Latest / MyMaine Birth / 11. MyMaine Birth Diantha's Maine Coast Memorial Hospital Birth Story, Ellsworth, Maine

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11. MyMaine Birth Diantha's Maine Coast Memorial Hospital Birth Story, Ellsworth, Maine · MyMaine Birth

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: I'm Angela and I'm a certified birth photographer, experienced doula, childbirth educator and your host here on the my Maine Birth podcast.
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: This is a space where we share the real-life stories of families and their unique birth experiences in the beautiful state of Maine, From our state's biggest hospitals to birth center births and home births.
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: Every birth story deserves to be heard and celebrated.
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: Whether you're a soon-to-be mom, a seasoned mother or simply interested in the world of birth, these episodes are for you.
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: Welcome to episode 11 of my Main Birth.
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: Today's birth story guest is Diantha, and she is here to share about the experience of birthing her daughter with care of the midwives at Maine Coast Memorial Hospital in Ellsworth.
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: Hi, Diantha, Welcome to my Maine Birth.
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: Good morning.
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: So, to get started, can you tell a little bit about you and your family.
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: So I have a husband and two kids, lily and Connor and Lily was born when Mitchell was working on a PhD degree at UMaine.
• 1:13
  Speaker 2: So that was 2015 that she was born, and then, shortly after, she was not quite a year old when we moved to Vermont, where I grew up, and that's where my son was born.
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: But Lily was born at Ellsworth Hospital with the midwife team.
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: All right, can you share a little bit about when you found out you were pregnant and the care that you chose?
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so.
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: So let's see, we I mean we decided to like stop not trying to get pregnant after we got married.
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: The one like thing that I was trying to be careful about was not having a due date, like on the day of my sister's wedding, which I accomplished, but I was eight months pregnant in my maid of honor dress, but yeah.
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: So the pregnancy was like great easy.
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: She was born in September and it was so hot that September, but yeah, no, it's a really easy pregnancy.
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: We ended up hiring a doula.
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: I can't remember how far along I was, probably before 20 weeks, just after doing some research, um, and you know, I was like I don't, I don't want the birth that you see in the movies, like I don't want the screaming out of control like excruciating pain.
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: There's gotta be a different way, like there's gotta be another option.
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: So did some research, found out about doulas, um, hired a doula, and she's was actually a hypnobirthing instructor too.
• 3:04
  Speaker 2: So did the hypnobirthing program I had been receiving care um with from an OBGYN office and I was like, yeah, an OB is an OB, right, like.
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: And so, through meetings with my doula, we came up with a list of questions, you know, after, like going through my birth preferences.
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: And so she was like all right, well, why don't you take this list of questions to your OB?
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: Like obviously she knew him.
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: Obviously she knew that it wasn't a good fit, but she didn't say that, you know.
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: She was like bring your list of questions and let me know how it goes.
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: So it was like first question and I was like, oh my god, like no, I do not want to be routinely induced at 39 weeks pregnant.
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: And on and on all of his answers.
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: So so at 36 weeks pregnant, I transferred to Ellsworth and I just remember that first meeting with one of the midwives there.
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: I walked out and I was like, oh, wow, that's a different experience.
• 4:19
  Speaker 2: So she came into the room and her first question was tell me about your baby?
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: And I was like, oh, okay, that's not a question that I was being asked at the OB's office.
• 4:34
  Speaker 2: So yeah, that was wonderful.
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: I just felt so taken care of and cared for and know a pregnant person.
• 4:47
  Speaker 2: So that was wonderful.
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: Wow.
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: So what did your care look like with the midwife practice versus?
• 4:53
  Speaker 2: the care you started with at the OB's office.
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: So I mean, my experience at the OB was all just very routine.
• 5:01
  Speaker 2: I so I had done enough research to like hire a doula and know that I wanted to do the hypnobirthing program, but other than that it was just kind of, you know, like whatever the OB suggested, you know, we chose, we chose to do less genetic testing than you know, than all of it.
• 5:21
  Speaker 2: I think I just kind of had this like feeling in my body that everything was fine and regardless of you know who the baby was, like we would just be fine.
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so we didn't do any testing, or like we didn't.
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: We chose not to do a lot of the testing but, yeah, did the routine ultrasounds.
• 5:46
  Speaker 2: And then I'm trying to think I had the gestational diabetes test done at the OB and they didn't mention that my levels were like in the higher range.
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: And so the midwife team, when I got to Ellsworth they were like you know, your numbers are on the higher end of normal.
