065 - The Incredible Gift of a VBAC at Home (with Kelly Ozbolt) [Miscarriage | Breech Cesarean | VBAC at Home]

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SHOW NOTES:

Coming from a medical background, and just winging your first birth can make for quite a traumatic birth experience. Then, when you’ve discovered a more holistic lifestyle but find out your next baby is breech, one that you went through many losses to get, the utter disappointment you can experience knowing you won’t be getting the redemptive birth you were seeking. Finally, making friends with two crazy home birthers later, the Lord blesses you with a son and a home birth midwife who believes in God’s design and your ability to birth your baby naturally, and the set-up for God’s greatest gift for you has begun. Listen to Kelly tell the story today of how God sustained her through every trial and every victory!

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TRANSCRIPT:

That was the night, Ransom went to labor, the night that she was supposed to have her nutcracker performance, her ballet, her nutcracker ballet performance.

And so she wanted to, the plan was for her to be there at Ransom's birth.

And so it's like, man, do you want to be here?

Do you want to be your nutcracker?

Mommy can't go to the nutcracker.

We can try to get someone to take you.

That was the in-between contractions conversation we're having as a family.

And she decided she wanted to go to the nutcracker.

She put a lot of work into it, and she didn't want to miss Ransom's birth, but she was going to try and do both.

So we had friends take her to the nutcracker.

I have pictures of me with my big old belly in between contractions, putting her little ballerina bun in.

Oh my gosh.

Trying to get her all ready.

Off to the nutcracker she went.

Hi, I'm Kayla Heater, follower of Jesus, wife and mother of five children, Christian childbirth educator and doula, and your host of the Surrendered Birth Stories podcast, where we share God-centered birth stories, evidence-based birth education, and our pursuit of surrendering our birth plans to God.

Let's get started.

Hey, everyone.

Hope your week is off to a great start.

We just celebrated my oldest son's birthday.

We had his party last weekend and his actual birthday was this past week.

And he's eight, which is wild to me.

Mr.

Milo Man is eight years old.

He's growing up.

He's got braces on his top teeth and a palate expander because we've been trying to help him out with his breathing and everything.

He's got a lot of issues, but we're working on them.

Party was so low-key.

I only go all out for first birthday parties.

If it's your first birthday, we go all out.

But all the other birthdays, we own a small family inflatable rental business.

So we've got like some bounce houses and some inflatable slides.

So we always just let them pick one or two of those.

We blow them up in the yard.

I make some cupcakes and buy some bottled water.

And that's the party.

When you have five kids, you got to keep it simple and low-key because if you're going to be throwing like five parties a year, that's a lot.

So we just keep it really simple.

But they have a blast.

They slide and jump and bounce with their friends and get to sing happy birthday, eat cupcakes, open presents, and it's every kid's birthday dream.

So it's great.

I wanted to read a review that got left from this past week, which I'm so grateful for.

Y'all, when you leave these reviews, it really, really helps other people discover this show.

So unless, you know, this show was recommended to you by a personal friend, if you just came upon it, it's because somebody else left a review, which helped push it to your podcast feed.

Let's go ahead and read this review from Ashley D.

Jarena.

She says, Kayla is such a good listener and so empathetic to everyone's experiences.

She gives everyone the time and space to share their story, so you can hear all the details.

I'm in my second pregnancy and look forward to having Kayla as my doula for this birth.

Every time I hear her motto, I'm reminded to leave this birth in God's hands.

Thank you, Ashley.

And I am so excited and honored and privileged to be able to work with you and to help you through this next birth, which yes, we will leave in God's hands.

She's referring to how we close out this podcast every week, which if you've never stayed all the way to the end, then you're missing the motto and the outtake from the week.

So I encourage you to listen all the way to the end of each episode.

But if you haven't left a review yet, if you could please just take the one minute out of your day that it would take to click write a review, it would mean so much to me and my husband and to the other women who have yet to discover this podcast.

Okay, let's get into this week's episode.

Coming from a medical background and just winging your first birth can make for quite a traumatic birth experience.

Then, when you've discovered a more holistic lifestyle, but find out your next baby is Breech, one that you went through many losses to get, the utter disappointment you can experience knowing you won't be getting the redemptive birth you were seeking.

Finally, making friends with two crazy home birthers later, the Lord blesses you with a son and a home birth midwife who believes in God's design and your ability to birth your baby naturally.

And the set up for God's greatest gift for you has begun.

Listen to Kelly tell the story today of how God sustained her through every trial and every victory.

Welcome to another episode of Surrendered Birth Stories.

I am your host, Kayla Heater, and I have Kelly with me today.

Introduce yourself, tell us about you, your life, who you are, so we know who we're talking to.

My name's Kelly.

I am a wife, a mom, a daughter of Jesus.

What else?

I'm a PA, a physician assistant.

I live in North Carolina.

I'm a mom of three, a seven-year-old daughter.

She just turned seven.

A two-and-a-half-year-old daughter and a ten-month-old son.

And I'm married to Tommy.

We had our ten-year anniversary a few months ago, last month.

I can't believe it's been ten years.

And we are, we met in Boston.

I'm a New Englander.

I'm from Maine.

Oh, cool.

He's from North Carolina.

So when we met, I was like, you're going to stay in New England forever.

I'm never leaving.

T-minus.

However many years later, here we are.

How far into the marriage did you move?

So we lived in Boston.

We had my daughter, my oldest, in Boston, and she was about two when we moved.

So and now she's seven.

So we've been down around here for about five years.

I'm from the North, too, but not New England, just Ohio.

Just a little Midwest, northerner.

And yeah, I'm a physician assistant.

So I was trained very medically.

I worked in Boston, a really busy emergency room up there for, what is it, six, seven years, something like that.

And then I've worked in some orthopedic surgery areas for several years as well.

I'm currently not practicing, I'm just moming, but yeah, a little synopsis.

Well, that's wonderful.

So take us back to Boston then.

So what was it like getting pregnant for the first time?

Tell us that story.

So my very first pregnancy was in 2016.

It was in the fall, and I found out that I was pregnant, and it was right before I was leaving for a shift in the emergency room.

And I didn't tell Tommy, I got a balloon and a little pair of shoes at the gift shop at the hospital, and rushed home and said it all up, and I wrote this little, I can't wait to meet you daddy sign, and was so excited to tell him.

And he got back from work, and I told him we're all overjoyed.

And we were just so excited to be parents.

We had been married about two years, and we were just really excited.

