Doing It At Home - The Home Birth Pod...

Doing It At Home - The Home Birth Podcast is a weekly podcast about home birth and our decision to go from a traditional hospital birth with an OBGYN to a natural birth at home with midwives. This is a raw and honest show that explores homebirth from every angle. We talk about the fears and judgements thrown at you when you choose home birth. We share resources that we found tremendously helpful for understanding our birthing options. We confess the magic and craziness in preparing for pregnancy, home birth, motherhood and fatherhood. We talk about having sex while pregnant and maintaining your connection and intimacy as a couple. We reveal how to stay centered and not lose yourself through pregnancy, and tons more! This show is all about adding an empowered conversation to the topic of home birth and natural birth, while keeping it real, grounded and fun. So strap in and join us as we’re doing it at home!

Kids & Family
Parenting
Self-Improvement
26
459: Home Birth for Baby #3 with the Help of an...
Would you consider using an enema during the labor process? In today’s birth story, we’re chatting with Alyssa Reeves, wife to Kirk and mama to twin boys Sam and Niko and daughter Zooey. And while there’s a lot more and totally magical elements to Alyssa’s story, she’s the first mama on the show to share her experience of using an enema during her transition phase of labor. We’re so grateful for her open and informative sharing on how helpful it was for her in preparation for pushing. So now other mamas listening to the show can learn from Alyssa’s experience and have another possibility for themselves if they have similar challenges during birth.
47 min
27
458: A Home Birth Transfer to the Hospital is N...
Has anyone ever felt like a failure because their birth didn’t go exactly the way they planned? We think this happens far too often. That’s why we’re happy we have conversations like the one we have today on the podcast. Allison Rich joins us to share her birth story.
53 min
28
457: How Orgasmic Birth Is Connecting Women To ...
We are so honored to have Debra Pascali-Bonaro join us on the show. She is the creator and director of the documentary, “Orgasmic Birth: The Best-Kept Secret.” She’s also the co-writer of “Orgasmic Birth: Your Guide to a Safe, Satisfying and Pleasurable Birth.” In our interview, we talk about her path to being obsessed with birth, learning from her own birth story. We also chat about the concept for the documentary and where it came from. We explore themes from the documentary and the impact it’s had on the conversation of birth.
48 min
29
456: Overcoming Diagnoses of “Incompetent” Cerv...
How do you plan for a positive hospital birth experience, when you were originally intending to have a home birth? This is such a great topic to cover. For many who start out with a home birth plan, sometimes that changes for various reasons. Sarah Schade shares her story with us. From a diagnosis of an “incompetent” cervix (definitely not a term we’re fond of around here) to another diagnosis of IUGR (intrauterine growth restriction), Sarah and her husband Jeremiah went through a lot of ups and downs.
76 min
30
455: Unsupportive Midwife with Traumatic Experi...
Is one way to birth “better” than another? Sometimes there are misconceptions and unhealthy conversations floating about in the birth community around natural vs. medicated birth or hospital vs. home. That one is better than the other or there’s a sense of superiority or higher moral code to choose one over the other. And competition comes in as a factor, like there is something to prove or defy. This topic is relevant for the conversation we have today with Lillie Cooke, sharing her birth story with us.
48 min
31
454: Rainbow Home Birth Baby After 2 Miscarriag...
What would you do if you really trusted yourself? This is a beautiful question that comes up in today’s episode, and I think everyone can take something from it and carry it into their lives. Mellisa Reeves of Motherbirth is sharing part of her journey with us. From some of the traumatic elements of her first hospital birth with her first son Aiden, a stillbirth in hospital at 41 weeks pregnant with her second son Rowan and two subsequent miscarriages, she brings us to the healing process and experience of her home birth with her daughter, Etney.
44 min
32
453: Leaning Into Birth and Postpartum Challeng...
In this episode, we continue our conversation with Joy Kiesch, our DIAH mama who had her first baby Dakota at home. We dive into some of the things that pop up in the early postpartum stage. Things like dealing with family and visitors, informing people about the birth and how you deal with the outside energy and comments. What happens when the whole “I just had a baby!” thing starts to sink in. You’re 72 hours in and just lose it. Crying. Don’t know what to do. Joy is real, raw and totally awesome to share what she experienced.
19 min
33
452: Leaning Into Birth and Postpartum Challeng...
In today’s episode we speak with Joy Kiesch, wife to Yamil and mama to Dakota. The way Joy describes the home birth of her son Dakota goes something like this, “born peacefully at home, surrounded by love.” This episode is part 1 of 2.
40 min
34
451: Healing Through Trauma After a 48-Hour Lab...
What do you do when it’s difficult to come to terms with how your birth unfolded? In today’s episode, Katie Suder shares her journey with us. From her unexpected and joyful pregnancy to currently 9 months postpartum and still processing a lot of her birth experience.
56 min
35
450: Empowering Hospital Births with a Home Bir...
What do you do when you want a home birth, but life circumstances make it a bit challenging to create? Cami Harper is sharing her story with us and how she embraced her situation to make it beautiful, even though it wasn’t exactly what she wanted.
