Birth Story: What Went Wrong & How I Navigated It

Episode 16

The line that summarizes my birth story the most is, “I’m in awe of all the things that go right amongst all the things that go wrong.”  Just about everything went wrong. From the outside looking in this was textbook birth trauma and yet I feel like I've walked away untraumatized. I believe this is because of three very specific things that I discuss with you in this episode. My hope is that by sharing this story and the things that created resilience I might help you walk through the things that go wrong in your life with a little bit more ease. Hit play to learn more!

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Transcript

0:00  
Welcome to regulate, and rewire and anxiety and depression podcast where we discuss the things I wish someone would have taught me earlier in my healing journey. I'm your host, Amanda Armstrong. And I'll be sharing my steps, my missteps, client experiences and tangible research based tools to help you regulate your nervous system, rewire your mind and reclaim your life. Thanks for being here. Now let's dive in. 

0:27  
Hello, Hello, today's episode, it takes another more personal turn, as I share the birth story of my most recent tiny human, where nothing went according to plan. And just like previous episodes, I am going to do my best to share this tiny piece of my life in the context of how you can apply what you learn in this conversation today to situations in your own life. 

0:57  
So today, I will be talking about three very specific things that I believe carried me through this event where things went wildly array, and created a resilience that minimize the traumatic imprint that very, very, very well could have been left. So this is my birth story, what went wrong and how I navigated it. And for those who want maybe just a little bit more backstory, in Episode 11, titled how to prep your nervous system for a triggering life event, I took a deep dive and shared the things that I was doing to prepare for this birthing experience. Knowing that I wanted something very specific out of this birth experience. So you can go back and listen to that episode. Really quick summary. 

1:51  
I was attempting a VBAC. So that is a vaginal delivery after a previous C section in this context will make sense in a moment when I share this story. And I have very specific things that have been part of my past birthing experience. So my first son was a C section delivery, things didn't go according to plan there, I then experienced recurrent pregnancy loss. So you know, there was a grief component to us getting to this point of having another child, and so on, and so on, and so on. So if you want to hear a little bit more about what I did to prepare myself, for this experience, that is going to be the episode to check out. And before I share the details about my birth, I do, as always want to just issue a quick content warning around things like birth trauma, I am going to be sharing the details of my birth, but definitely in the context of a hopeful solution oriented way. 

2:58  
But like I shared in Episode 11, one of the things that I was doing very intentionally to prepare myself for giving birth to my son was that I was not exposing myself to other people's traumatic birth experiences, and specifically, exposing myself to those experiences that were shared from the standpoint of oh my gosh, did you hear what happened to my aunt? Or did you hear what happened to me were kind of it was almost a birth trauma pissing contest where it was like whose birth was the most traumatic, there were definitely situations in which I was given details about somebody's birth that didn't go right, in a similar context that I am going to share today. 

3:43  
So for those of you who have experienced in birth trauma, this may be a sensitive episode for you, it could also be one of the most helpful episodes in your healing. For those of you who might be preparing to give birth. What sounds like it's going to work for you. If you feel like me, sharing the details of what went wrong for me is going to make you more riddled with anxiety. Please, please, please go ahead and skip today's episode and join me again next week. Some of you may say no, I in preparing for birth, want to hear about what it looks like when something goes wrong and how I can protect myself and mitigate against potential birth trauma in those experiences, so again, just always putting that decision in your hands. 

4:33  
So before I jump in to anything else, I want to just share a little bit about what our birth looked like what went wrong and how we navigated it. So leading up to my son's birth. We were told by the doctors that he was measuring big and this is no surprise I was nine pounds eight ounces. I think my husband was nine pounds seven ounces, his brother was over 12 pounds like we know genetically that there are just big babies. So one of the things that I did in hopes again, of having a more successful VBAC was something called a membrane sweep, hoping to kind of promote labor a week we can have early lab that did not work for me. Two days before his due date, was when I woke up at 3am on a Wednesday morning, to kind of reasonable but frequent contractions. About 15 minutes later, I noticed they were picking up in intensity, I want my husband up, he hopped in the shower. About 10 minutes into his shower, I was pretty much cursing at him telling him it was time to get out in time to go, my contractions intensified really quickly. We were at the hospital by about 430 in the morning, when we called my friend and photographer who was going to do my birth photography. Hey, Ali, thanks for letting me wake you up at four in the morning. Got her on her way. And things then just proceeded to happen quite quickly, going into this birth experience because again, I had had a previous birth experience where all of the things that I wanted, didn't happen. 

