Today on The Natural Birth Podcast we have Jan.

Jan is a 43 yr old nurse and mama of four beautiful souls.

She has dedicated her life to nurturing the health and well-being of others.

Alongside taking care of her patients and homeschooling her children, she has embarked on a deeply personal journey of rediscovering the power and magic of holistic health and was given the chance to use that knowledge during her most recent pregnancy and birth.

In today’s episode we will be diving into medicalized birth in the beginning as Jan had 3 C/S before her home birth. And then about her total change and awakening to holistic health.

Her fourth pregnancy, that resulted in a home birth was not expected. And once the news settled in she embarked on a path of exploration and empowerment, choosing not to have a fourth C/S but ultimately experiencing the profound transformation of her first home birth.

This pivotal moment ignited a passion within her to share the spiritual dimensions of birthing at home, transcending the boundaries of conventional medicine to embrace the holistic beauty of the birthing process.

Curious about Jan? Find her on Instagram as @mindfulrn911

SACRED BIRTH INTERNATIONAL

Today on The Natural Birth Podcast we have Alexandra.

Alexandra is a mama of one from California.

She runs a farm with her partner and has been a performing dance artist for the last 10 years.

Alexandra comes from an area where the home birth movement was big back in the 70’s and 80’s. One of her brother’s was home birthed when she was three and a half years old and she was also present for the home birth to hospital transfer of another brother's birth at the age of thirteen. Coming out of this challenging birth a bit traumatized, she internalized fear around birth.

However years later, after a miscarriage she found her calling to birth work and took a weekend doula course. This class, with an experienced, wise doula, opened her eyes to the flaws of the medical system and the standard cascade of interventions which completely changed her views on birth.

When she became pregnant again she knew she wanted to birth naturally. She wanted to be as prepared as possible for her own initiation and rite of passage into motherhood so she dedicated her free time to reading countless books and listening to birth stories, and she became very informed.

Due to there being no home birth midwives in her area currently she chose a birth center 2hrs away.

And her birth ended up being a fiery one where she spiraled her baby down in the car on the way to the birth center and almost gave birth to her daughter on the parking lot outside the center.

Curious about Alexandra? Find her on Instagram as @alexandrakateri

Find All of Anna’s Links & Resources here:

SACRED BIRTH INTERNATIONAL

Today on The Natural Birth Podcast we have Lindsey Meehleis.

Lindsey is a fellow spiritual midwife, medicine woman and storyteller who I absolutely adore and I am so excited to have her on the podcast.

It feels like talking to myself.

I am certain you’ll all love the beautiful storytelling and wisdom that pours through Lindsey.

In today’s episode we dive on into Lindsey’s own two birth stories.

Her first induction turned c/s at a very young age and how that catapulted her into becoming a doula and then a midwife.

To her second which was a very conscious conception and home birth totally transforming Lindsey from who she was to who she then became.

It’s an episode that dives into the topics of midwifery and herstory and claiming your sovereignty in birth and life, to talking about the birth portal and how there are four things that need to dilate. The cervix, the vulva, the heart and the mind.

It’s a beautiful chat that I hope you’ll all enjoy.

Curious about Lindsey? Find her on Instagram as @lindseymeehleis

Find All of Anna’s Links & Resources here:

SACRED BIRTH INTERNATIONAL

Today on The Natural Birth Podcast we have Holly.

Holly is a mama of two from the UK. 

She is a clinical psychologist and working with children is her passion. 

Today we will dive on into her two birth stories.

She thought she was well informed with her first birth which was a fast hospital birth, but in retrospect she wishes she knew more.

For her second pregnancy, she dove deep into the research literature on labour and birth and constantly listened to this podcast and concluded that a home birth was the right fit for her with it being safer for both mama and baby.

Despite feeling under pressure from the maternity system who were encouraging an induction due to a 'suspected big baby' and 'undiagnosed gestational diabetes', she stuck to her home birth plan which resulted in a euphoric, calm home water birth.

Once her baby was born, she said it felt so amazing that she wanted to do it all again! 

She wishes all pregnant mamas would get to experience a birth like hers. 

She now advocates for pregnant women to do their own research and not assume they will get the information they need from their antenatal classes and loves telling her birth story to highlight to women that birth isn’t something to fear and can be positive and empowering... and can leave you wanting to do it all over again!

Curious about Holly? Find her on Instagram as @hollymariethom

Curious about Needed? Find out more at thisisneeded.com 

Use the code THENATURALBIRTHPODCAST for 20% off your first month.

Find All of Anna’s Links & Resources here:

SACRED BIRTH INTERNATIONAL

Today on The Natural Birth Podcast we have Nix.

Nix is a mama of 2, originally from Cape Town, but have lived in the UK since the age of 5.

Nix is trained in finance and has spent the last 6 years working for a large music and arts festival as well as a tech company. 

But now she is following a different calling and career path after training as a yoga teacher and joining The Sacred Birth Worker Mentorship in January this year, hoping to fulfill her dream of working with women in the future.

In this episode she shares about how the maternity system derailed her first home birth with fear mongering and an induction that ended up only being a foley catheter and breaking of waters before Nix’s body took over and birthed her baby.

And then how the second time around she decided to educate herself and withstand the desire from the maternity system to medicalize her birth and only deal with her home birth midwives.

She joined The Sacred Birth Worker Mentorship in her third trimester and also took The Natural Birth Course as soon as she found out she was pregnant and was informed up to her teeth as well as doing the inner work needed, and ended up having her redemptive home birth (in an Airbnb mind you, but more on that in the episode ;) ).

I absolutely adore the picture of Nix on the floor with her baby absolutely beaming with ecstasy after her fast and furious birth under 2hrs. Make sure you check it out on our Instagram @thenaturalbirthpodcast as it will be published this week to come. It will fill you with so much joy!

