Monica’s Birth Story: VBAC Car Birth

[00:01:42] Gina: Welcome to the MamasteFit Podcast, Birth Story Friday. In this episode, we have Monica here, who’s going to be sharing her birth story.

[00:01:49] Gina: So we’re excited to have you here with us.

[00:01:51] Monica: Thanks. I’m happy to spend some time with you guys.

[00:01:53] Gina: So tell us, how did you prepare for birth? what were you doing throughout your pregnancy, in preparation for your labor and for your birth experience?

[00:02:02] Monica: So, I guess a good way to start this is I actually discovered you guys on Instagram back in 2021 when I was pregnant with my son.

[00:02:13] Monica: So that was towards the second half of the pandemic there, and our local hospital wasn’t doing birth classes, birth education classes live. And so I actually signed up for your prenatal exercise program and then also the birth class option. So my husband and I were able to watch all of the videos that you guys had created in lieu of not being able to do any of the birth education classes at our, at our local hospital. So that was really helpful then. And then fast forward to my recent pregnancy with my daughter, I signed up for the exercise program using the TeamBuildr app. And then, of course, I was just online reading every birth story I could.

[00:02:56] Monica: With my son, I had a C section. I was hoping for a VBAC with my daughter. And so I was just looking for any tidbits of information that could help me feel a little bit more confident pursuing that. And then also really trying to focus on where I felt with my son, I had progressed with my labor, he was so close to exiting and everything being good. But then his heart rate decelerated. And so we had to have an emergency C section. And the doctors leading up to this VBAC attempt were very unsupportive. They basically said my pelvis was too small and that there was nothing I could do to change the anatomy of my pelvis. And so I latched onto every stretching exercise that you guys put out there, that I could find. And every night during the third trimester, I, that’s what I focused most on was just opening up my pelvis and flexibility and, and that kind of thing.

[00:03:59] Gina: So how was the end of your pregnancy? So I know for VBAC, sometimes there’s a little bit of tension, as you’re kind of navigating the last few weeks with figuring out, are you going to go into spontaneous labor?

Are you going to be induced? Are you scheduling a C section? So how was the end of your pregnancy? And we can just go straight into your birth story as well.

[00:04:18] Monica: So what was interesting was at the start of my pregnancy, so the doctor’s office that I go to, there’s actually four physicians there, there’s four OBs and so I asked all of them, you know, what their thoughts were on VBAC and, and they all seemed relatively supportive initially, except for one.

[00:04:39] Monica: And then towards the end, it felt like they were a little bit more hesitant. They just wanted to check on a lot of things, like they wanted to do a growth ultrasound and they wanted, you know, there was just a lot of things, I felt like, they wanted to check on. And maybe weren’t as pro VBAC as I was hoping.

[00:04:56] Monica: But. All of the content I could find online was super helpful in just kind of standing my ground and and being firm and, “Here’s my plan. Here’s what I want to do.” We did have a scheduled C section date out because where we live, there was a solar eclipse. And we were like peak totality and there was a lot of, there was like over 200,000 people coming into our community for that. And so the local hospital was not scheduling, intentionally they were not scheduling any surgeries on that day.

[00:05:30] Roxanne: Yeah.

[00:05:30] Monica: And so they were like, “That means we’re trying to cram all of the other surgeries in the other four days of that week.” And of course that was the one week that my 41, like right after I was 41 weeks would’ve fell on.

[00:05:44] Monica: And so we went ahead and scheduled, and that night I went into labor .

[00:05:50] Gina: The night that you scheduled it?

[00:05:51] Monica: Yeah, yeah.

[00:05:52] Gina: Oh man, that’s…

[00:05:53] Monica: Yeah, we had the conversation. I said, “Okay, fine. I’ll schedule the C-section just to make everybody happy, after 41 weeks.” And, that night I went into labor spontaneously, so.

[00:06:06] Roxanne: Oh, that’s awesome.

[00:06:07] Monica: Yeah. So.

[00:06:09] Roxanne: It was like, that was like a stress, taken off the table. So it might’ve been helpful.

