[Birth Stories] How She Confidently and Calmly Gave Birth in a Moving Car

[Birth Stories] How She Confidently and Calmly Gave Birth in a Moving Car

Adriana Lozada: Welcome to Birthful, Mighty Parent or Parent-To-Be. I’m Adriana Lozada and here we are, at the last episode of our Birth Beyond the Clinical Experience Series, and for this episode, I wanted to close us out with a story that brings to life the concepts that we’ve talked about during the past few weeks. Mainly looking at birth through a physiological lens to harness the power of supporting your hormones, leaning into your sensations from a place of curiosity, discovering what the transformative experience of birth means to you, and even find bliss in the messiness of it all to connect with the immense, immense fierceness inside you. 

So, today, we’re gonna go on a wild— yet very present!— ride of a birth story courtesy of Laura Loos, who really did a lot of work during her second pregnancy to help her connect with her inner voice. And wow did that pay off!

Laura is here to share her two non-medicated vaginal birth stories, but we’re really going to dive deeper into her second one, which happened so super fast that it involved birthing while driving. It also involved going into the hospital holding her baby, while her placenta was still attached, and then the very intentional and unconventional birth of said placenta. 

What stood out most for me -aside from you know, the having a baby in the car part- was how incredibly present, calm, and pragmatic Laura was about taking charge of every part of her birth, but also in an extremely fluid and non-controlling way. It was quite the balancing act. 

You’re listening to Birthful. Here to inform your intuition. 

Adriana: Welcome, Laura. It is so great to have you on the show today, and I’m excited to have you share your story.

Laura Loos: I am so honored to be here to talk to you about it.

Adriana: And why don’t you tell me and the listeners a little bit about yourself?

Laura: So I am a mother to two. I have Zachariah, and then Leonidas. And I really developed a fascination around childbirth before the birth of my first son, and consider myself a student of nature.

Adriana: So since you already had, like, a curiosity and an inclination towards learning about birth before you were even pregnant, so when you realized you were pregnant, what did you do to prepare? Or were you already doing something in anticipation?

Laura: Really, I started preparing when I found out that I got pregnant. And I took a hypnobirthing course and that kind of started things. And then just from there started learning about all of the possible hospital interventions, stages of birth, premature rupture of membranes. I ended up taking a course online, How To Birth Unassisted, on Indie Birth.

And all of those I felt really helped me feel confident in the end, because really the main thing that I took away from it was that my experience and my emotions during the whole process and the tension in my body was ultimately going to affect the hormonal flow and the ease of labor.

Adriana: Yes, absolutely— that you are correct! Was there anything else that you did or did that make you feel you were confident and ready for what was to come?

Laura: You know what… So I was previously (before becoming a stay-at-home mom), I was a full-time personal trainer, so I had the knowledge of my body and physiology and, for me, I had confidence in my body’s ability to birth. So I definitely think that helped. And movement during pregnancy and just generally maintaining a healthy diet was definitely essential. And for me, that gave me confidence that I was doing everything in my power to make sure things would go as smoothly as possible.

Adriana: And you were preparing to give birth at a hospital with an OB or midwives? What was your plan there? 

Laura: I went through several different practitioners until I found one that I felt comfortable with, and it ended up being a midwife group at a hospital.

Adriana: And so let’s fast forward today, of how did you— or did you?— know that you were in labor?

Laura: I was laying down, doing a guided meditation, and then all of a sudden my water broke. And contractions didn’t start initially. So I just kind of waited and waited and I realized and knew that if I checked into the hospital that I’d be put on the clock essentially. So, my husband was around and he’s medically-minded.

So we definitely took my blood pressure and heart rate, and took the baby’s heart rate to make sure everything seemed good there. And then we just kind of waited a couple hours until contractions started, and tried to get as much rest as possible just to prepare for the possible long journey ahead.

Adriana: And so it started off a few hours later. How many would you say?