And then on my birthday, October 15th, we lost that pregnancy.

So our very first time finding out we were pregnant, we lost it.

And that was so hard for me.

I worked in the ER, and so I counseled women in losing their pregnancies, all the time.

And like I had the spiel that I would always say, you know, one in four pregnancies, you're not alone, this is nothing you did.

You know, the things that I would say to my patients, and then it happened to me, and I was gutted.

So that was really hard.

But the Lord was really good to us in that too.

I think I learned a lot.

You know, when you're young and you're like, okay, well, I'm gonna be pregnant at this age, and I'm gonna have a baby, we're gonna be married for two years, and we're gonna have a baby, and we're gonna do this, then, you know, it's kind of a good, not a good, but it was, you know, a check of, hey, Kelly, like, your plan is not the Lord's plan, and he's still good.

And so we were sad and devastated, and, you know, all of those things that come with that.

But thankfully, shortly thereafter, we got pregnant with Shiloh.

And same thing, we were overjoyed, and, you know, a little more hesitant in the beginning with the whole, like, okay, we just need to walk through this and trust that, you know, everything's going to be okay.

But we are so excited to be parents.

And thankfully, you know, that pregnancy was fine and carried all the way through.

So that was, you know, in the wintertime of 2016.

Yeah, like, around Christmas-ish?

Yes.

I think it was two months after we lost our first pregnancy in October.

Well, a nice Christmas present.

So how did that pregnancy go then, in terms of, like, how you felt?

Like, was it smooth?

Were there any complications or anything?

I think it was pretty typical.

I had, in all my pregnancies, like, first trimester nausea, exhaustion.

I maybe threw up a couple of times, but nothing over the top.

But, you know, I just felt crummy towards the beginning.

The hardest part about it was working.

You know, I worked really long shifts in the ER and a lot of evening shifts, night shifts, and that doesn't slow down.

So that was probably the toughest part of Shiloh's pregnancy.

Towards the end, I had some pubic synthesis dysfunctions.

I had a lot of pelvic pain.

And I was on my feet with a huge belly running around patients for 12 hours.

And I actually went into labor during one of my, during shifts.

So things didn't slow down.

So that was probably the toughest part of pregnancy.

But I had no other little ones to chase around.

And I could nap when I wanted to.

You know, looking back on it, it's like, oh, that was a little bit more of a cakewalk than the last.

Right.

You don't ever know what a gift your first pregnancy is when you don't have any other to compare it to.

Absolutely.

So it was pretty typical.

I mean, did what I just kind of thought everyone did is I found an OB that looked nice and people said good things about and was associated with the hospital system I worked in, because it was just kind of what everyone did.

And so kind of plugged along that path.

And she was fine and great.

And the prenatal care was normal, nothing atypical.

The pregnancy itself was pretty standard, I would say.

So going into birth, did you have any plans then or visions of what you wanted or how you wanted it to go, or were you just kind of winging it?

You know, I kind of was winging it, which looking back, it's so funny, because for the second two, it was just very different.

But I kind of was like, you know what?

I might try to go all natural, I'm not gonna be a hero if I can't handle it, I'll get an epidural.

You know, I was kind of like, I'm just gonna do what feels right in the moment.

We were just thankful to have a baby, you know, like after losing our first, it was like, you know, everything's fine, and we're just gonna do what we need to do to bring this baby here and like have her in my arms.

So it really wasn't a whole lot of planning, which like, you know, I think back on it's like, man, I really wish I knew better.

I wish I would have educated myself more for as much education that I have and had in medicine and the body.

And it's just, I just wish that I would have done myself the service of educating myself more.

I mean, I think we did a prenatal class at the hospital, which was far less what to expect in your body and more about where to park and how to get snacks, you know, like it was not a class that's actually a good educational what to expect during labor and delivery.

And I just wish, looking back, that I would have done more for that.

So it was kind of just, you know, I'm going to go into labor and we're just going to take it one step at a time.

We knew where to go.

And so we I was very kind of lackadaisical about it, I think, which surprises me for it being like my first baby.

Yeah, I know, I did not have any grandiose plans.

I didn't have a birth plan typed out.

No, I didn't have any of that.

Well, that's fine.

We're going to see what happened.

So how far along were you when you went into this labor during your during your ER shift?

So I was a week and a half before my due date.

So 38 and a half weeks.

And I expected to at least go up to my due date or at least get close to it since it was my first baby.

And that's what everyone says.

And I remember just being really uncomfortable and sitting in her rocking chair all night in the nursery, just trying to get some rest.

So funny, hindsight's 20-20.

Look back and you're like, Kelly, seriously?

How did you not, like, did it not click?

I went into work at 5 a.m.

or so.

And my attending, the doctor that I was working with, was like, man, you look rough.

Are you okay?

And I was like, I didn't sleep last night.

She looks at me and she was like, are you in labor?

And I was like, no, I can't be.

No, you know, it's probably just Braxton Hicks.

I'm just not feeling that good.

And kind of went through more than half of my shift.

And finally she looked at me and she was like, Kelly, I'm calling you a taxi.

You're going home.

You, I think you're in labor.

Like, there's no way I'm in labor.

It was Friday, like mid-afternoon.

So I get home and I prop myself up and I'm watching a movie and I couldn't get comfortable anywhere.

So I brought like a chair we had on that deck and I brought it inside to watch the movie.

And Tommy came home and was like, what are you doing?

And, you know, I just don't feel that good.

He's like, did you call your doctor?

I'm like, no, she's just going to tell me to wait it out.

You know, what is she going to say?

Anyway, I called and what did they say?

You know, well, say what they typically would.

Wait it out.

Let us know if you're having consistent contractions that are, you know, and took a shower that night, went to bed, sat in the bed and my water broke, like pin-crack water break though.

Like I was like, did I pee the bed?

Like a leak.

Yeah.

And so kind of walked around a little bit, convinced myself that my water broke, called them.

And they said, you know, take your time, take a shower, pack a bag, whatever.

Slowly get your way into the hospital.

I was GBS positive, so they didn't want me to wait too long.

And so Tommy and I kind of got our steps together and into the hospital we went.

And it was like kind of a rough experience, the whole thing.

And Cliff Notes version, I think, was just, I felt very, like, untended to.

I don't know if that's a good way to describe it, but we got there, it was late, it was like, I don't know, almost midnight maybe.

And we just sat in the waiting room for a long time, nobody else was in there, finally they brought us back.

We sat in a tree house room, I think it was, for a while.

