- Hey guys, my name is Shayla, welcome to the channel.
If this is your first time here, welcome.
(laughs)
I started this channel traveling full-time,
then I got pregnant and blogged about my pregnancy.
Now I'm a mom.
Which is weird.
Still.
But I am vlogging about it because there's a lot of things
that come up that you did not know about
until you just go through it.
And some of the things I think I'm glad
I didn't know about.
Other things I'm like why did no one tell me?
What's up?
- [Seth] Oh, my bad.
- It's okay, you can be in it if you want.
- [Seth] No.
- This is all very, like what would be the right words?
Like hippie, crunchy, granola natural.
Sometimes he calls it witchcraft.
- [Seth] Just super Jenny from "Forrest Gump."
- Was she granola?
What I'm trying to say is if you're on that natural train
you're going to like this.
If you're not on that natural train
maybe keep watching just to see
what all the crazies are talking about.
I think I've like dreamt
and thought about my labor and delivery
like most girls think about their wedding.
Oh yeah, it's going to be primal
and I'm going to do it naturally and it's going to be great.
You don't have to be that interested in it, but I was.
I'm just going to read you the blog
because nobody likes to read blogs,
so I'm just going to read it for you.
The three books that I read,
one was called "Mindful Pregnancy".
"Mindful Pregnancy" was written by the guy
with the meditation app Headspace.
And so I listened to it because I like his voice.
Pregnancy can be hard, there can be body issues,
there can be miscarriages, there can be IVFs,
there can be all this stress.
There could be COVID during your pregnancy!
He also does a whole pregnancy session
in his app... which I also did.
The second book that I read
is called "Ina May's Guide to Childbirth".
Ina May, she is hippie AF and I am so into it.
She started this whole thing in a caravan,
became a midwife and now she delivers babies on "the farm".
The whole first half of the book is like good labor stories
just to get that in your mind.
I've read some of them and then I skipped
to the meat and potatoes.
The one thing that just got burned into my mind
was that women have had babies in comas!
Can you believe that?
- [Seth] No.
- I think that's incredible!
So what that means is that your body knows exactly
what to do and your mind gets in the way.
Here we go, I'm going to nerd out a little bit.
So when you're going into the labor,
if you have fear or you're afraid, you tell your body,
this is not a safe place to have this baby.
So, your cervix goes whoo and it goes,
"okay, we're not going to have this baby now"
but your uterus goes, "yeah we are" and it goes like this.
The muscles are up like this, your cervix is closed.
Hi! Painful! Lots of pain!
So if you can just relax, let your cervix open,
let your uterus push everything out,
everything out, push the baby out.
The third book that I read was "HypnoBirthing",
and this was because I was talking to my midwife
and I was like, I think I want to do hypnobirthing.
And like, oh.
She was like, yeah, maybe start by reading the book.
Okay.
That'll just give you an intro to what it is.
I read the book and I still wanted to do it, so I did it.
I have a whole video talking
about my natural birth with hypno babies.
- [Seth] And she rocked it, she killed it.
- Thanks, boo.
But if you're kind of like, what is this?
You could follow my midwife's advice and read this book.
A couple more things that I did just
to prepare for labor, I took probiotics.
I have a whole video on this too.
All of your organs are just getting crushed
by this growing human in your belly.
You might have constipation, you might have diarrhea.
Your gut health is directly linked to your immune health.
I'm into that.
LoveBug is who I work with.
There's a lot, go watch that video,
but probiotics are a great thing
to take while you're pregnant.
And then I have a discount code with them.
if you do want to get that.
Did you make the toast.
- [Seth] It was just sitting there.
- Yeah.
(laughs)
It was sitting there for when I'm done.
- [Seth] I thought you forgot about it.
- No!
Dates.
You remember when I ate all the dates?
- [Seth] Yeah, the cockroaches.
- They look like little cockroaches.
In my blog I also linked an article in there
that explains how it can help you progress during labor
a lot faster if you eat those starting at like week 36.
I also linked some smoothie recipes,
energy balls that you can make with dates
so that you don't have to just eat the cockroaches.
How do you say perennial, perennial, perennial?
- [Seth]] Perennium?
- Yeah, okay.
I hate doing this when I can hear her crying.
The very simplest way to say this
is that you're just stretching out the area down there
so that you don't tear as much.
Tearing was my number one concern
and my midwife was like, that's fair.
Might I ease your mind by letting you know
that most women don't even know that they tore?
There's too much pressure,
there's too much going on after the baby's born.
Don't stress too much about that and I will agree with her.
I had a second degree tear and a sideways tear,
and I wouldn't have known except for all the stitching.
I was just afraid of that.
Don't be too afraid of that.
But anyway, so the stretching you're supposed
to do it with like coconut oil or olive oil in the shower.
Look it up, couldn't do it.
I couldn't reach any more.
My belly got too big and it was just like, well,
that's one thing I'm not going to do.
The next thing is I worked out
until a couple of days before I gave birth.
I had this program Expecting and Empowered,
I also have a discount code with them,
but what I like about them is that it's a sister combo
a nurse and a PT, a physical therapist.
And so they tell you the things that you can do
where you are in your pregnancy.
I started my third trimester and I got the postpartum guide.
The postpartum guide is where it's at
because they give you, day one, they give you exercises
and it's all rehab, pelvic floor rehab.
