HOLY WILD BIRTH : Training Christian Birthkeepers, Traditional Midwives in Faith-Based Birth Work

In this episode, Jess shares her experience choosing unassisted birth for the second time, alongside her birthkeeper, Olivia.

• A special birth story told from two perspectives.
• You'll hear Intuition guiding Jess to want another set of hands
• How they each came to a peaceful “yes” about doing this birth together
• Surrender moment to possibly needing a hospital birth
• Minimalist prenatal care and the role of journaling in that
• Skipping ultrasound & connecting to baby
• 3rd Trimester fatigue and the discovery of low iron
• and how Olivia helped Jess through that in a birthkeeper way (collaboration)
• Joy of postpartum support from a birthkeeper perspective
• Take-away as mom & as birth attendant
• How the Way of the Hearthmother guided Olivia

You can find Olivia & her services here:

https://www.visitationbirthkeeper.com/

IG: https://www.instagram.com/nourishedfemininity/

BIRTH STORY DISCLAIMER:

The choices, beliefs, and opinions of the mamas sharing their stories are as individual as the storyteller herself and do not necessarily reflect the beliefs or recommended choices of Lauren and/or Brooke.

Connect:

Email us to say hi: [email protected]

Have you ever been curious to hear the story of how a birthworker becomes a birthworker?

In this episode, Brooke shares her own story of becoming, how she moved through different phases over the 14 years, and has played different roles (birth photographer, apprentice midwife, doula-ish, birthkeeper, aspiring traditional midwife).

This is a story of unfurling, of obedience and adaptation. It's a story of one woman's continual YES to the Lord to serve birthing families while also birthing and mothering her own babies.

In the end, we hope it's a story that encourages you on your unique, one-of-a-kind journey in response to your undeniable pull toward birth work.

Mentioned in this episode:

- Confidently Called: 21 Days to Clarity for Women Drawn to Birth Work (starts 7/27/2026)!

- Hearthmother Journey: Raising The Next Generation of Holy, Wild Birthkeepers (next cohort opens for enrollment on 8/17/2026)!!

- Brooke's first birth story

- Brooke's freebirth (baby #5)

Connect:

• Email us to say hi: [email protected]

• Put in a request for future topics and/or submit a question for future Q&A episodes: Fill out the form

• Apply to tell your birth story on the podcast: http://sisterbirth.com/podcast-guest

  • Hang out with us and other Holy Wild Women in our private community (off Facebook): https://hearthmotherministries.app.clientclub.net/communities/groups/community/home?invite=6a3acb7b9e1f37cda3920fb6

• Become a holy, wild birthkeeper with us inside Hearthmother Journey

From Lauren:

• Instagram

• Midwifery consults: Email  [email protected]

From Brooke:

• Instagram

• Trust God, Trust Birth Workshop - a 5-part high-level roadmap to a confident home birth (pay what you can)

• Faith-Filled Home Birth Workshop - a free, 3-part video series delivered to your inbox

• Embrace Birth Journey - comprehensive and holistic faith-based home birth preparation (courses + private community)

• Sister Birth: The Podcast - short, beautifully scripted episode to encourage your along the way

Intro and Outra Music Credit -
Betty Dear By Blue Dot Sessions is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

In this episode, Brooke & Lauren chat about their Fourth of July experiences, taking thoughts captive, homesteading chats, fostering a pregnant cat (Brooke), and suturing knees (Lauren).

They also share about their newest offering, Confidently Called: 21 Days to Clarity for Women Drawn to Birth Work.

If you are interested in serving birth in any way, we would love to have you for these 21 days of clarity and community.

