[SPEAKER_00]: So with the baby being so close to being here, by the time you hear this episode, she might actually already be here.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I thought it was just the perfect time to reshare my birth stories from my first two births.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, this is my disclaimer.
[SPEAKER_00]: I had a very traumatic first birth experience.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you have not heard it, you are about to hear it,
[SPEAKER_00]: It helps someone, I think that I learned so many meaningful life lessons as I became a mother for the very first time and so I'm sharing it in honor of Baby Girl, I am sharing the birth stories from her big brothers.
[SPEAKER_00]: So today I am re-releasing my very first birth story and then next week I will share my second
[SPEAKER_00]: a completely different experience.
[SPEAKER_00]: So get into it, share this episode with a friend with a mom in waiting, a mom to be.
[SPEAKER_00]: Hopefully it's not a scared straight kind of story, but just a learn from my mistakes as you become a mother kind of story.
[SPEAKER_00]: So let's get into it.
[SPEAKER_00]: welcome back to another episode of the girl's stop plan pie cast it's shuffavor home girl coriel here to encourage you to stop plan with your potential and start working for what you want in life and in love you already know that I believe you can make the money
[SPEAKER_00]: and you can get the honey.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can have it all as long as you are willing to work.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it is my goal to bring you the information and the conversations to help you do just that.
[SPEAKER_00]: So if you have been slipping on your pimping and have been missing out on my latest episodes, curl, stop playing.
[SPEAKER_00]: I have been bringing you so much juicy conversations, so much good girl talk.
[SPEAKER_00]: to help you get it together.
[SPEAKER_00]: Whatever getting it together means for you.
[SPEAKER_00]: On my last episode, we got into some pretty spicy conversation around poly relationships and y'all.
[SPEAKER_00]: Word on the street is y'all, we're not ready.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, if you watch the episode, then you already know how I feel about poly relationships personally.
[SPEAKER_00]: Definitely not my cup of tea, you know, I want to keep my man as mine and I have no problem being only his.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's definitely not something that I'm personally into or interested in.
[SPEAKER_00]: However, I really love being able to use my platform to have these conversations that we just don't typically have.
[SPEAKER_00]: I literally happen to meet two women who were poly in a matter of months and I felt like
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't know that people were really out here living like this, you know, aside from what I see one TV, like on the Sister Wives show, I had not personally ever known of anyone to have an open relationship, to be in a poly relationship or anything of the such, but it is going on.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I do know that, you know, as we get a little bit older, I've had conversations with my home girls that are like, you know, I'm not saying I would be down for poly, but I might consider it, you know, it might be an alternative lifestyle that I might be interested in because I'm over 35.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't have any kids yet.
[SPEAKER_00]: And,
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm just exploring different options.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I think that it's super important for us to be open-minded enough to at least have the conversation.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not here to try to convince anyone to do anything, but I definitely appreciate everybody who was open enough to at least hear the conversation and not be judgmental.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I mean, I know it's pretty hard to not be judgmental, because
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, we all grew up with our own belief systems.
[SPEAKER_00]: And when things are outside of the norm, outside of what we're used to, it sometimes is like culture shock for us.
[SPEAKER_00]: And again, if you watch the episode, you can see it all over my face that I was experiencing culture shock.
[SPEAKER_00]: OK, my scalp was sweating under my wig, the entire
[SPEAKER_00]: time, but again, I love being able to have these conversations, and definitely cooking up some more spicy conversations for season two, which is going to start in April.
[SPEAKER_00]: So definitely make sure you are subscribed.
[SPEAKER_00]: Wherever you happen to be listening to this solo sermon, whether it's on YouTube, be sure to hit the subscribe button, or if you are on an audio platform, make sure you subscribe there as well.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you
[SPEAKER_00]: Typically, listen on audio and you didn't even know that you could watch the full episodes on YouTube, definitely head over to YouTube.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can just search my name, Coriel, or you can log on to GirlStopPlan.com and it'll take you to YouTube, or it'll give you options to go to YouTube so that you can check out the video versions of the podcast.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you are interested in advertising your business on an upcoming episode, all you gotta do is go to girlstopplan.com or tap the link in my Instagram bio to learn more about advertising opportunities.
[SPEAKER_00]: You already know that I love being able to use my platform to promote my people.
