The Skinny Confidential Him & Her Podcast - Everything To Know About Being Pregnant, Healthy Pregnancy, Supplements, Hospital Vs Home Birth, & Hospital BTS Ft. MariMikel Potter

Episode Date: April 7, 2022

#450: On today's show we are joined by MariMikel Potter. MariMikel has a degree in nursing, is a CPM, and mother of 5. She is also on the board of directors of the Texas Association of Midwives and Red Cross certified as an instructure who has been delivering babies for over 30 years. On today's show we dive into everything you need to know about pregnancy and much more.  To connect with Lauryn Evarts click HERE To connect with Michael Bosstick click HERE Read More on The Skinny Confidential HERE For Detailed Show Notes visit TSCPODCAST.COM To Call the Him & Her Hotline call: 1-833-SKINNYS (754-6697) Check Out Lauryn's NEW BOOK, Get The Fuck Out Of The Sun HERE  This episode is brought to you by The Skinny Confidential  The Hot Mess Ice Roller is here to help you contour, tighten, and de-puff your facial skin and It's paired alongside the Ice Queen Facial Oil which is packed with anti-oxidants that penetrates quickly to help hydrate, firm, and reduce the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles, leaving skin soft and supple. To check them out visit www.shopskinnyconfidential.com now.  This episode is brought to you by Wealthfront No One is great at something the first time they try it. And if you’re unfamiliar with investing, getting started can be intimidating. Wealthfront does the work for you, so you can invest like an expert from the beginning. Wealthfront creates automated investment portfolios of diversified, low-cost index funds personalized for you. To open your account all you need is 3 minutes and $500 to invest. Right now you can visit www.wealthfront.com/skinny to get your first $5,000 managed for free.  This episode is brought to you by RITUAL Forget everything you thought you knew about vitamins. Ritual is the brand that’s reinventing the experience with 9 essential nutrients women lack the most. If you’re ready to invest in your health, do what I did and go to www.ritual.com/skinny  Your future self will thank you for taking Ritual: Consider it your ‘Lifelong-Health-401k’. Why put anything but clean ingredients (backed by real science) in your body Produced by Dear Media 

The following podcast is a Dear Media production. This episode is brought to you by Whoop. All right, Michael has been running around our house doing all these health and fitness and wellness things. And one of the things that he has turned me on to is this wearable fitness device. It is called Whoop. I told you, Lauren, this one's the best on the market.

We've tried other wearables throughout the years and this one is my favorite. I like it the best because I can wear it when I sauna, I can wear it when I cold plunge, I wear it when I sauna. I can wear it when I cold plunge. I wear it when I work out. I wear it when I sleep. And in a nutshell, it monitors all my heart rate levels, my HRV, my respiratory rate. It monitors how well I'm recovered, how well I sleep.

It lets you know throughout the night how much rest you're getting, how much deep sleep, how much REM sleep. And it lets you know, okay, maybe today's the day you push a little harder. Maybe today's the day you take it a little easy. And it balances all of this based on your workout, your sleep, and it just lets you know where you're at so you can get the most activity in the best and most productive way. I think this is really cool too, because you can track the quality of your sleep, your heart rate. You can track your respiratory rate and key vital signs. I have learned everything about Michael Bostic. Next, I feel like it's going to be tracking your bowel

movements. Well, listen, if it gets there, then let me know, Whoop. Guys, and make sure if you're checking it out, you want to check out the new 4.0 release. It's 33% smaller and designed with new biometric tracking, including skin temperature, blood oxygen, and more. I'm telling you, this is the wearable fitness device to have if you're going to have one. And of course, Whoop has been so generous. We have an offer for you. You're going to go to Whoop, that's spelled W-H-O-O-P.com and use code SKINNY at checkout. You save 15% off. That's Whoop.com. Use code SKINNY for 15% off. She's a lifestyle blogger extraordinaire. Fantastic. And he's a serial entrepreneur. A very smart cookie. And now Lauren Everts and Michael Bostic are bringing you along

for the ride. Get ready for some major realness. Welcome to the Skinny Confidential, him and her. Aha! You are distracted in birth that it's the same sort of thing, that oxytocin level doesn't get high enough for you to go to the zone. And what happens is that there is a zone like in sex. Sex is transcendental. When it's really wonderful, you lose track of who you are and where you are. And you're no longer two. You are one.

And it is really sacred space and very, very spiritual. I have gotten so many DMs about this episode. I cannot even tell you. You guys have borderline harassed me about when this person is going to be on the podcast. You saw a tease on Instagram story. Mary Michael Potter, she is a birth midwife. In this episode, you are going to learn everything and anything that you can learn about giving birth naturally, holistically at home and in the hospital. She gives so many tangible takeaways. I had pages of notes. This is a super interesting, engaged episode, even for the guy. If there was somebody that was born to be on a mic, born for podcasting, it's Mary Michael Potter.

I was blown away. And this is a topic that I was like, oh, maybe I'll take a little bit of a backseat here, which I did. But I was fascinated the entire time, not only because of the stuff that she was sharing in this episode, but she is a born talent on the mic.

Mary Michael, let me sign you to Dear Media. What is going on? Call me. She is a nurse midwife and the mother of five. She's lived in Austin, Texas since the 70s, where she attended the University of Texas. And she has done thousands of at-home childbirths. She was recommended to me by Hope Smith of Mother. Hope is coming on the podcast too. I'm very excited about that. And Hope knows her shit when it comes to all things babies. I am so excited to welcome Mary Michael Potter to the Skinny Confidential Him and Her podcast. This episode, be open-minded and just listen because you will not believe

what you learn about the birthing process. On that note, Mary Michael. This is the Skinny Confidential, him and her. Okay, I'm so glad to have you here because I actually ran out of gas the other day and Michael was so mad. Can you defend me right now? No, I wasn't necessarily mad. I was, it was the only moment of time.

Like I just got the baby to sleep. I was at home alone on a Sunday. Oh, poor you. Yeah, I totally understand. Because what she said, she goes, don't worry. I'm in a parking spot. I'm just going to leave it here and I'll take an Uber and it'll be fine. We'll get it later. I'm like, where's the parking spot? I better come check this out. And it was literally in the bus lane where you drop the passengers off. I'm like, we can't leave the car here. It's pregnancy brain. It is. Is it a real thing?

It is a real thing. It's an actual real thing so if you're pregnant you're entitled to have a leeway leeway you get leeway okay you get a bunch of get out of jail free cards and you get a little bit of get out of jail when it comes to running behind yes okay yes i have an idea that before we get into this podcast i have have to propose to you. I would like to buy my husband a 50-pound pregnancy outfit. I found one online, and I want him to not only wear it throughout the day, I want him to weightlift in it like I do and drive the car and pick the baby up all day and night

and sleep in it. What's accomplished there? Well, it is going to bring awareness, but the fact is, is that it's not the same. Sure. It's just not the same. He's not designed to do it.

And you are. And women actually make it look easy and it's not. But it's just, it's not the same. This is just the episode I need to bed. It has to come from empathy. It has to come from compassion. It has to come from compassion.

It has to come from awareness and communication and all of those things that you listen to each other and hear what each other is saying. But it can't be recreated. It can't be recreated. For him to do that would be interesting. It would definitely be information but as far as you were never designed to you know to do that unfortunately women are okay all right and we and it's an amazing bit of business i was shocked the first time i did it i could not believe that women have been doing this and have had to do this and men haven't had had to do shit. I couldn't believe it. Now, men do shit.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Let's talk about it. But it's just not the same shit. It's not the same shit. So just to give background on you, I found you through Hope Smith, who also lives in- My dear. She's a dear in Austin, Texas.

And she had, I believe she opened up about an at-home birth that she had. Two. Two. With me. And I was intrigued. And so I reached out to you to just have a conversation and the information that you were telling me on this call was blowing my mind so much so that I said, let's do sort of a consultation and record it for our audience because there's a lot of people that are curious about at-home births versus the hospital. So I guess just to start off, I would ask you what the process looks like from beginning, middle to end.

Okay. Well, I do a free consultation for everybody who calls. It's actually two hours and I give everybody two hours of my time. And I do it because I want more information out there in the world about birth and about empowerment and about safer birth and a different approach. So I want to educate people and I want to bring awareness and lift the dialogue so if you don't mind I'm just going to kind of start in the way I do it so my first name is Mary Michael m-a-r-i-m-i-k-e-l all one word thank you mom and dad decide be give me a weird one and my last name is Potter and I'm the owner and director of New Life Birth Services here in Austin, Texas. I have a bachelor of science degree in nursing from the University of Texas Nursing School and I graduated in 1974. Never done anything but be a

midwife. Been a midwife here in Austin for 48 years and I've done well over 3,000 births, well over. And I have handled everything you can just almost possibly imagine and many things that I'm certain you can't. But I've never worked as a nurse. I got impounded into service by people who in the 70s said, I am not going there. Every single woman was given drugs pretty much against their will. Every baby was removed from the mother the moment after birth and kept from the mother. In the hospitals, you mean?

