Trish: Okay you guys, today I am gonna share my very first birth story, my pregnancy, and my birth with Ian, which some of you guys know I was 17 when I had Ian, so this story's gonna be a good one, but I'm also gonna talk about why I do what I do now and how Ian's birth planted the seeds for me to advocate for birth everywhere.

Okay, so this is totally unscripted.

I'm just gonna share Ian's birth experience with you guys.

It's really funny.

I've had, I think that we launched the podcast in 2022, and I've never shared like completely my birth stories, so I have seven of them.

One of them is an adoption and I'm gonna share them all with you, but we're gonna start with Ian.

So we're going way back and.

A lot of you guys know my story, especially if you've been a student or you've heard the foundation of labor nurse Mama, but Ian's pregnancy and his birth laid the foundation.

What would become my labor nurse experience as a labor and delivery nurse for over 16 years, but also why I fought so hard.

To advocate for women and why I still do that to this day.

So let's go all the way back here I am this good old girl, right?

I was very naive, you guys.

I went to a Christian school, very fundamentalist Christian school, and I was super young and.

You know when you go to a Christian school, all they tell you is sex is bad.

They don't tell you like, what can lead up to that or what have you.

So I meet this really gorgeous surfer and you know what?

I ended up pregnant at 17.

I was a very good girl, by the way.

Didn't know anything.

I was so naive.

So I end up pregnant and I come from a very birth friendly, breastfeeding is the only way type of family, so I don't feel like I was really scared of birth.

I like that just wasn't a part of my narrative because birth had just always been a natural process to my family, you know?

And we talked about it and at the same time there was a lot of things my mom didn't talk to us about.

And so here I am pregnant at 17.

Well, my big sister who like.

Was like my mama.

She is nine years older than me and she's pregnant with her last, I'm pregnant with my first go figure.

If I hadn't gotten pregnant so young, we would've never had pregnancies together.

But you guys, it was so funny because I truly thought she was ancient.

I was 17, right?

I thought she was ancient.

If someone would've told me back then that I would go on to have a baby at 42, I would've been like, that is disgusting.

What are you talking about?

No way.

But I did, which is Grayson, which will be my last birth story that I tell you guys about as we go on this journey over the next few months.

So I am pregnant and I'll never forget, like I'm really telling you guys the details here, so it's so awful.

I told my dad, my dad went hunting and I put a letter in his suitcase.

How evil is.

I was so scared to tell my dad though, y'all.

I was so scared.

And I told my mom, like when my dad would go hunting, I would sleep with my mom a lot and we would have like movie nights or whatever and I'll never forget, I told my mom like, this tears me up.

Hmm.

I told my mom and she got outta bed and went in her bathroom for hours.

I ended up going to my bed and going to sleep, and then we talked the next day.

But she was just so sad.

And, and now I understand because even though Ian was such an amazing blessing, like me as a woman, it changed, you know, my ability to become who I could be, right?

And go to college and do all those things, which I did eventually do.

Okay, so I'm digressing.

I don't know.

Y'all are getting the raw version here.

Not scripted at all.

So I'm pregnant and we get married.

Don't recommend 17-year-old getting married, but we got married.

And the pregnancy, you know, I was so sick, y'all.

I was so, so sick.

I had to go to my O Obstetrician's office, which by the way, I had never been to a gynecologist, and we're gonna talk about that in a minute.

But I had to go and get a shot of RIN in my ARS every day.

At that time, or maybe it was once a week, I don't remember, but it was, it felt like always, and I was scared to death of needles, which fast forward, that's why I went on medicated with Ian.

So super sick.

Super sick, and.

My pregnancy.

Let's kind of fast forward to the end.

My sister and I are pregnant together.

She's pregnant with baby number three.

I was pregnant with baby number one.

She had three girls.

I was pregnant with my first of what would be five boys and two girls, and I'm pregnant and she's pregnant and we're sick of it, right?

So this is a Friday and we decide to go walking and we walk around the lake, and then we walk to this little Greek cafe downtown Newport, Richie, and.

I was obsessed with baklava.

So we go there and these three elderly Greek ladies, they're all sitting there.

