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I'm Hormonal | PCOS, periods, gut + hormone health insights
If you're looking for information on women's hormone health, PCOS, perimenopause, estrogen excess, hormonal acne, gut support, and overall how to feel your best--look no further. I'm Hormonal host, Bridget Walton, provides you with the information you need to get your hormones in balance so you can feel your best. Long-form episodes come out on Tuesdays and you'll get a mini episode on Thursdays.
I'm Hormonal | PCOS, periods, gut + hormone health insights
Embracing Holistic Preconception & Pregnancy Care with Midwife Morgan Miller | Ep. 79
This episode highlights the essentials of preconception and pregnancy care, emphasizing the beneficial role of midwives and doulas in creating a supportive birthing environment. Listeners learn about the importance of nutrition, holistic care, and the need for clear communication with healthcare providers to enhance their pregnancy experiences.
• Overview of the historical role of midwives and current practices in the U.S.
• Importance of nutrition and nutrient levels during and before pregnancy
• Benefits of preconception care and regular lab testing
• Holistic gynecology as a way to manage reproductive health
• Role of doulas and midwives in supporting the birthing process
• Exploration of alternative birthing options like water birth
• How to build an effective support team for pregnancy
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Morgan's website - morganmillermidwifery.com
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Welcome to I'm Hormonal, your source of information about women's hormone health and how to support your body. Naturally. I'm your host, bridget Walton, and I'm a certified functional hormone specialist and menstrual cycle coach. I am on a mission to hold these hormone conversations with as many menstruators as possible, because you deserve easier access to accurate information about what's up with your unruly menstrual cycle and with your fertility mysteries. Don't you think it's time that we figure this out once and for all? Hey guys, welcome to today's episode of I'm Hormonal. I'm your host, bridget Walton, and I'm really excited that you're here today.
Speaker 1:Sometimes I do episodes where it's just me solo episode, chatting with you, and sometimes I do interviews, which is what you're going to get today. You will hear a conversation that I had with Morgan Miller, who is a midwife. She's a lactation consultant, activist, birth center founder and she's an author. If you caught the episode two weeks ago about the cycle book, then Morgan is one of the authors that you heard on that episode as well. So I'll talk more about Morgan in our conversation in just a second, but I wanna come back to saying welcome to you and thanks for listening. Thanks for coming back if you've been here before or if this is your first time, then I'm really glad that you found me. Like I said, you can expect conversations where it's just me. You can hear interviews that I have with other people, and once a week I give you my longer kind of full form episode. Then on Thursdays I will give you like a mini bite size, little snacketizer where you can just get the kind of short version of what I talked about in the earlier episode. So, whatever works for you, I got you, I got you. I am a women's hormone coach and so I work with menstruators who have period problems, who have unpredictable periods, pms. Maybe you're here listening because you have some of those symptoms or situations going on, and what I really want to do through this podcast is help you understand why those things are happening and also what you can do about it so you can feel better. That's the mission here at I'm Hormonal.
Speaker 1:If you hear anything in the episode today that you really love and find to be helpful, I would be so appreciative if you would rate or review the podcast. You can do that in whatever app, whatever platform that you are listening on, and, if you feel so inspired, maybe you would even share it with a friend or a sister. Especially today's episode we're going to be talking about preconception and pregnancy. Morgan shares so much good stuff with us about how she guides her clients through those phases of life and what they may want to consider during that phase. So if you have a friend or a sister who is also in that phase of life, considering getting pregnant or is pregnant, then send this on over to them and I would be so, so, so grateful for you to help me expand the I'm Hormonal community. If you ever have requests for episode topics, you can send them over to me on Instagram at Bridget Walton. I really love when I get messages from you listeners out there. Thank you so much for making my day so you can find me again at Bridget Walton on Instagram day. So you can find me again at Bridget Walton on Instagram.
Speaker 1:And, as always, I like to remind you that the information that I share with you on the podcast is for educational purposes only and it shouldn't be used as a replacement for any sort of medical advice, diagnosis or other one-on-one support from the practitioner. That is right for you. There's just so much information, there's so much nuance with different aspects of health and wellness and what works for you and your life or your body. So it's not exactly one size fits all, but if you are somebody who's in the market to work one-on-one with a women's hormone coach, then I would urge you, recommend you, encourage you to take me up on the free consults that I offer, and you can find the link in the show notes to book that free consult. So I introduced Morgan a little bit a couple of minutes ago, or if you heard the previous episode with her, then you'll be a little bit a couple minutes ago or if you heard the previous episode with her, then you'll be a little bit familiar.
