Shows
Love Your Mom Life181. Letting Go of Perfectionism in Motherhood with Paulette KameneckaGet your copy of Nikki's book today on Audible, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and through Bookshop.Org, where every purchase supports your local bookstore.Want a sneak peek of Nikki's book? Download a FREE chapter!Before you gave birth, you probably had a lot of expectations about pregnancy, the birthing process, and motherhood. But for some of us, those expectations were wildly different from what actually happened. Tune in to hear Nikki's raw and honest conversation with Paulette Kamenecka, a writer, economist, podcaster, and m...2024-08-2134 min
One Bad MotherEpisode 546: I Didn't Expect That! with Paulette KameneckaHow many times can you hear "We haven't seen a case like yours in years!" before you scream? Paulette Kamenecka, host of the podcast War Stories from the Womb: What You Didn't Expect When You Were Expecting, sits down with Biz to talk trainwreck pregnancies, the infertility gauntlet, and dog overlords.Listen to War Stories from the Womb: What You Didn't Expect When You Were Expecting wherever fine pods are cast. For more information on Paulette Kamenecka, her book, and her work, visit her website, www.PauletteKamenecka.com.Go to MaximumFun.org/join to support On...2024-06-0756 min
Hindsight is 20/20: A Motherhood Feels PodcastDr. Paulette KameneckaOn this episode, I welcome seasoned mom of two, Paulette Kamenecka. Paulette graduated from Yale University in 1992, carries a MA in Public Policy and a PhD in Economics. Listen in as she shares how in her last year of graduate school, she and her husband navigated a pregnancy that introduced them to autoimmune diseases, high risk pregnancy, cardiologists, and neonatologists. Paulette has found a passion in reading, writing and researching on the intersection of immunology and pregnancy and women’s health in general. Check out the shownotes for links for her website and her podcast. Listen in to all of...2024-05-1539 min
Parenting in the First 3 YearsEmbracing Challenges and Celebrating Resilience with Paulette KameneckaCan you imagine being told at 25 weeks pregnancy that your baby has a rare heart condition and will likely not survive? And then choosing to discontinue the medication given that's might help your baby (but they really didn't know)?!
That's what happened with our guest speaker, Paulette Kamenecka.
In this episode, you'll hear her amazing story of facing the terrible news that no pregnant woman wants to hear... and how she embraced the challenge, followed her heart and believed in her strong baby girl, who kicked the odds right outa the park.
Paulette...2024-04-0222 min
What You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when you Postpartum in a pandemic? Julia's Birth story, Part IIScientists often study extreme cases to learn about the mechanics of a phenomenon. Many women found themselves running this kind of experiment in their own homes. How would the postpartum period--a time marked by isolation--feel when the whole world was isolating?In today's episode, author of the Upstairs House Julia Fine, reflects on her experience having her second child in the heart of the pandemic, and how the difference between a pre pandemic postpartum and a pandemic postpartum taught her something important about the period. She shares some advice she wishes she'd received before she had kids a...2023-04-1431 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when Your Postpartum Inspires a Novel? Julia's Birth story, Part I"Need is an albatross. To be needed is to wear the weight of stones across your chest . To be wanted. That is different. To be wanted by a child is the cleanest of desires. To still be wanted once the child is fed and rested; once the diapers are fresh and the snot has been siphoned from the nostril and the gas has passed through. To be recognized not just as a body, but a person, a comfort to be loved." That's a brief snippet from the novel The Upstairs House by Julia Fine, my guest...2023-04-0735 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when you Trade Motherhood Myths for Yogi thinking? Anja's Birth story, Part IIIn today's episode Anja and I talk about one of the biggest, most oppressive misconceptions about motherhood and what you can do to free yourself from it. We also discuss:* how not being in control can actually be a good thing; * how being present makes you better able to respond to needs, including your own, and * how the energy you bring into the room and the world has a big impact on both you and your kids. For extended show notes with links, see War Stories from the WombThis is a we...2023-03-3126 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat can an Unexpected C-Section Teach You about Life? Anja's Birth Story, Part I In today's episode you will hear, useful advice about what you can do if the birth you planned is not the birth you experience, a very persuasive case for why trusting your intuition is so important and insights on how much control you have in this transformation from person to parent. Nausea & Lethargy in PregnancyMayo Clinic on NVPCleveland Clinic on NVPPregnancy Sickness Support on NVPStanford Children's Hospital on NVPHealthline on NVPWhat happens in...2023-03-2432 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Could Happen when you Develop skills of Self Advocacy? Megan's Birth story, Part IIEntering the Postpartum period is like being pushed from a cliff...it's a shocking change of circumstance, and its hard to be ready for it that first time--but with more accurate expectations??In today's episode, you'll hear the second half of my conversation with Megan. She shares: how she was able to identify what turned out to be PostPartum Depression in herself given that her symptoms didn't match her sense of the condition*a useful perspective on managing the difficult transition from one to two children and *insights about what she wished she'd known ab...2023-03-1730 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat you Might Feel when Confronted with an Emergency C-Section: Megan's Birth Story, Part I"I've heard somewhere that the first baby, it's like a bomb going off in the mother's world. It just totally rearranges you. It rearranges your life. "This is a show that shares true experiences of getting pregnant, being pregnant and giving birth to help shift the common cultural narrative, away from the glossy depictions of this enormous transition you can find on all kinds of media to a more realistic one. It also celebrates the incredible resilience and strength it takes to create another person and release that new person from your body into...2023-03-1032 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when a Nicked Bladder leads to a path of Natural Healing? Kayshaun's Birth Story, Part IIToday my guest experiences pain in her everyday life for years after pregnancy. And then finally, after an exploratory surgery gets a diagnosis she's been waiting for.In today's episode you'll hear how Kayshaun, a nurse turned businesswoman who is a mother of four, uses the pain and trauma from her four complicated pregnancies to help other people find their voice and consider natural remedies to things like fibroids and endometriosis. What follows is the second part of our conversation, as well as some insights about preeclampsia from Dr. Jellen, the Program Director of maternal fetal...2023-03-0328 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when C section Recovery leads to Holistic Healing? Kayshaun's Birth Story, Part IHi, Welcome to War Stories from the Womb: In this episode, you'll hear how my guest rejected her doctor's insistence on a hysterectomy, and saved her own life.Today you'll hear how my guest learns to trust her body and advocate for herself--a critical skill in any medical procedure, maybe even more critical in childbirth; she had four births and each was visited by something unexpected that required her to develop these skills. She also shares how alternative medicine, in particular, acupuncture, helped to relieve chronic pregnancy-related pain when no western medical approach worked. We are also jo...2023-02-2435 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when a Last Minute Breech Position leads to an Emergency C section? Kekua's Birth Story, Part IIIn this episode, you'll hear how Kekua managed when her experience really shoved her expectations for her second birth off a cliff.Tune in to hear how Kekua manages many surprises in the birth of her second child. The number of things that go a bit sideways almost makes her story sound like a sitcom script, but the way she sticks the landing, in the end is what's truly impressive. We'll pick up our conversation where Kekua is talking about the slow return of her body, a body she recognizes after the birth of...2023-02-1734 