Speaker 0
Into the wild, I'm going into the wild, I am. It's been a wild freedom child since I left my roots back home. Into the wild I'm good. Into the wild I am. It's been a wild freedom child since I left my roots back home.
Speaker 1
Welcome to the Free Birth Society podcast. This is a radical space for women who are ready to celebrate their autonomous choices in birth, motherhood, and beyond. Together, we'll learn about wild birth through personal narrative. We'll explore the politics of birth, and we'll analyze everything that relates to our lives as women from a feminist perspective. Here's your host, Emilee Saldaya.
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It's been a wild freedom change
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since
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I've left my rules back home.
Speaker 3
Support the awesome power of women as we make life form kinship and transform the world through undisturbed mother centered birth? In your most expansive vision of your life, are you the authentic midwife of your community? Walking in total grace, reciprocity, and trust with women through the sacred portal of pregnancy and birth. Then our groundbreaking Radical Birthkeeper School is for you. It's an immersive and intensive, fast paced live program in all things authentic midwifery and self mastery that will give you the blueprint and guidance to launch a life altering, world shaking, radical birth brand and business. Think birth business mastermind, life changing coaching intensive, deep dive into all things birth, step by step roadmap for serving women authentically, and the wise woman initiation that you have been dreaming of, all rolled into one epic program that will change your entire life. It is time to become the lighthouse that guides women home to themselves. Head over to radical birthkeeper school dot com and grab your spot because we are enrolling now and we always sell out. Say yes to your calling and join us in this revolution of bringing birth back home. W w w dot radicalbirthkeeperschool dot com. Caitlin is a midwife from South Africa who long dreamt of attending birthing women in integrity, but kept coming up against the hypocrisy of the medicalized midwifery world. She brings to us today her story of unraveling herself from the regulations and culture of licensed midwifery, how she navigated being investigated by the Department of Health, and how she found her way forward in authentic midwifery through taking the radical birth keeper school. I'm excited to do this today, and this episode is going to specifically go out to all of the women out there who listen to this show, who are, on the path of medical midwifery, who are trying to navigate perhaps, medical midwifery schooling. Maybe you're out there dreaming of what you see us doing with the radical birth keeper school. Yeah. Women who are on the path of midwifery, and we're gonna, you know, really kind of, encapsulate or rather include, all paths of midwifery in this discussion because Caitlin, my guest today, has a, a uniquely, yeah, just cool background of of your own journey of figuring out how to serve, how to have community, how to show up for the women of your community, and also, how to navigate, in some respects medical midwifery and also how to not navigate it. Right? So, yeah, this is for everyone kind of interested in the midwifery conversation. Why don't I pass it to you to introduce yourself in a bit more depth?
Speaker 4
Thanks, Emilee. Yeah. I'm Caitlin. I am living in South Africa and I've been into birth since just before I fell pregnant with my first son seventeen years ago. I heard the term midwife and I I had never heard it before. And I was like, oh, that's what I'm meant to be. That's what I've that's what I'm called to do. I'd heard nurse before, and I was like, no. I don't wanna be that. I definitely didn't wasn't aligned with the idea of what a nurse was. But when I heard the term midwife, I was like, that's it. That's what I'm meant to be. And I guess, yeah, I guess I went through my pregnancy at age twenty one, twenty two, and, was in the UK at the time. And I think I was pretty lucky to have, like, the kind of the borough midwives in London serve me, and it was really low key. I didn't have any ultrasounds. And I think from my my upbringing, I was just like, I can do this. You know? I can I can birth my baby? And, I mean, it's a bit of a longer story, but, essentially, I did birth my baby with very little interference, sort of unknowing at the time how much they could have been. And I think because I'm pretty stubborn and determined, I I birthed him pretty much undisturbed in a in, like, a birth center. And then I came back to South Africa because I couldn't stay in the UK. I thought I'd study midwifery there. I came back to South Africa, and I realized that the only way to become a midwife was to do nursing first. And I was like, no ways. I'm not gonna leave my baby for twelve hours at a time to do these shifts, and I'm not interested in nursing. I wanna be a midwife. So I became a doula, through the only doula training there was in South Africa at the time, and it was pretty conventional. And, again, because of my upbringing, I always had questions. I always feel like I kind of saw through the things that were sort of serving the system right from the start. Very soon, I was just, yeah, I became very disillusioned with the whole doula thing because I saw how little sort of, difference I really could bring into the birthing space is, yeah, in hospitals, and even homes. I mean, I very quickly started saying, like, I'm not going to sit in hospitals because I just saw how much abuse and lies were happening. And I just I knew I, you know, I could see straight through it right right from the beginning. And so I just say to a woman, you know, sorry. I don't work at these hospitals. And slowly but surely, it was like, all of the hospitals. I can't work at any of the hospitals. I mean, I learned a lot. I learned a huge amount attending women in hospitals and sort of really getting insight into the psychology behind medicine, how broken it is and how disturbing it is really. Yeah, how sort of scared and small most of the people feel in those institutions. And yeah. So I I kind of I was like, I need to do something about this. I can't just stay a doula. So I met it all kind of fell into my lap. I feel like the universe really led me along this journey. When I look back on it now, I kind of don't quite know how I did it all. So I met this woman who had discovered the the, you know, North American Registry of Midwives, and she was living in Botswana at the time, actually. And she managed to do this, like, long distance study program and do her practical in a hospital in Botswana. So she introduced this concept to me, and I think, you know, at that time, I guess, the Internet was becoming more and more accessible, and I embarked on doing the non PEP process from South Africa. I got some midwives in South Africa to agree to be my preceptors, but they were nurse midwives because we only had nurse midwives in South Africa.