In the hospitals for between a minimum of six hours and sometimes as much as 12 hours just for observation. Why did they do this? They were ignorant. They wanted to be safe. And actually they wanted to make it easy on themselves. So they figured if they cried out all the baby. Also, the mothers were all medicated.

The mothers were all given scopolamine and dimerol. It was called twilight sleep. So everybody was not in any shape at all to take care of their newborn or do anything. But it was a vicious circle. And I had friends who said, I'm not going. I'll take my chances. And at least you could come and listen to the baby's heartbeat and take my blood pressure. And I said, I'm just learning. I've just seen births. I haven't done anything. And they said, well, I'm going to be there. And if you're there, it'd be better than not. So I, in the hospital, in my labor and delivery rotation, the nurses

were talking about, oh my gosh, look at this. These people are having their baby at home without anybody there. And I was like, oh, that's terrible. Let let me see that and it happened to have their names and their address in the article in the statesman and I wrote it all down and I went immediately over and had the absolute joy of meeting Nikki and David Richardson and they were working with some incredible women Jane Gehring and Alison Nash. And I came and sat in on their meetings, and they had been doing births. And I said, well, you know, I'm a nurse. And they said, well, that's amazing.

And I had all medical information, but absolutely no knowledge of spiritual anything. I mean, in the hospital, it was like they were changing the oil. There was not a sacred flare anywhere. And they were very, very sacred in their approach to birth, which just was an absolute eye-opener. We all joined forces and started the Austin Lay Midwives Association, ALMA. And we did that for many years and did hundreds of births. And I branched off to start a school for midwives in 1980. And the name of my practice was New Life Birth Services. And I had the first out-of-hospital birth center licensed to a non-doctor in the state of Texas. And I had my birth center for 35 years. And then I let that go eight years ago and decided I didn't want to work that hard anymore.

And I just wanted to be more relaxed because I did 10 to 12 births a month for decades. And a lot of midwives I worked with and a lot of apprentices. While I am an RN with a BSN, I don't practice as a nurse. I am a certified professional midwife, which is a national credential that's given through an education process and a testing process, credentialing and continuing education process. It is actually the process that most of the states use in the United States to credential midwives in their state. And I am also a licensed midwife in the state of Texas. And I had six kids. I had my first three in the hospital and my last three at home. And two of my hospital births were planned home births that ended up with complications and I ended up having to be transported. So it really made me more appreciative of how great the hospital is

when you need to be there. But in Austin currently, every hospital in Austin is doing two to 500 births a month. It is an assembly line process. They are all so incredibly overwhelmed. It's hard on them. I feel my heart goes out to them for how hard they work and how much they give. But you can't really get to, I mean, they can't get to know people. There is no real connection. You're dealing with absolute strangers. And for what they have to deal with, we should be bowing down

and honoring them. But they're very overwhelmed, very overwhelmed. And so what do you do when you have that many people? You have to get an assembly line process together. And the very first huge component of that is that an Pitocin is so abnormal and so unlike what the natural process is for the body that most women cannot handle it. It's like a relentless, steady climb up an absolute steep slope, whereas natural birth ebbs and flows and goes in a really it'll get really intense and then it'll back off a little bit and then get really into it back off a little bit and it's you can handle it you can you can work with it you can manage it but because they can't there is a currently an 80 epidural rate where women are told that there is no reason to experience the sensations of birth that it is something that should be avoided at all are told that there is no reason to experience the sensations of birth that it is

something that should be avoided at all costs and that there is no value to it whatsoever which i believe is very very wrong i think that the sensations of birth are astonishingly transformative and a spiritual altering life altering state. How so? Well, for one thing- Because I'm like epidural all the way because it was so comfortable and easy, but I wanna know, I'm very curious of what,

if you could get really granular. Yeah, I sure can. Oh, this is a soapbox I love to stand on. Oh, get on the soapbox. Go for it. For one thing, you know, you can always have an epidural, even if you're at home. You can go to the hospital and have an epidural. I've had it happen where a lady said, I'm not doing it.

And I say, all right, let's try some things. Nope, don't want to try anything. Okay, let's go. And they have their epidural. That has happened a couple of handfuls of time. Very rarely. because I teach everybody how to handle the sensations. It's not that hard, but we have such a lot of misinformation and erroneous stuff going on that it's hard to get the data to have better information and therefore

better outcomes. But one of the things that happens is that this system is set up to work. Birth is an evolutionary process that is absolutely millions of years in the making. It wasn't designed incorrectly. And if you weren't supposed to feel anything, you wouldn't feel anything. I think on a, let's talk about the two different levels because there are different levels of stuff going on. The first is physiologic. If you were an ancient woman, you know, hunting and gathering, you had to do that every day or you did not eat. So, if you started having some pain, you knew to go back to your nest, to your spot and to prepare because that's where you were going to be the most safe.

There's blood and you're completely vulnerable. So the rest of your tribe family would come and guard you and keep the predators away and help you through the process because they really didn't want people to die. So it was all very tied. On an emotional level, this is designed to tear you open in a way that you bond differently with the baby. It's like we are so head oriented. We so mind-entrenched with so much media, so much information coming at us all the time that our minds are on hyper-alert and just really taking over. No one gives birth with their mind. It is a body, spirit, heart, emotion thing. And I feel that emotionally when you are not experiencing any of the sensations and basically you have to watch TV to have something to do while you have

a baby, I never see the moment of birth look the same that it does when you're unmedicated. How fitting is it to tell you about my protein pancakes? I've been making them on stories. They are such a hit after my workout. So I'll do weights and then I'll go home immediately and make these pancakes and they are so good. Here's what I do. I do two egg whites, two full eggs, two scoops of ritual protein. And I'll tell you why I like ritual protein in a second. I add some boysenberries, a little bit of liquid coconut oil, probably like a tablespoon, and then a half teaspoon of baking powder and a half teaspoon of baking soda. I mix that all up. Sometimes I add chia seed, hemp seed, flax seed, whatever seed. And then I have these beautiful pancakes.

I cook them in coconut oil in a pan. They are so delicious. They're going to blow your mind. And what binds them together is the plant-based protein powder. And that is by Ritual. I've talked about this protein for a while. I am picky with my proteins. Very picky. I don't want to use any kind of protein. This one has 20 grams of protein per serving. It's made from sustainably grown peas. It has traceability. So you can go on their site and see their visible supply chain, which I love. Daily support,

very important when I'm pregnant. It has complete amino acids in it, which is awesome. So I'm getting protein and amino acids. And most importantly, there's no added sugar or sugar alcohols. It's soy-free, it's gluten-free, it's non-GMO. And I'm telling you, it is the trick to my protein pancakes. Two scoops, 20 grams. Ready to shake up your protein ritual? Skinny Confidential listeners get 10% off during your first three months at ritual.com slash skinny. Ritual even offers a money back guarantee if you're not 100% in love, but I know you will be. Visit ritual.com slash skinny and you get 10% off your first three months.

That actually makes so much sense. And this is not an indictment. This is not an indictment this is not an indictment it makes total sense but it's so easy it's like it's almost like easy come easy go it is yeah and i don't think it leads to the same degree of bonding and heart opening stuff that happens when when not it that doesn't mean everybody who's ever had an epidural didn't bond with their baby. That's not it. But it's different. It's different when you feel the sensations. What I see is a woman giving birth going, oh, my God, oh, my God, oh, my God, oh, my God, oh, my God.

And then the baby comes out and she goes, oh, my baby, oh. And she's just in another world, another world. And it's because of the rush of hormones. I think the rampant use of pitocin blocks receptor sites in the brain that would be being filled with oxytocin. And oxytocin is what the pituitary produces to make you have contractions, make you have the baby, make your uterus contracted. Oxytocin is released in very large amounts in any sex and especially in orgasm. It's released in exercise as well. But when you have this big rush of oxytocin, it floods your body with this very orgasmic stuff. And while, and Pitocin, nobody ever had an orgasm with Pitocin.

I didn't have an orgasm with Pitocin. I'm not, I can tell you after even like five minutes in, I'm not getting Pitocin after this conversation. For the ignorant at the table, myself. Listen, Pitocin is a wonderful thing when you need it. So we don't want to throw the baby out with the bath water. Okay. It's just overused.

What exactly is is or does pitocin do it makes you have contractions okay so it are it artificially i'll use that it artificially makes your body have contractions it is chemically very similar to oxytocin okay so it makes you have contractions it will also stop bleeding after the birth pitocin is a wonderful thing we have ladies that get stalled and they're not moving along in an orderly fashion and they need some help. And we go to the hospital, they've been working at it for a long time. I say, you need an epidural, darling. Is it bad for the baby?

