The Ordinary Doula Podcast
Welcome to The Ordinary Doula Podcast with Angie Rosier, hosted by Birth Learning. We help folks prepare for labor and birth with expertise coming from 20 years of experience in a busy doula practice, helping thousands of people prepare for labor, providing essential knowledge and tools for positive and empowering birth experiences.
The Ordinary Doula Podcast
E58: Early Labor with Emily Steadman
How does early labor really unfold, and why does it often catch new parents by surprise? Join us with our special guest, Emily Steadman, a seasoned doula. Emily sheds light on the marathon-like nature of early labor, contrasting it with the unrealistic portrayals we see in the media. Together, we explore the importance of conserving energy and pacing oneself in the anticipation of childbirth, ensuring that expectant parents are well-prepared for the journey ahead.
For those facing anxiety or discomfort at home during early labor, we dive into various coping strategies that harness both physical and mental techniques. Emily shares tips on creating a comforting environment using heat, movement, and mindset adjustments. We further explore personal coping mechanisms, from embracing hobbies to indulging in comforting activities like binge-watching a series or experimenting with new recipes. Our goal is to provide listeners with practical and relatable strategies to ease the early stages of labor, transforming them into moments of calm and control.
Navigating the induction process in a hospital setting can be daunting, but with the right approach, it doesn't have to be. We examine how small changes, such as bringing personal items and managing expectations, can drastically enhance the experience. Emily highlights the significance of involving family members while ensuring they are ready to support post-birth. Through heartfelt anecdotes and professional insights, we aim to empower our listeners to trust their instincts and cultivate a stress-free environment conducive to a positive birth experience.
Special guest: Emily Steadman
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Show Credits
Host: Angie Rosier
Music: Michael Hicks
Photographer: Toni Walker
Episode Artwork: Nick Greenwood
Producer: Gillian Rosier Frampton
Voiceover: Ryan Parker
Welcome to the Ordinary Doula Podcast with Angie Rozier, hosted by Birth Learning, where we help prepare folks for labor and birth with expertise coming from 20 years of experience in a busy doula practice, helping thousands of people prepare for labor, providing essential knowledge and tools for positive and empowering birth experiences.
Speaker 2:Hello and welcome to the Ordinary Doula Podcast. My name is Angie Rozier and I have a pretty awesome guest with us here today. This is a longtime colleague and friend. Her name is Emily Stedman. She's been a doula for a long time and she is expert on so many things. I love learning from Emily. Talking to Emily, working with Emily, I like to refer to her as a walking research article. She is just a wealth of knowledge and information. She's been doing this work a long time and I will let her introduce herself a little bit more. So, Emily, tell us a little bit about yourself, what you love about this work, what got you into it, how long you've been doing it. Give us a little background of yourself.
Speaker 3:Of course, thanks for having me. I've been a doula, officially completed my training in 2011 and been working in the birth field soon. I always imagined I'd work in medicine. I always had an interest in like nursing and was completing nursing prerequisites, was starting nursing school the next semester and needed kind of a place filler in my schedule and found a doula and childbirth preparation class. They called it, took it and just changed my life. I'm like, wow, this is what I want to do. This I just found. It just lit a fire in me a passion for advocating and um and supporting um people as they, as they move into parenthood and um and give birth and feed their babies and um, uh, worked as a doula pretty consistently throughout that Took a little pause here and there as we welcomed our own babies into our family and, yeah, I'm waiting on a client today to hopefully go and support as well. So it's good work, it's important work.
Speaker 2:It is and you are so very good at it. So today Emily is going to something I think she is really great at, among many other things, is we're calling strategies for early labor. Now, as we've talked, you know, in the past and as we educate our clients, early labor surprises people a lot because it's so long or it's so slow, it takes some time and I don't think people are always ready for that. I think that if you, you know, if you got any of your education from pop culture, from the general media in the United States, you were kind of led to believe that birth is fast and furious and it fits in a sitcom, and that is not the case. A lot of times. We have some pretty lengthy stages of labor, especially that early phase of labor. So, emily, talk to us about some of the things people can be prepared for or do during those early labor phases and a little bit about what that phase is and what it's like, what to expect.
