Today Bea shares her perinatal journey from dealing with unexpected infertility and IVF to the whirlwind experience of a fast labor and delivery. She discusses the realities of fertility treatments and the specific challenges surrounding her fear of needles, the surprise of her water breaking dramatically while she was asleep, and a bit about the great support she got in early breastfeeding, sleep challenges, and an early thyroid imbalance her son had that required medication.
Resources:
Natural Breastfeeding online course (focuses on laidback breastfeeding/bodyfeeding)
Bedsharing & Breastfeeding (Academy of Breastfeeding Medicine)
Safe Cosleeping Guidelines (Mother Baby Behavioral Laboratory, U. of Notre Dame)
Safe Sleep Seven (La Leche League International)
Sponsor links:
Free “Pack for Your Best Birth” Packing List (with free mini-course option)
East River Doula Collective (find a doula, attend our free “Meet the Doulas” event)
Birth Matters NYC Childbirth Education Classes (Astoria, Queens and virtual)
*Disclosure: Links on this page to products are affiliate links; I will receive a small commission on any products you purchase at no additional cost to you.
Episode Topics:
Unexplained infertility, went to NYU
A couple rounds of IUI, then went to IVF
Coping strategies for fear of needles
Not getting many eggs
First IVF worked
Healthy pregnancy
NYU has a higher rate of IVF success in NYC
Hiring doulas, taking birth class, reading books
Gaining a lot of weight and feeling uncomfortable in her body in pregnancy
38 weeks doctor asked her if she wanted to think about induction, Bea says no
40 week checkup, 2x/week checkups
Photo shoot to reenact her baby pic
2 days after due date, she’s asleep and feels a sudden jab, her water breaks
She cleans up and tries to go back to sleep
She calls the doulas to let them know water broke
Had noticed a contraction the night before when she was about to go to bed
Really intense contractions as soon as the water broke
Started timing contractions; they’re 5 min apart
Sophia came to check on her and contractions are 3.5 min apart, Bea is vocalizing
Feeling constantly like she needs to poop (but she had been constipated)
More vocalizing, contractions around 2 min apart and are very long
They call an Uber
Bea is telling her husband stuff to pack
Arriving at NYU main entrance and more fluid gushes out
Skipping triage, straight to L&D room
Almost fully dilated and effaced
Kneeling with arms on head of bed
Got to hospital around 11:20am, in room around 11:30am
After 10-15 min, they said time to start pushing
She’s on all fours but the doctor she got (not one of her OBs) told her to get on her back
Directed pushing, they’re rushing her to bear down forcefully
Felt the ring of fire
8:05 water broke, 12:27pm baby’s on her chest
Old school doc is doing cord traction
Delaying newborn protocols
Got breastfeeding off to a good start
They got to be supported by a couple of lactation consultants at the hospital, addressed some nipple pain, recommended staying for an extra night to be seen by another lactation consultant, stayed for 2 nights
NYU has a virtual lactation consult after you go home, they have a virtual breastfeeding cafe, have a warmline
Going through Natural Breastfeeding video, doing laidback breastfeeding
Sleep challenges for baby around 5 weeks
Baby had slightly elevated thyroid issues so he’s on meds for hypothyroid
6 lbs, 11 oz at birth
Final insight: trust your instincts
Interview Transcript
Lisa: Hi Bea, how are you doing today?
Bea: I'm good.
Lisa: I'm so happy to have you with us sharing your baby's birth story.
Bea: Yeah. I'm excited too.
Lisa: Would you please first just take a moment to introduce yourself so that the listeners can get to know you.
Bea: Yeah, my name is Bea. I'm in my early thirties.
I'm a software engineer. I live in Astoria in New York City. I used to live in East Village for a while when I first moved out here. But, yeah, we wanted to settle down and start our family. So we found a nice place in Astoria.
Lisa: Nice. Thanks. And you gave birth around, you're exiting the fourth trimester around now?
Bea: Yeah. Yeah. I gave birth, just before the 4th of July. Yeah, it's almost 12 weeks.
Unexplained Fertility Issues and IVF
Lisa: Yeah. We're recording this in September. So great. Why don't we start off by, just, sharing anything you would like to about the conception journey or the pregnancy journey, just the different ways that you prepared for the journey into parenthood.
Bea: Yeah, I started preparing quite a while ago. My 1st friend that got pregnant during the beginning of the pandemic. And I really wanted us to have our kids around the same time, so they could grow up together because we're super close. so my husband and I started trying to conceive, and we were 1 of the 30 percent of couples who have unexplained infertility issues.
So we ended up going to NYU fertility,for help with that. We like tried for a year ish, a little more to conceive naturally before looking more seriously into fertility assistance. Tried a couple of times, like once, without drugs, once with a trigger shot to make sure the timing was perfect, still didn't take, so we ended up doing IVF, which was an interesting journey for someone who's very afraid of needles.
I got really used to needles and
Lisa: It's a lot, right?
Bea: Yeah. It was a ton. I had to give myself multiple shots a day for weeks.
Lisa: Are there any tips you would have for people? Cause I just talked to someone recently who's about to go down that road and was like, I have such a fear of needles.
Any like coping strategies or things that helped you?
Bea: I mean at first, for the initial stuff with fertility is a lot of going to the office for blood draws and I had my husband go with me for the first few appointments, to just be moral support, and to help distract me. And I got used to that after a couple of weeks and was able to go by myself and just look away and think about other things and like do breathing exercise, like breathe in through my nose and out through my mouth so I wouldn't forget to breathe or hyperventilate, both of which I've done in the past with the needles. And then when I had to start giving shots to myself, I watched the videos a bunch. And my husband was like, oh, I can give you the shots. But I was more afraid of having him give me the shots than doing them myself.
So I just had to amp myself up, he was a cheerleader for me. And yeah, I just, after the first week, it got easier. The shots you have to give yourself for getting eggs extracted are all like small needles that you can give yourself in like the stomach and the front of your thighs.
And, it's definitely, like important to pinch the skin out and you go really fast and pinching your skin feels more of a thing than like the actual needle.
Lisa: So like a distraction. Yeah.
Bea: So once I got used to it, it was like, not too bad. Some of the later drugs for the trigger shots right before the extraction you can feel the meds and that's more painful. Yeah, I adjusted. But my egg extraction, I didn't have very many eggs, like maybe that was part of my unexplained infertility, but yeah, they only retrieved like six eggs when the average is more around 10, and of those, we had four that fertilized and three that passed like the chromosomal screening.
So three healthy embryos. And we implanted the healthiest one, regardless of gender we didn't find out the gender until birth. So that was fun, but for the first couple months ish after, before and after implantation, you have to do progesterone shots, which is like a much, much longer needle that has to go in the butt, which is very difficult to do yourself.
Yeah. So I had my husband give me those. And luckily, his parents are nurses, so they gave him some tips so that he
Lisa: Oh, good!
Bea: Yeah, so he was more comfortable doing it, and he only did it poorly once and there was blood a little bit more than usual, but I was more okay having him do those because I couldn't see what he was doing.
I was lying face down on the bed. It was just okay, it's like a sharp pinch and then he's done. It's fine.
Lisa: Things you never knew you'd be doing as a couple when you met. met.
Bea: Yeah, certainly not. That I was definitely very sick of because you have to do this for quite a while and that makes you very sore. My butt was just very sore for a solid couple of months. For walking and sitting down and stuff. But, yeah, it feels so long ago. I have mostly forgotten about it. But that is the part that I will have to do again if we want to have a second kid. But yeah, so like the first implantation, like it took, right away.
It was a very normal pregnancy after that,which was really good. I had only mild morning sickness during the first trimester, like I threw up once and then I was just like queasy and had to cut out spicy food, which was unfortunate because I love spicy food.