• 6:16
  Speaker 2: So the midwife team gave me the option of like having an OB join the team or doing, you know, the three hour test to confirm the result.
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: So I did that because I was like I'd rather know and just be able to keep my midwife team.
• 6:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so I was.
• 6:35
  Speaker 2: It ended up being fine.
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: The test was negative.
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: But yeah, it's fine.
• 6:39
  Speaker 2: I mean I transferred at 36 weeks.
• 6:41
  Speaker 2: So as far as testing, I guess I did the group b strap too with the midwives um, and tested negative.
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: So that wasn't a just you know a decision that I had to make about antibiotics or anything so how did your labor start and what was?
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: 40 weeks and three days.
• 7:07
  Speaker 2: My husband and I were building a corner hutch for our kitchen plates and bowls and I thought contractions were starting but I just like tried to ignore them.
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: It's just, I don't know my personality.
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: I was like, well, I'm not going to get worked up if it's nothing, so I'm just going to ignore them.
• 7:25
  Speaker 2: It's just, I don't know my personality.
• 7:25
  Speaker 2: I was like, well, I'm not gonna get worked up if it's nothing, so I'm just gonna ignore them.
• 7:29
  Speaker 2: Um, that night was, it was a full moon, but it was like the super blood moon and so we had planned on putting a blanket out in the backyard and watching it and right from the beginning, like the contractions were like consistently five to seven minutes apart.
• 7:47
  Speaker 2: But you know, very classic, like early labor, crampy contractions.
• 7:53
  Speaker 2: So we watched the moon and then went to bed and I just like dozed between contractions pretty much all night.
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: I think I woke Mitchell, my husband, up at two, two or three in the morning.
• 8:10
  Speaker 2: It was like I haven't slept at all yet.
• 8:13
  Speaker 2: They're just coming pretty consistently every five minutes.
• 8:18
  Speaker 2: He was like, well, why don't you call Evelyn or doula?
• 8:20
  Speaker 2: And so I did and she was like yeah, yeah, they sound like early contractions.
• 8:25
  Speaker 2: Still, why don't you get in the bathtub and that will either like slow them down enough so that you can rest, get some sleep, or like, if it doesn't, we know that this is probably it.
• 8:39
  Speaker 2: Um.
• 8:40
  Speaker 2: So I got in the tub.
• 8:41
  Speaker 2: They didn't slow down at all.
• 8:43
  Speaker 2: Uh, they started to get a little closer together and she was like Okay, well, you're now 45 minutes away from your care team, since I had switched to Ellsworth we were living in Milford, so closer to Bangor and she was like Okay, well, why don't you call them and just let them know?
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: And if you want to head there now, we can do that.
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: So I called and they were like yeah, why don't you come in?
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: I think at that point they were coming more like every three minutes, but still very like manageable, not super intense.
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: So we drove to Ellsworth.
• 9:23
  Speaker 2: We got there at like five or six in the morning and got checked by one of the nurses.
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: I was one centimeter dilated and they were like well, we keep you when you're four, so let me call the midwife on call and see what she wants to do.
• 9:48
  Speaker 2: So Diane was on call and she was like well, why don't you keep her?
• 9:55
  Speaker 2: And I'll check her when I come in in a couple hours.
• 9:57
  Speaker 2: So the nurses gave us some tips, things to do while we were waiting to try to get some more progress to happen, and called Evelyn again.
• 10:09
  Speaker 2: Let her know, yeah, and she was like, okay, well, I'm just going to wait until Diane checks you to head over.
• 10:15
  Speaker 2: So by the time Diane got there, I was at a four.
• 10:20
  Speaker 2: I think she was kind about it.
• 10:25
  Speaker 2: I kind of wonder if I was actually at a four.
• 10:27
  Speaker 2: Or she was like it seems like this is really it.
• 10:30
  Speaker 2: I don't want to send you home, so I'm going to whatever, stretch it a little bit.
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: Um, yeah, so we stayed.
• 10:40
  Speaker 2: Evelyn got there and I was just like in my hypnobirthing zone.
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: I was pretty sure I wanted a water birth.
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: So I, like you know, done, done my reading, thought a water birth sounded really nice, got the tub all set up and I got in and I was like, meh, I actually don't love this.
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: I love to be warm, even in labor.
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: Like I love to be cozy, and you know they have the tub at.
• 11:18
  Speaker 2: I think it's like 100 or something they like to cap the temperature at.
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: I was just like this just isn't doing it for me.
• 11:26
  Speaker 2: I don't feel warm and cozy.
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: So I got back out.
