# Imperfect Birth Stories with Sophie Walker

An episode of [The Imperfects](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1476501557), 19 Jan 2025, 1 h 01 min.

Audio: https://enrichment.soundstack.com/4vjqq8/episode.flightcast.com/zogyzlfddsyatuioztt5ho45.mp3

In this episode of our Summer School, we are joined by Sophie Walker, creator, and host of Australian Birth Stories. With over 17 million downloads, and 500 episodes, Australian Birth Stories podcast has been accredited by the Australian College of Midwives and has been instrumental in educating and empowering both people who are giving birth, as well as birthing partners. Hugh shares the incredible trauma and fear involved with his first experience of birth, and how tools of education and empowerment, such as Lael Stone’s excellent counselling, helped him prepared for birth a second time around. The power of information is invaluable, and Josh opens up about how Hugh’s experience with birth shaped his own, and what the experience was like for him. Sophie, it was such a pleasure. To watch this full episode on YouTube, follow this link: https://youtu.be/3sey26-L4Rw 🎧 Things to listen to: • Australian Birth Stories Podcast - https://apple.co/4f3PgKx • Lisa Wipfli’s episode - https://apple.co/3CZ34sx • Lael Stone’s episode - https://bit.ly/3ZhaZZD • Lael Stone on The Imperfects: • Creating Emotionally Intelligent Humans - https://apple.co/3V2vuIb • Take Care of Yourself - https://apple.co/4eAJNuw • Parent Yourself First - https://apple.co/3ZE28Tj • Martin Heppell on The Imperfects: • The Vulnerabilitea House - Martin Heppell - https://bit.ly/3ZerqqN • Martin “Rac” Heppell - The other F word ….. FAILURE - https://bit.ly/4fUkDIk • Jack Post - Natal Depression - https://apple.co/49AgxDb 💻 Things to check out: • The danger of a single story TedTalk - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie - https://bit.ly/4f16DM5 • Australian Birth Stories Birth Class Course - https://bit.ly/3BdMgxc 📖 Things to read: • The Complete Australian Guide to Pregnancy and Birth by Sophie Walker - https://amzn.to/3EscPQu If you, or someone you know, is struggling with post-natal depression or anxiety surrounding birth, these are a few great websites we’ve found • cope.org.au • panda.org.au

## Transcript

[0:01] It's just baffling to think that you can grow something inside your body and birth it, whether that's through a caesarean or vaginally, and create life.
[0:10] Hello, I'm British, and welcome to the Academy of Imperfect.
[0:16] Whoa, what's that?
[0:18] You know what that means?
[0:19] It means that school's in for summer, and while it's hot outside, it's still cool in here.
[0:28] School's in for summer.
[0:32] Wow!
[0:35] Swimming pools.
[0:37] We are in the Academy of Imperfections, summer school edition, of course, and we are joined by an incredibly impressive person, Sophie Walker, the host of Australian Birth Stories, a podcast which has tens of millions of downloads and has told hundreds and hundreds of birthing stories.
[0:52] And I am so excited about this because I remember...
[0:58] I remember calling Josh.
[1:00] So when we first had our first child, Benji, I remember you were over in Japan, Josh.
[1:06] And I called you to tell you, and I don't remember, but I just cried.
[1:10] Yeah, I do.
[1:11] And it was actually the trauma of the birth, 16 hours.
[1:17] And I still...
[1:20] Because when we had our second child, Elsie, we went to have birth classes again with Lael Stone, who people will know Lael from this podcast.
[1:29] And we realized about half an hour in, Penny was totally fine.
[1:33] It was me that needed the counseling and I was so traumatized.
[1:36] Penny had no memory of it, which I'm very happy she didn't.
[1:40] And I still cannot believe what I saw.
[1:42] I still don't understand what I saw.
[1:45] And so to have you on today to talk about this, I think is so important because when my friends tell me for the first time they're expecting a baby, I just say to the male, we have some time here.
[1:53] I want to tell you what's going to happen because you are not prepared.
[1:57] Yeah.
[1:58] Anyway, Sophie, welcome to the Imperfects.
[2:00] We are so happy to have you here.
[2:01] I think I should interview you and we'll just debrief.
[2:04] Maybe we'll just do an Australian Best Stories episode with you and work through the trauma.
[2:08] I would love to do that because I don't want to take up today's episode with the full story of it, but it's the most traumatic thing I've ever gone through in my entire life.
[2:17] Well, I actually think it could be good to get into some of that stuff because obviously none of the three of us have given birth.
[2:23] So it could be a good chance for us to do an episode talking about the birthing experience from the point of view of a partner.
[2:29] Yeah.
[2:30] The thought of it just makes me feel so on edge that just we went through that and I wasn't.
[2:36] We did all the birth training, everything at the hospital, but nothing, nothing prepared me for it.