30 min
36
449: Giving Birth in Another Country Without Fe...
What’s it like giving birth outside of your native country? It’d be understandable to have fears and/or reservations around birthing in a different country. But what if it could be normal, uncomplicated, supported and without fear? Our guest today is Amy Brown. Amy traveled from Chicago, Illinois to Peru in 2011 to work as a teacher, and hasn’t left since. After meeting her now husband Marco, she has since set up life in Lima. And she has given birth to her two children: daughter, Leah and son, Christopher in a birthing center in the city.
51 min
37
448: Witchcraft, surprise babies, and moving du...
In today’s episode we’ve got the whole family on the line - Meggie and Steve Andrews join us, along with their baby William, or Liam as they refer to him.
47 min
38
447: “I did it!” - Building Confidence in Our B...
Do you feel confident in your ability to birth? Today’s birth story features Naomi Jardine, sharing her journey to home birth. Naomi felt a loss of control with her first birth of her daughter Jasmine, followed by some traumatic stitches to repair her tearing. She was left feeling disappointed, not at peace. For her second birth, she wanted to do something different.
40 min
39
446: Choosing Home Birth from an Academic Persp...
Are you the type to research and look for evidence and information to support your decisions when it comes to your birth? In today’s episode, we’re chatting with Isis Rose, a PhD student, doula and mama to baby Xena. Isis shares her journey to home birth, which first entered her awareness during a doula training. She’s a PhD student studying birth and reproductive justice. Her husband Chris, a fellow academic, is a visiting professor at UIUC. So it makes sense that Isis took a very analytical approach to planning her birth. She searched for truth and wanted to make sure she was as informed as possible when it came to her options.
62 min
40
445: How the Letdown of a Hospital Transfer Can...
How do we cope with the parts of our birth that didn’t go the way we envisioned? In today’s episode we chat with Cadyn about her birth experience. She and her husband planned a home birth, because (in her words) of “how special we consider our home and surrounding space to be, and that this was where it seemed that magical portal of birth was meant to open.”
88 min
41
444: When You Find Out You’re Pregnant and Don’...
What did you do the moment you found out you were pregnant? What was going through your mind? How were you feeling? We talk about that in today’s episode with our guest Brittney. Brittney actually reached out to us within the first few hours of discovering she was pregnant, and it opened up a beautiful dialogue. We felt inspired to bring that conversation into this space and share it with the DIAH community.
46 min
42
443: Home Birth for Second Baby After a Hospita...
What happens when the news and experience of your pregnancy isn’t all sunshine and rainbows? For returning guest and DIAH mama Thea Robnett, she’s open and honest about the mix of emotions she dealt with when she got pregnant right after her first daughter, Harley, turned 1. She and her husband Alex had debated on whether or not to have another one, and actually decided to pause any plans for future children. So she worked through the mental challenges and coped with the changes. This process gave her time to get deep into her emotions and create a powerful birth experience for her second daughter, Laurel.
59 min
43
442: 6 Children, 4 Home Births, Circumcision an...
Why home birth? This is a question we ask most guests on the podcast. Today we dive into that with Amelia Page, mama of 6. We chat about her first two births and the influence that moved her towards home birth for her remaining 4 children.
55 min
44
441: Lessons in Surrender, Gratitude and Streng...
We welcome back Katie McCormick to the show today! She joined us back in episode 73 where we talked about her and her husband Ryan planning a home birth in their cottage in West Cork, Ireland after leaving life in Portland, Oregon.
45 min
45
440: An Expat Planning a Home Birth in Ireland ...
What is it like planning a home birth as an expat in a new country? Well, Katie McCormick has some stories to share about that! Katie and her husband Ryan decided to leave their life in Portland, Oregon - quit their jobs and travel across Europe. They decided to settle in Ireland, eloped and got pregnant shortly after.
31 min
46
439: When You Livestream Your Home Birth on You...
In this episode we chat with Lindsey Drury: photographer, activist and mama extraordinaire who livestreamed her third home birth on YouTube!
44 min
47
438: How to Create Something Different After an...
Today’s episode takes its root in episode 36: So What Happens After Your Home Birth? - where we chatted about an article from Romper.com by the lovely Angela Johnson, who now joins us for this episode number 65!
36 min
48
437: Mother's Day Special Edition: We Interview...
In today's super special episode of the Doing It At Home podcast, we are interviewing our own moms about our birth stories! In this show we interview tons of moms and families on their home birth stories, and so we thought we'd switch things up a bit for Mother's Day and hear about how each of us came into the world from the women who ushered us earth side.
76 min
49
436: High-Risk Pregnancy, Traditional Midwives ...
How do you learn to trust your body after some difficult experiences and a high-risk label? In today’s episode, we’re talking with Erin Zekis about her journey to home birth.
62 min
50
435: Informed Choice, Empowered Pregnancy and B...
In today’s episode we speak with Dr. Elliot Berlin, an award-winning prenatal chiropractor, childbirth educator, labor support bodyworker, and co-founder of Berlin Wellness Group in Los Angeles, California.
41 min