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat you might feel if you are surprised by an Unintended Pregnancy: Kekua's Birth Story, Part IThis is a show that shares true experiences of getting pregnant, being pregnant and giving birth to help shift the common cultural narrative away from the rainbows and roses depictions you can find on social media, and other media more broadly, to a more realistic one (which might include rainbows and wreckage?). It also celebrates the incredible resilience and strength it takes to create another person and deliver them into the world. I’m your host, Paulette Kamenecka. I’m a writer and an economist and the mother of two girls who had far too many surprises on my own p...2023-02-1032 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat has a Doula (and Mother of 5) Learned from her experience? Aliza’s Birth Story, Part IIThis is a show that shares true experiences of getting pregnant being pregnant and giving birth to help shift the common cultural narrative away from the glossy depictions of this enormous transition you can find on social media, and other media more broadly, to a more realistic one. It also celebrates the incredible resilience and strength it takes to create another person and deliver them into the world. I’m your host, Paulette Kamenecka. I’m a writer and an economist and the mother of two girls.In this episode Aliza, a doula and marriage coach, s...2023-02-0336 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat are some Doula Tips for Managing Miscarriage & Labor Pain? Aliza's Birth Story, Part IThis is a show that shares true experiences of pregnancy to help shift the common cultural narrative away from the glossy depictions of this enormous transition you can find on social media, and other media more broadly, to a more realistic one. It also celebrates the incredible resilience and strength it takes to create another person and deliver them into the world. I’m your host, Paulette Kamenecka. I’m a writer and an economist and the mother of two girls. In this episode you’ll hear advice about managing miscarriage from a woman who has experienced numerous miscarriages, intermi...2023-01-2730 min
What You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat are some Tips for keeping your sanity on your fertility/IVF/pregnancy journey? Amy's Birth Story, Part IIThis is a show that shares true experiences of pregnancy to help shift the common cultural narrative away from the glossy depictions of this enormous transition to a more realistic one. It also celebrates the incredible resilience and strength it takes to create another person and deliver them into the world. I’m your host, Paulette Kamenecka. I’m a writer and an economist and the mother of two girls. In this episode you’ll hear more advice about things to think about on your fertility/ivf/pregnancy journey–knowledge that just might make the often challenging process of fertil...2023-01-2030 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when IVF includes repeated miscarriages...and pregnancy? Amy's Pregnancy Story, Part I This is a show that shares the true experiences of pregnancy to help shift the common cultural narrative, away from the glossy depictions of this enormous transition to something more realistic. It also celebrates the incredible resilience and strength it takes to create another person and deliver them into the world. I'm your host, Paulette Kamenecka, writer and an economist and a mother of two girls. In this episode, you'll hear suggestions about what to do with recurrent pregnancy loss and gain insights about the highs and lows of the often challenging process of fertility from a writer wh...2023-01-1328 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsREBROADCAST: What Happens when a Home Birth moves to the hospital? Jules' Birth StoryMany women enter pregnancy, coming from a life that feels firmly under their control. That was the case for today’s guest, whose past experience in the world led her to make detailed plans for her home birth. But the stars did not align, and what started out as a home birth ended with a hospital birth attended by a life threatening case of eclampsia. Luckily, both she and her son survived. For her second birth, she planned to be in the hospital, and again the fates refused to abide--a precipitous labor forced a home birth. Although she and...2023-01-0651 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsREBROADCAST: What Happens when Natural Birth Prevails when IVF Fails? Danielle's Pregnancy Story + Expert Insights from an AudiologistTeenage girls are repeatedly told that pregnancy could fall on them at any moment. Caution is the watchword. But often when those young women grow up, pregnancy is nowhere to be found. That was the experience of today’s guest. When she and her partner set out to start a family, month after month, the pregnancy tests were negative. After some fertility testing the doctors believed that they had nailed down the issue, and almost as soon as it was discovered, my guest got pregnant, and her son was born 9 months later. When her newborn was 6 months old th...2022-12-3042 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when you are Ambivalent about Stepping into Pregnancy? Courtney's Birth Story, Part IIIn today's episode we hear the second half of my conversation with Courtney Maum. She shares the motivation for her second pregnancy and the challenging end of that pregnancy. We'll pick up where we left off last week: with wise words from the French gynecologist that Courtney saw for the very first pregnancy appointment for her first pregnancy.for more extended show notes, see: http://warstoriesfromthewomb.com/This is a weekly show that highlights real pregnancy, birth & postpartum stories.2022-12-2333 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when you are Surprised by a Lovely Pregnancy? Courtney's Birth Story, Part IToday's guest shares her experience of pregnancy, birth and motherhood, none of which conformed to her expectation. She walked into pregnancy ambivalently....and to her surprise loved many of the aspects of the experience that people often find difficult; because of a lifelong struggle with insomnia, the nine month hormone bath of pregnancy gave her luxurious periods of long sought-after sleep; she approached the pain of delivery as a unique experience between herself and her future daughter, and those early sleepless months with a newborn, which so many find challenging, turned out to be a period she'd been trained...2022-12-1634 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when Preeclampsia includes a NICU stay? Joy's Birth story + physician insights, Part IIToday we hear the second half of my conversation with Joy about how her experience with preeclampsia played out and her efforts to understand what happened to her, why her hospital care was so chaotic, and how she and her husband returned to a more stable place. I also include more from my conversation with Dr. Oparil and Dr. Sinkey. Both doctors have done important work in the hypertension and preeclampsia space. We pick up Joy's story just after the birth of her daughter, and just before she is told she likely has preeclampsia.For more extended...2022-12-0941 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens When a Chaotic Hospital Birth turns into Preeclampsia? Joy's Birth story + physician insights, Part IToday's guest walked into pregnancy carefully. She is a health journalist who had researched and reported on pregnancy issues and this work influenced her ideas about the kind of birth she wanted to have. Things began swimmingly, and it wasn't until the third trimester when the first signs of what would become preeclampsia began to emerge, but nothing is diagnosed at this point. The birth was the beginning of a chaotic couple of days in the hospital. It's not until after the birth that preeclampsia is caught and the turmoil of her experience really impressed upon her the challenges...2022-12-0234 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when the Second Birth Involves Less Medical Intervention? Nicole's Birth Story, Part IIThis week we hear the rest of my conversation with Nicole. At the end of last week she'd described her first birth, which ended in a C section and left Nicole feeling that the birth had been exacted without her full participation, and she was vowing to have a different experience in future births, despite the predictions of one of her doctors, who suggested that she might be too physically small to avoid another C section. We pick up Nicole's story as she affirms her goal of a birth in which she feels more intimately connected to the experience.2022-11-2532 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens When the Birth involves much more Medical Intervention than you Expected? Nicole's Birth Story, Part IToday's guest walked into