Speaker 3
Yeah. This is for you to become a CPM. Yeah. But you because it's kind of this new option since it's from North America, you're gonna take a long distance school, and then your preceptors are going to be CNMs. Right?
Speaker 4
Right.
Speaker 3
Exactly. And they're okay with you doing the lesser in the hierarchy and doing the PM, which would which would give you a certification. But, like, who acknowledges that in South Africa? Because it's a normal thing.
Speaker 4
Totally. So we kind of naively thought at the time, because there were a few women who wanted to do this route. Actually, a couple of sort of women pioneered it just before me. And and and at the time, actually, the midwives and the nurse midwives in South Africa were really excited about it because they were feeling so disillusioned about midwifery, like, what we would call private midwifery outside of the system. Mhmm. And they really wanted to see new midwives or, you know, younger midwives come through, and they can see this happening through the state training that we have here.
Speaker 3
But were private midwives actually outside of the system?
Speaker 4
No. No. So we've got the South African Nursing Council. It's basically like certified nurse midwives. They work they attend home births, but they still registered. So they're still guided by the protocols and guidelines.
Speaker 3
It's like an off
Speaker 4
Yeah. Exactly. Exactly.
Speaker 3
So it feels down the path, and you are, like, not doing the doula thing. Oh my gosh. I'm gonna take this CPM thing, and that probably feels really exciting at the beginning.
Speaker 4
Totally. At the time, I was like, wow. This is this is incredible. This is, you know, this is gonna give me freedom. I'm gonna I'm gonna you know, I mean, predominantly, these these midwives were doing home births. But it really was when I look back on it, it was, like, really a hybrid kind of version of, real nurse midwifery in many regards and then sort of I don't know what I would maybe say traditional midwifery. You know? I I because I did the the PEP process, so I had to self study all the the didactic or the theory. And I just was immediately, drawn to midwives like Carla Hartley and sister Morningstar and women like that. And I get I read I mean, the whole Anne, you have to read those huge Anne Fry books, and she's got a lot of, you know, a lot to offer. So I was getting this one the stream of sort of international or maybe more US based midwifery unfolding. And then here, I was sort of following midwives who really, I think, genuinely wanted to do things differently. And at the same time, their hands are often tied because of wanting to kind of gay keep, keep the backup with the doctors who are you know, all of that that, yeah, maintain sort of good channels with the doctors. And, you know, I'd see some really strange stuff. And, you know, I was learning at the time, so I'd see, like, midwives, like, beautiful old midwives who've, like, attended thousands of births, like, be in a hospital with a doctor who's, like, twenty years younger than her. And she, like, melts into this giggling kind of girl because she wants to, you know, keep Yeah. Keep these channels hell or good or, yeah, at least at least, like, tenable. And so it was a really interesting way to learn. I feel like I saw so much into, like, yeah, into the psychology behind it all and the hierarchy of it and kind of how it works. And I would see how if the unfolded without a glitch, like your textbook birth, that would be all great and well, like, no interference at all. But with many births, if there was kind of a sort of slightly out of that, like, kind of tight range of normal, that things would unravel because the midwives are feeling under
Speaker 3
pressure
Speaker 4
to not, create sort of bad bad blood with them and the doctor or the backup hospital. It, you know, it it obviously took me some time to kind of put it all together and figure all of this out. Because I must say, I mean, in the first couple of years of my, midwifery sort of apprenticeship, I was just loving being at birth. I was just loving being with women and getting to know women and getting to know pregnancy intimately and just learn learn so much, like absorb, absorb, absorb. I was a sponge. So it definitely took time to bring it all together and realize
Speaker 3
That's what's Yeah. That's what's so crazy and so painful and confusing because it's like you don't even and by you, I mean, everyone on this path. Like, until it's put together, you don't even realize how you're hurting them. You know? Like, of course, it's and with the best of intentions and we're all, like, doe eyed and bushy tailed or whatever in the beginning, we're doing exams and doing Doppler and the subtle shit and the big shit. You know? And it's so complicated. Like, the psychology of it is so complicated because it's like the heart is in the right place, but it's inside a model that's inherently abusive and hierarchical. It's so confusing. I mean, I was a midwife's assistant for quite a few years of a CNM, and some of the stuff that would happen or that I've participated in, it felt at the time like, like, we were just looking out for her. You know? And I look back on it and I'm like, oh my god. Yeah. Oh, we totally completely ruined her third stage or her first time meeting that baby or the baby's first breaths, or fill in the blank. Right?
