#28 | Claude Racine-Valinsky's Birth Story: No Place Like Home

Claude Racine-Valinsky is a professional dancer and social media influencer who developed determination and grit in an industry that tells pretty much anyone over thirty that they're too old for dance. Refusing to buy into those limitations, her career and social media following skyrocketed in her thirties. So when she and her husband were newly pregnant and expecting their first baby at age 37, and her doctor told her at her pregnancy confirmation that she's too old to have children, Claude took the bold step of ghosting her doctor. It was then that Claude's instinct rose to the surface, and for her, that meant there was only one place to birth her son: at home. And while her birth was far from easy, she says she wouldn't have dreamed of doing it any place else.

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Transcript

Every time somebody looked at me and go, are you sure you want to do that? Oh my gosh, I couldn't like what if, what if what if you start to go Okay, what if, what if what if but every time that would happen? I would say no, my gut my instinct everything is saying, do it at home and so I stuck with it.

I'm Cynthia Overgard, owner of HypnoBirthing of Connecticut, childbirth advocate and postpartum support specialist. And I'm Trisha Ludwig, certified nurse midwife and international board certified lactation consultant. And this is the Down To Birth Podcast.
 Childbirth is something we're made to do. But how do we have our safest and most satisfying experience in today's medical culture? Let's dispel the myths and get down to birth.

Claude Racine-Valinsky is a professional dancer and social media influencer who developed determination and grit in an industry that tells pretty much anyone over 30 that they're just too old for dance. Refusing to buy into those limitations, her career and social media following skyrocketed in her 30s. So when she and her husband were expecting their first baby at age 37, and her doctor told her at her pregnancy confirmation that she's just too old to have children clothed took the bold step of completely ghosting her doctor after that. It was then the clothes instinct rose to the surface. And for her, that meant there was only one place to birth her son, and that place was home. And while her birth was far from easy, she said she wouldn't have dreamed of doing it anyplace else.

Hi, everyone. My name is Claude Racine-Valinsky  and my story starts with me never ever, ever thinking about having kids or wanting them until I met my Amazing husband, Noah. And all of a sudden the idea of kids seem to be fun and wow, I can do this with this person. So after our honeymoon, we basically said okay, if it happens, it happens. And it took a year before baby Nova was conceived and at which time I really had no idea about pregnancy birth, what do you do? Where do you go? So I just kind of chose to go to my gynecologist and get a confirmation on my pregnancy. And I went and she basically scared the living poop out of me. By telling me I was too old to have kids and that I because I was so old. I was at risk for all these things with my baby down syndrome. How old are we talking? At the time, I was 37; I am now 38. So apparently anytime above any age above 35, you are in a geriatric pregnancy. You just love that term here. All right, yeah, it's hilarious. You know, I still feel like I'm 19. So. So when she started saying that stuff, I of course got really scared. She left me a voicemail and said, Hey, Claude, you need to call me like yesterday, you should have had all these tests done by now. You're at high risk for Down syndrome and this and this and this and completely just robbed me of the joy that I had that I actually found out and confirmed that I was pregnant. So after that experience, I called my mom and she calmed me down. And then this my friend of mine popped into my head Victoria and she had told me that she had two home births. I said, You know what, let me just look into that. I know nothing about it. It sounds like that's what we're just supposed to do. As as women like we give birth, like Our bodies are made to do it, why do we need all this extra fuss? So I met with Victoria and she referred me to her midwives who I met with and after my first meeting with them, it was a no brainer that that was the route I was going to go. What was it about that first meeting that made you feel like that was the route you're gonna go? they just, they supported, like, what everything they said, like, you know, this is how it's supposed to be done, like women can talk we're made to tolerate this experience. Also, there's a whole business side to it that I didn't know and to the metal, like the hospital route, where, you know, a certain amount of money is made per c section because I spoke to a lot of my friends who there's the same exact story. They were in labor for 17 hours. After 17 hours, the doctor said we're going into a C section. So they push push, push, push on son Things are going all wrong. And we do a C section. And I thought that just doesn't seem right because I know people who've had home births, who were in labor for a very long time, and gave birth vaginally. So um, it just resonated with me. And indicated to me that that was the route I wanted to go, the less interference with the natural way of the way it's supposed to go, the better. And I'm like that about pain or things in general, I never go to the doctor. I just know my body is going to heal itself. And that's just by choice. Like, obviously, if I needed a doctor emergency, I will go but normally, anything that has to do with the body, I just know, hey, if I caused it I can unconscious or something like that. So that's exactly how I how I fell in the midwives just reinforced my thought about how that experience was supposed to go.