pregnancy with an expectation that the process would be as smooth for her as it had been for her mother, as it was for the farm animals she'd been surrounded by for her whole life, as it was from 50,000 feet: civilization depends on this process and women's bodies were made for this project. Although the pregnancy part was relatively straightforward, the ways in which her first birth unfolded deviated profoundly from her expectation. In this first part of our conversation we'll hear how she processed that first experience, and how she used what she learned...2022-11-1830 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when you become a Mother Without your Mother? Melissa's Birth story, Part IIToday we pick up the second half of Melissa's story. At the end of last week's episode Melissa was on bedrest, she has to leave her job and be home with a four year old and a husband who worked full time, in a town in which she didn't have a strong support network because she'd moved there relatively recently. To remind us where she was emotionally, I'm going to share an excerpt from Melissa's writing--this is a sneak preview of her book...in this excerpt she is describing the experience of being told about the prospect of a...2022-11-1123 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when you Confront Challenges in Pregnancy without your Mother? Melissa's Birth story, Part IToday's guest is a clinical psychologist, whose mother passed away a few years before she had any direct experience of pregnancy. She encounters recurrent miscarriage, three in the first trimester, and then a pregnancy that progresses past the first trimester, only to be threatened with prematurity early in the third trimester and experience all of these challenging and transformative events are harder to manage without her mother. Now she's focused on helping women who are going through or have gone through these major life events without their mothers. What follows is the first part of our conversation. Next...2022-11-0428 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when you Lose your Identity in Motherhood? Marnie's Birth storyToday's guest had a number of challenges with the physical aspects of pregnancy--she and her partner had trouble getting pregnant initially, and her third child was born in June of 2020, very much in the heart of covid, which invited it's own challenges; but what really surprised her was the loss of the person she used to be. She found motherhood to be both beautiful and completely overwhelming and had to work hard to reestablish her boundaries and her life after kids. Her experience becomes the motivation for a new company in an effort to help other mom's navigate this en...2022-10-2832 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Can Happen to your view of Pregnancy after Recurrent Miscarriage? Eileen's Birth Story + Fertility Specialist Insights, Part IIToday we hear the second half of Eileen's story about her experience with pregnancy. Last week we heard about some of the challenges associated with her miscarriages. But when we left Eileen, she was about to deliver her first baby, having christened the hospital elevator when her water broke on the way up to a birthing room. we'll pick up her story when she's on the way to the hospital for her first birth.For more extensive show notes, see: https://warstoriesfromthewomb.com/This is a weekly show that highlights real pregnancy, birth & postpartum stories.2022-10-2130 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens When You Experience Recurrent Miscarriage? Eileen's Birth story + Reproductive Endocrinology Insights , Part I In today's episode, my guests challenge is with miscarriage. She has two miscarriages both at the end of the first trimester, and then uses IVF (despite the fact that getting pregnant isn't the issue)...and get's pregnant, and has a miscarriage....eventually she becomes the mother of two girls, but that's later in the story. She is a writer, and in one of her pieces about this topic called On Fertility in The Toast she writes: When you give birth, you do it with others. When you miscarry, you do it alone. Even if doctors and nurses are present, nu...2022-10-1436 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when You have to Manage a Preterm Birth? Kristine's Birth story, Part IIToday we hear the second half of my conversation with Kristine. Last week we heard about her first pregnancy that ended in a stillbirth. She just started talking about her second pregnancy, which was looking and feeling too much like the first one for her comfort. And she's gone into the hospital at 27 weeks to get checked out. Near the end of our conversation, when reflecting on her experiences with pregnancy and delivery, Kristine wonders again about the possible impact that trauma could have on her pregnancies. To give us a sense of prevalent issue.2022-10-0734 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens When you rely on Gut Instinct in a Pregnancy ? Kristine's Birth story, Part IBeing able to create a new life inside your body is both an awesome feat and one fraught with the real possibility of death. Once you really hone in on the millions of things that have to go right in the just right way to make a baby, it's a wonder anyone is born ever. Today's guest spends time on both sides of this line. Her first pregnancy ends at the beginning of her third trimester in a stillbirth. Although the exact cause of her son's death is not definitively found, my guest suspects that the proximate cause may...2022-09-3030 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when Your Mother's Birth Story Gets in the Way? Corinne's Birth storyFew of us enter pregnancy and delivery with a crystal clear picture of what the experience will be like the first time. In some ways, this makes sense, given that everyone's experience will be unique in certain ways, depending on their health, their age, their partner, their history...but the distance between the narrative today's guest received from her mother and her actual experience can only be measured in lightyears....to be fair to her mother who gave birth in the 50s, it was a very different time in maternal care...but carrying this version of the story among o...2022-09-2329 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when you Give Birth to Motherhood? Amie and Katie's birth stories & book storyToday we hear from two women, one’s an author and generally in the book world and the other is an author, grief counsel and therapist. Individually, these women encountered challenges with their own pregnancies. They’ve come together to write a book that helps women to process the events of their pregnancies and birth by writing about it.For extended show notes, see: http://warstoriesfromthewomb.com/This is a weekly show that highlights real pregnancy, birth & postpartum stories.2022-09-1641 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when Preeclampsia includes Blindness? Diana's Birth story + Neuro opthalmology Insights, Part IIToday we hear part two of my conversation with Diana about her experiences with pregnancy and delivery. Last week, our conversation ended with Diana 41 weeks pregnant, partially dilated, stomping around in the hall of the hospital trying to get her baby to move into a better position for birth. When all of a sudden she loses her sight. We'll pick up the conversation where we left off in this part of the episode I also include the insights of a doctor training in ophthalmology and neuro ophthalmology.This is a weekly show that highlights real pregnancy...2022-09-0941 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when Preeclampsia Includes Blindness? Diana's Birth story, Part IToday's guest grew up with a mother who is something of an earth goddess, meaning that she was involved in a movement toward empowered birthing long before it's a main cultural current. So the seeds of an idea of what a birth should look like were planted early in my guests life. In the course of her first delivery, preeclampsia fell on her out of a clear blue pregnancy–one that was normal and healthy up to that point. This condition can come with insults to any number of organs, and in her case it dramatically affected her vi...2022-09-0330 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when you Manage an Unwanted C section? Nina's Birth Story, Part II Today’s show shares the conclusion of Nina's experience as a pregnant 40 year old, trained in psychiatric nursing. She experiences many challenges, some unexpected, and other's that are less surprising. She talks about navigating an unwanted C section and peripartum and postpartum depression. This is a weekly show that highlights real pregnancy, birth & postpartum stories.2022-08-2625 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when you have to manage Abortion and Postpartum Depression as