[00:06:13] Monica: Yeah. Yeah. So her birth story, my labor started at night. And so I went to bed around 10 PM. I woke up a little after 11, I felt some contractions and I was like, “You know what? This is gonna be a marathon.” I learned my lesson from my son where I let anxiety get the best of me and I just was up immediately and I was doing ball circles and I was you know, overthinking everything. With this labor I was like, “I’m gonna lay in bed for a while.”

[00:06:44] Monica: And so I laid in bed for about an hour and then I was thinking to myself, “These contractions are… they feel kind of strong, you know? Am I just a wuss? This is supposed to be early labor! Like, why am I struggling with this a little bit?” So then I started to actually count, and I used an app on my phone for that. And sure enough, they were lasting the full minute, but because of the intensity, I was like, I don’t know. I’m just gonna go. So my husband, he was working on a work project, so he had not gone to bed yet. So it’s like midnight, right? And I go to him and I’m like, “I know you haven’t slept yet, but tonight’s the night.”

[00:07:26] Monica: So I’m like, “You know, just go ahead and put the hospital bag in the van.” And, you know, “It’ll, it’ll be a while…” And we have a toddler, so he’s two and a half and so we had a go bag for him to go to my brother and sister-in-law’s house and I’m like, “Go ahead and put that in the van, I’m sure we can just drop it off in the morning on the way to the hospital.” In my mind, I’m still convinced we got lots of time here.

[00:07:50] Monica: And about 15 minutes later, so I just kept feeling like I had to go to the bathroom, I kept drinking lots of water to try to stay hydrated, so I kept feeling like I had to go to the bathroom. And it was just like a, I stood up and I felt a little bit nauseous and a little bit like lightheaded. And then it was just like the light switch went. And here’s the other thing I forgot to mention, when I woke up with contractions, my thoughts around it were, “Okay, my body knows what to do. I’m going to trust my body.” And as these contractions come, I just kind of viewed them as here’s a wave of energy and I’m just going to ride this way. Right? And so this whole time, I think I’m just like riding this wave, and I’m just accepting what’s happening with my body. I think at some point though in that bathroom, I started pushing.

[00:08:46] Monica: I don’t know when exactly, but things got really intense, and that’s when I was like, “Call my brother and sister-in-law! They need to get here quick!” It was storming that night.

[00:08:57] Gina: Oh, God!

[00:08:59] Roxanne: Oh, my God!

[00:09:00] Monica: Yeah. It’s like 12:15, 12:30 at this point. And so I just labored on all fours in our master bathroom.

[00:09:09] Monica: And again, at some point, I had to have started pushing, because maybe 30 minutes later, I made my way down to our downstairs area as we’re trying to get everything out to our van to, to leave for the hospital. We’re still waiting for my brother and sister-in-law to arrive. They live on the opposite side of the county, of course. And so, I get downstairs and I’m laboring, kind of on my knees, and then I have my arms propped up on the couch. That’s just what felt the most comfortable. And I remember you guys kind of talking about you’ll know, your body will tell you what feels most comfortable or what feels most natural.

[00:09:52] Monica: And so, kind of, again, I’m like, “My body knows what it’s doing. I’m riding these waves.” Until, I pushed so hard that my water broke. And that’s when I realized, I have been pushing. Everything was painful, right? But I didn’t realize I was not just riding the wave. I was like, pushing with the wave and that’s when, for me, it got real. I was like, “Oh, we’re not going to make it to the hospital. We’re like, this, we, we’ve got to. We’ve got to go!”

[00:10:24] Monica: So, my husband is so funny. I was like, “Grab every towel! Grab every towel you can!” To put in the van to lay, you know, on the passenger seat there. And, you know, he’s doing the best he can. He was actually very calm, like throughout everything. And so then, we’re getting ready to leave. And I’m like, “Oh, we’re supposed to call the hospital and tell them that labor has started. So can you call them?” So he calls and, one of the nurses on the, on the floor, she answers and she’s super kind. But one of the things she said was, I did not consent to cervical checks the entirety of my, pregnancy, towards the end. I felt like I was going to latch onto a number and it was just going to, not help me progress. So I just opted out of cervical checks. So what she recommended, because I hadn’t had a cervical check and they didn’t know that I, if I was dilated or not, was to not push. And I was like, this freight train has left the station. There is no stopping this.