Speaker 1:But we really talked about what's going on during pregnancy. What are some things when it comes to nutrition that you might want to consider. What's the dream team when it comes to your support team throughout pregnancy, when it comes to your support team throughout pregnancy and especially during the birth experience? And also, you know, if you're somebody who, like I was, for you know most of my life I thought, okay, you're pregnant and you have a baby in a hospital, like that's the option, right, what else? What are other options? But if you're coming from that same perspective and you're curious to learn about what that would be like to work with a midwife or consider giving birth in a birth center, then you're really going to get a lot out of this conversation.
Speaker 1:One last note, and then I will turn it over to our conversation. But just remember that Morgan's book, the Cycle Book, releases this week actually, so you can go ahead and check it out at thecyclebookcom. Listen to the earlier episode to learn more. Cycle tracking is a huge well, hugely valuable is what I meant to say resource when it comes to getting to know yourself and, of course, your cycle and starting to kind of troubleshoot. So thecyclebookcom is where you'll find it. So I hope that you enjoy this episode. Let me know what you think by rating and reviewing.
Speaker 1:And here's my conversation with Morgan Miller. I think I was probably in my 20s, like I was saying before, when I first learned that midwives still exist, and so I've learned so much over the last whatever 10 plus or minus years. But maybe there are some listeners who are just getting acquainted and getting familiar with how midwives serve women right, and what you do, how you support women, I guess, is what I mean to say. So would you kick us off by giving us the rundown of how do you work with your clients and what does that look like for somebody who's not super familiar?
Speaker 2:Yeah, you're definitely not alone in not realizing that midwives were a prominent caregiver role for people throughout their reproductive years. I think it's historically midwives have been the dominant figure of people supporting people through pregnancy and anything around reproductive care. But in the United States these days it's really the minority that people are working with midwives and we have a much more obstetric led birth community.
Speaker 2:So it's definitely you're not crazy for not knowing how many midwives are out there, but midwives are out there. They have been there the whole time for eons and eons and they're working really hard across the US and across the world. Their primary focus that people are known for their care is around pregnancy care. They're really specialists in pregnancy and birth and the postpartum period and everything that goes through the changes of the body around reproduction. So midwives can do a lot more care outside of pregnancy and birth, but that's probably the primary focus that people know about them as as kind of a birth attendant and caregiver.
Speaker 1:Is that something that I'm just thinking? Timelines wise, in the last, probably in the last hundred years, did that shift really happen from midwives to yeah? I see you nodding.
Speaker 2:Okay, so it's like recent human history, industrialization kind of thing. Exactly, that's exactly it. It's with industrialization that the obstetric, hospital-led practice of having babies within a hospital with an obstetrician started. Before that it was the norm to work with a midwife in your community and have your baby at home. That was the normal thing that occurred, and if there was any sort of complication that occurred in the pregnancy or at a birth sort of complication that occurred in a pregnancy or at a birth you would then go to the hospital.
Speaker 2:But otherwise birth has historically been seen as a normal physiologic event that the body goes through. It's not an illness, it's not a pathology, and so you would be staying at home and working with somebody who has a lot of experience in that type of you know life activity. That happens. But with industrialization and the advent of hospitals we kind of commodified birth in a really different way and it unfortunately really wiped out midwifery in the United States and we've been on a long, long, long, slow road of recovery since then. The basis of that onslaught against midwives was heavily based in racist practices and it's got a pretty dark, dark history. But there are some phenomenal practitioners out there right now that are really trying to flip the script and get us back to where we were before.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay, well, we can work on that today in this conversation. Yeah, sharing it with everybody. Maybe we can start or like move on to talking about during pregnancy, how are you supporting women and kind of what are the things that a lot of pregnant folks out there are surprised by and that you help them walk through? Is it from a nutritional perspective? Are you checking, like doing checkups with the baby in them? So, yeah, just kind of looking at what sort of support is there and what might a listener want to keep in mind whether or not they're working with a midwife already.
Speaker 2:I think the greatest part about pregnancy care and having, you know, a good amount of time to work with clients is realizing that in the explorations of learning about how a body is changing through pregnancy, I often find that clients are also learning about their body in general for the first time, and it just happens to be pregnancy is the thing that brought them in the door, and pregnancy is the thing that has heightened their awareness over how their body's communicating with them, and so it feels like they're learning a new language and really acclimating themselves in their own bones for the first time.