Resources we mentioned:

• Radiance of the Ordinary (Radiance of the Ordinary: Essays on Life, Death, and the Sinews that Bind )

• Confidently Called (starts 7/27 and goes through 8/16) enrollment open now hearthmotherministries.com/called

• Embrace Birth Journey Live cohort - sisterbirth.com/journey

  
  

  Connect:

  • Email us to say hi: [email protected]

  • Put in a request for future topics and/or submit a question for future Q&A episodes: Fill out the form

  • Apply to tell your birth story on the podcast: Holy Wild Birth Podcast : Guest Application

  • Hang out with us and other Holy Wild Women in our private community (off Facebook): Rooted in Eden PMA

  • Become a holy, wild birthkeeper with us inside Hearthmother Journey

  From Lauren:

  • Instagram

  • Midwifery consults: Email  [email protected]

  From Brooke:

  • Instagram

  • Trust God, Trust Birth Workshop - a 5-part high-level roadmap to a confident home birth (pay what you can)

  • Faith-Filled Home Birth Workshop - a free, 3-part video series delivered to your inbox

  • Embrace Birth Journey - comprehensive and holistic faith-based home birth preparation (courses + private community)

  • Sister Birth: The Podcast - short, beautifully scripted episode to encourage your along the way

  Intro and Outra Music Credit -
  Betty Dear By Blue Dot Sessions is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

Nicola's two birth stories include several abnormal and/or frightening elements. Her first was an ultimately uneventful breech birth (but a surprise breech!). Her second, however, included placental abruption, emergency cesarean, neonatal resuscitation, a helicopter lift, and a NICU stay. Through it all, Nicola points out the ways she saw God's hand at work, protecting them, providing for them, and ultimately showering them with blessings. She wouldn't do it any other way; she's still a fierce advocate for home birth and midwifery care.

Please note that we had a lot of challenges recording these stories, and editing the recording to make it salvageable posed significant hurdles. If it seems choppy or "off" at points, this is the reason. However, the stories are rich, and I hope you'll hang with us through the hiccups to mine the gold nuggets.

You can find Nicola on IG

Get on the First-To-Know list for our fall cohort of Hearthmother Journey and get an exclusive invitation to our open house.

BIRTH STORY DISCLAIMER:

The choices, beliefs, and opinions of the mamas sharing their stories are as individual as the storyteller herself and do not necessarily reflect the beliefs or recommended choices of Lauren and/or Brooke.

Connect:

• Email us to say hi: [email protected]

• Put in a request for future topics and/or submit a question for future Q&A episodes: Fill out the form

• Apply to tell your birth story on the podcast: http://sisterbirth.com/podcast-guest

  • Hang out with us and other Holy Wild Women in our private community (off Facebook): https://hearthmotherministries.app.clientclub.net/communities/groups/community/home

• Become a holy, wild birthkeeper with us inside Hearthmother Journey

From Lauren:

• Midwifery consults: Email  [email protected]

From Brooke:

• Trust God, Trust Birth Workshop - a 5-part high-level roadmap to a confident home birth (pay what you can)

• Faith-Filled Home Birth Workshop - a free, 3-part video series delivered to your inbox

• Embrace Birth Journey - comprehensive and holistic faith-based home birth preparation (courses + private community)

Intro and Outra Music Credit -
Betty Dear By Blue Dot Sessions is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

In this episode, Brooke and Lauren tackle the dilemma of needing (or feeling the tug!) to switch to a new midwife.

They discuss...

• What to do if you feel the inkling that you need to change midwives

• How to discern what your next right step is when you are out of alignment with your midwife

• Questions to ask yourself about your relationship with your current (& prospective) midwife

• Making a decision with the Holy Spirit vs just your own desire/idols/trauma

• What might be behind your desire to do away with your midwife (hint: your own interior growth!)