They missed my IV several times, so that was kind of annoying.

But again, I'm trying to be like the person who works in the hospital, who's not trying to be overly needy.

So I'm just kind of like letting it all go, I'm laboring, it's like rough at this point, because I hadn't even told myself what to expect.

And then nobody's there, we couldn't find anyone.

And so finally, someone came and they're like, oh, we didn't know you were here.

Somebody left for their shift and forgot to tell us that they had pulled you back.

So at this point, I'm like frustrated and had like 5 million holes in my arms from getting an IV in, and labor is picking up, and I'm not handling it well.

I'm super tense, everything feels really, really painful.

And I'm like, I want an epidural, I just need an epidural, I can't do this.

And so they're, you know, they're like, oh, well, you know, we'll give them a page.

And at this point, it's probably like 2 a.m.

And so everyone's probably sleeping.

And anyway, finally get to a room, finally they get anesthesia to come.

Long story short, they end up missing my epidural four times.

Oh my gosh, it was really rough.

Had to end up getting like the attending to come do it, which I had asked for in the beginning, and they said that he couldn't.

Anyway, finally got the epidural, I ended up taking a nap, which was needed at the time, and then labored, but had an epidural, so rested.

Yeah.

Told me that I was 10 centimeters, and it's time to push.

And this entire time, I'm lying in bed, not moving, because I have an epidural.

And so it was time to push, and I was like, great.

And you know, we all rear up to get ready to push, and I'm pushing with the contractions when they're telling me to, because I was like numb, numb.

I couldn't feel anything.

And I pushed for an hour and a half, and baby was coming, but they were like, you know, you gotta keep pushing harder, you gotta keep pushing harder.

And she was getting stuck under my pubic bone, and she was asyncletic, so I was pushing and pushing, and she would come out, and then the second I would take a breath, she'd pull right back in, so she couldn't get under my pubic bone.

And nobody moved me, you know, like now I know that even with an epidural, they can move you on your side, they can peanut ball it, I literally nothing, I was literally in the same exact position for the entire time.

And you know, the doctor would come in and be like, okay, how are you feeling, Kelly?

And I was like, you know, not good, what can I do?

And she was like, well, you know, at this point, I have to start thinking of other ways that we can safely get her out.

And I was like, I don't wanna C-section.

I remember being super, super tearful and being like, I can do it, I can push her out.

Just give me a little more time.

Give me a little more time.

And this doctor was thankfully, she worked with me a little bit.

In fact, she'd be like, okay, you know, we'll give you another 30 minutes to see how you can do it.

And she'd leave.

And so then I'd be there with the nurses and I tried pushing, pushing, pushing for 30 minutes and she'd come back.

And it was the same thing.

And so she ended up saying, listen, Kelly, I spiked a fever, I spiked a temp.

And so then everyone's nervous that I have a fever.

And so they were pumping me full of antibiotics and fluid.

I am so swollen, I can't even see.

Like, you know, when your eyes get really, really puffy, because you got so much fluid.

And she said, listen, Kelly, we can go back for a section and get this baby out, so you can hold her.

There's also another option.

She was probably the oldest physician in the practice.

It wasn't my doc, but it was the one on.

And she was trained in forceps, which she was the only physician in that practice that was trained in forceps.

And so she said, I feel confident that I could get her out with forceps if you're willing to let me try.

So I said, OK, right?

C-section or forceps.

And so I had an episiotomy and forceps delivery.

And she came out and looking back on it with all of the trauma that ensued with that birth and how hard it was.

And I think that it was a gift that the Lord had this physician there.

Because if there's any other physician in that practice, I would have had a section probably earlier in the day.

It wouldn't have been as patient with me and wouldn't have been trained in that.

Did they ever talk about a vacuum?

She said that, so with the vacuum, she had said there was, you know, like you try twice, and if it doesn't work, it's an automatic section.

And she was like, she's so stuck that there's, the vacuum's gonna pop off.

She was like, I just don't, I don't think it's worth even trying.

So if we're gonna give this a go, I would just straight up forceps.

And so I was like, okay, let's do it.

And so I did get to have a vaginal delivery, which is great.

I'm very thankful for that.

But because of the fever that I had, and because of the forceps delivery, I mean, I got to see her for like a hot second.

And then they took her from me onto the warmer, tested all the things, took blood cultures, checked her.

She had like a little black eye from the forceps.

Yeah.

Took her straight to the NICU.

And so Tom, I wanted Tommy to go with her because I didn't want her to be by herself.

And so then I'm now left by myself after all of that without a baby.

And without to be stitched up and all the things that kind of come after.

So that was Shiloh's birth.

We had to stay for 24 hours until her cultures came back because of the fever.

And they came back negative.

And I don't know, I was kind of stuck in this doing everything that they told me I needed to do for her because I wanted her to be okay.

But also like in my heart being like, I just want to go home.

I just want to take my baby home and get out of here.

Like this is just was not what I envisioned.

But we had a healthy baby girl and there's a little story.

Well, did that, do you feel like that played into your postpartum?

Like how does your postpartum in nursing go?

Ah, terrible.

Yeah.

I absolutely feel like it had a lot to do with my postpartum.

Postpartum was really hard with her.

Lots of tears.

Breastfeeding was awful.

I think that because I worked in the hospital setting, people just thought I knew like, if you work in the hospital, you know everything that you need to do.

And so when the lactation people will come in, they'd be like, oh, look, you got her on like a champ.

How you doing?

Like, how was your last shift?

I heard you went.

And so then it kind of would morph into, you know, talking about work or talking about people we both knew.

And I never really got help, I guess.

It was just like, oh, she knows what she's doing.

But I didn't.

And so her latch was, she had a terrible latch, too shallow.

And that affected my supply from the beginning.

So she wasn't getting enough food and my body wasn't getting the message, hey, make more.

And it was just kind of this cyclical spiral down of like just really in that postpartum time.

Nursing was painful.

She was super fussy.

And I now think it's just because she wasn't getting enough.

And so I pumped a lot.

I hated pumping.

I cried a lot.

We ended up supplementing with formula because she was a little jaundiced.

And the NICU was like, she's not getting, you know, we need to supplement, you know.

It was hard.

It was really hard.

So we did both semi-nursing and pumping for six months.

And then after six months, I just I couldn't anymore.

I had gone back to work at that time and it was just really rough.

So the first month or so, I would say it was like a really, I was in probably a really bad place.