Curious about Nix? Find her on Instagram as @nixsacredbirth

Find All of Anna’s Links & Resources here:

SACRED BIRTH INTERNATIONAL

Today on The Natural Birth Podcast we have Helen.

Helen is a stay at home mother of two, airbnb superhost, and a property developer who lives on the Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia. 

Today we will hear about how Helen became pregnant with her first baby at 39 years old using IVF and then experienced secondary infertility until she became pregnant with her second.

A long, painful but essentially empowering conception story for both.

She was 43 and a half for her second and it was actually a natural conception after doing a huge amount of preconception work and self education as the medical system wasn’t finding answers.

Something you’ll learn more about in the beginning of this episode.

She also opted for a private OBGYN and private hospital birthing experience and did lots and lots of birth preparation and ended up having the natural birth she wanted.

Mind you her OBGYN didn’t make it to the birth and the midwife wasn’t in the room as her baby’s head crowned.

The key to her success was education, birth prep and staying out of the hospital as long as possible.

Curious about Helen? Find her on Instagram as @helenblazey

Curious about Needed? Find out more at thisisneeded.com

Use the code THENATURALBIRTHPODCAST for 20% off your first month.

Find All of Anna’s Links & Resources here:

SACRED BIRTH INTERNATIONAL

Today on The Natural Birth Podcast we have Kayla.

Kayla is a mama of one from South Africa. 

She is a doula and a Sacred Birth Worker Mentee who is passionate about supporting mothers and families during the precious journey of childbirth. 

Today we will hear about her journey of knowing at a very young age she needed to become a mother and how the desire to become a mother and a birth worker was intimately woven together.

She did a short doula course at 6 months pregnant and straight after decided it wasn’t enough and applied for The Sacred Birth Worker Mentorship.

She ended up birthing the first week of the mentorship, at 37 weeks, as a first time mama.

And she had a short first time birth in water, in her home, surrounded by family, a doula and her midwife.

Home birth and natural birthing is rare in the world nowadays and even rarer in South Africa so I’m so pleased to have a mentee there and for her to share her story with you. Hopefully inspiring other young African women to trust in birth’s design.

She has great visions of starting a podcast for natural birthing in South Africa and I’m sure with her passion she’ll do great things for the natural birthing and home birthing community in her country and beyond.

Curious about Kayla? Find her on Instagram as @sacredart_ofbirthing

Find All of Anna’s Links & Resources here:

SACRED BIRTH INTERNATIONAL

Today on The Natural Birth Podcast we have Rachel.

Rachel is a mama of two from the US.

Her passion for birth and babies started when she went to nursing school and wanted to work on a maternity floor. When she finally landed a job as a mother & baby nurse, she quickly was not impressed by how birthing mamas and newborns were cared for.

She stayed working in the system for four years, but was constantly unlearning what she saw, and trusting birth in a whole other way through podcasts and Instagram. 

It really goes to show the power of storytelling, women to women. So thank you for listening to these stories and spreading them far and wide.

I can’t tell you how amazing it is to get your messages and emails, especially from birth workers who share this poddy with their clients or tell me how it's changing their practice and trust in women, babies and birth. Gives me goosebumps. Truly.

Anyways, back to Rachel.

When Rachel became pregnant with her first, she planned her dream home birth with a slightly wild pregnancy and left the maternity system at the very beginning of her first pregnancy.

She’s now worked as a pediatric home care nurse and home birth assistant with a traditional midwife in the past few years, but mostly has been home raising her two babies.

She just started her journey on encapsulating placentas. 

And today we will hear about her home births.

Curious about Rachel? Find her on Instagram as @_love_dahlia

Did you know you can now watch all the podcast episodes on our YouTube channel? Every Sunday the new video version of this podcast is aired on The Spiritual Midwitch YouTube channel.

Please pop on over all tell us what you think? Do you prefer to listen to watch ? Or maybe both? I’d love to know.

Send me a dm on our Instagram @thenaturalbirthpodcast or comment on one of your favorite YouTube episodes!

Curious about Needed? Find out more at thisisneeded.com

Use the code THENATURALBIRTHPODCAST for 20% off your first month.

Find All of Anna’s Links & Resources here:

SACRED BIRTH INTERNATIONAL

Today on The Natural Birth Podcast we have Fanny.

Fanny is a mama of four, something she says she never thought she’d ever be, from Sweden.

She is currently a stay at home mama and used to work in HR.

Today we will hear about all of her 4 four births but the focus will be on her most recent amazing home birth with her twins.

Fanny says her home water birth was a fantastic experience where she just let her body do the work. She breathed and talked to her babies and just let go into the power of the birth portal. Her older kids were there and so was her mum and her husband of course.

It was just a really natural, safe and ordinary birth according to Fanny.

And it is!

However these stories are few of twins born at home nowadays, so I am very grateful she wanted to share it with us.

Curious about Fanny? Find her on Instagram as @fannyplato

Find All of Anna’s Links & Resources here:

SACRED BIRTH INTERNATIONAL

Today on The Natural Birth Podcast we have Dailah.

Dailah is a Mother of 4 from the US living in Africa. She is a Quantum life coach and a Painless Birth™ Worker. 

She assists Women to give birth without pain using a series of brain wave techniques and tools. 

In this episode she will share about her first 3 hospital births with epidurals and the shift that led her to birthing her fourth child at home with no pain and how she became a painless birth worker after her own experience.

Curious about Dailah? Find her on Instagram as @the.painless.birth.worker

Curious about Needed? Find out more at thisisneeded.com 

Use the code THENATURALBIRTHPODCAST for 20% off your first month.

Find All of Anna’s Links & Resources here:

SACRED BIRTH INTERNATIONAL