Sarah: Walking the Tightrope between Joy and Loss, High-Risk Births, Miscarriages, and the Journey to Becoming a Bereavement and Fertility Doula

*Content Warning: This podcast episode delves into sensitive topics such as miscarriage, birth trauma, and death, exploring the emotional complexities of these experiences, including the loss of a child, high-risk pregnancies, and the role of a bereavement doula.

Have you ever wondered what it's like walking a tightrope between birth and loss? Join us, your hosts Liz and Natalie, as we welcome Sarah, a seasoned doula and mother, who has extraordinarily experienced both the joy of childbirth and the pain of loss. Sarah's rich narrative of her journey, losing her first child and navigating her way to become a bereavement doula, tugs at the heartstrings. We take a deep dive into her world, discussing the emotional support vacuum in infertility treatments and her initiative to bridge this gap, especially for military spouses.

As the conversation unfolds, we tackle the pressing issues faced by high-risk mothers during childbirth and the absolute necessity of providing them adequate resources. Sarah, herself a high-risk mother, poignantly sheds light on her unique struggles and triumphs with her four living children and 13 miscarriages. A sobering revelation - nearly 45% of mothers experience birth trauma - is discussed at length, leading us to the introduction of a doula program tailored to help high-risk mothers who have experienced birth trauma heal through a positive birth experience.

Moving to a more sensitive subject, we discuss death and the role of a death doula. Sarah bravely discusses her own journey of grief, losing both of her parents, and how her work with hospice led her to the discovery of death doulas. This segment underlines the emotional toll of being a death doula and the absolute necessity for self-care in this role. Sarah's story is a touching testament to the importance of human connection and the honor of accompanying someone on their end-of-life journey. Tune in to be moved, inspired, and educated by this powerful episode.

Connect with Sarah through her website: https://heritageconsultingstl.com/

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

The Golden Hour Birth Podcast, a podcast about real birth stories and creating connections through our shared experiences. Childbirth isn't just about the child.

Speaker 2: 0:10

It's about the person who gave birth their lives, their wisdom and their empowerment.

Speaker 1: 0:14

We're Liz and Natalie, the Golden Hour Birth Podcast, and we're here to laugh with you, cry with you and hold space for you. Welcome to the Golden Hour Birth Podcast. I am your co-host, Liz, and I'm your co-host Natalie, and tonight we have Sarah on.

Speaker 2: 0:34

Sarah has been a doula for 13 years and also a mother, so thanks so much for joining us tonight. Sarah, thank you for having me, I appreciate it. Thank you. So if you want to go ahead and tell us a little bit about you and your family and we'll go from there.

Speaker 3: 0:50

Sure. So again, my name is Sarah. I have been a doula for the last 13 years and I am a mama, for I have a seven-year-old, four-year-old, three-year-old and a almost 10-month-old. And in between you know, birth work and working in the you know community, I'm raising my own family. So it's kind of a parallel alongside my own journey, trying to see how things change, and raising my own, yeah absolutely so.

Speaker 2: 1:18

how's it been being a doula to then becoming a mother yourself?

Speaker 3: 1:25

So the whole reason I became a doula was my first pregnancy was back in 2009. I found out I was expecting with a little boy. Everything was going fine and then in the beginning of my second trimester in 2010, I went to the OB's office for a regular checkup and there wasn't a heartbeat, and so they sent me home and they were like, okay, you know, just monitor and wait for things to kind of start happening and we'll kind of go from there. And overnight I started hemorrhaging quite a bit and I went into the ER and I had my son in an ER room all by myself. I was pressing the call button. No nurses were coming, and so I delivered him in the hospital bed and by the time the nurse came in, she just grabbed a bunch of sterile cloths and she just kind of whisked all the bedding and everything and I was trying to process what was happening. So he was taken with everything and I hadn't even thought to try and look at him or ask for anything.

Speaker 3: 2:41

I was young at the time. It was like I said, I was my first pregnancy, I had just turned 20. And I didn't really know much about birth. I hadn't even started taking childbirth education yet I hadn't thought about where I was giving birth or how I was giving birth or anything like that, and in those moments everything absolutely changed for me in a heartbeat, and I didn't know that. I had option. And so I was examined and they gave me the option to stay overnight or I could go home, since it was only second trimester, as they put it, and so they were like it'll be just basically the worst period of your life. They want to go home, you can go home. So I was like, okay, I'll go home, but can I take him with me? And they kind of just looked at me and they were like, I'm sorry, what? And I said, can I take my son with me? And I found out he had been discarded in medical waste and there would be not taking him anywhere and they wouldn't be able to cremate him or anything like that for me.

