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
E100: A Conversation with My Four Daughters
A hundred episodes felt like the right moment to gather around the kitchen table and pull back the curtain on what it’s like to grow up with a doula mom. Angie sits down with her four daughters for an honest, funny, and moving conversation about family culture, witnessing a home water birth, and how open dialogue turned birth from something to fear into something to understand. If you’ve ever wondered how advocacy actually plays out in labor, or what kids absorb when birth is normalized at home, this one hits close.
We talk about the on‑call lifestyle and the teamwork it demanded—older siblings stepping up, dad filling the gaps, and a community ready to drive, cook, and cheer. The daughters describe how using clear language for bodies and birth gave them confidence to support friends, ask better questions, and process hard birth stories with empathy. They share vivid details from their brother’s birth, from quiet living room light to the rush of first moments, plus the often overlooked truth that immediate postpartum procedures can feel tougher than the last contractions.
The conversation also looks forward: unmedicated birth goals, skin‑to‑skin, breastfeeding, and the crucial role of well‑prepared partners who can advocate when words are hard to find. We tackle social media myths, dwindling birth rates, and the narrative that motherhood is only sacrifice. Instead, we offer a grounded perspective: informed choice, compassionate support, and flexible plans can transform experiences in hospitals, birth centers, or at home. Along the way, there’s humor—uterus mugs and an unforgettable frozen placenta—because normalization thrives on warmth as much as facts.
If you care about birth, postpartum support, or simply want to hear how family culture shapes health literacy, press play. Then share this episode with someone who needs a reframed, hopeful take on labor. Subscribe, leave a review, and tell us: what’s one belief about birth you’d like to rethink?
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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 Rosier, 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_01:Well, welcome today to the Ordinary Doula Podcast. To celebrate, it's actually our 100th episode to celebrate. I gathered some of my very favorite people and best friends actually to have a conversation. So I gathered four of the coolest ladies that I know, and these are actually my four daughters. Um, and I will let them kind of introduce themselves, but these guys have been with me along my entire journey as a birth doula, postpartum dual lactation consultant. So they have always kind of had a front row seat to that. Um, and for some of them, this has been more than their whole lives, for some of them, all of their lives. So I want to just invite you into what we like have as just kitchen table conversation. So as we're just hanging out as a family, um being together, um, I just want to kind of have a little organic conversation with them and kind of get their perspective on this work um from their unique parts of life. They're all in a little bit of a different part of life right now. So if we can do some intros, let's start oldest and go youngest. Sound good?
unknown:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Go to Gilly. Um, my name's Gillian. Um, I I edit all of these podcasts that you've been listening to, so it's kind of fun to be on the back end of that. Um, but yeah, my name's Gillian, live here in Utah, and I'm 27 years old.
SPEAKER_03:Uh my name is Brindley. I also live in Utah. I'm in Ogden, Utah. Um, I'm 25 years old. I work as a graphic designer, um, and I really enjoy like outdoor activities, outdoor recreation, like fishing and hiking.
SPEAKER_04:My name is Ember. I live in Idaho, and I'm studying right now at a university. I'm studying nutrition and food science, and I'm 22 years old.
SPEAKER_02:Um, my name is Piper. I am 16 years old, and I am just a junior in high school living at home.
SPEAKER_01:Living the dream. So at one point, we did all live under one roof, and it was super fun. And like I said before, these are some of my very favorite people and best friends. So I feel honored that they're here with me today. And I, yeah, as any parent does, like they just love their interactions with their kids and um love to have that as those associations. So, in no particular order, let's just throw it out there. Um, you guys grew up in a in a doula lifestyle. Why don't you share with me a little bit what that was like? Whoever wants to, just jump in and go for it.
SPEAKER_02:I have a quick experience to share. Um, just last night we went to dinner with some friends, and the the wife is pregnant, her second baby, she's like, I don't know, 23 weeks pregnant or something. And first thing, because because I knew this episode was coming up, and so that we talked about doing this, so I've just been paying all more attention to some of my thoughts recently. And first thing I wanted to ask her, like, what what hospital are you at? Who's your provider? What's your birth plan? Do you want to go natural, unnatural? Like, all these things are are probably a little bit inappropriate to ask someone you don't know super well. But I think that's very much a part of growing up with a mom as a doula is like, it's just tell me everything you're planning. So that's one little thing that uh frequently happens to me. And I think it's just from how we grew up close.