[2:41] There was that day where you tried to buy that Buddha bowl on Uber Eats, but then they closed by the time that you ordered.
[2:47] That was pretty traumatic.
[2:48] Similar trauma.
[2:49] Yeah, I had a similar response.
[2:54] To start with, because I've not gone through the birthing experience.
[2:58] And to me, you know, I keep hearing these stories from people who have.
[3:03] And every single time, it just blows me away that this is such a common thing that happens all the time.
[3:13] something that is like arguably the most natural thing in our existence, it is so full on, like without wanting to even minimize it by saying full on.
[3:25] I cannot believe, like this is going to maybe sound insensitive, but like surely there's a better way.
[3:33] beginning of parenthood though it's like why doesn't anyone know how they sleep like there should be a recipe for this and it's like a yeah entry into this portal of unknowns yeah yeah I mean do you I mean you're so having gone through it yourself obviously and spoken to so many people now about it do you still have that like a feeling of like
[3:56] Like surely there's like a better way.
[3:57] Like is that a stupid thing to say?
[3:59] Well, our book, The Complete Australian Guide to Pregnancy and Birth that we wrote and the starting line is, I wish I had had known.
[4:06] I feel like the majority of the people that listen to my podcast have birthed or been through a birth and then they're like, oh God, I wish I'd known.
[4:13] And then they immerse themselves in like similarly perhaps for your second.
[4:16] You're like, okay, I need to know more because I was not prepared.
[4:20] I mean, I had a traumatic birth as well with my first, which prompted the whole starting of Australian birth stories.
[4:25] You had to go into that story?
[4:27] Yeah, yeah.
[4:28] And I think it's interesting the way that you were saying that you were traumatised to you because my husband was too and my mum found him after the birth crying in the other room just thinking he thought that my son and I were going to die.
[4:40] True.
[4:41] And it's interesting talking about the trauma and one in three Australian women experience birth trauma.
[4:48] So it's incredibly common.
[4:49] But then we're always at Australian Birth Stories trying to uplift people and educate.
[4:54] So it's that fine balance.
[4:55] But I moved into this based on my own trauma.
[4:59] So I went in really cocky.
[5:01] I've always been interested.
[5:02] I'm not sure why I wasn't a midwife.
[5:03] Yeah.
[5:04] I've always been interested in that and I toy with the idea of going back and doing it.
[5:08] But I was like, yeah, I can do this.
[5:10] I'm going to go drug free and just bring on the contractions.
[5:13] I can do this.
[5:14] And my mum had like three-hour labour with me and I was like, I'll inherit that.
[5:18] I'll be fine.
[5:19] And I actually went to my antenatal appointment and I said, I was like 40 plus 5 or something, and I said, I think I'm having contractions.
[5:27] And she had a look and she's like, yeah.
[5:29] you're four and a half centimetres.
[5:30] And I was like, I haven't even raised a sweat.
[5:32] Which is a fair way, which is like halfway.
[5:33] It's kind of halfway if you're going on those measurements, which people have different thoughts on.
[5:38] But you need to technically get to 10 centimetres.
[5:41] So I was like, I'm halfway there and I'm not even stressed.
[5:44] So I'm a unicorn.
[5:47] She's like, go home and have a sleep and you'll have this baby by this afternoon.
[5:50] First fail.
[5:53] So, and my husband is like quite sporty and he's like, this is fine.
[5:56] I'm going to time the contractions.
[5:58] I'm going to take this on as like a sport thing.
[6:00] Take it on as a sport thing.
[6:02] It's like, it's just numbers basically.
[6:05] He was going to coach me.
[6:06] That was his idea in a rugby.
[6:09] Is that a new PB?
[6:10] Yeah.
[6:10] And some kind of rugby terminology.
[6:13] So anyway, I went hard because I was like, I'm going to have it this afternoon so I can just go hard at like really walking this baby out.
[6:20] And then to cut a long story short, 36 hours later, I was still only five centimeters.
[6:27] Oh, my gosh.
[6:27] I was like, I have slogged it out.
[6:29] I've used every kind of trick that I thought I had in my toolkit.
[6:33] And they're like, yeah, you haven't progressed.
[6:36] And then I literally was just like, oh, fuck this then.
[6:41] I don't know what's happening here, so just get the baby out, please.
[6:45] And so then I had what's now known as like the classic cascade of interventions.
[6:49] So they broke my waters and then waited, hoped that that progressed things.
[6:54] And then I still didn't progress.
[6:55] So then they hung the syntocin and drip up, so the induction medication to kind of speed up the contractions.
[7:01] So this is all drug free?
[7:02] Yeah, at that point, but I knew enough to know when they, like I already felt out of control at that 36-hour mark and I said, if you're going to ramp things up with Syntosin and then I'll have all the drugs, please.