6:19  
I had kind of a plan A, a plan B, a Plan C for a lot of different parts of this birth experience. And I wasn't sure if I want an epidural. In fact, there was part of me who really didn't want the epidural. I wanted the chance to go through this unmedicated so that my labor was uninterrupted again, increasing the chances of having a successful VBAC. And again, VBAC stands for vaginal birth after a cesarean. So whenever I say the word VBAC, I just mean, my attempt at having a vaginal birth after my previous son was born via a C section. But when we got into the hospital, I had something called back labor. So this is where you have excruciating pain in your lower back with every contraction. And I decided that an epidural was the way to go. And we soon found out that my son was face up. So an ideal birthing position is that your baby is head down, and face back, so they're facing your spine. My son was head down, but he was facing forward. I was very familiar with this. This is the positioning of my previous son. And it was one of the number of things that made it so that we needed a C section last time. 

7:43  
So when I found out that his positioning was not ideal, even though it was ideal, in the last ultrasound that we had, I felt a little frustrated, but my midwife was still really supportive, still really optimistic. So I said, All right, let's, let's still go for it. And within just a few hours, I was fully dilated and ready to push. And so even though I had an epidural, my midwife was amazing. They got me on all fours. We were trying to turn baby get him an optimal position. He wasn't budging. Again, he is a huge baby. There's not a lot of room in there. And after about 45 minutes of pushing, the midwife mentioned, you know, hey, I just want to put it out there. It's not an emergency. But I think there is a possibility of needing another C section. I just want to put it on your radar, his vitals look okay, they're not great. But if his positioning doesn't improve, he's not really moving right now. That may be the route to go. And I said, Okay. Am I in the clear to continue to attempt for this? And she said, Absolutely. Absolutely. We have time. So I decided to continue to push. And my body was absolutely getting to the point of complete exhaustion. And now as I say that some of you might be like, well know that like birth is an exhausting thing. It's a hard thing.

9:23  
But my experience with my first sends delivery, and I pushed with him for three hours before we decided to go into the or for the C section. Every single time another wave of contractions came on or the midwife was like, Okay, it's time to go. I was able to kind of dig deep get into this very primal place and I had what I needed to each and every time to push and to give it my all. I have a background of being a competitive athlete. I have a store of you know, physical resiliency and grit And yet here I am a little less than an hour into pushing this time, and I am just feeling my body in complete distress and exhaustion to the point where we did a round of pushing, and I just looked at her and I was like I can't, like I don't I don't think I have anything to give right now. Like I need to take a break and taking a break when you are fully dilated and labor like isn't always an option. But I was so smoked. And she did, we took a we took a break for a couple rounds of contractions. 

10:42  
And then I pushed and I had a searing pain in my abdomen. And it was unexplained. And it was something the epidural was not taking the edge off of and I just remember saying, I have so much pain in my upper abdomen like what is happening, what is going on, like I'm in so much pain. Now the way that my practice works is it is a collaborative physicians and midwives practice. And so the midwives do all of the delivering and the birthing in normal circumstances. It's only when we need to go into the or have a cesarean that the physician gets involved. And the physician typically isn't in the room during delivery. What I later found out was that the physician who was in the hospital that day, who happened to also be the physician that delivered my oldest son, she had just kind of a hunch that something might happen that this VBAC was going to be a little bit more complicated than other VBACs. And so she was in the room. And when I mentioned this upper abdominal pain, she signaled to the midwife like it's time to make that suggestion again, like it's time to go. And so after one more round of pushes, the midwife looked at me and said, you know, at this point, he's actually like, kind of head and shoulder, he's kind of crooked. I think it's time to, to go to the or I think it's time to move forward with a C section. 

12:15  
And I remember just closing my eyes, so disappointed, so utterly exhausted. And just like, I knew, I knew that that was the right step. And so I didn't protest, I didn't argue I didn't dig my heels in about this feedback. I just said, Okay, let's go. And then everything escalated quite quickly. So I am at the brink of exhaustion, I am more kind of out of it than I am. with it. I remember getting wheeled into the O R. And the team in there said, you know, if you can help us get you from this table to the next, this is gonna go a lot faster. And I just remember saying to whoever was talking to me, like I have nothing left to give. And they said, okay, and about three more bodies got around me. They did all the work to pick me up, put me down. They got me all numbed up. And then the operation began. And I could tell the minute they kept me open that there was accelerated urgency. And they got my son out quickly. Got him over to the NICU team that was in there to check him out. And he wasn't crying. 