[SPEAKER_00]: So get in where you fit in.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now this week's solo Sarming y'all.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is a personal, I mean, they're all pretty personal, but this is one that I would definitely say has been a long time coming.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's something that I have been...
[SPEAKER_00]: cringing at the thought of talking about for the last 22 months to be exact.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's something that a lot of y'all have asked me about, but y'all, I have honestly just had PTSD around my first birth.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so on a couple episodes back, I talk to
[SPEAKER_00]: Fallen, Mrs. O and she's created a planner specifically for women who are dealing with postpartum and they want to be able to plan their lives and, you know, document their processes and all of those things and we ended up getting into her postpartum story and y'all When I tell you that her story was dead on with with what I experienced, I felt like wow it made me feel a little bit better because
[SPEAKER_00]: When you go through something and you don't talk about it, you tend to think that you're the only one who is dealing with it.
[SPEAKER_00]: You tend to think that God was playing a trick on you, like why me.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I definitely feel that people can learn from and benefit from me just sharing my truth.
[SPEAKER_00]: And y'all are my girls.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like I know that that's what y'all are here for.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I feel like I have probably been hiding.
[SPEAKER_00]: For long enough, and so today is the day that I am going to spill the beans on my birth story.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, for those of you who have been following me on social media since my first pregnancy back in 2020, you know that I was talking a whole lot about maternal mortality, like the percentage of black women.
[SPEAKER_00]: who are dying during childbirth, the percentage of black women who end up having sea sections for their birth versus vaginal birth.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I just kind of went down a rabbit hole of doing research and really trying to figure out what was the best option for my family.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so my husband and I decided that we were going to opt for a home birth.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I did my research, I interviewed midwives,
[SPEAKER_00]: And I ended up really, really liking Christine, who on Instagram she's birthed by Grace, y'all saw her on a past episode of Girl Stop Plan.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you missed it, go catch it because it was definitely full of gyms.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I ended up hiring her as my midwife.
[SPEAKER_00]: I found a dula.
[SPEAKER_00]: My dula's gonna remain nameless because I'm still mad at home girl.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, I'm still mad.
[SPEAKER_00]: and I'm gonna tell y'all while we get into this story, but she shall remain nameless, I do not recommend her, zero stars, do not recommend, but I hired my birth team.
[SPEAKER_00]: In addition to the birth team that I hired, I also had Kaiser insurance through my husband's job.
[SPEAKER_00]: My husband is a pharmacist, he works for Kaiser.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I had Kaiser and so I had what is considered dual care.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I would go to my regular Kaiser appointments and then I would also have appointments with Christine.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I was basically getting seen twice.
[SPEAKER_00]: And let me just say that was definitely like two very different experiences.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, going to the Kaiser appointments was very,
[SPEAKER_00]: maybe sterile is the right word.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was very just like assembly line, you know, you get on the scale, take your blood pressure, pee in the cup, listen to the heartbeat, okay, do you have any questions?
[SPEAKER_00]: I write you out the door.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was a very, just a medical experience.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't really know what to think, what to, how to explain it.
[SPEAKER_00]: But it was different for
[SPEAKER_00]: and it was during COVID.
[SPEAKER_00]: So my husband couldn't come to any of my appointments at Kaiser.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it definitely was a benefit that I also had Christine because he could come to all of those appointments.
[SPEAKER_00]: So he could still, you know, hear the baby's heartbeat and he could, you know, get any updates and all of those things.
[SPEAKER_00]: So we would do both.
[SPEAKER_00]: With Christine, it was very different in that
[SPEAKER_00]: She asked me questions, she took her time with me.
[SPEAKER_00]: It wasn't like in a assembly line.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, okay, your next, all right, you're out the door.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was, it definitely made me feel like I had more ownership over my process.
[SPEAKER_00]: I wasn't just kind of being forced to go with the flow.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so my entire pregnancy was amazing.
[SPEAKER_00]: I did not have morning sickness a single time.
[SPEAKER_00]: I did not have,
[SPEAKER_00]: any complications.
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't gain that much weight.
[SPEAKER_00]: Everything was great.
[SPEAKER_00]: The entire pregnancy.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I had zero expectation that anything would change in terms of labor and delivery, but baby, your girl was wrong.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now let me also preface this by saying that
[SPEAKER_00]: I kind of feel, and this is probably where some of my PTSD comes from, also, I feel like I have probably been blaming myself a little bit too, because I have made up in my mind and y'all don't judge me, okay, and this is no shade to any Pisces out there.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I have made up in my mind that I, even before I got pregnant, I knew that I did not want to have a Pisces baby.