[7:14] And my husband who has said, oh, I said, get me the epidural and he came over and he said, now remember how you said you would ask for this and you told me to tell you no.
[7:23] And I was like, get out of my face.
[7:26] I said, mum, get over here.
[7:28] I'm serious.
[7:30] And she's like, she definitely wants the drugs.
[7:33] So I got at that point got an epidural and then laboured for another kind of five hours, but I wasn't in pain then.
[7:39] So then I was just texting everyone I knew saying the baby's coming.
[7:42] And then it took another turn.
[7:44] It turned out my son that they didn't kind of predict in the pregnancy was 4.4 kilos.
[7:49] Wow.
[7:50] And so he came out, they panicked, they brought him out with forceps and then I hemorrhaged and lost 900 mils, which in the scheme of hemorrhaging is not huge, but 900 mils on the floor, my husband will tell you is pretty traumatizing.
[8:05] And my son wasn't breathing.
[8:07] So he came out and my mum,
[8:09] My mum ran out of the room and said to my stepdad, she's had a boy and he's not breathing.
[8:13] And it was all distress.
[8:15] And my sister, who's a photographer, was meant to be taking photos of the birth.
[8:18] And I said, put down the camera and hold my leg.
[8:20] So it was like a joke that a lot of birth isn't like the movies, but it was a little bit like the movies at that point of just like screaming and panic.
[8:29] And it was really quick that my son came around.
[8:31] They just gave him a bit of oxygen and a good rub.
[8:34] But I just was like, I felt terrible and everyone was traumatized and
[8:38] They were like, and here's your son, so if you could just breastfeed him.
[8:42] And that was kind of like, I was just like, whoa.
[8:45] How many hours from?
[8:47] I think it was about, yeah, I might have misjudged that then.
[8:50] About 38 hours altogether kind of in the end.
[8:53] And so he's so depleted as well as shocked and, yeah, and going in cocky.
[8:59] I was like, whoa.
[9:00] And so did you start the podcast that day or did you?
[9:03] No.
[9:06] Wow.
[9:06] And I mean, I was lucky in a support sense that I'm really close to my mum and we, my husband and I were both doing our masters.
[9:13] We didn't plan the pregnancy.
[9:14] So we were finishing masters and living at my mum's house at that point.
[9:18] So I went home from that traumatic birth and I had all the support.
[9:22] Like my mum was cooking for me and there was first grandchild.
[9:25] So they're obsessed with like, as soon as we woke up, they were pretty much waiting at the bedroom door.
[9:28] And so I could go and have a shower and I had fantastic postpartum support, but I was still just like, what?
[9:35] And I'm like, what about like, I've got a child now?
[9:38] Is that what you?
[9:39] Yeah, but just like, what was that?
[9:41] Like nobody, I did not expect that.
[9:43] And then you're physically on the back foot and then you're like learning to breastfeed and trying to settle a baby.
[9:49] And often is the case with a traumatic birth that your milk will come in later.
[9:54] So then I didn't have milk and he was a huge baby.
[9:57] He was crying all the time.
[9:58] So, and I feel like
[10:00] I tell this story, but it's incredibly common.
[10:03] And I've now, I mean, I started the podcast just with interviewing my first, or my first episode is my second son and I had a five hour like dream birth with him.
[10:13] So my best birth of my hardest child, pretty much.
[10:15] But, um,
[10:17] So I was like, okay, it can be done and I want to talk about it.
[10:20] And I was sort of approaching people saying, come on the show.
[10:23] So that's like the first 10 episodes are just close friends.
[10:27] But now I've got over 7,000 applications to come on.
[10:29] Yes.
[10:31] Yeah, because there's a form on the website, which I really need to remove.
[10:34] 7,000?
[10:37] Everyone wants to share their birth story I've since found.
[10:40] Yeah.
[10:42] But I reckon about 80% of the submissions are traumatic and people want to talk it through and they want to share it and they don't want other people to go through what they went through.
[10:50] So they want to impart the knowledge.
[10:52] You mentioned cascading interventions.
[10:55] What is cascading?
[10:56] I mean, I know, but just for everyone else, what is cascading?
[10:58] What is cascading interventions?
[11:00] So it's a cascade of interventions where the probability of having more than one intervention after the first one is administered.
[11:08] And it can be triggering for obstetricians and midwives when you say it in that way sometimes because they're like, well, we're there to help and we're trying to do the things.
[11:16] But it's having knowledge and understanding if you say opt to have an epidural
[11:23] then it can lead to needing more assistance.
[11:26] So you're then on your back more often than not and you've got really limited mobility.
[11:30] So therefore you might require more assistance with the baby coming out.
[11:35] So therefore you might need forceps or you might need the Ventus, which is the little suction...