[00:11:37] Roxanne: That is NOT the advice….

[00:11:38] Gina: The brakes are broken.

[00:11:39] Monica: That is not an option.

[00:11:42] Roxanne: There is no stopping this now.

[00:11:44] Monica: I did not tell her that, though. You know, I was in a different world. And so, we get off the phone. We get in the van, we’re on our way to the hospital, and the quickest route to the hospital from our house is actually, there’s a train track that we have to cross.

[00:12:01] Roxanne: Oh no.

[00:12:02] Monica: And wouldn’t you know, at one o’clock in the morning, ere’s this, there’s a train stopped on the tracks for servicing.

[00:12:11] Roxanne: No!

[00:12:12] Monica: While it’s storming, the train is stopped on the tracks, and so, and, and here I am in the front passenger seat. I couldn’t physically sit all the way down, so I’m kind of like, propped up a little bit, to one side. No, I’m, I’m not.

[00:12:29] Gina: That’s a telltale sign. The baby is coming.

[00:12:33] Monica: So I’m not fully sideways, but I’m not upright either, so I’m at this weird diagonal, and I’m just yelling at him like, “Go around!” So, we have to go the opposite way. I mean, we didn’t even make it that much further as we’re heading back the alternate route. I could feel her like you guys talk about and everybody else talks about the ring of fire, right? And I could feel it. And I was like… because the whole time I’m screaming, “She’s coming! She’s coming!” And then I was like, “For real now, though! This is about to happen.”

[00:13:07] Roxanne: I wasn’t telling the truth then, but now for sure. Oh my gosh.

[00:13:12] Monica: I, I was yelling at him and I was like, “You’re going to have to call 911 to have them send an ambulance and they’re going to have to meet us. They’re going to have to meet us wherever we can stop.” And so as we’re, we’re driving and he’s making the phone call there’s a Walmart on our side of town, and it was like this beacon of hope because it was like 1:30 in the morning, and the lights were so bright in this Walmart parking lot. There wasn’t

a car in sight. It was just like there. And I was like, “Park at the Walmart parking lot, she’s coming now!”

[00:13:47] Monica: So he’s calling emergency dispatchers, and they’re like, on speakerphone through our van. So they’re hearing me and all the noise I’m making, as well as I’m like yelling at him to park the van. And he’s trying to tell them what’s happening so that they can send emergency responders. And he parks and I’m just like, “She’s coming out of me!” And he’s like, “What do you want me to do? What do you want me to do?” And I’m like, “You’re going to have to catch her! Pull my pants down and catch her.” And so he gets out of his side, he comes over to mine, and he, he catches her. And it was like this wild moment where he like brings her up and he kind of hands her to me and I go to take her, but both of us are still holding onto her and we’re looking at each other with this like facial expression like, “This happened? Like this really just happened?” And there she was, you know, and she was almost as stunned as we were that she was there so fast.

[00:14:46] Monica: And I looked, so we actually took a photo, I took a selfie with her in the van and the time stamp was 1:52 in the morning. So it was under three hours. No, not at all what I thought. I thought we had all that time. We did not. But honestly, it was really it was really beautiful. And you know, I’m so thankful everything worked out the way it did.

[00:15:11] Monica: My husband got back on his side of the car, and it was so funny because the dispatcher, like the 911 dispatcher, is still on the call. And so she’s, “Are you there? Is the baby breathing!” Because she was, the baby didn’t really cry. She, you know, she let out a couple of cries, but again, she was just looking at us like, “Whoa, that was a wild ride.”

[00:15:31] Gina: What just happened?

[00:15:32] Roxanne: What the hell just happened?

[00:15:34] Monica: And we’re like, “Oh yeah, she’s fine. She’s breathing. I’m fine.” And that, it was right around then where we see four cop cars come, with their lights and sirens, into the Walmart parking lot. And we’re like, “Oh, they’re here!”

[00:15:49] Roxanne: Walmart’s probably, “What’s happening out there?” There’s one car in the parking lot. Why are there so many cop cars?”