So I just came back to a very bland, salty carb diet. But that wasn't too bad and everything else was pretty uneventful.
Lisa: Can I ask you, did you like the NYU clinic that you worked with? I don't know if they call it a clinic, but fertility.
Bea: Yeah, I picked NYU for just our general pregnancy stuff because my parents are also doctors and my mom works at a teaching hospital and I just have a strong bias towards teaching hospitals just because I feel like they seem to be a lot more up to date on more recent research and protocols.
Because they're not a for profit institution in the same way. They're more focused on the patient. They tend to have up to date systems. They don't try to sell you on things that you don't need as much. At least that's my impression.
But I really liked them. NYU Langone, in New York City has 1 of the higher success rates for IVF, which I learned in my research was like one of the most important factors for IVF is the clinic success rate can vary anywhere between 30 and 60%. And that's like the biggest contributing factor for will an individual IVF attempt be successful.
Cause it's all your personal factors, but yeah, the clinic really makes a big difference.
Lisa: That's going to be so helpful for Thank you for sharing, cause I’ve had a ton of clients who have gone down this road, some shared on the podcast, but I've never had anybody highlight that, having done that research realizing what a big difference that can make.
Bea: Yeah. Yeah, because it's definitely possible to try IVF at a smaller independent clinic that does it less often and isn't involved in the research. And yeah, they just have a lower success rate overall, even independent of personal factors that would affect it..
Yeah, so I did that, the doctors and the nurses were really great. Honestly, for IVF, you mostly see the nurses. I think I saw the doctor twice and everything is on rails. They have it down to a science. You go every week to check your blood levels and do all this stuff.
And, yeah, they were all very nice and very accommodating of my fear of needles and things and answered all the questions. And I stuck with NYU for my checkups, for my obstetrics, and I was really happy with that experience. It was definitely asking just tons of questions like much earlier than I think they generally have people ask questions. I was like, Oh, I'm only like 12 weeks along, but tell me about all of your labor and delivery stuff.
Lisa: I'm curious how, needing to have gone down this alternative conception route route and all that it entails both physically, scheduling wise, emotionally, do you feel like that affected your perspective and preferences and your hopes for the kind of birth you wanted to have?
Because I've seen it really vary from person to person.
Bea: For me, personally, I think I would have been the same either way. I really like to do a lot of research and know what the scientific method backed research says, and I think I would have been that way, even if we conceived naturally, I still would have been reading all the books about labor and delivery and all the research I could find.
And I don't do well with pain. My primary objectives for what I wanted for my birth experience was to minimize the likelihood of extra pain. It's like, I know it's painful. I know it's one of the most painful things that a woman goes through in her life.
And I'm like, I just don't want it to be worse than it needs to be. So yeah, I think I would have done that either way. And I think I might look into a midwife for my 2nd child. When we get around to doing that, because there's some research about them having some better outcomes for some metrics, and just given how fast everything happened.
Lisa: Yeah. After I heard how fast your first was I was like, oh, she's going to need to plan home birth this time. Yeah. So we'll get there shortly. So you just decided you liked NYU, so you stuck with them for pregnancy and birth as well?
Bea: Yes. Yes. I was really happy with them. They're like one of the bigger teaching hospitals in the city and they've got a lot of offices and locations and availability.
So yeah, I stuck with them.
Preparations for Birth & Finding Doula Team
Lisa: Nice. So then once you were pregnant, in addition to choosing a provider in NYU, what were the other ways that you prepared? I know a couple of them, but I'll let you share.
Bea: Yeah. I mean, I took the Birth Matters birthing class. I knew I wanted to have a doula, because one of the books that I read was, Expecting Better, by Emily Oster.
And I also read her like early childhood research book as well. So that was like one of my big sort of jumping off points for like other things to look into. But like one of the things she pointed out was that, having a doula results in a lot lower intervention rate and positively affects birth outcomes.
So I was like, well, I got to get a doula then. And so looking into doulas in the New York City area, I came across Birth Matters and started looking, went to the meet and greet through there and saw that there were birthing classes. And it was also one of the more recommended birthing classes for the area.
So I did that. I found my doulas who were wonderful, a pair of them. Should I mention, call out their names?
Lisa: Sure. If you'd like to, yeah. Yeah. From our East River Doula Collective.
So you came to our Meet the Doulas and I think there is where you met Jess and Sophia.
Bea: Yeah. Jess and Sophia.
They were a super good team. What I loved about them was that they're like, oh, we've got this whole Google Docs folder of research backed articles for you to keep doing research,read up on things yourself and available to answer questions, even after birth for a few weeks. And they just have really great energy and just seem so friendly and supportive, which they were, I was very happy with having them available to me. But yeah, I hired them and I took the Birth Matters class, which was really helpful cause I had a good idea of the types of interventions I wanted to talk to my doctor about and things to avoid, but I didn't really have a lot of information on like a more subjective idea of, what those things are like, and, how to have those conversations with my provider. So the birthing class is especially helpful for, like, here is how you can have these conversations. And, here is, step by step, every part of the experience and like how it's going, how it could possibly feel,just giving me a baseline, and it's a few more things, to look out for that I hadn't thought of.The research doesn't really tell you about pain management techniques or, like, how to adjust your mindset and things like that. That was really helpful for making me feel more prepared in a well rounded way for all the various things that come up during birth and the fourth trimester.
Lisa: Sometimes people ask about timing of like when should I hire a doula? When should I take birth classes? So I was just looking back at our emails and your history with being involved with our doula collective and my classes. And it looks like you were due in June, I believe.
Bea: Yeah, the very end of June.
Lisa: Yeah. And you, I think in January to Meet the Doulas. And I assume within a few days or weeks, hired Jess and Sophia, although it might've been months, I’m not sure. Didn't look back at that nuance. And then you came to birth class in March. I think it started in mid March and, I like that, I don't know. How did you feel about timing that matters more than what I think.
Bea: I feel like it was good timing. I felt like I was behind on various things. It's just like, oh, yeah, I'm pregnant, I'll figure that stuff out later. And then as the new year rolled over, I was like, I really need to figure out what's going on and get my house in order and get all these things lined up before.
And I'm like, it's too late because I tend to procrastinate a lot. And I was very aware that if I didn't get moving I would be like 30, 36 weeks pregnant and be like, wait, I need to like, do some of this stuff. Yeah,I felt good, but I think I took a little while to pick a doula.
It probably took me like 3 or 4 weeks. because I narrowed it down from Meet the Doulas to a couple of options and then had half hour conversations with the couple of options that I was thinking about, and then picked Jess and Sophia from there. And yeah, and then the Birthing Classes.
I felt like I was taking them late, because like some of the things I was reading, it was like, Oh, make sure you do this, it's never too early to take them. And I was like, Oh, I'm more than halfway through my second trimester. And I'm just now taking classes. Then when we got there, we were like the--
Lisa: Earliest probably.
Bea: Yeah.
Lisa: Yeah, a lot of people don't even think about it until it's very late. Like I just taught somebody this week who was, what were they? One person was like 35 weeks, one person was 37, which is, I recommend trying to have completed it by 36, 37 weeks. But I really love it when people take it earlier because there's so much to process.
And, as you know, I give lots of resources for people who like to take a deeper dive and like to do the research or want to listen to the podcast or all of those different things. And so the earlier, the better, for the people who want to take the deeper dives, who really, become fascinated and have lots of curiosity around different topics and things. Some people would argue, it's nice to have it fresh. so I'd rather take it later. But there's pros and cons both, but generally I love that you took it when you did. I felt like you definitely, on average, you were way earlier in both exploring the doula option, as well as taking birth class in a great way, really strategically smart way, I think.
