Speaker 0
Welcome to the Free Birth Podcast, a supportive space for people who are learning, exploring, and celebrating their autonomous choices in child childbirth. Together, we'll unpack truths, share personal stories, and claim our ability to birth freely and intuitively. Here's your host, Emily
Speaker 1
Saldea. Are you craving a community of like minded women? Do you feel like an outsider in your family or your community? Well, I may have the place for you. We have a Freebird Society private online community that's full of radical and wild women just like you. If you resonate with the topics that we explore on this podcast and wanna belong in a circle of women who support each other in the self exploration of free birth and wild mothering, come join us. You can apply online at our website, free birth society dot com. It's where myself and my team are hanging out these days, and we would love to get to know you. This week, I sit down with Amber, the host of the Medicine Stories podcast. Following her intuition to free birth with her first child, Amber tells us the refreshing story of how her grandmother and mother came in in Amber's time of need to support her in finishing the birth of her child. And then a decade later, as Amber prepared for her second child, her beloved mother was tragically killed in a car accident. Amber shares with us the emotional journey of that pregnancy and why she chose to be surrounded by a circle of women in her second birth.
Speaker 2
So take me back to, you know, like I said, when I when I ask you, you know, where does your motherhood journey begin, what comes to mind as the as the first spark of that?
Speaker 3
That's sweet question. I'm excited to answer it because for me, it was when my sister was born. I was two years and four months old. And my mom said that I was just little mommy from day one, you know, and that I didn't have any of the jealousy or anything. And but I was just, like, right there beside her, mothering this little this little baby. So my whole life, I think with that sort of as a foregrounding, my first two memories are from the night my mom went into the hospital, and my parents took me to their friend's house who had a little girl kind of my age, but we weren't that close. So it was unusual, and I strongly remember playing My Little Ponies on the floor by a nightlight because it was like the middle of the night. Aw. And then I really remember the next day after she had been born, my dad holding me over the hospital bed and seeing my mom holding my sister. So, I mean, that's not totally abnormal to have memories that early at all, but it is a little on the earlier side. I feel
Speaker 2
like it's a little
Speaker 3
Yeah. And so I just felt, like, the enormity and the the sacredness Totally. Of this little person coming into our family. And I just always knew I wanted to be a mom, like, my entire life. You know, when people ask that question, it was just the one thing I had to do. And I really hoped I would have girls, and I did. Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2
So did you feel
Speaker 3
as a
Speaker 2
child, did you feel, you know, with some understanding now as an adult about, you know, spirit babies and and, you know, traveling with our with our babies to some degree in the spirit realms? Like, did you feel a connection to them before they arrived?
Speaker 3
No. I wouldn't say that. In fact, my oldest, like, really surprised me with her spirit. She just wasn't what I thought she would be, you know. I I thought I would feel like she was an old soul, you know? And but when she came out, I was just like, I don't I don't know you. Right. I still feel that way about her, like but then with my little one, I'm like, oh, yeah. I I know you. Mhmm. Like, yeah. That's cool. A lot more familiar. Yeah. So it's interesting, and I I'm hesitant about, like, sharing that story with my oldest because, it just seems like something that could be become a story in her mind that's maybe not wholly positive. But
Speaker 2
Mhmm. Totally. Because it's almost saying, like, you're a stranger, but your sister wasn't.
Speaker 3
Right. Yeah. But she's just like I don't she's just got the spark, this, like, universal energy about her that is, new to me.
Speaker 2
Mhmm. Well, that's a nice way to say it.
Speaker 3
Yeah. Yeah. I know. It's she's amazing.
Speaker 2
Yeah. Okay. So then so you've always known you wanted to be a mom and you felt that calling in your heart and and then what? And then just
Speaker 3
And, like, I always worked with kids and then, I discovered the idea of home birth when I was, like, twenty one years old or something. My mom had just turned fifty five and started being mailed this, like, older ladies magazine. I remember her being like, I didn't ask for this. You know? I'm not old yet. And there was, like, a birth a home birth story in one of them that just totally blew my mind. And then a few months later yeah. I remember crying reading it. A few months later, I picked up women's bodies, women's wisdom, that giant book by doctor Christiane Nordman. Needs to go get that book. Yeah. And she talks about home birth and that too, and I was like, oh my gosh. Okay. First of all, I have to have home births. And second of all, I think I wanna be a midwife. So, like, I went to a midwifery today conference in Eugene, Oregon in two thousand three. I started subscribing to midwifery today magazine and mothering magazine back when it was a print magazine. It's so good. So, you know, didn't end up becoming a midwife. But, yeah, I was just really focused on on motherhood from that time, and I didn't have a partner. And I didn't know when it would happen for me, and it ended up happening three years after that point.
Speaker 2
So still pretty young.
Speaker 3
I'll take care of that. Okay. Yep. And my girls are ten years apart.
Speaker 2
Right. Okay. And so take me to that to that pregnancy.
