: Yeah, yeah, that's exactly it.
• 1:03:25
  Angela: Yeah, beautiful.
• 1:03:27
  Angela: I love it.
• 1:03:27
  Angela: What an amazing story.
• 1:03:29
  Angela: Cool.
• 1:03:31
  Angela: So yeah, is there anything else you want to share about the postpartum?
• 1:03:36
  Lilly: Yeah, with both girls, I struggle like through the first couple of weeks, is I think is always hard.
• 1:03:40
  Lilly: Just the baby's learning how to eat for the first time, and you're learning how to feed this baby for the first time.
• 1:03:45
  Lilly: Um, so I had like a lot of pain with nursing for a while, but silverettes have been my lifesaver, and that was all that I used this time was I just wore them in between um nursing sessions and it saved me from like the chapped bleeding that I had the first time.
• 1:04:03
  Lilly: I was glad to not experience that again.
• 1:04:05
  Lilly: But I found them too late the first time, but I I knew they would be helpful the second time.
• 1:04:10
  Angela: Yeah, that's really interesting.
• 1:04:12
  Angela: So, for anybody that's listening, those actually I hear all the time that those are really helpful for a lot of moms.
• 1:04:18
  Angela: So, yeah, if you're struggling or have sore are sore, you know, with during feeding or in between feedings, those are definitely a game changer for a lot of moms.
• 1:04:26
  Lilly: Yeah, which I didn't really did not expect it to work as well as it does.
• 1:04:30
  Lilly: It's just a little metal cup.
• 1:04:31
  Lilly: How much can it really do?
• 1:04:33
  Lilly: But it really makes a night and day difference.
• 1:04:35
  Angela: Yeah, cool.
• 1:04:36
  Angela: Well, I'm glad that that helped you.
• 1:04:39
  Angela: So two boys and two girls.
• 1:04:41
  Lilly: Yeah, two and two.
• 1:04:43
  Lilly: I know.
• 1:04:43
  Lilly: The boys, the whole time I was pregnant, were hoping it was a girl, so that especially the oldest who likes kind of order, he really wanted two and two.
• 1:04:51
  Lilly: And then that way the two girls stay together at daddies, and the boys are, you know, like kind of buddied, buddied up.
• 1:04:57
  Lilly: Um yeah, and my daughter just she's been the best big sister.
• 1:05:02
  Lilly: She I knew from how she cared for her babies that she would be a good caretaker.
• 1:05:07
  Lilly: And there is, of course, some jealousy that always comes with adding anybody, but she loves her sister like nothing I've ever seen a two-year-old do.
• 1:05:15
  Lilly: And she's such a little caretaker.
• 1:05:17
  Lilly: She always wanted to make sure she was involved with every diaper change.
• 1:05:20
  Lilly: I think for the first two months of Elizabeth's life, she would get the diaper and get the wipes for me, and she'd come over.
• 1:05:26
  Lilly: She always wanted to be the first one to say good morning to Elizabeth.
• 1:05:29
  Lilly: And now that like Elizabeth's a little older, they like to like snuggle in the crib in the morning when Elizabeth gets up, she gets in there, and like Elizabeth knows Amelia.
• 1:05:38
  Lilly: She beams as soon as as Amelia is anywhere near her.
• 1:05:42
  Lilly: Um, so seeing their little bond develop has been so just precious.
• 1:05:48
  Lilly: And everything that she said when the baby was in my belly has come true since she's come out.
• 1:05:55
  Angela: Oh my gosh, that's so, so, so special.
• 1:05:58
  Angela: And yeah.
• 1:05:59
  Angela: She got her baby.
• 1:06:00
  Angela: She did.
• 1:06:01
  Angela: She sure did.
• 1:06:03
  Angela: Oh my gosh, I love it.
• 1:06:06
  Angela: So, yeah, now, as a final question, if you were to give advice to someone who's expecting or even new parents, what are some of the biggest things that you'd want to share?
• 1:06:18
  Lilly: I think when you're expecting and you're getting ready to give birth and go into labor, one of the biggest things I learned the second time around is to not let fear be in the driver's seat.
• 1:06:31
  Lilly: Fear is normal.
• 1:06:32
  Lilly: Fear is going to be part of the process, but just acknowledging it and being able to still move past it and not make decisions out of fear, too.
• 1:06:43
  Lilly: So whether that, like for me, that looked like learning as much as I could about what was happening with my body, what was going to happen with my body, maybe that could be the support people that you have around you, but just being able to feel the fear, but not let it control the narrative.