Speaker 3: 3:41

So I went home and I turned to the internet, you know, and I started trying to figure out like what's next? You know, I had baby things in the closet and I had maternity clothes and all these things and hopes and dreams for a pregnancy that just wasn't, you know, gonna come to fruition. And I found out. I found out about bereavement doulas at that time and so I decided that was something that I wanted to do so that nobody would ever felt like how I felt in that moment, and I wish I would have known about the before I had had him, so things could be different. You know, now I have, when I get a call to help somebody who's losing their baby, there's all these tokens and things that I can help with with memories and such, and I don't have any of that with my son. So my oldest would be 13 now and I don't have a gravestone, I don't have an urn, I don't have a handprint or footprint or a piece of his umbilical cord or literally anything. I have nothing of him.

Speaker 3: 4:55

So over the course of the year, in 2010, I started I'm first off I made a in-person support group for grieving moms, so I had a second trimester list. That's where I focused on was second trimester and then I kind of just grew from there and I just branched out into just full spectrum bereavement work for moms who have lost babies through miscarriage, stillbirth, unexpected, you know demise after giving birth or in the NICU. And then my husband and I we started seeing some fertility doctors kind of trying to figure out why we weren't getting pregnant, or getting to everybody. It's like, oh well, you're always more fertile after you give birth and we weren't having that experience. And so several years of infertility treatments and during that time realizing like how much there's no pure second for women going through that process, like you have specialists and you have nurses and you go to these meetings and these you know educational seminars, and you go and you sit and you talk to these people who are taking your money and trying to help you get pregnant, but they're not providing any type of emotional support in the process. And I really just was struggling and I reached out to my community and I was like, hey, you know, like would we benefit from having as a poor group for this too, in addition to the bereavement? And so I started offering infertility support and I really branched out to working with military spouses. So since my husband was in the military, it's quite common for there to be a lot of baby bones around homecomings and for people like myself who couldn't get pregnant or who had lost a child, that was very hard because you were constantly surrounded by young, growing families with people who were constantly having babies, and it was just this reminder all the time that that was something you wanted and you couldn't have.

Speaker 3: 7:02

So I focused on bereavement and infertility, do the work and just educating families and walking through that process with them up until we finally were able to conceive and we had our daughter. She was born in 2016. And she was actually kind of a surprise baby for us. So I had been saving up money and we were getting ready to do an IVF cycle. I was on birth control, I was on a depot shot and I went in for my next shot and they're like well, we have to have you take a pregnancy test just before we do it. And it came back positive and I was like there's no way. So I made them do a blood test and it came back positive and they're like you're actually for real pregnant and I was like that's not possible.

Speaker 3: 7:54

So we had our first daughter and I started off low risk and so, as of July, I had chosen to be under midwife-free care and I was going to give birth at the birth center down there and with Carolina. And then, into our third trimester, I started developing some pretty severe health problems and they labeled me as high risk, and so my whole entire plan got flipped upside down. I went from having a birth center first, with a midwife planned out, to now, all this sudden, I'm being transferred to the largest women and children's hospital in the state, because I needed very specialized support for me and my daughter while we were in labor and I had to have a whole team of specialists on board. And so it really was just this completely like just thrown in, try and keep your head above water kind of situation. Try and figure it out as you go. And so after I had her and I had hired a doula, I had my own doula and everything for giving birth with my first. She unfortunately didn't come, because once I actually went into labor I worked very quickly and so she actually didn't make it. But after we had our daughter I told my husband I was like this is going to be.

Speaker 3: 9:14

I think where I focus for birth is the women who are in the hospital, who have these risk statuses and who are struggling with having plans change, especially when it happens later on in pregnancy, which is when a lot of women become labeled high risk, as after their first trimester, when they start developing problems and issues and then they start seeing specialists and then get bounced around and for subsequent pregnancies, you know having those various issues. So after we had her, I started looking into finding a doula training that I kind of that. I felt like kind of covered everything that I did. And that's when I found Babelmia. Actually, in 2019 is when I decided to take like a formal training and that's who I chose to go with was Babelmia. So I had been doing everything kind of like you know my pants. I had done a lot of like book learning and other job training. I had Shado doulas down south. I had worked with, you know, the infertility and bereavement community for a long time. I had already done training with still birthday, pregnancy and infant loss, advocate training, evidence based birth, birth monopoly, all these things. And Babelmia was like one of the pieces of the puzzle for me because they do offer you know kind of that full spectrum of doula work there. So I did take their training and then after that I realized there was still even more things you know in birthwork, that work covered for me with supporting families, and so it's just kind of been an ongoing process Like, as I've added on each of my own children, with being a high risk mom and kind of the things that occurred during my own pregnancies.

Speaker 3: 11:13

It's changed how I work with moms and kind of like how I offer my service. Like I said, I do very much focus on the women who are giving birth in the hospital who have that high risk status, whether it's because of preclimacy or they were, you know, they conceived their idea, which can predestinate you to a whole bunch of other like things that can happen. Like we see a lot of pre-eating growth restriction, we see preclimacy, we see preterm labor, especially if mom ends up, you know, conceiving multiples. So there's just different variables at play there that just really tug at my heart. But at the heart of all of it, you know, bereavement has been my one passion since I lost my son and so for the last 13 years I kind of that's been my focus.