Speaker 3
Yeah. Okay. So it was so young so young. And her dad was, twenty one when she was born, and I was twenty five. And so we got pregnant two weeks after we met each other. Oh my gosh. Conceived so young. Right? We conceived, on psilocybin mushrooms in the Redwood Forest outside of Santa Cruz, Big Basin, and it was our first time. It was just like, you know, super beautiful and magical and amazing. And when I look back on it, I guess I just wasn't tracking my periods back then because I wasn't even thinking about it. You know? But I remember the next the next morning, I said something to him like, I would have your baby. You know? And he's like, yeah. I would do that with you too. And I said, wouldn't it be amazing to have a a a free birth, an unassisted birth? Because I had heard about that being a thing, and he was like, yeah. I would totally do that. He was like a super DIY type Mhmm. You know? And, and so it's just weird that we had that conversation that that's crazy. Right? And then a few weeks later, we find out we're pregnant. We're like I mean, we we were just like, yes. You know? Wow. Yes. Let's do it.
Speaker 2
So you, ten plus years ago, had already heard about free birth.
Speaker 3
Yes. I don't know if I'd heard of it or if I just had the idea, like, we can do it. People have been doing it forever. But I remember during that pregnancy, like, we didn't we couldn't afford Internet at home or anything, and I would go to this learning center, and I printed out massive pages about unassisted birth. Just what I could find on the Internet at that time. There was one website. I'm sure you know the woman's name, but I can't think of it right now. Laura had a bunch of information. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2
What's her? Shanley.
Speaker 3
Yep. Yep. Yep. It was her.
Speaker 2
I think her website is unassisted childbirth dot
Speaker 3
com or something like that.
Speaker 2
She lives here. We're friends now.
Speaker 3
Oh, yeah. Yeah. Okay. Well, very inspiring. Yeah. But meanwhile, we did have a midwife up here where I live now, And she was great. Everything was going fine with her. And then we ended up moving an hour away back to Sacramento where we had originally met. I'm in Grass Valley, Nevada City now. And, at my five month checkup, she was palpating my belly, and I just got this really strong no. Woah. And I think of it as, like, that first real hit of mothering intuition because I didn't understand it. I was like, but I really like her. I'm like, why would this be happening? But I remembered that conversation that we had had five months previous about an unassisted birth. So when we got home, I was like, I'm kind of feeling like maybe that's just actually what we're supposed to do. And he was like, yeah. I'm totally fine with that.
Speaker 2
It's interesting that you went from being in interested in the midwifery world, you know, and getting the book and going to the or getting the magazines, going to the conference, and even seeking out a midwife, but there was still this other piece of you that was was feeling called to not have to not have that. So was it specifically if you can remember, was it specifically being called to to really walk it alone, or was it just that you weren't connecting with that one midwife?
Speaker 3
No. Because we'll get to this. She ended up being my midwife for my second child. Oh, that's true. I think that was kinda sweet for both of us. But yeah. No. It was just feeling called to do it alone and really trusting birth. Just everything I had read and heard over the previous few years, I really trusted birth. And I really like being alone. I like going into, like, those deep spaces alone. I don't like feeling observed. Mhmm. I'm more comfortable with it now. But I was just like, I just think I'm just gonna wanna be alone, but, like, that's it. And I trust it. I'm not afraid of it. Right. And we did live two minutes away from the UC Davis Medical Center there in Sacramento, and we had, like, a backpack just in case, you know, we weren't being, totally you know, we were we were prepared if something happened, and we almost got there. Okay.
Speaker 2
So you're seeing a midwife in your first pregnancy, and then do you stop care and actually, like, break up with her, or do you kinda do
Speaker 3
Yeah. So I called her and told her what we were thinking, and she was like, okay. But come see me one more time. You know? Let's, like, talk about it in person, and let me tell you the things I would tell you if you're gonna do this alone. So she totally gave us her blessing and, like, gave us her list of, things to have on hand. And she gave me a really good piece of advice that I did not take, which was to have women there or to have at least one other woman present. And I think I think the lack of those women is what got me stuck, but we'll we'll get to that part of the story. It's really beautiful how it all played out. So, yeah, she was sweet. Gave us gave us our blessing her blessing, and then we went on. And we didn't tell anyone that we had canceled the midwives as we called it, you know, because, you know, we just don't want people's fear energy Totally. Getting on us. But my mom, who I was very close to, she died in a car accident three years ago. Oh, my god. She figured it out, you know, because we were so close and we talked so often and she was so excited about this baby. I remember at one point, like, with a month to go or something, she was like, Amber, what like, what happened to the midwives? I was like, oh, well, okay. You know, we told her and she was like, okay. I trust you. You know, I trust you, but I don't like it. But, okay. We felt good. We were doing a lot of research, that Elizabeth Davis's book, The Heart in Hands, like, we read that. My partner read it. He really wanted to be totally prepared for, you know, the little things that can go wrong that are fixable at home still. We were we were just fine. We were excited. We were trusting it. You know? We were really trusting it. And so she was eight days past the due date. It was August in Sacramento. It was so high. It was miserable. I just I hate the last few weeks of pregnancy. I hate it.