Super thankful to my husband and the Lord for kind of pulling me through that.

But looking back on it now, I just wish I knew more.

You know, you live, you learn and you have more kids.

And I think that's what kind of changed my mind and my heart towards a lot of things for Coset and Ransom, you know, like our next ones.

You said your daughter Shiloh is seven and your second is two and a half.

So that's a pretty, like it's a decent size gap between the two of them.

So when did you decide or did you decide?

I mean, we know you moved in that time.

Was the decision to wait that long your decision or how did that play out?

I needed a hot second after that whole experience, I think, to kind of wrap my mind around becoming a mom and like the process of what all that was.

And then we learned pretty quickly that living in the city, Boston is one of my favorite places in the entire world.

It's where I met my husband.

It's where we had our baby and where we did so many wonderful things.

But living in the heart of the city with a infant is next to impossible.

Like Tommy and I both worked good decent jobs and we were still like working.

We were just burning out.

We would work and we'd have a nanny for Shiloh.

And then I worked a lot of 4 p.m.

to 2 a.m.

shifts.

And so I come home and I'd sleep a few hours and I get up with her.

And then there's just a lot of, it was just hard.

And so reality hit.

It's like we just need something different.

Like we just feel like the Lord is telling us that this is just not our home anymore.

And so we're trying to figure out where to go and landed in North Carolina.

I think during that transition, where everything was really up in the air, we never owned a home in Boston.

We rented, we didn't have much space there.

So it was like, if we're gonna kind of uproot our lives, let's try and figure out what that looks like first before adding a bunch of other kiddos.

So I think that was kind of a decision that we made together.

And then once we came to North Carolina, I was like, okay, we're settling.

This is gonna be great.

Let's start a family.

Let's start a bigger family.

And so that next chapter is another really hard season.

I would argue probably harder than our first loss is between, we got pregnant May 2020.

And between May 2020 and summer 2021, we had three other losses.

So we had three miscarriages in trying for another baby.

And all of those looked a little bit different, but nonetheless, a season full of breathing and COVID and isolation and just sadness and just like asking God, why?

Why?

Why?

Like you tell us to be fruitful and multiply and we want to do that.

And why?

Why?

Like, why won't you give that to us?

So that was a really hard season.

And I think I forget how hard it was now that we have, you know, we've been able to have our last two.

And sometimes I just forget how tough that season was.

But I don't know the Lord, like I grew a lot during that season.

I think we both did.

I think the losses were just as hard on Tommy as they were on me.

And I think we both developed like such a good dependence on the Lord in that season, knowing that all we could do was just trust that, you know, on this side of heaven, we're not gonna really ever understand that and living in a broken world, that those are just things that we have to endure until we don't anymore.

And so anyway, that was our next season of trying.

We really wanted one, we wanted another baby.

And I know the Lord uses everything for good.

And I know it's been really special in like the season I'm in now to be able to walk with some friends and loved ones through those seasons that they've, you know, like using things that the Lord taught me in that season to try and help grieve with them and hold their hand through that season.

I think that that has been special, like looking back on it now.

Well, I love your perspective on that, because, I mean, you could easily have stayed bitter and resentful and let the enemy use that as a way to distance you from the Lord.

That's amazing and wonderful that you were able to seek him and get closer with him instead.

I love that.

I mean, don't get me wrong.

I went through my angry bitterness towards the Lord, you know, phases in that it wasn't all, you know, the Lord is good.

You know, when you know that and like you can say that, and you can say that to other people, but then walking through yourself, it's like, man, do I believe that?

So I wrestled with that many times.

But yeah, I can look back on it now and be like, you know, thank you Lord for walking through that with me and for carrying me through that.

Yeah.

So after the traumatic experience with your first, okay, for your second daughter, first of all, I guess, when did you get pregnant with her?

And then now living in a new state and everything, did you go about your care any differently or your plans for birth?

Or were you just sort of winging it like you did the first time?

No, I did not wing it.

So after we had lost, we had our three losses.

I actually ended up working with a really wonderful functional medicine provider and doing like a fertility protocol and kind of healing my body of some things.

And then the next time we tried, we got pregnant with Cosette and carried her whole term.

So that was really special and kind of taught me that even when everyone's telling you, you're fine, you're fine, you're fine, and your guy is telling you you're not, it's okay to look elsewhere.

So we got pregnant July, 2021, and we were right in the midst of moving, our house flooded, and so we lived in a hotel for four or five months, pregnant with a toddler.

So that was a fun.

But saying it for, you know, the pregnancy was fine, like, you know, rough first trimester and then fine otherwise.

And this time I was like, things are going to be different.

So I wanted to have a natural delivery.

I didn't want an epidural.

I saw how much bad outcomes that caused for me with Shiloh.

And so I wanted to do a natural birth.

At this point in my life, I had kind of, after finding the functional medicine doctor, I had taken on a lot of, like, more holistic approach in, like, how I treated my body and thought medically about how our body's working.

So I kind of wanted, I wanted a midwife to do my delivery because I felt like they had a better perspective on that than obese.

So I found an office locally that had a midwife team who did the deliveries.

And so I saw midwives in the office for all of my prenatal care.

They were wonderful and great.

I did meet a few of the physicians because they had said, you know, just in case, we like you to meet some of our physicians.

This is in North Carolina now, not in Boston.

And it was great.

I was excited to have a natural delivery with a midwife and at the hospital.

And that was the plan.

And then towards the very end of my pregnancy, I was seeing an OB instead of the midwife because the midwife is on vacation.

And it was like one of my last visits.

And it kind of same thing in the medical world.

I feel like when you're seeing another provider, it's like you end up talking about that.

Like, oh, so do you miss the ER or do you miss Boston?

And very little about my actual pregnancy and baby, just because we were just chatting away.

And so I'm walking out the door and I'm like, do you want to check and make sure her position is okay?

Because we're like a week, a couple of weeks away from her due date.

And she was like, oh, I'm sure she's head down, but we'll double check.

I'll have the tech come in and throw the probe on you.

No like, I think, yeah, yeah.

And so I was like, okay, great.

And so the tech came in through the probe on and her head was right here.

Sticking straight up.

She was just, no way was she head down.

So she was breech and you know, it's like, oh, shoot, she's breech.

Oh man, well, that's schedule a C-section.

You know, it's kind of just like a, well, this is what we do in this case.

You're too far out, chances are she's not going to flip.

And I was like, no, I'm going to get this kid to flip.