Speaker 3: 12:06

Like I work with the birthing moms and the high risk moms, but bereavement has always been like my main focus of doula support. So over time I have created my own training where I train other doulas. I've trained midwives, I've trained labor and delivery nurses. I have a bereavement intensive where I take people under my wing and I explain to them kind of how I approach a bereavement, birth and the different types of support that I offer families and I teach it from the side of families who don't have you will feel like I felt 13 years ago and I don't want anybody to feel like that. Nobody should have to feel like that. You know, nobody should walk away from giving birth to their baby with absolutely nothing to hold on to except for their discharge papers. You know, and it's been over a decade and I still care, think about him without it hurting, yeah, and so I know that pain the other moms feel. So when I step into that room, I, you know I, have something unique to offer them. It's more than just empathy or sympathy. It's I truly, I truly understand what it feels like, but I'm giving them something that I didn't have. You know, I'm giving them a gift that I would have so desperately wanted. So, yeah, it's hard work. It's hard work, but it's my life's work and it's been an incredible process to kind of. You know where I've started to where I am now.

Speaker 3: 13:58

Like I said, this year I started partnering with another local doula and now we actually just launched a doula program ourselves this year for high risk moms, because up to 45% of moms who give birth experience some sort of birth trauma and that statistic, if you sit there and you absorb it, like that's absolutely mind boggling, that's not just first time moms, that's all moms who are giving birth. Like that's ridiculous that that many women are walking away and they're looking back at their birth and like that was a traumatic experience. And so Laura and I were both lost moms ourselves. She lost a baby as well, and so she actually started out taking my treatment, training, and then we've started working together and we tag team a birth for a high risk mom who had some pretty severe birth trauma. I wrote about her on my blog and we just talked and we came up with the idea that we just really wanted to offer moms who have experienced birth trauma something a little bit more focused on them, focused on minimizing recurrent trauma and having that healing birth experience.

Speaker 3: 15:16

So I have four kids of my own. Like I said, all of my brutes have been kind of all over the place. My first one I expected to have in a birth center and then in the third trimester I found out I was being transferred to a hospital. My second one I knew that I would be high risk. And we only had my second one because we had an incredible periodontologist here in St Louis who actually finally diagnosed me with a clotting disorder that was causing my recurrent miscarriages. So I have four living children and I've had 13 miscarriages over the years, and so when we had our second boy, we knew automatically he would be our first lovin' ox baby. And so I've had three children since that diagnosis Junior, finn and Eva.

Speaker 3: 16:11

And each one of their situations has been unique. So Junior, when he was born, I experienced shoulder to shoulder with him and I was, you know, pushing, and the hospitalist OB actually came in and realized what was going on and he was actually able to reach Finn and rotate my son for me, and he was born without any problems. And my second son he was kind of our you know what just happened world one. So I ended up having a precipitous slavery with him and he came out in two and a half hours. So he came out stunned, and so they had to go and resuscitate him.

Speaker 3: 16:51

And then our third she failed her NSTM BPPs, so she had a very low score and they determined that it was safer to induce me even though I wasn't full term yet and they whisked me straight from my MFM appointment to labor and delivery and they're like you're gonna have a baby. And so I called my doula and I was like, hey, I'm not going home for my appointment today, so if you wanna come meet us. And she did, and even though it was a high risk situation and with my doula there and I had a very, you know, firm burst plan of like I know I'm getting induced, but I don't want my water broken. I wanna be in control of my pitocin as long as my baby's tolerating it. We knew in the back of our mind that, you know, at any point we could just pump the brakes and be like, okay, we're switching from a vaginal birth to cesarean at any point. She shows us that that's what needs to happen. And they were just really phenomenal of supporting me through the fact that, even though I was on pitocin, I was being induced. I wanted to be in charge of what was going on, and so she handled labor beautifully and I was on pitocin.

Speaker 3: 18:01

I've never had an epidural with any of my kids. So when people are like, oh, you know, like if you get induced you have to have an epidural, I can speak to the fact firsthand as a mom. That's not the case and I've had multiple clients, you know have had epidurals and other multiple clients who have had pitocin and no epidural. So it's just really it depends there. But she was pouring and I had a postpartum carriage for her, so then I was separated from her. She was home with my husband and our kids and I was at the hospital recovering when I was almost born during the COVID pandemic. So I have, you know, I had a lot of just lived experience that when I work with my clients I can offer them. You know, I've kind of walked all the past thunder, the sun that you could.