a Psychiatric Nurse? Nina's Birth Story, Part 1Today’s show features a guest that can give us some perspective on the current climate around two important topics: abortion and postpartum depression. She’s a psychiatric nurse practitioner, who experienced an abortion in the 1970s and peripartum and postpartum depression in the 1990s. She’s written about her experience. In a piece, titled “No Stranger”. Here are some excerpts from her writing. First, she writes:“How do you know?” the patient might ask. I lean forward a bit in myoffice chair, a magic mix of science and...2022-08-1921 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when You have to manage the Pain and Loss of a Late Term Abortion? Kate's Pregnancy StoryToday's episode features the story of an extremely challenging pregnancy that ended in a late term abortion, which was difficult for many reasons, and made more so by the politics and legal apparatus around abortion. My guest was well into a pregnancy that felt off to her in ways she could describe, but which didn't trigger any particular medical action, because first, the diagnosis when it came was for a very rare condition, and secondly, she made it past the 20 week screen with no visible issues on ultrasound. That my guests first pregnancy was visited by a significant...2022-08-101h 06What You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when Hyperemesis and postpartum depression visit a pregnancy? Laura's Birth story + Psychiatry InsightsToday's guest had a pregnancy marked by extremely easy things and significantly hard things. Getting pregnant was consistent with the kind of fertility you see in a romantic comedy instantaneous, but the first trimester morning sickness was more like a sci fi thriller, totally extreme and requiring all kinds of medical help. And after a pretty challenging pregnancy, she ran into postpartum depression after the birth but her’s is a story of overcoming. She found help and recovered and she's deeply immersed in the joy only a five year old child can bring. I also include the insights of...2022-07-3141 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happened when an Unintended Pregnancy led to a Home for Unwed Mother's? Cathryn's Birth Story + Adoption Expert InsightsToday's episode features a moving story from a woman who recalls her first pregnancy in the late 1960s. The pregnancy was unintended. She was 18. Her parents, her social setting, and the cultural expectations of the time suggested that she had two options: either to marry her then boyfriend and start a family or have the baby in secret and surrender the newborn to the social workers who vaguely tended to her in the Home for Unwed mothers where she spent the end of her pregnancy and birth. Raised in the catholic faith to strict parents, abortion was not something...2022-07-211h 02What You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when Gestational Diabetes shows up in Your Pregnancy? Tabitha's Birth story + OBGYN insightsIn general all the stories women shared on the show reflect on Roe in part because they show how challenging pregnancy can be both physically and mentally even when pregnancy is highly sought after. That's one of the major take homes from this podcast real women sharing their actual experiences and hopefully contributing to a more realistic narrative around pregnancy and birth. And today's story is very much in this vein. My guest today walked into pregnancy unsure about whether she wanted to have a child. Ultimately she and her partner decided they did. She ran into gestational...2022-07-0952 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when an Unintended Teenage Pregnancy affects your view of Pregnancy? Sunni's other storyToday's episode features a difficult but important story. It’s the kind of story we avoid in part because it involves difficult emotional topics—sexual assault and unintended teenage pregnancy—topics that society does not handle gracefully. My guest today was sexually assaulted by her partner as a teenager, and carried this unintended pregnancy to term, at which point she put the baby up for adoption. More than two decades have passed since these events transpired, but we talk about how every element of this challenging situation has impacted my guest's life, and continues to affect her deeply, and likely...2022-06-2341 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat you might feel with an Unintended Pregnancy: Jennie's Birth Story + OBGYN insightsThese days the word mother can mean a lot of different things. As today's guest shares, she sought out the birth of her first child, but the second pregnancy was unintended. Her preference for family size clashed with her partners, Although she may have been open to terminating the pregnancy, her partner was not; she was living in a state whose majority is not particularly supportive of a woman's right to choose, and she was brought up in a religion in which abortion is not considered a reasonable choice. and so began a very emotionally taxing pregnancy and...2022-06-1344 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when Preeclampsia sneaks up on you? Jess's Birth storyToday's guest did not anticipate that pregnancy would offer a totally smooth ride to parenthood, but the ride she did encounter included a number of experiences that were nowhere near her radar. Managing a lot of challenging conditions like preeclampsia, and post partum anxiety had significant effects on her: first it encouraged her to reimagine what her family would look like and to find contentment in this family even though it wasn’t what she originally pictured; it made her really engage in caring for herself, to focus on both her mental and physical health; and lastly, this ex...2022-06-0243 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when Your Need a Second Trimester Abortion? Tova's Pregnancy StoryThis show is focused so far on the unexpected elements of the emotional or physical toll of pregnancy and birth. Today that story is extended to include the emotional and physical impact of a pregnancy that didn't find its footing and ended in abortion. Abortion is obviously a topic most people have strong feelings about. And unfortunately, those strong feelings tend to flatten the conversation, when in reality like all elements of reproduction, thinking and talking about abortion requires nuance. Some people may seek out first trimester abortion early in their pregnancy and feel like this choice. This...2022-05-2456 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when Race & Identity affect Motherhood? Naomi's Birth storyToday's guest, like many of us, encountered some unexpected twists and turns at the delivery that were challenging to manage in the moment. But the focus of the story she shares today is about race and identity--she gives us a sense of what it's like to live in the world both as a daughter who doesn't resemble her father, and as a mother who doesn't superficially look like her son...what assumptions people make and share and what these assumptions suggest about how we define motherhood.for extended show notes, see: https://warstoriesfromthewomb.com/2022-05-1348 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when Health Conditions don't affect the Pregnancy? Lisa's Birth StoryToday's guest has an interesting spin on the difference between her expectations for the pregnancy and birth and her experience. Going into pregnancy she had a number of health conditions that led to a lot of cautionary talks about the many things that could go awry...and then, when she actually was pregnant--she more or less skated through a problem free pregnancy...so she's left both feeling grateful to have outrun so many serious issues and like she didn't get to enjoy what was basically a straightforward pregnancy because she was constantly on alert.See extended show...2022-05-0446 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Adoption Feels like when You Were Adopted: Jody's StoryToday's guest has a host of experiences when it comes to creating a family. She and her partner had their first child when she was 35. And when they tried to have another, things didn't quite line up. And so she and her partner looked for adoption, something she'd always been interested in exploring, as she herself was adopted. She’d anticipated that her experience would draw her closer to her daughter, but what she hadn't expected is that it also drew closer to her mother. This is a weekly show that highlights real pregnancy, birth & postpartum sto...2022-04-2447 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when you have issues with Preterm labor and Surrogacy:? Ariel's Pregnancy Story + High Risk OB insightsIn today's episode, my guest is a friend of mine shares her story. She comes up against a host of extremely difficult situations and challenges in her quest to have a