[SPEAKER_00]: When do you conceive your child so that they're born during Pisces season?
[SPEAKER_00]: And I calculate it like it's June or July, I told Kendrick, like, do not get me pregnant in June or July, like, no, I'm not playing those games.
[SPEAKER_00]: And now let me just also say that I had a very traumatic experience with the Pisces.
[SPEAKER_00]: When I was engaged previously he was he was a Pisces and I just you know I just feel like our personalities are conflicting like me and Pisces.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a no my sister is a Pisces We are like complete opposites.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a no for me like Pisces.
[SPEAKER_00]: No, thank you So I definitely feel like I had good reason.
[SPEAKER_00]: However, I know
[SPEAKER_00]: the way the law of attraction works and when you focus on whatever you focus on is what you're bringing in.
[SPEAKER_00]: So whether you focus on what you want or focus on what you don't want, you are literally calling it into your life.
[SPEAKER_00]: And that is exactly what I did because I ended up getting pregnant at the very beginning of June 2020 which made my due date land during pricey season.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I was literally trying to pull out every trick in the book to be able to have my baby early.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like I was doing everything I could to guarantee that he was not a Pisces.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so what that amounted to?
[SPEAKER_00]: which is why I, you know, still feel some type of way about my dola is, and again, I'm taking ownership and accountability for my silly beliefs and the actions that I took.
[SPEAKER_00]: But my dola had convinced me that she had the magic recipe that if I just take this concoction, I'm going to go into labor.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, it works every time I've done this with all my clients,
[SPEAKER_00]: you are definitely gonna go into labor if you do this.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, I was about 40, I was two days before 40 weeks pregnant.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it was literally right at the tail end of a queries season.
[SPEAKER_00]: My husband's in a queries, we get along great, like we are 100% compatible.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'm like, okay, I'll just have an a queries, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm in control, I'm just gonna have an a queries.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I ended up taking this concoction, nothing happens.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, I get my hopes up, nothing happens.
[SPEAKER_00]: So she's like, okay, well, let's just try it again because I've never seen it not work before, you know, like, it's gonna work if you do it again.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I do it again, nothing happens.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I call Christine my midwife and I'm like, yo, I didn't drunk this drink.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was supposed to, you know, go into labor and nothing's happening and she's like, okay, come to my office, I'm going to check you out.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to see if you're dilating, yada, yada, yada.
[SPEAKER_00]: So we end up going to her office.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is on a Sunday at like six o'clock.
[SPEAKER_00]: We go to her office, she hooks me up to some type of machine because she realizes that I'm dehydrated.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, she puts me on liquid, you know, the little fluid thing hanging the Ivy bag.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's what's called.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, she gives me Ivy bag.
[SPEAKER_00]: She's trying to rehydrate me and while she's doing that, she's monitoring the babies heart rate.
[SPEAKER_00]: And, his heart rate keeps like dropping.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I'm literally in her office for like two hours.
[SPEAKER_00]: And she's like, you know, I'm concerned because of, you know, this line right here, she's showing me like on the little printout, like this means that he could be in distress, in distress blah blah blah.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now mind you, I had been planning for a home birth.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, so Christina's home births where, you know, you blow up the tub.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're literally gonna have this baby at your house.
[SPEAKER_00]: Again, I had done all of my research.
[SPEAKER_00]: I knew that at these hospitals that I could go to, because of my insurance, I knew that they had very high sea section rates.
[SPEAKER_00]: I did not want to end up with the sea section.
[SPEAKER_00]: So much so that I had found a chiropractor that I had been going to since like my 19th week of pregnancy.
[SPEAKER_00]: This chiropractor had like a super high success rate on, you know, women being able to have vaginal birth and all of this stuff.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I was really being proactive about,
[SPEAKER_00]: not having a C section.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was dead set against having a C section.
[SPEAKER_00]: Did not want to do it.
[SPEAKER_00]: So she's telling me, you know, so I had the, I had the tub set up in my house, like, because I knew that when I drunk that drink, I was going to have the baby.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I had everything set up and ready to go.
[SPEAKER_00]: the towels, the supply, like I had everything.