Speaker 3:Absolutely so. In birth, in birth work, I've learned that you don't know anything and every birth is going to be different. And when you do it several hundred times, you notice trends and you notice commonalities, but every situation is just so different. I always tell people to prepare for a marathon are so different. I always tell people to prepare for a marathon. Do sprints occur? You know, are there births that occur faster than we expect? Absolutely Sometimes that happens, Much more often the process is a little slower and a little more nuanced than people expect, and so that early labor that you know, that kind of pre-labor phase even often takes people by surprise.
Speaker 3:As doulas, we always visit with the clients after they give birth, kind of to wrap up our experience. I always ask them questions like is there something you wish you knew before you went into this process? Is there something you wish you had learned more about? Is there a question you wish you knew before you went into this process? Is there something you wish you had learned more about? Is there a question you wish you had asked your provider? And I've used those answers to kind of significantly change how I educate and how I prepare people over the years for their experience, and I would say nine times out of 10,.
Speaker 3:When I visit with someone who's given birth, usually for the first time, they say gosh, I wish I had slept more, I wish I had not gotten so excited Very often, I wish I had stayed home longer. We really got overexcited. We went into our birth facility much sooner than we had planned on, much sooner than we probably needed to be there, or we started drawing on a lot of our heavier coping strategies earlier than we probably should have, and so I just have started you know, using that language to prepare future clients to say you know, nine times out of 10, I hear people say I wish I had slept more, I wish I had rested more.
Speaker 2:I love your marathon strategy. That's so perfect because you got to pace yourself right, like you're going to need some gas in the tank at mile 22. And if you go out of the gate super excited, that's gonna hard, that's hard to come by.
Speaker 3:For sure. And if you're, I love the distance running strategy and in fact some of my clients have been runners or you know distance athletes and they've said a lot of the same strategies really do apply. And so you know, if you're preparing for 26 miles and the the finish line ends up 10 miles down the road, no one's like unhappy about that, right. But if you're preparing for a 5k and the finish line never, never shows up and never shows up, and the 10k, you know, mark rolls around and the finish line still not there, gotta keep running. You're kind of out of steam. And so almost always you know preparing for maybe longer than you thought. And so you know back to more sleeping. You know I hear so often people say I wish I had slept more, but that's easier said than done, right? So if you're either A excited to be in labor so if you're either A excited to be in labor, which most people are, or B, you're really uncomfortable, which early labor can absolutely be pretty intense and uncomfortable for some people how do you sleep through that? And so I always encourage my clients to kind of develop some strategies for getting more sleep. And of course, as doulas, we can never recommend medication, and so I always encourage them.
Speaker 3:Talk to your provider about the use of medication in early labor, if that's something you're interested in. So ask your doctor. Would it be reasonable to use something like Tylenol to help with the pain of early labor? Would it be reasonable to try something like Unisom or Benadryl to help with the pain of early labor? Would it be reasonable to try something like Unisom or Benadryl to get a little bit of extra sleep?
Speaker 3:And some people don't want to use any medication and we absolutely support that right as doulas. But a lot of times when people start to think about it, start to do the mental math. They realize if you go into the hospital in an early phase of labor, you're not in an active phase and it's not time for them to keep you for labor. They'll often offer you something like a shot of morphine with often something like fenugrin in it, which is kind of a sedative-based medication. So when you're considering that that's what the hospital would happily offer most people, all of a sudden a Tylenol or a little bit of Unisom doesn't start to seem so Right. You can do that.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:So if you're wanting to potentially use medication, that's one option, right? Some people find a lot of comfort in heat, in ice, in movement. So we talk about that hot packs on the back or on the lower belly, things like that we talk about and often give movement strategies, kind of stretching. But I think the number one thing is just to really and I joke with some people if a client seems like they would appreciate the humor I say gaslight yourself, tell yourself I like that. This isn't happening. This is so mild and manageable. These sensations I'm feeling are not even close to labor. I don't think that I am even feeling anything right now. This is so easy and mild and manageable.
