Healing Birth with Carla

This episode is a deeply vulnerable share which delves into all the taboo topics surrounding birth and new motherhood. Poppy, a home birthing mother of two, one of which was a free birth, speaks frankly about herpes, about miscarriage, about radical responsibility, about being confronted with the potential for death in birth, about vaginal wall prolapse, about healing ourselves, and about postpartum sex. We leave no stone unturned with this wildly honest conversation that gets right to the heart of things most are too confronted by to ever really face.

Covered in this episode:

Follow Poppy's motherhood journey & podcast here: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/outthegateparenting_podcast/⁠

Find out more about my (Carla's) holistic birth & postpartum preparation course here: ⁠https://www.healingbirth.co.nz/soulful-birth

Pippa is Mum to 5 year old Greta, whose planned home birth ended in cesarean, and 8 month old Flora, whose empowering home birth involved an unexpectedly healing postpartum transfer to hospital due to a third degree tear. 

In this episode, Pippa shares various dimensions of the healing that becoming a mum has encouraged her to delve into. She talks about how peeling away the layers of the mother wound has supported her to find her voice and be her authentic self, and she shares the journey she has been on to offer her own daughter the opportunity to heal her birth wounds. Threaded throughout this conversation is the notion of generational healing that can take place when we do the work to access our inner healer.

I am particularly grateful to Pippa for sharing about the ways she has supported her daughter to heal. In my work, I hear a lot of grief and guilt from new mums about what their baby must have experienced during, and in the wake of, their traumatic birth, and a sense of helplessness around how to heal the damage done. Pippa and I discuss some great tools to guide this process, so hopefully some of you listeners who can relate to this, feel encouraged with helpful suggestions.

Also discussed in this episode:

* Artificial rupture of membranes

* Epidural

* Breastfeeding challenges

* Laid back nursing 

* Mother Blessing

* Physical support during pushing phase

* Setting loving boundaries with children

* Laughter & play as tools to help our children heal

* The Aware Parenting podcast

If you are interested in following my (Carla's) work on Instagram, here's the link: https://www.instagram.com/healing.birth/

You can find out more about the Healing Birth Practitioner Training programme here: https://www.healingbirth.co.nz/hb-practitioner-training

And here's the link for my free Understanding Birth Trauma Basics course: https://www.healingbirth.co.nz/understanding-birth-trauma-basics-course

As humans we are also mammals, and like all other mammals, evolution has ensured that we are well equipped to birth in safe and rewarding ways with a very rare need for outside interference. In fact, disturbing our innate birth design in the countless ways us humans do, often creates a lot more difficulties and harm than safety. 

Today’s podcast guest, Lindsay Askins, knows a lot about mammalian birth. She shares with us how her decade long experience as a vet tech, witnessing untold births of horses and other mammals, led her to understand that birthing at home without a midwife in attendance was going to be the safest way to birth her first baby, a profoundly life-changing and positive experience for her.

We dive into some great conversations about mammalian biology, about the mind-body connection, about how disturbing a woman’s birth and creating fear in the birth space can lead to all sorts of complications, including damage to the mother-baby bond, and about the needless trauma that is created due to over medicalisation and obstetric violence.

Hear about the Exposing the Silence project that Lindsay co-founded with Cristin Pascucci, from Birth Monopoly, and about the Birth Like a Mammal business that Lindsay now runs. She’s a juicy and informative podcast episode, folks!

Check out Lindsay's website here: https://www.birthlikeamammal.com/

Follow her on IG: https://www.instagram.com/birthlikeamammal/

Here's a link to the Exposing the Silence project: https://www.exposingthesilence.com/

Email Lindsay at [email protected]

If you're interested in my (Carla's) work, here are some links for you...