Speaker 4
Right. Totally. I mean, I've, definitely had to sort of forgive myself, I guess, for some of those things that in the moment, in my innocence, I, like you say, thought, you know, and and none of I mean, there are few stories that were, like, really terrible, but, like, just even the subtle things of, like, oh, no. This baby is too big or you know? And it's all out of fear. It's all out of fear. And I never really I never really, like, fully believed it, but I think also there was a time for me where I was I put my myself in this position that I'm learning, and I would always bring my my insights and my readings and stuff to the midwives, and they were sort of open to it. But, essentially, I was the student, and there's a dynamic there. And I I was a good student. You know? And I think just, like, just to mention on, like, models of care, because I used to think, like, oh, the midwifery model of care is so great. You know? And it's, like, it's the medical model of care and the midwifery model of care. And
Speaker 3
right. Right. Right. Oh my gosh.
Speaker 4
Yeah. And and now I'm like the midwifery model of care. We need to have a new model. Like, we don't yeah. Because the midwifery model of care is still so much about it's so much steeped in that system of, like, the industrial medical complex, actually.
Speaker 3
But more truthful to say is there's the medical model of care and a branch of that is medical midwifery. And it it it is a part of medical paradigm a hundred percent. Assessment, diagnostic, hierarchy, you know, all of it. All of it. The technocratic model, it really is. And there is also another model of care, you know, that obviously we teach and practice in the radical birth keeper school, but then there's this confusing part where medical midwives lie and call it the holistic model of care. And they lie to themselves and their students and literally think that they're not a part of the medical paradigm all the while they're fucking licensed and they're one hundred percent doing it, but they're lying to themselves, the clients, and their students, which is where we both know and we've been on this path in our own ways, but this is where it's so confusing. Because women like us want to be a part of the holistic model of care, and then it's very easy to start down the path of what you think is that and find out it's not. And that is that takes, I think, a lot of guts to admit to ourselves, to move away from it. Yeah. And it's not just fear. You said it was all based in fear. It's I think it's important to say it's fear and hierarchy because fear is actually not, like, a problem. Right? Like, we all have fear. I still have fear at births or with clients. Like, that's a that's a totally understandable, aspect of working in these realms. Right? And it I don't think it ever goes away. But if it's fear and hierarchy where the pathologized fear actually, you like, gives us justification to sabotage and decide for and, yeah, like, be on top of, like, dominate and control the client, that's when it's totally fucked, which is what medical midwifery is. There's no transparency. It's not like,
Speaker 4
oh, did
Speaker 3
you know that there's actually no benefit to vaginal exams? But I'm still gonna do it. You cool? You know? Like Yeah. And Doppler don't improve outcomes, but I'm still gonna do it. Are you cool with that? Nobody's honest in that moment.
Speaker 4
Yeah. Totally. And, I mean, I you know, when I when I was a student, there were still, like, midwives who would practice at in home settings the whole, like, pushing, like, you know, tell encouraging telling the woman when to push. And, that was always so just like, oh, it just felt so wrong and just so what is this? Like, this is this is and it was, yeah, it was just it was awful to you know, as I went along more and more, I was just like, I this is this is really difficult. And I think there was, like, at the time, I was so focused on, like, this is what I'm gonna do because I definitely have to claim that Mhmm. You know, part of going into this this work was, like, my whole complex of, like, needing to be needed and wanting to save people and save birth. And I was so, like, passionate and, you know, they yeah. All of this I was kind of on this track, and at the same time, I was I was also, like, going down this other road of, like, no. I'm gonna I'm gonna do this differently. When I'm when I'm qualified, I'm gonna do this differently. And and I I remember one of my first I think it was just before, because I had my two other children in the time where I was apprenticing. And with my own children, I mean, my second child was born before anyone else arrived, so my husband and I caught him together. And my third was just I think I was I was just really lucky that my births nothing ever my births just unfolded really I don't know if I should use the word easy, but, like, blissfully. You know? And I remember there was this one older midwife. She doesn't she used to live in Cape Town. She doesn't anymore. And she once said to me, she said, you know, Caitlin, the births that you were lucky enough to have, like, that's what you can gift to other women. Like, that no one, like, no one has to do anything for birth to work. She was kind of using my birth as an example of you don't have to do anything. That's what you can bring to your midwifery. Like, you can just be and just trust, and birth will work. And it was kinda it you know, she's she definitely worked somewhat differently to the other midwives. And, I mean, the other thing that was so traumatizing, actually, and it's still traumatizing in South Africa, is that the midwives have no solidarity with one another. It's like it's really sad. It's really sad. There's, midwives have always kind of been against each other. Like, there's always one midwife that's, like, being pitted as, like, the the extreme midwife who, you know, does, like, birth after cesarean section at home or whatever it is. And because the doctors have, like, ousted that midwife, she's kind of the baddie. And it's it's it you know, I was also involved in this. I'm trying to figure myself out in all of this, and it's like, you feel really alone and out on a limb, actually.
Speaker 3
Oh, yeah.
