Welcome to this podcast: My Positive Birth. A little corner of the internet where I will be collecting positive stories from women birthing their babies across the UK.
Series 1 currently live! New episodes released on Tuesdays.
Stories are a really powerful way of learning and growing. We know that from childhood. But I don’t know if you’ve noticed… all too often during pregnancy people want to tell us horror stories about their birth. And this reflects our current cultural expectation: that ALL birth is risky, dangerous, and something women and babies need to be saved from.
Together we can challenge the narrative, and positive birth stories are a way of doing this. This podcast is a space to come together and hand down the wisdom from one mother to another of how it is possible to have a positive birth and the difference that can make.
The title of the podcast is very specifically MY positive birth. Because the key to it all is the family at the centre. What a positive birth meant for me in my circumstances, will almost definitely be different to what it means for you. But research, and common sense!, tells us that whatever your actual birth – be it hospital birth, home birth, free birth, induction, abdominal birth, water birth… that having choices, being respected and listened to, feeling safe and having confidence in yourself lie at the very heart of a positive birth.
So come and surround yourself with positive birth stories, told in women’s own words, and I hope you’ll find a village here to calm you but also to inspire you and give you confidence in birth. All women and babies deserve a positive birth experience.
Welcome to this podcast: My Positive Birth. A little corner of the internet where I will be collecting positive stories from women birthing their babies across the UK.
Series 1 currently live! New episodes released on Tuesdays.
Stories are a really powerful way of learning and growing. We know that from childhood. But I don’t know if you’ve noticed… all too often during pregnancy people want to tell us horror stories about their birth. And this reflects our current cultural expectation: that ALL birth is risky, dangerous, and something women and babies need to be saved from.
Together we can challenge the narrative, and positive birth stories are a way of doing this. This podcast is a space to come together and hand down the wisdom from one mother to another of how it is possible to have a positive birth and the difference that can make.
The title of the podcast is very specifically MY positive birth. Because the key to it all is the family at the centre. What a positive birth meant for me in my circumstances, will almost definitely be different to what it means for you. But research, and common sense!, tells us that whatever your actual birth – be it hospital birth, home birth, free birth, induction, abdominal birth, water birth… that having choices, being respected and listened to, feeling safe and having confidence in yourself lie at the very heart of a positive birth.
So come and surround yourself with positive birth stories, told in women’s own words, and I hope you’ll find a village here to calm you but also to inspire you and give you confidence in birth. All women and babies deserve a positive birth experience.
Hello and welcome back after a much longer break than I was anticipating. For various reasons I needed to take the podcasts offline for a short period of time and it turns out it's much harder to get them back online than anticipated! But here we are again I hope.
This is a special bonus episode with my colleague and good friend Rebecca Verlander, aka the Lactation Doula. Rebecca is a birth and postnatal doula, IBCLC lactation consultant, hypnobirthing instructor, sleep consultant and baby massage teacher. She's a busy lady!
She is also the mum of 5 children and has a huge wealth of experience to share about pregnancy, birth and postnatal. It's fair to say that Rebecca has had a whole range of experiences. Since this podcast focuses on positive birth, here she tells the story of her 3rd baby, and what a joyous one it is! We also explain why we are talking about positive birth, not perfect birth, and you can pick up some information Rebecca wished she had known at the time.
I also couldn't let her go without mining a bit of infant feeding gold, and Rebecca lets us know how breastfeeding went this time around and what you can expect from those first few hours after birth.
You can find the lovely Rebecca at:
https://lactationdoula.co.uk/
https://www.instagram.com/thelactationdoula/
If you would like to get in contact about something shared on this episode, or to share YOUR positive birth story, I'd love to hear from you. You can find me at:
https://www.doulaforyou.co.uk/
lisaharrisdoula@gmail.com
https://www.instagram.com/lisaharrisdoula/
This week season's finale is a very special and super useful episode as I speak to the inspirational Megan Rossiter from Birth-ed.
Megan is one of the people I wish was active on insta when I was pregnant with my son in 2012. At the time I was bashing my head against a maternity service that I felt was viewing me a policy and not a person, and I found it oh so hard to find any nuance in the system. I wanted to take responsibility for my body, my baby and my birth but how to do it? I felt very alone.
I am so thrilled that organisations like https://birth-ed.co.uk/ now exist to try and help women find that nuance... by giving you confidence to ask questions, establish your rights, help you take control of your own birth experience and be reassured that are other people out there who believe that birth works.
So, if you haven't already then get over to https://www.instagram.com/birth_ed/ immediately! Megan has loads of free resources including a f.a.b.u.l.o.u.s podcast, and she also runs antenatal education courses online and in person in SW London / Surrey.