Speaker 2
And, Especially if it's hot.
Speaker 3
Yeah. Yeah. Both my girls was like that. And then one night, he was massaging my back, and we both heard a pop. And I stood up and the water just gushed out. And that was, like, at eight thirty at night. Yeah. We were like, oh, okay. This is it. This is it. Oh, and the midwives had, lent us their their birthing tub too, like, the big plastic horse trough Mhmm. Tub. And so we had that set up, and we had done the trial run, and we were ready. We set it up, and I basically labored through the night on my own. I kinda let him he was in and out of sleep. You know? He was, like, trying to be there for me, but I was like, I'm fine. I remember being in the shower and on the toilet, and we got in the tub around, I don't know, sometime in the early morning. And we're in there for hours and hours and hours together, and this was when I was really getting stuck. You know, looking back on it, like, energetically, physically, things just weren't progressing. And, of course, I was tired at that point. And then by now, it's like mid afternoon. It was probably around twelve thirty that we were starting to be like, okay. Should we should we go to the hospital? Because there's a little bit of meconium that we noticed in the water. And we were like, okay. This might be the time that we say, okay. Let's just let's be smart, you know, let let's let's move on. And so okay. I was living in Sacramento at the time. My grandmother, my mother's mother also still lives in Sacramento. She's ninety seven now. My mom still lived in South Lake Tahoe where I had grown up, and she had taken this week off of work to be there when the baby came. But because the baby was eight days late, she had to be at work the next day. And she stayed at my grandma's house. And we because, like, we had this thing thing about we're gonna do it totally alone. We didn't let them know that I was in labor. We turned our phones off, and we locked the front door. And my partner put a sign up. It was like
Speaker 2
Smart.
Speaker 3
Beautiful soul is coming through. Please don't knock or, you know, some stuff. So, in the tub, I'm just, like, slipping. Like, my mind is slipping. I don't know what to do. I'm, like, shaky. And then all of a sudden from the back of the house, my mom and my grandma come in. Oh. Yeah. They, you know, they knew, like, they're not answering their phones, like, what's going on? They came to the front door and we're like, no. We're coming in and so they snuck around back and, when they entered the room, it was just like it was just like everything changed. Wow. You know, I just I felt like the light in the room changed. They were just like these angels.
Speaker 2
Oh. I mean Oh my god. I have goosebumps.
Speaker 3
Yeah. I was really close to both of them. You know? They're just just amazing in people. My mom was the best mom. And so
Speaker 2
And I love that that it was it was about the women and the elders in your family hearing the call and knowing to be there versus, you know, we hear so many stories of sabotage, of the fear winning, and and people coming over uninvited. So it's so profound to hear a story of of the opposite of of true, like, matriarchal line coming to to support you and bring light to that. That's so
Speaker 3
beautiful. Yeah. And I was just talking to my grandma about it, like, a month ago, and she was like, I remember your mom was just like, we're going. We're going. She's having my grandbaby. You know? Like, she needs us. It's time. Mhmm. And so we told them what had been going on. They were like, you need to get out of the tub, which, of course, was what needed to happen all those hours.
Speaker 2
Fresh energy.
Speaker 3
Yeah. Yeah. And so they helped me out. I was, like, was shaking and so tired. Mhmm. And I went and I sat on the toilet, and my partner knelt in front of me. And my mom was next to me, and my grandma was kinda behind my mom. It was like this narrow Mhmm. Bathroom. And my partner almost immediately was like, she's coming. So I stood up and kind of, like, leaned over him with my hand on the wall and, you know, that last moment where you're like, I can't do it. So I was thinking that I was like, I'm gonna die. I just can't do this. And then I I literally thought, like, okay. The woman who gave birth to me is right there, and the woman who gave birth to her is right behind her. And that line of women who gave birth to women goes back Wow. So far in time. And if they did it, I can do it. And just that final push and she came out. Oh my god. I mean, we hadn't done the testing, so we didn't know it was a girl, but we were calling her a girl the entire time. You knew. Yeah. But I remember we're sitting back down on the toilet just exhausted, you know, and my mom being like, it's a girl. I'm being like, yeah. Yeah. Of course it's a girl. I was still, like, just felt super, like, blessed and honored that my mom had been the one to know that. Oh. To, like, call it in, you know. That is so sweet. What a great story. I know. I mean, it was you know, it's just some every time I think about it, I'm like, wow. Mhmm. What a beautiful, beautiful blessing. And I wrote up the birth story a few months later and posted it online. It was called matrilineal love was what I titled the birth story. And, since then, that's really become, like, a focus of my work in the world is, you know, ancestors and especially through the mother line and, like, the bonds between mothers and daughters and grandmothers and granddaughters. And I the I think that my my oldest daughter's birth has so much to do with, like Totally. In the world now.
Speaker 2
Oh my god. Of course. Ugh. So beautiful. Do you remember your placenta being born?
Speaker 3
Yeah. Yeah. So we laid on the bed. And, yeah, I don't know. An hour or so later, I was like, oh, that's coming out too. I think we yeah. I did it on the toilet again. Went back to the toilet and had this beautiful bowl that someone had gifted us because we were gonna do the lotus birth. Mhmm. So, yeah, we did that.
