WEBVTT 00:00:00.119 --> 00:00:03.846 When I think back to my pregnancies, what stands out the most 00:00:03.879 --> 00:00:09.726 unfortunately, well, there's two things that stand out. One is I was very 00:00:09.759 --> 00:00:14.607 sick for both of my pregnancies for the entire length of the pregnancy 00:00:14.640 --> 00:00:20.526 from week probably 8 until the day I gave birth to those boys. Every day 00:00:20.559 --> 00:00:25.535 was a struggle, every day was a push and a fight. And it was very 00:00:25.568 --> 00:00:29.387 challenging for me. The other thing I recall about my pregnancies that 00:00:29.420 --> 00:00:33.256 stands out to me as being in absolute awe of my body and what it was doing 00:00:33.289 --> 00:00:37.417 , growing a life, how it was changing, how it was expanding, how it was 00:00:37.450 --> 00:00:41.326 responding, amazement at the vision of my body in the mirror. I would look 00:00:41.359 --> 00:00:44.976 in the mirror constantly and be like, Can you believe this is what's 00:00:45.009 --> 00:00:49.506 happening and my body is facilitating life and growth, and I'm just in 00:00:49.539 --> 00:00:55.707 amazement of the female body. My second birth. I was home and it was, it 00:00:55.740 --> 00:00:59.125 was raining in the desert, which I'll never forget that desert rain is so 00:00:59.158 --> 00:01:02.936 beautiful. It has a smell and a feel that is quite different because it's 00:01:02.969 --> 00:01:06.967 not the norm in the desert. And my parents were over and my mother had 00:01:07.000 --> 00:01:11.486 cooked this amazing home cooked meal. She's an incredible chef. The sun 00:01:11.519 --> 00:01:15.846 was setting and it was raining and I sat down to this meal and just as I 00:01:15.879 --> 00:01:20.745 was sitting down, I felt a gush of water. And I was like, oh wow, that was 00:01:20.778 --> 00:01:25.745 my water, but I really want to eat this dinner. OK, I'm gonna hurry up and 00:01:25.778 --> 00:01:28.665 eat because I'm not missing this and I think I have a long night ahead of 00:01:28.698 --> 00:01:34.576 me. And it was a very peaceful evening. I remember finishing dinner. And 00:01:34.609 --> 00:01:38.897 inviting my parents to, to leave as I knew I wanted to give birth in my 00:01:38.930 --> 00:01:44.415 home with my husband and my midwife. And they were loving and, and wished 00:01:44.448 --> 00:01:49.296 me well and were very excited and they left. The surges started very slow 00:01:49.329 --> 00:01:57.266 , very gentle, just as that tightening feeling. And it excited me. And I 00:01:57.299 --> 00:02:00.626 went to sit on the exercise ball just to be with them and to start going 00:02:00.659 --> 00:02:06.186 inward. I practice the style of a birthing tool called hypno birthing, 00:02:06.219 --> 00:02:10.577 where it's a meditative birthing practice where you go inward and use your 00:02:10.610 --> 00:02:15.745 breath and use guided imagery to work with your body to birth the baby 00:02:15.778 --> 00:02:20.987 naturally. It was wonderful. It was groovy. It's like, great. The first 00:02:21.020 --> 00:02:26.286 hour, I'd say, I was just with myself and I decided it was time to go into 00:02:26.319 --> 00:02:31.636 the bedroom and Eric lit the candles, put my Native American flutes on the 00:02:31.669 --> 00:02:37.196 iPod dock, put my essential oils out and, and sat with me for a little bit. 00:02:37.229 --> 00:02:40.745 In this meditative state, I don't talk much. I'm, I'm very much inward 00:02:40.778 --> 00:02:44.346 and with myself. But we talked a little bit at that time, and I shared 00:02:44.379 --> 00:02:48.106 with him some of what I was feeling. I was sitting on the bed practicing 00:02:48.139 --> 00:02:52.396 my breathing and the surges were becoming more intense, bordering on 00:02:52.429 --> 00:02:58.186 uncomfortable at this point. And I would practice meeting each surge with 00:02:58.219 --> 00:03:02.316 the same level of relaxation. As we know, being in pain, we tend to tense 00:03:02.349 --> 00:03:06.275 up. So my goal was to relax into each contraction to help the efforts of 00:03:06.308 --> 00:03:10.237 dilation, which is the ultimate goal. I learned all this because my first 00:03:10.270 --> 00:03:14.036 birth didn't go so well, so I was determined to try something differently 00:03:14.069 --> 00:03:19.327 this time. I remember thinking, gosh, I hope this works. And I, I just 00:03:19.360 --> 00:03:23.805 trusted this process. I just decided I, I picked a method and I'm going to 00:03:23.838 --> 00:03:29.386 trust the process. And the surges were getting much more intense, more 00:03:29.419 --> 00:03:35.085 rapidly, and