You don't even work out until week six.
Part of you is like, well, I just want to work out
and the other part of you just wants
to crawl in a hole and sleep forever.
I'm at week 15 right now and it's starting
to amp up a little bit, but I'm ready for that.
Cannot recommend them enough.
Let's go into labor and delivery.
I chose a midwife instead of an OB
for more of a natural approach.
A doula friend of mine told me
do it wherever you feel the safest.
If you feel safest in the hospital, do it there.
If you feel safest at home, do it there
'cause you need to relax.
No flight or fight, remember.
And I felt safest in the hospital.
I was like, I want to be disconnected from everything,
but I want to be there in case something goes down.
So that's where I did it.
I wanted all the tools available.
I wanted to be able to have a tub.
I wanted to be able to have a birthing ball.
I wanted whatever because the tub
and a shower are second to an epidural.
Water therapy I think they call it.
Really good for helping manage the pain, food.
I had these chia squeezers.
You don't need a spoon.
It's really light, but there's some sugar in there.
I'm in the tub just like (smacking), just sucking.
Like a little hamster or something,
just like eating out of this little squeezer.
It was just what I needed to give me a little bit of fuel.
As you get closer to your day,
there's a couple of ways that they can induce you.
I wanted to do it as naturally as possible.
There's something called stripping up the membranes,
where they take their finger and they swipe
to separate the uterus and the amniotic SAC.
And basically that kind of tells your body to go into labor.
I've heard it's debatable whether or not it actually works.
I was super nervous going to my 40-week appointment.
They're going to try and swipe my membranes.
What am I going to say yes or am I going to say no?
You have to be at least one centimeter for them to do that.
I was supposedly a half.
I'd never heard of anyone being a half a centimeter.
I think they were just trying to make me feel better.
Well, you can't even do it if you wanted.
Great decisions made for me.
What?
I know, it looks super droopy.
- [Seth] Water, you need to water it.
- Seth is upset about his plant over here
that looks real droopy.
Another way that they can induce your labor is Pitocin.
Some people have to go into labor
or some people have to be induced and that's fine.
Pitocin makes you contract.
You can have more intense contractions.
It's possible that you then will want an epidural
because you're in so much pain.
The epidural could slow down your labor
and then they might give you more Pitocin
which could then cause the baby to go into distress.
That is a big generalization,
so do with it what you want.
I chose not to have constant baby monitoring.
I wanted them to monitor her and then I wanted to be mobile.
I couldn't walk down the hall because COVID.
I wanted to walk around my room if I wanted,
I wanted to get in the tub if I wanted.
Episiotomy.
They can cut you instead of letting you tear.
From what I have read, you don't heal as well.
Because when you tear naturally,
you've got just fibers that can go back together.
When you're cut, it's not as good,
but sometimes in an emergency,
if the baby needs to come out, they'll just do that.
So I was like, don't get me an episiotomy
unless it's an emergency.
She was like, I won't and I was like, okay, thanks.
If you've watched my labor and delivery video,
I was literally telling her this as I was pushing
because my midwife didn't make it
because she had a flat tire.
I did not eat the placenta,
I did not encapsulate the placenta,
I didn't do anything with the placenta,
except for ask for a tour.
Can we see it?
Held it up, it was huge, right?
- [Seth] Yeah.
- Delayed cord clamping.
A third of of the baby's blood goes
into their body after they come out.
So you want to wait until the cord stops pulsing.
I didn't even know that Seth cut the cord
until like a couple days later
when he was like, yeah, I cut the cord.
That's cool.
Where was I when you were cutting the cord?
And he said it felt like you were cutting just rubber.
- [Seth] It was tough.
- That's so weird.
Do you think the scissors weren't very sharp?
Did you see it pulsing?
- [Seth] At first, yeah.
- And then you saw it stop?
- [Seth] Yeah.
- 'Cause it goes there's color in it
and then it goes white, right?
- [Seth] Yeah.
- There's a golden hour.
So I delayed everything, shots, weighing, all the things
until, I don't know if it was really an hour,
but they say it's the golden hour.
That's where you want to try and latch
because your boob releases this smell
that smells like the amniotic fluid
that makes the baby want to go there right away.
And it's just like a bonding thing.
Plus I didn't have her bathed either
because the vernix on their skin that they like are in
for nine months, they're like a fish in water.
And so if you wash them, A they'll get cold
and B they're not as protected.
So if you keep that vernix on, it helps them out.
And that's all of it.
I'm just going to link the blog in the bottom
and then all of the links are within that blog.
Should we show the baby?
Come here, munchkin.
Here's the baby.
Baby girl!
What is that?
Did you have a nap, were you sleeping?
Did you sleep a little bit?
Yeah.
Thank you guys so much for watching.
I hope this was informative.
If you're like trying to go the natural route for labor
and delivery, you can do it.
You can absolutely do it.
And if things don't go the way
you want them to, that's fine.
As long as the baby comes out and you guys are both healthy,
it's all worth it.
Good luck to you on your labor.
I hope that you have a safe, easy and natural labor
if that's what you're trying to do.
But most of all,
I hope that you have a healthy baby and you stay healthy.
Thank you guys so much for watching
and I'll see you next time.
Bye.
Oh yeah, one more thing.
You can find me on Instagram
like all the days on Instagram stories.
Probably too much, bye.