So I just wanted to talk with you about that and point that out to listeners as well.
Bea: Yeah, I do think it's helpful. And plus like when you do it a bit earlier, it's like you have more options. It's like doulas tend to get booked up and you don't want your favorite option to not be available because you waited until the last minute.
And yeah,
Lisa: Yeah, that happens a lot to people. They'll meet with somebody and then they'll just sit with it and be busy, as New Yorkers are, and then a few months later, they'll come back and be like, I I think we want to book this person. And we'll be like, sorry, they already are booked up now.
Anything else you wanted to share about pregnancy and the ways you prepared it before we go into your birth story.
Supportive OB with Weight Gain
Bea: Yeah, I will say I gained way more weight than I expected to or wanted to like, especially in the third trimester, I had uncontrollable, food cravings just constantly, especially at the end for ice cream. Like we were just going to Coldstone just all the time.
So I guess they recommend gaining like 25 to 35 pounds and I gained more like 50 pounds, which I am now still trying to get my eating more in check. My weight's starting to come down a little bit. But I was not expecting that I was like, oh, I'll probably be at the higher end, but then I wasn't expecting to go way over and I was just completely uncontrolled. But everyone is, I don't know, if everyone keeps telling me that I look good despite my pants not fitting.
Lisa: What I can see of you looks great. You look healthy.
Bea: Yeah. Yeah, I think I'm reasonably healthy, but I definitely neglected keeping up with working out during pregnancy and just like walking around more. Cause with it being summer, I was like, it's so hot. I don't want to do anything.
Which I know, I don't know. I try to remind myself to be kind to myself and not stress about things too much. But it is definitely something that is difficult when you're used to your body being a certain way and looking a certain way and then that changes it is a lot to adjust to.
Lisa: Sure. What was the dynamic with your provider? Were they concerned at all? Or did they make you feel bad? I hope not.
Bea: I was using whatever the Ovia app, even before, like when we were trying to conceive, I started using the Ovia Fertility app to track periods and whatever cervical mucus and basal body temperature and stuff to like time my ovulation, and then I started using, their pregnancy app. And I'm using the kids app, cause they're just like good little tracking tools. But the pregnancy app had like a chart of here's the bands of what your weight gain would be based off of your starting weight and like the minimum and maximum of whatever recommended weight gain. When I started growing faster than the weight band, I asked my doctor, I was like, Oh, I feel like I'm gaining weight a little bit faster than I maybe should be. And is that okay? Like, what do you think about that? And the doctor I saw for that appointment was like, it doesn't matter. Like everyone gains--
Lisa: So nice to hear. I was hoping I'd hear that but many OBs are very overly weight conscious, not really an evidence based necessary way or helpful way. So I'm glad that they were like, it's okay.
Bea: Yeah. She was downright supportive. She was like eat what you want. It's just like the number. I was almost like, Oh, I kind of wish you would tell me that I need to stop eating so much sugar because I might change my behavior if a doctor's like, you need to stop eating so much sugar.
Lisa: But maybe your body was craving the calcium or something in that ice cream it needed, perhaps.
Bea: Yeah, possibly. The baby was healthy. Like he's near as perfect as I could hope. But yeah, so everything's turned out for the, Good for the most part.
Lisa: Nice. I want you to know that I'm hearing that it can feel uncomfortable when you're not used to being a certain way or a shape or size. That can be challenging, just all the body changes that we go through in pregnancy.
Bea: Yeah, I mean I think if it was just a number I feel like I'd be more comfortable but I was so much looking forward to getting back to my normal clothes and have clothes that I thought would fit fine, like just not at all.Like things that I'm like, Oh, this has like room for having a bit more of a stomach afterwards, but I'm like, Oh, I didn't know that my thighs could get this big. And I didn't know my breasts would grow this much like for breastfeeding.
Lisa: Hmm. And it hasn't been very long since you gave birth. So yeah, I think like you said, being kind to yourself and giving it time, that'll happen.
Yeah. All right. Thanks for sharing that. would you like to go into your birth story and it can be like in the days or weeks leading up to or however you want to start?
Delaying Talk of Induction, Followed by Spontaneous Labor
Bea: Yeah, I had the weekly appointments, for the last few weeks of pregnancy, I think at 38 weeks, NYU, because it's such a large practice, you see a different doctor for most appointments, which I like, because you're more likely to have had appointments with the doctor that you will ultimately be delivering with. But yeah, so my last, 38 weeks, the doctor I was seeing, then she, started talking about, oh, do we want to think about induction, which I do think it's unfortunate that hospitals do tend to like that's their default mode of practice of, might as well induce, but it's unavoidable these days for whatever reason. But she asked me if I wanted to do an induction.
I was like, no, I want to wait and see what happens. And she was, it was fine, just ask the question and then move on. 39 weeks, explaining okay, we're getting towards the end, you're still pregnant, it doesn't seem like you're going into labor imminently. You might need to start doing bi weekly appointments.
And if you haven't delivered by the 40 week checkup, so when I went in at 40 weeks, which was like my due date, they started scheduling me for like 3 or 4 days later, to keep coming in to make sure baby was doing well. And when you schedule appointments with that short notice, and there's like scheduling conflicts, so they're like, oh, we have to call you to see when we can fit you in because they're constantly redoing their schedule as people like suddenly have their babies and don't need to come to their check in appointments.
So yeah, my due date rolled around, my mom was in town for moral support and I wanted her to be there for the delivery. We're very close and she like, helps me stay calm. So she was staying at our place and I'm just waddling around the house. We got a watermelon to recreate a picture that my mom had from when she was pregnant with me, where she was just standing next to a watermelon.
Lisa: Oh, hope I get to see that if you're willing.
Bea: Yeah. Yeah. I can send that over. Yeah, it's one of my favorite pictures from my baby book. And I was like, I have to recreate this picture.
So we did that, and did it like a photo shoot. And, days were just passing, and then, yeah, two days after my due date like, eight in the morning, I was like, sound asleep in bed, and I just felt, a sudden, jab in my uterus, low down, and then it was just like a flood, just all of a sudden, all over the bed, and I, like, jump out of bed, and I'm just like standing there, and my compression socks are, like, soaked, because I'm dripping all over them. And my husband always wakes up completely shocked even when nothing's happening like he just jerks awake suddenly like anytime he's woken up so he's just oh my god what's happening and like also jumps out of bed and I'm just like oh my god like we need to take off the sheets or the mattress is gonna get ruined. Like strip the bed. My mom was already awake. She's a super early morning person and she's just like oh it's starting, but I was just very preoccupied with like I need towels, I need to clean up this giant puddle on the floor. I need to get the bed linens in the laundry because I don't want everything to be soaked through for whatever when I want to take a nap later.
Lisa: A little note for listeners, you might want to have what are called chux pads underneath you or a waterproof mattress protector in the last few weeks of pregnancy, just in case this happens to you.
Bea: Yes, I will definitely be doing that next time around it. It had not occurred to me.
Lisa: And then of course it won't happen. We'll see.
Bea: Yeah, we will certainly see. But yeah, so like my first line of business, I was just like, okay, labor starting, I'm going to get the bed stripped, get that laundry started, get the sheets changed so I can go back to sleep because I don't generally wake up at 8am.
Because, from the birthing class, it's like, oh, early labor lasts a long time, contractions didn't start immediately. And so I was like, oh, my water's broken, but I've got time. So I want to, get as much sleep as I can to prepare for this,long exhausting journey I'm about to go on and while my contractions are still light and I can sleep through them because, I can sleep through some reasonably bad period cramps, that's usually what I do if I have period cramps is just take a nap.
I called the doulas as they had told me to do. And I was like, oh, my water broke. And they're like, all right,settle in.