13:28  
And again, like I shared in Episode 11, I have had four miscarriages. And so in my mind until I hear my baby cry, like my baby's dead, something is wrong. And I just remember telling Christopher, my husband like, why isn't he crying? And bless this man, his ability to stay calm and crisis is unmatched. And he just calmly responded. He said he's being taken care of he has so many people around him taking care of him and you're being taken care of he will be okay. And you will be okay. So, minutes later, and I mean, it felt like hours. I think it was just maybe a minute or two later, he cries I immediately feel relief. They bring him over eventually to my husband for some skin to skin. He tells me because again, I'm kind of in and out of it at this point. He tells me Hey, I have him he's here. 

14:24  
And with my first son, I remember being very with it and the or there's a picture of me smiling with my husband holding Kade my son and when he said I have him, I opened my eyes. I saw him and that was just about everything I could do. I close my eyes. And I said to my husband, I need you to take care of our son for the next few hours because I have nothing left to give. My body was in complete and utter shock. Shut down. 

15:02  
So what I learned happened was something called a uterine rupture. It happens to less than 1% of people who are attempting a VBAC. And it essentially means that during delivery, again, it was likely when I started to feel that searing pain in my abdomen, that combination of how stretched out my uterus was with the intensity of the contraction and pushing, my uterus ruptured, you know, kind of tore along my old C section scar. And this, like I said, is something that happens to less than 1% of people who attempt VBACs, but it is life threatening for myself and the baby. And when this happens, time is of the absolute essence, because when your uterus ruptures, the baby loses protection. 

15:52  
And so one of the risks is that there is a lack of oxygen at some point. And typically, you have between like 10 and 15 minutes, from the uterus, uterine rupture, to when you get the baby out, before something goes really wrong. And what I came to learn was that from the time my uterus ruptured, to the time when they got my son out was 30 minutes. And it didn't make sense that everything turned out fine. And yet it did, they ran the tests, it didn't appear that there was ever any lack of oxygen for my son, my body was able to be kind of cleaned and stitched up. And the pediatrician and my physician came to me over the next couple days in the hospital, and just reassured me like you are kind of the best of a worst case scenario. 

16:55  
And when I was sharing this experience and processing this with our head coach and a friend of mine, AJ, she said something that will likely stick with me forever. And she said, I am in awe, of all of the things that go right, amongst all of the things that go wrong. And I remember just hearing those words and tearing up because, man, she's exactly right. There was so much that had to go right. Amongst so much that went wrong in this story for my son and I to walk away and to be okay. And especially for me to walk away and to feel like I have a very small, traumatic imprint from this experience that I think likely could have left a very significant, traumatic imprint. And there are very specific reasons why I think that is. But just taking that moment for me to look back and intentionally choose the story that I wanted to write about this experience. And I think it can be summarized in that one sentence because the truth is, everything went wrong. There is not one piece of what I wanted in an ideal birth situation that I got, I wanted delayed cord clamping I wanted immediate skin to skin. I wanted that VBAC, I wanted to be unmedicated and every single minute that passed in this birth story, I lost each and every one of the things that I wanted, except for what I walked away with, which is what I wanted most, which was a healthy mom, and a healthy baby. And so I am just going to be forever grateful for that single line that she shared with me that has helped me to shape the way I want to focus and I want to tell this story.

19:05  
I am in awe of all the things that do go right, amongst all the things that go wrong. And there were so many things that did go right, to allow us to be okay, and to walk away. And one of those things I feel was definitely just some true and honest divine intervention, because uterine ruptures are serious and a 30 minute timeline is is very serious. And yet, we're okay. 

19:36  
And so I don't just want to share my birth story today, but I want to share it in the context of how we can go through seemingly traumatic things and come out okay, come out and traumatized or at least minimally so. And what I just shared with you would pretty unanimously be categorized as birth trauma, and many many, many, many Many people would walk away from the scenario traumatized. And yet, I don't think that I am. And I think like I said, there are some very specific reasons why. And as I share those, I want you to reflect on them and context of your own experiences, and how you might be able to cultivate more of these to help you become resilient against being traumatized when things go wrong in your life, too. 

20:28  
And the three things I'll touch on are an intentionally curated, regulated baseline, a sense of safety and a support system. And before I expand on those three things, let's get just a quick framework and get on the same page for what I mean when I say trauma. So a definition I often share of trauma is that it is anything that overwhelms our nervous system, creating store to survival, stress, energy, that impacts our fe, who is one of the leading researchers and just leaders in the trauma space. He says, trauma is not what happens to you. Right? So trauma is not the event itself, trauma is not what happens to you. It is what happens inside of you, as a result of what happens to you. Trauma is the scarring that makes you less flexible, more rigid, less feeling and more defended. So trauma is not the actual event, but it is how our nervous system processes this event. And it is what is left after that event passes in our system. 