Laura: At about 18 hours I ended up using a breast pump to start contractions. I was having contractions, but they were pretty sporadic and, you know, just a couple minutes using that intervention, it was able to get things going, and it was pretty much a linear process from there. My contractions started and they were eight to ten minutes apart. Every hour after that, they decreased, until I actually gave birth. 

Really, my goal was to labor at home for as long as possible, and I was able to do that, until I got to the point where I realized that I was probably nearing transition. I thought it would probably be best to load up the car and head to the hospital. So, and in between this… really, during my contractions, my goal was all about distracting myself. For some reason, I kind of defaulted to that. So I was saying the ABCs three times, and I was holding ice cubes, and really doing everything that I could to distract myself from what was actually happening. Then we got into the car, which, you know, now in retrospect, I realized for me I was using that as a distraction.

And then we made it to the hospital, really, 45 minutes before Zachariah came out. 

Adriana: So you were far… quite far along. You were, like you said, in transition. And then when you got there, did they do a vaginal check? Or it was clear that you were going, your water broke, and it was like… Did you feel an urge to push? 

Laura: So initially when I got there, I was really hesitant initially to get any vaginal checks, just because my waters were open and I couldn’t really conceptualize or understand how much or how far along I was. But the midwife I was with said she would feel more comfortable if she just did a check just to make sure baby’s head was down, and I consented to that. So when she checked I was ten centimeters— that was where I was when the first time she checked!

Adriana: Right! And then I’m sure they all scrambled to get you into a room and try to […] ‘cause the baby was coming.

Laura: Exactly. Yes.

Adriana: And so 45 minutes after you went into the hospital, your baby was born.

Laura: Correct.

Adriana: Yay!

Laura: Yep.

Adriana: So, you’re pregnant again, Did you do anything differently in terms of preparing for the second birth? Did you have to process anything from the first one? What did you do?

Laura: Okay, so when it came to my second birth, there were some things that happened during my first birth that I really wanted to change if possible, or just kind of have an awareness around. So one of the biggest things was when I was giving birth to my first son, the position that I was in didn’t allow me to receive him when he came out, and I actually didn’t see him coming out.

Adriana: Were you hands and knees?

Laura: I was on hands and knees. After I had him, I laid back and the midwife handed him to me. And for me, there was a disconnect. I felt like my brain couldn’t process him being in my belly, him coming out, and then me holding him. So the second time around it was really important to me if I could, to receive my own baby and see what was happening. Because, ultimately, I felt like that affected the hormonal flow and my ability to bond with him right after, because I was trying… my brain just couldn’t understand what had happened. So that was one of the biggest things. 

And then the other thing was I really wasn’t present or autonomous when it came to the birth of the placenta. So in the hospital, in the back of my mind, I knew, “Okay, at some point, it’s going to be time to birth my placenta,” but it really was the midwife that I was with that kind of led that process. So this time around, I wanted to really be present for that and manage the delivery of my own placenta. So those were the biggest things. And then for me to be able to do that, I felt like I needed to be even more confident and comfortable than I was the first time through. 

So I ended up retaking the Indie Birth course and then that’s how I found the Birthful podcast, ‘cause certain things came up. And then I searched for more podcasts and more information, whenever any fears would pop up about the childbirth process. So that was definitely really helpful. 

The other thing that I did is I felt like I needed to develop a better relationship with my inner voice. And at first, I had no idea how to do that, but, as I was searching, I came across Jess Lively’s podcast, and she has an episode on communicating with your inner voice. So throughout my pregnancy, this was a practice for me, anything that would come up, whether it be challenges with people or challenges in my own sense of self and my own confidence. I started to get practice on consulting with my inner voice and hearing what maybe something greater than me or greater than my mind was able to process.

So that definitely helped. And then in the evenings, if I wasn’t able to sleep, I did yoga nidra. So essentially that’s yogic sleep, or where your body’s asleep, but your mind’s awake. And through that I was able to really get into my body and feel the energy within it in order to remove blockages or essentially to prevent blockages from preventing the flow of energy, because really having a calm mind is important for a properly functioning body. So those were definitely important to me. Just developing that relationship with myself and then learning more based on, kind of, calming my fears from some of the stories that I had heard of the people around me since giving birth to my first son— because there were stories that I heard about people who things didn’t go as planned, and I had to wrap my mind around that and how things are managed in a hospital setting or independently or unassisted if it came to that.