So I tried all the things, spinning babies, mock Sebastian acupuncture, swimming to the bottom of a pool.

You know, you've heard it.

I've tried all the things to get her to flip.

And she didn't.

They offered me a version, like a version in the hospital.

And I prayed about it.

And for some reason, I don't know why, I just really did not have peace about it.

I just didn't have good peace about the procedure.

If the procedure went wrong, then she's going to be born via C-section, but I'm going to be out.

Like I won't be awake to meet her.

So, you know, that was kind of the, if things go south, this is what happens.

And I don't know.

I just didn't feel at peace about it.

And that was our prayer.

Lord, just help us feel at peace about what we're supposed to do in this scenario.

I did, there was a physician in that practice who did offer to do a vaginal breech delivery for me if I went into labor.

So that was our plan.

If I went into natural labor, I was going to attempt a vaginal breech delivery with her.

And I didn't.

That's a price for shocker.

And I, at this point, had done enough research about, you know, when your body's ready to deliver a baby, it goes into labor.

And then, you know, all these things happen so that you can deliver that baby.

And so the thought of they had offered going, you know, starting Neon Pitocin and getting the labor process started, and then trying the Vaginal Breech Delivery.

And again, something we prayed through and just asked for guidance from the Lord.

And I don't know, I just didn't feel at peace about that either because it's like, well, if my body's not ready to deliver, then is it even going to go well?

So anyway, in the end of the day, we ended up scheduling a C-section, which was devastating to me after I had just wanted a redemptive birth experience.

And this was like the last thing I wanted.

But I remember the morning we went to the Planned C-section.

God was just so good to us in that moment because just the overwhelming sense of peace I had that day was really special.

Like it wasn't a ruined day.

It was still a really special day.

And the team that we had was really great.

They knew it's not what I wanted, but they tried to make it.

They tried to honor all the things that I really wanted.

So we had like a clear drape.

I watched the whole delivery.

They gave her to me immediately.

They let me nurse her immediately.

They let, you know, it's just all these things that I just really wanted.

They tried really hard to let me be able to do.

So it was a really special delivery.

It was a special day.

She was healthy and happy.

And she nursed right away.

And we had skin to skin for the longest time.

And like my nursing story with Cosette was beautiful.

Like she nursed through my pregnancy with him.

And it just was easy and beautiful.

And I loved it so much.

And so I got that part.

And I think it was because I was so at peace and we had such a less stressful post delivery So that was Cosette.

Way to go, Cosette.

Yeah.

Do you call her Coco?

We do.

That is so cute.

Call her Coco.

When Coco turned one that month, we had a little surprise pregnancy.

We had a surprise, right?

I'm like half freaked out.

So I was like, oh my goodness, it took like years to get pregnant with Cosette.

How did this happen so fast?

So yeah, we got pregnant with him basically, right?

After she turned one.

And it was really exciting.

You know, I feel like after any pregnancy loss, or at least from talking with other people who've experienced it too, you always have that sense of hesitation to be overjoyed, because you wonder is that like, joy going to be taken away from you.

But I think with Ransom's pregnancy, finding out I was pregnant with him, it was like a testament to how much the Lord had done in my heart, because I felt so much joy.

It was so much less of that hesitancy that I had had before.

I don't know.

It was really cool to be like, you know what, here's another gift.

And what the Lord has planned for this is his plan.

And no matter what, it's going to be okay.

I don't know.

It was just, I feel like my feeling when I found out I was pregnant with him was just very different than, you know, the others had been.

So that was really cool.

I'm happy for you for that.

That was a gift.

It was.

It was such a gift.

It really was.

Was his pregnancy pretty on par with your others then?

Yeah.

Yeah.

I would say other than my deep dive into VBACs.

I'm like, I think I know where this is going.

Not only VBAC, but home VBAC.

Yeah.

So what made you want to dive into that world?

So I knew I wanted to VBAC.

I think that was just even after I had my postpartum visit in the office where, you know, I know this isn't what you want to go for.

Don't worry.

VBACs are so encouraged.

And I knew that I wanted to VBAC.

I knew that they were going to be less excited with my history to let me do just midwifery care in the office.

And so I was trying to like figure out the game of, okay, what am I going to do?

Where am I going to go?

In those first weeks where nobody's going to see you anyway.

And I had met two dear friends at church.

Morgan and Victoria, and got to know Morgan really well, and she had had several home births.

And so just picking her brain about her home births, and then met Victoria.

Come to find out they had the same midwife, and I was picking her brain about her home births, and just like that is just so cool.

And it just was always something that intrigued me.

I had had another friend in Boston who had had a home birth, and I just thought it was so cool, but I just thought that's just not me.

I'm not strong enough to do that.

My medical mind was just, the scary things would always come up when I would think about it.

And I remember Victoria will tell me to this day, do you remember when you said to me on the playground while our kids were playing, maybe someday I'll be as crazy as you and have a baby at home?

So I just talked with them a lot.

I did a lot of research.

I borrowed Morgan's Ina May's Guide to Childbirth book, which I would highly recommend to anyone even wanting to learn more about birth.

It's just that book was what did it for me.

You mean this book right here?

The one I recommend to everybody who's ever been pregnant to read?

Even if you think there's never in a chance I would ever have birth at home, that's okay.

It's just such a wealth of knowledge.

It's just very informative.

It really is.

I also will tell people, you don't even have to read the whole book.

You can skip the first half.

It's just stories and just read the first half if you don't have that much time.

So I read that and then Morgan connected me with her midwife just to ask questions and I in my head thought, I doubt any midwife would take me on for a home birth because I just had a c-section like exactly a year ago and Shiloh's birth with a little kind of all over the place.

Like I just didn't feel like I was super low risk.

So I had a phone conversation with her and she said, no, absolutely, I think you would be fine to have a baby at home.

I would love to do your care.

Think about it, pray about it, and let me know.

And so I finished reading the anime book and called her after I was done.

And I was like, okay, I'm in.

I made my decision.

It was truly that book that I think pushed me over the edge.

Just the way that she educates with almost like a medical mindset of teaching.

That may not be a good way to explain it, but it really spoke to me.

Care was all with my midwife, and it was one of the coolest things to have in comparison to what I had had before.

Like the care that I received with her was unlike any care I'd ever had during any other pregnancy.

Even as little as like just the hands on my belly and being able to tell me exactly where my baby was.

Like, oh yeah, his head's right here, and oh, he's doing a little flip while we're feeling it.

It's just like, she was just so connected to knowing the physicality of pregnancy.