SPEAKER_01:Where my brain would go too, I would want to ask all those questions.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, for sure. And I think it's cool that we like have that vocabulary. And I just remember like we could spend hours sometimes talking to mom about questions about like what the woman's body is doing pregnancy, what it's doing during labor. Like, and it's super interesting. And she would come home from these births with a lot of really unique um experiences and having met a lot of really interesting people, and like her stories were always interesting. And like my dad, he has a career too, but like we just didn't talk about his as his as much because it's not as interesting. Yeah, exactly. And so um it it was something I do think that we got to learn a lot about because it it is interesting and and it is applicable to life. Um but yeah, she would have a different take on some things than like a lot of other people. For example, I remember when I was in like so we were like homeschooled mostly when like through elementary school, we were homeschooled and then we do like some part-time stuff at the elementary school and junior high, and then we did high school full-time in school. And I remember mom, guys, do you remember on the chalkboard? Mom would like draw a picture of the uterus and explain how it all works and stuff like that. And I remember the elementary school had a program called the maturation program, which was where they would take like the fourth graders or the fifth graders and like separate the girls and boys, and then they would teach them about what their body was gonna go through when they started puberty and you know all everything that they needed to know about like the reproductive parts and stuff. And we went to that. Me and mom went to that. Did any of you guys go to it? Yeah, I went to that too. Okay. And after like an hour of this lady talking and going through presentation and and showing all these fourth and fifth grader stuff, mom walked out of there with me and she's like, I did not like how she explained that. Like this and this and this. And then she basically re-taught me the whole thing in a better, more positive way. Because the way that the lady was teaching it was that like it's terrible to be a woman, it's it's terrible to have a uterus, it's hard to have a period, you don't want to get pregnant, childbirth is the worst thing that could ever happen to you. Stuff like that. And mom just had such a positive spin on everything, and like that's something that I've taken out of this is like, I don't know about you guys. So none of us have kids, but I don't know about you guys, but like I've never been fearful of childbirth or pregnancy or anything like that.
SPEAKER_02:I don't think I have either.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, I would agree. Um, I was kind of thinking along the lines of what Gillian was saying too. Um so most of us are like in our 20s. So in this like age cohort, I have friends who are having babies and um getting pregnant and starting to breastfeed and stuff like that. And I think having that vocabulary, even though I don't have kids, has kind of helped me be a better friend to them in those times because it's helped me know what kinds of questions to ask. So I went to a friend's house a few weeks ago and she she has a baby who's a few months old, and I was kind of hanging out with him so she could work on some homework and stuff like that. And she was just having like a rough mom day, and I'd never really heard her her birth story like through and through, because normally we're like in a pretty social situation and we're together. So I was just like asking her about it and came to find out that she had like some parts of her birth story that were really hard for her, but she hadn't really had an opportunity to vocalize that. And so it was cool to be able to like kind of know what kind of kinds of questions to ask and hear her perspective from her birth story. And um, and then I found out some people uh like she just hadn't been able to vocalize that before. So it was helpful to her to be able to um talk about it and try to put more of like a positive spin on things and know that each birth and her upcoming kids, because she actually um is expecting again, um, it'll be different and that she can uh learn and she's very open to that. So I think that's been cool too, like just growing up and and getting older knowing these things and how like naturally it comes to talk about for us.
SPEAKER_02:I agree. It's really cool, I think, to see friends have like like you said, we don't have kids yet, but it's really cool to see like close friends go through that, and we just have a little bit of a different understanding, and it's fun to see them grow into that, I think.
unknown:It's cool.
SPEAKER_02:Piper, what about you? Um, I was actually totally gonna change the subject away from people because like when I was younger, it's kind of fun because like I'd be like four or five years old, and I would watch videos of animals giving birth because I was bored, because that's just such a totally normal part of like our lives. And it would always be like, oh, like the giraffes are way up tall, and then oh, the elephants are huge, and then like having like going to eighth grade and my teachers getting pregnant, and even now it's like, oh, my English teacher is pregnant, that's so cool, like blah blah blah, and just being able to understand differently than like everybody else in my grade what exactly childbirth can be and should be for people.