Adriana: And I have to commend you for all you did, because, truthfully… I mean, we always talk about how birth is so unpredictable and that is true, but there’s lots of things that are under your control and primarily how you show up and how you support your own process that’s happening in your body.

And it’s a super complex, multilayered process of mind, body, and chemistry and positioning, and your spirit, and all the things. You birth with all of it, not just one part. Your logical, neocortical thinking brain is maybe the one you shouldn’t invite to the party.

Laura: Yes. [Laughs.]

Adriana: But other than that, invite all the other parts of you to this process. And by doing all this hard work, into sort of the less controlling aspects of life, right? Like “I am going to do yoga nidra and meditate and listen to my inner voice.” Those are things that people don’t run to do generally. But for birthing, they are vital. They are vital in having that support your physiology to get things to flow by calming your mind, getting out of the way. Recognizing fears that might come and block the process too, getting those out of the way. You did such great preparation and I love that it’s not comfort measures and coping techniques, right? It’s the opposite, yeah.

Laura: Because really I felt like I needed to be in my body for the most positive outcome, because looking outside of myself was just gonna slow the process down.

Adriana: Absolutely. I could not agree with you more. So I am loving this— I’m loving your story so far, your preparation. Okay, so you were doing all that. How did birth start the second time around?

Laura: Okay, so second time around a similar start. I woke up and my water broke. It was… the first thing again is “Check vital signs. Make sure the baby is okay.” Make sure my heart rate and blood pressure and oxygen saturation, everything that we could really do at home looked good. And it did. Prior to this, I had gotten a cold about a week before. And this was about a week before my due date, and I was hoping “I’d like another day to recover, another two days.” So I ended up… I had a cold as my water broke, and at first I was a little kind of unhappy with the timing, but it all ended up working out.

Okay, so I woke up to my water breaking and contractions hadn’t started. So I decided, especially since I wasn’t feeling well, to try to get as much sleep as possible. So I went back to bed, and we both decided— my husband and I— that he should go into work because we didn’t know how long everything was gonna be and really wanted to be ready for anything.

 

So I ended up staying home and I called my mom and she came to spend time with me and my son. And then at around one o’clock, which was about five or six hours later, I started feeling a little lightheaded. So I decided to call my midwife, just to kind of talk to her a little bit, and we both confirmed that it would probably be best just to come in just to get a 20 to 30 minute reading on the baby’s heart rate to make sure everything was okay there, and then make the decision from there to either go to the hospital or come home.

I got to the office and declined any internal exams, ‘cause I felt like my waters were open and everything looked good. They checked my vital signs. Really, my midwife just suggested “Stay hydrated. Take care of yourself.” And then, again, gave me the option to go to the hospital or continue laboring at home.

And I was having contractions, but they were so sporadic and really quite far apart. You know, I’d have a 15 minute apart contraction, and then it would go to 20 or 30 minutes… 

Adriana: So it’s still early.

Laura: Yes, it seemed early, so I went back home. When I got home from the doctor’s office, I felt a couple of intense contractions, so I tried to take a nap and do just a calming meditation to relax myself a little bit. And then called my husband because I thought “My contractions are getting more intense. Maybe it would be best if he came home from work early just to make sure he’s around just in case we need to go to the hospital.”

So he came home. And I was in the middle of doing a meditation, but I found it was really hard to focus on my breath ‘cause my sinuses were clogged. And, just… I generally wasn’t feeling so well. So at some point I told my husband, “I think it would be best just to pack up the car, just to make sure we have it ready.”