Speaker 2
So how was your immediate post partum? Were your women around in those early days
Speaker 3
to care for you? My mom called in sick the next day, but then she had to go back the next day because she was taking over a week off. And then my partner had to go back to work two days later. What? Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2
So what did your postpartum look like those first?
Speaker 3
It's just me alone crying. Damn. And, you know, he was great when he came back from work, but he worked forty hours a week. Yeah. My mom came whenever she could. You know, his mom and grandma came. My dad came. There were there are people trying to be there, but yeah. No. I was alone a lot. I was it was hard. It was really hard. Yeah. And I was vegan. So as per month I'm breastfeeding. As the months went on, I was getting more and more undernourished.
Speaker 2
Mhmm.
Speaker 3
So it was like a really I was really weak and anemic and tired. It just it wasn't working for me. So, yeah, it was a pretty rough postpartum.
Speaker 2
Yeah. Sounds like it. God, it's such a I just did an episode with this postpartum woman who talks about the about pregnancy brain and, mama brain and how our brains change once we have a baby. And, yeah, just talking about the diff the tilt of integration and how linked it is to support, like, the ability to integrate the experience can kind of fundamentally down come down to how supported are you or not, how respected are you or not, for that integration piece to be easeful or not. You know? Yeah. So so much is happening, obviously. Damn. Okay. That's interesting. So pretty pretty epic birth into your your family trying to cobble together as much support as they can, but, of course, they all have to work and and you're spending a lot of time alone. So then you shift your diet, I'm assuming, to start to feel better.
Speaker 3
Yeah. My first herb teacher, Cammie McBride, who's been on my podcast twice now. She's amazing. I started doing, like, an apprenticeship with her when my oldest was seven months old. And during one of those first classes, she sat me down at lunch and was, like, you're vegan. Right? I can tell by looking at you. And I was, like, yeah. And she was, like, I don't really do this, but, like, you have to stop because I can tell by looking at you that you're not well, and it's not gonna get better.
Speaker 2
Dang.
Speaker 3
And she was like, I'm gonna go into my house right now and get you some, sardines. Will you eat them? And I was like, probably. Yeah. Because I've been wanting I've been wanting to eat meat. I've been talking about it with my partner, but she was really like, no. You know? But then we both ended up making this huge shift into, like, traditional foods and organ meats and, you know, good fats.
Speaker 2
Yeah. Totally. So, so you're you're doing this apprenticeship and you're you've done this major shift of how you're eating, you're feeling better, now you have this little baby, you're finding your work with this, you you know, you mentioned your ancestral work, and, and so what does it kind of in a nutshell look like to bring us into
Speaker 3
a whole decade of your life? Yeah. Yeah. Well, interestingly that my, birth story that I wrote out, I submitted it to some website and, that's not around anymore, although I'm still connected to the woman who did it, and she's gonna be on the show coming up up too. Right. And that and it kinda got I mean, for me at that time, you know, two thousand six, like, a lot of attention. People really responded and resonated with the story. And then I started a blog two years later, and that was the first thing I posted on my blog. And I still have people who, like, hear my podcast or find me on Instagram or something who are like, I remember you. I remember your birth story from way back then. Or people who have been with me the whole time since that birth story, which is amazing because it's been over ten years. Wow. And so that blog, I wrote about birth. I wrote about mothering, breastfeeding, herbalism, food, stuff like that, and it's just kind of transitioned me now. Ten years later, I've been blogging the whole time. The subjects have kind of changed, but mostly remain the same in a lot of ways too. Yeah. It's got me to what I'm doing now, selling herbal medicine and having my podcast. And at some point, my oldest father and I split up. I was a single mom for, I don't know, years, so so broke, just trimming weed, trying to make money to survive, having various weird roommate situations.
Speaker 2
You know, the Nevada City way.
Speaker 3
Yeah. Yeah. Way So
Speaker 2
how long were you a single mama?
Speaker 3
From when she was five until my husband and I only moved in together when I was pregnant, like, eight months pregnant because we were in the house buying process through most of the pregnancy.
Speaker 2
And how old is your daughter, your second daughter?
Speaker 3
The youngest is two and a half. Okay. The oldest is twelve and a half.
Speaker 2
Okay. Wow. That's wild. Yeah. Okay. So you do the single mama thing, you're just trying to survive and take us into the next kind of phase of your life where, you're doing this work, you're now in a new relationship, and tell me about this this second pregnancy.
Speaker 3
Yeah. Okay. So Owen and I got together almost six years ago now, I guess. And I didn't even realize that he was a plant person when I was, like, totally falling for it. You know, it took, like, one night for us to totally fall in love even even though we denied it for a while.
Speaker 2
And so
Speaker 3
slowly, he was getting integrated into the medicine making and the harvesting and all that, and that was really sweet. And then and so that's what we do together now, like, in our lives and our our home out here. But the pregnancy for me is so so tied in to my mom's death. So Oh, yeah.