So rewinding a bit to your obstetrician, did you officially break up with her?

I ghosted her. Thank you. I did the same with my doctor and it's so interesting to hear that because at my 16 week they were like we're worried your baby's measuring too large we need to start seeing you every two weeks and I literally after seeing her for years for my annual I literally never went back and no one ever called me and I think you know how worried were they? They literally never ever saw me again. For real you you never got to fall. I've never got a call. Not like you missed an appointment.

Nothing I never booked the 18th week I left there and says just such a state of anxiety that I walked out and I ended up changing my plan but I always look back like you know what you saw me three Sharpies you acted so happy to see me once a year for that five minute checkup. And you were worried about my baby You know, no one ever called and same thing happened to you and good for you for ghosting her because you have every right to end that relationship without an explanation. Women don't have to explain themselves to anybody. This isn't a personal relationship or trust. And you owe each other some kind of communication that you they were there to serve you. They weren't serving you Yeah, left. That's your that's your way. I love when people I love when women don't explain it.

Yeah, I never even thought for a second.

I don't ever explain myself about anything. And that was one of the things with with the baby was like, you're going to get all kinds of advice and blah, blah blah and I don't have any problem being like, I don't need it. Thank you so much. Because every time you say I'm gonna have a home birth 95 not every time but 95% of the time. Yeah, people are like, Oh, you're doing what? Oh my god, but what if, what if, what if well, what is risky right now, but I get it, like people are sort of uneducated in that area, or it is so popular or socially accepted to do it one way. You know, it's all fear based to me. So if I'm making a decision out of fear, I know it's not the right one.

That's that's a very good point. And that's really what people's mind goes to first with home birth, this will let us think of the worst possible things that can happen. And it's not rational because those things are extremely rare. And for we know, there's so many good studies out there to demonstrate that home birth is safe under the right circumstances for the right woman with the right, you know, a trained provider.

And what this conversation never seems to include is, what about the risks of unnecessary medical intervention in a hospital and that's always left out of this discussion. So yes, home birth has risks that have to be managed, but we always seem to leave out that other half we just take for granted that a hospital birth will necessarily be safe. And that is not necessarily safe, particularly in the US, where unnecessary medical intervention is identified as a major contributor to the trend we're seeing right now and in this industry with mortality, so Okay, but you did this all based on your friend inspired You and that doctor knew the red flag, your intuition said, run. And then you had that final validation of a good appointment with a home birth midwife. Yeah. So what did you What did she say about your age? Because I'm sure you had some kind of question or anxiety around it after what the doctor said. So you must have raised it with the home birth midwife, and what did she have to say about it?

I mean, I, I didn't get scared about what she said, or have increased anxiety. I was like, I've been told my whole, you know, my whole career engine getting too old to dance and how do you see you're 37? When are you gonna have kids and get married and blah, blah, blah. You know, so I knew that what she was saying was the gynecologist is just what she knew and what she was afraid of. And I just, I didn't I didn't even bring it up to the midwives. I mean, I told them that that's what she said. And I was like, I don't believe her. And I'm not going to be around somebody that is afraid of my pregnancy because of my age. They're like, you know, my grandma had twins at 4060 years ago.

So I see We're okay, that that was that.

That's so cool. So what happened next?