And I was laboring in my bed. And just trying to stay as relaxed as possible. So I was feeling some intense contractions and I looked at the clock and they were about eight minutes apart. Then I was trying to decide “Should we leave? Should we stay?” And Jonathan came into the room after packing the car and I said, “I think we should go now. Let’s at least get to the car, go on the way to the hospital. I’m not sure if I wait any longer if I’m going to be able to make it to the car.” So we get into the car and called the midwife. I should say this is about 3:45 p.m. I was at the doctor’s office at 1:30 p.m. previously, so just a couple hours in between from when I wasn’t experiencing any contractions to now I’m feeling really intense contractions. And like I said, I, at that point, I don’t know if I waited any longer, if I’d be able to get to the car.

So I’m feeling the intense contractions, we’re in the car and we give my midwife a call and just let her know we’re on the way to the hospital, and she says that she’s already there and she’s waiting for us. And it was in that process that I realized how relaxed I was able to stay in between contractions, and that was one of my biggest goals. A couple weeks before my birth, I saw a picture of a woman, and it was of her 30 minutes prior to giving birth. And she was laughing in the picture and I thought, “Wow, that’s possible! Someone’s able to relax that much to be able to laugh 30 minutes before receiving her own baby.” So that was definitely one of my goals, is to really focus on the present moment and not think about the next contraction. So then we’re on our way to the hospital and my husband jokingly says— we kind of talk about, kind of our estimation— “When’s the baby coming?” And he says, “I bet the baby will be here in an hour.”

And I just said, “Well, I’m really hoping at least in the next two hours. I’d really like to meet my baby within two hours,” but really trying to prepare for a long labor ahead. 15 minutes later, I asked Jonathan if he’s been timing contractions. We’re in the car about 10 minutes away from the hospital. The last contraction was three minutes apart. And then the one after that was two minutes. and then the next contraction that came, I started making the involuntary low groan that I know means the baby is coming, and my husband knows it too. So we’re in the car, I’m in the passenger seat, my husband’s driving and we’re about a mile from the hospital. My feet are on the seat and my one arm’s on the passenger side door and the other on the center count console, and I tell my husband, “I just felt the baby’s head come out and go back in.” 

So at that point was the only time that I really panicked, because, in that moment, I thought, “How am I going to walk through the lobby with the baby’s head coming out?” And then I had heard stories about people having lobby births and I felt like I was prepared for a lot, but I wasn’t necessarily prepared to give birth in front of people in the lobby of a hospital!

Adriana: You weren’t?! I mean, come on— nobody’s prepared for that! Yeah. [Laughs.]

Laura: No. No, I was not prepared for that. So that was one contraction. And in my mind, I thought… Definitely one thing that helped me was listening to the Birthful episode with Whapio, about Rethinking the Pushing Stage, and realizing that every contraction doesn’t necessarily mean progress.

So in my mind I thought, “Okay, there could be a couple of contractions like this, with, you know, his head coming out and in.” But the next contraction, I had a really strong contraction, and in that moment I heard my inner voice or something greater than me inside of myself saying, “You can do this! You got this!” And it was almost like it was shouting at me! There was so much energy and emotion and a love that’s just so hard to explain, that I felt running through my veins. And in that contraction, his head came out and stayed out. And from there, I calmed down immediately, ‘cause “I knew I’m having the baby here. I’m not going to have it in the lobby of the hospital.” So I didn’t have to worry about that!

Adriana: And… hold on. What?! Of course, the practical part of me goes like, “What were you wearing?” Is this baby, like, head out, holding your underwear? Like, what’s going on down there? [Laughs.]

Laura: [Laughs.] So I will say, as I felt his head coming out, and in that first contraction, I pulled down my pants. I was wearing just jogger pants and winter boots. It was February, so I had my pants halfway down and my boots on the floor.

Adriana: Okay, thank you for clarifying. I just need to, like, get a picture of it.

Laura: Yeah.

Adriana: So then once you felt the head out and you thought, “Okay, this is not happening in the lobby. That’s great.” And we’re feeling all this amazing love. What happened next? How quickly did the body come out?