My free birth trauma training course: https://www.healingbirth.co.nz/understanding-birth-trauma-basics-course

My Healing Birth Practitioner Training programme: https://www.healingbirth.co.nz/hb-practitioner-training

My Soulful Birth online antenatal series: https://www.healingbirth.co.nz/soulful-birth

And you can follow me on IG: https://www.instagram.com/healing.birth/

Today’s guest, Carla, is an Australian traditional birth keeper and healer. She shares with us the deeply moving story of birthing her first baby just days after the passing of her own mother. This planned home birth ended in hospital transfer and provided the lessons for Carla to have a redemptive home birth with her second child. She now works with others supporting them on their own journey traversing the motherhood initiation.

Carla describes herself beautifully on her website bio which reads:

Birthing my two children has changed me, and I have grown to deeply revere this phase in a woman’s life. My experience of birth is that it is a life-changing event, ecstatic, sacred and challenging, a liminal space between worlds. It also has the potential to be a healing experience. To discover a strength and power you’ve never known. To expand into a deeper sense of self and connection. To love deeply. Yet without appropriate support, the golden wisdom available in this transition is often lost. 

Included in this episode:

You can check out Carla's work on her website: https://www.traditionalhealingbirthwork.com/

And follow her on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/carla.sage.birthwork/

And if you're interested in exploring my (the other Carla's) free Understanding Birth Trauma Basics course, head here: https://www.healingbirth.co.nz/understanding-birth-trauma-basics-course

Or my Healing Birth Practitioner Training Programme, click here: https://www.healingbirth.co.nz/hb-practitioner-training

You can also follow my work on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/healing.birth/

After the birth of her first baby, Bekki experienced intense fear and anxiety surrounding whether her baby was getting enough milk from her, or not. She hadn’t addressed the fears she held onto with regards to the breast reduction surgery she had had years earlier and what this might mean in terms of her ability to produce sufficient milk.

Through good support, expert advice, generous offers of donor milk, many tears and sheer determination, Bekki’s breastfeeding journey became a very successful one. In fact she is still breastfeeding her daughter even after having birthed her son a few months ago. What is more, Bekki has developed a website and various services that aim to support other mothers on their parenting and breastfeeding journeys. What a legend! Soak up the juicy lessons and heart that Bekki’s story have to offer.

Check out The Perinatal Directory NZ that Bekki started...

Website: https://theperinataldirectory.nz/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MamaShineNZ

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theperinataldirectory/

If you're interested in my (Carla's) Soulful Birth course, take a look here: https://www.healingbirth.co.nz/soulful-birth

Or my FREE Understanding Birth Trauma Basics course, click here: https://www.healingbirth.co.nz/understanding-birth-trauma-basics-course

Or details about the Healing Birth Practitioner Training programme, click here: https://www.healingbirth.co.nz/hb-practitioner-training

Or if you'd like some 1:1 support from me to guide you on your own healing journey, click here for options to work with me: https://www.healingbirth.co.nz/healing

You can also follow my work on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/healing.birth/

In celebration of ONE YEAR of the Healing Birth with Carla podcast, including 45 episodes and 4.6k of downloads in 30 countries, I invited Sophia Paskell to join me on this episode.

Sophia was one of my first podcast guests and her episode #3, titled Sophia Paskell - on Grief, Loss, Birth & Death, has been the most listened to episode of them all.

This special celebratory episode has Sophia sharing the intimate story of the birth of her niece, a particularly touching birth for her to have attended. She was given the honour of receiving her sister's baby as she was powerfully birthed into the world. 

Sit back and soak up the oxytocin xox 

Included in this episode... 

If you would like to follow Sophia's work or get in touch with her, here are some links:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mothers_circle/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/motherscirclenz

Website: https://www.motherscircle.co.nz/

And if you would like to follow my (Carla's) work or connect with me, here are my links:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/healing.birth/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/healingbirthwithcarla

Website: https://www.healingbirth.co.nz/

Like me, Emma is an ex midwife who now works primarily in supporting new mothers to find healing after a traumatic birth or who have struggled with the transition into motherhood. She shares with us about her midwifery experience and why she quit not long after starting; about her own two birth experiences and the crucial impact that her positive first birth had on navigating major breastfeeding challenges; and about the path she has travelled in her birth work.