And I was like, okay. And then I was going to start the laundry, in the middle of putting the laundry in the wash, I started having contractions. This was like 15, 20 minutes after my water broke. And I was like, oh, that was pretty intense. I was like, that wasn't the type of contraction I thought I would have.
Like I think the night before I had a mild like little twinge and I was like, was that a contraction? And I wrote it down, but then nothing else happened for a few hours. And I was like, okay, maybe that was just like, a random twinge.
Lisa: Probably slept through early labor.
Sometimes it happens, Yeah.
Bea: Yeah, possibly. I tend to stay up pretty late. So I had been awake pretty late and I had felt like one isolated, maybe contraction, like early in the evening and nothing else. So it was just like, yeah, I guess I wasn't starting. And yeah, like it took twenty minutes after my water broke, but then it was just immediately like fairly intense. Like I had horrific period cramps when I was a teenager,I would typically, if I didn't catch them early and load up with ibuprofen or whatever, I would have to take a day or two off of school and I'd be lying there moaning. Like I've had period cramps so bad that I threw up the ibuprofen I took because they were just that intense.
Yeah, so learning about the contractions and stuff in the class, I was like, this doesn't sound too bad. I was like, I've had whatever period cramps that make me make the farther along face, like, I don't know if I can talk face, I'm very mad. So I was like, I'm pretty sure I can make it like most of the way through labor without thinking it's terrible and like I can manage that especially given that contractions only last like a minute or two and then you get a break in between.
I'm like, that sounds way better than period cramps where it just hurts for an hour straight. But then yeah, when I started it was so intense to begin with, I was like, Oh, this doesn't seem like mild period cramps. This seems like moderately severe period cramps.
Lisa: And part of that probably had to with the fact that you had a big gush of fluid, right? So you lost a lot of the cushion, which often causes us to feel it a lot more powerfully than we did before. If we felt it before you You were sleeping, though.
Bea: Yeah. So I Started timing the contractions with my app. And they were like, five minutes apart. And I was like, that can't be right. I must be wrong about which part of this feeling is a contraction.
And I was texting the doulas and I was like, Oh, they seem closer together and more intense than I would have expected. and Sophia was like, Oh, I'm gonna call you, and I want to hear you have one of your contractions to see how you sound, like how far along it sounds like you are.
And so I was on the phone with her while I was continuing to put laundry in the wash andlike trying to talk to her through my contraction and she's like, okay, you sound like you've still got some time. Cause you're still able to talk and that was a little bit like, yeah, I am still able to talk, but also I'm used to having really bad contractions.
I feel like I'm able to talk through a lot of pain.
Lisa: But I think you cope better with pain than you think you do. I think you maybe don't give yourself enough credit.
Bea: I just, I really hate pain, but yeah, I do think I handle it all right. Yeah, but she was like, oh, I'm on my way to a postpartum appointment with some clients and, I'll head over, and see how you're doing and then I'll head to my appointment. So she came over and I don't know when she got to our house, maybe like 10 a. m. and my contractions were getting steadily closer together. I think when she got here, they were like three and a half minutes apart or something. And I was starting to moan and yell. And I was just like, having difficulty coping 'cause it would just come on so suddenly and so fast. I didn't have time to do any of the like, gradual oh, pain is increasing, let's try the yoga ball, let's try some positions and stuff because they were just so close together. It was like my husband was having trouble adjusting. My mom kept whispering to my husband to not disturb me. And I was just like, mom, stop whispering. I feel like I need to know what people are saying around me.
I don't like this. But yeah, Sophia arrived and it was just like, I think I want to go in and she's doing what I wanted her to do, which was help me stay at home and labor at home as long as possible to avoid a different hospital. And she was like, I don't think you're, about to have the baby.
I don't think you're that close. And you expressed that you wanted to avoid epidural, if possible, if reasonable or whatever. Because I wanted to, I wasn't completely against having an epidural, but I wanted to see if I could go without it. and not do that unless I was just like, no, I cannot stand this pain and she's like, you're managing well, if you go to the hospital now, they're just going to try to do interventions and you don't want to do interventions.
So, like, you know,let's try. If you feel like you need to sit on the toilet, you can labor on the toilet. That's fine. Because my primary feeling during labor was like that I just needed to poop. I just immediately was just like, I feel like I need to poop so badly.
Lisa: It must've been really low from the time that the water broke maybe. Yeah. And or before perhaps.
Bea: Yeah. I'm also just generally pretty constipated. Like me and my mom both just have chronic constipation. And during the last trimester, it was awful. Like I was just constantly just so constipated.
And nothing really worked for it. So I was like, maybe I do need to poop. Like I haven't pooped in ages. And that was just like the primary feeling. And like my husband will confirm that the thing I was saying most often was just I just need to poop.. So yeah, Sophia was like, okay, feel free to sit on the toilet.
That's fine. So I was just sitting in the bathroom, screaming my head off. And then she was at the house for like, maybe half an hour or so, and she was like, you know what, maybe it is time to go to the hospital, cause I was no longer communicating, I was just like wailing my head off, and with only a couple minute break in between, and the contractions were also a lot longer than I expected,
I was expecting to be like 45 seconds long at that point, but they were like 2 minutes long with only a minute in between.
Lisa: 2 minutes? That is long.
Bea: Yeah, they're definitely
Lisa: That's longer than usual.
Bea: Yeah, it was like a minute and a half, 2 minutes my timing, and I was just like, this is just a lot. And so she's like, I think it's time to go to the hospital.
Going to the Hospital
And I had my phone in my hand the whole time for timing my contractions. So I just opened up the Uber app, while screaming and just being like, call an Uber, and Sophia to my husband is like, Oh, are you calling an Uber? And he's like, I'm pretty sure she is. So Uber came a few minutes later, my husband like rushes out, takes the hospital go bag out.
Also while all my contractions are happening and because I was like oh this seems like we need to go sooner than I thought we would need to go. And so I hadn't had everything in the go bag, we had the last minute stuff to pack. There were things that I was like oh yeah I want to bring that too, and I figured that once labor started I would have plenty of time to like top off the bag with a few extra things so I was like directing my husband on where things were to put them in the bag while dealing with these horrible contractions. So he ran out to the car to tell the driver, "Oh, need a minute, wife is in labor, like I promise she will not give birth in your car.”
The Uber driver was like a middle aged guy who was very nice. He's very accommodating. we got in the car, it was luckily like a bigger SUV and I could not stand sitting on the car seat, it was just too painful, feeling like I had to poop it was just not working. I was like I need to be not putting pressure on my butt and ended up having to move the passenger seat forward so that I could kneel in the foot area and lean over my husband's lap with him, like holding my hands. And I was just yelling in the car and the Uber driver was like, don't worry, we're like on the bridge, we'll be there like 10 minutes, we'll be there like two minutes. And he's just driving like a crazy person.
Like we're almost there. And I got to Tisch Hospital. I don't know if I directed him to the right place, because I just went to the Tisch Hospital, we were at like the main lobby entrance, and I got out of the Uber, like when I stood up, just a bunch more water gushed out of me, onto my feet and the sidewalk and stuff, and I'm just like standing there mid contraction, and I'm like, I can't walk right this second.
And then contraction eases up and I like, shuffle into the doors of the hospital lobby. And Tisch has this big cavernous picturesque window filled lobby and there's like a check in area where you're supposed to get your sticker and they tell you where to go and there's like security guards standing around. It's generally there's like a giant cavernous empty space but I like couldn't make it over to the check in area obviously and my husband's like frantically running around, he's like look there's a labor person, I'm standing there yelling and bent over and they just look confused and wander over the security guards, oh, yeah, I should do something. And grabs a wheelchair, rolls it over to me. And then the check in person comes over and puts a sticker on me and they're like, follow the blue path, 8th floor labor and delivery.