Speaker 2
Those were, like, really close to each other.
Speaker 3
They yes. They were very, very interrelated, I think. Wow. And I had spent, you know, just basically my oldest daughter's whole life wondering if I was gonna do it again. Am I gonna have another child? And I always wanted at least two, but I was also, like, so broke. You know? I was like, I'm not I'm not doing it again, broke. It's just too hard, and I'm not supported enough. And I just don't know if I'm gonna do it. And then one night in early November two thousand sixteen, Owen and I were hanging out. We hung out together all day just doing stuff, and somehow the conversation kept coming back to having a child. And we had been, like, we're not gonna have kids, you know, all the years we've been together to that point. And something about that day, we were just like, okay. Let's have a child.
Speaker 2
That's huge. Yeah. It was been together for years and we're like, we're not gonna have a kid.
Speaker 3
Yes. Yes. Wow. Yeah. And that and it was the new moon in Scorpio because I went to a new moon circle that night. And, like, the card I pulled and the stuff that kept coming up was, like, I'm gonna have another child. I mean, it was it was bizarre. Like, someday, I'm gonna tell the whole story, but it was unreal what was coming back at me as far as, like, yeah, have another child. Especially because another woman at the circle, her oldest was, like, eighteen, and she was just grappling with the fact that she was not gonna have another one. Like, she was too old, and I was just like, I don't wanna be there someday, you know, if I don't do it now. And Owen and I just kinda realized we're solid enough. We could make it work, but we had a plan. Like, well, it'd be great to own a home. You know? Could we make that happen in the next few years? How would we get to that point? So we kind of laid out a plan. And I wasn't sure if I should tell my mom or not that we had made this decision because she wanted nothing more than for me to have another grandbaby for her. She loved being a grandma to my daughter and just she just kinda lived to be a mom and to be a grandma. And she was just about to retire from her job of forty years dealing roulette at Harrah's in Southlake Tahoe, and she and her husband were gonna move up here to be closer to me and my daughter. Okay. So I decided to tell her, and I remember calling her or she called me, and I pulled over on the side of the road and parked. And I told her, and she was so happy. She was so, so happy.
Speaker 2
And Are you her only child?
Speaker 3
No. My sister, two years younger Okay. Who's not having babies. And, like, when I I was just going through our Facebook messages the other day, and she had those last two weeks of her life, like, sent me all his links, like, healthy foods to eat in pregnancy, stuff like that. You know? So two weeks after I told her that, she died in a car accident driving home from work. Fuck. Yeah. Yeah. It's the worst.
Speaker 2
Oh my god. And you were not yet pregnant? No. Just the seed had been planted.
Speaker 3
Yep. Yep. And I remember telling, oh, and in those first few days, like, I don't never mind about the baby. You know? Like
Speaker 2
Yeah.
Speaker 3
Having that my mom moving to our town was a huge part of me thinking I'd be supportive enough to do it. And Totally. And he was like, yeah. No problem. I that makes sense. And then Wow. And then I got pregnant through a condom at my next ovulation, like, three weeks after she died.
Speaker 2
Oh, this baby is so linked to your mom.
Speaker 3
I know. I know. So when I got the pregnant the positive pregnancy test, I was alone. And I immediate I was just sobbing, sobbing, sobbing, sobbing, and just saying thank you. Thank you. It felt like the biggest gift. Like, that that was like a a spiritual experience getting that positive pregnancy test, you know. And I actually called my sister, you know, before I called my husband. Well, I wasn't gonna tell him over the phone. So, you know, I was like, come over today. Right now. Yeah. But I called my sister because it just felt so intertwined with mom. You know? I I just I I wanted her to be the first one to know.
Speaker 2
That's beautiful.
Speaker 3
Yeah. So it it was like with my oldest, it was there was no question that we were gonna have the baby. You know? I was so so thrilled. I couldn't even believe it.
Speaker 2
Well, this adds a lot more context of the choices to to have women with you in this
Speaker 3
Yeah. In this next birth. Yeah. So I just, you know, the aftermath of my oldest daughter's birth was hard too. Like, there was blood everywhere. Like, you know, just you don't think about if you haven't birthed before. And I was like, I want, yeah, I want women there, and I want people to clean up afterward. And I just wanna feel exactly super held and supported this time. Like, I'm not young and, like, all I don't know. I need anymore. Yes. Yeah. Like, yeah. I need comfort now.
Speaker 2
Well and you had the experience of having your women show up at a pivotal time in your labor and witness you, and I assume help you afterwards with love and support in those immediate hours. And so, of course, like you saw how valuable that was and ten years later making a new assessment of of what it should be like. So I'm assuming your grandma didn't come to the next birth?
Speaker 3
Nope. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2
So tell me about that pregnancy and and, I mean, just I I've walked with with a a decent amount of women who were grieving in their pregnancy and and who experienced loss, of people very close to them in in that pregnancy, and it's it's a very unique, way to be pregnant that, is very complicated, I think.