Speaker 2:In particular, you know there's a lot of people that don't regularly engage with the healthcare system or seeing doctors for annual visits, things like that. It can be, you know, difficult to do financially or logistically to be a person that goes and sees the doctor for preventive healthcare, and a lot of times it's actually really common that when I'm seeing someone for pregnancy care, it's the first time they're really engaging in the healthcare system, and so there's a lot of body awareness and knowledge that we go over and visits, and it definitely very much so goes back to the basics for a lot of it, which is understanding, truly, in regards to things like nutrition and how we nourish our bodies and how we move our bodies. You know what are the ways that human bodies want to exist in the world and how can we best support them. So it does kind of backpedal into that, that kind of understanding for a lot of clients, cause we're not really taught about our bodies when we're growing up, and so it's the first time I really get attention.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I definitely. Like you know, we'll have conversations with friends who are or not well, yes, friends or other gals that I meet elsewhere who are, like man, I didn't even really understand how my cycle worked and then I had a baby and it's crazy that I didn't know that before I had a baby. But right, I guess we can't blame ourselves for not knowing stuff earlier. We can just learn it when we can learn it Right, which I know is what you're saying.
Speaker 2:Yeah exactly.
Speaker 1:I'm curious if you have any go-tos or recommendations. While everybody is bio-individual, so there's some nuance, but during pregnancy, when it comes to nutrition, what are some things that you really work with clients to focus on for their own health and the health of little baby?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think the biggest focus that we want to work on is really nourishing the body and filling it with nutrients, which we should be doing all of the time.
Speaker 2:But conceptually, with pregnancy, it's because you're building a whole, nother human being, so you need all of those building blocks in your system to be able to do it, and that generally looks like staying away from processed food and looking at whole foods for more of your impact.
Speaker 2:You know the processed foods often have less nutrients and don't really metabolize in the same way in our bodies, while they are convenient, and whole foods tend to be much more nutrient dense, and so it's all about giving you know, get the most bang for your buck on the foods that you're putting in your body, and if you can really have the most nutrient dense, then that's definitely going to serve you.
Speaker 2:There are things that are really you know, we've done more research over the years and seen that having good nutrient stores prior to pregnancy can actually reduce the risk of certain pregnancy illnesses once you are pregnant, and so I always really like to talk to people about making sure that certain things are up to snuff in their body and that that really does look different person by person, but I think knowing that you have a good amount of iron in your body and good iron stores and aren't suffering from things like anemia is a great starting point.
Speaker 2:Having enough vitamin D in your system, magnesium levels there's all these certain nutrients that really play a huge role in pregnancy. So it's really wonderful to make sure that you've got enough of that in your system, and supplements can be helpful if people aren't able to get those things from food. I think you know it's. It's really meeting people where they're at when it comes to nutrition and food, and the reality is not everybody lovely organic market or the time to cook food in that same way, and supplements can be awesome. Then we can get all you know, cover our bases with those things.
Speaker 1:So it's nice to do a little bit of both when you can when it comes to some of those nutrients or vitamin and mineral levels, is that, I have to imagine, impacted by previous pregnancies, right? So like spacing, or maybe not so much? Not leaving, so much space between pregnancies. So you mentioned magnesium, iron and vitamin D. Is there anything in particular that's like correlated witha deficiency in one of those, like morning sickness or something else, or is it just overall, you're going to feel your best if you make sure that those stores are repleted.
Speaker 2:I think it's fairly safe to say, overall, you're going to feel your best and that's great, but you can start to feel symptomatic if any of those things are low and we're getting more and more research out every day about it. But we are really learning that. You know we're. We're getting more and more research out every day about it, but we are really learning that, especially in the United States, there's a huge chunk of the population that is below optimal levels on things like vitamin D and magnesium, and the reasoning of why that's happening is is multifold.
Speaker 2:So it's it's way higher complexity than just saying you're not eating enough of a certain type of food. But I think it's interesting to know that it's so, so common and we walk around and not even realize it. And that's where checking in with your primary care provider every once in a while to do some blood work can be really helpful, because you might discover, hey, even though I feel okay, my vitamin D is in the toilet and it actually feels amazing now that I finally got it up to optimal levels, I have energy. I didn't even know that I was allowed to have or could have, and that's what we really want is people to be feeling as good as they can.
Speaker 1:Totally, and so, just like you mentioned, doing some of that testing with the primary care provider would work. Or I'm curious, maybe just for a mini plug for you, but do you work with clients remotely or from afar too, or is that the type of labs that you would order for your clients?
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely so. We can always set up labs and meet virtually with clients and set up a local lab visit. There's also a ton of really awesome direct lab services these days where you can have really accurate, amazing levels that are taken by a blood sample you collect at home with something like a lancet from your finger.