SPEAKER_01:Cool, cool, cool. Um, any other thoughts on that? Cool. So tell me a little bit about um you guys, like Gillian, the oldest of the of you is five years old when this whole lifestyle began. Um, so for some of you, that's all you know and remember, most of you. Tell me a little bit about that lifestyle. Like we did have a ton of time together, which is awesome, and I cherish that time. But tell me about the lifestyle of having a mom who kind of just disappears at random times for random amounts in time.
SPEAKER_02:I mean, I think we all got used to it of having a mom who's on call 24-7. It has its difficulties, like there are things you've missed. Um, but one thing that I look back that I think fondly of is sometimes like you know, we'd wake up in the morning and you would have gone into a bird in the middle of the night. And we became very independent because of that. Um, but like in a in a good way, like we really learned to take care of each other when you were at a birth. Um, even like more of us older three, Piper a little bit, but if I that's one thing I look back positively on is we just like really learned to take care of each other, which I think was just cool because I don't think all of our other kids our age necessarily got to do that in the same way.
SPEAKER_04:I think that's true. I also think um, I mean, it's kind of hard to like wake up and mom's gone and you don't it's not like she's gonna get off five, you know, she'll get off when the baby's there. And everybody knows that that's just like up in the air. But we also had like a really good community and family who was willing to step in. I mean, I could like we could make a whole list of all the people who would um drive us places if we needed it, or um, would kind of just like pitch in as needed, whether that be from our church or um friends or dance studio or grandparents or anything like that. So it also did, I think, teach us the value of having like community.
SPEAKER_01:I like that. That's cool.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, and I think it's unique because like most other careers there's a schedule. You can schedule out who's covering what, who's driving someone somewhere, you can schedule out your childcare, whatever. But this truly was like a schedule wouldn't have worked because obviously mom was on call. And so it was um, you know, if we woke up and oh mom went to a birth last night, all right, we gotta step it up now. She's not here to do the things that she usually does. And so we all gotta step it up, we gotta be a team, we're gonna figure it out however long she's gone. And so I think it worked well. However, I think one of the reasons it worked well was because of the personalities that we have. Um I I think that that dynamic we kind of got lucky. I don't think it would work for everyone. Um I don't know, being little girls, we were kind of all like people pleasers in a little in a way. We all wanted to be good. We all we we we you know, I remember hurry, clean up before mom gets home so she'll she'll be happy that we kept the house clean while she was gone. I don't know if every uh family with their personalities of children or little boys or what would be it would be the same experience. I think I think that we were a little bit unique in that way of sometimes I just I just see kids that I know and I'm like thinking back on how we grew up with mom going to birth, and I'm like, how did that work? Like, were we just good? I don't know.
SPEAKER_01:If we had had started with four boys, that might be a totally different story.
SPEAKER_02:I think something else we all benefited from, maybe not Piper as much, but when mom started going back to births again when Piper was however old, we like took care of baby Piper when mom would be at birth. Like we all learned how to take care of like little kids, which I think we've all benefited from that over the years, which is kind of cool. True.
SPEAKER_01:Piper, what about you?
SPEAKER_02:I mean you still live with me on call, so um well, I think something that kind of you've like learned, or I guess you've been doing this well since you've been doing this my whole life, but like it's multitasking. Like you'd come home and then you'd have like four like girls, and you have like baby Bo, and then you also have like kids who have dance recitals and you have piano recitals, and you have school on top of that that like you gotta get them to. And of course, dad is a part of that, but I think it's kind of cool for you that you've been able to like go and be out and about, and also be able to manage five kids on top of that, and it's just kind of fun to be like, oh wow, like that's something people can actually do. It's not just something that's crazy for in the movies or in shows and stuff.
SPEAKER_01:That's cool, interesting perspective. There, that's cool.
SPEAKER_03:I do think dad played a key role in making sure that it worked too. That's true. We have an incredible dad, yeah.
SPEAKER_02:He could like fill in all the gaps for sure. Yeah, so that worked well too. I think that's important. Like supported that, like, yeah, good partner support.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, absolutely. That is key. That's cool. Um, okay, so you guys talk, Piper brought up baby Bo. So our family has a kind of interesting age dynamic, I guess you could say. The first oldest three girls were born in like normal order fashion, like I don't know, every two or three years, and then we have this huge gap till Piper. That's why she's still hanging at home with me. Um, like a six-year gap, and then we had another five-year gap till Bowden. So our kids are kind of spread out over a lot of years, and you guys were well, the plan was for to have you come to Piper's birth, those those three older girls, but it just kind of went fast in the middle of the night, and so nobody really made it. Um, but they were five years later. We planned again, we did a home birth for those two and planned to have the girls come to that. So, you guys, all as teenagers, Piper was five, so she was sleeping, but um, those three of other three olders of you were teenagers. Um, you got to come to his birth. How was that for you? Because I know we planned for it and we talked about it and stuff, but then we really did it. Who wants to start?