Speaker 3
Yeah. It was interesting because so I had five weeks between her death and finding out I was pregnant. And, you know, those fireworks were hell. And, yeah, it shifted when I found out I was pregnant. Storm cloud lifted.
Speaker 2
But I'm also wondering time wise when you actually conceived.
Speaker 3
Well, it was about three weeks after she died.
Speaker 2
Three weeks after. Okay. So then you found out at at five weeks. So you were very freshly pregnant.
Speaker 3
Yeah. Gotcha. Yeah. Okay.
Speaker 2
So so finding out shifted the energy for you.
Speaker 3
It did. And, yeah, again, I'm you know, we don't ever stop grieving people that we've loved on that level, but, I just I to this day, feel grateful that it it brought me out of the darkest hole that I had been in, and just brought so it's such a gift, you know, that it's such a gift to have been given this child. And, she's so she weighed was kind of jumping ahead a little bit, but she weighed exactly what I weighed at birth, six pounds, four ounces. She looks just like me. She has dark full head of hair. And so in so many ways, I almost feel like I'm experiencing what my mom experienced with me. And just in so many ways, it's connected.
Speaker 2
It's like the wheel of time. It's so yeah, I think it's so so cool.
Speaker 3
Yeah. So, also, right right around this time, I was realizing that, you know, my mom had had a nice retirement account just from dealing roulette for forty years, that my sister and I, you know, both inherited. And I was like, I think I could buy a house, which is crazy, but I think I could buy a house. And so I spent almost the entire pregnancy every single day super focused. Just that, like, nesting instincts, and I felt like it's now or never. Like, I'm not gonna have the energy or time to go through this process again. Right. Or who knows what will happen with the money if another need will come up. Like, I'm gonna buy this fucking house before this baby comes. Wow. What a good idea. I spent. Yeah. I know. I know. I spent the whole pregnancy doing that, and we moved in, like, three weeks before she was born. Oh my gosh. Yeah. It was crazy.
Speaker 2
Is in it is it this house that you're in?
Speaker 3
Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2
Okay.
Speaker 3
We love it. We love this. It's perfect for us. It's on one acre. We can have herbs that we're making for Awesome. Medicines, and it's just perfect for us.
Speaker 2
And she was born in this home?
Speaker 3
Yeah. She was born in a house. So So Yeah. I just knew that I wanted to be surrounded by people this time. Even even back when I was planning my first birth, I had that vision of birthing totally alone, but I also always had this vision of a literal circle of women surrounding a woman giving birth, which is kinda what ended up happening. So we used, the same midwife, Cindy Foxfoot, and her wonderful partner, Kathy Boyer. They're just they're the best. I'm sure, like most women, I could just gush about my midwives for for ages. Such amazing people. They were there, and my sister was there, and my dear friend Jen was there, and then we had a photographer. A acquaintance through my daughter's school had written me and said, I really wanna get into birth photography. I have this great camera. I know you're pregnant. Are you at all interested? And, you know, we said yes. So, it's it was fast and more painful. It's interesting because my first one was seventeen hours, and I swear I didn't feel pain. I never felt pain. I felt extreme intensity, but not pain. And this one was about four hours and
Speaker 2
so Yeah. Painful. Well, that makes sense. Sometime, you know, when they're flying through you, things are opening and stretching at such a faster rate. It can absolutely
Speaker 3
Yeah. And so I'm pointing that too that, like, the longer it takes, the more those, like, anti pain hormones are flooding your system.
Speaker 2
Mhmm. Totally.
Speaker 1
And you have more time
Speaker 2
spiritually to kinda wrap your head around
Speaker 3
it. Totally.
Speaker 2
You know? Or, I mean, it can go either way, you know, certainly people get really heady when it's long too. Seventeen is not long, but but, you know, you I think it it's that dance that you can have the time to really integrate it. But I know women who've had one hour burst, two hour burst, and it's it's it can be traumatic to have it fly through
Speaker 3
you that quickly. It's nuts. That is nuts.
Speaker 2
Okay. So this one felt a lot more intense, but everyone made it. Everyone remember.
Speaker 3
Yeah. Everyone you know, I could just feel that day. I just knew, you know, it's gonna be today. It's gonna be today. And I remember around seven o'clock, like, climbing into bed next to my husband and just I just started silently crying because I just felt, again, the enormity of what was about to happen. Yeah. And my oldest was with her dad that night, and she didn't wanna be there anyway. So it was it was
Speaker 2
good timing. Gonna ask. Okay.