I think it is less ideal for the baby to not have the rush of oxytocin in its brain and the mother's brain that causes that transcendental moment. One of the things I tell people, this was a little early for this in the podcast, but I'm going to tell you, I believe that birth is a very sexual experience. The energy that gets the baby in there is the energy that gets the baby out. And so I tell people, you know, don't have people around you that you couldn't have sex in front of. And they're like, well, that's a really small list. And I say, absolutely. Well, how can I even have you there? It's because in ancient times when people all lived in a tribe, they didn't go out in the jungle to

have sex. They're getting eaten by the jaguars. So they went to their hammock and the whole rest of the tribe turned around and ignored them. You would hate that. I would hate that. They create privacy in a super unprivate situation because they knew how to disassociate themselves. I wouldn't hate that, Lauren.

I just think we live in a time when people don't know how to give people privacy. Yes, they don't. What they do when you invite people to your birth, most of the time they stare like with their mouths open

and they're like, and this is not exactly what you need at the moment of birth. In ancient times, you didn't have strangers at your birth. You had your mother, you had your grandmothers, you had the wise women of your tribe, and all of them had given birth, and they all had given birth the way you're giving birth. Nowadays, the women who give birth at home, nobody's done that in their reality. And a lot of them, their families and

friends feel ill at ease. They, on some maybe unconscious or subconscious level, they feel like they are being made wrong by the woman, somebody choosing to do it another way. And so, they want everybody to do it the same way so that they can validate their experience. This is less than ideal. So, you know, at least we need to bring it up so people can look at it. But, oh, okay, let's keep going on this. So, if you're having sex and you're making a grocery list, it's probably not your best moment sexually. And we all know that we have all made that list. You're making grocery lists when we're getting at it? You know what? people say this i

actually have not made a grocery list having sex i haven't i really have not but have you what have you ever been distracted and i don't i every woman says this to me i don't i feel like i don't know i mean i can't think of a time i'm really being honest but orgasm only my husband must be really good at that. Taylor, pull this clip. Put that, use this as the clip of the episode. You know what? Don't mean to brag, but I'm multi-orgasmic.

So maybe that's why I haven't made my grocery list. That's good. If we ever get to the grocery list point, Lauren, please let me know. Please, please, please let me know. Well, the point is, is that not always is your oxytocin level high enough, especially if you're distracted. You can hear the kids screaming and you're, you know, just a few more minutes on here.

They're in the crib. They'll be all right. But still, there's enough distractions that it's the same sort of thing, that oxytocin level doesn't get high enough for you to go to the zone. And what happens is that there is a zone like in sex. Sex is transcendental. When it's really wonderful, you lose track of who you are and where you are, and you're no longer two you are one and it is it is really sacred space and very very spiritual and you're you're in an altered state that state is where you give birth easily in but you can't do it as easily or maybe almost never with an epidural and pitocin it doesn't it's not conducive it

blocks all the receptors yes it blocks too much of the receptor stuff because there's a feedback mechanism that's happening between your cervix and your brain and all these biochemical things that are happening in your uterus and your vagina and your cervix. And it's biochemically extremely dynamic. I feel very connected to my intuition and I did have Pitocin and Epidural for my first birth and I agree with you. I understand everything you're saying. Looking back, there is a blockage of energy in the body. It is. Yeah, it's almost like having like, in a way, like a surgery, like a twilight, like you're disconnected. But I think if you've been laboring for 12 to 24 hours

and it's not progressing, that's the time. You need an epidural and then the Pitocin will get you to pushing, you'll sleep and you need it at that point in order to have anything left for bonding. Let me ask you this. Why do the hospitals want to push epidural and pitocin? Because they don't have the staffing to be able to deal with a bunch of women in the throes of the most intense experience of their life. Plus, none of these people are prepared. They are not prepared.

I spend, I give 14 hours, I require 14 hours of childbirth classes. I do first this free consultation where I tell people all this stuff. If they decide they want to be my client, the next step is a two-hour initial visit. I draw their blood. We talk and talk and talk. I think it's kind of nice to get to know people before they do a vaginal exam. All of my doctor person was like,

how do you do? Lie down. It was like, can we chat? No, no chatting. We get right to it because they don't have time. They're all overwhelmed. And I, so it's not until the third two-hour visit that we even do a physical. And then I do a two-hour physical for them. Most women and men have never had a two-hour physical. My physicals are incredible. I look in the eyes and ears and nose and mouth, talk about oral hygiene and all the cool new stuff that's out.

I palpate the lymph system and thyroid. I teach you all about breast cancer, preventing breast cancer, doing regular breast exams. I teach all the men about doing breast exams and testicular exams. We talk a lot about preventing cancer. We have this huge thing about how awful the COVID epidemic has been, but we are not talking enough about the cancer epidemic. One in three Americans develops cancer. One of every nine Americans dies of cancer. One of every eight American men develop prostate cancer. One of every eight American women develop breast cancer. And one of every 300 children die of cancer or get cancer.

This is an absolute epidemic. 600,000 Americans die every year for the last 20 years of cancer. 600,000 a year. We should be up in arms about this. And it's like, well, you know, she's kind of part of it. No, it's not part of it. There are over 10,000 chemicals that the FDA has approved, 10,000 for use in our food and drink.

And 3,000 of them have never been checked. And there are scores of them on that list that are clearly cancer-causing. And we're not talking about it enough. So I spend a lot of time talking about prevention. When people say, you know, how do I have a healthy birth? I say, you cannot have a healthy pregnancy, birth, and baby without having a healthy lifestyle. And I tell people, I think that there is a seven-fold approach to ideal perfect birth. And the most important thing, number one, is nutrition and vitamins.

And I talk a lot. I think prenatal vitamins are fine in the first trimester, but after that, it's basically the minimum daily requirement, what it takes not to die. So you go into like, after the prenatal, you go into the very specifics, right? Very specific. And so like, what would those be? Well, like for example, I recommend that everybody, including you, do in the morning, mixed tocopherol vitamin E, not just D-alpha tocopherol, but they're finding now that the

beta gamma and deltas are also critical. And I recommend a 400-unit mixed tocaferol vitamin E in the morning and in the evening. I recommend a gram, two 500-milligram Ester-C with bioflavonoid rutin and hesperin, which is the C-complex. Like that other one is an E-complex, C-complex, and then a good probiotic. That's in the morning with breakfast. You eat a few bites of food, you put the vitamins in, you put all the rest of the food on top. At lunch, few bites of food. Then we do Ultramin, which is an amazing and a very absorbable mineral supplement. It's just minerals, but it's chelated, so it doesn't open up. The calcium and magnesium and everything that's in your prenatal is not chelated. It opens up in your stomach with everything else, and most of it is destroyed.

So this is an awesome, awesome mineral supplement. I recommend like 1,500 of calcium, where you usually have 150 in a prenatal. And most women are getting calcium pulled out of their jaws, pulled out of their bones. There's an old wives tale, you lose a tooth for every baby because it happens so much. Oh, that's where that comes from? Yes. You need a lot more calcium than you think. And I think the ossification of the baby's bones is absolutely critical and that we are getting so much of our calcium from pretty unabsorbable sources of calcium. Like we think a

lot of our calcium comes from dairy, but the fact is, is that there's only calcium in dairy and human beings require calcium magnesium, one part calcium to a half part magnesium in order to absorb it. So if you're not, if you don't have magnesium- Would you do a magnesium citrate? Or would you do- You can. Magnesium is magnesium. But no, I think a good mineral supplement, I'm particularly fond of Ultramin. Okay.

Because it's got calcium, magnesium, manganese, potassium, boron, selenium, PABA, enzotol, biotin. It's awesome. You said Ultramin. Ultramin. That's a brand. It's made by NOW.

Is it for men and women? Yeah, anybody. It's just a mineral. Is it for men and women? Yeah, anybody. It's just a mineral supplement. So keep going with these supplements. So then also at lunch, I tell you to do a B50. If you look at most B supplements in a multi of some sort, it's got five milligrams of this, 10 milligrams of that, four milligrams of that. But there's plenty of information out there that 50 milligrams daily is a great idea, especially with stress. I don't know

very many people that haven't been stressed to the max for a long time. Then folic acid, that's the middle of the day and that will boost your energy because of the B vitamins. And most, you know, we're supposed to be, most people through the history of the world ate a really uh good breakfast right at dawn and then the biggest meal of the day was always midday and then everybody slept you know lots of europe is still smart and sleeps midday you go to spain or portuga you're not going to have anything going on between one and three and then they eat a very light supper around nine. And dinner was the midday thing. And that was the biggest meal of the day. And everybody worked through the morning to do that.