• 11:31
  Speaker 2: I wasn't checked again after Diane came.
• 11:35
  Speaker 2: So I was just like doing my hypnobirthing thing.
• 11:38
  Speaker 2: My husband, mitchell, actually had to tell the nurse when I was having a contraction so she could listen to the baby's heartbeat during a contraction because I was just like so relaxed, like calm no change between like having a contraction and having think.
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: Because I did the hypnobirthing.
• 12:05
  Speaker 2: I was just like.
• 12:07
  Speaker 2: I don't have a lot of memory of it, I just like was in the zone.
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: You know, I like moved around from the birth ball, like I said, to the tub, back to the birth ball, to the bed.
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: But other than that it was just like.
• 12:24
  Speaker 2: I don't want to say it was easy, because laboring isn't easy, but it was just kind of like.
• 12:33
  Speaker 2: I don't know, I was in this trance and it was, yeah, it was very, very manageable, so it was nice.
• 12:42
  Speaker 2: I mean it was also slow, like it was a long labor and so because it wasn't fast, it wasn't super duper intense, it was a nice nice, nice pace.
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: I think wow, so how about when she was born?
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so that was like the.
• 13:02
  Speaker 2: I mean, that was like the one part that I remember being like I don't like this, I don't like this, I don't want to do this part again.
• 13:17
  Speaker 2: So I I'm trying to remember.
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, so I had been laboring like for trying to think it was probably 2 pm at this point, so I had been there a while, laboring for a while, and I got up on the bed and just fell asleep, like took a nap, and I think that kind of like everyone in the room was like wait a minute, this is what's going on here.
• 13:43
  Speaker 2: And so the midwife asked if she could check me and I said yes, and so I was at a 10 and just like resting, my doula called it the rest and be thankful phase.
• 13:58
  Speaker 2: So like once you're finished dilating, before you're getting those urges to push, just like, yeah, taking your time to catch your breath, taking your time to catch your breath.
• 14:06
  Speaker 2: But I think, you know, looking back on it, I think that the care team was just like getting a little nervous that I had been laboring for so long and that was just like laying on the bed, and so they encouraged me.
• 14:25
  Speaker 2: You know they were like, well, do you think you could start pushing, I don't know.
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: I guess, um, and because I wasn't having those strong urges, I uh, I just like didn't know where to push, and so it wasn't super effective.
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: I guess the beginning.
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: Then I developed an anterior lip, my cervix, um, and just could not get the baby past it, um, so the midwife ended up manually helping to move that piece of cervix out of the way, and that was the not fun part.
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: That was like this is terrible, um, but finally got her head passed.
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: I think I pushed for an hour and a half or something like that, um, and then she was born and she was screaming.
• 15:23
  Speaker 2: I mean like screaming before her whole body had even been born, like her head was out and she was just like here I am, um, I looked over at my doula and she was like well, this one's going to keep you on your toes.
• 15:33
  Speaker 2: She was right, lily is a spitfire, but yeah, so you know she was born, came right up on me for skin to skin and pooped immediately.
• 15:44
  Speaker 2: We're like all covered in the combium, but yeah, like all covered in the combium, but yeah, the rest was smooth.
• 15:55
  Speaker 2: Um, the placenta came right out and I can't remember who cut the cord.
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: We hadn't found out her sex.
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: And so we were just, like you know, got her cleaned up, got me cleaned up, we're doing like our bonding, our golden hour.
• 16:10
  Speaker 2: And finally one of the nurses were like you guys are killing us, like you're not going to check, let's see if this baby's a boy or a girl.
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: And you're like, oh yeah, it didn't even occur to us, we were just used to.
• 16:25
  Speaker 2: You know, like this is our baby.
• 16:27
  Speaker 2: Um, I think it was like almost a half an hour after she was born that we hadn't even thought to check to see if she was a boy or a girl.
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: That was kind of funny so how was your postpartum time so?
• 16:47
  Speaker 2: it was rough.
• 16:48
  Speaker 2: She was not a sleeper, she was a screamer from like day one.
• 16:55
  Speaker 2: Yeah, we were in survival mode for a long time with Lily.
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: She fed great, she was a great breastfeeder, so luckily there there wasn't like stress there.
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: But yeah, she just didn't sleep and when she was awake she was yelling, you know, and we like investigated all the things um the allergies and the GERD and there was just like no explanation and, knowing her now she's like a super deeply feeling kid and she like her feelings are huge and we were just like she just hated being a baby.