Speaker 3:And I always preface that with once you're full term, if you have a low risk pregnancy, if your provider has told you it's safe for you to labor at home. So we don't want to ignore cramping or labor-like sensations. If we're preterm, if we have a high-risk situation, that should bring us into the hospital right away. And so always, you know we're always, always conferring with our provider about the safety of that. But once you're into a full-term part of your pregnancy after 37 weeks, once you're, you know we've confirmed your baby's, ideally head down. Everything is kind of in a low risk situation and your providers told you yeah, you can labor at home. It's okay to you know, stay at home for the first part of your labor. That's a great time to just distract and deny and dismiss for as long as you possibly can.
Speaker 2:I like that distraction method and I've heard you say this to clients find something to do, right, like whether that's catching up on a show, going for a walk, there's a lot of things. Just keep your mind off, just like you said, like ignore it for a while, just kind of put a shit down the road until you can't ignore it anymore. Your body will let you know, right, it kind of will take over. But, emily, tell me, I have two questions here For folks who are a little more anxious about things and it is hard to calm the mind sometimes.
Speaker 2:This is something you've been anticipating for so long. Right, you're jittery, you're jumpy, you're raring to go, you're like awesome, let's do this thing. And yeah, those of us who have seen this hundreds of times, you're like you know what. Just chill out for a little while. What are some strategies for folks who it's just hard for their mind to calm down in order to let their body be still or quiet in those boring quiet times? How can we, how can those folks that are a little anxious about it approach that?
Speaker 3:That's a great question. So a couple of things. It depends on what you know. I always encourage people. Always encourage people when you're in. Labor is not a great time to develop an entire new personality and new series of coping strategies, right?
Speaker 2:Right Like impossible.
Speaker 3:Like impossible. Right, you're busy, you're doing something else. I always encourage people to start thinking about how they have coped with other exciting or possibly stressful or possibly exhausting situations throughout their life.
Speaker 2:So that's going to be emotional or physical, or both, right?
Speaker 3:Absolutely, yep. So some people are more physically anxious. They're jittery, they're nervous, they're excited, they're pacing they're. They're excited, they're pacing they're. You know, some people are more mentally anxious, you know, um, what if we? What if we wait too long? Um, is everything going to be okay? I saw a couple of spots of pink in my, you know, on my toilet paper is is. Is that normal? Um?
Speaker 3:So you know you are the expert in you. Your provider is an expert in medicine. If you choose to have a doula with you, hopefully she's an expert, or they're an expert in medicine. If you choose to have a doula with you, hopefully she's an expert or they're an expert in the birth process. But you, the person giving birth, is the expert in them and you know you and your mind and your anxieties and fears and excitement better than anyone else.
Speaker 3:And so, trying to kind of formulate a plan before you're there about how you can calm your own mind, about what helps you, you know we develop coping strategies throughout our life. Some of them are really helpful. We go for a run after work if it's been a long day. We cuddle up with a loved one and turn on a favorite show. We sip, you know our favorite tea from a warm mug.
Speaker 3:And some of the coping strategies we develop throughout our life are not very helpful, right, some people develop addictions that are not helpful. But you know how you cope or how you don't, and so trying to kind of find what's worked for you in the past and what can translate into the birth space. You know a run maybe not the best for early labor, right, we don't want to physically exhaust ourself, but maybe a short brisk walk can quiet the mind, can calm your anxieties, if you're one that's a cuddle up kind of person. You know, turning on a favorite show, you know what's chicken soup for you, um, you know an episode of friend. Or I joke start a lord of the rings marathon or harry potter see how far you get, yeah, what's a tedious, enjoyable movie or show?
Speaker 3:um, you know, if you're, if you're one that loves to use your hands you know knitting, or um another um kind of busy hobby? Um start a tedious um recipe. There's a fun um eggplant parmesan recipe from a restaurant on the east coast that they claim induces labor where it works, and there's like all sorts of testimonials on the website and they started um posting the recipe so people that don't live locally can prepare it and as a joke for fun, I've sent it to people.