So I kept going to my appointments with the midwives and I had a wonderful pregnancy like I really loved being pregnant, and everything went smooth. I didn't get sick. I you know, I stayed a little bit active. And then then it came. I mean, I was kind of like, a free birth. I'm not gonna lie. Um, what were you afraid of?

You know, the pain.

Yes. overwhelming feeling.

Yeah. And you don't know how long it's gonna last you you don't know anything. So you're going into it like Well, hopefully it's short and quick. And it was. But um, yeah, you know, my water broke on Saturday morning at 830 and I delivered Nova Sunday morning at 7:37am And when the contractions started happening, like the really hard ones, I was like, Oh my god, how long do I have to do this for? And the first time the midwives came over to check me, I was only two centimeters and they left is like 10:30pm. And they left and I was like, why are you even? Horrible? Like that's, that's a hard that's a hard pill to swallow when that happens when he been in labor that long and your midwives arrive and you think, Okay, it's time and they're here to have a baby. And then same thing happened to me. And it was like, I didn't end up giving birth for another 12 hours after that, and it's already been 24. But it was like I thought I had been I thought that I had I thought it was going to be like eight centimeters. I had been working hard for a long time. And then I hear well, your cervix is just beginning to open like it wasn't even one centimeter.

My go home says a lot because it's like yeah, I've got a long night ahead. You but we don't get anywhere close to much progress and we're going to go home and literally sleep through the night. My mid my midwife left. Yeah, it's tough. Yeah, you want somebody that at least knows, okay, what's going on and my mom was here and my husband was here he held my hand for like, I think 20 hours without stopping, but you just kind of want someone who is in tune aware of. Okay, well, now it's time now. It's not I don't know. So they, they left and literally two hours later, Noah called them again. They're like, hey, let me hear her. So they listened to me for a couple of minutes. And then Shawnee was like, okay, we're on our way. So they came back check me again and I was only four centimeters. So my water broke at 8:30am Saturday morning. And then at 10:30pm is when they came over the first time and then at like 12:30am they came back and checked me again. I was only four centimeters. And also my cervix was swollen because apparently I was standing With my arms over Noah, and I, something made me feel like pushing. But I guess you're not supposed to push until your cervix is fully dilated. But I was like, very well, you might have been like, quote unquote, fully dilated, but the swelling could make it go back down to like seven or eight. And sometimes in a long labor, swelling of the cervix can happen. So you could have been all the way there the tissue in the uterus could have lifted all of the cervical tissue out of the way. But because it lasted so long, you were swell and back down a few centimeters.

Yeah, that sounds like that probably happened. And they wouldn't let me stand up. I wanted to sit on the toilet so bad and suffer through these contractions. They're like, No, you need to lay down. So they let me lay down in the bathtub for about Trisha, does that resolve the swelling? I know an epidural. Yes. And but in a home birth do they say lie down? Because it can be through the pressure of the head on the surface can add to the swelling?

Yeah, I didn't know that. It also has to do with the position of the baby. The reason the cervix get swelling is because of position and so you need to change position, the hope in that changing position is that the head, the baby's head position will change and then the cervix can the swelling can dissipate in the survey thing open.