Speaker 3: 18:50

So when I say that I get it, I really and truly do I get it. You know it's not something to be taken lightly and it can be very isolating because when you think of giving birth or like trying to plan a natural birth, like there's a certain like environment that comes to mind or a certain set of you know, like your birth plan or your preferences or things that you want, and kind of having that all ripped away from you or knowing that it's not even an option to begin with can it can be very hard to process and it's just. It's interesting to me to watch kind of in our community the moms who are planning a hospital birth and they don't know doulas are for them too. Even here in St Louis, where we have a humongous phenomenal, you know, doula community. I talk to moms all the time and they're like I didn't know I could hire a doula just for a C section, like yes, girl, you can. You know, like we're not just for home births or the birth center, and just constantly just kind of changing that mindset is really kind of what I want to do, especially since I've been through that. You know I've hired a doula with all of my, all of my babies. You know, even being a doula I understand that, the importance of that. So yeah, it's just kind of intertwined, you know, from the very beginning of becoming a bereavement doula before I started having my living in children, and then kind of this path and trajectory that I've gone on since I've started having my family, of how it's shaped my doula career and the type of doula that I am and how it just really affects the way I serve families.

Speaker 3: 20:34

It's been humbling at times, it's hard, but I'm very excited to see what the next 13 years bring my daughter. She always wants to know. When I come home from a birth, you know she's got questions like how did it go? How was the baby? How was mom? You know, what was it Belly birth? Or did she have her baby like you had your baby, you know? So she's growing up knowing you know, and is being normalized with her and that to me is so incredible because she knows that all women deserve that kind of care. So it's an exciting place to be. It's kind of a unique situation to be in focusing on those moms, but there's no place else I would rather be and I could talk about it literally all day long. I could.

Speaker 2: 21:21

Us too. I can hear the passion in your voice and I love how your daughter is already becoming like a birth advocate. I love that. We need to be like you. Need more children like her out there Now please she's not obsessed.

Speaker 3: 21:36

She loves it when I'm packing my bag. She knows mom's do the bag. So when she sees it out she's like are you gonna go help somebody have a baby today? And I'm like, hopefully that's the plan. You know She'll call me. I'll get a voicemail. She'll say is the baby here yet? I'll call you back.

Speaker 1: 21:57

I love how you touched on how a lot of people don't know that doulas are for hospital births too. That's one of the reasons I started. My doula training is just because of all the stories that we hear of bad you know experiences in the hospital and it's like it's needed. It's really needed and I feel like when I had my second, I risked out of the birth center. I was still like, yes, I'm hiring a doula. She helps so much in my pregnancy, like the birth. My birth went really fast so she was not there for a lot of it, but, yeah, she helped me so much with my pregnancy and finding the right provider and everything like that. So it's just doulas do so much more than just like tips queef hospital birth.

Speaker 2: 22:57

Yeah, it was like so knowledgeable too because of like the high blood pressure and you guys, like I remember you like telling me like all the questions you asked and like she just, you know, calmed you down and like validated you. So, yeah, there's doulas are so amazing Supportive. I mean, with my first birth, my doula is like the forefront of my mind or my care team, like that's all I think about. So you've like made in like class or like education surrounding bereavement doulas, yep.

Speaker 3: 23:37

So I offer what I call a bereavement intensive coaching, one on one, or I do a group setting, and what I do is I sit down on and I teach everything, from the moment you get the phone call to when you walk in the room, how to just kind of slow down time and stop it. So when you're losing your baby whether you found out before you get to the hospital or whether you're in labor and all this that in your baby's heartbeat stops, time stops for you. But the world just keeps on spinning. And the doctors and the nurses, they have a job to do and their job it's counted in minutes and hours and their shift, and so they come in and they go out. But the ones who are in the room, the ones waiting to have their baby, regardless of what that circumstance is for them, they're frozen in that moment. You know, most of the time, like they don't know the choices that they have to make. They don't know the options that are available to them. They don't know what it's going to be like to meet their baby. They don't know what it's gonna feel like. They don't know what to expect visually. They don't know a lot of things, like some families I worked with didn't know that it's an option to have their baby baptized or to be christened or anything like that in the hospital. They don't know that these are options for them. Sometimes families they want like they want a little of I played when their baby's born even though their baby's born sleeping they don't know that's an option. Some families they don't want the butterfly on the door and they don't know that that's an option. And some families, even if their baby's going to be born alive but isn't compatible with life, they don't know that they have options for their baby's care. And so what I do is I sit down and I educate people on the choices that are ahead of them when they enter the room with these families, and kind of how to work your way through that process without rushing them. So you're not there to make the decisions for them, you're just there to walk along beside them and be like, hey, this is what we can do in this moment, right now.