Lisa: Were you able to sit in that wheelchair?
Bea: Yeah, I was just kind of like holding myself up on the arms.
Lisa: Yeah, and is Sophia with you right now?
Bea: No, so she had, she sent us to the hospital because she had driven herself, so she wasn't in the Uber with us, but she was like, okay, you're really close, it seems, so I'm just going to go and check on my postpartum client.
Lisa: Wow. I'm surprised!
Bea: See if they're, see if they're okay. And I'll meet you at the hospital. So she went and checked on her clients really quick. I think she was supposed to have an hour appointment with them and she was maybe there for 15, 20 minutes. And it was like somewhat on the way, I think, to the hospital, so she met us there.
And my husband was just like, Oh, I guess I am wheeling my wife up to labor and delivery. Cause like the birthing class, we learned Oh, you'll have to go through triage and that's super uncomfortable. And we just did not do any of that. Like we did not go to triage at all. It was just straight up to labor and delivery, my husband pushing me out of the elevator, the wheelchair bounced back at him and ran into his toe and he was bleeding. But yeah, we just like wheel up to the nurse's desk and they're like, Oh, can we have her ID and whatever, we'll get you into the room.
And I was like, I forgot my purse. I didn't even think about that part. But since I was a patient there, they were able to just look everything up. And they were like straight into the delivery room.
Lisa: Yay, I like it when you arrive late enough that you don't have to even mess with triage. I don't know if you liked it.
Bea: So that part was nice not having to go to like intermediary locations was good. But yeah, everything like once I got in there, everything was very like, straight to the point. It was a very nice room. I guess it would have been nice to get there a couple hours early or like without being in such intense pain because there was a lot of nice amenities in the room.
Laboring at the Hospital
But yeah, they checked my cervix, I was already fully dilated and like 90 percent effaced.
So they're like, okay, you're almost ready. They're like don't push quite yet. But like you're basically ready and I really still did not want to be sitting down or like having pressure on my backside at all.
So I was kneeling, like on the bed position, with my arms up on the head of the bed, and wanting to stay in that position. And because I was in such pain and just not able to deal with anything, I wasn't able to like, give them my birth preferences or talk to them about any of that.
Lisa: No time, yeah. But then like hardly time for interventions either.
Bea: Yeah, that was good. Yeah, one of my preferences had been to labor in positions that feel natural, and, push when I felt like pushing, and, deliver the head slowly, and, like, all of that stuff to prevent tearing, but, did not have time to advocate for any of that.
Was just way too fast and overwhelming. We got to the hospital at 11, 20, and like I was probably in the room by, like before 1130. So I was only there for 10 or 15 minutes, like in the delivery room before I was like, okay, yeah, it's time to start pushing.
And I started trying to push leaned over like in the hands and knees type position and the doctor was like, yes, this isn't happening. Like can we have you turn over onto your back and I really had not wanted to labor on my back, but I just did not have the energy or the mindset to put up a fight Or anything.
Lisa: Can I ask why they said, do you know why they said this isn't happening, like this and get on your back?
Bea: So unfortunately the doctor that I had for delivery was not any of the like half a dozen doctors that I had appointments with. and she seemed to be a little bit more old school than a lot of the doctors that I had talked with. But yeah, it seemed like she was just like of the typical doctor mindset of I'm used to doing deliveries of someone on their back and it's going to be easier for me. And like I also would have, if I had had the presence of mind, said I don't want to be coached for pushing and stuff, but by default, they like coach you through pushing.
And I was just like, I just need to poop. I just need to get the feeling to go away. I felt like if I had the more typical, slow ramp up of contractions and, been able to, get in the headspace, that I feel like I would have been able to advocate for myself a lot more and to, make it clear, like, what I wanted to, just to straight up refuse and be like, no, I'm going to stay in this position because this feels more natural to me.
But yeah, I just wasn't in that headspace.
Lisa: Understandable.
Pushing Stage & Struggling with Directed Pushing
Bea: Yeah, but the doctors are going, we're going to have you on your back and Sophia showed up, somewhere in that process. I think she might have showed up before I switched positions.
But yeah, she was there and they were having like the nurses and Sophia, like hold my legs up more to have my knees legs are more like a curl position. and they were like, when it's the next contraction, you need to push and they're like, Oh, you need to push way harder.
They're like, no, that's not remotely hard enough. And it was just a lot. I was just really struggling. And they were like, Oh, if you are yelling, then you're not pushing hard enough. Cause I was directing more energy towards moaning and yelling and stuff like that and not just shutting up and clenching my teeth and pushing as hard as they could.
So they like, coached me and convinced me to push as hard as I could and finally start like getting the baby to move some, And
Lisa: Were you feeling an urge to bear down at all?
Bea: Yeah, I was feeling the urge, but I wasn't pushing as hard as I could, because I'm like, as I said, I'm chronically constipated, so I'm used to having bowel movements that need to be pushed out, and I have learned through experience when, with dealing with constipation, not to push as hard as I can, and let my body help it come out, cause it'll be a lot less painful if I just let my body push it out. And then if I like try to force it out,
Lisa: More protective for your pelvic floor too, right
Bea: Yeah. So I was pushing more like that. I was like, Oh, pushing a little bit, but it doesn't feel like it's moving. So I'm not going to try to force it.
And they're like, no, you need to force it.
Lisa: And I want to point out, you didn't need to. I swear to you, it's more about efficiency and hospitals and that kind of scenario. It's not like there's an urgency for the baby or for you. And I find that really frustrating that they were rushing you and not trusting you and your body intuition.
Bea: Yeah. And they hooked me up to the monitor. They do have wireless monitors, but it's like the two bands around your belly, and one of the nurses kept adjusting the lower band and pressing it into my stomach more.
And I was just like, please stop. This is so uncomfortable. And they're like, we need you to push because we're worried about the baby's heart rate. But, I do not have the brain capacity to be like a baby, unless it is a precipitous drop or a continuous drop, I'm pretty sure it's fine. Just give me a minute, which is what I would have said if I had the presence of mind. Cause in my head, I was like, yeah, the baby's heart rate is wavering because like it's being contracted. And because this monitor isn't staying on very well.
Lisa: Nor is that external monitor very accurate either necessarily.
Birth & Delivery of Placenta
Bea: Yeah. Yeah, but it was all just happening too fast and too chaotically to have that conversation. But yeah, she eventually got me to push hard enough to actually start like, delivering the baby's head. Had the ring of fire that lasted for a couple, few pushes and then Yeah, like the worst of it was over.
It was very sudden. It was just like, Oh, okay, now it's done. And then like this baby on my chest and he was so small and so cute. And it was like 12:27. So it was like water broke at 8:05 and he was on my chest at like 12:27. And yeah, Sophia took a ton of pictures, which I super appreciate her for. So many pictures, like when he first was on my chest, I'm just making this face, like just an intense frown glare. Cause I'm still processing this pain that I was recently in.
Lisa: Yeah.
Bea: Slowly going to neutral and then I'm smiling. Cause he's my baby, he's so cute. And like I had my own hospital gown thing, like not Pretty Pushers some other random Amazon brand. Yeah, so tore that open so I could have skin contact immediately. And like my husband's all smiley. I convinced my husband like a couple of weeks before that, he did want to cut the cord. so
Lisa: You convinced him.
Bea: Yeah, I don't need to do that. And I'm like, it's a once in a lifetime opportunity.
Like, why would you not want to do it? So I got him to cut the cord. And then while my baby's laying there, I started feeling whatever sensation of the doctor like pulling on the cord. And I was like, hey, what are you doing?