• 1:07:00
  Lilly: Um, I think, especially the second time around, that's what helped get me through at least the first part.
• 1:07:08
  Lilly: Maud really turned it around for me, but just not being afraid of what's coming and not allowing those what-ifs to take you out of the moment that you're in.
• 1:07:19
  Lilly: I think for women who are expecting that would probably be my biggest piece of advice.
• 1:07:24
  Lilly: Whatever that looks like for you.
• 1:07:25
  Lilly: Just don't let the fear lead.
• 1:07:28
  Angela: Yeah, absolutely.
• 1:07:29
  Angela: Like preparing your mindset for birth is one of the most overlooked pieces of like the birth prep puzzle.
• 1:07:36
  Angela: Yeah.
• 1:07:37
  Lilly: Yeah.
• 1:07:38
  Lilly: And it it was not really talked about very much until I started really looking into giving it birth naturally, but it would be helpful for every mom, no matter like if you know you're getting an epidural, still do the mindset, look into that and read about that.
• 1:07:52
  Angela: Because yeah, it really I mean, you gotta get to the point where you get the epidural still.
• 1:07:57
  Angela: So, like having that mindset of just yeah, how you're gonna handle it is yeah, thinking about that time.
• 1:08:04
  Lilly: Exactly right.
• 1:08:05
  Lilly: Exactly right.
• 1:08:06
  Lilly: Definitely.
• 1:08:07
  Lilly: Yeah, and then as new parents, just have a lot of grace for each other, um, or just a lot of grace for yourself as a new mom.
• 1:08:15
  Lilly: Our bodies go through so much through pregnancy, through birth, through postpartum.
• 1:08:21
  Lilly: You're doing a lot caring for a new baby.
• 1:08:25
  Lilly: So just yeah, be very patient with yourself and with everyone around you because it can feel like a lot and it feels frustrating and it feels exhausting, and it's gonna be one of the hardest things you've ever done.
• 1:08:39
  Lilly: But you can do it and you will get through it.
• 1:08:42
  Lilly: So just be kind to yourself.
• 1:08:45
  Angela: Yes, that's well said.
• 1:08:46
  Angela: So, so true.
• 1:08:48
  Angela: Be kind to yourself in these moments because it it's it's a lot and big changes you're going through.
• 1:08:53
  Angela: Definitely.
• 1:08:54
  Lilly: Oh, and one, okay.
• 1:08:56
  Lilly: If you are pregnant and you're going to go through labor, one of the best things I heard leading up to it that was in a couple of the books that I had read was just talking about you will experience pain.
• 1:09:05
  Lilly: There's not a way around that.
• 1:09:07
  Lilly: There will be pain, but it is productive pain.
• 1:09:11
  Lilly: It is not just pain for pain's sake, it is your body doing what it's designed to do.
• 1:09:16
  Lilly: And so, like learning about what causes those sensations was actually really kind of comforting to me in a way, because as the contractions got stronger, I knew that my body was just helping the baby, you know, get into the right position and helping the baby move down.
• 1:09:33
  Lilly: And it's not like when you stub your toe, that does nothing for you.
• 1:09:37
  Lilly: That's just pain for pain's sake.
• 1:09:39
  Lilly: This is pain being caused by your body doing what it was designed to do.
• 1:09:43
  Lilly: So it's the pain is not stronger than you, you are stronger than the pain.
• 1:09:47
  Lilly: And that helped me through a lot, especially a lot of the more intense contractions of breathing through it and allowing that pain to be, like not trying to just wish it away, but allowing it to happen because it is doing what you need it to do.
• 1:10:03
  Angela: Yeah, definitely that like purposeful pain is a big thing because when you're in it and it's so intense, especially as it continues to increase in intensity, you can forget why you're doing this.
• 1:10:13
  Angela: Right.
• 1:10:14
  Angela: It's like, wait a minute, you're gonna meet your baby soon.
• 1:10:17
  Lilly: Yeah.
• 1:10:18
  Lilly: Yeah.
• 1:10:19
  Lilly: It's not trying, it's not trying to kill you, it's trying to bring your baby to you.
• 1:10:24
  Lilly: And it's yeah, it's especially it's unlike anything you've experienced before if it's your first baby.
• 1:10:30
  Lilly: So just kind of understanding that was helpful too, and learning some of the for me, learning some of the biology behind it and what's actually happening was was helpful because it helped to uh bring this really big, scary uh sensation down to manageable, uh understandable chunks.