[11:40] or you might need an episiotomy or recommended, I should say, instead of need.
[11:45] But that's that kind of cascade or knock-on of once you have one thing, you're more likely to need another.
[11:51] And that's not just kind of hearsay, that's statistically shown, that you are going to more likely need more than one thing.
[11:57] So having that awareness, and I mean I've had an epidural in my first as well, so I'm not saying don't have them.
[12:02] I'm just saying once you have an understanding of what
[12:06] is involved in one and are acutely aware that it might mean you need other things.
[12:11] So when you agree to it, you know that and you're giving full informed consent, which is really important.
[12:15] Okay, great.
[12:16] I mean, I also, if I can just say before when I was saying how I'm traumatised, I'm not downplaying what Penny went through.
[12:21] She genuinely cannot remember it.
[12:23] She cannot remember what happened with the first birth, which blows my mind because the amount of things that took place that I thought, well, that is just the most awful thing a person can go through and she doesn't remember it.
[12:33] And so she would be the first one to say that I was traumatised and she was not.
[12:37] I think.
[12:38] I think there's value in hearing if Penny's okay with it.
[12:41] I don't know if you've talked to Penny about sharing some of the details because I worry sometimes when you say that, that people write it off as a bloke not being able to handle what's going on.
[12:53] But I think it's important to say that there was genuine trauma in Penny's birth, which me and Soph didn't experience.
[13:00] Yeah.
[13:01] Yeah.
[13:01] And we didn't with our third.
[13:04] Our third, Patrick, was just a dream.
[13:05] It was just such a beautiful experience.
[13:07] I have the best memories of it.
[13:08] It was just everything was great and I loved it so much.
[13:12] First two, not so much.
[13:13] But with Benji, our first, it was, I remember when the waters broke, we'd been to see Star Wars at the cinema and it was like, which was very exciting but probably not only relevant.
[13:27] Which Star Wars?
[13:28] Cool.
[13:28] We'd seen Rogue One.
[13:29] Oh, Rogue One.
[13:31] No, it would have been Rogue One in 2000.
[13:32] Anyway, it was one I can't remember.
[13:33] It's important, Hugh.
[13:36] These are the important days.
[13:38] What session time?
[13:38] Candy Bar?
[13:39] Well, it was nine o'clock.
[13:40] It was like the late one.
[13:41] Oh, okay.
[13:42] And it doesn't matter where it was.
[13:43] But anyway.
[13:44] And I remember she was due around that time.
[13:46] I remember thinking, gosh, this would be great.
[13:48] I don't know why in my head I was like, if she gave birth the same day we saw Star Wars, that would be so cool.
[13:54] Why?
[13:54] Anyway, we got...
[13:56] Anyway, we were about to fall asleep.
[13:58] I think we'd fall asleep that night at one o'clock and we were staying at Penny's parents' place.
[14:02] And she sort of, I'd just fall asleep.
[14:04] She woke me and said, I think my waters are broken.
[14:06] And they had.
[14:07] And we got into the hospital and it was just the whole, we'd been preparing for this, but all of a sudden the waters are breaking and we got into the hospital at two in the morning and we're standing there at the reception.
[14:18] We got up to reception and this I'll never forget, but...
[14:22] Penny's really stressed.
[14:23] Waters are breaking.
[14:24] And I said, oh, hi.
[14:25] My wife's gone into labor.
[14:27] And the lady looked up quickly and then looked down and put her finger in her face and goes, just wait.
[14:31] And just kept filling out a form she was filling out.
[14:34] And she made us wait.
[14:35] There was no one else around.
[14:36] And there was one man.
[14:37] He was vacuuming.
[14:38] The cleaner was there.
[14:39] And he came here, excuse me.
[14:40] And he was like pushing Penny's feet to get her to move because you're trying to vacuum where she was standing.
[14:45] And the receptionist wouldn't look up.
[14:46] And I was like, excuse me, my wife's going to labor.
[14:48] She said, yeah, I heard you.
[14:50] And just put her head down and kept working.
[14:52] And so that kind of stressed us out that no one was really... No one was alarmed.
[14:55] Anyway, the lady said, can you just, you can go and wait in a room over here.
[14:58] And we went into this room and Penny grabbed a box of tissues and threw them against the wall.
[15:02] And it reminded me of what it's like having played cricket a lot when someone goes out and they're really angry afterwards.
[15:07] They just go in the room and just throw things around.
[15:08] I was like, oh, I've dealt with this.
[15:09] It's an angry batsman.
[15:10] Like, it's just going out.
[15:11] I'll just put my head down.
[15:12] And so I sort of just was nice and quiet.
[15:14] And then we went into this, we got to the room and...
[15:18] And it just, Penny was in so much pain and she didn't want to take, she wanted to be drug free.
[15:22] She'd read somewhere.