Speaker 3
Yeah. I I would have welcomed it, but she was like, no. And I I knew she would feel that way, and that was fine. So, yeah, everyone made it in time. We had the same big horse trough tub set up. We had a little altar with, like, a photo of my mom nearby. And, yeah, I sat in this chair for a little while while people arrived, and then I got in the tub. And my good friend Jen was rubbing some of my Saint John's wort oil in my back, and that felt really, really good. And I remember I was, like, telling jokes. I was talking about, like, SNL sketches that I thought were funny in the nineties and, like, making weird references. You know? And then, you know, and then it just shifted. The midwives have kind of been trying to nap on the couches, and then they were both, like, at the at the tub. And they told me later, like, your vocalization changed, you know, all of a sudden. And so we knew this is it. And I turned around, you know, I just kind of been sitting at the tub, but I turned around and was, like, holding on to it and kinda leaning forward. And, oh, I mean, it was it was, like, awful. You know, it was so intense and so painful. I was, like, screaming and crying and shaking, but also I was doing it. That's something else I'll say is that with my first, like, I wasn't working with the contractions. I was kind of resisting them because I was like, this is crazy how intense this is. And with this one, I knew how to work with them. Mhmm. And each time it came, especially during, like, the first stage where I was feeling my cervix expanding, I was just working with it. I was going deep within and working with it. I think that's why it happened so fast. I'm I was grateful to, I don't know, have that ability to do that this time. Yeah. I just felt really like like a woman, like a birthing woman. You know? And so she just came out really fast. The midwife said later is about ten minutes or less of Wow. Questions.
Speaker 2
And so with that many people there, it's it's hard for me to imagine it not being disruptive with that. Many at all, but but you just had the right
Speaker 3
They're the right people. Yeah. That I adore. The midwives, of course, were doing their part. They knew just what to do. My husband, with like, his head our heads were pressing against each other's, and, you know, apparently, I was digging my nails into his hands pretty good. Yeah. And then my sister and my best friend, Jen, were both standing right next to me too with their hands on me. So there are photos on my blog of, me in this position, like, screaming and crying, and everyone has their hand on me. Aw. This is I'm literally being surrounded. Like, my my vision from back in the day was and, no, it felt wonderful. And I wasn't even aware that all those people were staying around me actually until I saw the photos later.
Speaker 2
So they just really knew how to hold it.
Speaker 3
Yeah. And I'm I'm so close to my sister and Jen and Owen, and so it was it felt wonderful.
Speaker 2
That doesn't even you know, being close doesn't equal people knowing how to hold the birth space.
Speaker 3
Right. Yeah.
Speaker 2
With these people, it did, obviously.
Speaker 3
They did not. There if I didn't think they could do
Speaker 2
that. Yeah.
Speaker 3
Yeah. Jen's a mom of two and just an amazing woman. So she came out. Oh, god. You know, that relief, that feeling. And I turned around, and the first words out of my mouth were fuck giving birth. And then Yep. That's fair. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2
You're like, what? That was the first thing she
Speaker 3
heard. Alright. And I wanna say, like, I love birth. I still love birth. I love hearing birth stories. I just think it's the most incredible thing. I'm proud of the way I did it with her, and I'm also super stoked to not do it again.
Speaker 2
Yeah. Totally. I mean, it's it's walking through the fire, and it's, it's usually not rainbows and butterflies.
Speaker 3
Mhmm. You know?
Speaker 2
I love it. And then do you remember that placenta being born?
Speaker 3
Yeah. I was on the bed, and the midwives set up, you know, the pads underneath me so it could just come out right on the bed. And that was really nice because with my oldest, I, like, got out of bed, and I was, you know, tired and weak, and that was wonderful. And just having the midwives there, like I was saying, to clean up and, help me take a shower and change the sheets on the bed and make sure everything was set up and then come back the next day. It was amazing. It was amazing.
Speaker 2
Sounds like what authentic midwifery really is.
Speaker 3
Yeah. Yeah. And she was born at two twenty in the morning, and, the three of us lay in bed, and my husband fell asleep. And Nixie, the baby, was sleeping, and I just could not sleep. You know? Okay. I was just staring at my baby.
Speaker 2
Oh, yeah. We were so high. Yeah. And then was this postpartum any better? Did you put more support in place?
Speaker 3
I did. Yeah. Well, I had set things up, like, with my work and my website so that I didn't have any orders to fill or any responsibilities, you know, for at least the first month. And I had just really warned Owen, like, the whole pregnancy is gonna be really hard. It's just gonna be more intense than you can imagine having not done it before. So he was as prepared, I think, as you can be for that. We work from home, so he didn't have to ever leave.
Speaker 2
That's huge. Oh my gosh.
Speaker 3
Yeah. And then having a, at the time, ten year old there was pretty helpful too.
Speaker 2
How was that integration with your older daughter?
Speaker 3
At at that time, it was super easy. She was really happy. You know? And, of course, it's a huge deal among all her friends and you know? So, like, we're getting all the special treatment for the first few months. It was, I think, fun for her. It's a little harder now that she's twelve and Nixie's two. They're both, you know, at difficult ages.
Speaker 2
Yeah. Right. Oh my gosh. Totally.
Speaker 3
And she's kinda like, you know, this kid again. Yeah. Not all the time if Sure. By any means, but that's there right now. But, you know, I could have used a whole lot more support, you know. My mom had been here, or just there there is still plenty and plenty of times where I was just crying and being like, where are my people? Mhmm. Where are my people? And, you know, I'm not Sorry. Go ahead. I was gonna say I do have a lot of friends, but they're all moms themselves. They're all, like, middle age, busy, working moms like me, and it's just they can't stop their lives to be here for me. And
Speaker 2
No. It needs to be it needs to be the an elder of mine always says the handmaidens, which I don't love that term, but, it needs to be the younger women. It needs to be the women who haven't had children either yet or ever. Right. Because exactly. Right? Like, if you have if you have three kids, it's it's your hands are full and or or it could be the grandmothers, you know.