Speaker 3:What it does do is it's a very tedious recipe that takes a lot of time, and so, if nothing else, it gets your mind off of um the sensations you're feeling you know at the end of that, if, if you get, if labor doesn't stop you, you can have yummy, absolutely yeah.
Speaker 2:So what I'm hearing too, like I like this approach something for your mind, something for your body, and maybe both right. Like if you to call, like if you're sitting and cooking a tedious recipe, you're up and moving, you're thinking like your mind's being slightly occupied, not hard, your body's being slightly occupied, not hard. I also think the movement component is important. So I love the idea of a movie marathon and sometimes you're going to get through all, all the lord of the rings. Sometimes you're not right, like sometimes you'll have a baby long before that, but it's. I see someone sitting on a ball, like right, just like bouncing on a ball as they watch. So so they have a movement component and you know you cuddle up for some of that. But just being flexible, um, things for the body and mind, yeah.
Speaker 3:And I think you know I often compare it to other physical discomfort we've had in our life. Right, if you are in the grocery store and you're pushing a shopping cart and you stub your toe and you're in public, there's children around you know you can't say some choice words.
Speaker 3:So, you just sort of take a deep breath and you just go on about your shopping trip, right? Um? If you were to stub your toe at home, in the privacy of your own home, you might have a few choice words. You might immediately think oh my gosh, it's broken. My toe is broken, I have to. I gotta get this sock off. It's probably bleeding, am going to be okay.
Speaker 3:Once you start to focus on a sensation, it almost always becomes stronger and less manageable. I think the sensations of early labor are similar to that If we decide we're going to go out to dinner with a friend and we have to take some deep breaths through some sensation, but we just go about. If we decide we're going to take a stroll in the park, if we decide we're going to, you know, finish up a little bit of work or a craft around the house, versus if we just sit on the side of our bed and get our contraction timer out and start trying to really notice every single sensation we have, the minute it starts, the minute it stops, I think it's almost always going to feel less man right, right, I like that I hate contraction.
Speaker 3:I have a love hate relationship with contraction. Timing out right I agree.
Speaker 2:I think it's a good check-in every now and then, but don't live on it.
Speaker 3:Some of them are real eager to encourage you to go to your birthplace. Sometimes you'll you'll have a couple of contractions and it's like, oh, time to go to the hospital, get your bag, get your bag ready. Um, so I would, um, you know, because of liability issues, I think they're almost always going to. If it has a component built in to recommend you go to your birthplace, it's almost always going to recommend you go quite soon in the process for liability reasons. A contraction timing app also doesn't have the nuance of you and your provider.
Speaker 2:Right, it doesn't sense intensity of anything really, right. It's just a frequency duration. It's not an internal of any kind. It's not measuring experience, just the outside. Look.
Speaker 3:And the app doesn't know if you are two hours from the hospital or 10 minutes.
Speaker 2:If this is your first baby or your third baby.
Speaker 3:Which makes a significant difference. Right, a lot of these strategies we're talking about not very relevant if we're having a second or third baby. You know, often we're not hearing from people days before with the second baby. We're hearing from people the afternoon like, hey, I've been cramping throughout the day and, uh, you know, we got to get, you know, little junior picked up from from daycare and off to grandma's quick because, um, you know, maybe you should meet us over at the hospital. Like, we're not right often the same, you know, kind of days, um, but, um, yeah, so these these apps love hate relationship. Um, first of all, I don't love how often and how quickly they recommend you go to the the hospital. An app is not a physician or a midwife or a childbirth educator, it's just an app. But also, I think some people are really committed to getting the data, and so I have people that are sitting there timing every single cramp and confection for hours and hours and hours. That's exhausting, that's mentally exhausting.
Speaker 2:That's like watching a boiling pot, right Like it's that is. Yeah, that's a lot of work absolutely like watching the turkey.
Speaker 3:Right, you know it's going to be thanksgiving if you were to pop open the oven and check every two minutes to see if the turkey was browning yet. Um, it's. It's gonna feel like thanksgiving. Dinner took a day to cook, right, right, if you just set in the oven and ignore it, set a timer for a few hours when you think it might be time. You know, I tell people if they're timing contractions, don't even time them for a couple hours. Come back in a couple hours, give it a break. Give it a break Because active labor, it's not subtle, you're not going to miss it.