[15:23] And this is no judgment to anyone.
[15:24] However people do it, you do it however you want to do it.
[15:27] I think that's so important, whatever you feel comfortable with.
[15:29] I do, what I've learned, there's a lot of judgment around the way people choose.
[15:33] It's triggering.
[15:34] It's really, there's like, I remember telling people in a proud way later that Penny was drug free and people would go, yeah, well, I didn't do that.
[15:41] So I don't know why you feel like that's the best.
[15:43] I was like, no, no, I wasn't saying that.
[15:44] Anyway, it's a lot of judgment with it.
[15:47] Penny's in a lot of pain for a very, very long time.
[15:49] And there was, I think, about 14 hours in, she was just, I've never seen a person in so much pain before.
[15:56] And I know this is what happens with childbirth.
[15:58] It's the worst pain you can go through.
[16:00] But I remember that the midwife was starting to look quite stressed as well.
[16:06] At about 15 hours in, they said, look, you're getting pretty close, which close was still another hour away.
[16:12] Yeah.
[16:13] and penny pushes and pushes and she has the baby and as she has the baby um i will never forget this but the it was just us and the midwife and another nurse at the time i think that's my memory anyway my wife runs over to the wall and she smith's a green button on the wall and it's a button i hadn't noticed for the entire 16 hours of there all of a sudden was the most obvious thing in my life
[16:36] and she smashes it with the back of her fist and it just says emergency.
[16:40] And I look up and Penny sort of passes out.
[16:43] She's looking at me and then she sort of passes out.
[16:46] I put Benji on Penny's chest and I wrap.
[16:49] I was sort of, when Penny got birthed off pretty much underneath her, they'd rolled her onto me and I was getting squashed, which is totally fine.
[16:55] That wasn't a problem.
[16:55] I mean, it really hurt my back, but honestly, it's such a small thing.
[16:59] And I'm hanging on to both Benji and Penny and the nurse says, your baby's fine, but Penny's not.
[17:07] And I look up and we are surrounded by doctors.
[17:09] The doors burst open and I've never been so grateful to be in Australia in the health system.
[17:14] Doctors came from everywhere.
[17:15] We were surrounded by doctors.
[17:17] and she had hemorrhaged really badly.
[17:20] And it was on me, like I was underneath her.
[17:24] So the blood, I can't remember what it was.
[17:27] It was a very confronting amount.
[17:29] I can't remember how much we were told.
[17:30] It was very, very serious.
[17:32] He was on me.
[17:32] I was covered in it on the floor.
[17:35] Benji's not crying or anything.
[17:37] He's just on her.
[17:38] And so I'm trying to – I've been told it was the most amazing moment of your life when you see a child for the first time.
[17:43] But Penny had passed out and there was doctors everywhere trying to do what they could.
[17:47] She opens her eyes eventually.
[17:49] When I say eventually, it was probably only 20 or 30 seconds.
[17:51] It felt like a lifetime.
[17:53] They said now she could give birth to a placenta, which I didn't know about that.
[17:56] And I went, what?
[17:56] What do you mean she has to do that?
[17:57] I said, well – I hope you've thought of a second name.
[18:03] We want to meet it first.
[18:09] Anyway, what I was understanding in that moment was because we had the doctors out, I don't think it was life and death, but in another time, in another part of the world, it would have been, it is a chance Penny wouldn't have survived that.
[18:21] Mm-hmm.
[18:22] And I never once for a second thought, I knew it was going to be traumatic and I was going to see some stuff that I had never seen before.
[18:28] And that happened.
[18:28] And I knew I was going to smell some stuff I never smelled before.
[18:30] And I knew that when your baby comes out, you know, you're hoping it's healthy.
[18:35] You're not really sure there's anxiety around that.
[18:37] But I never thought for a second there'd be a time when I'm thinking, is Penny going to survive this?
[18:43] I never prepared myself for that.
[18:45] coupled with the fact that I was expecting that to be the most beautiful moment of my life.
[18:49] And it wasn't.
[18:50] I had this fear of Penny.
[18:52] No one was answering me.
[18:52] I was saying, is Penny going to be okay?
[18:54] And no one would answer.
[18:55] And that to me, I took as this is the worst possible scenario.
[18:59] Now, they did an incredible job and they stitched Penny up and she got through obviously.
[19:06] But it was not – there was no part of it that was enjoyable at all.
[19:11] I'm so happy Penny's forgotten it because, again, she was drug-free, everything –
[19:15] She was tore so badly and they were stitching her up, you know, with no, there's no drugs there.
[19:22] Um, I'm so happy, so grateful she doesn't remember it, but I remember I saw every bit of it.
[19:26] I saw everything that happened and I, Penny had, must've had so much adrenaline and cortisol, whatever it is flowing through her body to, I didn't have that.