Laura: So, next contraction, definitely fetal ejection reflex, his whole body came out. So there was definitely no pushing needed. It was time and just kind of nature. Nature did its thing. And that second, or that last contraction that I had as his whole body came out, I felt the same energy and the same love and the same voices came back saying, “You can do this! You’ve got this!” So again I was just in a place of, I would say, “bliss” and “faith,” and I felt like everything was just aligned in the way that it was supposed to be. And then from there, I was able to fully, just slowly help him descend to the seat. So I know often people, you know, say if you… “How are you supposed to catch your own baby?” And really, I was so low to the seat I had… I was in a half-kneel position, so I was just able to, you know, slowly help lower him to the seat. 

Adriana: And by this time, had your husband pulled over to stop the car? Or was he still driving?

Laura: He didn’t! He was still driving. I think at one point I said, “Could you pull over?” And he just was like, “Oh, okay. We’re so close. I’ll just keep going.” And the area around the hospital is residential, so there’s a lot of stop signs around there, that he just said were “rolling stops.” I think he blew quite a few stop signs trying to get to the hospital. And we were… when Leo came out, we were about four blocks from the hospital at that point.

Adriana: Okay, so then he just kept going. [Laughs.]

Laura: He just kept going! [Laughs.]

Adriana: Okay. So as he is trying to get you to the hospital… What were you feeling then, and what happened next?

Laura: So definitely my instincts, just kicked in, looking at him— just checking for signs of life. How does he look? How does his nose look? Does he need to be suctioned? Just kind of examining him and ready to do anything that I needed to. But he looked really good. So then I brought him to my chest to keep him warm. And I just remember saying and trying to reassure him with, “You’re safe. We love you. Everything is well.” And we drove into the turnaround for the lobby of the hospital. So at that point, my husband got out and I waited in the front seat and I pulled up my pants.

I still hadn’t birthed the placenta. So I had the cord out and Leo on my chest, and he went into the lobby and asked for a wheelchair or a gurney. And the staff there were really confused. And luckily there was a patient that… a patient or maybe a visitor there in the lobby that overheard what was happening and he ran out because he saw a wheelchair and he came out to get me. So, my husband took off his sweater and then handed it to me to help wrap the baby up. And I got out of the car and got into the wheelchair and then the kind gentleman that was there to help us pushed me straight to the elevators and I said, “I need fourth floor, labor and delivery.” We got into the elevator— and I think it was a full elevator too— and we’re just kinda all looking around. I’m holding the baby, I’ve got the cord, then the midwife was there to meet us when we got up there.

Adriana: The elevator ride, right now. Just… here. Just, you know, “Just birthed my baby. Waiting for the placenta…” 

Laura: Yes. [Laughs.]

Adriana: Going to labor/maternity. What was going through your head then? Do you remember?

Laura: What was going through my head is I wanted to birth my placenta! I wanted to get into the delivery room as fast as possible because that was the second part of my intention, is managing the placenta birth. I would say that was mainly it, but I felt so good and so happy to be holding my baby and really, just a couple minutes before his birth, I had thought I had maybe another two hours of labor to go. So just being in that space of things happened a lot faster than I could even imagine was pretty awesome.

Adriana: And had you talked with your midwife ahead of time, of your desires and intentions for being the one in charge of delivery of your placenta?

Laura: You know, I didn’t… because I would say that it all came together by the end of my pregnancy. It was just, I would say, like, a beautiful process that unfolded as my pregnancy unfolded, about my wishes and really my intentions. Um, And really it was just through listening to things that I really understood exactly what it is that I wanted in terms of the placenta delivery.

So I didn’t talk about it with my midwife, but immediately getting into the delivery room, I said, “Can someone hand me a bowl? I want to get my placenta out.” And for them, I think, coming in there, they really wanted to inspect me, inspect the baby, and wanted me to just kinda lay down and relax. And I had pictured, you know, birthing my placenta in a full, deep squat. They definitely were encouraging me as I was trying to squat on the hospital bed, to just kind of relax. “We’ll get your,” you know, “We’ll help you get your placenta out.” But I kept kind of voicing what I wanted to do, and after a minute or two they got me a bowl and I was able birth my placenta.

