Episode 326 Jolie's HBA2C + Finding the Right Provider + Surprise Big Baby

The VBAC Link

“I leaned back in the tub and I think what I said was just, ‘I’ve never held one of my babies after they were born before.’

It was interesting how there was an element that was sort of mundane about it but I liked that. It was just the normalcy of it all that shocked me if that makes sense.”

Since her only experiences with her previous births were in a sterile, surgical, hospital environment, the simplicity and freedom of a home birth felt shockingly normal in all the best ways!

Jolie shares her first C-section, her planned home birth turned CBAC, followed by a 15-hour home birth at 43 weeks to an almost 11-pound baby with her third. She gives invaluable advice on how to REALLY know if you have the right provider for you and how it may not always be the VBAC-supportive provider everyone recommends.

Jolie's Photography and Coaching Contact Info

Transforming Birth

Needed Website

How to VBAC: The Ultimate Prep Course for Parents

Full Transcript under Episode Details

Meagan: Hello, Women of Strength. It’s Meagan here. We have another VBAC story for you today and we have our friend, Jolie. Hello, Jolie.

Jolie: Hey, Meagan.

Meagan: How are you today?

Jolie: I’m good. How are you?

Meagan: I am so great. I am so excited to record your story. There were a whole bunch of little snippets through your story that I’m like, Oh, I want to talk about that. But I wanted to tell everybody that I’ve been starting to do this. I don’t know if you’ve been noticing but we get a lot of emails of, Hey, where was this person located? What state was that? I’m curious if it was my state so I can try to find that provider. We are going to have her providers and stuff tagged in today’s post but you say you are in North Georgia, correct?

Jolie: Yes.

Meagan: Is that just where your VBAC was or is that where you are residing now?

Jolie: Nope, this is where my VBAC was, in North Georgia.

Meagan: Okay, so North Georgia people, listen up. This is going to be a great story. I’ll tell you guys a little bit more. Okay, so you’re a birth worker and a photographer. Are you a doula?

Jolie: Yes. Yep. I was trained as a doula in 2020 but I’m exploring different ways to support people in the birth community because, with three young children, I’m just trying to navigate the on-call life and doing things. But yes, I do have experience being a doula.

Meagan: Awesome. So cool. Like she said, she has three kiddos. She is a Christian wife to a Biblical counselor. That’s awesome. I love how you guys said that you have a vision of a multi-generational team on a mission to God’s kingdom. I just love that so much. I am so excited to record your story here in just a few seconds.

I do of course have a Review of the Week as always. We always have reviews and just a reminder, if you haven’t left a review yet, we would love them. They really do help the show. They help other Women of Strength find these amazing stories and honestly, they just put a ginormous smile on my face.

This review says, “Love these ladies and this podcast.” It says, “I love listening to your podcast. I listen almost every day in the car. So often that my oldest son knows you both by name. The stories shared here have inspired me so much. I wish I had all of this information with my first baby. I have had two C-sections. I’m not pregnant at the moment and still have to get my husband on board for a third, but I am so excited to start planning for a VBAC after two C-sections when the time comes. Thank you, Julie and Megan, for creating this amazing VBAC community. I’m so thankful for the education and support.”

Okay, seriously, I love that. We keep hearing this. I love that other kids know who we are because they are just so used to listening to the podcast because this is what I love even more than just they know who they are. They are learning. These kids are sponges. We know that. They are always taking stuff in that we are saying and if they’re listening to these stories, they are learning. So hopefully if your kiddos are learning and listening, they are going to have a different outcome in their future for their future births if they so choose to because they’re going to know, right? They’re going to know all of these stories.

Anyway, that makes my heart smile.

Jolie: That’s awesome.

Meagan: All right, girl. Are you ready? Let’s do this.

Jolie: All right.

Meagan: All right. Let’s turn the time over.

Jolie: Okay, so yes. I had a home birth in November, November 5th. That was a home birth after two Cesareans so an HBA2C. I’ll just do a small synopsis of the first two births because I feel like that always helps preface the background of where I’m coming from. I think everybody’s journey to their VBAC is totally different.

Meagan: Yeah, totally different and at the same time, there are so many listening who are like, Oh my gosh, this is just like me. I think sometimes we hold on to those past experiences even if we’ve processed them. We know that was our past so sometimes we even doubt ourselves because of that so hearing someone’s story who is pretty similar to yours and then hearing them go on to have a VBAC is pretty impactful.