[19:35] Yeah.
[19:36] You know, I was, I was watching it and I was thinking I could lose Penny here.
[19:41] That's why I was so unbelievably traumatized and that's why when the second we found out we were having Elsie, I was so stressed and I wasn't excited because I was so excited to have another child and to have a girl.
[19:55] I didn't want to go through that again.
[19:57] I guess what I'm trying to say is I hear you.
[20:00] And I think like you mentioned, Lael, and I've interviewed her on the show too and love everything that she does.
[20:05] And she's trained under Rhea Dempsey, who's incredible, but she does a lot of birth debriefs, not just for the mother, but also for the birthing support person who, as you say, hasn't got all the hormones and isn't kind of lying there in it.
[20:18] You've got this bird's eye view and you've got like obviously double the investment.
[20:23] You're like, love your partner and don't want to see anything terrible happen to them, but also trying to feel excited and...
[20:29] everything for the baby.
[20:30] But there is more of a shift, I think, as you see it rise in doulas and things at the moment.
[20:34] There's more of a shift of really processing that birth and debriefing, because I think we also encourage people, particularly if you're going into another birth, to ask the hospital for your birth notes, because you think, oh, I mean, even with the hemorrhage, like maybe you thought it was two litres or something, you get the notes and it's
[20:51] was three litres or it was 500 mils or something.
[20:54] And that can shape how you go into this second experience.
[20:57] So having that kind of documentation to refer back to based on like all the emotions and what you thought went down, I think there's a real movement of people processing birth differently, which perhaps, yeah, would have helped you a bit more.
[21:11] I don't know if you did a bit of that before you went into the second.
[21:14] Yeah, Lyle was incredible.
[21:16] It just became a one-on-one counselling session for me, but I still felt no amount of talk therapy was going to get me to a point where I was looking forward to the second one.
[21:24] Yeah.
[21:25] And the second one was really traumatic as well, really traumatic as well.
[21:28] Obviously there's a lot that you can't control in childbirth, but do you think people's grasping for control and not being able to get it can be a cause of trauma in itself?
[21:41] Yeah.
[21:43] I think people have an idea that if I have a drug-free birth and I have the birth that I planned for and my dream comes true, that they'll instantly love the baby and then everything will be great.
[21:55] And I think we've really tried to show through the podcast as well that even when everything's perfect, you can still look at this baby and then perhaps develop postnatal depression or anything.
[22:04] Like it's not going to be the number one fix for you.
[22:07] And similarly, we've had people come on who wanted, say, a drug-free birth.
[22:11] Not saying that that's like the thing you should aspire to, but on the spectrum of things.
[22:16] Say they went in wanting that.
[22:18] They had an emergency cesarean, but they'd thought about that and they thought, if I have to have an emergency cesarean, I want the doctors not to talk about the weather and I want...
[22:27] my playlist to still be on and I want the baby to be put on me straight away and I want to see the drape come down and they've thought of all the little intricacies that they can control in that environment.
[22:37] Those women have reported feeling a sense of less trauma because they felt in control of the situation.
[22:45] I think it's really that sense of being out of control and not knowing what's going to happen that really contributes and feeds into that trauma.
[22:53] If you can think about all the different things and you're not blindsided and you've built an incredible relationship with a known care provider, like we know the best outcomes is if you know your care provider through the antenatal process, they're at your birth and they help you postnatally, then you're going to have the best outcome.
[23:10] Like science backs that up, whether that's an obstetrician or a midwife, whichever model you...
[23:15] But having that known care provider, so you're not in the middle of labour going...
[23:20] I want the epidural and they're like, oh, you said you didn't want the epidural.
[23:24] You want someone who knows you and knows your expectations and perhaps knows that your last birth didn't go to plan and you're not trying to bring them up to speed in between contractions because that's, yeah, it's not good for anyone.
[23:36] Just back to the playlist that you mentioned, is there a most common song that...
[23:42] I don't think so.
[23:43] Yeah.
[23:44] I didn't have one.
[23:45] I feel like most people, I don't know if you guys had a playlist, but, like, you can't get Bluetooth working or you're like, shut that off.
[23:50] What a nightmare.
[23:52] Yeah.
[23:53] It was probably my biggest fail in the whole process was that I was put in charge of a playlist and for whatever reason I made the playlist, like, an hour and a half long or an hour long and I was, like, done.
[24:04] On repeat.
[24:05] So I was, like, what happened to the playlist?
[24:07] And I'm, like, it's finished and I reckon we had probably 14 hours to go.
[24:15] But then ironically, like auto playlist after that based on what I'd done and we didn't know what sex was going to be.
[24:24] And it worked out that I remember that the Pixies Here Comes Your Man came on and Charlie was birthed to do that.
[24:35] That's cool.