Adriana: I’m so happy for you, because this is something you really wanted.

Laura: Yes!

Adriana: But I know from having been in countless births, that you need to speak up a lot, loudly, and repeatedly for something like that to happen. Because the way we— at hospitals, the way the culture in which we birth and manage is the word— that third stage of labor is so focused, suddenly triggered into anxiety and a sense of urgency of “Make sure baby’s okay! Stop this bleeding!” Like, everything becomes those two directives— which are definitely important and fair enough, I’m not saying those aren’t important, absolutely. 

And you had that instinct of as soon as your baby was born, take a look and see that he’s alright and all’s good, and then bond. I just find that it’s often (very often) done in detriment of everything else that’s going around and all the potential meaning and bonding and other connections that need to be made during that time that physiologically are important, both for you and baby. And I do think that that kind of gets taken away, right?

Laura: Yes.

Adriana: And that’s one of the things that I find really fascinating about the shift you had from your first birth to your second birth, in that I think we need that cultural shift. So many people don’t even wanna see their placenta, or are curious about it, but it becomes more of a show and tell of this person is showing me where my baby was. And I am just an a spectator in that process. And it requires a lot to get out of that mentality and switch it to something else. Like now as a doula and tons of births, I’d be like, “Yeah. Gimme that bowl,” but that was, I was not even anywhere close to that mental space, when my daughter was born.

Laura: I definitely agree. The one thing in retrospect, when I look back at my birth, the one thing that I would’ve changed is I would’ve brought my own bowl, so I wouldn’t even have to ask! That was just such a minor thing, but for me, that was… everything was flowing so well, and I was really feeling good at that point that based on my blood loss, the energy within my body felt good and, and vital. So I really, immediately after the birth, I didn’t have fear around that at that point.

Adriana: Well no, and I feel also, like, just the whole energy and that and that perspective of how we treat the birthing person, and what we consider the birthing person is so changed the minute the baby is born. Immediately, we think you go from being this amazingly strong person who gave birth to this child, to a fragile being that shouldn’t try to stand up and just…

Laura: Yes! [Laughs.]

Adriana: “Lie down and don’t move and let us take care of this.”

Laura: Yes, exactly!

Adriana: There’s a big disconnect there! It’s like, “Wait, I just did this immensely powerful thing. Why am I suddenly feeble?” Like, that’s not it. “I’m not feeble at all!” And so I think having the perspective of what the birth that you… story that you just shared, or even seeing homebirth and seeing how different it is in terms of, like, people are standing up when they gave birth or get up and move from a tub to a sofa at some point, or you know that, that there’s movement and then they go up and go to the bathroom and it’s not this whole, like, “Don’t move for an hour in case you might get dizzy.”

Laura: Yes.

Adriana: No, sorry, that was my little soapbox for the day. But, we’ve been slowly changing a lot of things at birth and, realizing, “Huh, we were thinking about this probably wrong”— that I wanna start definitely normalizing that third stage a little bit more and giving it back to birthing parents.

Laura: Yes, absolutely. I think it’s… it is just definitely important, definitely important to be present for that. 

Adriana: So you squatted on the bed, they gave you a bowl, you birthed your placenta, you received your placenta. What happened next?

Laura: After that it was bonding with the baby time. There was definitely some, you know, forms and questions that needed to be answered in order for them to admit me to the hospital. So there was a little bit of that, but for the most part it was just a beautiful time with us as a family.

And then about 30 minutes later, the cord was completely white and dry, so we consented to having it cut and clamped actually. Well, that was done by my husband.

And then after that we ended up moving to our hospital room for the night, and then 24 hours later we went home.

Adriana: How were you feeling at the time? Or how are you feeling now? I guess what’s… If anything has changed in terms of how you’re feeling about this birth story?

Laura: Wow. I definitely think I was changed by this birth. For me, it was… there were a couple things that really impacted me and it was my ability and seeing the value in enjoying the pauses in life and it came up, in between my contractions, but really trying to step into the present moment and realize that although things could be emotionally intense, there’s always pauses.