In her podcast episode Megan generously recounts her pregnancy journey with hyperemesis gravidarum, her introduction to hypnobirthing and where Birth-ed began, her homebirth plans and then how she retained control of her birth experience and ensured it remained a positive one when things didn't go according to plan A.
Honestly, the episode is gold. Thank you Megan.
If you would like to get in contact about something shared on this episode, or to share YOUR positive birth story, I'd love to hear from you. You can find me at:
lisaharrisdoula@gmail.com
https://www.instagram.com/lisaharrisdoula/
https://www.facebook.com/lisaharrisdoula
This week I am speaking to Rebecca about the birth of her daughter Sunny, and wow, it is just such a sunny episode
One of the many things I love about Rebecca's story is that she grew up around positive birth, she was around for the birth of her own baby brother at home as a child... and just what a legacy that was. The power of positive birth! It's exactly what motivates me to record the podcast.
But I also love how Rebecca went on her own journey, as we all need to do, to discover what were the right choices and mindset for her as she birthed Sunny. And even if you make different practical choices to her, the mindset and the affirmations she descirbes are of benefit to absolutely everyone.
This is how birth can be. Enough said.
If you would like to get in contact about something shared on this episode, or to share YOUR positive birth story, I'd love to hear from you. You can find me at:
lisaharrisdoula@gmail.com
https://www.instagram.com/lisaharrisdoula/
https://www.facebook.com/lisaharrisdoula
In this week's episode Nilsha tells the story of both her births... and boy is it a tale of two labours!!
I loved both her stories, and Nilsha had a positive experience with both babies, but they couldn't really have been more different.
Her first birth had a long early phase of labour (or as I describe it with my clients, she was in the "first room" from a long time). She has so much wisdom to share about keeping calm and positive. It's very inspirational how much faith Nilsha had her in body and how she coped with, and I meant totally bossed, those many hours at home - with random little hospital stay to contend with too.
And then you'll love her description of her second birth. I don't want to spoil it but let's just say it was quite a surprise compared to the first. If you want evidence babies don't read textbooks, then this is it!
If you would like to get in contact about something shared on this episode, or to share YOUR positive birth story, I'd love to hear from you. You can find me at:
lisaharrisdoula@gmail.com
https://www.instagram.com/lisaharrisdoula/
https://www.facebook.com/lisaharrisdoula
This week I speak to Abla, and even though we recorded this episode a little while ago, I can remember the tangible joy over the airwaves as she described the birth of her second baby and how much pride she took from birthing him in her own power and in her own way.
You will hear that it was following her first experience that Abla realised she would need more education and support to have a more positive experience for her next birth. And she certainly achieved that!
Abla puts it best: “The success for me is not that I gave birth naturally… it is that I gave birth on my own terms and in my own choices” BOOM!
I hope you enjoy listening to Abla as much as me! Abla now works as a postpartum doula herself so go and look her up at https://www.instagram.com/theshemsdoula/
If you would like to get in contact about something shared on this episode, or to share YOUR positive birth story, I'd love to hear from you. You can find me at:
lisaharrisdoula@gmail.com
https://www.instagram.com/lisaharrisdoula/
https://www.facebook.com/lisaharrisdoula
Welcome to episode 6 of the My Positive Birth podcast!
This is a very special episode for me because I am speaking to Lucy Hill... earlier this year I started looking for birth story podcasts to listen and learn from myself, and I came across Lucy's - the "Real Birth Podcast". I have listened to every story & am a genuine fan. And this was my inspiration to start my own podcast as there is a real shortage of UK birth stories out there. So it has been amazing to connect with Lucy. Even if technical issues on my side meant it was quite a battle to get this one in the can!
Lucy had so much wisdom to share, from conception, into the prep she did for her birth, a quite brilliant movie like start to her labour, and then her journey from planned home water birth to a Caesarean section when the baby was found to be breech.
Lucy's reflections on her birth are magical, particularly the value she places in her labour at home, her power, her strength, her instincts. I think the way she describes it all might literally stop you in your tracks, and stories like hers are EXACTLY why I started this podcast.
Buzzing for this one! Thank you Lucy - and do check out her podcast @https://www.instagram.com/realbirthpodcast/
If you would like to get in contact about something shared on this episode, or to share YOUR positive birth story, I'd love to hear from you. You can find me at:
lisaharrisdoula@gmail.com
https://www.instagram.com/lisaharrisdoula/
https://www.facebook.com/lisaharrisdoula
Episode 5 of the podcast is now LIVE! Click on the link in my bio to listen, or search for "My Positive Birth" on any of your favourite podcast distributors.