Speaker 4
Yeah. So so much you're trying to figure out as you
Speaker 3
go along. You know? Yeah. Because you need your peers. You need your mentors. You need your peers to, like, understand or survive in long term birth work. Right? Like, it's it's hard to do it alone. And all of us, you know, when we're in the kind of standard mainstream midwifery, it becomes very, very clear very quickly not to do anything outside what the core, you know, kind of successful leader midwives, like, say. Right? In the peer review, there often it would turn into just gossip about the one midwife who didn't transfer soon enough and then he died and it's their fault and they need to really and it's like, yes. I totally hear you, and that is absolutely what I experienced in in in my arena as well. And it's like like you said, around getting into this to to be needed and to save. I mean, that's really kind of the crux of this and why this concept of, you know, reclaiming authentic midwifery, whatever that even means, it is so compelling, I think, to so many of us because when we remove ourselves out of it and just look at, like, female mammals, you know, and that they don't need anything, and in fact, less is more, and we take the midwife out of the equation. And from understanding anything about physiological birth, you know, knowing that we are actually not needed for this to go down. But that really requires all of us dealing with the part of us that wants to be needed, that wants to be the hero, that wants to, you know, be loved and adored and welcomed into these families. And and, you know, I couldn't have done it without you and all of this stuff. And, like, god, talk about missing the point. Right? It's just perpetuating the same nonsense narrative that obstetrics perpetuates.
Speaker 2
This is
Speaker 3
what we see with the free birth stuff. You know, midwives are like home birth, home birth. Oh, but not without a midwife.
Speaker 4
Well, the funny thing is is that, every single birth that I've that I have ever missed is, like, completely great and fine. You know? So it's totally yeah.
Speaker 3
I wish that medical midwives were more honest, which is, like, when they say I trust birth and I trust women, it's, like, as long as they've hired me. That's the rest of the sentence that everyone leaves out. Trust birth as long as I'm there. You know? I mean, it's it's crazy. But I was gonna say also about the the you seeing midwives telling people to push, telling women to push. You know, what that lets us know is that those midwives know nothing about birth. And so many of us started out our midwifery trainings with women who knew nothing about birth. Right? Like, really knew nothing. And our teachers. I mean, wow. That's a lot for us to, like, we wade through and and overcome and and figure out a new way. Right? If I mean, I my mentor just started breaking everyone's bags once labor started to get active just to make sure there's no meconium, just to make sure.
Speaker 4
Oh, yeah.
Speaker 3
God. You know? And that was just that was the normal just to be safe, you know, thing that I was learning.
Speaker 4
Sure. Yeah. Yeah. There are many things like that and, I've you know, it took me like, when I when I started my own practice, I I'll I'll tell a little story about I'll come back to that. But when I started my own practice it's like I instinctively, intuitively I didn't do these things like vaginal exams, and I I knew I was I wasn't gonna do them. But they were they were these really challenging times where when birth got a little bit, you know, when not a little bit, but when birth, like, became, like, you know, forty eight hours, sort of seventy two hours, those were the times where I rarely had to challenge myself to not start using these kind of tools of safety that I'd learned. And, you know, what I I just feel so grateful for really is that the women have been my teachers the whole way through because, you know, the women that I've served have predominantly really on the whole being such incredible women who trust their own process. And and through them, actually, I have become more and more yeah. I guess I guess I I would they've been my teachers, and they are the incredible people. It's like I'm I still feel like I'm
Speaker 0
a student.
Speaker 4
You know? I'll always be learning. And and I guess I can just I feel really grateful that the woman who felt energetically aligned with me were the ones who really were willing to walk their walk and, yeah, and trust trust their process. I remember just, like, just before I finished all my exams and all of that, there was a birth that I I had been to this woman's first birth as a student, and, she was having a second. And she'd asked me to be there, and she called me when she was ready for me to go through. And my supervisor, who was she was, like, teaching antenatal classes, and she she wasn't available. She she could only get there at a certain time. And I went through and, and I I didn't call anyone else, And I was just there, and she had her baby. And, I remember being so shocked because two of my, like, really you know, the teachers at the time that I I really I loved. I loved so much. They were really upset with me that I hadn't called anyone else to the booth. They were like, this is dangerous. You could've, jeopardized yourself or the mom and, like, this shouldn't have happened kind of thing. And I was like, woah. What what is that about? Like a student? Yeah. Yeah. And it was, like, out of concern for me, kind of, but it was it was, like, one of those times for me where the penny dropped of, like, this is just all so skew. This this is really like, it's not about the mom so often. You know? So many times, it's not about the mom.
Speaker 3
No. Of course not. It's about them saving their asses and not getting in trouble with the people who actually run the game, which are the doctors.
Speaker 4
Yeah. Yeah. Who who who they who they really it's I guess, it's like they love to hate. It's, you know, I think the sad thing is that they feel they feel like they can't be what they are without that backup because it's like they've they've been
Speaker 0
Mhmm.
Speaker 4
I guess, programmed to, you know, to believe that that is the safest thing, that it like, a a a good healthy backup, you know, relationship with the doctor is what's gonna make my practice safe. And yeah, and, sure, so much to to unravel.
Speaker 3
So let's talk about, you know, the part of you that that I think so many student midwives can relate to, which is this, like, looking around, seeing seeing starting to smell some bullshit and being like, okay. I'll be the unicorn midwife. Like, when I have my own practice, I just will do this totally different from everything that's being taught to me. And I think a lot of women are there. A lot of women I talk to who are really struggling with their medical midwifery schooling, with their preceptors. They're holding on to what I would call a pretty a pretty ignorant or naive, you know, hope that they're just going to be the unicorns. And there are some unicorns. I have definitely met some unicorn midwives, but like Yolanda points out so so articulately, if you choose to go the medical path, you will inevitably have to betray somebody. You'll be betraying the family you serve or you'll be betraying your license that you sought out and thought you needed. And so, yeah, I just kinda wanna ask what you think around this unicorn idea because I know a lot of women are doing the mental gymnastics of medical midwifery or cognitive dissonance, whatever the right word is, and being, like, all just be different. Think about that.