And then they slept and then they worked in the cool and into the evening. So I think that we've kind of lost our way with that. And instead of doing caffeine, which I tell people really stay away from caffeine, it janks the baby around in a really serious way and what happened to me is that my baby came out with a headache and cried and cried and cried for the first few days because it was off caffeine and so i tell people and i tell people look there's a way to get off caffeine you do uh three quarters calf, one quarter decaf for a week, then half and half for a week, and then three quarters decaf, one quarter calf for a week, and then you go to decaf.

Because I love the thing, but you got to learn to live your life without stimulus. I've had a glass of coffee every single morning of this pregnancy. That's not good. You're not hurting anything, but it's not good for the baby. The baby is janked around by it. The placenta really concentrates nicotine and caffeine and all the- But it makes sense that it would withdraw from it when it's out because it doesn't get it anymore. Yes, it doesn't get it. It doesn't go through the milk real well.

So I tell people just, and you know what? If you cut back like that, it's going to take a full month. You're not going to have any misery. It's not going to be unpleasant. You're not going to have a headache. And you're just gently going to get off and you're going to find what your energy is and how to have your energy. And if you're jacking yourself around because you don't sleep enough, well, you should whack them. What about matcha? Caffeine is caffeine.

Okay. So you're just like- It's caffeine. Okay. So just try to get off caffeine. So decaf. I do decaf tea i do i don't really like the taste of coffee i just like what it does oh see i just like the taste okay so i don't have any trouble so if i just if i just go like less and less and less and less and telling yes and do and do something else find something that you do like to have a morning beverage that's i mean you just can't do jack shit when you're pregnant but you know god damn you can't do anything actually that's a lie

they tell you all this stupid stuff like you can't have sushi you can have sushi i've had sushi i've also had locks and don't don't eat the sushi from the 7-eleven in waco you know yeah don't eat the sushi in Boise. What else do they tell you that you think is bullshit? What kind of wild animals eating the sushi from Waco? What else do you think is bullshit that they tell you? That you can't get in a hot tub? It's perfectly fine to get in a hot tub.

I was never stupid in a hot tub. I always got right out, sat on the side, cooled off, got back in. Where I was stupid was too hot a shower, too hot a bath, music or sporting event in the summer outside, working in my yard in the heat or exercising in the heat. You cannot get overheated. It's not about a hot tub. It's about getting overheated. And that is not explained. And really, you can damage the cord by getting overheated. So all is not explained. And really, you can damage the cord by getting overheated.

So all of those things are not a good idea. And hot tubs were never my problem. I never kept it too hot and I didn't stay in it too long. Next is soft cheeses and lunch meats. Yeah, even though Applegate and Boar's Head are probably decent brands, it's been in the package too long. But we in Austin have Central Market, and they make those beautiful roasted turkey breasts. They're as natural as can be without being organic, and they're very well done, and they're made every day. And if you go to Central Market

and let them shave you off some turkey, you're going to be fine. Also, Central Market Whole Foods have world-class fromageas. They are thinking a lot and vetting their cheeses, and you don't really have to worry about their cheeses. So, I think some of that is just, and you know, it's really hard to say, if you do it this way, it's okay. So, it's a blanket thing. It makes complete sense from an evolutionary standpoint, because it's really hard to say if you do it this way it's okay but so they just it's a blanket it makes complete sense from an evolutionary standpoint because it's not like if you were you know if you were living in in ancient times and you had a turkey in the yard and then you shot and killed the turkey or ring its neck and kill and i'm getting grounded but you wouldn't not let

the woman have a fresh slice of the turkey because that's probably some of the only food you would have or same with the cheese right so it has to be fine what about wine but the problem is is that now things are not fresh that's the problem and so if you know where you're buying from and you know it's fresh and like again central market people go out to all the dairies that they work with and they look at them and they make sure that they're doing a good job. And I would always feel very comfortable and I've never heard of anybody having any trouble with that. But it is true that there are things that can have bacteria that can be a bad thing and you just have to be a conscientious consumer. What about wine? My doctor says that one glass of wine a week is okay.

Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. That's exactly what I say too. And I asked a whole bunch of my doctor friends, where was the study that said that a glass of wine would harm the baby? And they said, oh, there isn't one. And I said, well, what is it that one glass of wine is going to damage the baby? And they all said, this is a while back, but they all said, well, you know, women, if you tell them that they can have one, they'll have 10. And I said, oh my God, did you say that? So let me get this straight. You think women are so hysterical and indulgent and uncontrollable that we have to lie to them to get them to do the right thing? He said, uh-huh. I said, okay, well, we're done.

Hey, I got a newsflash for you. I think they apply that reasoning to a lot of other things and not just with women. Oh yeah. Right? Yeah. No, it is true. There was a certain amount of disdain and I think a lot of that's changing. There's a thing that I have a real pushback with people

at the academic level. And I say this to people all the time. Smart people are extremely smart, but sometimes they think they're so smart that they forget other people are smart as well. Yes. And they think they're so smart that they forget other people are smart as well. Yes. And they think that they know better. They think they know better or best for the people they perceive to be beneath them from

an academic standpoint. That is true. From their mind, they can justify something that, like if I came to somebody and said, I'm going to lie to you because I know better than you and my way of life is the right way, you would say that's not okay. Yeah, that's not okay. But people slap a credential on and then we say, well, then they can do that. It's not acceptable on any level, in my opinion.

You should give the people the information. I also think that it was just a different world. And one thing, I cannot overemphasize my admiration for doctors and nurses and CNMs in the hospital and the hospitals. I think they are dealing with the really difficult stuff and we get to kind of deal with the cream and isn't it all glorious? But it is a fraught, difficult situation. This is not a healthcare system because health is not profitable. What's profitable is diseases and interventions and procedures and labs and things that they're going to make money. They first off have them over a barrel where they don't pay them quite as much

so that they have to have more billable stuff in order to just make it. And these poor folks, every single person that comes out of medical school has between, and it might not be 100%, but it's close, a $300,000 to $500,000 debt just for medical school. Then they deserve, by God, they deserve to have a nice car and a nice home after all that work and what they're going to do for the rest of their lives. And then they have to set up a practice and spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to set up their practice. So almost everyone is between $700,000 and a million dollars in debt

before they ever hang out a shingle. The kind of pressure that that puts on them is beyond comprehension. And most of the doctors that I know are having to see 30 people a day and do 15 to 20 births a month. And they cannot go when you go into labor anymore. That's not the way it works. That's the way it works with me, but not with them. They have an on-call day. It's the only way it can work for them. So the doctor has absolutely no incentive for you to have your baby at your body's timetable. If they don't attend the birth and catch the baby, they don't get paid. It is whoever catches babies who gets paid.

And that's why when I gave birth, when they told me to push, I pushed and the baby was going to come out. I could feel it right when I pushed. And the person who was the midwife at the hospital told me, no, stop. And I was like- She said, hold it. She said, hold it. And I said, what the fuck are you talking about? Hold it.

I think- She had me hold it for 15 minutes because that is why she wanted the doctor to catch the baby. So I had to hold the baby in until the doctor got there. What do you think about that? All right, it's been a few weeks,

but we still have to discuss Zaza's birthday party. We had a pineapple soiree for her. We had games. We had pineapple bowling. We had a white bounce castle for her. And of course, we had That's It pineapple bars. I did not know that I would become addicted to these bars after her party. They're so good, you guys. You have to try them. They have barely any ingredients. I think there's like two ingredients It's a hundred percent real fruit and these bars were such a hit that my mother-in-law was stealing them from me my sister-in-law Zaza's cousin zaza. Everyone was loving these pineapple bars. They're so good I even was like cutting them up and rolling them into balls and giving them to zaza and she loved them And for those of you who are looking for another That's It product,

guess what else I'm going to recommend? You guessed it. The Kids Apple Crunchables. We have these in every single purse, suitcase, diaper bag. They are everywhere. They're these little crunchy apple clusters, okay? And they have one ingredient, which is just apple. And I give them to Zaza.

Organic apples. They're crisp to perfection. No organic apples. They're crisped to perfection, no added sugar, no preservatives, no weird ingredients that you normally find in most fruit snacks because I've looked. I also feel good as her mom knowing that I know exactly what's in her snacks. So most importantly, I know Zaza is getting clean, nutritious snacks on the go. And when we gave them out as party favors, I felt good about it. It was minimal ingredients. So good. All right. If you're looking to try these fruit snacks for yourself, That's It is giving all Skinny Confidential Him and her listeners a special discount. You are going to go to That's It Fruit and use code SKINNY to get 25% off your order.

That is so generous. I'm using my own code, pineapple bars and apple crunchables for the win. That'sitfruit.com and use code skinny to get 25 off your order well i think that's dangerous yeah because the when the baby is supposed to come out there is pressure on the baby's head that is putting pressure on their brain and pressure on their on their on vessels in their brain that can. When the baby's supposed to come out, the baby's supposed to come out. Listen, the bottom line is that for all of this, we are 58th in the world in infant mortality, maternal mortality. We are the worst in the westernized countries.