[24:36] Yeah, which I remember at the time, it's a strange thing to pop in my head, but I'm like, if this is a boy, this is amazing.
[24:41] This is amazing.
[24:42] The musician in you was like, yeah, this is well played.
[24:45] More of it was a pixie, that would have been it.
[24:47] Yeah, true.
[24:48] Has anyone ever, I mean, I feel like I would be so tempted to get an orchestra in there and live score.
[24:54] I feel like having like a live reactive score to the bird thing, that would be incredible.
[24:59] Incredible.
[24:59] Imagine.
[25:00] You're friends with Whipper, aren't you?
[25:02] Yes.
[25:02] Yeah, because he wore a GoPro on his head for his wife.
[25:04] Of course he did.
[25:05] So I've interviewed his lovely wife.
[25:07] Oh, Lisa, yeah.
[25:08] Yeah.
[25:09] And, yeah, so he really went in.
[25:10] Oh, wow.
[25:12] Do you know what mum played for you when you were born?
[25:15] Yes, four seasons.
[25:16] Yeah, Vivaldi's four seasons.
[25:17] Yeah, Vivaldi's four seasons.
[25:18] And I think she doesn't listen to it anymore.
[25:19] No, I think it's kind of, yeah.
[25:22] I was going to ask you, Josh, I know this is your show, but I'll just take over the mic.
[25:25] Yeah, please do.
[25:27] I feel like there's a school of thought that perhaps if you're doing, say, hypnobirthing and stuff, it's like unbelievable.
[25:32] I'm only listening to positive stories.
[25:34] I don't want to hear anything negative.
[25:36] And there's a philosophy.
[25:36] There's even some birth courses, which we won't name in shame, that say don't listen to Australian birth stories because I do share such a variety of experiences.
[25:46] And I was wondering, did you find it helpful then hearing that traumatic story from your brother going into your birth or do you feel like it helped you in a way to be more prepared?
[25:56] Great question.
[25:57] Really good question.
[25:58] I...
[26:00] I'm trying to remember back to how much you told me before our first birth.
[26:05] Like I wouldn't have told you.
[26:06] I don't think you told me all the details.
[26:08] I knew Penny hemorrhaged and I was aware of the fact that things can go, that for me personally and for Soph and I, we went into it knowing that things can go really wrong.
[26:21] And so for us it was really important to be in a hospital around the best possible medical care if that was to happen.
[26:30] I find it very hard if anyone wants to know what it's like because of the obvious thing that was mentioned before in that it does seem to me that it's always so different.
[26:41] And I'm aware of that.
[26:42] I remember hearing years ago a TED talk by the writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, I think that's how you pronounce it, called The Danger of a Single Story.
[26:52] And it was how we can get attached to the idea of a single story.
[26:55] And this was in a completely different environment.
[26:58] But she's a writer from Nigeria.
[27:00] And in this context, she was talking about when you only see one story of what it's like, that's how you develop false assumptions and racism builds in and all this kind of stuff.
[27:08] And how important it is to tell multiple stories, which is why your podcast is so incredible.
[27:13] And I imagine why it's been successful is people being able to hear that there's infinite ways that birth can happen.
[27:21] So I'm always tentative in telling any part of our story because I don't want it to cloud people's assumptions of what might happen.
[27:27] Same with being a parent because everything is so different.
[27:30] So I heard a bit about it.
[27:32] I think it was helpful for me to be reassured, but then our birth story was so different.
[27:37] I guess to put it back in a question to you is that when men have asked me, like, what can you do?
[27:42] I find that really tricky to answer because there's so much that you can do, but there's also like there's a point there's so many unknowns.
[27:54] And it is one of the things I found tricky during the birth is that I like
[27:59] did so much work to prepare myself.
[28:01] I thought this might come up, but I sort of, I saw a psychologist for years on a lot of stuff and I, and it was really, I had this really poignant session and I was rereading an email that I, to get into the mindset cause I sent her an email after the birth and I hadn't realized that I was in a session with my psychologist when Soph's waters broke and,
[28:22] And that was a really cathartic, important session for me.
[28:26] And during the birth and after the birth, I realized that without knowing all that work that I'd done with the psychologist, it felt like it all was for this moment to become a father.
[28:40] And I hadn't actually framed it like that at all, but it allowed me to be present in the way that Soph needed me to be present throughout the birthing experience and not avoid it and be the best possible version that I had of myself at the time.
[28:54] So for me, the only advice I would want to give people is to do the work on yourself that you think is needed in any form so you can be the best possible version of yourself for whatever comes up.
[29:05] in a birth because it could be anything, but you want to be able to tackle that with all your faculties as well as you can.
[29:12] Yeah.
[29:13] Well, we've created our own birth course, the birth class, and the first module is almost primed for the birth support person and I feel like it gets them on board because I think you hear a lot of, oh, well, she has to do it or...
