Mindful Midwifery Presents: The Labor Behind Labor
From an outsider's perspective, midwifery sounds like a fascinating profession. But what does it feel like to juggle life's demands in a career that doesn't allow you to have a bad day? This is an insider's view of the labor behind labor.
Join Katie O'Brien, Certified Nurse Midwife, for frank conversations with frontline midwives about the joys, challenges, and politics surrounding the work of midwifery while trying to maintain a quality life away from the job.
Episodes
14 episodes
Fully Dilated: Season 1 Finale
In this season finale, Katie reunites with Laurel and Lindsay — two of the OG guests from the very first episodes — for a conversation about what a year actually does to a person. They dig into where they were twelve months ago versus where the...
The Labor of Choosing a Hysterectomy: Carrie
Carrie knows how bodies work. She's spent decades supporting women through some of their most vulnerable moments — and yet, nothing quite prepares you for becoming the patient yourself. In this episode, she joins Katie just two weeks after her ...
From Undocumented to Nurse Midwife: Angela
Angela came to the United States from Venezuela as an undocumented teenager, speaking just enough English to interpret for her grandmother in an ER — and somehow found herself captivated by the people rushing around in scrubs. It took a percept...
Carrying for Others: Cori
In this episode, Katie sits down with Cori — nurse-midwife, gestational carrier, and quite possibly the most interesting person you'll meet this week. Cori has spent her career advocating for better birth experiences after her own traumatic del...
Night Shifts and New Horizons: Holly
Holly never set out to have a career. She wanted to be a wife and a mom — and for a long time, that's exactly what she was. But somewhere between homeschooling three kids, working night shifts as an L&D nurse, and her husband's quiet encour...
My Mentor, the Trailblazer: Kathy
Before water births were trendy, before fathers were allowed in delivery rooms, before midwives could legally do a pelvic exam in Maryland — there was Kathy. the midwife who wouldn't be managed. In this episode, host Katie O'B...
Still With Women: Beverly
Taking a step back in your career isn't always a bad thing or an indicator of lack of commitment or drive. Sometimes it's just plain common sense and self-love. In this episode, Katie sits down with her self-described "introverted" ...
From Hospital Halls to Homebirth: Bayla
Being a homebirth midwife is an all-encompassing, 24/7 career choice. Most homebirth services are offered by Certified Professional Midwives, but why don't more Certified Nurse Midwives offer homebirth services? In this episode, hos...
Two New Beginnings: Jenna
What happens when the midwife becomes the patient?Katie O'Brien sits down with Jenna — a newly minted midwife and an even newer mom — to find out. With 10-week-old Celeste in tow (and occasionally on the breast), Jenna unpacks w...
Midwifing the System: Hadja
Not all midwives feel they were called to be a midwife! In this episode, Hadja traces her path from a double major in international studies and nursing to the delivery room, driven not by a "calling" but by a conviction: that midwifery is one o...
Finding True North: Lindsay
It's hard to be vulnerable, especially in the medical field, but if you can't show vulnerability at work are you in the right place for you to thrive?Katie and Lindsay explore the invisible weight midwives carry: constantly explaining wh...
Full Scope, Full Life: Carrie
What if the best thing about being a midwife was that it wasn't the most important thing about you? That's the philosophy Carrie lives by — and in this episode, she unpacks what it really means to be present at birth without losing you...
Intro to Mindful Midwifery Presents: The Labor Behind Labor
What's this podcast about? Midwives, of course! Find out more in this introduction to the series.
The Midwife Next Door: Laurel
Midwife and podcast host Katie reconnects with longtime colleague and friend Laurel, a certified nurse midwife of 15+ years, to kick off the podcast series!Laurel stumbled into midwifery as a nursing student through a Women's Studies min...