They've got aprons on and they are like, oh honey, you are so you guys are ready to pop?

We're like, yes, we are.

And so they tell us about cast royal.

And I had never heard of cast oil.

My mama never shared that.

Now, afterwards, she told me she did do that, but she never told me about that.

I didn't know anything about it.

I thought this was like, what?

You can make yourself go into labor.

What?

So how they tell us to do it is they tell us to do shots of cast oil, like a two ounce bottle and then a shot of Coca-Cola.

Drink it shot, drink it, shot right?

So we go and we buy the cast oil at Walmart and we go to my apartment and we do this.

Now, we had to do it quick because my sister had to pick up Kara and Kaylee.

And if you, if you guys have been following me on social, you know that Kaylee in November had a seizure and then a cardiac arrest.

And I'm praying by the time y'all hear this, she's doing amazingly.

At this point, it's been three weeks.

Still mostly unresponsive, but doing.

And she has three boys.

Y'all can pray for her.

Her name is Kaylee.

Okay, so.

She had to go pick up the girls from school.

And so we do the shot, we do the coke.

It's horrible.

It's like drinking baby oil.

It was horrific.

So we get through that feeling pretty sick, right?

So within an hour I'm having diarrhea and throwing up.

My sister's only having diarrhea and throwing up, and I'm having what I now know is early labor.

So the thing about casual, it only works if your body's ready.

If your body's ready, it's just gonna make you feel like crap.

Right.

So you don't ever wanna do it until you're at least 40 weeks.

That's my, and don't do it straight.

You do it with the midwives ru We have, we'll put the link to the blog post in with the recipe in there because the, if you do the midwives oil, the the almond butter binds to the cast oil and it doesn't make you stinking sick.

It still can make you sick though, but drink it, it straight out of a bottle, like shots of baby oil is not the way to go.

I will tell you that.

So I decided I was gonna make homemade cream puffs.

Homemade stuffed mushrooms and I did, and I'm in there in the kitchen on a stool.

So sick.

My daughter Laney is pregnant right now.

She's having my sweet little granddaughter in January and she's just like me.

This girl's always baking.

So I make this, I never did eat one because come about eight o'clock at night.

I am like, we gotta.

I do not feel well.

I wanna go to my mom's.

So my mom lived near the hospital that I was delivering and we were about 45 minutes.

So I'm like, let's go to my mom's.

So we get in the car listening to Shana O'Connor.

Nothing compares to you.

And I've got my feet on the dash of the car.

It was our green machine automobile that we had back then and we're driving towards my mom's and I was like, forget my mom's take me to the hospital.

I gotta get there now.

Now I don't know what I was dilated to when I got there because they didn't tell us nothing back then, but.

Knowing what was going on with me and as a really good labor nurse, which I am, I would say I was five to six centimeters.

'cause I was definitely an active labor.

So we get there and Laura Berry, she was an angel on earth, you guys, she's the reason I became a labor nurse.

She had, triaged me when I went in about 36 weeks of super sick.

My doctor, who was quite the thing y'all.

He was so scary and he was, did never listen to me.

His offices were in a house, which is very normal for Florida 'cause there's no land.

And I had to change in an o, a closet of a room and I was 17.

I had never been to a gynecologist.

It was so scary looking back now, like I was so traumatized by all of that.

Anyway.

Go in at 36 weeks.

I'm really, really sick and dehydrated.

And he wanted to induce me and she was like hell to the no.

They may do that where you're from, but not here.

She hydrated me.

She got me better and I went home.

Thank you, Laura.

And then she was there when I came in with Ian.

She was my labor nurse.

She was amazing.

She's the best part of that experience besides getting Ian.

But the rest of my birth, you guys, like I get there, I'm walking the halls.

I'm so sick.

I did not get an epidural 'cause I was so scared of needles.

And back then I think you had to pay out of pocket, which we did not have the money.

Thank God.

'cause I love unmedicated birth, like I love it so much.

But that birth felt like everything just happened to me.

I don't, I wasn't asked about anything and I had, it was like a really fast first birth.

I got there at 9:00 PM had him at like 1:30 AM but I had every intervention known to man.

I had an epitomy.