Jolie: Yeah, absolutely. I can relate to that as well with listening to podcasts and finding those stories of women’s journeys to their VBACs. I definitely clung onto the ones I related to.

With my first baby, our daughter, she was born in 2019 and I mean, that was like so many, a typical cascade of interventions situation where I was aware of home birth and natural childbirth. I knew that I wanted that, but I also was just young and didn’t know and wasn’t aware of the resources I had. It’s pretty much what I chaulked that up to. I just was getting into birth and eyes wide open and reading what I could but I didn’t really know obviously what the future was going to hold for me. I didn’t know all what was available to me either.

I was seeing a traditional OB group and was planning a hospital birth but wanted just a natural childbirth with no interventions at all. I just wanted in in the hospital. I ended up getting fear-mongered to just put it simply out there. Fearmongered into an induction at 41 weeks and yeah. Quite frankly, it just didn’t work. My body was not ready. I was not open at all and I was so determined. I stayed in that hospital working with an induction for a whole week before I had my C-section.

I was trying to go slow and steady and I was going a little stir crazy there at the end of that week. I obviously was confused and just downcast and so just sad about what was happening. I was shocked that I was there in that situation. I remember reading Ina May’s book and skipping the C-section chapter because I was like, That’s not going to be me. Why do I need to read this?

Meagan: That’s really normal. Even here with the CBAC stories, I think it’s really common to be like, I don’t want to listen to that CBAC story because that’s not going to be me. But at the same time, I think it’s good too.

Jolie: Yeah. Yeah. There’s definitely a balance to that. I found myself at the end of that week pushing 42 and was kind of again just had fear within me and had fear coming from my providers of, “You’ve been at this for a week. You’re not in labor. Your options are to leave or have a C-section.” I was just like, “Leave? I’ve been here for a week. I’m not going to leave here without a baby.” We opted for the C-section and she was fine. We handled that whole week together perfectly fine. There were no emergencies or hiccups in the road. It was just like, “All right. This is just what we do next,” kind of at this point.

She was born at 32 to the day via Cesarean and yeah. That was that. I definitely processed the birth very traumatically because any trauma is how you process what’s going on. I know there are births out there that could look like that and people handle it differently. So anyway, for me, I processed it with a sense of trauma. I spent that next year just working through that sorrow and trauma. I started seeing a Biblical counselor which is why I included in my little bio that my husband is one because I saw one and the change that he saw in me is what spurred him on and encouraged him to become one. That was a really cool moment in our family where I was going to this wonderful woman for help and just handling my birth.

Anyway, that was really helpful for me in growing and changing the way I was looking at my birth. I was very determined to have a VBAC. My husband I have always said that we want however many children the Lord would give us. I assumed that wouldn’t be just one. I wanted another one so I was very determined for a VBAC for my second pregnancy.

We conceived my second when my daughter turned one. It was a year later and I was just– the way this pregnancy and birth happened which was a repeat Cesarean, I just put my blinders on and put my head down and was like, I just need to hire a home birth midwife and she’s going to give me my VBAC. That was my attitude. Surely if I plan a home birth, I’m not leaving my house. There’s no way it will end in a C-section.

I was very– I don’t know if stubborn was the right word, but there was a sense that I was covering up all that I went through with this first birth to just have the VBAC, have the VBAC. It was almost like that was going to fix the first one. That was how I felt. In hindsight, I see that now. In the moment, I probably did not recognize that that was how I was operating. I hired a home birth midwife who came recommended to me. I knew friends who used her.

So then here we are towards the end approaching 41 weeks like the last time and my water broke on 41 weeks. It was the first sign of labor and I had no signs of labor with my first child so that was so exciting. I was kind of scared too. I was surprised.

My water broke at 41 and I was talking to my midwife and whatnot. I had some little pitter-patter contractions that night and then nothing the next day. That was on a Sunday. My son ended up being born that Thursday via Cesarean.

What happened within that week or a little less than a week was not the funnest of times. I pretty much realized there at the very end when I was needing– you’re here at the end and you’re like, What’s going to happen next? I realized, I hired the wrong midwife, but what do I do now?

Meagan: No way.

Jolie: Yeah. Like I said, I’m not going to speak ill, but I believe that every care provider is not the right fit for everyone. So just because I heard wonderful reviews, that’s not negating the fact that she was wonderful for some people, but looking back, this is pairing it where my head was down and my blinders were on. Now I can see in hindsight the red flags that were coming up. I was like, Oh, she’s just tired. Maybe she just got back from a birth and that’s why she seems grumpy. She’s been doing this for a long time. I was just giving reasons to why she was the way she was. It was nothing more than that we just didn’t click well.