• 1:10:49
  Angela: Yeah, and it's a big deal because I feel like going through just high school, like growing up, it's not like part of something that everybody's always learning about and being educated about.
• 1:11:00
  Angela: So it's like this thing, when it happens to you, you have to kind of do it on your own, the research.
• 1:11:06
  Angela: You know, you have to find what works for you and seek out those resources and really, you know, reach out to learn, to learn all of these things because it's not like necessarily something that's always like part of like, you know, like the standard classes that we're taking, you know, as we're growing up or whatever.
• 1:11:22
  Lilly: Right.
• 1:11:22
  Lilly: And one size doesn't fit all.
• 1:11:23
  Lilly: It every pregnancy is different, every baby is different, every birth is different.
• 1:11:28
  Lilly: So yeah, knowing everything went well with my first one didn't make me think that's how births always go.
• 1:11:34
  Lilly: You know, preparing for all scenarios and just knowing that it there's such a wide range of normal.
• 1:11:41
  Lilly: And there are plenty of ways that babies arrive into this world every day healthy.
• 1:11:46
  Angela: So yeah.
• 1:11:48
  Angela: Yeah, it's so important.
• 1:11:49
  Angela: This has been such an amazing episode.
• 1:11:52
  Angela: It's been such an honor to sit and hear your story.
• 1:11:55
  Angela: Thank you so much for sharing it.
• 1:11:57
  Lilly: Thanks for having me.
• 1:11:58
  Lilly: It's been so fun talking to you.
• 1:12:00
  Lilly: Like I said, I listened to this podcast so much in preparation for my birth.
• 1:12:03
  Lilly: So you're like a little mini celebrity in my mind.
• 1:12:06
  Lilly: It's really nice chatting with you.
• 1:12:08
  Angela: Feels a little surreal to be here.
• 1:12:10
  Angela: So much, yeah, for all your kind words.
• 1:12:12
  Angela: Like that means so much to me.
• 1:12:14
  Angela: I don't think of myself as a celebrity at all.
• 1:12:16
  Angela: Just that it's affected you in a positive way, like and helped you go into your birth experiences with like a better, you know, mindset and understanding of like not being fearful.
• 1:12:26
  Angela: Like that means a lot.
• 1:12:28
  Lilly: Yeah, no, what you're doing is amazing for any woman who ever finds you.
• 1:12:32
  Lilly: I think is gonna take good pieces into their labor from what they find.
• 1:12:37
  Lilly: I have not heard of anything else like this ever.
• 1:12:40
  Lilly: And so when I was introduced to it, I was Gloria was the one that had told me about it.
• 1:12:44
  Lilly: And there was another one of the moms at the library.
• 1:12:47
  Lilly: Her name is Sarah.
• 1:12:48
  Lilly: Her son's name is Boston, and she did an episode here too.
• 1:12:52
  Lilly: Oh, Sarah, yeah.
• 1:12:53
  Lilly: Yeah.
• 1:12:53
  Lilly: So I was like directed to you, and I was like, I, this is amazing.
• 1:12:58
  Lilly: What a like, you've just created this little treasure trove of information and of such a wide range too of birth stories, which is helpful to hear that there's not just one way.
• 1:13:09
  Angela: Yes, that's like the biggest point I'm trying to get across.
• 1:13:12
  Angela: Thank you again so much, Lily, for sharing.
• 1:13:14
  Angela: I really appreciate you.
• 1:13:16
  Angela: Thanks for having me.
• 1:13:23
  Kate Sutherland: Follow the walk of the wild ones into the woods and the darkness.
• 1:13:28
  Kate Sutherland: Rebirth the ways of the ancient ones whose tracks were washed away in blood.
• 1:13:33
  Kate Sutherland: It falls to us now to open up and taste beyond what we've prefed.
• 1:13:38
  Kate Sutherland: Take up the Phoenix dark cleaning change to like the bed.
• 1:13:43
  Kate Sutherland: Follow the water, into the woods and the darkness, we put away the ones away.
• 1:13:53
  Kate Sutherland: Take up the phoenix cleansing, change your light.
• 1:14:46
  Kate Sutherland: Step by step through the unknown, I'll be on the line and you'll be line.
• 1:14:52
  Kate Sutherland: In darkness, let love light the way to feed the soil of changing times.
• 1:14:58
  Kate Sutherland: Step by step through the unknown, I'll be on the line and you'll be mine.
• 1:15:03
  Kate Sutherland: In darkness, let love light the way to feed the soil of changing times.