And absolutely horrific. What exactly does that mean? Well, it means way too many people die and are damaged in this country. In the hospital. Yeah, in the hospital. In the hospital. How come you don't hear about it more? Because they don't want to talk about it. Why scare people? But the problem is that a lot of the people that are having a really hard time are marginalized. They are not given enough information or enough opportunity to have healthy lives. And as I said, you cannot have a healthy pregnancy, birth, and baby without having a healthy life. And if you are desperately poor, I don't care how good your intentions are, It is going to be really hard to eat well enough

and take vitamins and get the care that you deserve. You may be working three jobs. You're not going to be getting prenatal care. The system is set up incorrectly. It does not support the people that really, really need the support. People like you guys should be out there looking at other options and thinking about things and making good decisions. But the people who are marginalized are just fed the little bits of crappy information. Oh, this is the way everybody does it.

And this is why we're going to do it. And yeah, it's good. Well, that's some of my personal hopes for this specific show is like, we've talked to people in all different walks of life and different expertise, different fields of work, you know, all over the board and it's free for people to listen to. So even if you can't access the greatest schools or the greatest resources, like, and listen, we get flack a lot of time because we have such a wide

berth of different perspectives. And a lot of times those perspectives can be on completely different sides of the spectrum. And, you know, obviously there's disagreements. Sometimes you, like even this conversation, somebody may be all about hospitals and hear this and push against it. But at least for the people that are looking for information and don't have access like Lauren and I do, like here's at least a little part of what we can do to give some people a little bit more access

and a little bit more information and for free, right? I think that was like a lot of the intention when we started this show. It started as a Q&A and it was like, how can we answer questions that people may not be learning in school or from their parents or from their peers or from their jobs, right?

It's like, we don't always have the answers, but at least we can present a different perspective. Awesome, awesome benefit. Before we get into the pros and cons of natural birth at home, I would love for you to, we cut you off on the part where you were finishing the supplements.

I wanted you to finish that supplement. Because if someone's writing them down at home. So last is an evening, more E, another 400 unit mixed tocopherol E, another gram of C. What's with the E and C? You know, we just don't have time to do it, sweetheart. I think you're going to get better out of me

if we talk about other stuff. Okay, enc is important absolutely what it does for the mother and baby are really critical we all need more vitamin c we used to make it in our livers we had a mutation that stopped it now we don't we have to supplement it used to be in food now it isn't because they bred it all out because it was bitter. So they started inter, you know, hybridizing everything and bred everything out. Symbiotica makes an amazing vitamin E. We are ancestors and a huge amount of the people in the world today eat insects and insects are super high in vitamin E. So we got it from that. I'm taking a pill. I don't care how good they are for you. I'm going to take a pill.

Thank you. But we need a lot more E than is in our diet. Okay, so anyway, but there's a lot more to that tale, which I love to tell people about. So then also I tell people to take beta carotene, which is a precursor to vitamin A. I think we're all, the woman's liver is really challenged by all the metabolic waste from the baby, her increasing metabolic waste as her metabolism goes up in the pregnancy. And so this is a water-soluble precursor to vitamin A. And if you're eating really, really well and have lots of vitamin A-rich foods in your diet, then you'll excrete what you don't need. Next is a good omega-3 source. And I used to recommend Nordic Naturals, but then I started

hearing more and more about the starving sea creatures and that there are tons and tons of whales and sea mammals that are starving because we are taking all of their food. I know. And it was like, oh my God, because we really need omega-3s in our diet. One of the things, we don't eat enough fish. Our ancestors ate enormous amounts of fish. It was so easy to whack the water and drag out a big, tasty fish that had fat on it than to chase down an antelope with a spear and with no fat on it because it's out running for its life on the savannah and so fish was a very predominant source of protein and now we all you know the eight billion people on the planet we all can't be eating fish three times a week there would be no fish left but i do recommend strongly that women eat lots of fish just not the fishes that are high in mercury. And so I have in

my notebook here, all the information about all of that. There's a whole section on nutrition, a whole section on all of these things that I'm talking about, a section on vitamins. So I recommend EWI, I-W-I, and it is a really great company. I always vet everything that I recommend to anybody. And EWI is making algae oil. And algae is where the omegas come from anyway. It's like the algae, the zooplankton eat the algae, the krill eat the zooplankton, the menohanas, sardines, and anchovies eat the krill, and then the big fish on up. And then we get omegas from that but it's from algae so they're making in seawater but on land algae oil and it's very very absorbable excellent source of really bioavailable uh omegas without harming the porcine creatures. So we need to be like really supplementing during pregnancy.

Yes, really, really, really. I thought I was really supplementing and then I just heard you do your list. I know, it's like, oh dear. Well, I'm having anxiety. Listen, but let me tell you, people have never done this. We're talking about optimal.

We're talking about ideal. And I do believe that the diet was different in ancient times. It was so different. There was more of this stuff available in the foods. But when we eat farmed this and farmed that and when eating GMO and eating all of these things that are just denatured. One last thing is vitamin D. And I believe again, they have proven that vitamin D. Okay. And I believe, again, they have proven that vitamin D is an enormous factor. The lack of vitamin D is an enormous factor in cancer. And so I tell everybody, and there's a bunch of stuff. One of the things in my notebook is an article from Time Magazine about epigenetics. Are you familiar with epigenetics? Of course. Fascinating stuff.

Fascinating stuff. Epigenetics is short-term genetics as opposed to the long-term genetics of how you can manipulate and how you can manipulate it. So when you do this stuff during pregnancy, it sets your baby up to be incredibly healthier, including resisting cancer through its life. So I- Oh my God, this is so much pressure. Tell me if you disagree here. I think humans should be supplementing like this regardless of pregnancy, but obviously maybe more when you're pregnant. Like I think- I've been doing all of this for 37 years.

People wait until there's an event. Yes, of course. I want the mother to do it. And I tell people you can stop doing it when you die. It's not going to help you anymore after that at all. You know, it's funny. I showed a picture. I take a fucking pharmacy every day. Sorry, excuse my language. And people were like, well,

if you could only do one, what would it pick? And I was like, well, that's not really how supplementation works, right? Because, I mean, just in your short period. If I had to pick one, honest to God, I think I'd pick vitamin C. But the problem is it's hard to get a good vitamin C. Symbiotica, which you should check out if you like. It's liposomal stuff. They make a great

C. The problem is that it is liposomal. It is encapsulating with fat ascorbic acid. And ascorbic acid is the problem. Check the one from... I'm going to show it to you after this. Because I think ester C, Linus Pauling discovered all of the manufacturing

processes for vitamin C and right before he died he invented estrusy and it's 400 times more absorbable by the human body and 40 times more retainable by your body's tissues you can find lots of brands of it but it's a way

to bypass the need for liposomal because it's not so acidic. Are you a fan of intravenous supplementation? Well, I think that you can do that if you drank too much or if you've got some huge, enormous physical load coming on you. But I think if you supplement on a daily basis, and of course, supplementing should never take the place of food.

And we talk a lot about nutrition and that's enormously important. But let me go back for a moment because we were talking about the seven ideal things for how to have the most optimal birth. First is nutrition and vitamins. Next is drinking enough water. They say that 85% of the population are dehydrated every day of their lives. And I tell everybody that will listen that they need to drink four quarts a day. And that's in a 24-hour period from 8 a.m. to 8 a.m.

And they're like, wait a minute, wait a minute, four quarts? Oh, wait, oh, that can't be right. That's, what? That's a gallon. And it's like, yeah, that is a gallon. And that's 16 cups. So if you've got a 24-hour day and you sleep eight hours, you've got 16 awake hours. That is one measuring cup, a little eight-ounce measuring cup, an hour for your cerebral spinal fluid, for your colon, for your bladder, for your kidneys, for your liver, for your sweat, for your tears, for your respiration, for your saliva. All of these are fluid-based systems.

We're talking one cup an hour only while you're awake. That does not sound like that much, does it? I've been reading a lot about Napoleon lately for an assortment of reasons. And there's a quote that stands out that I think is very timely. And it goes like this. The reason most people fail instead of succeed is they trade what they want most for what they want at the moment. I think this is so applicable in the topic I'm about to talk about right now. And that is with personal finance.

We do this exact thing. We think very little about our future. We don't save for the future. We don't invest in ourselves. We buy things we don't need to impress people we don't necessarily like, and it's all in these short-term gains and transactions. There's no thought about what our future financial security position looks like, which is why I love Wealthfront.