[00:15:55] Gina: This lady’s screaming. There’s a bunch of cop cars.

[00:15:59] Monica: Oh man. But then the EMT crew arrived and they were amazing. They were led by, like a young woman who was just like, “You do this, and you do that. Hey, go grab this.” And she’s like “Mama, you’re doing great. Look at how well you did!” I mean, just so encouraging and so positive. And, it was just a really, really cool experience. And so they take me and, my daughter in the ambulance to the hospital and my husband follows with our van. And, they wheel me in right onto the, the floor, the labor and delivery like floor in the hospital.

[00:16:39] Monica: And the nurse who took our phone call, she greets us and she’s “Hi, I’m the nurse who took your call, blah, blah, blah.” And so here I am holding this baby on my chest as they’re wheeling me. “Sorry, I pushed.”

[00:16:52] Gina: So you didn’t stop pushing, is what you’re telling me.

[00:16:56] Monica: No, I did not.

[00:17:00] Roxanne: I’m sorry I pushed.

[00:17:02] Monica: She was like, “Oh, honey, I knew by the sounds you were making, you were going to have that baby before you got here.” So it was really great.

[00:17:11] Monica: And I think that the cherry on top for me was, of the four doctors at the practice that I was seen at, the one that was the least supportive, he gave me an 18 percent chance of success for VBAC, he was the one that was on call. So he had to come in and check me out and hear the story and hear how I did it. And I, it was just like, I don’t know, I just felt so, it was, it was amazing. So.

[00:17:42] Gina: Oh man, that’s such an exciting story.

[00:17:44] Roxanne: I know, I was like, I’m literally on the edge of my seat. I’m like, oh my gosh, what’s happening next?

[00:17:49] Gina: We’re, we’re all so diagonal on our seats.

[00:17:53] Monica: It’s funny too, because, you know, a couple of people asked, they were like, “Did your husband get to cut the cord?” you know, because we were in our van and I was like, funny that you ask that, because the lead EMT, when she arrived and she was like, “Okay, well, we’re going to go ahead and we’re going to cut the cord.” Dad, do you want to do this? He looked over at her and he said, “I think I’ve done enough….”

[00:18:20] Roxanne: He doesn’t need to cut the court. He delivered the baby.

[00:18:23] Gina: He’s like, “I need, I need a moment here.”

[00:18:27] Gina: So how is your postpartum? So you are wheeled into the hospital already given birth, how was postpartum in the hospital and then transitioning back home?

[00:18:37] Monica: So admittedly, I was very anxious about what postpartum would look like for me because with my son in 2021, I had terrible postpartum anxiety for almost that whole first year of his life. And I had very dark, intrusive thoughts, and I really struggled.

[00:18:56] Monica: This was the exact opposite. It was just like a dream. It really was. You know, we, we arrived to the hospital… Physically postpartum, right, the difference between having an emergency C section and then spontaneous, you know, labor, delivery, in three hours, you know, they were like… I was just hungry. I wanted to eat. I was like, “Can I get up and, you know, go try to use the bathroom on my own?” You know, I was just, I… and maybe a little bit of that was still like the adrenaline. But even, just I don’t know, everything felt easier and more joyful. And I think part of that maybe was experience. Part of it was the circumstances. But I really embraced rest. I have not, I have not done my first postpartum workout.

[00:19:50] Gina: That’s okay.

[00:19:51] Monica: And I’m almost 7 weeks postpartum. I’m just soaking up, soaking up the baby snuggles and, enjoying, I don’t know, this kind of transition season as we go from a family of three to a family of four.

[00:20:06] Gina: I love that. I really love that you’re really emphasizing the rest now, too. It’s okay that you haven’t gotten back to workouts yet. They will be there for you when you’re…

[00:20:13] Roxanne: I don’t think I started until eight or nine weeks and it was pretty slow. So you’re doing amazing.

[00:20:21] Monica: Now I have started doing like some of the, the breathing and just you know, focusing on, you know, tightening my pelvic floor with deep breaths. I remember with my son, the move that I loved the most, and I’m actually going to start doing that, is the dead bug.