Speaker 3
Yeah. I was gonna say.
Speaker 2
Totally. They talk about it. Robin talks about it in Braiding Sweetgrass, which I'm just finishing right now about, you know, that when when you're a mother, your creation, your whole creative energy is focused on on your children, obviously, but then when they leave and you shift into the crone, that all of a sudden you've now walked through the portal of of being ready now to nurture nourish a whole community. And, you know, obviously, with pretty much zero reference of the elders in our in our culture and and all of us living such individualized isolated lives, it just it's such a shame. Right? Because it's so, like, on the one hand, we talk about it all the time that, like, we all know better, but, like, we all know better, like, us women who are who are in these communities know better and know that women need support. But, where are we, you know, if we have our hands full and if we live, you know, the busy lives that we live. Yeah. And do you
Speaker 3
do you know about the grandmother hypothesis?
Speaker 2
Tell me.
Speaker 3
It it's very close to what you're saying that Robin writes about, but, it's an anthropological idea because most species don't have menopause. You know, when the females are through their childbearing years, they die. And we have this extended period of menopause. And the idea is that humans evolved that way so that the older women could nurture the younger generations specifically. Yeah. And it just yeah. It's so sad that that's our culture is not set up for that to be what's happening.
Speaker 2
Right. Yeah. Totally. And then instead, they're isolated. They're put in homes. Yeah. There's no there's no light and and community, and so then that's like a really dark end of life situation too.
Speaker 3
Mhmm.
Speaker 2
So you said you didn't have the support you didn't have enough support. So was it primarily Owen? And Mhmm. It wasn't like you didn't hire, like, a postpartum doula
Speaker 3
or or No. I just I felt supported enough to not need to do that. Looking back, maybe I would have, but I felt prepared for what I was gonna face. Mhmm. Owen's amazing. And, you know, the midwives make their frequent visits over the first month or something. That that might have probably been helpful. Yeah.
Speaker 2
And did the midwives do any sort of medical management, or was or were they really the authentic?
Speaker 3
Yeah. They did nothing but catch the baby and coach me through the last ten minutes of, like, this is it. It is happening. Keep going. You're almost done. You're doing great.
Speaker 2
Awesome.
Speaker 3
Yeah.
Speaker 2
That's beautiful. And so tell me a little bit about your work in the world before we close so that if anyone is resonating with you and wanna check you out, they know where to find you and and more of what you do.
Speaker 3
Okay. I'm an herbalist, which is a really flexible word for people who don't know. I just like to remind people of that. There's no official certification for herbalism in the United States, which is really a huge blessing. Mhmm. And you can use that word as long as you're using plants for well-being as my definition of it. But my herbalism takes the form of having a line of medicines called mythic medicinals that my husband and I either sustainably and, respectfully wild craft here in the Sierra or grow ourselves. And we have a number of products. I don't know. Maybe twelve or something. And that business has just really taken off over the last couple years. Yeah. It's I I kind of got, like, lucky that herbalism got really popular So Around the time I started finally putting my my knowledge to use there. I've cast medicine stories in two thousand eight seventeen. And we talk about herbalism, ancestry, dreams, earth wisdom, all all sorts of stuff. I it's so hard for me to even, try to define it, but I invite people on to share their own medicine stories, and we tend to kind of focus on the same themes over and over. Ancestry has become a big focus of my work recently.
Speaker 2
Yeah. Just thank you. Thank you for sharing these, and they were Thank you. Refreshing to hear, and just the, wow, I'm just gonna hold that that image in my in my heart now of of your women just coming in and hearing that call and knowing how to do it. And, yeah, it was actually really healing for me to hear as a keeper of so many stories and so many stories that are rooted in the family fear mongering and in the family, not knowing how to do what your mom and what your grandma did. That is such a lighthouse image, you know, for all of our listeners. It's really, really beautiful. So thank you.
Speaker 3
Yeah. And I would just add that, like, they can be that for their own families and descendants going down now. You know, my my grandma, her mom was pretty awful. She birth seventeen children, so she it makes sense, you know, but she wasn't loving. And my grandma grew up in a really difficult household. And when she had kids, she consciously decided I'm gonna do things differently. And it didn't come naturally for her, but she did it. And so I really you know, when I speak about this, it sounds like, oh, Amber just got so lucky. It must be this amazing line of women coming down, but it was my grandma making the decision to change the story for the family. Beautiful. Yeah.
Speaker 2
Thank you so much.
Speaker 3
Yeah. Thank you.
Speaker 1
That's it for today, everyone. Join us next week for another episode of the free birth podcast. Thanks for joining us, and remember, your body, your choice. Lots of love.