For those of you that want to take care of your future, that want to invest in yourself, that want to save and have a nest egg for your future self and watch that grow, Wealthfront is the platform for you. I love it because I'm personally a huge fan. I've talked about this on finance episodes of low cost index funds. And through Wealthfront, you can definitely invest in those. Basically, anyone can do it. The platform is built for anyone that's a first-time investor, whether you're a novice, just learning, have a little amount, and it can help you build your future and protect your future as you go along. And what I like about it is it's not just low-cost index ones. You want to get in the crypto space? Fine. They have something for

you. You want to learn a little bit more about commodities? They have something for you. And it's a perfect tool to set some money aside and start investing in yourself and your future. I think everybody should do this. If you listen to the episode Lauren and I did on personal finance, we said we set personally at least a minimum of 10% of our funds aside to invest in our future selves. So again, I love this partnership. I think Wealthfront's a perfect partner. So many people are asking us, how do you invest? How do you save for your future? And this is the perfect platform to start building your wealth and get your first $5,000 managed for free for life. Go to wealthfront.com slash skinny. That's W-E-A-L-T-H-F-R-O-N-T.com slash skinny to start building your wealth. Go to wealthfront.com slash skinny to get started today. And again, guys,

invest in yourself, invest in your future, and thank us later. I mean, I think that if one gallon a day is going to help me when I'm pregnant or when I'm not pregnant, I don't see why you wouldn't aim for that. And I don't always make it. I mean, sometimes it's three, and every now and then I'm just really wretched, but I never feel good. And I was plagued in my youth with migraines, constipation, and bladder infections. Went to scores of doctors, and not a single one ever asked me how much water I drank. And when I went to a natural doctor in my 20s, they said, well, how much water do you drink? I said, oh, lots. They said, well, what is that?

And I said, well, a couple of glasses a day. And they said, oh, my God, I can't, what is that? And I said, well, a couple of glasses a day. And they said, oh my God, I can't believe you're not dead. And that is not okay. And it's like, well, you know, that's a lot. Our producer Taylor drinks one glass a day. Oh my God. Well, she's going to die.

Well, he is a he, but- Well, everybody's going to die. He's going to listen to this. Taylor, drink some more water, man. And no, it's serious. So it changed my life. It also changed my health. I'm going to be 70 in two weeks. And I'm feeling pretty, by God, good for really super old.

You've got great energy and you look great. Thank you. God bless you. What's the next one after water? Next after water is exercise. This is an athletic event. And your ancestors were athletes. They cut and carried all their firewood.

They carried all their waterwood. They carried all their water distances. They walked miles to their fields, spent hours in hands and knees, picking bugs, pulling weeds, cultivating, harvesting. They ground everything they ate. They washed in a stream. They squatted by a fire. Their entire day was one aerobic exercise after another. And birth was just another hard day's work. It was no big deal. One another hard day's work. And, but now we are so incredibly sedentary. I mean, I have people that say, oh yeah, I exercise. And I'm like, great. What do you do, babe? And they say, I walk. And it's like, wonderful. How often, how long, how far? Oh, twice a week. I walk for 20 minutes.

And I'm like, oh, that's, that's great. That is a really good start. Yes. And I think to myself, yeah, and if you have a 20-minute birth, that's going to do you. Because birth is hard. And every now and then, in my younger days, I realized that the women who weren't in shape couldn't give birth. They didn't have the stamina. And some of them actually couldn't push the baby out. Their stomach muscles were so poor that they could not get the baby out. So exercise. And I tell people, walk, swim, weight work, and yoga. And you have to cross train. And you just, and you be moderate, you know, but it will change your life emotionally, spiritually, in every which way and physically.

Next is the emotional and spiritual. This is a profoundly emotional experience. And most women are really very volatile, very volatile. As soon as they get pregnant, they weep more easily. They get mad more easily. They're irritated. They get happy real quick. There's just emotional roller coaster.

I don't know why you're looking at me like I'm a crazy person. No, no, no. I'm not. I'm Z. No, but this is confirmation. The other day I told him, you need to be more tender with me. At this point in my life, I need you to have tenderness towards me. Absolutely.

And he can't compute that because he's used to me being at a certain performance level in all areas. No, no, don't say he can't because then he he's used to me being at a certain performance level in all areas. Don't say he can't because then he won't. Okay. Okay. He has. You're negating him. Say at this point, it could be better for him to do that more.

At this point. You want to speak what you want to receive. I would. And you always, you never, you don't, you make me, these are things that are, don't work as well. But let me tell you, my husband at one point said, I had a hundred children. I worked more than anybody I've ever known. And he said, you know what?

You're just mean. He said, you are so mean, you're meaner than a snake. I don't know what to do with you. And I said, dude, I just want to point out just real briefly here that you don't have to be occupied by an alien. You don't have to get stretch marks from your nose to your knees you don't have to be completely crazy with hormones that you can't do shit about and you don't have to have a cantaloupe come out your ass and all you have

to do your piss hole all you have to do is endure me i'm doing all of that. And for all of my sacrifice, you get progeny. And he looked at me and he said, you know, babe, I really had not thought about it like that. And I said, so I can't do anything about the crazy. I don't like it. I would love not to be crazy, but I am. There's nothing to do. I will get better. I always do, but this is a hard time. And I work and I have a bunch of kids and I'm dealing with you, dude. So my advice to men.

What happened to him? He left at a certain point after we'd been married for 30 years. I can't really, when our kids went away, he had just had it. He just needed to do something else it sounds like you're in your own lane though and you're you're you're giving the world and i think it was also i mean he was a very very supportive midwife husband and i think he really

got tired and you give a lot to your clients i do i do yeah and and i and i it also is very very tiring there's a lot of middle of the night stuff i think that's what gets most midwives is the middle of the night stuff yeah so then we talked about the spiritual and we talked about that this is sacred transformative space but they can't really do that in the hospital they don't know who you are i have muslims and and fundamentalist christians and jews and and buddhists and atheists and agnostics and all these different ways of approach. You have to learn where people are spiritually in order to support their spiritual path in birth. But again, you know, we were never supposed to be surrounded by people that we didn't know.

They can't know you to find a spiritual space and they have to stay completely out of that, is a shame because it is sacred i i really agree with you here i when i was giving birth i will never forget this there was two girls that walked into the room besides the doctor and the midwife and they were smiling and sweet and laughing and i my whole body was like get them out yes it wasn't even like i wasn't trying to be, I don't know if they were nurses, I don't know what it was. I was just like, get them out. I can remember hearing somebody laugh in the other room and storming out there and saying, there is

nothing funny going on. And I do not want to hear that. If you need to laugh, you go outside. No, I get what you're saying. That you don't want to have all these people that don't know you in the room. Right. And they're going to put their fingers in your vagina. No big deal. That happens every day, right? With strangers that you've never met before, they're putting their fingers in your vagina. Yep. And that is not going to slow anything down or be any, or going to be weird at all.

Michael's eyes are popping out of his head because I timed this episode perfectly. So next is the intellectual. And I believe that our minds are on hyper drive all the time and that you, the mind is what really messes with you in childbirth. It's like, how much longer? How much more can I do it? What if I don't want to do it? What if I don't like it? What if the baby's okay? It's just all this mind stuff. And again, if you're in your mind, you're not in the zone. You don't want to be thinking. You want to go to that special place, like the place that is orgasmic and sexually powerful. And so, I believe that when you give information, when you give lots of information that the mind quiets down. It goes, I know what to expect. I know what's going to happen. I know all about the safety

and all about why, and I've got all of that data so my mind can shut off. Because your mind is there to help you and to support you and to make you safe. So, it doesn't want to let go at all unless you've got enough information. Next is rest. We are all so type A and driven, and this culture comes from a Judeo-Christian work ethic of you are not valuable unless you are producing. If you are not producing, productive, successful, dynamic, doing stuff that you're not valuable. It is not valuable for you to rest or say no or do less. And I think that is such a problem. It sure was for me. And I very slowly learned that it is as blessed to receive as it is to give. If there's nobody receiving, nobody can give. And so I learned to slow down

and not be so type A and driven and everything in my life changed. You know what I was thinking today? I was driving and this is a real serious tangent, but I grew up and I listened to like, for a while there, I got really into punk rock. And I still like think that a lot of that punk rock scene was probably like ingrained in just who I am and what I,

and I realized today why it's because that movement in that group of people stepped outside of what the most of society put value on productivity, all these things. And when they stepped outside of what the majority of the people put value on, they were not, they could not be leveraged by society, right? They could not be leveraged in a way that's like a control you with money,

productivity, job, status, all of these things. They said, we don't care about any of that. So yes, so they got, a lot of people looked at those people like outcasts or like they hadn't figured out. But I think to some degree, a lot of them had to figure it out because they were enjoying life

and they were taking time and they weren't going to, and they weren't attached to this whole system. And next on my list is joy. And I think that joy and rest are kind of part of getting out of any system. Because in a system, you have to do a certain set, you know? But when you're more natural and more relaxed and I think educated, then you can make better decisions. Also, I read one time that there are biochemical markers to every single human emotion and state.