And she's like, oh, we need to deliver the placenta. And I was like, I thought you guys didn't do cord traction. Yeah, that's one of the things that I'd asked about. And like all the providers I had seen. The various checkups that I had asked about it, but they're like, no, we don't do that. That's not a practice that we do, that would just cause issues.
But this doctor hadn't gotten that memo.
Lisa: Old school again.
Bea: Yeah. And she was just very brusque and she's like, Oh, we need to deliver placenta. And if you don't deliver the placenta within the next 20 or 30 minutes, we're going to have to take you to the OR and you're going to have to be sedated and we're going to have to surgically remove it.
And I was like, okay, well, let's wait. Like
Lisa: Scare tactics. Oh, I'm sorry.
Bea: Yeah. Yeah. But Sophia was there to back me up if I needed it, but since I was no longer having horrific contractions, I was like, no, let's wait. That's fine. If that happens, we'll deal with it when it happens.
But I would prefer to wait and you not pull on the cord and she was like, okay. And then like 15, 20 minutes later, it like came out on its own naturally and it's
Lisa: With less risk of tearing. Yeah. Oh goodness.
Bea: And even my mom, who's been retired for a few years now, she was like, no, that just causes more issues. Cause she's a pediatric pathologist. And so she's seen tons of placentas, she knows all about that kind of stuff. And she's like, it causes more issues.
Lisa: So great to have her back you up.
Bea: Yeah. She's like, that's crazy. And I'm like, yeah, I don't know what this doctor was thinking.
Everyone else was like, no, of course we don't do that. So I just had the bad luck of the draw to get the one doctor who doesn't follow the more up to date policies.
Lisa: And had you been told at any of your prenatal visits that this was a possibility that you might not get any of the doctors in your practice that you had chosen?
Bea: I didn't explicitly choose a doctor at any point. Like I chose the practice, but I didn't choose a specific doctor. So it's who's on rotations.
Lisa: Oh, okay. I was understanding you to say that this was not a doctor that was in your
Bea: No she was in the practice, but she wasn't of, a dozen doctors in the practice and I hadn't met them all, eight to 10 of them
Lisa: Oh, I see
Bea: She was one of the couple that I hadn't met yet.
Yeah, because I was definitely making a point at each of my appointments when I had a different doctor like asking some of the same questions to like, see how the different doctors responded. And they were generally all on the same page about basically everything. But I guess if I had her and asked her, I would have gotten different answers.
Yeah, because if I had done that, I would have made a point of being like, Oh, I would prefer not to do that, to that doctor. But yeah, I just, luck the draw. It hadn't come up. but
Lisa: Yeah, that's a challenge when we're working with a large practice like that, which is quite a few practices in our city, cause it's almost impossible to meet all of them and to have time to ask all the questions and express all those preferences and get a really specific sense of their style.
Bea: Yeah. She was not bad. She was reasonably, she was a little bit brusque, but she wasn't unkind or anything. She got the job done, but yeah, just a couple of the little things during delivery. Yeah, I feel like if I had Been there longer, been there earlier, I would have been able to talk to her and let her know what kind of patient I was and it would have gone a lot smoother.
But, yeah, she was just doing her standard practice, with old school, get it done kind of thing. And 1 of the things that because I was coached to push so hard, after I delivered, I had little spots all over my face, petechiae, as my mom told me they were called.
It's apparently what that phenomenon is called. It was funny because I looked like I had freckles, which my husband had freckles so we were like matching.
Golden Hour & Beginning Breastfeeding
But yeah, so it was a very whirlwind delivery. but once the baby was out, everything was very nice. The doctor left, it was just the nurses, the nurses were very sweet. NYU is a baby friendly hospital. He was kept in the room and Within, a couple feet of me, while they did everything, they waited a couple hours to weigh him and do all that stuff, breastfed right away. I luckily didn't have any issues with breastfeeding. He was able to latch on really quickly. And that was one of the things that I've been most surprised by since the birth is that, I was expecting to, not like breastfeeding.
I was like not about it. Like I didn't like the idea of it really. And I was figuring that I would pump, like exclusively pump. Like one of my close friends exclusively pumps. Cause, probably because her babies didn't latch well. But I actually really like breastfeeding.
Like it's just, he's super cute. He just looks like a little like Kilroy drawing with little hands balled up and like just being able to see.
Yeah. And he sort of like roots around, it's just super adorable. And I really like bonding time.
Lisa: Yeah. I'm so glad you're highlighting that. Cause we don't hear that enough.
You know, for people who have some challenges initially, as we're learning this new skill, eventually, for many people, it can be a beautiful thing.
And I don't point that out enough. I need to do that more. But I'm glad that's been your experience. It's nice because it really does help really facilitate the bond between you and your baby.
Bea: Yeah, and so we stayed at the hospital for 2 nights, partly because I wanted to see the lactation consultant, like 2 of them, um, because they came the 1st morning we were there,to check in and see how things are going to, give, pointers and everything.
And I was having some nipple pain on one side, and she was like, oh, maybe it could be yeast infection. You might ask your doctor about that. And she recommended staying for an extra night to see another lactation consultant the next morning, just to get as many pointers as possible.
So we stayed at the hospital 2 nights. And I don't know, I kind of liked that, my husband was like, ready to go home as soon as you were allowed to go, but I liked being in the hospital because the nurses come in every six hours to give me Tylenol and stuff and you can order the food from the little tablet and, getting like three meals a day and feeling like everything was taken care of.
But, yeah, it's also good to get home and like we were in the hospital over 4th of July and my poor dog was terrified of fireworks. My mom had to go back and help him through that for the evening of 4th of July.
Lisa: It's always the worst night for our dogs.
Bea: Yeah.
Lisa: Have y'all tried the Thunder shirt? Totally off topic, but
Bea: I have not specifically gotten a Thunder shirt, but when we're home and there's thunder or fireworks, we tend to just put him in a bear hug or wrap him up.
Lisa: The Thunder shirt has been a game changer for our dog.
Anyway, a little advertisement, not a sponsor.
Bea: Yeah. Yeah, I was there for two nights mostly to see the lactation consultant.
Lisa: And was it a private room or a shared?
Bea: Yes, it was a private room. It looked like it had been set up to be a double room in the past. But yeah, it was private when we were there. Nice. Yeah. So that was very nice.
Lisa: And you didn't have to pay extra?
Bea: No. so the company I work for has insanely good medical insurance.
Yeah. So we paid 0 for anything with pregnancy and labor and delivery. The only thing that I had to pay for was for IVF, the genetic testing it's not covered by insurance, but then my company has supplemental fertility insurance and we just got that reimbursed.
Yeah, so maybe they charge the insurance more. I don't know. We were fortunate to have that good insurance. But yeah, but the rooms have a, there's like a couch with a table in the middle of it. And the backrest of the couch folds down to become a single bed for your visitor. So my husband was able to get a decent sleep in the room as well. Because he stayed with us the whole time. Yeah. And the baby was in the room. The only time the baby left my sight was for like half an hour to do all of the newborn testing that they do in the nursery. I think still because of COVID protocols weren't allowing people to be in the nursery.
But yeah, like everything went really well.
Lisa: And was your mom with you in postpartum?
Bea: Yeah, my mom came during the day. She went back to the house to sleep, but she came by for the morning through the afternoon. And, just sat and hung out and took pictures of the baby.
And, kept us company.
Lisa: And in the labor and delivery room, it sounded like ,you were able to have your mom and your doula and your husband? Is that right?
Bea: My mom didn't come, she stayed at home with the dog until the baby was delivered and she came right after that. And then I think that's around when Sophia left.
So I think they weren't all three there at the same time.