[00:20:40] Gina: Yeah.

[00:20:41] Monica: For whatever reason, I felt like that was like how I was able to connect with my core again. I could genuinely feel that, with him. So that’s definitely something that I’m going to work in here eventually.

[00:20:53] Gina: So do you have any tips for somebody that maybe realizes that their labor is going very fast? What advice would you give? yourself if you can go back and be like, “Hey, by the way, prepare for this.”

[00:21:08] Monica: Interestingly enough, my mom, I talked to her that, that next day after my daughter was born and she said, “Were you scared?” And I was like, “No, there was no time to be scared.” And also I had, I think I had done so much research ahead of time and I had, I had listened to so many birth stories ahead of time there, there wasn’t that fear there.

[00:21:34] Monica: And so I guess, one, don’t let anxiety or fear intrude on your moment, right? Trusting your body. But also, make sure you’ve got those towels on hand, your hospital bag is packed, you’ve got your people on call, you know. Because we did everything we could once we realized it was happening quickly, but again, that whole first hour I just laid in bed thinking, “This is a marathon, not a sprint. It’s going to be a while. You know, let’s, I’m just going to rest on the front end because I know I’m not going to rest later.”

[00:22:12] Monica: But definitely taking that time throughout your pregnancy to gather as much information, research, prep, plan as much as you can. I think, I think it was maybe Gina who, you actually did a reel where it was like, what to do if you do actually have a (car) birth or something. And I remember,

[00:22:37] Roxanne: Oh, yeah,

[00:22:37] Gina: Yeah we did that.

[00:22:38] Monica: Yeah. And I remember, you mentioning the towels and was basically like, “Ultimately, somebody is going to catch your baby, even if it’s you.” And so I kept thinking that when we were in the car, and I’m like, if we don’t pull over quick enough, I might have to catch this baby, which is fine, you know, I’ll, I’ll do it. I’ll do whatever it takes. But yes, the preparation, I think, is what changed.

[00:23:03] Monica: With my son in 2021, I did a lot of preparation, but what I focused mostly on was strength. And I did not focus on… like, I focused on physical strength. I didn’t focus on flexibility and really working on movement, like how to create space in my pelvis, what movements did that. And I also didn’t focus on like the, the mental part of it. Those contractions come on and

they’re so strong and you don’t really know like how long are you going to be in labor? And, and when is this going to end? And I think also just my mentality had changed in preparation too, so I would encourage that.

[00:23:48] Gina: Awesome. Well, thank you so much, Monica, for coming on the podcast and sharing your very exciting birth story. I was, again, on the edge of my seat, are they going to make it? I don’t know if they’re going to make it.

[00:23:59] Roxanne: As soon as she was like, “We were pushing at home,” I was like, “This is a car birth.”

[00:24:02] Gina: I’m like, “She’s going to have a home birth.”

[00:24:03] Roxanne: This is a car birth story.

[00:24:06] Gina: But thank you so much again for, one, trusting us to support you throughout your pregnancy. Through two pregnancies now! Trusting us to be able to come on to the podcast to share your birth story. We really, really appreciate your time and your support.

[00:24:19] Roxanne: Thank you.

[00:24:20] Monica: Well, thank you. Thank you guys for all the content you put out there. I also love how genuine and just real you guys are. Like, I don’t know, I live every day in my workout clothes and my hair is pulled back in a ponytail and I just love how real and authentic you guys are. And so and just knowledgeable too, of course, but I appreciate everything.

[00:24:43] Roxanne: Thank you!

[00:24:44] Gina: Thank you. I will continue to do my mom bun with no makeup and just work out clothes all the time.

[00:24:49] Roxanne: I don’t know how to do makeup. I’ve watched so many YouTube videos now and it’s not who I am. So I fully embrace that.

[00:24:56] Gina: Thank you for accepting us for who we are as well.

[00:25:00] Monica: I recommend you guys to everybody I talk to. I’m like, “Hey, if you’re doing any preparation, these are the people you want to follow.”