SPEAKER_02:You go for it. Okay. Um, I as a teenager, birth like freaked me out in the sense I just thought it was just gross. That's become less so as I've gotten older. So I remember thinking like it was cool but gross. And then I remember thinking it was like it was hard to see like mom in pain. I feel like like I think that part of it was hard, but it's also at the same time really cool to like watch Bo come into the world and like just to see that first few moments between like mom and baby was really cool, especially since we have like an intimate connection with our mom and our brother. So that was kind of cool to just observe that. Um, again, I think it was cool to watch dad support mom and childbirth because again, anything bloody totally grosses dad out. Yet here we are during childbirth, and like he's holding it together and he's doing great. So there's just different sides of mom and dad that I thought was really cool to see during that.
SPEAKER_03:I don't remember. Did we watch for very long? I think we woke up, someone woke us up in the middle of the night, and was it like 40 minutes later Bowden was born? It wasn't like how much.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, it was pretty quick. It was pretty quick.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah. Um yeah, I remember the way there was in our living room all the blinds were closed, of course. And in the living room, we had the tub set up, and mom gave birth to Bo in the tub, and we had moved the couch to the side. Do you remember we were sitting on the couch watching? And then after I remember after he came out, they put him up on her chest, and we all kind of crowded around behind her, just like looking at him. And she was holding him, and I remember he looked up at us, and I just remember crying because I was like, wow, like to me, it felt like almost spiritual in a way of like, wow, here's this new soul made by the soul that made me, and it was just like a beautiful thing, and it just made me appreciate life a lot. Thanks, Brynn.
SPEAKER_04:You're not supposed to cry. Yeah, I think um to add on to that is just cool because um we could have easily imagined, like like Brendan was saying, like that was all of us at one point. Like that's how we got here. And I was 10, but I kind of I had like a I had a decent understanding of what was going on. My mom actually had a doula when Bo was born. She also had a doula there. And I remember asking her, doula. I didn't want to bug mom, obviously, because she's like busy. I got that. I got mom was busy, not gonna go ask her questions, but I can ask doula questions. So um my 10-year-old self asked the doula questions like throughout, and I'd be like, How many centimeters is she at? And then a few minutes there, like, how many centimeters is she at now? They check her. And I was like 10 years old. And this doula later I found like I kicked got a kick out of that, and I get why, because you have a 10-year-old asking you, like, how many centimeters is the laboring mom at? Um but uh it was a really cool experience, and I'm glad we got to do it. I didn't realize, um, just because this was like our normal growing up, I didn't realize how not incredibly common it is to have all the siblings there to watch a baby be born. And so ever saying that in middle school or high school, some people would react and they'd be like, that's like so weird, or like, was that creepy? Did it scare you? And I was like, Oh, of course it's not weird. Like, this is cool. This is how life comes into the world, like how it's not gross. It's um it's I mean, it's quite miraculous. So um, yeah, I thought it was really cool. I'm glad we got to be there for that. And I remember it still really, really well.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. I remember um my this was something that stuck with me from that night. Um, and it was a short labor, and so we knew to kind of get you guys up, you know, sooner. We had somebody assigned to kind of get you guys out of bed. And um when I when you were all there, and I was in transition, I'm sure, um, at this point, um, it was difficult. And I remember once you were all there, I looked back at you. You were kind of to my back, and I turned back to look at you, and I saw all three of you sitting there on the couch, and I lost it in that I lost my coping. I couldn't stay on task with contractions and coping, which the baby was probably, you know, just a few minutes away and I didn't know that. But um, because my my heart and mind went to being your mom, and instantly I was, I saw you and I was worried about you, and I wanted to not in a bad way, but I just wanted to like reassure you that it was okay, that I was fine, that this was normal, to ask if you had any questions. Like my brain went into being your mom, and I realized right away that the pure, like the demands of the task of my moment, like the physicality of what I was doing, I couldn't ask you, I couldn't verbalize anything to you, but I wanted to. In my head, I'm like, are you guys okay? Like, it's all right, you know, don't be nervous. Um, and so I had to, I had to ignore that you were there, and I had to turn back away and just like go deep down into what I was doing for the next few minutes and stuff till he was born. Um, and so as I as I just because you know, at that being a personal experience, and different people have different experiences with that. I think I see some people with their toddlers there, and they can talk to their toddlers and their toddlers are you know stroking their hair and stuff, and um, but I had to, I couldn't focus on you. And some people might have a very different experience. And then Cute Piper was like four or five when that happened, five years old or something. Um, we did sorry, Pipe, we did choose to leave you in bed because at the time, sometimes still, Piper's a little bit of a motor mouth, like she can talk.