I'd have to each time dig even deeper to stay relaxed against 00:03:35.118 --> 00:03:39.207 the wave of discomfort and tightness. They got so intense that I remember 00:03:39.240 --> 00:03:44.827 really hitting a point of feeling like, OK, can I do this? And I was so 00:03:44.860 --> 00:03:47.987 focused on my breath and so focused on being present with each contraction 00:03:48.020 --> 00:03:54.305 , I didn't realize how far along the labor was going until I felt super 00:03:54.338 --> 00:03:59.017 intense contractions that made me dizzy. Eric was with me. I wasn't saying 00:03:59.050 --> 00:04:02.335 a word to him. A conversation had stopped for a while now. I wasn't 00:04:02.368 --> 00:04:05.616 speaking to him anymore. I couldn't, I couldn't break my meditative state 00:04:05.649 --> 00:04:09.327 or concentration or the pain levels would go up. And I would just stay 00:04:09.360 --> 00:04:14.096 super deeply connected to myself, to being present to each contraction, to 00:04:14.129 --> 00:04:19.377 where finally, I had a contraction that was so, so deep that I felt tingly 00:04:19.410 --> 00:04:24.455 all over. I started shaking. I got a wave of heat and I'm, I realized I'm 00:04:24.488 --> 00:04:29.205 in transition. I did it. I think I'm fully dilated. Think this baby and 00:04:29.238 --> 00:04:32.877 all this is happening within me, and I couldn't share it with my husband 00:04:32.910 --> 00:04:37.205 cause I couldn't break my concentration. So I leaned back and slid down 00:04:37.238 --> 00:04:41.336 into the bed and opened my knees, and that was his sign that he knew that 00:04:41.369 --> 00:04:47.317 things were advancing, and I felt the crown. I felt Isaiah's head. And I 00:04:47.350 --> 00:04:54.197 was done, but I knew I had more to go. Eric said, Didi, that head, you're 00:04:54.230 --> 00:04:57.086 doing it. You're doing it. I see the head. I'm like, OK, good. He knows, 00:04:57.119 --> 00:05:00.467 he knows, cause I couldn't tell him, but he knows that this baby's so 00:05:00.500 --> 00:05:04.437 coming right now. The midwife hadn't returned yet. It was just him and I. 00:05:04.470 --> 00:05:09.176 I knew the next contraction was going to be a dozer, and it finally came. 00:05:09.209 --> 00:05:13.717 And I dug so deep and I had nowhere else to dig, and I just held on to 00:05:13.750 --> 00:05:17.395 this mantra and I kept saying, come to mommy Isaiah, come to mommy Isaiah 00:05:17.428 --> 00:05:22.995 , come to mommy Isaiah, come to mommy, come to mommy, and that helped me 00:05:23.028 --> 00:05:27.236 release from the discomfort and be so excited that I was getting to meet 00:05:27.269 --> 00:05:34.447 Isaiah, that I could deal with that last search that was so uncomfortable. 00:05:34.480 --> 00:05:39.387 And I felt Eric jump up and he went to wash his hands, and he came to my 00:05:39.420 --> 00:05:44.666 legs, and the next contraction produced Isaiah's head, and I could relax a 00:05:44.699 --> 00:05:48.656 little bit and talk to him and say. Don't touch him yet. One more 00:05:48.689 --> 00:05:51.976 contraction, and then you can hold him. And I went back inside because I 00:05:52.009 --> 00:05:55.817 knew it was coming, and then the last contraction came and it was so 00:05:55.850 --> 00:06:01.205 intense but so awesome. And I felt the release of Isaiah leaving my body 00:06:01.238 --> 00:06:04.776 and into Eric's arms, and then he brought him right to my chest, and we 00:06:04.809 --> 00:06:11.817 were both crying, and I felt such a sense of accomplishment. I was so 00:06:11.850 --> 00:06:19.395 incredibly excited to kiss and hug and meet Isaiah. I felt so confident in 00:06:19.428 --> 00:06:24.395 my body. I was on a high. I was like overwhelmed that that all just went 00:06:24.428 --> 00:06:29.836 down. And the midwife walked in, right, probably 2 minutes after Isaiah 00:06:29.869 --> 00:06:34.796 was in my arms, and Isaiah nursed pretty quickly, and he's just been a 00:06:34.829 --> 00:06:39.877 dream ever since. That birth is Isaiah. I felt differently about myself 00:06:39.910 --> 00:06:47.546 ever since that birth and my body, I cherished my body. And I'm in awe of 00:06:47.579 --> 00:06:52.687 the female body. Like really, wow, birth. 00:06:52.720 --> 00:06:56.567 Amazing, and it's just programmed to do that. If we just get out of the 00:06:56.600 --> 00:07:02.805 way, it's programmed to birth the baby. To be able to birth naturally was 00:07:02.838 --> 00:07:08.926 like a self-development seminar, like on steroids. I'm so grateful to have 00:07:08.959 --> 00:07:16.509 a birth like that, to have that had that experience with nature. Yeah.