[SPEAKER_00]: The lights were hanging, the string lights.
[SPEAKER_00]: I had a decked out in there, okay?
[SPEAKER_00]: Everything except for the water in the actual tub.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'm in her office.
[SPEAKER_00]: She is running all of these, you know, tests, doing all of these things.
[SPEAKER_00]: And she ends up telling me, like, I know this is not what you're gonna want to hear, but I'm gonna have to recommend that you go to the hospital.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, during this whole time, when I'm taking these childbirth classes,
[SPEAKER_00]: I was doing what's it called?
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, not meditation, but some type of class, that's supposed to help you prepare for natural birth.
[SPEAKER_00]: I can't think of the name of it right now, but I was doing all of the things.
[SPEAKER_00]: And one of the things that they kept telling you is like, just know that you have to be flexible in your birth plan.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, everything does not always go as planned.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so this is what you want to happen, but you have to understand that there's no guarantee that it is going to happen.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the whole time I was like, no, I'm having a home birth.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's no way I'm going to end up at a hospital.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am not packing a hospital bag because I ain't going to know about this hospital.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like I was just that said, I was really, truly trying to use like the power of positive thinking.
[SPEAKER_00]: to refute the fact that I could possibly end up at the hospital.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, I'm not, if I pack a hospital bag, that is me saying that I could possibly go to the hospital.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'm not even gonna do that.
[SPEAKER_00]: So by and due, when she says she needed to send me to the hospital, I was not prepared to go to the hospital.
[SPEAKER_00]: I instantly burst into tears because it was the one thing that I did not want to hear.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was the one thing that I did not want to happen.
[SPEAKER_00]: had to listen to her.
[SPEAKER_00]: This was someone that I trusted, this was someone that had been there with me throughout this entire pregnancy.
[SPEAKER_00]: She knew how bad that I wanted to have a home birth.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I knew that if she was recommending that I go to the hospital, that it was the best thing for me.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, the other thing that I knew is that if I went to the hospital and I was not in labor, they were going to induce my labor.
[SPEAKER_00]: For those of y'all who don't know,
[SPEAKER_00]: inducing your labor at a hospital is done with drugs like labor inducing drugs.
[SPEAKER_00]: So they they give you, you know, whatever type of drugs, puttocin.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's like three or four different things that they could possibly give you, but it literally puts your body into labor.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I honestly feel like that was the worst thing that could have ever happened to me because it's literally them trying to rush a process that's supposed to be a natural process.
[SPEAKER_00]: So they started the induction process.
[SPEAKER_00]: I arrived at the hospital.
[SPEAKER_00]: This was a Sunday.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I arrived at the hospital at like 1030.
[SPEAKER_00]: Got into the room around 11 o'clock.
[SPEAKER_00]: They started the induction process, let's just say around 1231 o'clock in the morning.
[SPEAKER_00]: So now it's Monday and so they're trying everything I'm not dilating quick enough.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm in a whole lot of pain because they are literally putting my body into
[SPEAKER_00]: labor and what that means is they're forcing my body to have contractions.
[SPEAKER_00]: They are trying to force my cervix to die late like it's not happening naturally so they're trying to make it happen basically.
[SPEAKER_00]: And because of that your contractions are much more painful than they would be if they were natural.
[SPEAKER_00]: If your body was naturally in labor.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'm in a whole bunch of pain.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm telling them, like, I'm in a lot of pain.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're trying to convince me the nurses are trying to convince me that I shouldn't be in that much pain because they've only given me this amount of, you know, of Potosin.
[SPEAKER_00]: I should only be at a level this, even though I'm telling them I'm at a level that.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so they were really like minimizing my experience.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm like, what?
[SPEAKER_00]: What you say, I should be, I'm telling you what it is, you know, and so it was, it was just all in all a terrible experience.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm trying to listen to my little relaxing like melodies from the class that I had taken.
[SPEAKER_00]: None of that shit is working.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, none of the strategies, none of the breathing, none of the stuff that I had intended on doing during my home birth were helping me.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now that I was in the hospital and now that I was going through this induction process.
[SPEAKER_00]: Kendrick is sitting there, like, helpless, not really knowing what he could do other than just being there with me.
[SPEAKER_00]: The baby is stressed because they have, they're trying to force him out of my body, basically.