Speaker 3: 25:55

So a lot of times when I am teaching someone, I like to have people shadow me. Because I've been doing this for so long, I have a very specific way that I provide brilliant support. But for the people who can't shadow with me or they're already labor and delivery nurses or a midwife, or I've even had OB approach me. They've been in the room, so they kind of know the process but they don't know, kind of how to step back and instead of we want to fix right, we want to fix, we want to make it better, we want to make it easier so it doesn't hurt so much. But you can't, you cannot do that, no matter what you want. But what you can do is you can change the experience for them in a way that makes grieving a more healthy process, a more productive process, and it gives them something tangible to hold on to once they get through to the other side. For me that looks like teaching how to give them a bath. So a lot of times when I talk to labor and delivery nurses, you know they usually take the baby out of the room or over to the side and give the baby a bath or clean them up or whatever.

Speaker 3: 27:03

What I teach is completely different and some people are a little. You know they find a taboo. But when you think of dead babies, that's a taboo enough subject already. So I like to break down that barrier. Like it's uncomfortable to talk about dead babies, but it's important that we talk about dead babies because they matter and the families who are giving birth to them matter too, and so something as simple as changing how we do their bath, this is going to be the only bath experience these parents get with these babies, and it's life-changing.

Speaker 3: 27:33

You know, every mom wants to sit there and just stare at her baby. I don't care if your baby was passed away immediately before birth or it's been a couple weeks, or you didn't know when you were sent to be induced, or it happened tragically during delivery or sometime after delivery. Every mom I've ever met, once they see their baby, they just want to stare at their baby. It's the most beautiful creature they've ever seen, and I agree wholeheartedly and I want to foster that. So we slow down time, we stop time that bath. If it takes you an hour, I'm okay with that. If it takes you two hours, I'm okay with that. I'm going to be there every step of the way.

Speaker 3: 28:11

So I teach, I teach families, I teach nurses, I teach doulas how to slow that process down, and it's very cathartic for families to be able to take the time to wash every finger, every toe, wash their hair, behind their ears, you know wipe their face, clean their eyelashes and just, you know, really just slow down. In that moment there is no reason to rush through. We don't have to. We're just so used to the busyness of birth that you know that first bath is kind of a quick experience and rinse and we're done. But with Grima we take a different approach. I take a different approach, you know, let's, let's savor this. This is going to be your one shot at this. Let's make it as perfect as we can.

Speaker 3: 28:54

And like another thing is a lot of times there's like the little flannel diapers or something like that that some incredible volunteer has sown for these babies, and a lot of the hospitals have these phenomenal kits and those are great. They're great to put in the memory box, to take whole right, they're in your baby size. But what's even more important and even far better, I have found, is finding whether it's a preemie diaper or a newborn size diaper and giving mom and dad the actual diaper experience. And it seems so trivial to some people. I didn't get to change my boy's diaper. I never put a diaper on him, I never got to swaddle him or put a hat on him, and I know how important that is.

Speaker 3: 29:37

So for families, I give them the option Do you want the little crocheted hat that a volunteer made? Do you want the little flannel diaper? Or do you want the hospital newborn hat and do you want us to open a bag of pampers or huggies or whatever the hospital has so you can change your baby's diaper? And nine times out of 10, they want that normal newborn experience, and so people don't realize that's an option. So these are things that when I walk into the room and they're like hey, we have choices, we can make Choices that you get to be in charge of. You don't have to take whatever we're offering you and that's it. That's all you get. There's different things we can do. We can explore what that looks like to you.

Speaker 3: 30:22

So I have a preemie diapers plan and it's every option that you could think of under the sun for families and they just have to read through it and yes or no, they just circle what they want. Yes, they do want it, no, they don't want it. And I don't know, ask me later We'll come back to it and it just really kind of has changed what it looks like for families and losing their baby and walking through this process and seeing the kind of support that the hospital is used to offering them versus the support that I give and that I train others to give. It's not even a parallel. There's no comparison there. They're doing it in a way to minimize trauma, but they all still have.

Speaker 3: 31:11

They have another patient down the hall, but she's crowding, or her baby's crying, or her baby needs formula, she needs help latching. They've got other things going on versus when I'm in the room. That's it. The rest of the world doesn't exist to me. It's frozen in time with them.

Speaker 3: 31:24

So what can we do right now for you while you have your baby here? Because as soon as you leave the hospital, we can't go back, we can't redo it, we can't get that tie back. You know, whatever you believe with now is what you're going to carry with you the rest of your life. And that's kind of how you have to approach every birth, whether it's a living child or a bereavement birth. But when it's a bereavement birth, it takes on a whole new added responsibility because there's no take backs, there's literally no repeat button. You can't. You know, if you forgot to get a foot print at the hospital, you can't do it at home in the baby's you know baby book.