Speaker 2:So it's something that you're safely able to collect at home with something like a lancet from your finger. So it's something that you're safely able to collect at home and we can evaluate those samples together. So there's lots of options where this information can be accessible for people. That wasn't always true in the past.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay, good so is it. Would you say that you recommend, or maybe maybe not recommend, but it's like a great if for somebody who's thinking about conceiving, then they can go ahead and just go ahead and do these panels, get their normal CBC and thyroid panels and all of that good stuff done ahead of time to make sure they're in good shape.
Speaker 2:I really would. I think I'm obviously biased. I'm a midwife so I can speak to what I see. But you know, it's kind of like what you were talking about when you were saying that there are friends that never understood their menstrual cycle, what was happening in their body until they were trying to get pregnant.
Speaker 2:What happens for a lot of people is, as soon as something like pregnancy is on board, where your body's making a lot of physical and metabolic shifts really rapidly is we start to see the symptoms of certain illnesses or things that are going on that maybe weren't presenting prior to pregnancy because it wasn't that bad. But now we're in pregnancy and we can start to see the flags and then now we have to be managing and treating those illnesses. But if we can suss that stuff out prior to pregnancy, it greatly reduces risks for how that birth experience might go. And I see that day to day with clients where you know we have the benefits of if we've been meeting prior to pregnancy doing preconception work or doing gynecological work together, we've really sussed out overall health prior to adding on growing another human being and I'm not alone in this thought process where preconception care is a good idea.
Speaker 2:The research is really, really supportive of it. Because of all these things I've been explaining around certain nutrient levels and basic health factors that you know, organizations like the World Health Organization recommends every single person who is maybe sort of kind of considering pregnancy to do one of these formal preconception visits so that you can really just touch stone with somebody and see if there's anything that needs to be, you know, nourished in your system that's not currently happening, or any other type of health illness that might be, you know, potentially a future complication in pregnancy.
Speaker 1:So I'm imagining that when you're working with gals who are in that preconception or like maybe kind of sort of thinking about it, you say, okay, let's go ahead and get a prenatal in the mix here. Is that a safe assumption? It's a totally safe assumption. We'll see what Morgan says. So okay, prenatal, going ahead and getting tests done, like getting the labs done, to make sure that everything is in good range.
Speaker 2:Is there anything else that comes to mind that somebody who's thinking about conceiving should have in their mind a full health history review of just what it's been like to be in your body physically and mentally, and really find some grounding before going into this moment of huge transition of pregnancy. It can also troubleshoot if there may or may not be any fertility concerns along the journey that might change your decision of how you're trying to conceive. So I think really having it be a bigger conversation than just lab work is really helpful. It's not always accessible to everyone, so I think it's gather information where you can, and if you're a person who has access to some labs, then let's start there and see how far we can go with it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Is this something that like sort of normal kind of Western medicine, or somebody who has insurance and wants to go through their insurance that they can find good options or do a lot of, or any? Some midwives take insurance.
Speaker 2:A lot of midwives do take insurance and a lot of providers offer preconception care, including, you know, regular MDs, OBs, obstetricians and family nurse practitioners. There's a ton of providers that would offer that care. That care looks really different depending on who you're seeing. I think anyone who's engaged with healthcare in the US can probably speak to the myriad of types of care they've received.
Speaker 2:Unfortunately, our healthcare system is quite overwhelmed, and so it's fairly common that when you set up a visit through your insurance with your doctor, whoever that might be, you often only get five to seven minutes to sit down and chat with them, and that sometimes doesn't. You often only get five to seven minutes to sit down and chat with them, and that sometimes doesn't feel like quite enough time to have these big conversations. And so there's a lot of people that you know, if it's available to them, might be seeking privatized healthcare outside of that system, where they're able to get just a little bit more one-on-one time with a provider. But it just depends on you know what you're after and what you need. Sometimes you can get it done in five minutes and it's like great, I love my provider. We were incredibly efficient together, and sometimes it's getting referrals to other people.
Speaker 1:You know I I'm a small business owner and I get to make my own rules, so we do just about hour long visits and that feels like barely enough time to me, but it feels good, yeah, that feels like that is definitely my speed, because if I have something that I want to work on, or with my doctor, with whoever I like, come to my appointment with a whole like print out notes, like making graphs, like here's all the data so we can just be efficient.
Speaker 1:So I love that longer form kind of contact and care. One thing I'm really curious to learn more about, and you mentioned earlier, was holistic GYN. When I think of, well, gyn or OBGYN is just really me as a non-pregnant person going and getting my annual pap smear. So talk about, like, what else is a part of the holistic GYN picture?
Speaker 2:and what does that?