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: She's so independent and she has very strong opinions and very big feelings and that combination I think like she was just she had a lot that she was upset about and like that was her one way to communicate.
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: I think she finally started like sleeping a couple like four hour chunks when she was six months old.
• 18:07
  Speaker 2: Like telling this story I hope no new like expecting parents are listening Like oh my God, this is gonna be terrible.
• 18:15
  Speaker 2: I'm a doula now and I have not yet met a baby like quite as intense as Lily.
• 18:23
  Speaker 2: So but yeah, yeah, so postpartum was, it was rough, it was, there was not a lot of sleep, and that's actually one of the reasons we moved back to Vermont was to be closer to family and have a little more support.
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: What made you decide to become a doula?
• 18:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so actually I mean it was Lily's birth.
• 18:42
  Speaker 2: I remember just like laying, you know, in bed feeding her after she was born and just like feeling on top of the world after that labor, you know, I was like it didn't even cross my mind that I like needed pain relief or, you know, like the thought of an epidural didn't even like enter my head, yeah, and so I just felt like amazing, you know those like post-birth hormones, and then just like got really sad, because that's not the majority of people's experience.
• 19:21
  Speaker 2: And I think that you know the biggest impact that Evelyn, my doula, made for me was encouraging me to have that discussion with my provider, my OB, because if I hadn't hired her I wouldn't have done that and I am quite sure my experience would have been remarkably different, and so I give a lot of credit to her for helping guide me in the direction that I wanted to be.
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and so thinking like this is definitely something I could see myself doing Obviously was in survival mode for a while after Lily was born, so was not about to.
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: You know further my education then.
• 20:15
  Speaker 2: And then we moved back to Vermont and got pregnant with Connor, and so when he was a baby.
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: I started thinking about doing the training.
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: I looked up Jonah's requirements or whatever for doula certification, ordered some of the books off the reading list, but that it wasn't.
• 20:33
  Speaker 2: You know, it was like really thinking about it, but I was like you know, I'm a stay-at-home mom and it's just like not the time with a kiddo you know who's still nursing, who's still breastfeeding.
• 20:45
  Speaker 2: Neither of my kids took a bottle.
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: I introduced it way too late, and so you know that it just wasn't going to work then.
• 20:55
  Speaker 2: And so it wasn't actually until the beginning of the pandemic where I had planned to go back to teaching.
• 21:02
  Speaker 2: I have a secondary ed degree so, like high school, biology is what I taught before Lily was born, and so that had been the plan was to go back and do that.
• 21:12
  Speaker 2: Then the pandemic hit and I was like you know what, the teaching profession just doesn't really seem all that enticing right now.
• 21:23
  Speaker 2: And so I was like, well, maybe I'll think about this doula thing and thought that it really just wasn't going to be sustainable without a doula partner.
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: You know someone to like share a call with, so that I could actually like be at my kids' birthdays and plan family vacations and all those things.
• 21:45
  Speaker 2: So I texted my friend who was also a stay at home mom.
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: It's like, hey, do you want to take a doula training with me?
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: So yeah, the rest was.
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: The rest was history.
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: Wow, so you started your own doula business.
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: It's called Empowered Birthing Vermont.
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: Do you want to share a little bit more about that?
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so Katie and I own this business together.
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so Katie and I own this business together.
• 22:13
  Speaker 2: We're in a pretty rural, low socioeconomic location in Vermont.
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: We're in the northeast corner we call it the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont and so our big thing is just to try to equalize access to our services.
• 22:29
  Speaker 2: To try to equalize access to our services.
• 22:31
  Speaker 2: Obviously it's a huge shame that doulas aren't covered by insurance yet.
• 22:37
  Speaker 2: Some insurances are starting to cover services, but we're not there on the full scale yet.
• 22:46
  Speaker 2: So we offer our services on a sliding scale and then anyone who pays the full amount for doula services, we reserve a percentage of that and put it in a like our pro bono fund, and so then we're able to offer births to people who want doula services.
• 23:05
  Speaker 2: But you know, can't make it happen Because that's what you know.
• 23:07
  Speaker 2: Can't make it happen because that's what you know.
• 23:10
  Speaker 2: I was there when I have hired Evelyn.
• 23:12
  Speaker 2: She offered her services on a sliding scale and if she hadn't, I we wouldn't have been able to afford it at the time, and so that was really one thing that was important to me.
• 23:24
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so we provide birth and postpartum doula services, and then we've also partnered with the regional hospital here in our town, in St J, and we're teaching childbirth education classes at the hospital, which has been really fun.