[SPEAKER_00]: At one point, and his heart rate is dropping, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's dropping, then it's coming back up.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I can see all of this on the monitor because I'm being monitored, you know, the whole time.
[SPEAKER_00]: At one point, y'all.
[SPEAKER_00]: about eight nurses rush into the room because you know they have like remote monitoring outside of the room.
[SPEAKER_00]: I can see it in the room and they can see it outside of the room.
[SPEAKER_00]: So whatever they saw on that monitor made them come rushing.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm talking about like all the nurses that were on duty came rushing into the room, started pushing on my belly.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're not saying anything, but it was almost like they were trying to resuscitate my baby.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'm freaking out.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm scared.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're not telling me what's going on.
[SPEAKER_00]: Kendrick is, you know, he's jumped up.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's over there trying to figure out what's going on, but he's also trying to stay back and stay out of their way.
[SPEAKER_00]: So they could do whatever they got to do.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then they literally like stopped, you know, something changed on the screen.
[SPEAKER_00]: They stopped.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then they actually like it was no big deal.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now this is my first time having a baby.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I don't really know what's going on.
[SPEAKER_00]: But what I do know is that all the y'all came rushing in here for a reason.
[SPEAKER_00]: So something was wrong.
[SPEAKER_00]: Y'all don't want to tell me what was really wrong.
[SPEAKER_00]: And now y'all are trying to act like it's all good.
[SPEAKER_00]: Baby's okay.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I don't know about y'all, but this is just like a miscellaneous baby to y'all.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is just another baby that you're encountering on your shift at work.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not willing to play around with y'all.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not willing to play these games with his life.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so y'all, it literally came down to, and it probably sounds really dramatic, but it literally came down to what I saw as like life or death.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because I was trying so hard to hold out and just go into labor and have this baby vaginally because I had made up in my mind that that was what I wanted.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like I want a vaginal birth.
[SPEAKER_00]: another statistic, another black woman that has to have a C-section.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so it literally took me, we started the process, 1 a.m.
[SPEAKER_00]: on Monday.
[SPEAKER_00]: It took me until 11 15 p.m.
[SPEAKER_00]: on Tuesday to finally say, okay, I'm going to wave the white flag.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to give up.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is my first act.
[SPEAKER_00]: of selflessness as a mother, forget what I wanted.
[SPEAKER_00]: I gotta put my pride aside because I'm not willing to risk my child's life in an attempt to not have a sea section.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I ended up having my baby VSC section at 11.45 p.m.
[SPEAKER_00]: on Tuesday night, it was exactly one week past his due date.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I was 41 weeks pregnant.
[SPEAKER_00]: and the shit show just continued.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I have him VSC section and it wasn't like TV where they came over after he was out and they put him on my chest and I got to sit there with them.
[SPEAKER_00]: Instead of that, he came out.
[SPEAKER_00]: They let me see him briefly and then they're like, okay, we gotta go.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'm like, well, where are y'all gonna go?
[SPEAKER_00]: Where's my baby have to go?
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, I had, again, done on my research.
[SPEAKER_00]: I knew about the importance of skin to skin contact.
[SPEAKER_00]: I knew that my baby needed his mother as soon as he was born.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like I knew that that was a thing.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're like, his oxygen levels are low.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, he needs to be rushed to the NICU.
[SPEAKER_00]: So of course, my husband,
[SPEAKER_00]: feeling caught in the middle, he don't know whether he should stay with me, whether he should go with the baby, and I'm like, you got to go with the baby, you got to watch the baby, you got to make sure the baby's good.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I was, of course, had all of these alternative things.
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't want them to watch the baby, I didn't want them to do any of the things that they were probably about to do to my baby, so I'm like, you got to go with the baby.
[SPEAKER_00]: So here I am alone, after this traumatic experience, and
[SPEAKER_00]: not only am I traumatized, but I'm trying to figure out what the heck is going on with my child and I can't go see him because after you have a C section, you know, which is literally a surgery, you have to be monitored.
[SPEAKER_00]: So they have to monitor you for however many hours.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so during this monitoring time.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm up in the recovery room.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's down in the NICU getting like oxygen treatments and my blood pressure is elevated.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now mind you, I've literally had perfect blood pressure, my entire pregnancy, like not one single time did I even have.
[SPEAKER_00]: an elevated blood pressure like I have not had any problems ever in my life with my blood pressure.