21:39  
So in this situation, my body underwent a lot of trauma. But at no point do I feel like I was psychologically mentally or emotionally overwhelmed. So looking at trauma, as there's physical trauma, and there is psychological mental or emotional trauma. I absolutely had physical trauma, right. I had back labor that was excruciatingly overwhelming and painful. My pushing was exhausting. My uterus ruptured, I underwent major abdominal surgery followed by days and days and days of lack of sleep. My body underwent undeniable physical trauma and everything I went through, could also have easily been psychologically traumatizing. And it likely would have for most people, but again, I don't feel like it was for me. At no point did I feel emotionally overwhelmed. At no point did I feel a sense of helplessness or hopelessness. And I want to talk about why. 

22:49  
So here is why I think I was able to be more resilient in this experience. Number one, I was coming into the situation with a very intentionally laid foundation of regulation. A very intentionally regulated nervous system. For months and months and months, I had very intentionally managed my stress, done proactive nervous system regulating practices vagal, toning practices, I had intentionally cultivated context connection, and choice around this particular experience. And to hear more about what I mean by this. That is what episode 11 is all about. It is all about how I did exactly this, how I created a sense of context connection and choice, how I sourced for safety, around the situation proactively and the things that I was doing to lay this intentional foundation of nervous system regulation. And so what this did was that my window of tolerance, and I don't actually think I have explained window tolerance yet on this podcast. So stay tuned, because I'll do a whole episode on the window of tolerance. 

24:08  
But essentially, your window of tolerance is the amount of life that can happen within your window of feeling capable. So when your window of tolerance is small, any little thing feels overwhelming and can throw you off. When your window of tolerance is big. You can handle a lot of things a lot of hard, a variety of life experiences and still feel regulated and capable. So all of the work that I have done leading up to this experience, it provided me with a larger window of tolerance. For my experience, I had a lot of coping skills, I had a really regulated baseline and specifically in the context of this particular experience. So that is the first thing that I think has enabled me to walk away from what very easily could bit of an extremely traumatizing experience That's, that could have left a big ripple effect into my early postpartum months into the way that I thought about, you know, possibly birthing a third child in the future and so on. And yet it didn't. 

25:16  
The second thing is that I was in an environment and with people who made me feel safe. I am somebody who fantasizes about a beautiful home birth, where we have a pool in the basement, I get teary eyed every single time, a beautiful home birth video comes up on my Instagram feed. And yet when I reflected on what I wanted what I needed for this birth experience, I knew that wasn't it for me. For me, being in the hospital, was what felt the safest. And I know that that's not the truth for everybody's birthing experience. But for me, it was, I remember, after we'd been in the hospital for maybe about, you know, 20-30 minutes, I looked at my husband and I took a deep breath, I said, after everything we've been through, because I had considered maybe attempting a home VBAC. And I said, this was the right call, this is where I feel safest. And I intentionally source for safety. When it comes to situations in my life, whether that is a hard conversation with my husband, a family gathering, or a big experience like birth, I filter things through what can I do to help myself to feel as safe as possible in that situation. And so the second thing, I think, that helped me to be more resilient, and this experience was that I was in an environment, and I was with people who made me feel safe.

26:51  
And the third was that I was unbelievably supported, in the hospital, at home and within the context of my community. And there are numerous, numerous, numerous research studies that indicate social support is an essential ingredient for mitigating trauma, for maintaining physical and psychological health. There are harmful consequences of poor social support. And there are protective effects of good social support when it comes to trauma and mental health in general. And when it comes to this experience, I think this was by far the number one most impactful and protective thing for me. I had the most incredible hospital staff, I had family who was in the hospital was able to come visit me my partner is somebody who was so unbelievably supportive. My mom was living at my house with me for a few weeks before and after birth. So I was so supported at home, my mother in law was there, I have a neighbor who's just phenomenal. I felt supported within my community, I had friends who brought me dinner, I'm part of a church congregation who sent people over to bring me dinner. 

28:13  
And so I think this was the number one thing that helped me to mitigate the situation from ever feeling overwhelming was because I knew I was not alone in any of it. And it makes me so sad to know that I am the exception that this level of support for new moms is not the norm, at least not here in the United States. And my husband's on paternity leave. So I've been able to have kind of his undivided attention and support as well. And it just makes me so sad that more people don't have more support in this experience that I think that's why postpartum anxiety and depression rates are so, so high. 