Speaker 1:really mean.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think gynecological care can and should be so much more than the pap smear. You know I do love cervical cancer screening. I think it's phenomenal. I love that the recommendations are not to do it yearly anymore. We get to spread it out a little bit.
Speaker 2:You know, all of that is wonderful, but I think a holistic gyne perspective is really being able to look at healthcare through the lens of the reproductive system and see how it reflects overall health in the body.
Speaker 2:And that's where we can really look at how the menstrual cycle is maybe communicating with us and what it's telling us about bigger systems than just the reproductive system. You know you, you know this stuff so well that it's like we have all these systems in our body that you know circulatory, respiratory, all these systems. But if any of them are in any form of strain, reproductive system is not one you need to survive, so it's going to go a little bit wonky and maybe show some of those signs earlier than other systems in your body. So it can really be this amazing magnifying lens to see how your body's trying to communicate about bigger issues, chronic issues or particular hidden illnesses. And that's where I really love to dig in with people and see if we can do some detective work to figure out why they maybe don't feel the way they want to feel in their bodies.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that detective work is totally my jam too, and I'm sure you're familiar with this and sometimes I say this on the podcast right, how, your health of your menstrual cycle is the fifth vital sign, right, if something is weird with your cycle, then that could be indicative of something greater and weirder that needs to be uncovered. So I really like that and, okay, so it sounds like holistic gyn, I won't say G-Y-N, I'll be cool.
Speaker 2:Holistic gyn right.
Speaker 1:You can say either oh, either Okay. I was like I've outed myself-Y-N. I'll be cool Holistic Gyn. Right, you can say either oh, either Okay. I was like I've outed myself as a newbie. No, what was I going to say? Just that, okay, holistic Gyn sounds just like hey, let's just make sure everything's in good shape, like pregnancy or conception, goals aside.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so often when I'm meeting with clients it maybe is because somebody's due for that cervical cancer screening, due for their path, and we'll meet and we'll also do bigger health check-ins and say like, when's the last time somebody's checked in on lab work for you? Should we be doing that again? How's sleep going? How's your energy going? What are your days looking like? How are you nourishing yourself? You know bigger, bigger questions around. You know, yes, of course. Are you looking to grow your family as pregnancy in the future? Are you trying not to conceive? Do we want to find the best birth control options for you if that's the case? Or you know, there's always the visit that's like I don't know, something weird's going on down there or some sort of pain that's new to me, or some sort of smell, or you know those will be in those visits as well.
Speaker 1:Yeah, With my clients I use the Dutch test and GI map most often. Do you use either or both of those with your clients?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think that they can be really great tests. I think there's they're just full of so much information and so, depending on somebody's you know investment level, it can be a wonderful tool to use.
Speaker 1:I'm curious about if there's anything when it comes to pregnancy. Is there anything that's like newer or like trendy, or something that you're like oh okay, this is a new change that people are incorporating into their daily habits that like really works and is worth incorporating. Does anything come to mind?
Speaker 2:So many things come to mind, and the best part about it, I think if there's any midwife listeners out there or doula listeners out there, is that. A lot of the new things that are the hey, this is a great idea, we didn't realize we should be doing pregnancy this way are actually very old things.
Speaker 2:They're kind of going back to the basics and the simplicity and not trying to overcomplicate things. You know, some of the things that we've found to be really wonderful are, let's say, I'll talk directly about birth and, like the moment of birth, when a baby is coming out, there's something called a two-step process for a baby being born versus babies being delivered. So there's this idea in a lot of obstetrics models that there are certain hand maneuvers that you learn when you are delivering a baby which is helping them navigate their head and their shoulders and their body and then their legs, and you memorize these hand maneuvers. There's now a backpedal on that to say what if we went back and looked at how birth happens when your hands off, to see how it physiologically happens, and notice that it's actually a two-step process, that first a baby's head is born and then there's a pause and a wait for a contraction, and then the body of the baby actually does this beautiful little dance. It does the shimmy with its shoulders and turns this way and turns that way, and then it starts to birth itself with its shoulders and turns this way and turns that way, and then it starts to birth itself with its shoulders and body and legs next, and so it's kind of reversing this mentality of being hands-on and delivering a baby versus staying hands-off and catching a baby.
Speaker 2:These are kind of two different concepts of what we can do, and we can look back and see are there moments when we, maybe, in attempts to be helpful by delivering a baby, are actually accidentally complicating things by disrupting that journey that a baby's making? And so that's where we've kind of turned the tables a little, where we're saying, hey, these are new ideas that are actually old ideas. If we go back to the basics on this, then we can be a lot more supportive, and I think there's a lot of that. That's happening around nutrition as well and certain things we're putting in our bodies and then looking at how we're moving our bodies and things like support in pregnancy. It's a really simple concept, but the more supportive people are, the better outcomes we have.