SPEAKER_02:I remember that so well. You were teasing me for it just after Bo was born. It was so funny.
SPEAKER_01:We did get her up shortly after, but we didn't know that she would have the ability to be kind of quiet during that. So we got her up quickly and and she started talking, she started asking all the questions and fun to see you. It was it was pretty cute.
SPEAKER_03:And you know what was fun was that you had a birth photographer for that birth, and so we haven't looked at the pictures in a while, but they're so cute to see us in the background watching and then see us all hold bow for the first time. And I think we got pictures of Piper holding bow for the first time, they're really cute.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I can hear Piper talking in those pictures. Yeah, they're yeah, and I loved having a birth photographer. That was cool, like super cool to have those images, and that and you're right, they're kind of for all of us, which is cool. Like when there's an image of something, it sticks in your memory a little bit better. So up with our memories, so that's cool. So that was a fun, a cool experience we had all together. I remember a couple of you, I don't remember who it was, um, when I had to get some stitches after that, and a couple of you holding my hands as I recall.
SPEAKER_04:I I actually do think that that part was scarier to be there for than the birth part.
SPEAKER_02:That's the part burned in my memory. Hold mom's hand while she gets stitched up. Like mom's hand while she got stitched up.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, funny, like some people who want to go unmedicated, like, or those who don't and and do it even your mind psychologically and your body are set up to do one thing, and that's a deliver baby. And then after that, like you are just not prepared to cope with anything. So yeah, that is it. Sometimes it is harder actually than actually giving birth. So cool. Any other points? Um, any other things that are coming to mind for you guys? None of you guys have kids yet, and that's so fine with me. Um, I'm sure it'll be amazing when it happens. But um tell me a little bit about, and maybe you don't all the way know, but uh maybe and maybe you don't want to share all of it. That's kind of a personal decision and question, but like your future goals, like you guys have seen and you've heard about a lot of different options. Um, do you guys have a general idea of how you for you like this is such a subjective, you know, question about what how you want childbirth to be for you or how you think it should be for people?
SPEAKER_02:That's a big question.
SPEAKER_01:Piper, you go first. You're 16 when you have a baby, Piper.
SPEAKER_02:Okay, when 16-year-old Piper has a baby. Um I have not yet. Oh no, she won't have a baby anytime soon. But I can say that like one thing that's been in my mind since I was little is definitely wanting to be a mom. And I like kind of like will listen to like the people around me in my grade and at school and like you know, whatever on social media, and there's not like stigma necessarily, but it's like I feel like being a mom, especially with like having a mom as a doula for like freaking ever, is like motherhood is kind of like sacred in a way, and it's like kind of like really cool, and like I'm looking forward to it, but so many people that I know don't want to participate, or they're like, yeah, no, like they just like look onto it with disdain. It kind of makes me sad because I'm like, there's so many cool things about it that you just don't get when you don't have like birth as such an integral part of your life, but motherhood is definitely something that will be happening in my future.
SPEAKER_01:Not next year. Good.
SPEAKER_03:I think like I would definitely when I have my babies one day, I would love to go unmedicated. Um I don't think there's anything wrong with people who want um to go with medication, but just doing it all naturally. Um that's uh mom, what are the statistics? Like how many people actually do unmedicated? Not very many, right?
SPEAKER_01:No, like it's in a lot of places it's less than five percent.