Reflecting on Discovering Baby’s Gender
Lisa: Got it. Yeah. And I also wanted to ask for any reflections on when you met your son, you didn't know if he was going to be a boy or a girl, biologically. And so how was that discovered? Was it just visually discovered or did the doctor, did your husband or you identify that? Did you have any preferences on that whole thing?
Bea: I don't remember. I think someone said it's a boy. I just wanted to have a healthy baby and I wanted it to be a surprise.
As the pregnancy went on, I realized more and more that I did want my first kid to be a girl.
And my mom assumed it would be a girl. Like we both were like, Oh, of course it will be a girl. Cause like my mom has two sisters. Not that that's even a factor because the husband is the one who, like the male is the one who determines the sex of the baby. So we should have, it's like my husband's dad is one of six brothers, so that seems like a bigger factor.
But yeah, I was wanting a girl first for somewhat traditional, stereotypical reasons. Cause I was like, Oh, I feel like an older sister would be more nurturing, like caring towards a younger sibling. Possibly because like my stepdad is an older brother to three younger sisters and he was like a bully.
It was just like teasing and I've seen a lot of older brothers that are just very like teasing to their younger siblings. And I really wanted to have two kids, like one of each and want them to be close, and be friends, hopefully. I know siblings all like tease to some extent, but I was hoping the older one would look out for the younger one, which I think older brothers also look out for little sisters as well.
But yeah.
I had wanted a girl, but we got a boy and I'm very happy with him. He's adorable. I think he's going to have a great personality.
Lisa: Yeah, I was in a similar place in terms of just like I had a sister growing up. I don't know, I just didn't know what to do with a boy, I felt like. Which was silly. Then we found out our first was going to be a boy and I wouldn't have it any other way, now. He does have a younger sister who's just shy of three years younger. And, we've loved that spacing.
They're so close and I love the dynamic. So yeah, things work out, sometimes surprise us, sometimes we didn't think it was what we wanted and it's exactly what we wanted and needed.
Bea: Yeah. And I think it might be better because I think my husband will relate to him more.
And I think he'll have a much easier time because my husband, he's gonna be a great dad as the baby gets older, 'cause he's such a happy go lucky, playful guy. And like my friend who had a kid before us, her kid, he's almost three now and like before she had her second, like we'd go to visit them and there's this older baby, like toddler wandering around and I'm chatting with my friend and my husband's not interested in the conversation.
So he's just like playing with the toddler and he's like fully entertained, keeping the kid entertained, like having a great time. And I'm very excited for him to, as Nemo gets older and is more interactive and can be actually played with like a full sized kid or whatever, I think they're going to have a great time hanging out together and having boys time.
And I've learned that he is a little less confident or I think he's better gonna be better with a bigger kid than with a baby because the baby is screaming, he's a little at a loss what to do when he can't feed the baby. And he has to be much calmer to put the baby down for a nap. And he's just such a high energy person that's like a struggle.
So I think it'll be better to have a boy be older and him be able to entertain the boy and have boys' time while I'm taking care of a younger baby girl.
Lisa: Oh, that's a great perspective. Yeah. Love those thoughts.
Bea: Yeah.
Postpartum Reflections & Breastfeeding Support
Lisa: Yeah, so are there any reflections you'd like to share on settling in after you came home from the hospital, those early weeks or these three ish months since you gave birth?
Bea: Yeah. So my mom, she stayed until Nemo was like one week old.
And then my husband's mom came for the 2nd week, so we had help for the 1st couple of weeks, which was good to have company, good to have, another adult around. So, it's not just us and a baby that we're constantly figuring out how to deal with. And, I struggled a little bit with breastfeeding for the 1st couple of weeks, just like getting used to it, like having some amount of nipple pain, like the baby was able to get fed easily, but he ate really well, and latched really well, but I was just having some pain and I strained my wrist, during the first couple weeks of breastfeeding doing like the football hold and like supporting his head in like a not very ergonomic position and I ended up doing like a virtual consult with One of the NYU lactation consultants because they have you do that as like just a matter of course
Lisa: Nice.
Bea: Yeah.
Lisa: I hadn't heard that, hadn't had a client tell me that. That's really good to know.
Bea: Yeah, yeah. And they give you a lot of resources. They have a breastfeeding cafe thing, like on Mondays you can join a video call and they talk to other breastfeeding mothers and there's like a lactation consultant who's also there to answer questions and talk through stuff.
And yeah, they have a,Warm line, like you can call a number and they'll get back to you within 24 hours if you have any issues and yeah, they give you a lot of resources to help you. Yeah.
Lisa: That's so much better than pretty much any other hospital I can think of.
Bea: Yeah. But the follow up I had over video call, I like, explain my issues and like struggling to position and to start the latch without pain and stuff.
And she sent me a lot of links to different resources, but the one that I found most helpful was like this 40 minute video on like natural breastfeeding or laid back breastfeeding.
Lisa: That's the course that I shared in class about. Cool.
Bea: Yeah. Yeah, so I watched through that, and switched to doing that, like that's generally what I do now, and it's so much easier, and it took me like, I actually had to watch like the entire 40 minute video to figure out like what the heck to do, because it was like, okay, I lay back, but like, it doesn't work, and then finally walked through all of the, details and it's like, Oh, the baby has to have their stomach and the insides of their thighs, like fully against you.
And then it's like, Oh yeah, once you have all the things in the right position, like he does just bop his head around and lift himself up until he finds the right spot. And then yeah, it just became so much easier after that. And yeah, wrist pain has gotten better. I have a lot of soft tissue injury issues. So it takes me a while to heal from things. But yeah, being able to like, not have to support him while he's breastfeeding. I just prop my arm up on a pillow so his head has something to lean against and he doesn't like, fall off. but, yeah, that was like a big game changer and I recommend that to anyone who is doing breastfeeding stuff because it just made it so much easier and then I can just be relaxed and look at him and because he's laying down my body and he can like, look up at me
Yeah. And much cuter and more relaxing and also after I started doing that,We sometimes take naps together because he's laying fully on me and I have pillows keeping my arms so that I'm like, fully relaxed and he can't fall off the side of me. Especially in the morning, because we have a bed that like the head reclines, I can stay in bed and breastfeed comfortably. But sometimes I'll just take a nap for an hour with him just like laying on my stomach.
Lisa: Sure. Yeah.
Bea: And then we can both have a nice nap and get skin to skin. And I know it's not like the safe sleep guidelines or whatever, but because I'm reclined and because he's on top of me and I'm on my back, I can't fall into a deep sleep and I can't roll over being reclined.
And so I feel comfortable and I'm aware of any time he moves. So it feels safe.
Lisa: Yeah. You're the parent. You make the decisions that feel safe and good for you and your baby and your family. I fully support that.
Bea: Yeah, it's also been very good for my sleep to be able to like, get another hour in the morning when he first wakes up.
And one of the other things was that sleep for the first like four or five weeks was definitely difficult. Because they do need to eat every hour or two at the very beginning, and I was managing okay, with just napping a lot, like, whenever he was napping, but one of the things I did not research ahead of time, more extensively was just like, what to do about sleep, because for the first few weeks, he really does just sleep wherever he is, without, any issue.
And we were just like, Oh, he's awake. That's good. Oh, he's asleep. That's fine. And we'd be like, carrying him or holding him or sitting with him just like laying on our chest. So we like watched a movie or whatever. And he'd sleep through a whole movie and it would be like, super great.
But then like around five weeks. I had a really bad night where he just woke up every single hour and then at 6am he was just up for the day and wasn't gonna go back to sleep and I was so exhausted and I was just like, I don't know what you want. And he was crying because he was going through a fussy phase. He didn't want to go back to sleep.
He wasn't hungry because I just fed him and I was just like, I was too tired to deal with it. And I was just like, sitting on the floor of the nursery. Like I'd put him in the crib for tummy time, just like sitting there, crying. So I'm just like, I'm so tired.