Mentioned in this episode:

• The Aligned Birth Team episode of HWB

  
  

  Connect:

  • Email us to say hi: [email protected]

  • Put in a request for future topics and/or submit a question for future Q&A episodes: Fill out the form

  • Apply to tell your birth story on the podcast: Holy Wild Birth Podcast : Guest Application

  • Hang out with us and other Holy Wild Women in our private community (off Facebook): Rooted in Eden PMA

  • Become a holy, wild birthkeeper with us inside Hearthmother Journey

  From Lauren:

  • Instagram

  • Midwifery consults: Email  [email protected]

  From Brooke:

  • Instagram

  • Trust God, Trust Birth Workshop - a 5-part high-level roadmap to a confident home birth (pay what you can)

  • Faith-Filled Home Birth Workshop - a free, 3-part video series delivered to your inbox

  • Embrace Birth Journey - comprehensive and holistic faith-based home birth preparation (courses + private community)

  • Sister Birth: The Podcast - short, beautifully scripted episode to encourage your along the way

  Intro and Outra Music Credit -
  Betty Dear By Blue Dot Sessions is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

Oh, Due dates! How much hinges on them! What psychological impact they can have! How grossly inaccurate they are!!

In this episode we're talking all things estimated due date. Like:

- how often the word "estimated" gets removed from the entire concept

- various ways of calculating when a baby might be born (you might have 5 different EDDs)

- the argument for adjusting our language and expectations around the timing of birth, both for ourselves and for others in our lives

- the spiritual lessons and wisdom related to waiting for unpredictable events like giving birth (or Christ's return)

- and more

If you've ever been curious, confused, or downright crazy about an EDD, this is for you.

Mentioned in this episode:

• Guess Dates Workbook (a 6-page freebie loaded with links, scriptures, a reflective questions)

Connect:

• Email us to say hi: [email protected]

• Put in a request for future topics and/or submit a question for future Q&A episodes: Fill out the form

• Apply to tell your birth story on the podcast: http://sisterbirth.com/podcast-guest

  • Hang out with us and other Holy Wild Women in our private community (off Facebook): https://hearthmotherministries.app.clientclub.net/communities/groups/community/home?invite=6a3acb7b9e1f37cda3920fb6

• Become a holy, wild birthkeeper with us inside Hearthmother Journey

From Lauren:

• Instagram

• Midwifery consults: Email  [email protected]

From Brooke:

• Instagram

• Trust God, Trust Birth Workshop - a 5-part high-level roadmap to a confident home birth (pay what you can)

• Faith-Filled Home Birth Workshop - a free, 3-part video series delivered to your inbox

• Embrace Birth Journey - comprehensive and holistic faith-based home birth preparation (courses + private community)

• Sister Birth: The Podcast - short, beautifully scripted episode to encourage your along the way

Intro and Outra Music Credit -
Betty Dear By Blue Dot Sessions is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

In this month’s chat over a cup of tea (or lemon water?!), one of us has a surprising update for our listeners. The other one is doing a lot of “middling.” We’ll let you guess which is from which.

You’ll also hear us reflect on the fruit of a mission trip to Brazil, unexpectedly stepping in to use one’s hands in a birth, facilitating women’s groups in our churches, and the ministry of songs!

Thanks for joining us here, friends. And don’t forget to “write back.”

Mentioned in this Episode:

• Middling (a substack)
• First-To-Know list for fall cohort of HJ
• Questions for Women's Circle Sharing

Connect:

• Email us to say hi: [email protected]

• Put in a request for future topics and/or submit a question for future Q&A episodes: Fill out the form

• Apply to tell your birth story on the podcast: http://sisterbirth.com/podcast-guest

• Hang out with us and other Holy Wild Women in our private community (off Facebook)

• Become a holy, wild birthkeeper or traditional midwife with us inside Hearthmother Journey

From Lauren:

• Midwifery consults: Email  [email protected]

From Brooke:

• Trust God, Trust Birth Workshop - a 5-part high-level roadmap to a confident home birth (pay what you can)

• Faith-Filled Home Birth Workshop - a free, 3-part video series delivered to your inbox

• Embrace Birth Journey - comprehensive and holistic faith-based home birth preparation (courses + private community)

Intro and Outra Music Credit -
Betty Dear By Blue Dot Sessions is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

- Sensitive Content Disclaimer -

This episode includes discussion of pregnancy loss, miscarriage, and second trimester loss. Listener discretion is advised, especially for those who may be walking through grief or processing similar experiences.