And I think that that's what that's what happened. And like about an hour later, I was in the bathtub, I was like, these are getting too much like Something's got to give, y'all have to let me push. Which I then regretted them and I started pushing, I was like, This is worse than the contraction. Oh my god, you know, they were teaching me how to properly push and mind you it's like 3:30am by now. 5:30am and my midwives were asleep on the bed and when it was time for me to push that I would have a contraction. When they were telling me to push I would have to like push. Then breathe. You know? 123456789 No, no, breathe. And then push for 10 seconds breathe push for. So they wanted me to do that three times per contraction. I think I might have accomplished that like two or three times. And it's not just because of the birth but I was very kind of not stubborn, but because of my idea that like, okay, women know how to do this. Um, I didn't want to read too much. Because what I found is that a lot of the things I read, were scaring me. I was like, You know what, I just want to have my own experience. My midwives are there to coach me. Boom. And actually she was amazing at coaching me like if she didn't count, I was like, Oh my god, where are you? I knew the counts. But in between contractions they would like close their eyes and go back to sleep. And then I would do and then go get another one is coming in, everybody would wake up. And I mean, after like an hour, I got discouraged. It doesn't feel like the baby's coming down like there's movement happening. And finally, Shelley, the other midwives, there's two of them. She was like, give me your hand and she put my hand on the top of novas head, and I felt him and I was like, okay, he is right there. So I didn't even wait for contractions after that point. I was just pushing him out. And you know, once the head is making its way out, that's a whole other situation. But I was wondering like, what else then she stuck like this really cold pad on my vagina and I was like, when does the pain stop? Ever? What else are you doing to me?

Were you where you're after you're after Nova was Were you worried about giving birth to the placenta? Or was that not on your mind?

Um, I had heard that it's it takes like more contractions and again I I had read that it's very difficult for some women and I was like not it's just gonna come out and it did she did have to push like on my stomach and you know, but it actually felt kind of nice and warm and gooey on the way out. I was like, okay, that's Thank God. It is very soft, soft and slippery. Wait, so how long was the pushing phase? Two hour, two hours.

And what what position were you in most of the time? Do you remember they wanted me on my back on my bed and my husband had my right leg. He was pulling it here. My other leg.

Why on your back. So wait a minute, sometimes there there's really one. So the supine position is like you were flat on your back with your head back on the mattress, your whole spine on the mattress and your legs in The air. And then there's the other way women sometimes say they were on their back, but they're actually reclined where they're propped up a little bit. So if you would think about your tailbone to your head, what angle was that? Was that really flat on the mattress? Or was that angled upward? They had to hold my head. Okay, so we're holding you angled outward. So that's like a sort of more of a semi reclining position. So maybe like, like more, I'm getting the sense that you were describing, almost like a crunched over like, yeah, hold back or automatic.

I wouldn't say my whole spine, but like, I had to round so I'm laying flat and then I had to pull my head up and round. So maybe maybe they were concerned about the cervix to be in the baby fitting through the pelvis. It sounds like they were putting you in position to help get the baby under the pubic bone or maybe, maybe the anterior part of your cervix was swollen and that was part of why they I do remember that was a thing like trying to get him to Go under the table out of the purely bone.

Yeah, yes. I was actually very shocked that it went like that because I I was expecting to be in a full squat or like on the toilet with the gravity but they did not want me in that position as hard as it was. I'm so happy that I had the freedom to do it in my home with my mom, my husband, my midwives, my team. And, you know, I got to call the shots I guess nobody was making me do anything or making me scared that something was happening. I knew that with this team. We were gonna just get it done. In a weird sense, I was relaxed because of that. And I knew that I'd get to just hold Nova nobody would take him away from me afterwards and do what it is that they do.

What happened right after Nova was born. Do you remember him coming out and and him being placed up on your chest or how did it go?

My husband and I pulled him out together like we we We're holding him. And then he was placed on my chest. So he was crying. And he liked, like I breastfed right away, too. I think. I don't know how long it was, before I did that. I was like, Oh my gosh, it's crazy that we just know how to do that right away, like what a beautiful, you don't have to make breastfeeding happen. We have to allow breastfeeding to happen. Totally total. And there are always things that can get in the way of birth and breastfeeding. But we we always want to come from that place of trust, of just allowing the process to happen and trusting that we have those experts there to help us if we really are in that minority of cases that really requires support or support.

Yeah, and that's the thing too, it's, you know, I always used to joke with my husband and be like, Listen, elephants and things like that they have babies out there and nobody's telling them, how to push what position to be in. The thing they don't have is the reactive mind that we have of like, being irrational and reacting to fear and this and that. They just Trust that this is the process and I don't even know if they trust it, they just do it.