Speaker 3:It'll get your attention. You're not gonna miss, it'll get your attention. You're not gonna sleep through it. You're not gonna be at the grocery store trying to run an errand and all of a sudden you're just an active labor and the baby's coming out. We have to call an ambulance. Like. Those stories are so fun and so happy because they're so, so rare. Right, right in the wal Walmart parking lot and the patrol trooper comes and helps. Right, you know we hear about those stories once every six months because that's about how often they happen, right?
Speaker 2:It's not normal. Okay, so the other part of my question of this we've talked about being at home. What if you are in the hospital for this? We have a lot of induction situations like where we're doing long, slow burn on an induction, whether we have cervical ripening going on. We're taking it easy, being nice and patient about it. You're in a hospital room, right, you can't wander, you can't go for long hikes or walks in this. Give us some strategies for being in the hospital space during that time.
Speaker 3:Absolutely so great question Because, yeah, I would say about half of our clients these days are having an induction, some for, you know, elective reasons they are ready to bring this pregnancy to a close and some for medical necessity. So it's very common. A lot of people don't realize how common induction is and, depending on your birth plan, your preferences, it may or may not be something that you would choose or be recommended to have at some point, but I think it's always good to start wondering about how you might manage this in the hospital setting. So I think, even starting with the language that you use, so if your induction is starting with something like a misoprostol or a cervidil or a Foley, catheter or balloon, if you're hearing any of those terms at your induction, that is what you mentioned before as cervical ripener. So this is not yet labor. This we are trying to use a medication or a mechanical device or maybe a combination of of both to actually soften and prepare the cervix for labor. So if you say the first, you know I went into the hospital at 8pm on a Friday and they started my labor and it was 48 hours later until I had the baby. I was in labor for 48 hours first, 12 or even 24 hours of that for cervical ripening, a process that usually does not lead to strong, regular contractions, that does not lead to active changing of the cervix. And so even starting to kind of change the verbiage that you're using, changing your mentality a little bit, I think, can help the process feel less ominous, less long and so kind of going in knowing that the first 12, even 24 hours might be fairly mild and manageable, it might be fairly uneventful and as much as possible I can kind of go about my life as close as I could in a hospital setting.
Speaker 3:Right, you can get up and shower, you can turn on a favorite movie, you can have your partner possibly go order or bring into the hospital some of your favorite food, have a date night, you know, bring a. You know Uber. You know Uber eats a favorite meal from a restaurant and bring the Lord of the Rings with you I'm Lord of the Rings fan and your movies and eat your meals. You know if you're kind of in full patient mode, um, you know, laying in the bed with a gown on hooked up to machines from you know hour one of that induction that can start to feel really, really unmanageable toward the end of it. If you're in your own clothes, you brought a blanket and pillow from your own bed. You've got some you know, some shows on that you're enjoying or a card game that you love to play. I think that can help it feel less clinical.
Speaker 2:And get out of the bed too right, Like move around the room, Even if you're being monitored. You do not have to lay or sit in that bed. You can do other things sitting on the couch or a ball near the bed. I think being in a bed a long time gets pretty long and old for sure being in a bed a long time gets.