-----

In this deeply moving conversation, we sit down with a mother whose journey through loss, faith, pregnancy, and birth challenged nearly every mainstream expectation around maternity care and healing. She shares candidly about trusting both God and her body through uncertainty, grief, and ultimately an instinct-led birth experience that reshaped the way she views motherhood and surrender.

We talk about what it looked like to remain grounded in faith while enduring a miscarriage that did not resolve for weeks — and how she chose to interpret her body’s process. She shares the profound dream in which she encountered her daughter, the peace and meaning that experience brought, and how it transformed the way she understood loss and life itself.

Our conversation also explores the tension between intuition and medicalized narratives, including her decision to reject a diagnosis she felt did not align with what her body was communicating under the circumstances.

We discuss the standards she held for anyone involved in her birth space — especially her guiding litmus test for birth attendants: expect things to go well. She shares how unexpected circumstances ultimately left her without a midwife, and how a virtual mentor became a stabilizing and supportive presence during pregnancy and birth prep..

This episode also dives into the role that Embrace Birth Journey (EBJ) played in helping her prepare mentally and spiritually for a more primal, instinctive birth experience. Brooke’s birth video playlist inside EBJ became a powerful tool in reinforcing her confidence that birth unfolds as it is meant to, rather than something that must constantly be managed or controlled.

We also discuss how the discovery of meconium-stained waters led to a last-minute separation from her doula, the mysterious and meaningful presence of what she describes as “angel midwives,” and the mindset that carried her through labor: be where your feet are.

Additional topics include:

• Forgoing ultrasounds
• Viewing birth as a profound opportunity to operationalize faith

• The importance of honoring and celebrating every life, no matter how brief

Connect with Leah here:

• Reclaim Vitality Book: Reclaim Vitality: A Guide to Exit Conventional Medicine and Live Naturally
• IG: @standforhealthfreedom @lwilson4181
• Website: www.standforhealthfreedom.com, www.reclaimvitality.com
• X: @standforhealth1 @leah_wilson
• podcast: One Dream Podcast One Dream Podcast with Dr. Nick and Leah Wilson

Connect:

• Email us to say hi: [email protected]

• Put in a request for future topics and/or submit a question for future Q&A episodes: Fill out the form

• Apply to tell your birth story on the podcast: Holy Wild Birth Podcast : Guest Application

• Hang out with us and other Holy Wild Women in our private community (off Facebook): Rooted in Eden PMA

• Become a holy, wild birthkeeper with us inside Hearthmother Journey

From Lauren:

• Instagram

• Midwifery consults: Email  [email protected]

From Brooke:

• Instagram

• Trust God, Trust Birth Workshop - a 5-part high-level roadmap to a confident home birth (pay what you can)

• Embrace Birth Journey - comprehensive and holistic faith-based home birth preparation (courses + private community)

Intro and Outra Music Credit -
Betty Dear By Blue Dot Sessions is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

 

BIRTH STORY DISCLAIMER:

The choices, beliefs, and opinions of the mamas sharing their stories are as individual as the storyteller herself and do not necessarily reflect the beliefs or recommended choices of Lauren and/or Brooke.

You may have many people in your life who are very excited to meet and love on your baby, or who want to support you after your birth. This is a great problem to have, right?

But maybe you feel overwhelmed, crowded, or smothered by it. Maybe some of the people who are eager to get into your postpartum space bring up feelings of discomfort or resistance: having them there just doesn't feel good in your body, even though they're very nice and/or related to you. Do they have a right to be there anyway?

Are you obligated to tell your parents the moment the baby comes out? Is it necessary to allow your in-laws to visit and "meet the baby" within 24 hours? Should you allow others to hold the baby that first week?