Speaker 2:Like in community, yeah, and we can see that through things like doulas. Doulas are these phenomenal support figures through pregnancy and birth that offer education and emotional support and often physical support in labor, and they really are this continuous figure in somebody's life. And the integration of a doula and somebody's care, which is truly just offering support in this very particular individualized way, is significantly reducing the outcomes that we don't like in birth. So it's improving people's health and happiness and that's fabulous. Like getting a doula is one of the smartest things somebody can do. That's about to have a baby.
Speaker 1:That'd be my number one recommendation Okay, I'm going to write a note on this so we can come back to doula too. I have a couple other questions. I'm curious when it comes to how you were saying like catching versus delivering, I'm guessing that that has positive outcomes for both baby and mom. Is that true or like what is the research or findings show that the benefit?
Speaker 2:is there. I mean, some of it is difficult to dig through the research because, like I was saying, in the US we have this predominant model of care that a lot of it is doing these hand maneuvers and so we don't have as much studies on, you know, the hands off approach to this to do the side by side, but there's all these theories around it as being a supportive model want to go the catch route that they should bring up with their provider, or is it?
Speaker 1:maybe it's something more like the doctor or whoever is delivering or catching, like they're going to do what their thing is, and you know, I imagine. Well, I'll let you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think. I mean I think you should. You should be having every conversation you can with your provider. If they're not bringing it up on their own, then you can just ask hey, do you do a one step or a two step process with delivery? Do you like to stay more hands on or hands off? What's your approach? That can be really helpful to just prepare yourself for it, and I think any provider, regardless of what model they've been trained in, is also going to articulate that you know they're there to safeguard you and your baby, and so if there are any indications where it might make sense to be more hands on, that's also why you've asked them to be there. So I don't want to poo poo the idea of being more hands onon and quote-unquote delivering a baby, because I've done it too.
Speaker 2:You know, midwives do it too. There are times when there are things people might know of something called a shoulder dystocia. There are instances where you want somebody to be hands-on.
Speaker 2:It's going to be helpful and so you want someone with that skillset. But it is interesting to look at the difference of trying to use those things only when there's an indication versus using it just because, and you'll see a lot of style differences out there. So I think it's absolutely valuable to have those conversations with your provider. It helps you get to know them a little bit more and just have a better idea of what birth might look like.
Speaker 1:Maybe my assumption about births in pools or in water becoming more popular is just because that's the most Instagrammable sort of birth situation, so maybe that's just a bias. But like, is that becoming more popular? Or for somebody who's thinking, maybe they want to go that route, like, what is something to consider there, pros and cons, wise.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think a lot of people are considering water birth, I guess for many reasons. Yes, it is quite beautiful and Instagram, so if somebody has that inclination, that's what you'll get. Um, but mostly it's. It's a phenomenal form of pain relief. You know. It's a form of pain relief that has very low risks. Um, you know, there's a multitude of forms of pain relief that you can have in in labor and they all come with risks and benefits to each of them. But with water birth, you know, you've probably at some point in your life gotten into a warm bath and felt the relief that your body feels in it, and can know the risks associated with that as well.
Speaker 2:That, yes, you could slip while you're in the tub or theoretically fall asleep and be under the water, all of those things, but it's a pretty low risk situation with big rewards for pain relief. So I think that's a piece of people being really drawn to it. There's something phenomenal about those larger size birth tubs that you'll see that are not your standard house tub. They're just big enough that you can really fully submerge the pregnant belly in that warm water to get that pain relief benefit. But then they're also usually soft sided in a way where you can hang on to the sides of them and end up being in this like suspended, weightless state in the tub, which is amazing when you're having contractions or maybe about to push a baby out, because you can let every other muscle in your body be completely jello, totally relaxed and just let your uterus do the work, and then it's a really amazing way to hold on to your energy and use it where you want it most.
Speaker 1:Yeah, wow, that sounds amazing and I want to take a bath like that even not being pregnant.
Speaker 1:I tried to take a bath in my tub recently. My muscles were so sore I was like we're doing it, but my tub is so small that my knees can't even be submerged. So I'm like, so I'm going to be dreaming about a tub like that one. Um, let's come back to the doula topic. So, for somebody who is only vaguely familiar with what a doula is like, talk a little bit more about what. What does that support look like throughout the process? And my second part to that question I'm curious and this probably reflects the team that you have at the birth center but what is your like dream team for a new or, you know, soon to be mom, and like who they have surrounding them throughout the process and experience?