[SPEAKER_00]: But after this see section, my blood pressure is elevated.
[SPEAKER_00]: So they're like, okay, well, we're going to continue to monitor you.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're just going to keep you, you know, in this recovery room for like an extra hour so we can monitor your blood pressure.
[SPEAKER_00]: If it doesn't go down, we're going to give you this magnesium treatment.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I'm like, okay, I can see it.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, I can see everything on the screen.
[SPEAKER_00]: I can see when it, when it tests my blood pressure, I can see that it's higher than it's ever been before.
[SPEAKER_00]: But eventually, during this hour, it goes down enough for them to feel like they don't need to give me this extra treatment.
[SPEAKER_00]: So long story short, get put in my room.
[SPEAKER_00]: My baby is, he's okay.
[SPEAKER_00]: He has an oxygen like a, well, I guess it is a breathing
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not going to cry what I talk about this, but he's, you know, all tubeed up all of the things.
[SPEAKER_00]: And again, I can't go see him because I am technically still in recovery, so I couldn't go see him.
[SPEAKER_00]: I could not see my baby until the next day.
[SPEAKER_00]: The way that the NICU works is there's like hours, you know, you can only be in there for X amount of time, all of these things.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I had planned to, you know, breastfeed right away, but they had to give them formula.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just, I mean, when I tell you what could go wrong, did go wrong.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was literally like, why?
[SPEAKER_00]: Why would this happen to me?
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't understand.
[SPEAKER_00]: I had done everything right, quote unquote.
[SPEAKER_00]: I had done all the prep.
[SPEAKER_00]: I had, you know, tried to,
[SPEAKER_00]: predict the best possible outcome, all of the things, and none of the things actually worked out.
[SPEAKER_00]: So thankfully, after my C-section, I had to stay in the hospital for two days.
[SPEAKER_00]: By the end of the second day, he was ready to come out of the NICU, so we were able to go home together.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now this episode will probably be very different if I had to leave my child at the hospital, because you get special privileges.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's easier for you to go visit while you are still admitted into the hospital.
[SPEAKER_00]: Once you've been discharged, it's just like a whole other process to, you know, to get into the Nick you and how much time you can be in there all of the things.
[SPEAKER_00]: So thankfully, we were both able to leave at the same time.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I had a session scheduled with the lactate.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I did start nursing him.
[SPEAKER_00]: From the moment I, you know, went in there, I was able to start nursing him.
[SPEAKER_00]: He latched on the very first time.
[SPEAKER_00]: And, you know, when I would leave the NICU, I would pump and I would bring enough milk back or I would nurse him.
[SPEAKER_00]: So we were good there.
[SPEAKER_00]: The whole thing with the NICU is they have to gain however many ounces or however much weight before they can get discharge.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like that's how they're, that's one of the things they used to measure.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I had to be very diligent in, you know, going back and making sure he was fed and all of the things.
[SPEAKER_00]: So after I got home from the hospital, this was a Friday.
[SPEAKER_00]: I had a session scheduled with the lactation specialist because, you know, I've heard so many
[SPEAKER_00]: Poor stories about breastfeeding and how hard it can be.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I already had that schedule.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like when I tell y'all is being proactive, I was being proactive.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I already had that schedule.
[SPEAKER_00]: She came by.
[SPEAKER_00]: She happened to be a registered nurse and she came by on Monday.
[SPEAKER_00]: So she's doing the session.
[SPEAKER_00]: She looks down at my feet and she's like, your feet are really swollen.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, have they been swollen like that?
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm like, yeah, they've been like that, you know, I was just thinking it was gonna go away.
[SPEAKER_00]: And she's like, okay, well, before I go, let me just check your blood pressure and y'all.
[SPEAKER_00]: That blood pressure thing might have said like 180, one night, like something crazy ridiculous.
[SPEAKER_00]: And she's like, oh, no, like you need to call your doctor, like your blood pressure is really high.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't feel comfortable with you just sitting here and your blood pressure is high.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I called the nurse line at Kaiser and I told them what my blood pressure was and they're like, you got to get back to the hospital.
[SPEAKER_00]: Literally the worst thing that I could have ever heard because I just got home two days ago with my baby after a traumatic birth experience.
[SPEAKER_00]: And now you're telling me I got to come back to the hospital.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I go back to the hospital thinking maybe they'll just give me a treatment.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like maybe they'll just prescribe me with some pills or something.