In this episode we explore the concerns and tensions that many mothers (and fathers) experience about how to include loved ones in the earliest days of their baby's lives, what it looks like to honor the critical time period of the first week of a baby's life when the mother and baby are a dyad, and how to lovingly and clearly set boundaries or establish expectations with both healthy and unhealthy people.

Mentioned in this Episode:

• • Nils Bergman's work on the importance of continuous skin-to-skin contact
  • Hearthmother Journey

  
  

Connect:

• Email us to say hi: ⁠[email protected]⁠

• Put in a request for future topics and/or submit a question for future Q&A episodes: ⁠Fill out the form⁠

• Apply to tell your birth story on the podcast: ⁠Holy Wild Birth Podcast : Guest Application⁠

• Hang out with us and other Holy Wild Women in our private community (off Facebook): ⁠Rooted in Eden PMA⁠

• Become a holy, wild birthkeeper with us inside ⁠Hearthmother Journey⁠

From Lauren:

• ⁠Instagram⁠

• Midwifery consults: Email  ⁠[email protected]⁠

From Brooke:

• ⁠Instagram⁠

• ⁠Trust God, Trust Birth Workshop⁠ - a 5-part high-level roadmap to a confident home birth (pay what you can)

• ⁠Faith-Filled Home Birth Workshop ⁠- a 3-part video series delivered to your inbox

• ⁠Embrace Birth Journey ⁠- comprehensive and holistic faith-based home birth preparation (courses + private community)

• ⁠Sister Birth: The Podcast⁠ - short, beautifully scripted episode to encourage your along the way

Intro and Outra Music Credit -Betty Dear By ⁠Blue Dot Sessions⁠ is licensed under a ⁠Creative Commons License⁠.

What do you do when the people you love don’t support your decision to have a homebirth? In this episode, we’re talking through one of the most common and emotionally loaded questions we hear from families: “How do I handle the disapproval?”

Whether it’s a parent, friend, pastor, sibling, or someone from your community, navigating outside opinions during pregnancy can bring up fear, people-pleasing, insecurity, grief, and even old wounds we didn’t realize were still there. We talk honestly about what these conversations can reveal inside of us, how to discern when to engage versus when to hold privacy, and what healthy boundaries can actually look like in real life.

We also unpack how every relationship requires a different approach. A concerned mother may need a different response than a judgmental acquaintance. Some conversations may call for gentleness and reassurance, while others may require firm boundaries and less access altogether.

And perhaps most importantly, we remind listeners of something that can feel incredibly freeing: you are not obligated to disclose your birth plans to anyone.

We hope it leaves you feeling grounded, empowered, and reminded that discernment, wisdom, and privacy are not secrecy or selfishness.

Mentioned in this Episode:

• We talk about HUSBANDS being resistant to home birth in this episode: Home Birth Hesitant Husbands by Holy Wild Birth

• Home Birth Safety resource roll: Home Birth Safety

Connect:

• Email us to say hi: [email protected]

• Put in a request for future topics and/or submit a question for future Q&A episodes: Fill out the form

• Apply to tell your birth story on the podcast: Holy Wild Birth Podcast : Guest Application

• Hang out with us and other Holy Wild Women in our private community (off Facebook): Rooted in Eden PMA

• Become a holy, wild birthkeeper with us inside Hearthmother Journey

From Lauren:

• Instagram

• Midwifery consults: Email  [email protected]

From Brooke:

• Instagram

• Trust God, Trust Birth Workshop - a 5-part high-level roadmap to a confident home birth (pay what you can)

• Faith-Filled Home Birth Workshop - a free, 3-part video series delivered to your inbox

• Embrace Birth Journey - comprehensive and holistic faith-based home birth preparation (courses + private community)

• Sister Birth: The Podcast - short, beautifully scripted episode to encourage your along the way

Intro and Outra Music Credit -
Betty Dear By Blue Dot Sessions is licensed under a Creative Commons License.