After my water broke, she took on this fearful attitude. She was very concerned and just didn’t know what to do. She really fed into fears that I had and new ones in my head. I was just like, This is not helping. What’s going on?

All that to say, I think she wanted me to have a biophysical profile done since my water had broken and I was 41 and labor hadn’t begun. Obviously, the profile came back that there was low fluid which I knew because my water had broken but there was nothing else concerning with my son. But because of that report, she transferred me to the hospital. She transferred care and she called my husband after the report came back to her and said, “Y’all need to go to the hospital. I’m not going to be able to support you. Just go.”

That moment from the report to the hospital was scary for me but on the way there, I had this peace come over me because I was going back to the hospital that my daughter was born at and before this birth, I was very much even just seeing the hospital– I would just not look at it by the side of the road. I had all of this emotion attached to this place. I knew a few people who worked there in the labor and delivery ward. I had their numbers so I messaged them. I was like, “Is there any chance y’all are here?”

Long story short, I’m coming. I don’t want to be here, but I’m coming. They were. I had a friend come and she prayed with me and I had seen another nurse there who was there when I had my daughter and she remembered me. It was just this very healing moment in the sense of I was respected. People totally were not judging me for coming in as a home birth transfer. I was worried about that that I would get a side-eye or judgment because I was a home birth mom. I was actually going to the hospital and I didn’t have a provider there.

But no, they were all so very much like, “We are so sorry that you are here because we know that you don’t want to be here but we are taking care of you. We understand that this is hard for you to process everything that’s going on right now.” That was healing in itself. That healed my emotional attachments to the hospital that were negative.

He was fine. They monitored him for a few minutes when we got there. He was fine, but they also– I did tell my husband when we were on the way, “I just know that it’s going to be another C-section because I don’t even have a doctor here. My water’s broken. I’m already a VBAC.” I kind of had accepted that outcome before even getting there and decided to opt for it again.

The doctor there was also very respectful with all of that just like the nurses were. He was born at 41 and 5. He was fine even though the water had been broken for some time.

So that was that. In processing that birth, it was a little bit different than my first. I definitely felt like I was at a fork in the road though because here I am. I’ve just had two. I was technically a home birth transfer. I was determined to get this VBAC. What in the world happened that time?

I just realized that I had taken any sort of trust and responsibility in the medical community or within myself and just put it in the hands of this midwife and put her up on this pedestal of, You’re going to give me the birth that I want. I misplaced that into the whole home birth community. I was like, I can’t do that again. But then that is some deep internal work then. If I am realizing that I am making all of these other people responsible for my birth and my outcome and it’s not working out great, I need to figure out what the root of this is and really work on it.

That began the year journey of just doing some more internal work and more counseling and therapy and stuff like that. I remember it might have been this podcast episode that I listened to or it could have been another birth podcast. It was honestly a lightbulb going off. I didn’t realize I could do this. I can’t remember. I think it was your podcast but one of y’all said, “I interviewed seven providers before I became pregnant again to pick one out.”

Meagan: Yeah. I actually interviewed 12.

Jolie: Yes, okay. I wrote that down. I heard that and I was like, Wait a minute. How am I going to do that if I’m pregnant and scrambling to find the perfect provider? I heard you say that and it was almost like, Whoa. I didn’t realize I could interview people when I’m not pregnant, but why couldn’t I? So that helped me.

Meagan: It sounds weird. Why would you go talk to a doctor if you’re not pregnant?

Jolie: Yeah, but that gave me so much peace and confidence. It was a clear path of, Oh. I’m not pregnant. I’ve got time. I started. I didn’t want to figure this all out until my son turned 1 so I was just like, You need to take a breath. Everybody talks about your next baby right after you had one and I’m always like, Can you just slow down? I just had a baby and I’m going to enjoy this time.

So I waited a year not to get pregnant the third time but a year to go after my provider, find my plan, and really do the deep work again. So I did. I started interviewing all of these people. I found my midwife a little over a year before I conceived my third baby. I found her early when I wasn’t pregnant. It was just such a God-ordained, perfect experience where my husband and I went and had a conversation with her. She just aligned with us on a biological level, on a spiritual level. That was something I didn’t realize how important it was going to be to me to find a fellow Christian who really walked out their life with the Lord and she did. I developed a close friendship with her actually even before I was pregnant.