SPEAKER_03:And just I think being involved with having a doula mom in the doula world, the then my amount of people that I know would be a lot higher than five percent. Like, for example, so mom on her side of the family, her all of her like brothers' wives who've had babies, none of them were medicated. So that's what 19 and yours as well. That's 19 children who were born unmedicated.
SPEAKER_01:That's true.
SPEAKER_03:And so that is kind of defying the statistics, and it's also just lucky that nothing went wrong in their labors where they needed something. But um I'm just like, women are strong, our bodies are built to do this, and you know, I I'm up for the challenge, and so I would love to have an unmet medicated birth and you know, prioritize skin to skin and breastfeeding and all of that stuff.
SPEAKER_02:I'd say my thoughts are very similar to Brynley's. Um the only thing I would add is just kind of the focus of being active and nutrition during pregnancy still, uh which I'm sure should also be relevant. But yeah, it's very similar thoughts to Bryn.
SPEAKER_04:Um, same here, but if I could also add, um and I think I learned this from mom being a doula because I know that part of like her job is to meet with expecting couples like before and after to like educate them, get them prepared, see what they already know. But um for me, making sure that like my husband also knows what's going on because I feel I don't know everything about birth. I seriously am not gonna know really what it's like until I do it. But I have a decent understanding of like what's going on. I mean, I don't remember ever not knowing what the word cervix meant. Like I've on all of these other terms, like just I just I grew up with it. So I feel pretty um okay with my understanding right now. Obviously, I'll have more to learn once I start having kids, but making sure that like my husband is also prepared and as involved as he wants to be and understands like what's going on in my body and like at what points in late like in labor what's going on, that kind of thing, that's important to me. And something else, mom being a doula has taught me is how important it is for women to have some sort of like advocate. Uh from my understanding, when you're giving birth, maybe you're not in the best head space to be making a bunch of decisions. So having a plan beforehand to kind of know what you want and making sure that your doula, if you choose to have one and your your partner know that and respect that and fight for that in a hospital or a birthing center or you know, home, wherever you choose to like have your baby, that um the plan of what you want can be executed as closely as possible.
SPEAKER_01:Cool, good thoughts. And that it's interesting because none of you guys have kids yet. And I just often wonder, yeah, what what's the the probability, the likelihood that how things will go, right? Like maybe someone can't have kids, or maybe someone will have twins, or um, you know, maybe someone will have a baby with you know a challenging disability or something. So yeah, it's interesting. Or I as a family right now, we're on the cusp of a lot of anticipation and stuff. Um, and yeah, I think it'll just be interesting to see how things go. And maybe one of you'll have a cesarean, or for some reason, or use an epidural, none of which is the end of the world, right? But um, but yeah, like Brentley, I like how you brought up that, and it's still remarkable to me that all so that would be what 14 nieces and nephews. Um, and I've been at a lot of their births, almost all of them. Um yeah, none of my sisters in law, like not a single one of them, chose to get an epidural or um pitocin or be induced or anything, anything. So that's a very small sample study um of you know, the three of them and me in one little family who, you know, we got yeah, 19 births there that went very what we would call physiologic, like very physiologic birth. It wasn't interrupted. Super much. So you guys are all of a way younger age than me. So you a lot of my clients are getting to be your ages now. Um, and I I used to be younger than a lot of my clients, and I'm older than almost all my clients. But tell me like the the vibe on birth, childbirth, pregnancy. You've touched on it a little bit. People who are your peers, like what's out there right now? What are people thinking? And maybe your view is slanted just because of your life situation too. But what's out there? What are people thinking?
SPEAKER_02:One thing that I've noticed with friends that worries me a little bit is where they learn about childbirth. And they're like, oh, I just saw it on an Instagram roll. And I'm like, yeah, some of those are maybe like accurate, but that's that's one that I've been hesitant of over the last several years. I'm like, make sure you're getting accurate information because you just don't always know on Instagram or social media at all. So that's something that I would just encourage people is like learn from sources that you know you can trust, because you can't trust all sources.
SPEAKER_03:Um, I've noticed sort of with a couple of my friends, and then also just on social media and what I'm hearing people say. Um so you know how like like birth rates are declining? I have heard a lot of girls my age express that they don't want kids because like it's just so much sacrifice on the part of the woman, and the man barely shoulders any of that sacrifice and um stuff like that. And and I can see where that's coming from. Like, obviously, like the woman has to go through the pregnancy, the woman has to go through the birth and potentially like postpartum depression and recovery and all of that. Um but I do think it's sad that sort of those imbalances are preventing preventing girls my age from wanting to become mothers or have children because I do think that people have worked through those problems for thousands of years and have still had good lives. And I think we can still work through them and get the support that we need. It just might take some more effort, and in our modern world, everything just seems more complicated. But I really think that um it is in a remarkable way to add like meaning and value to your life.