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's been a really great partnership and, you know, the director of the birth center here has just been wonderful and accommodating and, yeah, we feel really lucky to have the relationship with our hospital that we do.
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: So what areas do you cover?
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: Do you go all the way to Burlington?
• 24:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's outside of our sort of radius.
• 24:04
  Speaker 2: So we'll do.
• 24:04
  Speaker 2: We say we'll drive about an hour and so that covers.
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: It actually covers five hospitals, and most of our birds are at NVRH, the hospital right here in St Jay, but there are.
• 24:21
  Speaker 2: There's Dartmouth, hitchcock in New Hampshire, that's just about an hour away, so we'll go go there.
• 24:29
  Speaker 2: And then Littleton.
• 24:30
  Speaker 2: We're right on the border of Littleton, I mean of New Hampshire, so Littleton hospital is just 20 minutes away too.
• 24:38
  Speaker 2: So yeah, we have a couple, but Burlington's more like an hour and 45.
• 24:44
  Speaker 2: So more of a drive, yeah.
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: Do you want to share a little bit about your son's birth?
• 24:50
  Speaker 2: It was a hospital birth.
• 24:52
  Speaker 2: I looked into doing a home birth with him but again our insurance wouldn't cover home birth midwife services and at that time we were still not at a place where we could afford to do that.
• 25:08
  Speaker 2: So there is a midwife team here at our hospital and they're fantastic, yeah.
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: So his birth also went into labor.
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: It was a full moon, it was a blue moon, um, for his labor.
• 25:22
  Speaker 2: He was born on his due date and the hospital was actually being renovated, um, and so I gave birth to him in the birthing, the you know the blue inflatable birthing tub that was stuffed in like a janitor closet but the door wouldn't close because the tub stuck out a little bit.
• 25:45
  Speaker 2: So they had one of those like folding, you know, like partitioned walls that they just like put up in front of the tub.
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: So that was was funny.
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: But he came fast.
• 25:56
  Speaker 2: His labor was like maybe four and a half hours, five hours start to finish.
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so very, very different labor but also, you know, great and very manageable Two full birth stories.
• 26:16
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and actually so.
• 26:16
  Speaker 2: I.
• 26:16
  Speaker 2: I just gave birth to a surrogate manageable two full birth stories.
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and actually so.
• 26:18
  Speaker 2: I just gave birth to a surrogate baby.
• 26:22
  Speaker 2: I did that for another Vermont family, and so her due date was March 3rd and the full moon was on the 7th and I was like that's the day she had me born on the 7th and she was, I had another full moon baby.
• 26:47
  Speaker 2: Wow, yeah, it was wild because I was like, oh, you know, the first two are a coincidence and then the third one, I don't know, maybe there's something to this, there's something to that oh my gosh, wow.
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: Is there anything you'd like to add to expecting our new parents?
• 27:06
  Speaker 2: I mean, I feel probably most of your listeners are in Maine and we're in Vermont, so I don't know how applicable.
• 27:13
  Speaker 2: You know my resources are, but my, you know, if I'm like giving the advice I don't know is just to hire a doula if you can.
• 27:23
  Speaker 2: I think that you know it's a really, really beneficial member to have on your birth team.
• 27:32
  Speaker 2: You know, regardless of what you want your labor to look like, if you plan on having an epidural or even if you know that you have a scheduled C-section, having a professional labor support, birth support person there just can make a huge difference in your experience.
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: What's the best way for people to find you?
• 27:54
  Speaker 2: Yeah, our website's empoweredbirthingvtcom, and we there actually aren't a whole lot of other doulas in our area, you know, in central Vermont and over in the Burlington area in southern Vermont I think there are more of us, but our area is pretty limited.
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: But yeah, yeah, that's who we are Empowered birthing.
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: Thank you so much, Diantha, for sharing your birth story today.
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah, thanks for having me.
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: Before you go, I just want to remind you I have a ton of resources for pregnancy and birth If you're pregnant, whether you're a first time mom or if this is your fifth baby.
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: I want you to check out the show notes, because I have some free trainings and free downloads that you can sign up for, as well as the link to access my Labor of Love, a comprehensive, self-paced online childbirth education course.
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: I created this course specifically for moms who don't want to be told what to do, regardless of where you're birthing or who you're birthing with, and I'd honestly love to teach you everything that I know so that you can prepare for an autonomous birth experience and prepare to step into your role as the leader of your birth journey.
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: So click to the show notes, check out all of those links and, if you ever have any questions, feel free to DM me at my main birth over on Instagram.