Being in the birth world, I would work with her. I had attended some births with her before I became pregnant so I really just saw her live it out and I knew she was amazing. What’s so funny, just the way the mind and body and spirit are connected was when I first met her and did the interview with my husband, I hadn’t started my cycle back. I was telling her, “I’m just looking. I need a VBAC. I want a VBAC. I’m not pregnant yet, but I haven’t started my cycle either so I have no idea when.”

The very next day, I got my period. For me, I felt like it was my body coming into alignment with the fact that I just found somebody who was going to be amazing for my birth.

Meagan: You’re ready.

Jolie: I emailed her, “This is so weird but I literally just started my cycle.” Anyway, that was just a really cool moment for me to recognize that connection.

That was when I found my midwife and that was such a key part to my VBAC. Then it was about a year later when I got pregnant with my third. I hired her and we were just so excited.

Okay, so one of my big things with interviewing people for my third was, “Okay, I have had two pregnancies and two Cesareans. Historically, I have gone postdates with both of them. I need to know what your deal is with due dates and the whole ‘let me’ language and all of that.” I was trying to figure out what I aligned with in that regard and what they would support me with. So here I am approaching 42 weeks.

She was very much like, “Whatever. We’ll check on you more when you’re past your due date if you want and we’ll obviously take care of you but I have no cutoff or whatever.”

Yeah. So I was 42 weeks and I started losing a little bit of my mucus plug. That was exciting but then another pretty much week went by and here I am a couple days before 43 and I have two nights of prodromal labor where the contractions would wake me up in the night but then I’d go back to sleep. That was the first night on a Thursday night I would have those contractions.

Friday rolls around. I am so pregnant and so tired. It was definitely emotionally very challenging that last month. But Friday night comes around. They pick up again and that night, I really couldn’t sleep so I would be on the birth ball. I would get in the bathtub and yeah. I knew I was going to need some support on Saturday because of my other children so it did fizzle out Saturday morning, but I had a friend come and play with my kids. We just all hung out together on Saturday. I did have some contractions that were strong every 30 minutes to an hour during the day on Saturday.

I was pretty much– that Saturday I was 43 weeks I think. Either Saturday or Friday I was 43 weeks. That evening it started picking up a little bit more and my birth team, so my midwife and her assistant who was going to come to the birth and my husband. They came over around 10:30 Saturday morning and then 30 minutes later– so they got to my house at 10:30-11:00 PM. My kids were asleep so that was fine. I wasn’t really sure if I was going to have them around or not. I was going to play it by ear because I wasn’t sure what kind of support I’d need from my husband and how they were going to handle it.

Through the night they slept which was great and I was laboring that Saturday night. My water broke at 11:00 PM Saturday night 30 minutes after my birth team got there and that was something that I was having to really work with in my mind because of the second birth having my water break as the first sign of labor and then not have the baby for several days. I was really wanting to not have my water break early.

Meagan: Yeah.

Jolie: But my water breaking actually when it broke at 11:00, I was in labor before then. That was a different situation and I just had this wave of peace come over me again because I knew I was finally in labor and my birth team was going to stay. It wasn’t going to be, “Oh, nevermind. We’re going to go home now.” They were here and the water was clear. I had no worries.

I was actually really excited after my water broke because I thought I wasn’t going to be because of my second birth but I was so thankful. Pretty much from there on, it started picking up pretty intensely. The nighttime was a blur. I just did squats and walked around and swayed and just clung to door frames I feel like. I was just sort of, yeah. I definitely struggled with holding tension in my body in the contractions.

I did labor pretty much all night on Saturday and then later in the night maybe around 4:00 or 5:00 AM, I finally found a great place to relax and just a position. It was actually just laying in the bed reclined is what did it for me. I was able to melt into the contractions and I could tell that I was opening and progressing. I just slept around 4:00 or 5:00 until 7:00 AM so early into Sunday morning now.

I was definitely still laboring intensely but I was sleeping. To somebody on the outside, you would just think, Oh, she’s just taking a nap. I was in transition actually. I did not think I would want a cervical exam because of my previous two births– never dilating, all of that. I had to move past that whole belief that my body was not going to open and things like that so I wasn’t sure how I was going to do with exams and stuff.

But at that time, being a doula and hearing so many birth stories, I was already pregnant for so long, I was just like, I need to know if I have a whole other day of this. I don’t want to hear a number but I want her to check me and at least tell me if my energy needs to be hunkered down, conserved, you’re not that far, or is it okay, let’s pick it up. You’re almost there? I did want her to check me but I didn’t want to hear a number. I just wanted her to give me a general frame of, “Here’s where you need to be in your headspace with this information I’ve just received.”