[00:25:09] Lakeesha: Hi, my name is Lakeesha Murphy Spencer. I am a certified nurse midwife in the central Carolina area, and I recommend MamasteFit to so many of my patients because it’s so important to get that functional fitness base in. They are amazing at explaining the physiology of different changes that happen in pregnancy before, during, and after birth. And they are a great way to reconnect with your body and push yourself to a new level as a mom or a mom to be.

[00:25:42] Gina: So if you think that your labor is progressing a little bit on the quick side, as Monica was saying, it is important to be prepared beforehand for the potential of a fast labor.

[00:25:53] Gina: Now, most of us will have probably just a normal length labor, but you never know. You never know. You might have something super quick. So Roxanne, what are your top tips for somebody who is preparing for birth with the potential that your baby might fall out of your body in the car?

[00:26:08] Roxanne: And I think that this is important because sometimes it could be that you didn’t have a precipitous birth, but maybe you stayed home for like just a smidge longer than maybe you should have, even if you’re like five minutes away.

[00:26:20] Gina: Or you have a train that blocked your path to the hospital.

[00:26:22] Roxanne: Or like a train, or a car accident is on the way, so like your like, little five minute trip turns into longer, and then you have a baby in the car. Or if you know that you have an hour long car ride, like labor can progress very quickly from getting into the car at that beginning of the hour to when you arrive at the hospital.

[00:26:40] Roxanne: So we always recommend having a go bag in both cars, or however many cars you have, because you never know which car you actually are going to take to the hospital in the moment. Like you might be out at Walmart when you start going into labor and you don’t have the car that had the original go bag. So I just recommend putting it in all of the cars that you possibly could drive.

[00:27:01] Roxanne: And what you’re going to do, in just like a garbage bag or a shopping bag, you just need towels. More than one preferably, but at least one towel. Some baby blankets, because after you dry baby off, having a softer baby blanket can be really nice. And then I normally just recommend a Ziploc bag, because just in case the placenta delivers, you can put the placenta in a Ziploc bag, so it’s not just like hanging out on your floor. And then if you have it, the,

they’re like the doggy pee pads, but not the actual doggy pee pad ones, they’re like just little pads that’ll collect as much fluid as possible, because birth is not clean. There’s lots of fluids involved with birth. So having things that can absorb fluids can be beneficial. Putting that, just, all over your car.

[00:27:47] Roxanne: I used the Pee Pod mats, which is like a reusable pad that you put on like your kid’s bed when they’re potty training. It absorbs a ton of fluid. So I put that in my car seat for our hour long drive because my husband was deathly afraid that we were going to have a car baby and it was forever unclean. So, it’s a huge pad that covered the seat and the floor a little bit, just in case, a baby shot out, it would have collected a lot of fluid. But you don’t need to buy one of those pads unless you, already have it, so the doggy pee pads would just work just as well. And put that in, just, again, a shopping bag. Put it in the front seat or like where you can or your spouse can easily grab it, in the case of an emergency. I think I saw a reel where someone grabbed like a sweatshirt that just happened to be in the backseat when their baby was born. I was like, this is why you need a little bag, a little go bag. You could use a towel, easily grab, throw it on the baby. Good to go.

[00:28:43] Roxanne: And with the go bag, like if you have a car birth, people are always like, well, what do you do with the umbilical cord? People are always like, well, do you need scissors in this go bag to cut the umbilical cord? No, you don’t need to mess with the umbilical cord unless the, at some point, it’s super rare, if the umbilical cord ruptures, like during the delivery process, then you will, you could use like a shoe tie or something to like, just tie off the side that’s attached to baby. You can order like the umbilical cord clamps just in case that happens, but it is super rare, so the likelihood of you needing to do that is not, but some people like to be prepared just in case, but otherwise just leave it alone. The baby can stay attached until you arrive at the hospital.

[00:29:27] Gina: Other things that I would recommend in preparation for your birth, especially if you do have to wait for people to get to your home to watch older children, or if you do have a long car drive, is to one, have Labor and Delivery’s phone number saved into your phone, so it’s easy to access, so you can let them know, “Hey, we’re on our way, and I am pushing.” and if they’re like, “Stop pushing,” you can be like, “I can’t.”