[SPEAKER_00]: So the treatment that they have mentioned right after I have my see section that magnesium treatment, that's the treatment that they needed to give me.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now the catch is once they start that treatment, you have to do it for 24 hours.
[SPEAKER_00]: and then they have to monitor your blood pressure for another 24 hours.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that meant even if everything worked out perfectly, I was gonna be in the hospital for at least two days.
[SPEAKER_00]: Someone who had just given birth, someone who had just had a baby, you want me to be away from my child in this hospital.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm devastated, I'm breaking down, I'm in tears.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm like slipping slowly into a depression, okay?
[SPEAKER_00]: not only was that like the bare minimum the two days, but the treatment didn't really work.
[SPEAKER_00]: It didn't work the first time.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, needless to say, I ended up being in the hospital the entire week.
[SPEAKER_00]: It wasn't until Friday.
[SPEAKER_00]: that they had figured out, whatever medication was actually working to bring my blood pressure down, enough to where they were comfortable sending me home.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, an entire week that my husband had to be a single dad, worrying about his wife.
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[SPEAKER_00]: trying to figure out how he was, you know, want to take care of this baby.
[SPEAKER_00]: He hadn't taken all the classes that I had taken, okay?
[SPEAKER_00]: So he was learning on the job, literally, how to take care of this baby.
[SPEAKER_00]: Luckily, my mom had came over.
[SPEAKER_00]: So she was helping out, but still, a newborn baby at home with that alone.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was just, it was traumatic.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the hardest part for me was, I had already missed out on those first few hours of his life.
[SPEAKER_00]: that I'm without my child.
[SPEAKER_00]: This little baby that I just met, like we're missing all of our bonding time that I knew was so important.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I was in the hospital for five days.
[SPEAKER_00]: My husband brought the baby, you know, to see me every single day, of course.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was still nursing, I was pumping, I was doing all of the things.
[SPEAKER_00]: And eventually, obviously, I got to go home.
[SPEAKER_00]: But y'all, I'm still trying to figure out what God was trying to teach me.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I'm feeling like he just wanted to show me that, you know, it's cool trying to plan out of things, but I'm in control, little girl.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, you're not going to tell me what to do, you're not going to try to do my job.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I really feel like my expectations, almost let me to depression.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like having a baby and being postpartum in a healthy scenario.
[SPEAKER_00]: is traumatic and stressful enough, but to have a baby in a scenario that I did not expect or did not want to end up back in the hospital and I've never been admitted to a hospital of my entire life.
[SPEAKER_00]: So this was just like totally just out of the norm for me, especially because I just expected to have a baby at my house.
[SPEAKER_00]: So every little piece that I tried to plan, none of it worked out.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am definitely grateful that I have a healthy, happy, brilliant baby boy who will not remember, hopefully any of this.
[SPEAKER_00]: But because I'm about to give birth again, I felt like I had to get this out.
[SPEAKER_00]: I had to share it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I had to finally release it, let go of the frustration and the blame.
[SPEAKER_00]: And hopefully, just move on and have a better story this time around.
[SPEAKER_00]: So keep me in your prayers.
[SPEAKER_00]: Please pray for a seamless, a speedy.
[SPEAKER_00]: And of course, a successful labor and delivery.
[SPEAKER_00]: This pregnancy has been identical to my last pregnancy.
[SPEAKER_00]: I haven't had any issues.
[SPEAKER_00]: Um, I did not plan for a home birth this time because, you know, I gave up on that dream last time and I'm, I've literally surrendered.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm going with God.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm going with the flow.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am going to allow whatever is meant to be to be and not try to play God because playing God or attempting to play God is how you end up playing yourself.
[SPEAKER_00]: So.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't try to do God's job.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let God be God.
[SPEAKER_00]: Do the best you can to plan the best you can, to prepare as much as you can, but just know that nothing is perfect.
[SPEAKER_00]: And you gotta be able to count your blessings.
[SPEAKER_00]: You gotta be able to find the good, even when it doesn't feel good.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I hope that this helps someone encourages someone if you have a similar story, know that it's not your fault.
[SPEAKER_00]: And yeah, I'm going to continue to share my truth to be honest with y'all about the crazy things that I'm going through because hopefully it can be helpful to someone who has experienced something similar and is dealing with some PTSD behind it.