Speaker 3: 32:06

So it's very important to me to help others understand that, while the standard of care is phenomenal that we already offer families who are grieving their babies, we can do above and beyond and so much more than what we currently do in hospitals everywhere and just you know, really educating families on what the purpose of a bereavement doula is, what the purpose of a bereavement photographer is, what their options are was having their baby and, once the baby's born, whether they want to stay in the hospital with their baby and use a cuttle cot, or whether they don't want to, or they want family to stay, or they want to be baptized or anything like that. It's very, it's very important. It's hard, but it's important to sit down and have these kinds of conversations with people you know and just really break down that taboo of uncomfortable Like a lot of people when they take the training, like they look visibly distressed when we start talking about things, because I talk about skin slippage and we talk about all these things that people don't want to think about fluids leaking and blood pooling and bruising and abnormalities, and it's not an easy thing to talk about, but these are important things to talk about because you don't want the first time that you think about these things to be when you walk into somebody's room and you see their baby for the first time. So over the years I've put together a lot of information and I've dedicated a lot of my own time, you know, with helping, kind of just compiling all of my knowledge and all of the things I've seen, all of the things I've experienced over the last 13 years, and I use that to train other people so that their trauma doesn't affect the grieving family and cause more trauma and compounding trauma on them. And it's important. It's important and I think more people would benefit from it.

Speaker 3: 34:10

I know there's a lot of you know like bereavement doula trainings out there, but they don't really go into what I teach.

Speaker 3: 34:16

You know they don't really go into how to bathe a baby or handle a baby that doesn't cause additional bruising.

Speaker 3: 34:25

They don't really talk about how to position a baby so that it's like if there's deformities or abnormalities or things like that and mom and dad are anxious about how to hold their baby or handle their baby, it doesn't really go into those kind of like the logistical side of things you know, and that's kind of one of the areas I focus on is that side of bereavement work and so that your first exposure to it is going to be in a classroom with me, so you can have that moment to process, versus it being when you're in a room and you're trying to mask your own emotions and kind of processing with a family, and I think that's I think that's important for people to have that opportunity to kind of have that experience I've had.

Speaker 3: 35:19

I've had birth professionals, midwives and nurses reach out to me and they're like, have you ever experienced XYZ during a bereavement birth? Because I've never seen it before. And usually I can tell them, yes, because I've seen a lot in 13 years. I've seen. I've seen quite a bit, and sometimes other professionals they just they haven't experienced that before, but they know that like, hey, you know, sarah, what can you tell me? What do I do in a situation? Something as simple as, or a baby whose skull is missing, how to pad a hat so that their head looks like a normal, what we would consider a normal infant shape, things like that. It's just, it's very important work and it's very needed and it's something I'm very, incredibly passionate about.

Speaker 2: 36:09

I love, love, how you want to like stop time for these patients because you're right like they'll never be able to get a moment like that back and you know you're saying that like the nurses have to like go to a different room or tend to another patient, but you're just right there and you're giving, you know, these people like everything that they deserve and I'm so grateful that there's people out there like you that you know have taken your loss and your trauma and turned it into like something so profound it's, it's beautiful what you do.

Speaker 3: 36:50

It's an honor. I will say that it's. It's an absolute, absolute honor. And I can tell you every baby. I can tell you their name. You know they don't, you don't forget them. You know their stories. They stay with you.

Speaker 1: 37:05

Such a valuable resource to St Louis and the Billets Mutantie. Sorry to go a little heavy.

Speaker 2: 37:13

It's okay. I I truthfully didn't know that there were doulas out there like you. I mean, just the way that you describe it is is pretty incredible. And yeah, taking that time because that's something that was missing for you and it's like, if anything like your son, it has to be like, so I don't know, so proud of you.

Speaker 1: 37:43

You can see how it goes like hand in hand with the high-risk pregnancies too. You know because you're there. You know everything about supporting the mom and the family, and if something does go wrong then you know you've got that other side as well.

Speaker 2: 38:02

Kind of an interesting, weird question how has your services and your bereavementula changed like within the past year of overturn of Roe v Wade?

Speaker 3: 38:17

So this is a delicate topic for many. So I am a Christian, my belief is I am a Christian, so therefore I am pro-life in that stance for myself, right? So I don't get to make a decision for anybody else. I believe what God has led me to believe. My convictions are exactly that. They are my convictions, so I don't get to. I don't get to fault anybody else because I'm not faultless myself. I don't get to judge or blame anybody else.

Speaker 3: 38:51

But because of who I am and my belief system and my faith in God, I can't step into a situation for any type of termination or whether it's for, you know, for whatever the reason might that a mom finds herself in that position. So I refer out for those cases. I've never kind of really been the go-to for that, because I'm not shy about who I am or where I stand. I would never turn anybody down. If they came to me and they wanted me there specifically, I would, you know, let them know I'm not the person for you. You know, I believe there's a doula for everybody, but I'm not the doula for everyone. And it's important that every woman, no matter what her experience is, that she has somebody who can relate to her or can put herself at her shoes or, you know, is 100% an equivocal in the moment there, without you know any kind of bias, whether it's recognized or unrecognized, and so I know that about myself and not to the points where it hasn't. It hasn't really changed things for me because I still I very rarely get requests for those circumstances and when I do I know that there are other full spectrum doulas that I can safely refer them to that I know is a good resource for them. There's one that I work very closely with and she's phenomenal. She's also a death doula as well, and so she has a little bit more of a, you know, very secular type of approach and she's just a good grounding experience for women who find themselves needing to make difficult choices.