And so for our ancestors, it was so dog-eat-dog and so tense. And the big ones took it away from the lesser ones, and there was always struggle. So when the marauders were marching up the valley to disembowel your village, these women had to run continually for the hills to get away. They're being flooded by stress hormones. And every time they're flooded when that baby is born we're gonna say this is a he he is ready to fight he is ready to be a warrior and kick some ass and that's what was needed they needed warriors to protect their village to protect the women and children to protect what they had because it was likely that somebody could just show up out of nowhere and take it if you weren't prepared to be a warrior so we were constantly flooded by these stress to protect what they had. Because it was likely that somebody could just show up out of nowhere and take everything.

Yeah, and take it if you weren't prepared to be a warrior. So we were constantly flooded by these stress hormones. But now what it produces is just warriors that have nothing to war except war, I guess. But we don't need warriors. I know what you're saying. We need peace. And, oh, I believe that when you pick joy, when you choose beautiful water, and we're so lucky here.

Don't come here, though. There's such beautiful water and such beautiful nature and rivers and streams and creeks and lakes. And, oh, my God, it's so uplifting. And it brings you joy and brings you peace and i think when you flood yourself during pregnancy and especially exercise also and and fun things family friends music song dance these bring biochemical markers that mark your baby for those things as opposed to stress. And what we need to realize is it's not just the marauders marching up the valley, it's traffic. It's working 50 hours

a week. There is no pregnant person that needs to be working 50 hours a week. It is a stress of racial injustice and political unrest and pandemics and war. These are things that create tremendous stress hormones that we've got to counter by as much joy as we can put in. I have a tip for anyone who's listening. I have meditated every single day of this pregnancy and it's helped me so much. Awesome idea. So much. And yesterday, Michael and I took, just going off what you're saying, a half an hour walk.

We just walked around the block and it was like, it was so like low cortisol. It sounds so stupid, but you're right. It was like very joyful and you need more of those moments when you're pregnant. You do. What about sex? Do you recommend that couples have sex when you're pregnant? Absolutely.

Is it good for the baby? Yes. It's good for the baby and good for the mom. I mean, at one point, I had 12 clients in about a year, maybe a little more, that did not have any sex. Either they didn't have a partner, their partner wouldn't, they couldn't, or their partner was gone or something. Nine of them had C-sections. Two of them had 48-hour labors. We need to get bucket-marked. One of them had a normal experience. And I think that's because sex produces endorphins and oxytocin.

Oxytocin is what makes you orgasm. Let's just go. I have a question. What position do you recommend for pregnancy? Whatever feels good. At some point, though, what feels good is not usually somebody on top of you when you've got a big belly that's like, you know, is he paying attention? Don't get too out there, dude, because if you squash me, I'm going to be unhappy. So for a lot of women lying on their side or hands and knees, lying on their side with their partner behind them or hands and knees with their partner behind them is much more comfortable i just feel like if i'm on top it looks like that scene from road trip where

michael the little skinny guy and there's like a huge obese woman on top of him and it's like just recognize that that's an altered view and not true okay um that's another that's another great great position. Anything that is good for you, an experiment. You know, be creative. But every time you have sex, it makes your uterus create more receptor sites for the oxytocin to attach to so that you have an easier birth. And it produces more oxytocin production in the pituitary to make the whole thing go better. And it produces endorphins. The things that produce endorphins are exercise and sex. So you want tons of endorphins

surging around in you in labor because they're natural painkillers. But as soon as you do an epidural and pit that it's over, it blocks all of that stuff. There isn't much oxytocin production because there's no need. You don't feel anything. So say you're doing all the things in yourself. Okay. So like people are still going to use epidural and like teach their own, but if you do all these things, but then you take it, are you saying it negates all the positive things or you still get a benefit? No, there's nothing negates anything. There's not a, you know, this, this is not like the way it has to be this is a choice but if the information makes sense then it might be worth looking into i want you to really walk our audience through the

pros and cons of a home birth and what it looks like because i when i hear home birth i'm going to be really honest with you my house is all white so i'm thinking it'll stay all white okay there would not be a single smidge of anything anywhere. But I also, I'm going to be honest. I'm going to go down a rabbit hole with you. Yes, please. I can't stand needles. I can't stand anything medical.

Well, then you should not go to the hospital because you're going to get plenty of needles. But this is my weird thing. To have it in my home just grosses me out. Like Michael, if he wears the same shoes that he wore in the hospital, I make him to keep him outside like I'm just very specific about my house and having all these medical supplies it gives me

anxiety is what does it look like when you're doing a home birth like walk me through the beginning to the end okay so first off we do prenatal care and that is a large part of what makes everything okay is because I spend two hours on all the first three visits, consult, initial, and physical, and then it's an hour every visit after that. And I see my clients once a month, twice in the eighth month, and once a week in the ninth month.

They have to take my childbirth classes. Not every midwife works this way, people. So you got to find the person that resonates for you. But I feel that it is super important to get to know people. And it doesn't take, you know, you go to your doctor visit and you see them for five or 10 minutes. Well, you can do everything in five or 10 minutes. But I ask, how are you feeling? How are you guys getting along? How are you feeling? How's your work? How are your pets? How are your kids? How are your friends? How's your family? How's your finances? All of this has a big part to play

in your stress levels and consequently how you're going to give birth. So I think that's super important. I also think having somebody there that you have a connection to. There are people that don't make connections real easily, but I do. And I'm very emotional and very available emotionally, spiritually, intellectually. And so, that helps to establish a relationship. And then they take 14 hours of childbirth classes. The classes are amazing. There's seven classes. They are two hours each. They're me teaching long ago and they're on YouTube. So I give them the link at 30 weeks and they start watching classes. The classes are really designed to put my clients in control of the process. And like the first class is an overview of the entire series. And we go into the greatest detail on the

breathing and relaxation techniques, which help you to handle the sensations of labor. There are plenty of ways to handle the sensations of labor. I've had really painful things in my life and I did not have easy births. I had pretty painful births, but there are lots of things worse than birth. And it comes and goes, it ebbs and flows. It goes up and then it down and then up and down. And some of them are stronger and some of them are less. But you get all this biochemical stuff that helps you every step of the way to handle it. Class number two is the nuts and bolts class. It's physiology and anatomy, impending and actual signs of labor, stages of the birth process, mechanisms of labor, how birth works.

Class three is about getting ready for the birth and getting ready that the baby's actually going to live with you after the birth. I can't tell you for years, people would get ready for the birth and then they'd be like, oh, what do we do with it? And I thought, okay, they need more information. So we talk about how to get ready, how to ready everything for the birth and what to buy and how to get your stuff together and things you don't need and things you definitely need. Class number four is all about the birth. We talk about a lot of it is about the coach's role. I teach the dads to time contractions and know when to get me there and what to do when you go into labor, while you're in labor. Huge amount of that class is coach's role. And then we talk about what I do from start to finish. If you don't have any ideas of what is going to happen, this is what will happen. And so that you can say, oh, that's great. Gosh, I really love that. But this, that's not going to work for us at our birth. We don't want that. And you didn't mention it, but it'd be great if you would do this at our birth so that we can, because everyone's unique and everyone needs to have it be unique for them. Then we talk about complications. I carry 175

pounds of equipment with me to every birth, $15,000 worth of stuff. I carry IV fluids, drugs to stop hemorrhage, drugs to stop violent vomiting, some pain medication, resuscitation drugs and equipment for the baby, several tanks of oxygen, several types of birth stool, a full homeopathic and herbal kit. And I'm much more likely to use herbs or homeopathy before I resort to Western medicine. But the Western medicine that I can do has lowered my transport rates dramatically. I carry stuff to catheterize you. I can even put an indwelling Foley catheter in if you're exhausted after the birth and need to just rest for 12 to 24 hours. I carry everything to do the occasional episiotomy. I'm going to stop right here and just tell you, I have about a 10% complication rate. I have about a 6% to 7%, I mean, an 8% transport to the hospital rate,

about a 6% to 7% C-section rate for my clients, and a 1% to 2% episiotomy rate. Episotomies are where they cut the vagina open. Everything is about make it go faster, and then they sew you back up. So, I have extremely minimal complication statistics because I'm super careful. I carry everything to weigh and measure and check the baby out and do vitamin K and eye drops and all of that. So super, super well-equipped.