Speaker 2:I love that. Just for a quick intro to doulas. It's sometimes helpful. A lot of people ask the question well, what's the difference between a midwife and a doula? Cause they get spoken about together. So I often am having that conversation with people. In that context, doulas are people that are often focused on birth work and really familiar with pregnancy, familiar with birth, familiar with postpartum and newborns, and so they can act as a person in your care who is there just for education and information and also emotional support. So they're there to guide you through the crazy, wild experience of being a pregnant person and giving birth from an emotional perspective. And then a lot of it can also be that physical support, especially in labor, where people are, you know, often getting hip squeezes or back pressure or these certain maneuvers that we know can be really helpful through labor, suggesting position changes, all of that.
Speaker 2:These are things that a midwife also does and that's where it gets confusing sometimes to people. But a midwife is different because they're really often your clinical primary care provider as well. So in our practice, you know, that also means we are doing things like blood draws and ultrasounds and we're navigating the broader health care system, speaking to radiologists or perinatologists when we need to, and we're there to clinically monitor your birth and labor when that's happening, so that we can safeguard everybody. So at that time frame, while we are there to also offer position changes and back pressure and things like that, our priority is safeguarding everyone in a way that if it might make more sense for my hands to go somewhere else, then I'm going to do that. But it's phenomenal to have someone like a doula who their role is just there to support you and perhaps your partner through the journey, so that you have that continuity of care throughout and they're able to help navigate that system without any bias towards clinical care, if that makes sense.
Speaker 1:That makes total sense, yeah. And then when it comes to kind of the dream team, what does that look like?
Speaker 2:That's such a great question because I feel like over the last five years of building out the practice we have here in Maine, we've really been creating the dream team and it feels so good to finally have it up and live. I've really found for myself as a person when I'm receiving care, I really like it when I have a team of people, when I have a team of people that each have their own expertise and I get to pull on all of it and they all work together to support me. So that's really what we recreated here. We did that while also copying international models of care that have really good outcomes, because that's ultimately also what we care about. So the dream team for us here looks like integrating nutrition. We have a nutritionist on staff. Everybody sees them in their pregnancy. We see them, you know, just out of first trimester when food starts to sound reasonable again, and really make a plan for the rest of pregnancy as well as postpartum with them. And then we also have lactation consultants on staff, which is a huge thing. To be able to meet with a lactation consultant prior to giving birth Totally changes what postpartum can look like, and that doesn't even matter if you're maybe not a person who's interested in body feeding or breastfeeding your baby, it's still the person who you want to talk to you about how you're going to feed your baby in whatever way that might look like. So having that set up prenatally is phenomenal. And then you know, we of course have our team of midwives so we get to hang out with our clients a whole bunch. But then we also have a pelvic floor specialist that people see postpartum. And I just like, if you haven't heard the memo yet, every single person who's been pregnant ever in their lives deserves to see a pelvic floor therapist. I mean, basically anyone with a pelvic floor which is most people with a pelvis should see one, but most definitely if you've ever been pregnant. So we have that.
Speaker 2:That stuff is integrated in in a preventive way and we've just seen like if we do frequent postpartum visits where we're in somebody's home, they're not having to get their newborn baby in a car and drive across town a couple days after giving birth. Instead, we come to them, we bring these people to them. Recovery can look so different. We can actually do preventive health care. It can look sweet and smooth, sailing in postpartum instead of that kind of madness, craziness that people often refer to. It is a little wild. It's very disruptive, so that your life prior to not having a baby but it can also be such a sweet little bubble and we can honor that and take care of people and meet them where they're at.
Speaker 2:And I think that's my dream team is an integrative team. So you know, our team of midwives is highly connected to our greater perinatal health care system. We're friends with all of the obstetricians at the hospitals. We can collaborate with them as needed. I think that that's something that I would recommend seeking out for people is, as providers that have a great team, a great network, that they work with them. Then you really get to reap the rewards of the expertise of everybody.
Speaker 1:On that same note too, of what to look for where if a listener is in the Northeast, in Maine, they should check you out, but if somebody is located elsewhere, is there anything they should keep an eye out for good or bad, when they're trying to assemble their team and see who is in their local area?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think one of the biggest things is figuring out who you communicate freely with. You want to be able to chat, you want to be able to ask a question, not feel afraid. You want to be able to ask a follow-up question and if there's any friction with simple communication with a provider, I think it's worth considering finding another provider or at minimum, if you haven't hired a doula, getting a doula on board as well. They'll often come to prenatal visits with you and can sometimes help out with that. But I think what I see a lot with pregnancy care is that sometimes people don't know that they have options. Care is that sometimes people don't know that they have options. They just see that when you're pregnant, you see it in the movies you go to your OB and then you have a baby at your local hospital and that is the option. The truth is that most hospitals work with many, many providers that have privileges at that hospital. So it's worth shopping around. It's worth meeting everybody and see who resonates with you. If you're interested in something like midwifery care, where you're interested in kind of following a care model that looks at birth more as a physiologic event, then look for midwives in your area too.