child. Her story has some elements that many people will relate to preterm labor and issues with her cervix, and other issues with IVF and surrogacy that I think really showcase her resilience and strength and make the birth of her daughter a triumph we can all celebrate. for extended show notes, see: https://warstoriesfromthewomb.com/This is a weekly show that highlights r...2022-04-121h 00What You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when Hypnobirthing eases the road from homebirth to hospital? Monique's Birth storyAmerican culture has a lot of ideas about pregnancy and motherhood baked into it. And even if you don't subscribe to most of the common tenants, pregnancy and birth can still offer unexpected twists and turns. Today's guest got pregnant relatively easily and for the better part of nine months had a smooth experience. She meticulously researched every aspect of birth, pulling the traditions that spoke to her from all over the world and setting out to have a very specific type of home birth. She couldn't have been more prepared. You'll hear she had her eyelash curler...2022-04-0158 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat do you do with *extra* Frozen Embryos after IVF? Nicole's Birth story + Reproductive Endocrinology InsightsIf, in your attempts to start a family, you run into trouble getting pregnant you quickly learn about a thousand elements involved in the process of getting pregnant: hCG and estrogen and the uterine lining and if you are making use of IVF technology to get pregnant, a whole other set of elements enter the equation: the quality of eggs and sperm and if you are lucky embryos, and then, again, if you are lucky, the quality of the embryo after a few days of cell division, the blastocyst…and the list goes on and on. What today’s gues...2022-03-2258 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when you have to navigate a tricky pregnancy? Rachel's Birth StoryPregnancy, both physically and emotionally, is a personally transformative event no matter what else is going on in the pregnant person’s life. The context in which you are experiencing this pregnancy, be it calm or dramatic, can add to the challenge. Today’s guest experienced flux in both her extended family, her immediate family, and the medical community she was a part of. While she successfully had six children, five of the births involved emergencies, and her third pregnancy, the focus of today’s conversation, was seeded with issues from the very start. Despite the many tricky element...2022-03-1257 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when you Find Endometriosis on the Way to Pregnancy? Julia's Birth Story + DR insightsPregnancy involves massive changes and for some of us, one of the first hurdles is overcoming issues that have developed in our bodies that make getting pregnant and being pregnant difficult. On the road to becoming pregnant, today's guest learned that she had endometriosis, an issue that she'd painfully lived with for years without a diagnosis, and which required surgery before a pregnancy could develop...and after the first child, the number of physical obstacles seemed to grow more numerous--more endo, a bit older, a shorter menstrual cycle, a medical community that was suggesting that pregnancy was unlikely again...b...2022-03-031h 00What You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when you Focus on the 4th Trimester instead of the Birth Plan? Sunni's Pregnancy StoryMany people enter the long road to parenthood stuffed with different stories about what the process will be like: how long it will take to get pregnant, what growing another human inside your body will feel like, how the birth will unfold. And these stories come from everywhere: your childhood, family experiences, books, and media...today's guest originally thought she wouldn't have children, which may have shaped what stories she took in and which she avoided...and then she had a change of heart. and with this change came some next level planning--not so much for the pregnancy...2022-02-2247 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when You & Your Partner are Unstable? Starr's Birth StoryPregnancy can invite a million different kinds of challenges. For some women, it's a physical trial. There are real limits on what our bodies can do. It certainly was for me for some all the massive changes that happen internally and externally can cause distress. And for some women, like today's guest, part of the challenge is how pregnancy can affect relationships. She had lots of challenges with the baby's father at the time, which forced her to navigate the very real question of whether or not to bring a baby into a relationship that wasn't fully settled...2022-02-1342 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when you are put on Bedrest?: Aileen's Pregnancy Story + OBGYN insightsIf there’s one thing I can relate to directly, it’s the story of a high risk pregnancy. But the pregnancy that my guest encountered was something I have no first hand knowledge of: she ran into an issue that threatened a premature birth, which caused her doctor to prescribe bedrest–for five months, 150 days for anyone who is counting–of being horizontal, she was more or less plucked out of normal circulation and forced into bed. We talk about what that dramatic transition was like and how she managed it, while also juggling w...2022-02-0456 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsA Pandemic Pregnancy with Surprises, Large and Small: Kaila's storyToday's guest stepped into pregnancy relatively easily, and while she had some pretty common early challenges--extreme fatigue, congestion, and sensitivity to smell (her husband called her a blood hound--which feels like high praise in the right context... ). The challenges really picked up at the birth, which was visited by a hemorrhage after a vaginal delivery and a bad reaction to morphine. And by the way, all of this went down during Covid before vaccines. After taking some time to settle after the physical and emotional turmoil, she is now enjoying chasing after her nearly two year old.2022-01-261h 03What You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsREBROADCAST: Good Things Come in Threes#003-Today’s guest approached pregnancy, and the motherhood that would follow, like a competition--one that she could excel at and ultimately win. And her first pregnancy, while not seamless, was relatively straight forward, giving credence to her early ideas about the process. But these beliefs lost steam when she had trouble getting pregnant the second time, and were fully deflated when ten weeks after a positive pregnancy test, a scan revealed that she was carrying triplets. A pregnancy with triplets is not for the faint of heart. Despite the challenges, she did everything she could to bri...2022-01-1751 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsREBROADCAST: An Ectopic Pregnancy that Jumped the SharkIn this episode we feature the story of a young woman who pursued pregnancy in a country different from her own, where language barriers and a different approach to care contributed to what became her life threatening condition. Originally told that she was not pregnant, she learns, many weeks later she has an ectopic pregnancy–but not your garden variety ectopic pregnancy. Thanks to her organized effort and perseverance, she saved her own life. In a second pregnancy, she goes on to deliver a beautiful daughter, who is a mirror of her mother’s driven spirit.This is a...2022-01-0849 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsPressure Makes Diamonds: Dr. Crevecoeur's Birth Story + OBGYN insightsHere we are at the end of 2021 and you may be feeling nostalgic for easier times, pre pandemic life…we visit these times in today’s story. my guest gave birth for the first time more than two decades ago and had a wide breadth of experiences in pregnancy and delivery in the course of her four pregnancies. She has hyper emesis for all of the pregnancies and learns to manage it despite her busy OB practice. A whole host of surprises visit her in the five years of pregnancy, including what I’ll call an enthusiastic cervix (you’ll...2021-12-2958 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsA Birth that requires Stamina: Kristen's Birth StoryEvery person has their superpower. Yours could be patience or wit or strength. I am guessing that among the things that today’s guest could list as her super power, toughness and or stamina are probably near the top of the list. She contends with a fair amount of uncertainty about elemental issues, like the timing of both pregnancies, and then manages a stack of challenges beginning with birthing a baby who is not situated in the birth canal in a friendly way, tending to said baby, who is getting fed too often to make restorative sleep a vi...2021-12-1445 