[Birth Stories] From Traumatic Cesarean To Healing (And Fast!) VBAC

What’s more stressful: a panic attack right before a surgical birth that takes your breath away and leaves you with memory gaps, or your baby’s shoulders getting stuck on the pubic bone after the head is out and needing a manual placental extraction?

For today’s birth story, doula, lactation specialist, and childbirth educator Morgan Moy shares with Adriana how she prepared (or didn’t) for her first birth that left her with significant trauma, and how being very intentional in her preparation to have a VBAC made for a healing and redemptive experience, despite having unusual immediate postpartum complications.

Related resources*:

• Perineal tears during childbirth, Royal College of Obstetricians & Gynaecologists
• Perineal Lacerations, StatPearls
• Perineal Protectors? MidwifeThinking
• Surgical repair of spontaneous perineal tears that occur during childbirth versus no intervention, Cochrane
• Shoulder Dystocia: the real story, MidwifeThinking
• Catastrophic thinking: Is it the legacy of traumatic births? Midwives’ experiences of shoulder dystocia complicated births, Women and Birth
• Shoulder Dystocia, StatPearls
• Big Babies: the risk of care provider fear, Dr Rachel Reed blog
• Evidence on: Suspected Big Babies, Evidence Based Birth
• Evidence on: Induction or Cesarean for a Big Baby, Evidence Based Birth
• Manual removal of the placenta, Médecins Sans Frontières
• Uterine Inversion, StatPearls
• Postpartum Hemorrhage, StatPearls
• Nipple vasospasm, Australian Breastfeeding Association
• Vasospasm, Dr Jack Newman’s International Breastfeeding Centre
• The Doula Duo, Morgan’s doula group practice based in Rochester, New York

Related Birthful episodes:

• The Induction Process
• [Postpartum] Hemorrhages Explained
• Childbirth PTSD
• VBAC Facts
• Big Babies And Shoulder Dystocia
• Have A Happier Pelvic Floor (And A Happier You!) During Pregnancy
• Talking Pelvic Health With A Physical Therapist
• All About Your Pelvic Floor

Image description: Morgan Moy, a white-presenting person with medium-length brown hair and glasses, is wearing a light blue top and smiling at the camera [courtesy of Jennie Kiefer]

About Morgan Moy

Morgan Moy is a birth and postpartum doula, certified lactation specialist, and childbirth educator. She is a mother of two children, Audrey and Will. Before becoming a doula, Morgan was a speech-language pathologist working mainly in pediatric feeding therapy. Today, her work focuses on encouraging families to choose options that will result in a positive birth experience, informed consent, and respect. In her spare time you can find her with her doula partner: Rebecca, drinking coffee, crocheting, Cricut-ing, swimming, or obsessing over her friends’ children. She lives with her high school sweetheart-turned-husband in upstate New York.