One of the things that gets in the way of birth is the intellect, the thinking mind. It's Yes, if part of having a natural birth experience requires you to drop out of the thinking mind and into just the intuitive space, like trusting your inner intelligence. And, I mean, we have only been thinking about birth and managing birth for 100 years. And we love that we've been around for how many hundreds of hundreds of hundreds of thousands of years and so you can't really you know, we wouldn't be here if it didn't work. Exactly.

You know, I often equate it to like, if you're going about your day, and suddenly your stomach feels really bad from something you ate, you don't freak out. You just make your way over to the bathroom and even if you feel awful if you eat your food, but what do we do, we sit, we breathe, we hang out. We try Trust we exactly. But labor begins and we freak out because society has conditioned us that way. But the mammals when labor begins for them, they don't even know they're pregnant. They don't even know they have a uterus or that they're about to become mothers, but they feel something. And their instinct takes over and they putting their breath. They go somewhere where they feel alone and safe. They deepen their breath and they relax immensely. Yes, it's so you're right thinking mind is the premise of HypnoBirthing. So it's my comfort area. How do we use it to facilitate the birth rather than be an obstacle to we have to go back to the primal brain? It's the primal. Yes.

And we can overthink sex before we ever have sex. Like if you're a teenager, and you're already thinking about sex, and you're like, Oh, my God, I don't know how to do it. How do people do it? I mean, what happens? What if I don't know what I'm doing? It's like try to stop any mammal from figuring out how to have sex. Yeah, not everyone. Just thought if we think about it, we're gonna doubt ourselves. And with childbirth is just that fear and the word pain is such a terrifying word we don't need Yes, we don't really like to use that word because it's so intimidating. We don't associate pain with anything natural. We only associate pain with problem or injury or a pathology. So when you put pain with childbirth, now you suddenly put it in the category of problem. Yeah, you interpret every experience and your brain says, oh, if it's painful, it's dangerous.

Or what I'm feeling right is pain rather than intensity rather than pressure rather than crankiness. It's like, I am interpreting this as a lesson. She's like, no, it's pain. I love it. But anyway, go on. This is the relief of a lifetime when it's over. Right? It's like it's advanced. Really? Yes. And that's what my mom kept saying. She's like, it's the best feeling when when he's gonna come out. And so I was like, okay, am I still waiting?

Let me do it. is the biggest relief in the world oh my god I guess relief it's just like and that's the thing is like pain or you know the way that obviously I have been conditioned to think about it because it's all perspective totally it usually when you feel something painful the the reaction is to stop it or get away from it you know the the pain is to tell you what you're in trouble fix it. So to you have to completely redo your mind and go in this moment. It is not that same signal. It's pushed into the pressure pushed into that pain.

I don't want you to keep pushing into that pressure. Everything in your mom in my mind was like something I gotta stop this. Yeah, you want to read you want to resist it? Because yes, it's so overwhelming, but wrong, is exactly the opposite of what you want to do.

Yeah. I mean, I Afterwards, I felt like a superhero. I felt like I had, I felt like a superhero like here was nothing I couldn't do ever after that.

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Let me ask you, I think the obvious for many women listening if it was so difficult physically and it went on so long you were really challenged in your birth in various ways. And then on top of it you were told to be on your back which is a notoriously uncomfortable position to birth in. How come you're saying you would not dream of having birth any other way? How come you're insisting this was the right place to give birth and giving birth naturally was the only way for you?

I feel like I think I would rather go through that again. Then experience the fear and the the rushing and the press just the whole medical Yeah, of doing it at a hospital.

And do you think home birth should be for anybody I would say that every woman is capable of giving birth at home. Absolutely it You do have to have your In the in the game though, like, I think if you're starting from a place of fear, and you have these doubts and things like that, I don't know that it'll go well for you. Your mind is very our minds are powerful. So if you're already coming from a place of, Oh, no, that's going to go wrong. Well, you're probably going to manifest that.