It was 7:00 AM maybe. She checked me. She was like, “Are you sure you don’t want to hear a number?” I could just tell the way she asked that question. I was like, Okay, she knows I’m going to like the number I’m going to hear. I was like, “Okay, go ahead and tell me.” She was like, “You’re an 8 and I can stretch you completely open very easily.” I was like, “What? Oh wow, this is amazing. Okay.” She was like, “I think all it’s going to take is some different positions. We’re going to do a circuit to get the baby’s head lined up just a little bit more straight and that will open you up all the way if we just move the baby just a little bit.”

I was like, “Okay, let’s do it.” I did two circuits of excruciating positions. Side-lying was not the most fun thing I’ve ever done but I was very much just like, “Tell me what to do and I’ll do it.” We did side-lying, knees to chest, and dip the hip where I was standing and I would swap and turn. I don’t know how to explain the sensation, but it was probably just the baby moving through my pelvis. It was pretty intense.

I did two circuits of that and I was just like, “I need to feel some comfort again and not do this circuit again.” So I was like, “I think I want to get in the birth pool.” I had the birth pool set up. I had tried to get in earlier in labor but got right back out. It was just not for me. I was like, “Maybe I’ll try the birth pool.” I stepped in and was like, “Nope. I don’t want to do that.” The second time now, this was around 11:30 AM. I was like, “I think I want to get in the pool.” I got in and I was like, “I’m not 100% sure but I kind of think I feel pushy.” It was just one of those things that in a lot of ways I felt like a first-time mom having this labor where I never had a pushing phase with the others. I was just sort of doubting myself a little bit, but the assistant was like, “Well, we can’t tell you if you feel pushy.” I was like, “Okay. I know. I know.”

Meagan: We can’t tell you.

Jolie: Yeah.

Meagan: That’s hilarious.

Jolie: I was like, “Okay. Well, I’ll just be in this for a few more contractions and see if whatever sensation I’m feeling stays or gets stronger. I think I’ll be confident when I am ready to push or if it changes and whatever.” I just was trying to figure out again where I needed to be.

So I did feel that pushing sensation and started to in the water. That was definitely such a switch in the way I was experiencing the sensations of labor because the contractions were painful to me, but when I started pushing, it was like relief and very relieving. I felt like, Oh, I’m doing something. This is different. I’m not just getting through this. I’m moving through it in a way where I have this sort of control over it.

I really enjoyed pushing and I was in the tub and again, reclining on my back. I never thought I would be in this position for birth because it’s usually the hospital stereotype of on your back on the bed but that’s where I felt relief and got through transition on my bed so in the birth pool, that’s actually how I pushed was kind of reclined back. I was just able to do it better that way. I had 5 minutes between each contraction so that was really nice because I ended up pushing for about 2 hours. That’s kind of a long time. I think from start to finish my labor was 15 hours so it was those last 2.

I never felt exhausted as in, I can’t do this, but I do remember I wasn’t really aware of the time. I knew it was Sunday afternoon. I got in the pool at 11:30 and my son was born at 2:05. I was pushing but I had those 5 minutes of breaks so I was able to doze off and float in the water. I genuinely enjoyed those 2 hours. It was just peaceful but I felt myself getting sort of impatient because I didn’t know what time it was, but I was just like, Okay. The water is kind of cool. I know I’ve been in here for a while so I don’t know. I really wish this was over now. So finally, there was a candid moment where I saw my midwife getting baby stuff together and I was just like, “Oh, what are you doing?”

She was like, “You’re pushing. I’m getting the baby stuff out. You’re doing this. It’s actually happening.” I was just like, “Oh wow. Okay. I guess so.” It was so funny. I don’t know. I think there is just this part of where I was just so zoned into what I was doing and what I was feeling that I wasn’t really processing it, Oh, this is happening. This is happening.

As she told me, I could feel my baby’s head and that was mind-blowing. Once I could reach out and feel his head, which we didn’t know at the time it was a boy. We were waiting to find out. That definitely brought me into a sense of reality when I could feel the baby’s head. It was just like, Whoa, okay. This is happening.

There was a slight burn when his head crowned, but there was so much adrenaline when his body was coming out that I don’t even really recall that being painful just kind of a burning sensation. His head crowned. I changed positions after his head was born. I was still in the water, but I sort of think I was on my back. I moved up a little bit onto my hands and knees and stayed in the water. My midwife ended up guiding his head and shoulders down and then his body came out.