Speaker 3:It's pretty long and old for sure. Yeah, yeah, laying in a hospital bed, in a hospital gown, for two days, no one's gonna feel good after that, even under the circumstances. Showering, putting on comfy clothes, sitting on a ball um, covid, restrictions are are loosening significantly. Um, we're seeing most hospitals happy to let you walk in the halls now, which we hadn't seen for years. So, getting out walking in the halls, you know it's easier to ask for forgiveness and permission. So, even if you sneak past the you know doors for a minute, go find a window with some, go see the outside, go check out the snack room, say hi to the nursing staff if you're wanting to kind of be friendly and social. And, yeah, definitely. And then, you know, trying to rest. So we love movement. We want to move a lot in early labor and we want to hopefully balance periods of good active movement with really, you know, productive movement with rest. So if we're sitting on the ball, we don't want to sit and do circles and bounce on our ball for 12 hours. Right, our hips and our knees are going to be pretty tired by the end of that. So I love you know, something simple like the mile circuit we talk about often. You know, getting moving and walking and stretching and then resting. Resting in a good functional position, so a nice kind of exaggerated side lying position, propping your leg up on the pillows, you know, so you're kind of half onto your belly, allowing a lot of good rotation and descent for baby. You know, rest for an hour or two, get up and do it again, right, get up and so yeah, and eating normally. So that's another thing in the in the. How long has it been now? 12 years since I've been a doula 1314, I can't even count anymore. There's so much more open at most birthing places, at most facilities for you eating, especially in those early stages. Some of our facilities will let you eat throughout any part of labor, but most hospitals are pretty happy for you to eat before Pitocin is started, before an epidural is placed, if you're choosing one, and that's something.
Speaker 3:If you're planning an induction, I'd actually ask the provider before you even start the process what's the policy on eating and drinking? I understand that an induction could take 36 or 48 hours. I'm not interested in not eating for two days. What are my options? What would be safe and reasonable, even if it's not common.
Speaker 3:Do you feel comfortable, as my provider, with me eating normally in those early stages of this induction? First of all, if they say no, I'd ask why and I'd ask a few more questions. But often they'll say yes, once the provider has given you an okay, I think it's really easy to then advocate for yourself with maybe the nursing staff Like oh, I actually already talked to the provider about it, they're comfortable with me eating in this early stage and eating regular meals at regular times can really help to create a normal pace and kind of keep us less in this clinical patient mode and more in like our normal life. So I feel like I'm rambling now, but you know, stopping to get regular meals at regular times I think can so much make those first 12 hours or so of that induction process just feel so much more manageable and less clinical.
Speaker 2:I love that and pacing like you're. If you're doing that, you're going to have three, four or so hours between those meal events, something you can anticipate, look forward to, as you are sitting there for 12, 24 or more hours for sure. So, emily, one more thing, I think, before you wrap it up. I know you've seen this a lot. I've seen a lot. We're in a situation where we're in a long, slow burn of an induction because we're being patient, letting the body, and it takes time right. A cervix that's not quite ready is going to take a lot of time for most people to coax it open, for soften it, so we can open it. Family members right, so this could be a partner, supportive family members. They may have in their mind a different picture.
Speaker 2:I see so often people are waiting in the waiting room, anxiously, right, like we have a number of people out there, or calling, texting, like is that baby here yet? What's taken so long? Why are you still pregnant? Why don't they just hurry it up or do a c-section? Um, how can we prepare those around us, those supporting us with the best of intentions, um, so that they are not pestering and they're not pushing, so that they, they also need to understand what to expect. Um, because it could be one day, two days. I've seen a lot of situations where we have loving family members waiting in the waiting room. By the time we get to a baby, they're hangry, they need a shower, they're grumpy, they can't wait to get out of there and here's the baby. So talk to us about that a little bit.
Speaker 3:Absolutely so. I think induction or laboring at home with more of a spontaneous type of labor, I think, pacing your support. So if you have a doula on board, if you have nursing staff supporting you, their job is labor support right, and that's what they specialize in. When the baby's born, your doula heads home. And now you have recently given birth and you have a newborn baby to take care of, your no-transcript, a well-meaning grandma, a loving aunt, a sister that's a great time for them to step in and help and support. And they're not going to be in a good mental or physical place to do that if they haven't slept for two nights. Right. And so having you know you are the expert in you and your family. Some people don't let anybody know they're in the hospital. Some people have no interest in support there. Some people are happy just to update family once the baby is there. I think that's a great strategy. I think that works well for some people. Some people want that love and support, some people want that community, and so I think getting realistic ideas about the process from your childbirth educator, your doula, your provider, and then sharing those and actually sharing the time of those, like based on how they're inducing my labor. It could be a couple of days until the baby is here. I would love you guys to come bring us dinner and visit for a few minutes and then go home and sleep. We'll check in with you tomorrow. We don't expect anything's going to happen overnight and it will be a second night too, you know so that grandma and aunt and well-meaning family are not, like you said, sitting in the waiting room for 12 hours or 24 hours or more. I think that can be helpful. 24 hours or more, I think that can be helpful.