Well, here's the here's the thing too, about home birth, when you are giving birth at home and you've made that choice and you don't have pain relief at your disposal. You just you just Carry on, carry on because it's not there. I think there are many women. First of all, I agree with you. I think every single woman who is you know, low risk and safe candidate for home birth can give birth at home. I think every woman has the ability to get through childbirth without needing something if that's their choice, but I think many women who give birth naturally at home if they were giving birth in a different environment in the hospital, and they were being offered pain, medication pain relief every hour. Yes, it's much more easy to just say yes. And to under percentage think that you need it or to think that you're doing something wrong, you're entering something you shouldn't have to if you don't use medicine, so when you give birth at home, it's sort of like it's out of the equation. You rely, right? You have to rely on what's available at home, which is water, therapeutic touch, movement, change of positions, you know, all of that, and you make food, whatever it is, and you make it work.

Yeah. And that's what I've told some friends to is at the hospital, they're gonna give you the option, and then I would have regretted it later. You're, you know what I mean? And I just knew that being at home. I wouldn't have any of those interferences or distractions. I was just going to have to get through it. You know, I've ran a marathon before you Don't just stop at mile 17 and go, yeah, you know what? No. But if somebody was somebody at mile 10 was being like, do you want to just take a 10 minute break and sit down? You look really tired? Why don't you just rest for a little bit? You'd be like, Sure, that's probably what you probably would know, when you're home, you're like, Okay, no, not an option. So let's just try the shower one more time, or let's go to the tub now, or you go back and forth between the two or whatever it takes. Mm hmm.

So basically, you're saying that it was still the right place for you despite a really long arduous birth because it was in alignment with your values.

Exactly. That's the perfect way to put it. I would have been sacrificing my beliefs and what I know I am capable of doing. Had I chosen any other way or should I choose to choose a different way next time. It's just I'd be disappointed in myself right and just needing to surround myself. with people that trusted the same way that I trusted, like, of course, you know, every time somebody looked at me and go, are you sure you want to do that? Oh my gosh, I couldn't like what if what if what if you start to go Okay, what if what if what if but every time that would happen, I would say no, my gut my instinct everything is saying, do it at home and so I stuck with it.

Giving birth is such a good analogy for how we live life. Because if you can surrender to your own intuition, and just see yourself and trust the process and trust that that deep inner feeling readings, then you know, like you know where to go, you know which direction to take helps you in parenting because you need so much of that in parenting.

Absolutely. Oh my gosh, I was just gonna say for me, that part of the postpartum part was like, for me, way more difficult than The actual physicality of birth, you know, the mental aspect of everything that kind of happens. And learning to trust my instinct as a as a mother and all this like, Oh, it was it was wild a wild journey.

So yeah, so what have you learned so far, about postpartum because no one seems to be prepared for the realities of that. And society does a crummy job at making us think it's really a golden Maggie. Yeah. And we have maybe fleeting moments of that. But what what surprised you about the postpartum day I sit there and I go, what was I expecting it to be in life? What was I expecting having a newborn to be like, I don't know I because I was like, Oh, he's gonna sleep in the bed with us. And then you know, when he needs to eat, I'm gonna feed him and then put him right back down.

And then all of a sudden, it's like, there's so many things that nobody tells you and part of me goes maybe there's a reason why we're like protected from that because then maybe not. Because I'm a research freak, you know, but in this sense like nothing told me to go look, what is it like having a baby and I really have never been around babies. I always loved kids, but I've never really been around like, newborns babies. So it was a shock to my system in every sense of the word. The biggest thing for me because I'm a freelancer, I dance I choreograph, I do everything with my husband. I was like, wait, I can't go anywhere. Like, I have to be here for this little human. And I really felt that isolation. The the being alone and sort of like, reminiscing on my old life a lot like I would, I would obsess over what my life was and what it was now and how I wasn't prepared. It was really like it felt really awful. Like you really awful.