She handed him to me and I just remember knowing it was a boy even though I hadn’t seen yet. I leaned back in the tub and I think what I said was just, “I’ve never held one of my babies after they were born before.” That feeling of an immediate, My baby came out and they are in my arms. That was just so surreal but at the same time it was almost so seamless and intuitive that I was just like, Okay. I just gave birth and it’s just a normal day. Everybody around me– I think I had thought built it up in my mind to be this incredible experience which it was. I don’t want to say, It wasn’t all that, but in a way, birth is so natural and normal that after it happened, it was just like, I’m in my bed and the birds are chirping outside and the day is going on, where before I was in the hospital and it felt like this whole different world. It was interesting how there was an element that was sort of mundane about it but I like that. I don’t know. It was just the normalcy of it all that shocked me if that makes sense.

Meagan: Yeah. No, I really actually can totally relate. I remember after I had my VBAC after two C-section baby, I was at a birth center. I was in the bathroom on the floor when I gave birth and they were like, “All right, let’s get you up and move you to the room.” I was like, “Okay.” I just remember going in there and laying down and starting to feed my baby and just looking around almost like, Did that really just happen? But at the same time, it was like, Yeah, it just happened and now I’m just feeding my baby.

Jolie: Yeah, that was it.

Meagan: It was so weird. It was so weird. There was a slight disconnect in my brain that what had just transpired transpired.

Jolie: Yes.

Meagan: So yeah. I really can relate to that so much. Then about how you were saying, “I was pushing for a really long time and I just looked over and realized my midwife was putting the baby stuff together and getting stuff ready,” and you were like, “Oh, yeah. Yeah.” I had that moment too where I was just laboring on the toilet and then all of a sudden, my midwife was just coming in here guiding me to the stool and I was like, Wait, what? She was like, “Let’s come have a baby.” I’m like, “What, really?”

I couldn’t believe that what was happening was happening but I was so zoned into doing this birth, having this VBAC, and then all of a sudden, I realized I was doing that. I was actually doing that.

Jolie: Yeah. I think when you have C-sections and when you have any sort of difficulties in your births, your mind clings onto those phrases that people say like, “Oh, your baby is too big. You’re not going to open.”

Meagan: Oh yeah. Oh yeah.

Jolie: It makes you feel like this miraculous thing must happen for me to give birth because it didn’t work the other times so how in the world? Trumpets need to be blaring and some crazy thing has to happen for this to work but it doesn’t and it was just like, Oh. That was it.

Meagan: This is normal.

Jolie: Yeah, the thing that didn’t feel normal was actually the surgical births but the thing that felt normal was the VBAC so it was very interesting but after he came out, they were like, “That’s a big baby.” He pooped twice before we got out of the tub like pretty big poops so then by the time my midwife weighed him, she knew that he had already pooped, but I think he weighed 10, 14 so she was like, “He totally was 11 pounds coming out. If I weighed him before he took those ginormous poops.”

That was shocking and not expected at all.

Meagan: Yeah girl!

Jolie: That was really cool that it was not even a part of it because I didn’t get any late-term ultrasounds. Looking back, people definitely kept asking me if I was having twins. They were like, “Wow. You look really big.” I just was like, “Ha, ha. I get it. I’m pregnant.” You know the things people say. I’m like, Maybe I actually did look larger than normal because this child could pass for two babies as twins. Yeah. He was almost 11 pounds.

I did have one tear that I chose for her to not suture, but that was it. That was the birth.

Meagan: Wow, and a surprise big baby. Think about how there are a lot of times in the provider’s world of the hospital where they see someone who is a larger baby and they are wanting to do those third-trimester ultrasounds and growth scans and they are like, “What?” When really you didn’t need any of those things, you just needed time. And a 43-week baby.

I had one of my beginning doula clients and she was 43 weeks and 1 day as well. I mean, it was a 10-pound baby as well. It was 10,12 I think. That girl just powerhoused that baby out but she was getting pressure to get induced at 39 weeks. She was feeling all of that pressure. “Oh, your baby is looking big. You look so big. You are small. I don’t know if this is going to be possible.” Then she switched at I think 41 weeks then she went to 43 and 1 and just had a beautiful, vaginal birth.

I love that. Okay, so there are so many things. Something that I caught in your story was with your second midwife or with your second provider with your second baby. Everyone said, “This midwife, this midwife,” so you went with this midwife then you realized it wasn’t the midwife for me. I think that is something that is important to note especially when we have our supportive provider list, right? We have this list and we’re providing these names where people will rant and rave for days and days and days about some of these providers so you’re like, Yeah, great. The whole community is going to this provider or whatever.