And I just felt so cared for.

And it wasn't just, hey, come in, we're gonna take your blood pressure, check the baby's heart rate, and you're gonna leave.

But it was, we're gonna talk about like, what are you eating?

Like, are you like feeding your body nutrient dense foods so that your baby is healthy and you're healthy?

Or, you know, how are you feeling?

How are you sleeping?

Just things that like she truly cared to just, it was really cool.

It was so special.

I'm very, very thankful for that.

And so yeah, his pregnancy was great.

And I tried really hard.

I read a bunch of books.

The Bradley Method book I read.

I read Supernatural Childbirth.

I read I Amazed book twice.

I read one called The Birth Partner.

I don't know.

I read all the books.

And I was trying to like just mentally prepare myself.

And then I focused a lot on like spiritually preparing myself.

Like I really, my prayer was just, I really, really, really want a Redemptive Birth Story, Lord.

Like, and I'm just going to boldly ask that you give that to me.

And he may not, but there's no reason I shouldn't ask, right?

So like that pregnancy was full of lots of prayers.

So thank you, Lord, for this life.

And if it is in your will, just help, help this birth story to just be beautiful and help me to be able to bring this, this sun earth side in my home by the light of our Christmas tree.

And and he answered that prayer.

And it was just really cool to kind of walk that pregnancy in like a different mindset.

I spent a lot of time in scripture.

I had this little journal that I had pulled out that I just like wrote scripture that I would read that just helped me remind myself that like, I can do this.

Like if the Lord's with me, I can do it.

Cause my my hitch was, am I am I going to be able to physically do it?

Like the pain.

And I just didn't think I was strong enough.

I think I doubted that at times.

And so so many passages in Isaiah were huge for me in this pregnancy, but Isaiah 46, there's a verse that says I will sustain you and I will rescue you.

And that verse just like was like a constant resonating in my end of pregnancy and through my labor.

I will never hear that verse and not think of this child in my pregnancy with him.

So it's just a lot of sitting in scripture and sitting with the Lord, and just trying to like mentally prepare myself for labor.

I don't know.

And it made a world of a difference, a world of a difference.

I did Christian Hepner breathing.

I really loved that.

Just like the calmness and the scripture that she like would read over you.

I had done that in my last, a little bit in my last trimester, and then I played those tracks during my labor.

And so I did a lot more preparation and research and self-prep.

Yeah.

For this delivery than I had for either of my other, of my other girls.

So it's very different.

Well, I think that's wise.

And I think that's the part that people underestimate, going into a natural labor.

It's like so many people are like, well, I'm eating the right things and I'm doing the right exercises.

And I'm going to my chiropractor, which is all great and you should be doing all those things.

But I can't stress enough how much labor is so like mental and spiritual.

And it's, yeah, obviously it's physical, but to me, that's the smallest part of it.

The smallest part of it is physical.

It's all mental and spiritual.

And if you don't prepare and prep mentally for what you're about to do, and spiritually for what you're about to do, it's just that's where it's gonna hit the hardest.

Oh, I wouldn't know.

I don't know that I would have made it through, honestly, without that prep.

I feel like that was huge for me.

Yeah, I totally agree with all of that.

So how did you go into labor and when?

Because your first one came so early and then your second one was scheduled.

So when did you end up going into labor with your third?

I remember saying to my midwife, I was like, is my body gonna know what to do?

Like, I feel like everything's been so different and it hasn't like, does it really remember what to do?

Yes, your body is still know what to do.

Ransom was late.

He was almost a week late.

He was 40 and six.

And it killed me every day past that due date.

It's a mental game, the end of pregnancy, man.

Because I had constant input of people in my life saying like, Oh, well, are you going to schedule an induction?

You know, like, aren't you nervous?

You know, the whole like, you don't want to go go late.

That's that's a feared thing in the medical world often.

And so I had that constant input that I'm trying to just ignore.

And then I had my just physical over this, you know, input that's hard to ignore.

And my prayer in like the end was when it got close to his due day and then I hit my due day and then I was like, Lord, every day that I go over, will you just teach me something new?

Like that's what I just tried to keep saying to myself.

Like every day that I'm going over my guest date, like will you just teach me something new?

Teach me something that I can hold on to, that I can know that, okay, this is why he's not here today.

Because I really needed to learn this.

And that helped me a lot.

That really helped me mentally be like, okay, it's okay.

Because I got this little nugget from the Lord, and I will remember that, and Ransom will be here.

He's gonna come, you know?

That's so beautiful and so wise, so very Solomon of you to ask for that from the Lord.

And so cool.

When I go over my due date, which I often do, I'm desperate and miserable and crying and lamenting to the Lord, like, why haven't you given me my baby yet?

I mean, I did some of that too.

Oh, I feel like I'm just a whole different person at the end of pregnancy.

But that's so hard.

But I love that you just shared that because part of why I love doing this podcast is hearing so many people's stories and how they experience what they experience and how they handled it and what they did and what helped.

And so it's like, I'm constantly learning, like, if and when we ever get pregnant again, I'm like, oh, that's great.

I should die.

Wow, you know, it's like five babies in, I still have so much to learn.

So they're all so different.

Yeah.

So you're 40 and six.

So I'm 40 and six.

I was actually 40 and four in the evening.

Okay.

And my father-in-law came over and I had been having some Braxton Hicks, but nothing to write home about.

And then I realized they were kind of consistent and I was like, man, I bet I could chime me.

And I did.

And they were pretty consistent but manageable.

And so I was like, man, this could be it.

And so I went to bed that night, was able to fall asleep, still was having some contractions, but nothing too intense.

And I woke up maybe like two, three, and it would wake me up out of sleep.

And but then I was able to go to sleep in between them.

And so I was just trying to get rest.

I was trying to not wake up Tommy so he could get rest.

Because you don't know what it's going to look like.

You don't know how long it's going to be.

I was texting with Victoria and Morgan.

So Morgan, my joke of hers was, you jokingly, you got me into this, you're going to help get me through it.

So she was my doula.

Morgan was going to come be with me for my birth.

And Victoria, she was very pregnant as well, due a few weeks after me.

And she does photography.

And so she was like, if I am not in labor, then I will come take pictures for you so we can all be there together.

And so I was texting with both of them in the middle of the night, and Victoria was up peeing.

So she read it and she was being like, okay, they were kind of coaching me through.

I didn't know what I was doing.

I felt like this is my third baby.