Speaker 2:People are allowed to change their mind mid pregnancy and sometimes that feels scary. But you can go to a couple prenatal visits with somebody and they decide that it's not a good fit, I'm gonna get somebody else up. That's so okay and so normal and not a big deal to just kind of shop around and find the right person. But I think somebody you communicate with is the thing you need the most, because communication when you're having a baby can be tricky. When your body is really focused on contractions and pushing a baby out, your communication often changes and simplifies. Things like pleases and thank yous often go out the window and it's really much more directed communication. So you want to make sure that you click with somebody and they speak your language and they understand what you mean and you know you don't so much have to sit in an advocacy role when you're just trying to have a baby, because you know you have a team of people that support you. You're not up in arms against them, they're on your side. That's what you want.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love this recommendation and also just that it kind of really extends to every other part of our life to like have the people around you that work for you and that support you and it's like a mutually beneficial thing. You know why stick with a provider who's like just not the right fit for you for whatever number of like totally valid reasons. And that's okay to just, like you said, just not go back to somebody if you're like we just don't vibe, and that's a good enough reason.
Speaker 1:As we get ready to wrap up, is there anything else that you want to mention when we're thinking about pregnancy or preconception that you're like? I wish that. I wish that folks out there knew this, because once they implement it, they're going to think themselves.
Speaker 2:That's such a good question. I think the biggest one was it's like never too soon to be figuring out how to best support your body, and it doesn't. You don't have to wait till pregnancy. You don't have to wait, and if you're, you're not ready to be taking prenatal vitamins. Even though that's the recommendation there's workarounds with it. We can tell you which particular supplements are helpful and then you don't have to have, you know, prenatal vitamins sitting on your counter if you're not emotionally ready to be doing that. But I think if you're starting to have any curiosities around pregnancy or anything reproductive related, there's great providers out there these days. You just kind of got to hunt for them. So I think it's really digging into what you're curious about and finding a good connection with people.
Speaker 1:I love what you said at first there, specifically because it is so interesting that well and totally beneficial to not consume certain foods or liquids while you're pregnant. That makes a lot of sense.
Speaker 2:But I've always thought it's so funny that, like we just reserve the healthiest time for that, instead of always being optimally sweet to our body and I mean, I think it's worth like locking it in in your brain that pregnancy and reproductive experiences that we go through is this time where, like things change, your brain changes, you can instill new habits in a new way.
Speaker 2:It's really a powerful time in a life and people know that. So you get marketed at like crazy in pregnancy. Once your Google algorithm starts to figure out that you're maybe thinking about it, you're going to get blasted with recommendations of things because they know they can change the consumer mind because you're in a malleable state. But I think anything we can do to look at ourselves and figure out like how do I figure out the support for me, that's, you know, not being sold anything, it's not being marketed at me? I'm just figuring out like how is my body communicating to me and what does it need? Then you can really sit in a little bit more grounding through these wild change experiences that happen, yeah, okay.
Speaker 1:Well, let us know, like, what can listeners do who want to connect with you? Let me actually start over that question really quick From here. How can listeners connect with you and learn more about what you've got going on?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so my care services you can find information about through MorganMillerMidwiferycom. I'm currently practicing at the birth center that I own in Maine called Soft Corner, and you can definitely find out more through the cycle book, which is the book I co-authored with Laura Federico, all about menstrual cycle tracking and ways to find that grounding in yourself.
Speaker 1:All right. Well, that is it for my conversation with Morgan this week and, morgan, thank you so much for coming on the podcast again. I really had such a fun time chatting with you. Dear listener, remember that you can connect with Morgan at MorganMillerMidwiferycom. You can also check out the book, which is called the Cycle Book, at thecyclebookcom and connect with them on Instagram at thecyclebook. So thank you so much for listening. I love making these episodes for you guys and recording these conversations, so I'm endlessly grateful to you that you are listening and sharing and coming back week after week. I am just going to be sending out all the good vibes to you guys, as we are a month deep into 2025 now. I hope things are going your way and I will look forward to seeing you guys on the next episode. Thanks again.