And it was just like, I need to do some research on this and figure out what to do. And ended up doing a sleep course, the Taking Cara Babies sleep class. And I started implementing some of those practices, which involve making sure he gets enough food during the day, so that you can try to get his longest stretch of sleep at night to get longer and longer. And what practices to do for that. And when he wakes up in the night, trying to get him to go back to sleep for a few minutes first, to see if he'll just go back to sleep and working on, stretching out the time since his last feed at night a little longer each night. And once I started doing that, and also what I hadn't realized was the importance of actually wake windows and thinking about how to actually put him down for a full length nap. So I started doing that and being like, okay, yeah, he's been awake like 60 to 90 minutes.
It is time for a nap and learning how to have him nap not laying on me so that I could actually do stuff during the day. And that took some practice, but once I started doing all of those techniques, I was able to get him to start sleeping, 4 hours, 5 hours, 6 hours, at night.
I've been able since then to get a pretty good amount of sleep on average. I feel like I'm a lot more well rested than the parents often are at this phase. Yeah.
Lisa: Yeah. Great.
Yeah, that can be really rough around, sometime between four or five weeks and eight weeks baby's amount of crying that they're going to do in a 24 hour period tends to peak and there can be sleep disruptions, and and of that. And that can be a really challenging time.
Yeah, I'm glad you found some resources to help you navigate that because it's constantly changing. Yeah. The waking window pretty regularly starts to lengthen over time. And it's just good to have the lay of the land from something. And 1 of the resources I love to recommend is The Happy Sleeper. That's another client favorite and a lot of clients have taken Cara Babies a lot.
Hypothyroidism Diagnosis & Medication
Yeah. Great. Anything else about postpartum you wanted to share before I ask you about your final insights or or tips?
Bea: The only other anecdote I have, so I said he was like, he's very healthy.
He's pretty perfect. The only thing he has that has been very stressful to deal with is he had a slightly abnormal thyroid level for one of his blood works. they check all the baby's, blood and stuff, to see if there's any conditions, and he had, one blood level that was a little bit higher than normal, that would suggest, possible hypothyroidism, which hypothyroidism can result in, poor brain development in the first few years, so it's, really important to treat early. And so he's having to go to an endocrinologist and he's on thyroid medicine, and...
Lisa: Do thyroid issues run in either of your families?
Bea: Not that I'm aware of, yeah, it's unclear. There might have been something on my mom's side of the family, but my grandma was on some thyroid meds, but it was unclear if she actually needed them or if it was something due to one of her... Many other whatever treatments because she's very elderly and being treated for a variety of medical issues towards the end of her life. So yeah, we weren't sure if she actually had hypothyroidism or something, or if she just was taking those meds because they seemed to be helping some other issue.
But yeah, we don't know. It doesn't seem like we have any congenital hypothyroidism in the family and the levels were very borderline. so like kids who have congenital hypothyroidism, that's, more significant or whatever, tend to have, it's like, the normal range is, 5 to 10 or something, and he was at, 17, and, kids with actual issues can have levels, 200, 600, much, much higher, it was very borderline high, but just out of an abundance of caution, and to, make sure his brain develops well, he was, like, put on some meds, Which are very annoying to have to give him because it's like a pill that has to be crushed up and put in milk and then the particulate clogs the bottle nipple.
So I ended up getting a pacifier that you can squirt an oral syringe through, so that he can suck on the pacifier and I can just squirt it into the back of his mouth and then he can't taste it and it doesn't get clogged up.
But I have to do that every day.
Lisa: And how early, how many weeks was he when this happened?
Bea: We started on the meds at four weeks. Yeah, because they did a follow up because his initial blood work showed abnormal levels and they did follow up blood work at his 2 week appointment, and they were still high. The pediatrician was like, oh,these tests can be a bit off sometimes and we'll just follow up and see if it's actually an issue.
And it was still a little bit outside of the normal range. So I got into an endocrinologist, did another follow up blood work at 4 weeks.
It's still a little bit high, possibly a little bit higher. So they're like, okay, yeah, we're just going to put them on these meds, which they're normally on for like, two or three years before they try taking them off the meds to see how their thyroid responds because after the first two or three years and like brain development's finished and there's not really as much risk to having a little bit of hypothyroidism, if it ends up coming back. But the thing that's very stressful about it is I would make sure I asked the endocrinologist,what if he's being over treated and what are the negative effects of being on these meds if he doesn't necessarily need them since the levels were so borderline? And he's like, oh, well, the overmedication signs are, failure to thrive, lack of weight gain, general fussiness, diarrhea, not eating well, not sleeping well. And it's like, Oh, okay, great. Like just normal baby things then.
And his first follow up after he was on the meds for a few weeks, I was like, oh, what happens if he has those over medication symptoms, doesn't that seem bad? Aren't those bad things for a baby to have like failure to thrive? And the endocrinologist was like, Oh yeah, that would be bad. But that's why we check every couple months. And if you were to disappear for a year that would be bad, but if you come to all your appointments, it should be fine. The over medication shows up in the blood work before it shows as clinical signs.
So there's a little bit of buffer time there, but like that follow up blood work showed that he was being a little bit over medicated and his levels had flipped to being like hyperthyroidism levels and so they reduced his dosage. But now I'm just like always a little bit baseline stressed if he's super fussy or not sleeping well or whatever because I'm like, is he just being a baby or is he slightly over medicated?
Lisa: Right. Oh that can play mind games with you, can't it?
Bea: Yeah. So that's stressful, but I trust the doctors. I do feel like they're providing good medical care and it's certainly much better for him to be a little bit extra fussy and maybe need to eat a little bit more than for him to have poor brain development.
Lisa: Yeah. It sounds like the benefit of doing it is outweighing the risks.
Bea: Yeah, otherwise he's extremely healthy. He's gaining weight really well. And he's like hitting his developmental milestones, some of them like even a little bit early. He's really good at holding his head up and looking around and making a lot of sounds and stuff.
But yeah, it's just like a minor constant stressor.
Lisa: I don't think you mentioned what his birth weight was. I was just curious.
Bea: Oh yeah. He was a little undersized. He was six pounds, 11 ounces, which was like 15th percentile birth weight. But now he's 12 weeks, he's 12 and a half pounds.
So he's like slowly moving up the percentiles and getting more into the average range. And I expect him to have a very fast growth rate, because I did when I was a kid, like I was the tallest kid in my elementary school, and starting in fourth grade, my mom had to carry my birth certificate around to prove I was under 12 to count as a child at various things.
Lisa: Oh, funny.
Bea: Yeah, so I assume he will grow like a weed and just be enormous. Yeah.
Closing
Lisa: Right. Well, this has been so lovely. Thank you so much, and I wish you well with navigating the thyroid thing. Hopefully it resolves and he can get off the medications eventually. And then you don't have to have these mind games constantly. Like why are crying? Is it normal or side effects? Yeah. Are there any tips or insights that you'd like to leave listeners with?
Bea: I feel like it's just like trust your instincts. I feel like I didn't know how it would feel to have a baby or if I would know what to do with him, like once he was around, and I didn't know that I would like babies. It's like, I haven't been around babies a lot, but he's great, he makes the cutest little faces, he's so much fun to hang out with. Like I get bored with him sometimes, and I'm just waiting for him to learn how to use his hands so that I can give him toys to play with.
But yeah, just trust that you will know what to do with yours, it's so much different having your own baby than like seeing other people's babies. And just like trust yourself and your instincts and don't worry too much because you'll know what to do.
Like humans have been giving birth and taking care of babies for millennia and instincts really do kick in.
Lisa: Absolutely. Thank you so much, Bea.
Bea: Thanks.