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsMany Challenges Can Visit a Pregnancy and Birth (Including Covid): Erin's Birth Story + Midwife InsightsHaving spoken with a lot of women about their experiences with reproduction, many of them report having one or possibly two issues that visit their pregnancy or birth that alert them to the fact that they have very little control over the momentous task of creating another person in the confines of their body. Today’s guest was visited by many, many issues, including miscarriage, hyperemesis, gestational diabetes and the coup de gras, issues with breastfeeding, all of which happened (drumroll please) during Covid….so yeah, it was a lot. But now that she and her partner are on t...2021-12-0645 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsA Look at Pregnancy & Birth from a bygone era: Lily's Pregnancy StorySince it's Thanksgiving weekend, I decided to make this episode about family. And in that spirit, I interviewed my mother about her experiences of pregnancy and childbirth. My mother, who is in her late 70s, had four kids starting in 1966, and ending in 1978. You’ll hear her reference my two older brothers: Josh who is the first born, and Teddy who is the second. I was the third in line, and there is an 8 year gap between me and my sister Samara. It's surprising to hear about how much she changed and how much the medical apparatus around pre...2021-11-2651 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsStroke in Pregnancy, A post partum Tale: Lauren's Birth story + Associate Professor of Neurology insightsLots of different inputs go into the project of starting a family; for many of us this includes a host of doctors: fertility doctors and OBs and anesthesiologists...and for today’s guest that list is even longer, extended to include pain doctors and ER doctors and neurologists because she had a stroke after her delivery. Some of the doctors who participated in her project did so because the symptoms she suffered after the delivery were attributed to a spinal headache instead of a stroke. Her’s is a story of amazing amounts of resilience and an inspiring amoun...2021-11-161h 04What You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsVagonominal: A Vaginal Delivery and a Cesarean Visit the Same Birth: Kristy's Birth Story + Midwife InsightsToday I'm lucky to be talking to a midwife about her experience with her own twin pregnancy. The process of getting pregnant and giving birth did not look at all as she had planned, despite the fact that she had a lot of real information on which to base her prediction. Although she didn’t have the specific birth she originally envisioned, she successfully carried twins to term, and gained personal experience with more styles of delivery in one pregnancy than most mothers of twins--she delivered one twin vaginally and the other through cesarean section--which she described as a...2021-11-0755 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when you Let Go of the Birth Plan (& Other Expectations)? Katie's Birth StoryWe all come to pregnancy and birth with ideas about what these transformative events will be like. Some ideas come from our own family experience and some from broader cultural influences. But discussions around the more challenging details of these experiences rarely get articulated, leaving a space for our own imagination to conjure pretty much whatever it wants. And this expectation will be matched to the actual experience in real time, coloring how we step into parenthood. Like most of us, today’s guest had some surprises at birth, which were trickier to manage in part because they con...2021-10-2951 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when miscarriage involves lots of bleeding? Melissa's Birth story + OBGYN insightsToday’s guest walked into pregnancy with reservations. She’d done a fair amount of research, as is her way, and understood that pregnancy, birth and postpartum were potentially a more difficult undertaking than movie depictions suggested. Despite her avid preparation, she was, like most of us, taken by surprise. She had to manage a hemorrhage during a miscarriage, and a birth experience that both tested her physical limits and her emotional resources, as her newborn required some experimental medical help. A few years out from these experiences, she can look back and appreciate all that she went throug...2021-10-2055 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when Postpartum Anxiety visits your pregnancy? Laura's Birth storyToday’s guest had to reexamine her expectations at various points in the process of growing her family. She enjoyed a relatively straightforward pregnancy, but had real fears of what the birth would be like. Importantly, both births were totally successful, but they didn’t necessarily progress the way she imagined they would. The real challenge for her came after the birth: in the fourth trimester. The monumental change of going from being a part of a couple, just two adults, to caring for a newborn was a pretty staggering life change, and the first time around it came...2021-10-1148 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when Infertility & PPD are part of your Pregnancy Journey? Ashley's Birth story + Therapist insightsToday’s guest used to be a bodybuilder and is now a trainer and the owner of a fitness center and the mother of two kids. I think she’d describe herself as a woman who likes a challenge, and that’s probably a good way to step into the role of becoming someone’s mother. Different circumstances required her to overcome challenges presented at each step of this process--she originally had trouble getting pregnant, she had a traumatic experience with miscarriage which ramped up her anxiety during the pregnancy that followed, she wrangled with postpartum depression--and each experien...2021-10-0248 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when a Midwife gives birth & becomes a surrogate? Anne's Birth Story + Midwife InsightsGetting pregnant, being pregnant and giving birth can be challenging in a myriad of different ways. But for some people, this massive transformation is….fairly straightforward. I totally enjoy talking to people who had a relatively smooth experience because it proves that the ideas many of us come to pregnancy with are not mythic, they do in fact live in the world ...And sometimes these lucky souls who tread the untroubled path are intent on sharing their superpower through surrogacy. Today’s guest had an interest in fertility as a young adult, and this interest led her into nurs...2021-09-2351 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when an OB hands off your birth to a Midwife? Janis's Birth Story + Midwife InsightsEveryone faces some kind of challenge in the process of becoming a parent. Today's guest took an unanticipated tour of possible approaches to labor and delivery. Once contractions were confirmed she arrived at the hospital to find her midwife busy with another birthing mother. So in the first half of her birth she was attended to by an OB, and the second half was overseen by a midwife, with very different approaches to labor. And because she was a single parent, she braved postpartum without a partner, which turned out to be a real challenge when colic arrived.2021-09-1448 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when you have an Ectopic...Twice? Kristi's Pregnancy story + OBGYN insightsBoth of my pregnancies taught me that just because some process is going on in the confines of your body, location does not imply control.This is also true for my guest today. To some degree, I think that if her timeline didn’t unfold in the very specific way it did, she would not have ended up where she did--the mother of two healthy girls. On the way to this outcome, she experiences both the best and the worst pregnancy “luck”. Overall this story is one of good luck, because she is a...2021-09-0454 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsHow Did we Get our Current Culture Around Pregnancy & Birth: Ask the Historians of ScienceTalking to my mother and other women from previous generations it sounds like they got pregnant and gave birth in a culture that's different from the one we face today. Based on these talks, I have often wondered how we got to the specific point we are at: where pregnancy is a very medical experience, C sections are so common, we seem to be just starting to talk more openly about miscarriages and the postpartum period, and women are trying to navigate the demands of breastfeeding and work. In today’s show I interview two historians of science to get...2021-08-2649 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when Breastfeeding challenges & PPD arrive? Dana's Birth story + Historian of Birth insightsToday's guest sailed pretty smoothly through the process of starting a family--she