Speaker 3: 40:33

But for me personally it hasn't really affected things. I've seen more changes because of COVID than I have because of, you know, rote versus Wade, and that's just where I am, it's just my, not that I want to call it a bubble, but like my part of the birth world it's not really affected much there. But I do see in my peers, you know, the struggles that they have because of it and kind of the shuffling with the visits to sisters and aunts, you know, across the river and situations like that. So I do recognize that for some women it's incredible that we're in a position now where a woman has to fight to get the kind of care that she wants.

Speaker 3: 41:22

Whether or not it's something I agree with, that's not my place to decide. You know, that's for her and her doctor, or her family and her situation and her circumstances, her life. That's her story to tell, not mine. But I do recognize that that is there and it breaks my heart, you know it does. No one should ever feel alone in any way, and I do believe our God is a loving God and I do believe that he doesn't want to see any of us hurting either. And so as a result of that, you know, I do acknowledge that there are some very broken things in our society and I do wish it was different, but I don't see that in the clients that I work.

Speaker 2: 42:05

I have heard about like a death duel, but from like adults. Have you ever done anything like that?

Speaker 3: 42:14

So I do a little bit of work working on like volunteering with the hospice home. So I was actually both of my parents are deceased, unfortunately my dad in 2020, in the height of COVID, and then my mom just eight months ago, and I got my introduction to hospice here and hospice volunteers so they went through the Evelyn's house in Cree 4 with BJC. Both of my parents went through BJC's hospice and it was phenomenal to see, like what I do for families with babies, see someone do for my parents, you know, and then kind of the support that I received walking through that process with my parents. So I have a huge soft spot in my heart now for Evelyn's house and I definitely, you know, kind of I'm still in my grieving process with my mom. I was her caretaker From the time she was diagnosed with cancer in 2020, she was diagnosed two weeks after my dad died and so she was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and she went into remission and then it spread and went to her liver and her kidneys and her lungs and then she just went into kidney failure and liver failure and she had a heart attack and she went into hospice.

Speaker 3: 43:47

So there was a lot of like extenuating circumstances there, but I was there with her throughout that whole process and my friend who's the death doula. She was always there for me Like whatever I needed, you know, and she just held that space for me in a way that only somebody who walks that path knows how to do, and she just kind of really opened my eyes that this is something like outside of birth work that someday I do. I do want to fill that space as well, but I just know right now emotionally I'm not secure enough for that. It's very triggering. I feel very young to have lost both of my parents.

Speaker 3: 44:28

There is a lot of grief and loss in my life in the last decade or so and so I know that I need. It's taken me years to get to where, when I go to a brim at birth, I don't have to stand outside the outside of the door and have a panic attack before I open the door. I know if I was to step into like a death doula role right now, I would. I would be right back in that situation and so, while I have the utmost respect and it's something I would love to do, especially just to volunteer at the Lent House or with any of the hospice associations in the area. I just know that right now it's not something that I can do and kind of protect my heart. It's still healing, but knowing people like her and what she does and the gift that she gave me, I know it's also a very undervalued and not very well known service that's offered to families and I, you know I can speak to the fact that it can change your experience when the person you love is dying.

Speaker 3: 45:41

It's definitely it is definitely you don't want. You don't want to need it, but then when you do need it, it's incredible how it helps. You know, and people, people like her, they're angels among us. I really believe that it's just. It takes a really special person to step into that space and kind of just shoulder all of that hurt with somebody when it's not your hurt to carry. And it's just, it really truly is.

Speaker 2: 46:16

Yeah, I'm really happy that you had like such a positive experience. Just to experience such a hard, hard thing, and I mean I can't even imagine. You said that your daughter is 10 months old. I'm so sorry.

Speaker 3: 46:31

Yeah. So she my daughter was born in September and my mom like she was, she was on, she was on hospice and they had told us we had anywhere from six to 12 months left with her and my daughter was born and my mom got to spend about a week and a half with my daughter after she was born and then she just I really think she held on for my daughter to be born. I was pregnant with my third when my dad died and I gave birth to him two weeks after my dad died. I gave birth to my third the day before my mom was diagnosed with cancer and she walked. I had horrible postpartum depression with my third because of grieving my dad and then his death. And then my son was born in May of 2020, like right in the middle of all the shutdowns in the hospital, and I really struggled with postpartum depression after having my third. Like there was times where I didn't know if I was gonna, if I was gonna come out beyond the other side, you know, and therapy, lots of therapy, lots of prayer got me through that. But my mom knew, she knew how hard I fought during that postpartum time with my third and I think she really just held on to meet my daughter and make sure that I was gonna be okay as much as I could be, you know. And so when she kind of started slipping away it was October she made a decision to visit the family and then when she came back, like she never came home after that, she went into the ICU and then ICU, she briefly went to nursing home and then she went to nursing home to Evelyn's house and you know I was driving back and forth and visiting and she was always, always wanting to know how the kids were doing, even all the way up to the kids doing, how are you doing, are you okay? And just, she passed the day before my birthday and it was I had told my husband I was like, if these are going to be on my birthday or right around my birthday, like we, just my mom and I, we had a very close connection and so I believe in signs and she stops by, she says hi, a lot.