Speaker 3:Some people find even having their partner sleeping or away from them less realistic in a hospital setting. But I've had some people even want the partner to be sleeping, you know, for some parts of this, so that they can be mentally, physically well to support whoever's given birth and their new baby. You know, just personally, for me, you know, my water broke in the middle of the night with my second baby. I didn't wake my husband up. Of course, if I started going into labor I would have, but I didn't. He didn't need to miss sleep while I knew that nothing was likely to be happening for a few hours. I wanted him to be well rested so that by the second night when I was in labor he was like mentally and physically well enough to be a good support to me to make decisions if decisions needed to be made. So some people find that really laboring by themselves in this early phase is more helpful and of course, again, the person giving birth is the expert in them. But you know, some people are more social birthers. They want.
Speaker 2:They want to be surrounded by people.
Speaker 3:Want to be surrounded and we love that and we love that. Some people are much more, you know, kind of crawl in a dark cave and labor by themselves and I think people sometimes don't know that that's even an option and, you know, in a clinical setting, in a hospital, less realistic in some ways, but there's still a way to do that. Some people don't want to be watched, some people don't want to be talked to and touched and surrounded, especially in those earlier phases. Some people just kind of want to cocoon up. You know, one of the most functional labors I've ever seen was a home birth and the woman would come out and say, you know, go check on the baby. And the midwife would listen for a minute and check in on her and she's like okay, I'm going to go back to my room now. She's like, I just like it. It's dark and it's quiet in there. And she's like, and I am just crawling around on the floor because it feels so good and I just don't want everybody to watch me do that, I just want to do my thing. And we said, of course, so she would go do her thing. And then, you know, she'd pop out 20 minutes later.
Speaker 3:Some people really just want to kind of get in the zone and focus and listen to their instincts, without feeling like they need to put on a performance or a show, without feeling like they need to host a birth. You know, if you've got aunt, you know Eileen and grandma Kathy there and you feel like you have to kind of put on a performance for them. You want to host them, you want them to feel comfortable and involved in the process. That's taking you out of that primal part of your brain that kind of needs to quiet down and listen to itself. And so I think you know visiting with yourself about the kind of person you are before you're in labor and what you're likely going to want or not again, I think is a good strategy, you know to potentially decide how you want to handle visitors support throughout that process.
Speaker 2:I love that and also being flexible, like knowing what you think you know about yourself or what you've prepared may change during labor. You can always change your mind on who's with you or who's there Absolutely.
Speaker 1:Cool.
Speaker 2:Emily, you have given us some great things to think about. Hopefully folks have realistic expectations. This can help them realize that early labor is long and slow sometimes and what this gives us some good things, of what we can do during that time so that we are most comfortable, both emotionally, mentally, physically. And that our support I love that phrase, pacing your support, whether that's near support, far support, helping them have realistic expectations, emily, any last words, any parting thoughts before we wrap it up today.
Speaker 3:Put down the contraction timing app. I love it, you know. Keep the lights low, get something to eat, move and rest. You're not going to miss labor. I promise the baby's not going to climb out while you're sleeping.
Speaker 2:Love that. Cool, Cool, cool. Emily, thank you so much for being with us here today. We sure appreciate your time, your expertise and what you have shared. So we're going to wrap it up for the Ordinary Duel podcast. Again, this is Angie Rose, your host. Thanks so much for being with us. Hopefully you can go out today, connect with someone near or far, let someone know that you're thinking of them, you support them, and wait for that human connection to come back to you. It always will. Hope you have a good one and we will see you next time.
Speaker 1:Thank you for listening to the Ordinary Doula podcast with Angie Rozier, hosted by Birth Learning. Episode credits will be in the show notes Tune in next time as we continue to explore the many aspects of giving birth.