And to really lean into those pauses in order to, kind of, ride the tides. So that was definitely something that I learned through the experience. The other thing too is, when I experienced those last final contractions as Leo was, you know, descending and his head and body was coming out, the voices that I heard and the love and encouragement that I felt such a great power within me.

And it’s not only about the power that I realized inside of me. But I have this realization that it exists within every woman and every person, and it’s my hope that eventually people can come to the point where they discover the power that’s within themselves.

Adriana: Is there… As we wrap up, is there anything that you wanted to share about your stories and the process that we haven’t gotten to?

Laura: Yeah, a big, kind of, component about this is a couple weeks before I gave birth, I had this sense that— I don’t know if I needed to— but something was telling me I kind of needed to birth unassisted. I didn’t know where that voice was coming from, and it just didn’t seem, like, “in the plan” would be to birth unassisted in my house. And we already planned for the hospital birth. And I didn’t know if that was coming from an egoic place or from an intuitive place. You know, was my desire to birth unassisted, the desire to feel empowered during birth? And I didn’t know how that was going to play out. So that was always in the back of my mind.

And before the birth, we had always joked that I would have no problem giving birth in the car if I had to. It was about just respecting the flow and allowing things to unfold as they needed to, and not rushing or trying to force the process. So if the main goal was to be… to have a hospital birth, I definitely probably would’ve rushed there right after, you know, my waters were open. But for me, the biggest thing was going inward and finding a place with the least amount of distractions so I could go inward and really tap into the intuitive side of myself. So it’s just beautiful how everything unfolded because really I didn’t plan for an unassisted birth, and I didn’t quite understand how that would be in the cards. And it just seemed like that’s how it happened.

Adriana: This has been such a fabulous story. It really speaks to my doula heart, just because I appreciate that unfolding of the process and that the surroundings don’t matter as much of where that unfolds, as long as it’s unfolding, right? I agree that the priority is “Let’s focus on the process and then things fall into place, or not.” But then there tends to be more clarity of why they’re not falling into place.

Laura: Yep! And I normally think of it again as “the art of sailing versus the art of rowing.” As I got to different stages in my pregnancy, I would ask myself “Is this decision or what I’m doing, does it feel like I’m swimming upstream or downstream?” Because going against the tides utilizes a lot of energy. So for me that was an important part of it, was I had previously planned a hospital birth and it seemed like things were flowing in that direction to do the same this time. And really about not forcing things and just allowing them to unfold.

Adriana: Mhm. That’s my new favorite saying now: the art of sailing versus the art of rowing. I had not heard that before. Thank you!

Laura: You’re welcome!

Adriana: Yeah, and thank you so much for being on the show to tell your story. It’s been really an honor!

Laura: Yes. Thank you so much.

That was Laura Loos, who is a multi-passionate stay-at-home mom, that enjoys being led by her curiosity and intuition. You can connect with her on Instagram @laura_allison_loos.

And you can connect with us @birthfulpodcast on Instagram.

In fact, we love it when you take a screenshot of the episode, so you can do that right now if you are not driving, and then post it to your stories sharing your biggest takeaway from the episode. Make sure to tag @birthfulpodcast so we can see it and amplify it.

You can find the in-depth show notes and transcript of this episode at Birthful.com, where you can also learn more about my birth and postpartum preparation classes and download your free postpartum preparation plan. 

Also, if you find that Birthful is your go-to resource for all things pregnancy, postpartum, birth, all the things, then the best way to support us is by taking any one of my classes or trying out some of the wonderful products made by our sponsors. This is what allows us to continue doing this work. 

Birthful is created and produced by me, Adriana Lozada, with production assistance from Aysia Platte.

Thank you so much for listening to and sharing Birthful, telling all your friends. Be sure to follow us on Goodpods, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, and everywhere you listen. 

And then come back for more ways to inform your intuition.

CITATION: 

Lozada, Adriana, host. “[Birth Stories] How She Confidently and Calmly Gave Birth in a Moving Car.” Birthful, Birthful, May 31, 2023. Birthful.com.