SPEAKER_01:That's cool. And I like that um touching on the postpartum, there is so much support to be had, more probably so than at any other time in history, because we're aware of it and we're talking about it. Some cultures do much better about taking care of people in the postpartum than ours does. But um that hopefully you're right, that is coming along so that we can because I would bet if we were to go back and ask some women who are 70, 80, 90 what their childbirth postpartum experience was like, it would wasn't very well supported at all, right? Right. Hopefully we're coming along and making strides there. Yeah. Ember, you talked a little bit about friends and stuff, but what's the vibe out there? You're at college, some people are having babies, some aren't.
SPEAKER_04:Um, I can't really think of anything very specific outside of what Gillian and Burnley already said.
SPEAKER_01:Um yeah, I can't really think of everything outside of what they said. Piper, you're in high school, your friends aren't having babies, we hope. Um I hope not too. But what's the vibe out there in high school about pregnancy, childbirth, all that jazz? I mean, it's probably not a topic that comes up a lot.
SPEAKER_02:It's not a topic that comes up a lot, but it is one that gets brought up with certain groups of people that are very um open about a lot of their political views. Um, and it's just often, I mean, obviously it depends on the person, what like they've grown up with and like what their family situation is like. But I would say more often than not, there's negative views about um childbirth, which is understandable when you don't understand the different like things that you can do with it. But I think from what I've known here around like places that it's just kind of like, ooh, no thanks. I'm not it seems kind of like what Beam said, like it's all on one end of like the relationship between like the birthgiver and the partner, but it doesn't have to be, and that's just what people don't like look into very much is that it's a dual, um, it's like a dual deal.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, team effort. That's cool. Um, okay, so this is like just I know there's a with chitter chatter, we could talk about this all night. Oh, um, I guess one other thing I want to bring up, each of you, somebody touch on this a little bit, and I've loved this over the years as we've just been driving around, going to activities or trips or whatever, and or just having conversations at home. Each of you have had the best questions um about pregnancy and childbirth over the years that that um we've been able to discuss and talk about. And some of your questions have pushed me to research. I'm like, oh, I don't know, like that's a good question. And um nothing specific comes to mind, but Ember, I remember you specifically asked me one years ago that was about placental function or something, maybe how the arteries went. Um, so you guys have also prompted my growth in your questions, which have spurred a lot of discussion, which I totally enjoy. So yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_02:I just want to say that like this extends to not just like pregnancy and labor, like it's the same with all of our periods. It was always a very open dialogue. Um, more recently, talking and figuring out what kind of birth controls we want to use. That's another one. Like, I just kind of it's this very open conversation that we've had for most of our lives, like it extends to a lot of just female health, it's not just labor and delivery and pregnancy. So I just wanted to add that that it extends to lots of other things as well, the open dialogue that we've all had.
SPEAKER_03:I would like to make a light-hearted comment. Um go for it. This one time I thought, are we weird?
SPEAKER_02:I thought that a lot.
SPEAKER_03:And it was, and we have a couple of weird little things around our house. Mom has a mug that she loves that's has a pattern that's uteruses on it. Not everyone is gonna have a mug patterned after uteruses in their house. You know, just funny things like that that she might have gotten at like a birth conference or something. But the time that I thought, are we weird? I went to our neighbor's house. I was a kid, like uh 10 years old probably. I went to our neighbor's house, they live two doors up the street, and I was having dinner with them. And at the dinner table, we were eating something that had been frozen and put in the oven. So we were talking about I frozen things, and I told them I think I know where this is going. And this is a little bit embarrassing, but I told them that we had a frozen placenta in our freezer, and their jaws were on the floor. Like that was the most absurd thing they'd ever heard in their life. And it was from Piper being born. Mom kept it because she was gonna like get it encapsulated or something, right, mom?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I didn't know what to do with it. We just kept it eight years.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, and it stayed in there for years. It was like actually, now that I think about it, that is kind of weird.