I should kind of know, but I didn't because everything was so different.

So I couldn't fall asleep in between contractions around like four or five.

And so I got up and I started the fire downstairs and it's December.

So I put on Christmas music.

I sat by the Christmas tree.

I just bounced on my ball and I just prayed.

And it's just this really sweet time by myself.

Everyone else is asleep.

I will remember that moment, I think forever.

It's just was a really sweet time.

I was like, man, I think this is happening.

Like I think that this is the Lord answering my prayer.

And it's just really cool.

And so things kind of started picking up around the time everyone was starting to wake up.

Morgan came over in the morning, called my midwife.

And yeah, I labored all morning and they kept slowly getting closer together, took showers, I don't know, all the things.

And they consistently were getting more intense and closer together throughout the day.

And my midwife ended up coming around 4 p.m.

to the house.

I was in a zone, man.

Like Morgan was the one kind of communicating with her because I just, I feel like I rocked it.

I feel like I, all of that prep mentally, I feel like I did really, really well until I hit transition.

I feel like I'm going to toot my own horn.

I feel like I did a really good job managing my contractions, just breathing through them, praying through them.

I had a playlist of like worship music and songs that I had listened to my whole pregnancy.

And that really helped me.

And we had the record player going.

And I just like felt like I was in my space.

And it was just, I loved it.

It was a really cool, it was hard.

The hardest thing I've ever done in my entire life.

But it was truly redemptive.

And so my midwife got here at around four and asked me, do you want me to check you and see where you're at?

And I had had mixed feelings about that, about like, well, does it really matter?

But I just wanted to know.

I wanted to know if the work that I put in was actually progressing me.

And so she checked me and I was six centimeters.

And I was so excited.

And like, I'd been doing really well.

My daughter was six at the time.

That was the night, Ransom went to labor, the night that she was supposed to have her Nutcracker performance, her ballet, her Nutcracker ballet.

And so she wanted to, the plan was for her to be there at Ransom's birth.

And so it's like, man, do you want to be here?

Do you want to be your Nutcracker?

Mommy can't go to the Nutcracker.

We can try to get someone to take you.

That was the in between contractions conversation we're having as a family.

And she decided she wanted to go to the Nutcracker.

She put a lot of work into it, and she didn't want to miss Ransom's birth, but she was going to try and do both.

So we had friends take her to the Nutcracker.

I have pictures of me with my big old belly in between contractions, putting her little ballerina bun in.

Oh my gosh.

Trying to get her all ready.

Off to the Nutcracker she went.

And I kept laboring, and I wanted to get in the tub.

I really wanted to deliver him in the water.

I had a pool here.

And so we filled up the tub, and I got in.

Everything was going great.

And then everything slowed down.

Oh, those tubs.

Maybe that was God's gift since your daughter was at the Nutcracker.

So get this.

She got back as I was in the tub, and she ran over and gave me the biggest hug and stood by my side until a ransom came.

So that was really cool.

You're right.

I think that that totally was him being like, here you go.

You can still see your brother be born.

So slowed things down enough that my midwife, she said to hop out.

Let's see where we're at.

I think that I could be wrong, but I think most people kind of thought he would have been here by now, if not very soon.

So it's kind of like, oh, what's going on?

Like, it just didn't seem like we were quite regret.

Like she got there and I was six centimeters, and this is, you know, several hours later.

This is probably around like eight, eight, eight, 30, maybe eight, nine, something like that.

And it's like, what's going on?

So she checked me again just to see where we are at.

And she did not tell me where I was because I will go out on a limb and say that it was likely because it was not much changed from her prior check several hours ago.

And I know that that would have really mentally frustrated me.

I mean, I was already mentally frustrated.

But she also was able to tell that my cervix was super ready to, you know, like it was soft and she was like, you know, there are really good things.

But I think that his position, he needs to be upright.

Like there needs to be constant.

My contractions would intensify when I was standing.

And when I was on the toilet, I hate the small bathroom downstairs because I labored on that so much.

So we then just transitioned to, she said, I know you're tired.

It's been, you've been doing this for a while.

We can either try and get you to rest in between contractions, or we can just gung-ho stand upright and try to intensify these contractions and have a baby.

And at that point, I was like, the only way to end this is through it.

So let's do it.

Like I will do, you could tell me to climb a tree and I would do that if this baby would come out, you know, like I would have done it.

Thankfully, the whole time his heart rate was rock solid.

They were checking him constantly and everything was fine.

So I sat on the toilet and Morgan was right there with me the whole time.

And things intensified enough until I felt like I had to push.

And I remember saying, I don't want to have a baby on the toilet.

Please bring me in the living room.

And I wish in hindsight, I just would have had that baby on the toilet.

We moved into the living room and I couldn't get into a position where I felt comfortable.

I tried to sit on my mom, my mother-in-law had most of her babies at home and she delivered my husband on a birth stool.

And that birth stool was in our living room.

She brought it, she still had it.

So I tried sitting on that, couldn't get comfortable.

I tried hanging on Tommy, like upright, couldn't really get comfortable.

And at this point is when I feel like I stopped rocking it.

Like I think I hit transition and I just that out of body experience where I just felt so out of control.

And it was really hard.

It was really hard.

There was a lot of praying.

There was a couple midwives helping with my primary midwife.

And one of them came over in this probably hardest point where I wanted to give up and felt like I couldn't do it.

And she just said, can I pray with you?

And she put her hands on my knees and got close to me.

And she just prayed.

And Victoria, who's there taking pictures, had her hands up praying over me.

My husband had his hands on me praying with me.

It's just like, it was this moment that felt so sacred and special.

And all of these people just praying that the Lord would just see me through it and that he would give me strength and that me and baby would be healthy and happy and that we would just meet him soon.

And it's just, I think that moment, my husband was like speaking scripture over me kind of towards the end there too.

And I just think, it really was just an answer to prayer.

You know, the Lord just gave me the strength and I ended up not having him in the water.

I ended up having him on my living room floor and he came and he came.

So my midwife, I don't know, she's been practicing for a long time.

Do you know how long she's been practicing?

Upwards of 20 years, I think not quite 20 years.

She had never had a baby on her birthday.

And Ransom was born just eight minutes past midnight on my midwife's birthday.

So that was kind of cool.

Not that I wanted it to last that long, but.

Right.

And so he didn't have a name at this point.

We didn't have a name picked out.

And so he came and straight to my chest, and Shiloh was there, and Tommy was there, and I was crying, and it was just so special.