Speaker 4
Well, I mean, that just what you said, what Yolanda says about about that, you know, that you either you either compromise yourself or you compromise the woman. That was one of the things that I heard you say on this podcast a couple of times that really drew me to the radical birth keeper school because I was like, that's so true. Right. It's so, so true. And I think yeah. Because because I my kind of journey was was unique in that. So when I did pass my CPM and because it is a US credential, I was still nothing in South Africa. And and I found this my my my really close beautiful friend and companion, found this loophole that in South Africa, there is the traditional healers association. You know, we've got a lot of traditional healers here. And, and in that they under that, there falls the traditional birthkeepers. And so I'll get to your question, but we what we ended up doing is writing letters of, like, why we why we loved what we were doing to a chief. And he read our letters, and he, you know, proclaimed that we were traditional booth attendants. Cool.
Speaker 3
This What kind of protection does that give you?
Speaker 4
None, essentially. Yeah. They've been trying for a long time to kind of be accepted by the Department of Health here, but, you know, things take forever. And quite frankly, now knowing what I know, I don't even wanna be regulate you know, I don't want the traditional healers association to be regulated. Exactly. And I mean, even, you know, even now in this time, like, you know, traditional healers are in a tough place because if they wanna be recognized, they have to kind of go along with the current narrative. And, basically, you become co opted if you're regulated or you're trying to be regulated. So yeah. But at the time, it was a loophole that felt good. And and so I guess I felt like I was, yeah, myself and a a couple of others were being those unicorn midwives, bringing, like, this, you know, undisturbed, sort of physiological birth to to Cape Town. And yet what I'd learned through my through my apprenticeship was needing to have a backup. So I kind of followed that. And very soon, I just realized how compromised I was because I wasn't willing to, you know, call a birth done after twenty four hours or after, you know, more than two hours of pushing or after, like, water bags have released for more than you know? Or you can go on and on and on. And I realized I wasn't willing to, you know, forty four weeks, all of those things, breech babies. I wasn't willing to not stand by the woman. And so I started to realize how much pressure I was putting myself under because, I through my student years, some doctors had kind of taken a liking to me, and they were still willing to, like, back these women up. And in our public health care sector, there were hospitals backing up, but then, of course, in the rare event of a transfer, things would come back to me. And, yeah, and I started to feel more and more and more pressurized and stressed. And that in itself is not a good Yeah. Place to be in attending birth. So, I'm really actually quite amazed that I managed to navigate that kind of playing the game, but not playing the game for as long as I did. It it ended up in in a year ago kind of getting like, being investigated by the Department of Health because a doctor made a complaint about a practice that my friend and I were were doing together. So, yeah, that's, in a nutshell, my unicorn midwife journey.
Speaker 3
So what when the doctor called you out as a unicorn, what did what did what happened? How did the investigation whole thing go?
Speaker 4
Well, it was all around not you know, because obviously so over the years, maybe I can just go back a bit. Over the years, we we started to realize things. Like, we did we we naively had no idea. The South African Nursing Council seems to have, like, a say over who calls themselves a midwife and who doesn't in South Africa. So they basically own that word, which is just insane. I mean, with woman, like, how do you own how do you own that? And I know, yeah, I know it's all over the place. So over the years, we started to realize that, yeah, we were being kind of naive. A woman who doesn't live in the city, but she got taken to court for calling herself a midwife. Then we were then we were officially calling ourselves traditional birth attendants. So it was pretty much around the fact that we don't do active management of third stage. Yeah. Because we don't carry drugs, and that's dangerous. But at the time, it was kind of like yeah. It so that was pretty much it. That was that was the crux of it. And the other thing that was said was
Speaker 3
Listeners who don't know, why don't you just briefly tell people what active management is? Because that's a very big deal, and this is one of my biggest issues with the rules and regs of medical midwifery.
Speaker 4
Yeah. So active management is is essentially, as soon as the baby's born, you get injected with synthetic oxytocin, pitocin on, or pit, and and that facilitates the the placenta to be birthed, and it's just completely unnecessary. If the needs of a physiological birth is met, it's just completely unnecessary, and it's, you know, it's sold as this life saving drug. And it's, in my opinion, it's it's dangerous. It's it's really it's an awful, unnecessary intervention.
