To listen to this episode, and more than 350 other birth stories in The Birth Hour archives, join our listener supporter group here!
Three Empowering & Peaceful Births with Melissa Emler
Melissa’s children were born in Iowa under the care of midwives but in a hospital setting. In Iowa all midwives who are legally practicing are Certified Nurse Midwives and many of them are providing care within a hospital setting. The hospital that Melissa gave birth at was set up more like a birth center than the typical hospital image that you may have in your head. It had a large tub as well as other comfort measures that aided her with finding more natural methods of coping with labor than typical hospital pain medications. Melissa also practiced Hypnobirthing which really made a big difference with her births and kept her from even considering asking for an epidural.
Melissa Emler Bio
is a mom to three kids, Cooper, Addilyn and Conner and lives in Wisconsin where she works in education. She connects schools with the best and most useful tools available to them in the 21st century! Melissa also has a podcast called On the Vender Floor where she connects educators and entrepreneurs in conversations that positively impact learning.
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To listen to these episodes, and more than 300 other birth stories in The Birth Hour archives, join our listener supporter group here!
A VBA2C Birth Story – Elizabeth Quinn
Elizabeth Quinn is married to Percy and they are raising three girls in Jackson, Mississippi. Her daughters are Chesley Cox, 6 years old, Anderson Lillian ‘Anders’ 4 years old, and Adella Calhoon 22 months old.
In almost seven years of motherhood she’s gone from the totally oblivious first time mom, focused on the nursery and stroller and clueless about all things birth related to a certifiable birth junkie. The journey from unwanted, unplanned, unnecessary cesarean section to incredible VBA2C (vaginal birth after two cesareans) has given her a passion for birth education and vbac support.
She’s now a co-leader of her local ICAN chapter, coordinator of the Jackson, MS Improving Birth Rally, and administrator of a Facebook group that advocates for evidence based practices in maternity care called Birth Circle.
Elizabeth did her fair share of research and preparation for her VBAC and has since been connected with even more amazing birth resources so you’ll definitely want to check out her resource list.
You can listen to Elizabeth’s fourth birth story (another VBAC) with her first BOY after three girls via our archives by becoming a listener supporter.
To listen to this episode, and more than 300 other birth stories in The Birth Hour archives, join our listener supporter group here!
Blythe Fike Shares Her Sixth Birth Story – The Epidural Birth
Y’all, I’m not gonna lie, this episode strays a bit from what you are typically hearing on The Birth Hour, but it was actually one of my favorite episodes to record. Blythe Fike is a mom of 6 and wife of 1 living in Southern California. After 5 unmedicated, out of hospital births, she went rogue for number 6 and headed to the hospital… on purpose. She loves talking all kinds of birth and you can find her sometimes doing that at thefikelife.com.
Blythe’s episode is pretty light hearted and will definitely make you laugh but I also think it’s so valuable in that she wasn’t afraid to trust her gut and go for the type of birth she wanted even though she had done things very differently the first FIVE times! I love how Blythe and her husband tease each other about how funny the hospital birth experience is after having so many homebirths. These two obviously really know each other on all sorts of levels and make an awesome birthing team.
In this birth story episode, Victoria Easter Wilson shares her two hospital births attended by midwives. The first birth was kind of overwhelming for her husband so when they were pregnant with their second daughter they spent some time processing the first birth story and preparing more this time by hiring a doula. This is a great episode if you want to hear some positive hospital birth experiences – I mean check out that tub and bar she got to use at the hospital!
Victoria is a wife and WAHM who thinks the Internet can be used for good and not evil if you have the right intentions. She is a new doula and birth educator, passionate about supporting women in their motherhood journeys. When she’s able to sneak away from the busyness for a few hours, you can find her enjoying a pretty latte and the company of a friend…also probably talking about birth. Connect with her on Instagram.
To listen to this episode, and the rest of The Birth Hour archives, join our listener supporter group here!
Today’s guest is Joni Edelman who shares the story of her most recent birth which was a planned homebirth that ended in a hospital transfer. She talks not only about the labor and birth but about the emotions behind not having the birth that she had dreamed of. She recently wrote an article titled My Labor And Birth Didn’t Go As Planned — And No, I’m Not ‘Over’ It and received quite a bit of backlash for it.
To listen to this episode, and the rest of The Birth Hour archives, join our listener supporter group here!
I know from my own experiences as well as the hundreds of birth stories I’ve heard that there are many women who can relate to the sentiment of Joni’s article. Often women who are dealing with birth trauma are told that having a healthy baby is all that matters but research and antidotal evidence has shown that birth matters. It’s important for stories like Joni’s to be heard so women hear that it’s OK to mourn the loss of the birth they had hoped for while still being grateful for their healthy baby.
Joni Edelman in a nutshell!
Body-positive intersectional feminist. BP Type II. Diet industry dropout. Wife. Mom of 5. Bibliophile. Cake aficionado. Editor In Chief @ Ravishly. Types 17 WPM. Connect with her on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
Support the podcast by purchasing our first product – it’s an awesome high quality bag and comes filled with over $80 in fantastic products! Proceeds from each tote sold will also go towards supporting maternal health worldwide through a donation to Every Mother Counts. Christy Turlington Burns will be on the podcast on Thursday to talk about this organization that she founded.