This week I am joined by wonderful Ella, who talks us through the birth of her second baby, which was a vaginal birth after Caesarean (VBAC).
Ella talks us through her preparation for the birth, support she received along the way and in her own words “I balanced the risks that I knew about with what my body and mind was telling me… which was… you can have a safe, natural birth”.
I just love the way Ella talks about her labour, she is so matter of fact, there is no hint of drama or panic. She just... well... went and had a baby.
Like many of the journeys on this podcast though, there were plenty of steps that Ella took to help achieve the positive experience she had, and so do have a listen - you will learn a lot that might help you with your own birth.
If you would like to get in contact about something shared on this episode, or to share YOUR positive birth story, I'd love to hear from you. You can find me at:
lisaharrisdoula@gmail.com
https://www.instagram.com/lisaharrisdoula/
https://www.facebook.com/lisaharrisdoula
In this week's episode Georgina tells the story of both her births, with a focus on her first baby who was born at home. Georgina takes us through the steps her and her husband took to prepare for the birth, and then her journey through labour and birth. Look out for how nearly the whole experience was de-railed and how Georgina managed to keep on track with her plans and have the birth she wished for.
And then we also get a bonus description of the much more speedy birth of her son in the birth centre!
The narrative is often that it isn't possible to have a good or positive birth with a first baby, that it's dangerous to have a first baby at home (the evidence does NOT support this), or that you will need help if you have never had a baby before etc etc. I hope Georgina's story will encourage you that these assumptions are unhelpful and inaccurate.
Georgina is a fellow SW London doula so head over to her insta @houseofmotherbirth to find out more about what she can offer you.
If you would like to get in contact about something shared on this episode, or to share YOUR positive birth story, I'd love to hear from you. You can find me at:
lisaharrisdoula@gmail.com
https://www.instagram.com/lisaharrisdoula/
https://www.facebook.com/lisaharrisdoula
Aileen is such a fantastic guest, as she describes her journey from tokophobia (a fear of childbirth), to getting pregnant and birthing her own two children, and then going on to work with families offering bespoke childbirth preparation, birth trauma recovery and running parenting groups.
There is so much wisdom and compassion in the way Aileen tells her story. I was actually greedy and got her to share a little about both her births: the first a planned Caesarean and the second a home water birth. She describes how these two very different, but both ultimately positive experiences, made into a reality for her that if birth went different to how she expected then she was not less of a person, and it wasn't less of a birth.
Aileen also shares some great thoughts on family centred Caesarean birth and how to mimic physiology to retain control over the way your baby is born and have a positive experience. And her description of supporting someone in labour during her stay on an antenatal ward, and all that this taught her about labour, is really quite magical. It's a deeply encouraging episode!
So do definitely have a listen... and if you want to contact Aileen then here is her linktree where you can access her website, newsletter, events and freebies: https://linktr.ee/Mybirthsupport
Here is the lovely Tamsyn's story about the arrival of her second baby. She graciously shares with us details of her pregnancy this time around, which was very different to her first. She experienced bleeding and was diagnosed with gestational diabetes which meant her planned home birth changed to a hospital induction.
Tamsyn reflects on her experience positively, and she was particularly motivated to record this episode because she struggled to find positive induction stories herself when she was pregnant.
I love the way that Tamsyn's instincts guided her throughout. In her own words: “Find what’s comfortable for you and don’t worry if that doesn’t fit in with how they wanted you to be”.
Enjoy!
A chance to listen to one of my own positive birth stories - the amazing arrival of my second child. For various reasons I had come out of my first pregnancy, labour and birth with a whole list of "risk factors" - gestational diabetes, postpartum haemorrhage, 3rd degree tear, "post dates" pregnancy.
I had to work hard, both externally within the maternity system, and internally within myself, to plan and prepare for the intervention free birth that I always believed would be best for us both. Come and find out what happened!
If you would like to get in contact about something shared on this episode, or to share YOUR positive birth story, I'd love to hear from you. You can find me at:
lisaharrisdoula@gmail.com
https://www.instagram.com/lisaharrisdoula/
https://www.facebook.com/lisaharrisdoula
Thank you so much for being here. Come and learn what the My Positive Birth podcast is going to be about and what motivates me to make it.
Please do subscribe and tell others about it so it can grow & grow! I have loads of positive birth stories lined up for you.
If you would like to get in contact about something shared on this episode, or to share YOUR positive birth story, I'd love to hear from you. You can find me at:
lisaharrisdoula@gmail.com
https://www.instagram.com/lisaharrisdoula/
https://www.facebook.com/lisaharrisdoula