got pregnant relatively easily, carried her pregnancy without too many hiccups and gave birth in a way that wasn't too far from her expectation--and then she hit a breastfeeding wall, which likely contributed to her experience with post partum depression. Now she's focused on helping women build a better relationship with their bodies. She clearly articulates the mental and emotional struggle so many of us experience as this process transforms our bodies into something new we've not experienced before, and aims to guide women to a more co...2021-08-1739 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when Birth Involves a 4th degree Tear & that Fuels your Transformation? Gill's Birth Story + OBGYN insights This episode could be titled "Overcoming: a guide". My guest overcame the challenges of premature birth, and a fourth degree tear, and a misdiagnosis, and a fistula and a stoma. Having had so many elements of her life overturned by her experience of birth, she was reborn in a way, as a complete badass tackling every physical thing that previously induced fear in her. She's challenging all the ideas that have created limits on her life and in the process, raising awareness and money for others who have experienced birth trauma and changing our perception of what life wi...2021-08-081h 10What You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Does Birth look like Before & After becoming a Doula? Keisha's Birth StoryIf you look at birth over time, it used to be the case that women were always attended at their births by other women, and sometimes midwives, and these births happened at home. In the 1930s american women moved those births into hospitals, in part to pursue effective pain relief and the allure of more safety--but for a good decade it was not actually safer to have births in hospitals. And over the next 50 years the process of childbearing became more heavily medicalized--with benefits: lower maternal mortality rates and less pain in delivery. But by the 1980s, in part...2021-07-2939 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when you become a Surrogate? Cheney's Pregnancy StoryIn this episode, my guest tells her own story of pregnancy and she shares her experience of being a surrogate for another family. It is, as you can imagine, a very involved process in part because it involves IVF, which always sounds to me like a full time job. Despite the fact that the pregnancies were relatively straightforward, there are challenges along the way, like postpartum depression, which can make other issues that come up more daunting to manage and we discuss those, too.For detailed show notes, see: https://warstoriesfromthewomb.com/This is a w...2021-07-1948 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when you have a neurodegenerative disease and want to pursue pregnancy? Sarah's Pregnancy Story + Neurologist insightsIf I had to use one word to describe today’s guest i’d say driven, or maybe fierce--truly, and maybe it’s because of these personal attributes that her life in the world doesn’t match the predictions you might make if you looked at her health status on paper. She was born with a neurodegenerative disease that dramatically affected her mobility--she’s never walked and has been wheelchair bound for almost her whole life...and despite the challenges this kind of condition invites, she’s a school psychologist and importantly for this podcast, had a baby. In general, in...2021-07-1042 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Does Pregnancy & Birth look like before the Internet? Julie's Birth storyToday's guest encountered her own set of surprises in pregnancy and birth. Because she gave birth almost two decades ago, she didn't have easy access to the overwhelming amount of information that's available now, we had kids before the iPhone was a thing and before the internet was the endless warehouse of information it is today, but she forged her path to parenthood, without immersing herself in the baby and parenting books that we had access to and learned a lot from the process itself. Another thing to know about Julie: she is a radio personality, which means, among o...2021-06-2850 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when Pregnancy requires and IVF Journey? Emily's Pregnancy Story + OBGYN insightsIf you have the slightest bit of doubt about the complex chemistry needed to inspire an embryo to develop into a baby, a casual stroll around the details of IVF will quickly disabuse you of that notion. Today’s guest set out to get pregnant a few years after she’d turned 35 and pretty quickly turned to IVF. Agreeing to IVF is agreeing to become a science project. Because she so deeply wanted children, she willingly gave all the blood samples, took all the shots, attended all the appointments that are required to re create this complicated chemistry… Through it all...2021-06-1950 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat I learned from visits to the NICU and the ICU postparum: Sarah's Birth Story + High Risk OB insightsToday's guest went into pregnancy without many expectations about what the process would be like. This openness likely helped her and her partner negotiate the challenging things she had to manage in delivery and the postpartum period. After her first birth, the baby encountered an issue that landed her in the NICU, and a few days after her second delivery, my guest wrestled with some scary postpartum issues, sending her to the ICU. Now a few years out from those experiences, everyone is thriving. Listen to her inspiring story.I also include the insights of a high r...2021-06-0952 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsExpect the Unexpected: Sarah's StoryToday's guest went into pregnancy without many expectations about what the process would be like. This openness likely helped her and her partner negotiate the challenging things she had to manage in delivery and the postpartum period. After her first birth, the baby encountered an issue that landed her in the NICU, and a few days after her second delivery, my guest wrestled with some scary postpartum issues, sending her to the ICU. Now a few years out from those experiences, everyone is thriving. Listen to her inspiring story.For detailed show notes, se...2021-06-091h 21What You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat Happens when Birth's Teach you to be a Better Advocate? Stacey's Birth Story + OBGYN insightsThe challenges of pregnancy and birth can be useful mentors for future parents. Today’s guest learned something significant from each of her three birth experiences. The first taught her that she’d need an advocate in birth given that it’s such a powerful and vulnerable experience. The second taught her that trust could be restored in a situation when a real partnership was at work, and the third taught her about physical limits and flexibility. Her experiences also encouraged a career change, from a police officer to a trauma practitioner. Listen to her inspiring story of growth.2021-05-3050 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when an OB encounters challenges in her pregnancy? Dr.Shieva Ghofrany's Birth StoryThere are three reasons to tune into today’s episode: first, it is a chance to see pregnancy through the eyes of an OB who is both the emotional individual experiencing what we all experience when we try to grow our families, and someone endowed with much more experience and information than most of us. Second reason: when you hear the story of a fully trained OB, who has seen how pregnancies and births can progress in a multitude of ways, but still cannot control her own experience it’s a powerful reminder that (spoiler alert) no one can...2021-05-2044 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when your cervix doesn't dilate in labor? Stefanie's Birth Story + OBGYN insightsToday's guest experienced both extremes of the spectrum when it came to creating a family: uncomplicated pregnancies that led up to more challenging births. She enjoyed an easy step into her first pregnancy and wrestled with infertility leading to her second. Both pregnancies were straightforward while both births, strayed from the script, injecting unwelcome drama. While labor more or less spontaneously arrived, her cervix refused to heed the call, and that led to births she didn't anticipate, one after another. Importantly, both deliveries ended with healthy babies. Listen to how she navigates this uncertain terrain. We also h...2021-05-1036 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when your Epidural doesn't work as expected? Tabitha's Birth Story + Anesthesiology insightsOur ability to delay pregnancy through various forms of birth control may lead us all to have expectations about our ability to manage our own fertility. It’s one thing to stop pregnancy, and something altogether different to