Speaker 3: 49:05

But it was just a very much different experience with losing my mom than it was with my dad and it was. It was harder losing my mom than it was my dad, but it's been a more kind of a spiritual journey with grieving for her than it had been for my dad, where my dad was like that physical just rip your heart out, you know. Hey, with my mom it was like a piece of me was missing. It was my mom, you know. So, yeah, it's.

Speaker 3: 49:38

It's been eight months since she's been gone and she shows up in little bitty ways all the time and just kind of, you know, she was my biggest supporter, she was a big part of why I became a dealer and she was always the person who took my kids when I was on call or responding to birth, and she was just, she was just my go to, you know, and I always tell people like my mom actually had a V back before V backs were, you know, mainstream or, you know, even starting to be recognized. So my older brother was a Cisarian and then I was a V back baby and so I feel I always told her I was like you predestined me to birth, for like you had a V back with me and it's in my blood, you know. So it's definitely a gift that she gave me and her presence made me better and her absence definitely makes me fight harder to be better at this, for both my my own family and for the families that I work with, and you're going to hear my kids going.

Speaker 3: 50:48

Absolutely may have in the background now.

Speaker 2: 50:52

Well, thank you for sharing your, your mother and all the like here that you've given the families over the years. My mom passed away two days before my sister's birthday and today is my mom's birthday. Well, happy birthday to her, thank you. It's kind of like a full circle connection moment for them. But thank you so much for coming on. I mean, I don't I don't have any more questions, but just thank you for sharing all of your wisdom and just those beautiful moments you share with your families. I really appreciate just hearing more about it.

Speaker 3: 51:27

I appreciate you guys having me on and giving me the space to talk and kind of just hold your ear for an hour and share my heart with you. I appreciate that.

Speaker 2: 51:37

And then where can our listeners connect with you or find you?

Speaker 3: 51:41

So I have a Facebook that I am terrible about updating. I have an Instagram that I just started that I'm horrible about updating. But I do have a website. Heritage consulting stlcom is my website. I just launched a blog and I'm going to try and be better about updating that, but I'm very accessible, whether it's Facebook or sending me a message through my website. I will respond as quick as I can and just just know that, like middle of the day, middle of the night, you know, if I don't respond right away, I always, I will always answer as soon as I can, but I am more than happy to, you know, answer any questions. Anybody who's listening, you know, if they want to know more about Breedman Worker, you know who I am or what I do. I'm, I'm, I'm very, I'm, very transparent. So I would, I would, welcome any questions.

Speaker 2: 52:34

Wonderful. Your website was very pretty, very pleasing, thank you, thank you, I appreciate that.

Speaker 3: 52:41

That was my baby. I worked at it all through, like my pregnancy with my fourth and finally like got the the gumption to just set it out into the world.

Speaker 2: 52:51

So thank you for the thank you, Well amazing. We'll definitely connect that in our show notes and make sure that our listeners can find you there, but thank you so much again.

Speaker 3: 53:02

Thank you. You guys have a fantastic evening. Enjoy your weekend and happy fourth you too, thank you.

Speaker 1: 53:09

Thank you for joining us on this episode of the Golden Hour Birth Podcast. We hope you've enjoyed our discussion and found it insightful and beneficial. Remember, the Golden Hour Birth Podcast is made possible by the support of listeners like you. If you appreciate the content we bring you each week, consider leaving us a review on your favorite podcast platform or sharing the show with your friends and family. Your support helps us reach more people and continue creating valuable episodes. If you have any questions, suggestions or topics you'd like us to cover in future episodes, we'd love to hear from you. You can reach us on our website, www. Goldenhourbirthpodcast, or connect with us on social media. We value your feedback and want to make sure that we're delivering the content you want to hear. Before we sign off, we'd like to express our gratitude to our incredible guests who joined us today. We are honored that they trust us enough to be so open and vulnerable. We're grateful for their time and willingness to share their stories with us.

Speaker 1: 54:11

If you're interested in taking the conversation further with us, join us on our Facebook group, the Golden Hour Birth Circle. We'll be back next week with another exciting episode, so be sure to tune in. Until then, stay golden and remember to take care of yourself. We'll catch you on the next episode of the Golden Hour Birth Podcast. Bye.