[00:29:48] Gina: And another thing is to know, when should you call an ambulance? And so typically what I recommend to my doula clients, because a lot of them do have about an hour drive to the hospital that a lot of them like to go to, is if you feel like you’re pushing just keep driving. Like usually it’s, it might take some time. You might still make it. Roxanne pushed for 40 minutes from our house to the hospital and still had 40 minutes before her baby was born with her first.

[00:30:18] Gina: Now, if you see baby’s head pull over, if you feel that ring of fire, like you’ll know, like there’s, there’s a lot of pressure.

[00:30:26] Roxanne: We have no time.

[00:30:27] Gina: At that point, I would say you should probably pull over and your partner needs to stop driving, stop filming, and help you deliver this baby. And preferably also call an ambulance at this point. If you’re still at home and you feel like you’re pushing it, it’s kind of up to you to decide, do I think I’m going to make it or not?

[00:30:48] Gina: If you have an hour drive to your hospital, you’re probably not going to, you’re probably not going to make that. and so it’s kind of like situation dependent. So this is where it’s really helpful to be able to call your labor and delivery to ask their opinion, because if there’s maybe a closer birth location that you can go to you can go there instead, or potentially just wait at home for EMT to come to you because that would be much safer than trying to drive while simultaneously delivering your baby.

[00:31:16] Roxanne: And cleaner for your car.

[00:31:17] Gina: So we can’t quite plan how fast our labors will go, and sometimes we can’t quite plan where our babies will be born. So it is important to be prepared. So if you have older children, ensuring that you have a child care plan for who is going to be watching these children. When are they going to come? How can you get in contact with them? Cause a lot of us would go into labor at night. And so it can be helpful to make sure that you can contact them wherever they are. I had one birth where the dad had to run out of the house and go bang on their window to wake them up to come get their other child. And they’re like “We’re going to have a baby on the floor!” So having a plan for any older children that you have in the home.

[00:31:54] Gina: The next thing is to make sure that you have a go bag, especially if you have a longer hospital drive. So if your hospital is more than 30 minutes away, I would say having a go bag in your car in case baby does come a little bit faster than you were expecting. Make sure you got labor and delivery’s number saved in your phone, and both of your phones, to make sure it’s really easy to access in case you need to ask for any advice on should we even go? Should we just stay here? What is your recommendation? Use them as a resource during that time. Like you don’t have to try to figure it all out in that moment.

[00:32:25] Gina: And then if you see hair, or if you see a head, because some babies are bald, stop driving or just go ahead and just call an ambulance and ask for assistance. You can also ask for assistance prior to this if you feel like this baby is coming and I do not want to be relocating myself. So those would be like our tips to prepare for the potential of a really fast or unexpected birth location. But hopefully you don’t need those advice and you give birth where you intend.

[00:32:55] Gina: Thanks so much for listening to this episode. If you want more support throughout your pregnancy, join our online prenatal fitness programs. We offer our prenatal fitness programs in two formats. Monica did our TeamBuildr app based program, which is a list of exercises with demo videos. And this is self paced workouts. We have full length workouts for that. And then also mini, in case you’re short on time. In addition, we have our on demand program, which are full length workout videos that you can follow and work out with at the same time. In both programs, we incorporate strength exercises to help you stay comfortable throughout your pregnancy while also incorporating a lot of birth preparation exercises to relax your pelvic floor, to create more space within your pelvis, to help you prepare for birth.

[00:33:32] Roxanne: And if you’re looking for a childbirth education course to help prepare for labor and birth, check out our online childbirth education course where we discuss the science of birth. You have lifetime access to the course, so if you buy it in one pregnancy, you can use it again in subsequent pregnancies like Monica did.

[00:33:47] Roxanne: We cover labor positions as well as what your partner can do during labor and we even discuss both vaginal and C section births so you can be prepared for both options. And you can check out all of our offerings on our website and use code STORY10 to get 10 percent off any of our courses. And our prenatal fitness and childbirth education course can be bundled together to get an additional 15 percent off and then with this 10 percent off it’s pretty much free.

[00:34:13] Gina: So thanks so much for listening. We’ll see you next week.