Speaker 3
It's also so stupid because we literally make the thing that it's artificially trying to replicate. But when we make it, it comes with all sorts of, you know, a comp accompanied beneficial hormones and all of that. But but also, it's not just the shot of pit. It's also often going to come with tractioning the cord, which is going to require the mom to be on her back and having the placenta be, you know, physically pulled. It's going to often involve fundal abuse, you know, the the intense, very, very, very painful experience of having your, tender tender womb be pushed on and and heavily rubbed. It's also going to include, vigorously rubbing and wiping the baby and, you know, the midwife being involved in all of that. Like, it's yes. It's a shot of Pitt and also it often comes with a whole a whole, like what's the right word? Like Flowery or Yeah. Like, it's like a whole scene that has to happen, which does not allow. Under any circumstances, it could not. It literally makes it impossible for mother baby to settle in and go through their hormonal matrix that is intended for proper bonding and breastfeeding. It literally is a commitment to disrupt that and not allow that to happen, which is Totally. Being abusive and outrageous. Like, I cannot. I cannot. I cannot believe there are women walking around this planet doing that shit to other women, having the audacity to call themselves midwives. Oh my god.
Speaker 4
Mhmm. Yes. Yeah. And it's you know, and everyone's, well, it's life saving. But, and, you know, it's also what it also includes is most often severing the cord prematurely. And exactly as you said, like, it's not just about getting the placenta out. It's it's the beautiful sacred moment of mother and baby meeting and all of the hormones that happens in that bondage that is happening and it's broken it's broken and it's yeah. I mean that's hence saying it's it's it's damaging. It's really, really damaging and it's, it's violent, you know. It's it's so aggressive and it's so violent and it's so not needed. Because as you say, the body produces the exact well, the the divine given, version of that hormone. So, yeah. So so it was that, and it was also there was something along the lines that they said, because you allow women to do what they wanna do in birth, you're a threat to their safety. So I mean and I was I was so angry about that because how how just undermining and, like, disregarding to the woman is that? Like, because, you know, they they they they actually said to me and my my partner because we were working at the time, oh, women do not have the wherewithal in labor to make decisions for themselves. Right. Right. Absolutely. Yeah. I just
Speaker 3
Every movie, every I mean, you know, even even in the court system. Right? Like, court systems around the world. Part of part of how lawsuits are won is being like, I was manipulated. I didn't I didn't know that I was doing this. Right? Like, my fault because I'm just a stupid little lady. I can't make my own decisions. I mean, everything worldwide is predicated on us being inferior and fucking stupid. Of course, you were sent that. Yes. Because to actually see women as old beings, as capable adults, undermines the entire obstetrics system. Mhmm. You couldn't the world could not get away with what they're doing to women if if they didn't first see women as inferior and incapable. Yeah. Of course, you're
Speaker 4
a threat.
Speaker 3
Yeah. Threat to women. You're a threat to the system.
Speaker 4
Yeah. So I just I just recently, like, in response to that, made a an in like, a spoken word Instagram post because I was just feeling so angry. I jumped onto the drama triangle, which is just the most awesome tool that we learned at the radical birth keeper school. And I jumped onto the drama triangle. I'm like, I'm totally committed to being on the drama triangle about this. I'm gonna I'm gonna yeah. I don't know. It's gonna be a hard one to let go of before I die.
Speaker 3
So but is that, like, whole case closed, or is there still something going on there?
Speaker 4
So, essentially, we were given a given a warning to stop practicing. And it's practicing. And it's it's so hilarious because they said and because you're not registered with the traditional healers association, but they there is no one to register with because they haven't put this through. So, essentially, it was a warning to stop practicing. And, I mean, my my sister, Ruth, and I kinda knew that before we got this final report. And so we have we did stop our practice that we were we, we were working. Our practice was called circle of elephants, and we were working together, and we stopped in July this year, because we kinda knew that's what was gonna happen.
Speaker 3
It's like, stop trusting women. Stop. Stop it. We're gonna come after you if you support women to do what they want.
Speaker 4
But I guess I guess I could say that my mistake was trying to trying to be underground, but kind of have been sort of, I guess, perverted in a way to continue to try and do this this other thing that I thought was the right thing to do or the safe thing to do. Right. And I think that was my mistake, and, it's it took me some time to figure that out.
Speaker 3
So tell us kind of, like, catch us up to date then. So then you close down Circle of Elephants. You get that warning to not let women make their own decisions. And and then who are you? You enroll in the school and, like, take us to the last five months, and who are you now with all of this?
Speaker 4
Yeah. I mean, I think what is so important about this work of being a birth keeper is, like, internal work, is self work, is, like, deep, deep, deep self work. And I was already feeling some years ago that something had to change, and, I embarked on some really incredible, like, deep sort of inner work journeys. Because I I really I mean, a few things went down in the last few years that were really dark, and and I kind of experienced, like, so much fear that I was gonna end up being, like, locked up and not seeing my children. I mean, that's where it was getting to. So I really I really journeyed to the underworld, like, in a big, big way. And, and, yeah, just being part of the community of the Radical Birthkeeper School, meeting you and Yolanda and, you know, all the beautiful women, in on this journey, it was kind of like the final circling back to myself. I feel like at the end of the the journey of the school, I said to the some of the sisters, like, it feels like I've circled back to the little girl that I was and, like, totally trust in the magic again of life and death, birth, life, and death, everything in between of that. And, it's sort of it's just it's really brought me home. It's brought me home, like, in such a big way. And I know that I will keep on being there for women forever, and it's it's really given it's freed me. It's freed me in many ways. I feel so strengthened from being part of this.
Speaker 3
You closed down, you know, the old company. Like, who will you be now in your community with birth work?