I.

I was put into lithotomy.

I had oxygen, I had all the things y'all, and nobody ever asked me, like, I never got asked about a, a cervical exam.

I never got asked about episiotomy.

They just did it.

And I, I'll never forget the noise of it.

And I know that was out of convenience for him because I was having really fast birth, like I only pushed for like an hour.

And he shouldn't have done that.

Like, he should not have done that.

Like I should have had the choice of having that and I didn't.

And all of that.

Laid the foundation for what would become a labor and delivery nurse and labor nurse mama.

So Laura Bakery was so amazing, you guys, and after I gave birth, because you know, I came from this very fundamentalist Christian background.

I was on track to go to college.

I had gotten a scholarship for art and.

All of that was gone.

And I felt like, you know, back then it was like, and still today, I think young girls are made to feel if they get pregnant and they choose to have the baby that they're giving up the rest of their life.

And Laura leaned down to me in that early recovery and she whispered, your life is not over.

You can do whatever you want and you can do big things.

And here I am, Laura.

Thank you.

Thank you.

She went on to, which I'm gonna tell you guys the rest.

To my stories throughout the next few months, but she went on to come in on her day off to see Hunter, and she was my nurse when I had Elias, and it was a precipitous delivery and she delivered him.

So Laura Barry, kudos to you.

You laid a foundation for what would let me be a compassionate and loving labor nurse, but you also encouraged me not to give up on my dreams, and I appreciate that.

So I had Ian, I had a episiotomy, and back then we went to recovery and our postpartum room was shared.

So.

I had a baby.

My, my roommate had a baby.

It was a hell of a night.

They did have a nursery back then, and they took them, but it wasn't what I wanted, like, and I didn't have a choice on that either.

But I remember just being like shellshocked because I wasn't prepared.

There was no education back there.

I took the little MA hospital class, which is what my doctor told me to do, and they basically told me to do everything my doctor said I had to do.

So I felt like that birth happened to me.

I did not feel like.

I was part of it.

I, I didn't feel like I had any choices.

And even though all in all, yes, I had a healthy mom and healthy baby, it wasn't a healthy birth.

And I think that's the part that people forget, like, yes, healthy mom matters.

Healthy baby matters, but healthy birth matters as well.

And that's why I do what I do.

I've got myself a little choked up right now because I thought all of that happened to me.

'cause I was 17.

I didn't realize that was happening to all women.

That was the thing that was the norm.

It's still.

A huge part of our culture and at Labor Nurse Mama, our mantra, our mission statement, is changing the birth culture, one birth at a time.

Each birth matters.

And having a healthy birth matters.

And it's not just about a healthy mom and healthy baby.

Those things are important, but this is like three legs to a table.

And your birth will affect you for the rest of your life.

And this is why I do what I do, and this is why I'm so passionate.

This is why I do my hangouts with my students, where they have access to me.

'cause I wanna be that Laura Barry for them.

I want them to be like, wow, thank God that Trish told me these things.

Thank God Trish told me I could fire my labor nurse.

Thank God Trish told me that I could tell my doctor, get out.

Thank God Trish told me I had rights.

Because having rights and having a voice in your birth.

It's so darn important, and I know you guys, not all of you realize that.

I know that like part of my job is helping women to realize they need to care about having a voice during the birth, that it does matter.

Like you don't just show up and wing.

It is not the way to do it because you'll end up feeling the way I felt and I don't want that for you.

Okay?

So.

That was Ian's birth.

I hope you guys enjoyed that short little shorty today.

Okay, you guys, I hope that you enjoyed that.

That was really, really interesting to go back so far and think about all those things and how that was such a part of the foundation of me as a labor and delivery nurse and labor nurse mama altogether.

Like I can't even imagine if I could go back and tell that young version of me what I would do because of what happened to me during my birth.

So God can use all things for good.

That's the truth.

Alright, you guys, as always hit subscribe, leave a review.

Tell me if you enjoyed hearing this, if you wanna hear the rest of my birth stories 'cause I'm excited to share them, but I wanna know that you guys are excited to hear them.

All right, you guys have an amazing week.

I will see you guys again next week.

Bye for now.