I love that Emma shares about her experience of doing my Healing Birth Practitioner Training programme and the impacts she sees this work having on the clients she serves. She also talks about her studies in Matrescence and Timeline Reset work. 

If you’re potentially interested in developing your own understanding of birth trauma and how to guide people on their healing journey, you’re going to want to tune in for the entirety of this episode. And of course it’s a great listen for anyone who is navigating their own pathway to healing after a traumatic birth.

Also discussed in this episode:

Books mentioned:

The Postnatal Depletion Cure by Dr Oscar Serrelach

Mama Rising by Amy Taylor-Kabbaz (her course to support mothers through matrescence is also called Mama Rising)

Check out Emma's work...

Her website: https://www.empowermatrescence.com/

Instagram page: https://www.instagram.com/empowermatrescence/

If you're interested in looking into my (Carla's) Healing Birth Practitioner Training, head here: https://www.healingbirth.co.nz/hb-practitioner-training

I also offer a FREE Understanding Birth Trauma Basics course: https://www.healingbirth.co.nz/understanding-birth-trauma-basics-course

And you can join me on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/healing.birth/

In this episode I interview free birth mentor and podcast co-host, Victoria whose instagram page is titled @freetobirth. Victoria shares with us the stories of her own two births, 4 and 2 years ago. Her first birth was planned to be a home birth but ended up being a hospital transfer for meconium stained waters. During her second pregnancy, Victoria went on a bit of a journey of self discovery that ultimately saw her declining midwifery care partway through and opting to have a free birth.

In this interview Victoria also shares her thoughts on who free birth is for; how we learn to tune into our intuition; the questions we need to be exploring to get the birth we’re seeking; the partner’s involvement in free birth planning; being mindful of people pleaser tendencies, and so much more. Enjoy!

Or check out her website: https://freetobirth.co.uk/

If you want to connect with me (Carla) DM via Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/healing.birth/

Or via my website: https://www.healingbirth.co.nz/

In this episode I interview Mieke, a Canadian mother of two, whose Instagram page, @takeyourbirthbystorm, captured my attention and sparked a desire to dive a little deeper with her. After training as a birth doula Mieke went on to birth her first baby at home with a midwife in attendance. Her second birth ended up being a free birth. She shares with us why this was the path she chose and how this ultimately led to her becoming a free and autonomous birth advocate.

Mieke shares her love for birth story podcasts and how they were her greatest source of information and inspiration; she offers ways to prepare for a free birth, including how to get in tune with your body and intuition; she speaks on the topics of radical self responsibility and shadow work; and we discuss questions to ask when interviewing potential maternity care providers.

Check out Mieke’s instagram profile page to find links to some great free resources:

https://www.instagram.com/takeyourbirthbystorm/

Interested in my (Carla's) Soulful Birth course? Head to this page of my website: https://www.healingbirth.co.nz/soulful-birth

Keen to explore training with my to become a Healing Birth practitioner? Take a look here: https://www.healingbirth.co.nz/hb-practitioner-training

Or follow my Healing Birth work on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/healing.birth/

In today’s episode I talk with Bonnie… and her newest little sidekick, Tilly, also apparently has quite a bit to add to the conversation! Tilly was born in their house bus, a beautifully healing experience for Bonnie after Eddie’s birth having gone nothing like she’d planned and hoped for. 

I love the openness with which Bonnie shares her stories and the various challenges she worked through. Eddie’s birth involved artificial breaking of the waters, coached pushing, an episiotomy and a time of disconnect with her newborn.

In contrast, Tilly’s birth was fully led by Bonnie while her support team watched on in awe. She talks about her lotus birth experience and why honouring the placenta felt important to her.

Sit back with a cuppa and enjoy this frank and inspiring chat.