Speaker 4
Actually, before before sort of the radical birth, keep the school, I already had a couple of people, like, saying, I just wanna I just wanna free birth. Could we just chat a little bit? Like, could we just do a few sessions in pregnancy? I just wanna kind of get my head straight. And it was so wonderful doing that and getting these getting these calls from women, yeah, afterwards. The one time, my really dear friend I was with her with her second when her second baby was born. She, she called me and she's like, Caitlin, I'm I don't know what to do. This is really intense. And then the next sentence was, oh, the head's out. It's like a baby. And I went back to sleep.
Speaker 3
Love crystal balls.
Speaker 4
Yeah. So it started happening organically, and I think what I am for women I think the thing is is that I had to kind of become the wise woman for myself first in a way. And, I think that's what's organically happening in my community. Women are not only asking me about birth, they're approaching me about so many other things. Just last night, I, held space for a woman who was a previous client of mine for, like, her birthday celebration because she wanted a woman's circle for her birthday celebration, but she wasn't quite sure how to hold it. So I was I I I said, sure. I'll come. I'll come and be there for you and with you, and it was so beautiful. So, like, it's what I've always wanted and what I've always been striving for and what I feel like I have be cut been becoming, but it sort of feels like I've really stepped into that now. I
Speaker 3
will attend births?
Speaker 4
I will. I will. I I mean, there already are people actually, also, someone phoned me and she's like, I really am being called to sort of have I have a shamanic birth. This is what I'm being called to do, and I heard you're not working anymore, but would you just be there? Would you just sit in the corner or, like, be in my house? And, of course, I'm gonna say yes. But, also, again, through being part of the school, I've really gotten into integrity with myself and ex and and with how I say things, which is, I mean, I always feel like I have been in integrity, but it's they've been like they were just certain Yeah. Sort of just loose ends. And I've kind of like I've they've all found each other. So it's like instead of threads dangling, you know, kind of blowing in the wind, it's almost like I've made I've woven a tapestry, and it's sort of all together. And and there's so much clarity. There's so much clarity. And in that in that clarity and integrity, women can choose. You know? Women that's what we believe. Right? That women women know what they need. So once it's said in that way, women you know, I've had some women say, yes. That's exactly what I want. I want to be radically responsible for my birth. I wanna birth my baby on my own terms, in my own way, and I would just like a sister to be somewhere close. And other women have said, I'm not ready for that yet. I that doesn't feel right for me, and that's great. You know? That's that's absolutely fine.
Speaker 3
How has the the fabric of your social scene shifted and what internally and externally, you know, from being long ago this good little student midwife, you know, to now dropping the the title and stepping into this, what we would both describe as authentic midwifery role, you know, outside of the medical paradigm, more of the shamanic space holder, and this whole transformation you've been through in the last six months, like you said, weaving together these final loose ends, I imagine that the the birth scene socially has also then changed.
Speaker 4
Yeah. It's certainly has changed. I think, as I mentioned before, midwifery has and I don't think it's unique to South Africa. I think it's all over the world. It's it hasn't been a friendly or easy place. Using my voice more, has definitely put me into some, I guess, situations where people feel affronted by what I have to say. I, at the moment, have lost touch with a few of my previous teachers and friends, which I I trust that in in time, if if it's meant to be, you know, it'll it'll be it it's fine. It's it's it feels fine that that's how it has that's what has happened. It was also a journey. It was like yeah. It was kind of bound to happen if this is if I was gonna stand up and say, I'm not gonna play the game anymore. I'm not gonna play this game in any way, shape, or form. And people who
Speaker 3
who are aren't just devoted to playing that same game but want everyone else to play that same game are not going to have the maturity or willingness to allow for anything else. You know? Like, it doesn't Yeah. One narrative that they need to cling on to because they've created a whole identity around it, similar to all the other stuff going on in the world right now.
Speaker 4
Absolutely. Absolutely. And, I mean, even doulas have been have been kind of upset with me recently for what I'm saying, about birth and about attending birth. I realized that doulas also are so often, kind of co opted into the system as well, you know, just as an ins yeah. I once got asked at a at a home birth that I was attending by a doula, Why aren't you doing a vaginal exam? The woman I was like, why would I do that? And what she reflected afterwards was that she was so used to being on a timeline in births and hospitals. So I've found I've found myself, I guess, in challenging situations with both midwives and doulas, and and some friends of mine who are doctors. And the thing is is that I that's the interesting thing. A couple of years ago, this would have been excruciating for me to be in that position of having kind of lost good relationships with people. But I am okay with it right now. I feel I feel like it's part of my journey, and I'm willing to let go of of certain relationships to, yeah, really walk in my truth.
Speaker 3
Yeah. It's really interesting, even alarming. Who falls away when you suggest that you trust women? It's really interesting who will stand up and throw you under the bus and no longer be able to have you at the table when when you just literally come come out as standing for this crazy idea that adult women could make their own decisions and that we could actually support them and show up for that. It's alarming to to see, like, the more the more I've stepped out, the more I've spoken up to just see the waves of of how much it reveals, you know, that that that their own misogyny. Like, that they're I remember kind of when I first got into free birth and talking about it at, like, doula meetups in LA, And women would literally get up and sit on a different side of the table than me. Like, they couldn't that I was interested in this idea that women could do whatever the fuck they wanted with their lives. And people were so they couldn't even be near me talking to me. Like, heartbreaking. I mean, it still is, but it was my first time being like, oh, shit. Everyone's a liar. Everyone's lying. You fucking liars are all saying you trust birth and you trust women and none of you are telling
Speaker 4
the truth.