Then you’re in that situation and you just take that word for it, but then you get into that situation of birthing and you’re realizing, Oh crap. This isn’t right. There were red flags and I didn’t recognize them because I was just going off of what everybody else said. I just think it’s important to note that even though everybody or people might say this provider is the only provider or the best provider that it doesn’t mean they are the best provider for you.

It really comes back down to what that provider is looking like for you in your mind. Close your eyes. Envision your birth. Think about what they are saying, what they are doing, how they are caring for you. Think about the questions you want to ask them and go and really ask these people these questions that are really something for you. I love that you talked about that with your third midwife how you were like, “These are the qualities I was looking for.” It took you a while to find it but you found it.

I love also that you pointed that out. Really you guys, I can’t say it enough. Finding a provider when you are not pregnant is night and day from finding a provider when you are.

Jolie: Yeah. There was no pressure. I felt like I could be so much more confident in saying no because I didn’t feel like I had to say yes.

Meagan: Yeah and honestly, our minds are in a different space. Even Dr. Fox a few episodes back talked about that how that is a really great thing to do because we are emotional. We feel pressure. There’s time. Our baby is growing and each week matters to find that provider. It’s a very different thing. It’s a very different thing.

Okay and then in your form, we talked about this a little bit before but you talked about radical responsibility and the word radical just stands out to me now because of our radical acceptance episodes that Julie and I have done. We’ve done two of them so if you guys haven’t listened to those, go back and listen. There is a part one and a part two. How would you describe radical responsibility or finding radical responsibility to our audience?

Jolie: Yeah. I think that it comes with a lot of coming face-to-face with some core beliefs because for me, when I was realizing was that we all day, “You are the one that cares the most about your baby and your body.” Okay. I think most people can agree that’s true. But then how do you actually walk that out when you are pregnant? Because what can happen is you can be subconsciously deciding that this person over here is going to make sure I’m safe, is going to make sure my baby is safe, and is going to do all of these things for me when in reality, I believe that nobody outside of you can guarantee that safety. As a Christian, I believe that I don’t even hold the keys to life and death. If that’s what we’re going to talk about, at the core of all of this stuff, people when they are pregnant, you want your baby after you are born and that’s a thing.

So that’s kind of your basic line. I had to come to grips with even just the reality at its deepest core of, Okay. So if I’m pregnant and I have this baby growing inside of me and I want to birth this way for these reasons, I need to own this. If my midwife recommends I eat this way or do it. She’s not going to come over and feed me. She’s not going to text me everyday and ask if I took my supplements or went on a walk.

That’s goes into something else I’d like to mention if we have time of just handling all the things in birth. But with the responsibility aspect, it’s hard to pin down but I think that it just boils down to realizing where you have control and where you don’t have control and are you giving any control to someone else or are they just there to support you? There was an element where I was at where I wasn’t wanting to do a free birth. I know there are very strong opinions for that or with unassisted– different terms and all of these things– but I did glean a lot from books I was reading about unassisted birth because I wanted to feel like I could make decisions with my midwife’s support and not the other way around.

It wasn’t her making the decision and making sure I was on board with it. It was more like, This is what I want to do and I’m going to work with you because I did hire you and I actually hired you more for the essence of womanly support. Midwife means “with women” so I wanted this relationship. The relationship I cultivated with midwife was more of a sisterhood/friendship where I was like, “I need you in my birth. I hired you because I know you have incredible skills and I know that you can use these skills if something arises where I need to do something different in my birth, but more than that, I know that you know that you’re not responsible for certain things and I’m not responsible for certain things but we are working together and you are there for me on an emotional level.” That was more important to me.

Meagan: I love that.

Jolie: Not everybody is going to be there for our births but I think if you’re listening and that resonates with you like, I’ve taken some power and put it in other people or I’m holding my provider responsible for x, y, z at the end of the day, I would just work through that and base those thoughts and beliefs and see if you think there needs to be a change in your perception on responsibility and what we control or don’t control. We have to surrender which is incredibly difficult.

Meagan: Yes. It is but I love that you are talking about that. We have to walk in. We have to own it but we also have to work together. I like that you said, “I don’t want her to have to convince me of this. I want to know what I’m talking about and work with her with this situation.” A lot of the time we have to do that with providers where we need to come in and work together and not be patient versus provider. It just needs to be a collaboration but at the same time, we have to take ownership into everything that we can.