The freedom being gone in that period. Mm hmm. You're still in it. You're still in it. So you don't see yet how you will come out of it. Yeah, I do feel better. But yeah, at 13 weeks, like, I would be like, what did I just do? Was this the right decision? What was I thinking having a baby was like, Oh no, I don't really actually like it. I can't give Nova back. So you're kind of stuck in this like this trapped feeling.

Yeah, feels very permanent, very permanent. And I would look at my mom, I'm like, this is like, every day forever. I can't just go You know what, on Saturday, I'm going to need to sleep until 11. So I'm going to take a break. You know, of course you don't sleep. And I, I would have this anxiety, had no idea where it was coming from. It wasn't really centered on anything. It was just an anxious feeling that would kind of rumble inside of me throughout the day. And at 13 weeks like something happened where I woke up and I felt relaxed for the first time I felt accepting of my life with Nova and everything like that. So the interesting thing about what you just said, you said to your mom, this is like, yeah, forever. And it's funny because it that's part of what causes that feeling of despondency or the beginning of postpartum depression. It is so not forever, but it's inconceivable that you will ever be waving at NOVA as he's getting on a school bus. Or even that he'll be hopping in the back of the car putting on his own seat belt. Yeah, sitting in a booster seat. It's like you feel like that's, you feel like you are now the mom of a baby. And you're always going to be the mom of a baby and it's in Yeah, well that you're going to be the mom of like a preteen. And that's what keeps surprising us as parents, they change so rapidly and you realize there's a point where like, you have changing right when you get used to having your child at their certain age they are off and in a new stage. Yes, and That's part of the relief that you keep getting though because it none of it is permanent. It's the whole law of the universe. It's just right constant rapid change, and our childhoods felt so long. But there's, they fly by and you don't see it in the first few years. Yeah, yeah, he's gonna be an adult with you guys for decades. Right? And it's not like you are with your mom. Yes. But it's so hard to believe it's so hard to believe them, then you're gonna have to let go of life the way you once knew it. I wish somebody would have just at least given given me a little warning of what the possibility is of how you will feel. And it's very important to have, you know, a support system. Don't. Don't hold it in. don't deal with it on your own. Don't feel ashamed. Don't feel scared. Like really use your partner. Use your family to express how you feel because holding it in Dealing with it on your own. There's nothing wrong with you. It's totally normal, and it will pass. And that's what I would say. And I would tell all of them to reach out to me if they needed to, because I wish that I just had, like, nobody tells you. It's very bizarre.

It's definitely something that is just not talked about in society. I mean, think how carefully we tend to pregnant women, and we see them every month and then every week and towards the end of their pregnancy, and then as soon as the baby's born, it's like, bye, bye. We'll see you once. Once. Mmm hmm. And what might you say to a woman who is on the fence about where to give birth? She's sort of intrigued by the idea about home birth, but you know, planning a hospital birth. What would you tell her?

I would tell her I actually have a friend who is on the fence and I tell her every day that she's more than capable of having At home, it you you are capable of doing that you will get it done and nothing will interfere. No reactive, irrational people and things will interfere with your goal. And if that's what you desire, then go with a home birth because you have more control over the outcome. Yeah, and also something that we didn't touch on yet is the recovery process. You know, I was walking like three days later. And even though I ripped, you know, it just it just happens. Okay? And because there were no drugs because I wasn't affected by anything that's not natural, you know, my body recovered like that.

It also probably has a lot to do with how you cared for yourself prenatally and how you cared for yourself in labor and you stayed nourished and you ate and you hydrated and Absolutely it the whole holistic picture matters to you, our body recovers, what would you say to any woman who's facing childbirth for the first time?

I would say, Listen to your gut, listen to your instinct. Listen to you. And try as much as you can not to allow outside factors to sway you one way or the other. You know what is best for you. If you just listen to what you want and trust you as the woman that you are, trust your capabilities. And if you can really just tune everything out and just listen to you, then that's the perfect choice.

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