But we set it up in a way that is very unobtrusive. All of my stuff stays in tackle boxes and the tackle boxes go up against the wall and we get it out if we need it. So it doesn't look like a medical process. So where are you giving birth? In your room, in your bed. That is where you're most relaxed. I double make the bed with sterile sheets and plastic between the layers. And you have never been more relaxed in your entire life than when you are in your bed. And you can't get that kind of tension. And you'll never see a smidge of blood anywhere. We are the maids. We do lots of doula type services. We cook for you guys. We do all the cleanup. We do the birth laundry. We take pictures

and video. We choreograph the family and friends. We take care of kids and pets. We do all the cleanup. We do the birth laundry. We take pictures and video. We choreograph the family and friends. We take care of kids and pets. We water plants. We do lots and lots of stuff. I come with- Do you want to move in now? I come with a minimum of two.

We really want three. And we sometimes have four of us or more. If we need that and the fee is exactly the same, let me just cut and tell you, I charge three to $6,000. I am absolutely worth $6,000. But if I made that my fee, I would cut off all the people who really deserve to have a different experience. So I have a sliding scale. You do not get more services for more fees or less services for less fees. The services are exactly the same. And I say, I'm not going to investigate you and say, oh, come on, you're in the $3,300, the $4,600, the $5,800.

This is an honor system. And I say, pay me as much as you can. And don't worry because it's going to be exactly the same. I take cash checks, credit cards, money orders, trade and barter, and PayPal, Venmo, Zelle, lots of ways for people to take care of it. I'm very flexible. I don't want people to be horribly stressed out about finances. I want them to have an amazing experience.

So let's go back to the equipment. I also, everything is set up and very unobtrusively, and it doesn't look like a big medical deal. All the equipment comes in, most of it stays in another room. And just what we need for the actual birth, and you'll see it all. You'd see it all in the classes and you know exactly what's going to be coming and what every bit of it is going to be used for. And what we would do if there's a complication. What do we do if you don't go into labor? What do we do if you, waters break too early? Are you, waters break and you don't go into labor at all? What do we do if you bleed? What do we do if the heart zones drop? What do we do if your blood pressure goes up? What do we do if the baby doesn't breathe? What do we do if baby

inhales amniotic fluid or meconium? I want you to know that I have a plan for every single thing that could happen and the equipment to deal with it. And if we can't handle it, we go immediately to the hospital. And we are so incredibly lucky in Austin. We have astonishing backup in Austin for midwives and for home birth clients. It is absolutely miraculous. And when it doesn't, when we need to go, and we talk about that in this class, when would we need to go to the hospital? What could you expect from the hospital? What would they expect from you? What could you expect from me? I go with my clients to the hospital. I stay there. I run interference and interpret, make sure they don't do anything that they don't want. And I stay there until the baby's born and we either get to go back home. If we have to stay in the hospital, if you have to stay in the hospital, then I do a hospital postpartum visit and all to go perfectly, which most of the time it does. And most of my transports,

almost all my transports, almost all my C-sections, almost all the complications are in first time moms. It is much harder to do it the first time. Once your body has done it, there is a muscle memory, a body memory, and it just gets easier and easier. And you know you've

done it. Yeah, and you know you've done it. You know your body can do it. How big was your baby? Seven pounds, seven ounces. Oh, awesome. Is that good? Lovely size, yeah. Lovely size. Lovely size baby. I mean, it's tough to get a nine pound baby out, but it happens all the time. And it's hard for the baby if it weighs, you know, under six pounds. They just aren't as strong and they oftentimes need a little bit of help. Like with pumping and doing bottles and breastfeeding until they get strong enough that you can toss those bottles and just breastfeed. I don't want, I want to finish you and my consultation off air. I wanted to do half of this on air. He has to go to a meeting.

It's on his calendar right now. I want to finish you and my conversation. If someone wants to book with you based off this episode, where can they find you? New Life Birth Services. And it's www.newlifebirthservices.com. And that's my website. And they can call and set up a free consultation. And this is basically what I do is just talk about all of this fabulous stuff and give them tons of information.

There is no pressure. There are 80 midwives in Austin. Austin has one of the highest per capita midwife groups in the nation and one of the highest per capita mid home births in the nation. And it's a great system. And again, we have wonderful backup. So class number four gets you up to where the baby's born and in your arms. Class number five is all about the postpartum. It's the baby's up in your arms. It's bonding, initiating breastfeeding, the birth of the placenta, the first three days after the birth, the first two weeks after the birth. And then half of that class is about breastfeeding. Sometimes breastfeeding is super

easy and sometimes it's really hard. So we want to prepare everybody. Then class number six is about raising kids, which is, as you well know, a whole lot harder than giving birth. I have people that go, oh, the birth, the birth, the pain. Oh yeah. And that's a whole nother podcast. And I say, oh, darling, don't be worried. It's a few hours out of one day of your life.

It is not a big deal, but raising kids is a big deal. And so I talk, this whole class is about that. Class number seven is a review of all the most important information, the last of the breathing and relaxation, and then sudden childbirth. What to do if they should fall out. And when I tell those dads what they're going to have to do if that baby falls out, by God, they do a good job of getting us there. Wow.

Well, let's see what happens so when we arrive i usually arrive first and we try to keep the equipment to a minimum in the beginning you know by the end of the whole process you're in another world you're gonna not gonna notice that we've got oxygen tanks set up and you know in a pressure cooker filled with our instruments and all of the stuff we get a we get a pad ready with iv fluids in case we need it we get a pad ready with hemorrhage medication if we need. We get a pad ready with IV fluids in case we need it. We get a pad ready with hemorrhage medication if we need it. We get a pad ready with all of the stuff for the baby. And it's all put away and covered so that you don't look at it. You don't see it. Oh, but a lot of what you've expressed are thoughts and you can think differently. It's not

reality. It's your thoughts and beliefs. And you can do affirmations can think differently. It's not reality. It's your thoughts and beliefs. And you can do affirmations and think differently and think, I am so comfortable being in my bed. The audience is going to have to stay tuned to see what I do. This is a lot of information. It is. It's a lot of information for my husband. Well, listen, I think I heard you guys before we started that you said you might've been a little nervous. And I mean this honestly, truly, I think you're one of the best guests we've ever had. You're killed it. And I really, I really enjoyed talking to you.

And it's, you know, obviously a subject that's not as geared maybe towards a lot of men. Right. But this was, I am no, but this was super interesting. Thank you for making men are relegated to the backseat of birth bus in this. And you know why? It's because men were never involved in birth. They were never involved in birth in almost all the cultures of the world. And men and women's roles were very separate. And they were kind of, I think, maybe a bit more brutish. And women sort of kept to themselves. So, this is new.

And men involved in life as partners and egalitarian equality and commitment and love. You know, most of the relationships that have ever happened in the world were not for love. They were arranged. Sure, sure. And so this is all very new. So we are forging a new way for men

to be a partner in the process. Maybe we can forge a new way to figure out for them to squeeze it through their dick hole. That would be really great. No, we would have no people. And that would be bad. Yeah, I say it all the time. If men were supposed to, we would have died off as a species years ago.

But they also do wonderful things that women don't. We must respect each other. We must acknowledge each other. We must hold each other in esteem and not negate anything that each other do. Hold me in esteem, Lauren. You need to be more tender with me during the rest of my pregnancy.

What did we say about you need to? Didn't we talk about that on this episode? I would so appreciate it if you would be more tender with me. I would so appreciate if you would be so tender towards me. Yes, there you go. Like I said, I mean it.

I had fun. The other day I napped on a Saturday and you acted like, you know. Wait, wait, wait. No, no, go. Like I said, I mean it. I had fun. The other day I napped on a Saturday and you acted like, you know. Wait, wait, wait. No, no, no. Let's not make stories up here. I'm going to tell on you. No, you can tell me if it's true,

but this is a made up story. Okay, I love made up stories. Normally I take it, but if it's made up, I got to call it out. You guys go check her out, especially if you're pregnant, if you're looking to do any at-home births.

You're incredible. That was so much information. I was taking notes. I really appreciate you taking the time to come on. My pleasure. And we popped your podcast, Cherry. Yes. Listen, I mean this. You should do more of these. You're really good. Thank you. You're a great guest.

Thank you. Thank you for coming. I've never been asked before and never really thought about it. The second you started talking, I was like, no, you got to come on the podcast. Oh, thank you. Thank you very much. Well, this has been a wonderful experience and I'm just glad to have people be thinking

a little bit more about how they can have a better experience. Hey, knowledge is power. And a safer experience. Knowledge is power. Thank you so much. Thank you so much. Giving away a skinny confidential book today. All you have to do to win a copy of

Get the Fuck Out of the Sun signed by me is tell me who you want to hear on the podcast next. Go to my Instagram at Lauren Bostic and give us some guest recommendations. We are always paying attention. I hope you guys love this episode. Like I said, I took tons of notes and the next guest on the podcast is going to shock you. You're going to love it.

Everything's a shock lately. Love you guys. This episode is brought to you by Whoop. All right, Michael has been running around our house doing all these health and fitness and wellness things. And one of the things that he has turned me on to is this wearable fitness device. It is called Whoop.

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