And I just held him, and he didn't cry right away.

And after, I don't know, maybe it's like a minute, he started crying a little bit, and he was just so sweet.

And it was just this, it was just so beautiful to not have everyone taking him off of me and rubbing him.

And it was just Tommy was right by my head.

Morgan brought Shiloh right to the other side of my head.

And she was touching her baby brother within like seconds of him being alive.

And I don't know, the midwives were just taking such good care of me.

And it just was such a special moment.

And I just wish that all women knew that like that was just an option.

You know, like I just didn't know that.

And I was just super thankful for the fact that I was just gifted that in this pregnancy.

So, yeah, he came and, you know, we leaned up and they kind of moved me on to the couch and everyone just disappeared.

And I got, I don't know, maybe like an hour, just me, Tommy and Ransom.

We were trying to pick out a name, lying on the couch and just looking at him and just thanking the Lord for him.

And we picked the name Ransom, Ransom Thomas, because Christ paid our ransom.

And it's just, there is just no better gift than that.

And it's just really fitting for him.

And it was just such a gift.

The whole experience was one that I'll never forget.

It was so hard, so hard, but also really, really, really cool.

It was truly the redemptive birth that I had prayed for.

And I think that if I would have been in the hospital after having a C-section with coset and such a, you know, kind of prolonged labor with being six and then not progressing and then needing to be upright.

And if I didn't, you know, didn't have a provider who knew well enough, like this is how you're progressing.

This is what we're going to do.

We're going to be patient with you.

We're going to work with you.

I think that I very easily could have had another C-section in the hospital.

And I'm just thankful that it played out the way that it did.

I think you're right.

I think that is likely exactly what would have happened.

Yeah.

I feel like we just live in a culture that does everything they can to avoid pain and discomfort and just things that we fear.

Right?

And I think that I learned through this last experience that to fully embrace that pain and that fear and like completely rely on the Lord in those times, albeit like excruciating or, you know, super frustrating.

I feel like that's just such a transformative experience personally.

And from a selfish standpoint, like I just feel like it is, it's just such a cool transformative, you know, experience.

It just deepens your strength and your reliance on the Lord.

I feel like more than anything has for me in my life.

So in the grand scheme of things, as hard as it was, like joy always comes in the morning, you know, and that baby comes in there in your hands.

It was such a gift, such a gift.

You used the word gift several times, and I think that's because there's no word more fitting for that scenario.

A gift, you know, these babies are gifts from the Lord.

That experience of that labor was a gift from the Lord.

I'm thinking about the fact that it was Christmas.

It was a gift from the Lord.

Like, just, Chris, you're probably going to have to put the word gift somewhere in the title of this episode.

But you're right.

I mean, with what you said about culture, fearing pain and discomfort, I mean, I truly, that was my life motto pretty much my whole life was avoid pain at all costs in every way, shape or form, especially physical pain.

A lot of people maybe know that natural birth is an option, or maybe even that home birth is an option, but they don't think it's worth it because they're focusing so much on the pain instead of everything else involved.

And I think that if they knew the, like you said, transformative experience that it is, and, you know, the gift that they'll be receiving and the overall experience they would have, like of the labor and the delivery and the postpartum, all of it together, I think they would realize it's way more than worth it, like way more than worth it.

Absolutely, yeah.

So how was your postpartum and nursing with Ransom?

It was so great.

Night and day, like it's just, it's so interesting how like, I don't wanna say easy, because there were definitely hard parts to it, but how different it was.

And I could go on and on about why I think that was, but I think that Ransom was a champion nurse, or he did great.

And I don't, it's probably a combination of coset nursed through part of Ransom's pregnancy.

She stopped maybe a little over halfway through his pregnancy, just didn't want to anymore.

So maybe it was just like riding a bike, hopping back on, but he did really great with nursing, still is.

And then, I mean, postpartum certainly has its ups and downs.

It's harder when you've got other kiddos running around.

But just the ability just to be home and in my bed and with my family.

And it was great.

It was beautiful, not without its hard days, for sure.

But it was a really slow and sweet postpartum period for me.

Those sounds like the two perfect words to describe postpartum.

It should be slow and it should be sweet.

Yeah.

It was very different than Shiloh's, for sure.

And then C-section postpartum recovery is just a whole other ball game.

Right.

So I think it's kind of hard to compare those two things.

But I've had the whole gamut of experiences from hospital, epidural, traumatic, you know, forceps vaginal delivery to planned C-section to home VBAC.

And, you know, on this side of things, it's very interesting to kind of compare and contrast how all of them have been.

But I would say Ransoms is by far the best in terms of like postpartum and recovery, for sure.

Well, and that makes sense.

And people often forget about the postpartum part of the way you have your baby directly affects your postpartum.

Yeah, I think that that people take that for granted all the time.

I think it's very strongly correlated.

Do you have any advice for moms?

Yeah, I mean, I think I've kind of said the two things that are like, I feel like my big just baby take homes.

And one of them is that like, is that Isaiah verse is that the Lord will sustain you, you know, you ask him for that strength and, and to help carry you through that.

And he will, you know, like you're not doing it alone.

I think that relying on the Lord is like one of the best things you can do as a mom, whether that's during pregnancy, during labor, or during parenthood, you know, like we can't do this alone, any of those things.

So I think knowing that the Lord will sustain us, like he has promised that in his Word and taking him for that is simple, but something that to me is like a saving grace, because I fall short every day.

And then just like, again, from scripture, you know, the sorrows may come at night, joy comes in the morning.

So knowing that like these are momentary afflictions, they're momentary trials, and that it is a season, and there are really hard seasons of loss and of pain and of hardship and of plans not going the way you want them to.

But joy comes in the morning and like the Lord always wins, and his plan will always succeed, and that's going to look different, and we may not know what that looks like here.

But I feel like those are things that help me the most and have helped me the most through my pregnancies, my labors, and my momhood.

Well, they're beautiful things, and wise.

Thank you.

Thank you for coming.

Thank you for sharing.

Thank you for taking the time.

All the things.

Thank you for having me.

It was a joy to share my story.

Thank you so much for listening to today's episode.

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And this time I was like, things are going to be different.

Wait, you froze again.

Kelly, can you hear me?

Can you see me?

Earth to Kelly.

Hello, I'm here.

Okay, I can hear you.

Now I can.

Okay, you froze again.

But it-

I don't know what's going on, I'm sorry.

I don't know, it's not your fault.

Don't apologize.

It's fine.