Okay, so we were talking about this and you mentioned that you wanted to talk about all the things. We talked about getting enough food, making sure we get the right supplements which we know here at The VBAC Link, I’m very passionate about getting the right supplements and then finding the right provider and figuring out what to do with the kids. There are so many things.

Jolie: There are so many things. Yeah, I can talk about that for a minute because I think there are so many things that you can obsess over or shut down over. So one of the things that this goes into my tips of if you are going for a VBAC, here are some tips. A holistic approach– when I say holistic, I mean body, mind, and spirit. There are a lot of things we can do for our bodies when we are pregnant– the nutrition, the walks, the exercises, the Spinning Babies gymnastics. There are all of these body-focused things but you also need to be working on your mind and how you are doing in your mind which was huge for me. I found a birth course and worked with this incredible group of people. They are called Mind Change, but her birth course I think I sent you is called Transforming Birth.

It’s all about subconscious stuff and rewiring your brain to have different pathways for your birth. Anyway, that’s my plug for that.

But going into it, prepare your mind for birth. Actually think about what you do want and not what you don’t want. Think about what you don’t want. Have a plan. You need to have a plan for your provider. Of course, that’s responsible. But put that away and spend the real-time immersing yourself in what you want it to look like.

And then just your spirit. You could make a whole list of all the things you need to do, but the key is in how you approach it because I remember in one of my previous births, one of them that was a C-section, somebody had said one time– it might have just been on social media, “Oh, I went to the chiropractor every week for my birth and I got this wonderful, fast labor and I know it is because of the chiropractor.” I thought to myself, I went to the chiropractor every week. Why didn’t I have a vaginal birth? It’s not in the things. That’s my main point which is so simple. You might hear that and be like, Duh. But it’s in how you approach them. Going to the chiropractor regularly is great for your health but if you are doing it from a place of stress and control like, If I miss an appointment or if I don’t hit 3 miles today, then actually, that’s not helping you anymore and you should probably not do that and not go on that walk if you are feeling stressed out about having to go on the walk. Don’t do it.

Approach it from a place of peace and joy and acceptance going back to your radial acceptance. All of the things that can help you in your pregnancy are wonderful, but take them one at a time and make sure that when you’re going on your walk, when you have your supplements, you’re taking them from a place of peace and acceptance and then it can be helpful for you. One of the– I’ll just share one small example of how I did this with my third pregnancy that I didn’t really have this frame of mind with my previous two. There was a certain supplement. I can’t remember what it was called. It was a combination of herbs that helped ripen your cervix. A lot of people recommend it for VBACs at the end.

Meagan: Like Birth Prep?

Jolie: It wasn’t Birth Prep. It was 5 weeks or something. It had something to do with 5 or 7. There was a number in it and it’s like a holistic supplement that has supportive herbs in it for ripening your cervix so I remember coming across this information while I was pregnant and just thinking, Okay. I looked it up. It was all sold out on line and I was like, I feel like in my mind I’m thinking I have to do this to get the VBAC. This is going to help me. If I don’t get it, then what’s going to happen? I ended up talking to my midwife about it and she actually had some. She was like, “Oh yeah, I do love this supplement. I have some and they are all sold out right now.” I was like, “I’ll take it. I’m going to let you know if I’m going to start taking it. Please ask me if I’m taking it out of a stressful, controlling way or if I’m taking it from a place of peace because depending on the way I answer, I need accountability to not actually do it,” because I wanted to be able to receive it in a way of support in general.

That’s what she told me. “It’s not going to hurt you. They are wonderful herbs that will just strengthen and tone your uterus so you can take it,” but I knew I needed to be in a frame of mind where it wasn’t like, this is going to be the thing. This is just a small example of how I embodied that reality of if this is going to stress me out, even if it’s a good thing, I’m not going to do it.

Meagan: Yeah, okay. I love that so much within our own community and other communities where it’s like, You guys, I have 5 days to get this baby out or they’re going to make me have a C-section, so then we have this stressful overreaction to do anything we can to get that baby out and actually what it’s doing is creating more stress in our body which is not going to help our cervix. I love that message. I do not know what you’re talking about exactly like what they used. Herbs are great, but I love that. Do things with intent and purpose. Don’t do things out of fear or out of worry or out of pressure. Do things because you think they are right and because you think this is what you need to be doing, not because you’re stressed about something. I’m just going to leave that right there because I love that message so much. Thank you so much again for sharing your stories and congrats on your HBAC after two C-sections.

Jolie: Thank you, yeah.

Closing

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