initiate it. Today’s guest, a fan of control like the rest of us, is a master planner. She planned to get pregnant quickly, have an enjoyable pregnancy, and a routine birth. But the birth refused to follow the birth plan. Pregnancy is, among other things, an educator, teaching hard and often valuable lessons. All the events of that first birth...2021-05-0146 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when Body Image issues are part of your pregnancy? Alasen's Story + OBGYN insightsToday’s guest stepped into her first pregnancy relatively easily,getting pregnant within a few months of trying…... and that was the last easy thing she experienced. She describes herself as someone who is “not a pregnancy unicorn”. She had body image issues while pregnant, felt nauseous, swollen and was generally physically uncomfortable for most of the pregnancy. And then postpartum recovery was even more challenging. A hormonal imbalance caused a too dramatic weight loss, she was visited by postpartum depression and anxiety, and a baby who wasn't particularly interested in sleeping through the night added to her 'non-unicorn' status. In...2021-04-2240 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when HELLP syndrome visits your pregnancy? Brooke's Birth Story + MFM insightsToday’s guest is no stranger to hard labor. As a strength and training coach she’s seen how disciplined effort produces results. But long runs and weight lifting sets didn’t prepare her for some of the consequences that the complicated chemistry of pregnancy can produce. Through the course of her different pregnancies she tangled with HELLP syndrome--a pregnancy complication that requires emergency attention, and a visit by gestational diabetes. Now, with three kids under 5, she can add a new exercise to her regimen: child wrangling. I also include the insights of a fantastic Maternal Fetal Medicine doctor...2021-04-1038 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens in an OB's pregnancy: Dr. Nicole Rankins Birth Story + Policy Analyst InsightsIt seems self evident that most doctors would agree that being the doctor and being the patient are two entirely different experiences. And being the patient as a doctor is a third, different path. Today’s guest is an OB, and got pregnant with her first daughter when she was still in residency. Unlike many guests, she probably knew too much about the world she was stepping into--which led her to have an anxious first pregnancy. As it turned out, that anxiety was well placed, as she did run into some complications in that pregnancy, and a delivery at 32 we...2021-04-011h 07What You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when preeclampsia shows up just before your Birth? Audrey's Story + High Risk OB insightsLike many women, today’s guest imagined that having a child would be straightforward–that’s the way she’d always seen it portrayed in the culture around her. And at the start, her expectation and experience lined up well. Getting pregnant wasn’t a challenge and being pregnant, was an exercise in smooth sailing for many months. But then the swelling hit, followed by an episode of fainting, and she and her husband found themselves caught up in the whirlwind of preeclampsia, including some of the more disconcerting features of this condition. Dr. Sarosh Rana, an MFM at the...2021-03-2245 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when Colic is a part of your Postpartum? Clarissa's Story + pediatrician insightsSome women waltz easily into pregnancy and motherhood, at least in the Hollywood version of the story. This was not the version today’s guest experienced. Getting pregnant and being pregnant was not as straightforward as she was led to believe. Recovering from her first trimester loss was challenging, but my guest and her partner persevered and her subsequent pregnancy went swimmingly. The next challenge: birth--which was physically and emotionally daunting. And as she recovered from the birth, she was introduced to the relentless press of colic. Slowly, slowly the colic subsided and now the greatest challenge is pla...2021-03-1245 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when you encounter a Postpartum Hemorrhage? Ashley's Birth Story + OBGYN insightsLike all great adventures, pregnancy rarely goes as planned, especially for first time mothers. For today’s guest, the journey had all the hallmarks of a grand adventure: pure joy when she found out she was pregnant, the excitement of an impending birth, the physical challenges of a natural labor, and a real dose of anxiety, pain and fear in the aftermath of that birth when a serious hemorrhage becomes life threatening. Listen to her tell her story of ultimate triumph. Read more about Ashley’s experience at http://thinkoutsidethecrib.com/, or follow her at @ashley_lewk...2021-03-0248 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when Peripartum Depression visits your Pregnancy? Maria's Birth Story + Clinical Psychologist insightsEvery pregnancy is awash in chemicals--that’s how the magic happens, how we turn an egg and a sperm into another human being. But this chemistry can have other consequences, notably, peripartum depression. Peripartum depression, the condition formerly known as postpartum depression, has been renamed to reflect the fact that this form of depression can strike during a pregnancy, as well as after it. It is believed to affect 1 in 9 mothers, a full 50 percent of these cases are thought to occur during the pregnancy. Today’s guest didn’t share her feelings with anyone, first imagining that it was no...2021-02-2035 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when Prematurity and Placenta Problems visit your pregnancies? Charlotte's Story + OBGYN insightsThe project of starting a family involves some elements that are totally under your control (when you start trying to get pregnant, the doctors or midwives or doulas you choose) and other elements that you expect to be uncertain: what the pregnancy is like or when the baby comes. But for today’s guest, almost every element of the process carried uncertainty: when she was pregnant, if the pregnancy would take, and if her other organs would behave during the pregnancy, to name a few. She weathered all these life changing events, some stressful, some lovely...and now has...2021-01-3052 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when your pregnancy is an abdominal ectopic? Charlie's Pregnancy Story + OBGYN insights#004-In this episode we feature the story of a young woman who pursued pregnancy in a country different from her own, where language barriers and a different approach to care contributed to what became her life threatening condition. Originally told that she was not pregnant, she learns, many weeks later she has an ectopic pregnancy--but not your garden variety ectopic pregnancy. Thanks to her organized effort and perseverance, she saved her own life. In a second pregnancy, she goes on to deliver a beautiful daughter, who is a mirror of her mother's driven spirit.2021-01-0149 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWelcome to War Stories from the Womb-#001This is an introduction to War Stories from the Womb, the why and what of the podcast.For more information, see:https://warstoriesfromthewomb.com/This is a weekly show that highlights real pregnancy, birth & postpartum stories.2020-12-3007 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsWhat happens when you experience Unexpected C sections & Postpartum Depression? Emily's Birth Story + Therapist Insights#002-Many women approach pregnancy, and especially the birth of their children, as a sacred moment, as something they’ve long contemplated before it arrives. And with these thoughts come expectations. Such was the case for my guest today. For all three of her children’s births, she’d imagined a natural birth, with both the pain and the sense of triumph that experience involves. But circumstance got in the way, once, twice, all three times. Despite the challenges she faced, including peripartum depression, she found some significant ways to square the difference between expectation and reality...2020-12-3052 minWhat You Didn't Expect in Fertility, Pregnancy & Birth: Real Stories & Expert InsightsAn Ectopic Pregnancy That Jumped the Shark002. In this episode we feature the story of a young woman who pursued pregnancy in a country different from her own, where language barriers and a different approach to care contributed to what became her life threatening condition. Originally told that she was not pregnant, she learns, many weeks later she has an ectopic pregnancy--but not your garden variety ectopic pregnancy. Thanks to her organized effort and perseverance, she saved her own life. In a second pregnancy, she goes on to deliver a beautiful daughter, who is a mirror of her mother's driven spirit.2020-10-1445 min