Speaker 3
Oh my god. I had it took me realizing that I had been a liar for so freaking long. And it took me stop you know, it took me stopping lying to see these deep, deep waves of misogyny in the birth world and women themselves, obviously, and doctors, but that was not surprising. But, you know, when you stand up and suggest that we could actually just trust women and that women actually should get to make decisions for their baby. You know? Crazy, crazy idea. Anyone, you know, like, it's such a litmus test. Right? Anyone who finds that to be triggering or polarizing or or irresponsible. Wow. What a reveal. Good information. But I hear you. I mean, it's the same thing. Right? Like, there's so much freedom to be had as you wade through these waters and as you see who's still standing. Once you've declared your truth and once you've declared in the public sphere and your social, you know, surroundings, once you've really said who you are and where you stand, which is entirely and completely with women and mothers, anyone who falls away, it's a fucking blessing.
Speaker 4
Mhmm.
Speaker 3
You know? Like I said in this right? Like, the playground's gonna get smaller, but the people who stay in the arena are gonna be a lot more fun. Right? It's a real game.
Speaker 4
Yeah. Well, in in some ways, it's gotten it's gotten bigger for me because actually, because I I left a group today, with doulas and midwives. It I just got completely triggered when someone just nonchalantly asked, like, where can where can someone get their baby circumcised? I was, like, I can't be part of this group anymore. It's just so I left, and someone sent me a private message saying, hey. Why did you leave? I was just like, well, I can't deal with this. It's just it's yeah. It just doesn't sit with me. And, actually, I'm part of a group of incredible, beautiful, strong women from around the world who are speaking about really interesting things, things that I'm gonna continue to grow through and from and think about and, you know, continue my journey of learning, because I'm gonna be learning forever. Yeah. So in some ways, it's like you've also gotta be willing to sacrifice. I mean, that's kind of what traveling to the under underworld is, isn't it? It's like about accepting that death's gonna happen. And, yeah, when you get reborn, things are a bit different.
Speaker 3
Yeah. And we wanna hang out in arenas where a woman mutilating her infant is is the is the is the minority, right, if if existing at all. Like, I don't wanna be in spaces where it's the norm to hurt your baby. No.
Speaker 4
No. Asserting myself feels good.
Speaker 3
Yeah. I mean, it's really like, let the world know you. Let the world know you and see what happens. And it's not for the weak hearted. Right? The weak hearted will not let the world know them. And that's, you know, that's their life to live. But the strong hearted will reveal who they really are, and they will reap the rewards. You know? Mhmm.
Speaker 4
Yeah. It's yeah. It's it's totally coincided with the whole craziness of the last two years and, you know, what's happening and what because COVID and birth are so parallel. It's so, like, glaringly obvious that they both, you know, it the system is broken. The system is not serving people at all. And, it's just been inspiration for me to speak out louder, actually. So
Speaker 3
I mean, I I would argue, though I know we'll arrive at the same thing, but I would argue that the system is perfectly intact and it's doing what it's always intended to do. Because to suggest that it's broken means that it was once fixed, like, that it was once you know what I mean? And it was Yeah. This is exciting.
Speaker 4
Yes. Yes.
Speaker 3
What it set out and and it's
Speaker 4
It was designed it was designed to do what it's doing. Absolutely. It was designed to break the bondage of mothers and babies right from the start because yeah.
Speaker 3
Keep us hurt and traumatized and keep us completely addicted to medical consumerism.
Speaker 4
One hundred percent. We've arrived in the same place.
Speaker 3
So how can women find you?
Speaker 4
So, I'm on Instagram at birth into underscore essence, and my website is w w w dot birth into essence dot org. Awesome. That's where I am. Yeah. Alright. Thank you, Emilee.
Speaker 3
And that's it for today, my sisters. Check out everything we do, including one on one and group coaching. Learn about our private membership, in person retreats, and more on free birth society dot com. Our online courses are on free birth society courses dot com, including our flagship course, the complete guide to free birth. Don't miss the radical birth keeper school if you're ready to become the authentic midwife that women are searching for. Together we rise and the revolution starts inside each of us. I'll leave you with our free birth society theme song, wild woman by Aruba Red.
Speaker 2
I honor you for the wisdom you held, the ancient traditions of plant medicine and womb magic. Magic. I feel the spirit of the ancestors not allow the separation of our young to be forced upon me. My sisters will no longer birth in captivity. The picket line redefined from burning our wild women to paralyzing us and drugging our babes. Strapped down in a clinical white bed, drying up the milk from our breasts, keep your needles. My family will never again be doomed to chase those dragons all your poison. We reject your fear. We choose love. Everything with intention. Death, ascension. I will fly and bring her back to the star. Wild woman, she still lives inside.
Speaker 0
Wild
Speaker 2
woman, from you, I will not hide. They could not bend