28:53  
And so again, if we think about this psychological trauma as something that changes the way that we view and show up in the world after an event, I haven't experienced that this time around, especially in contrast with my first son's birth, where I went into that birth, with really high stress came out almost immediately tried to start working again, my husband didn't take his paternity leave right away. And I had so much postpartum anxiety show up in those first few weeks and months that I haven't experienced this time around. And I think it is because of these three specific things that have helped me to be resilient. Having a regulated nervous system baseline, that sense of safety and this community support. 

29:39  
It is not going through hard things that leaves us traumatized. It is going through hard things alone going through hard things unsupported or unresearched, just what I went through in the hospital was no doubt a hard thing. birth trauma is very, very real. But what gives my story a different ending is that I was and I felt I'm so unbelievably supported from beginning to end. This is why one of our pillars at rises we is community. Not only do we create it within our programs, but we also help our individual clients to intentionally create and curate support systems in their individual, real lives as well. Community is essential to our healing and to being human. I wasn't not traumatized from this experience, because I'm in any way superior from somebody else who has experienced birth trauma. I simply had support and resources, and a regulated nervous system in a way that you may not have had. 

30:41  
Now, to bring this all together, the three tangible takeaways I want to share with you from today's episode are these three specific things that I did. And I feel like you can do to make you more resilient for when things are big, or when things go wrong in your life. 

31:00  
And number one is a regulated baseline. So asking yourself right now what can you do now? To grow that window of tolerance? What can you do now to create a more regulated nervous system for yourself to give you tangible tools to support yourself when things go awry? And if there is this predictable event for you, whether that is, again, a hard conversation, a particular of life event, family experience, whatever it is, what can you do, in context of that specific event, to prepare yourself to go into that event with specific tools to help you maintain a regulated nervous system in the face of those experiences? So that's tangible takeaway. Number one is what can you do now, to create a more regulated and resilient system? 

31:53  
Number two is safety. look at situations or events in your life and ask yourself, How can I create a greater sense of safety for myself in this experience, doesn't need to include a particular person or thing doesn't need to happen at a particular place? Can you identify different somatic practices that help your body to shift into a deeper felt sense of safety and so on. So constantly looking for an intentionally sourcing for safety? Maybe that's through context, choice, connection, particular place, person or thing. 

32:31  
And the third is support. Support matters community is essential to our healing and to helping us buffer against any future overwhelming or traumatizing experiences. The research is undeniable about this. Asking for help is often so hard, it's uncomfortable. And sometimes the biggest hurdle is that it appears that help isn't available for us. So for this takeaway, I want to invite you to reflect on whether or not you feel supported, whether you have had in the past or feel like you would have support to help you through your birth or whatever hard thing might come up in your life. And if you do not, I want to invite you to not just brush that under the rug. But to be intentional about creating a support system. Whether this is in your immediate community through friends, family, a church organization, community organization, this might be online. The community aspect of the rise membership is such a huge part of our members healing journey. Just know that feeling supported matters that you deserve to feel supported in this life and ask yourself what you can do to cultivate or seek that out. 

33:49  
Trauma is not what happens to you. It is what happens inside of you as a result of what happens to you. And what happened to me from the outside looking in it was big and scary and traumatizing. But what happened within me during this experience was a consistent sense of being capable, and a feeling supported and therefore for me, the traumatic imprint of this experience has been very minimal. And for that I have been extremely grateful. 

34:21  
And for those of you who are seeking community, and personalized support and your healing journey with trauma, anxiety or depression, we are about to celebrate the one year anniversary of my rise membership. This is a monthly mental health membership and nervous system healing space for those struggling with anxiety and depression. And in honor of that, and the launch of this podcast and the reach that rise we is having I have decided to make the support even more financially accessible than ever. On my Instagram last week I just announced a new self selected sliding scale option. So There are now three different pricing options that you can self select into the one that best matches your financial situation. Because everyone deserves a safe space to heal, everyone deserves a sense of community. And I will leave a link to learn more in the show notes. But I would love the opportunity for you to be a part of our community and for us to be able to support you, for me to be able to support you in a more personalized way inside that space. 

35:29  
So as always, thank you for being here. I thank you for holding space for these pieces of my story. And I hope that there was something in here that is able to support you in your story as well. 

35:46  
Thanks for listening to another episode of The regulate and rewire podcast. If you enjoyed what you heard today, please subscribe and leave a five star review to help us get these powerful tools out to even more people who need them. And if you yourself are looking for more personalized support and applying what you've learned today, consider joining me inside RISE, my monthly mental health membership and nervous system healing space or apply for our one on one anxiety depression coaching program restore. I've shared a link for more information to both in the show notes. Again, thanks so much for being here. And I'll see you next time.