SPEAKER_01:It's normal at the time. We've actually had a lot of placentas go in and out of our fridge and freezer over here.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, yeah. I guess it's just what you're used to.
SPEAKER_01:I know sometimes I'll bring a placenta home for someone to get encapsulated somewhere, and I'd have to warn everybody like, all right, it's usually in the downstairs fridge, don't you know leave that one closed up.
unknown:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, too fun. Well, um, uh any any other parting thoughts before we kind of wrap up? Okay, cool. Um, I just want to thank you guys for joining me today. This has been super fun, and I just wish we could all play games after this or something and hang out. Um, but we are all kind of spread out. Oh, somebody brought up birth control. That did bring it to mind like we could do a whole other episode on that because yeah, each of you like not, you know, had figuring out birth control. That's a whole nother can of worms to that we've learned about and um made decisions about, which is kind of interesting too. All right, well, thanks girls for being with me. Any anybody want to do parting shout-outs, thoughts? Women are awesome. You're awesome. I can't wait to see you again.
SPEAKER_03:Women are awesome. Thanks for helping us like like it's just it was just cool to have a mom that you could be proud of for many reasons, and who was like useful in the world, and um, like I still go to her for these things sometimes when I have questions, and I know I will be even more grateful when I'm having my own babies one day.
SPEAKER_01:And that's as you guys have babies, I want you to feel you don't have to have me come to those. Like, it's all up to you. We'll see.
SPEAKER_03:Are you kidding me? I'm not gonna pass up a free doula.
SPEAKER_01:Well, whatever you and your husband or partner want, like you know, that's it'll be there. All right. Well, you we can also find you another great doula if you need one. Okay, um, yeah, but thank thanks for like helping build this um family culture. You guys have all been pretty awesome about it, and I sure appreciate that. So cool, cool. Thanks for supporting me in a passion, something that's very passionate to me. I could not have had the role I've had and done the work I've done without a supportive family. So thanks to all of you. Okay, girls. I know sometimes when I'll be at a birth, um, I get a lot of texts from all of you, and oftentimes uh, which is kind of fun. Fun to keep in touch with you while I'm gone. Um, and and you guys all got really good at knowing, like, okay, is it time to push? Are you pushing it? That that was always a big milestone in in the birth, which was kind of fun. Um, but anything else to add before we really truly call it?
SPEAKER_04:Um, I think one more thing that I did notice pretty often growing up with you being a doula, was that you would like when you'd come home, we'd ask, how did the birth go? Uh, was it a boy or a girl? Like, you know, did they find pick out a name for it and how things went? And um obviously like a good birth is objective met, baby's born healthy, mom's healthy, and that's like great. But most of the time, if a birth was hard, like if you came home and you're like, oh, it was like a it was a hard birth, it's because um you knew what the mom had wanted and you wanted that for so bad, but for whatever reason she wasn't able to have it, which I think is like a key part of your role as Adula is um helping those moms accomplish their birth plan. Um, so it was it was hard for you when they didn't get what they were hoping for in their birth stories.
SPEAKER_01:Good point. That's true. Any other stuff? Like, okay, cool, cool. Sometimes I feel like you guys, by the time I got home, we're gonna be like all graduated from high school or something. Like, um, I know my backup were always a joke, like, all right, you know, how's my family doing? Have they moved out yet? Because it feels like it's just gone forever sometimes. Like, all right, is Bo married yet? I mean, he's only 11 right now, but it felt like we're but that's what it feels like sometimes. It feels like you're gone for long. Like, did Piper graduate from college yet? I missed a lot of that. So, yeah, it did feel like I missed some things, but cool. Thanks, girls. So just want to wrap up today's episode, actually, our 100th episode, which is kind of fun, um, by just the same sentiment with everyone, every the way we wrap up every episode is please encouraging you to go out and make a human connection. Humans are important, these are some of my favorites right here. Um, but go out and make a connection with another human today in any way that you can. That'll change your life and change theirs for the better. Thanks for being with us today, signing off from the Ordinary Doola podcast. This is Angie Rosier and Gillian Brinley Um Ember and Piper Rosier are with me actually today. And some of them have last names that are different now, too. But thanks, girls, for being with me. It's been a pleasure. Bye.
SPEAKER_00:Episode credits will be in the show notes. Tune in next time as we continue to explore the many aspects of giving birth.