[29:26] and a reluctance for... We're talking about men, obviously, because we're talking to you guys, but we're very inclusive on the podcast as well to talk about same-sex couples and solo parents.
[29:35] And so I recognise that families come together in a multitude of ways, particularly in Australia.
[29:41] But I think that module is really good in that understanding the physiology of birth, because I think I even didn't have a good understanding of that in the first birth because there's a sense of like...
[29:53] So there's this intense pain, but it's not pain like when you stub your toe or when you cut your finger.
[29:59] It's a physiological pain with a purpose.
[30:02] So I guess, and Ria in this first interview talks a lot about, yeah, pain.
[30:08] She likens it to a marathon runner.
[30:10] Like when a marathon runner is running, you don't go, oh, poor guy, look, he looks like he's really struggling or she and is like sweating propusely and is this looks totally out of it.
[30:20] Let's give them all the drugs to get them over the line.
[30:23] Instead, you think, look how hard they're working.
[30:26] They're really pushing themselves.
[30:27] They're almost there.
[30:29] They're really striving and this is their best work.
[30:32] And if you reframe labour in that way and then you look at your partner perhaps in that way, instead of pitting them and feeling sorry for them and trying to limp them along the line and help them in that way, you're really kind of...
[30:44] I'm just thinking of that analogy, kind of almost giving them a glucose shot or like giving them words of encouragement to kind of support the natural process of what they're doing.
[30:55] And that's obviously if they're going for an intervention free birth and helping support that.
[31:00] recognizing that that physiology and that crisis of confidence is going to come where you just, I don't know if your partners did it, but it's very common for people towards the very end to go, I'm out, just give me all the drugs or let's have a cesarean or I can't do this.
[31:16] I just want to go home.
[31:17] I'm going to just shut my legs and let's make this stop.
[31:20] And that is a very common and it's hilarious.
[31:23] I need to like trim all those bits down and just have all the lines of what people said.
[31:27] Like people hide at one point.
[31:29] It's like, who are you hiding from?
[31:30] It's within you.
[31:32] But it's like, I don't want to play anymore.
[31:34] But recognising that those things are going to come and then you have a bit of a plan of like how to support them rather than how to go, oh, yeah, she's not coping.
[31:44] And I think another thing that often happens, and again, I don't know if it happened for you guys, but...
[31:49] I became really non-verbal.
[31:50] You just like are so focused on the task of what's happening.
[31:54] And I think I found it really beneficial in my second to really go inwards and think, okay, the baby's literally moving down.
[32:01] And each time I feel a contraction, it's just everything opening for the baby to come down rather than, oh God, it's coming and tensing and working against it, working with it, and thinking this is positive and it's purposeful.
[32:14] Um, and having somebody look at you and understand that and support you in that way
[32:19] just can transform what unfolds, I think.
[32:23] I found that the really good point of the nonverbal thing, and it just made me think of, because I went in thinking and people saying like, you've got to support your partner, which obviously, but in my mind, I immediately go to the way other people would do it and Hollywood stories of like kind of like almost being, and then you hear the term like cheering and like motivating, all that kind of stuff.
[32:51] But that's not Soph.
[32:53] Like she wouldn't want me to stand there like... Yeah, and be cheesy.
[32:56] Like yelling and like counting and doing... Like I found myself having to really concentrate and be as present as possible to like what is actually going to be the support that she needs at this moment.
[33:08] Like...
[33:09] And it was kind of challenging to think of ways that were, it had to be real rather than what I'd seen in different areas and things, if that makes sense.
[33:19] Yeah.
[33:19] Yeah.
[33:20] So one of the positive memories I do have, just thought of that, Josh, was like how present I was for the whole time.
[33:25] And the reason, the last person who talked to me about my role was Martin Heppel, who we've had on the podcast before.
[33:32] From the Resilience Project.
[33:33] Yeah.
[33:33] So he had been through this, I think, just once at that point.
[33:37] But he said that...
[33:38] My memory is that Rack's wife, Jen, I think it was a similar, it was like a long, I think it was like 20 hours, maybe I'll double check that.
[33:45] But he said he made a rule himself, he was not going to leave the room, he was going to be there the entire time.
[33:51] And he told me this story that, because that had been up, it happened at night, so he'd been up for something like 20 hours at this point.
[33:58] No, it was like 30 hours he'd been awake for, and he noticed when Jen was really starting
[34:04] of these really strong contractions.
[34:05] He noticed his eyes were closing because he hadn't slept in like a couple of days or whatever it was.
[34:09] It was a long time.
[34:10] And he was like, no, this can't happen.
[34:11] And so he said, I'll be back in a second.
[34:13] He sprinted down the hallway.
[34:15] It was like a vending machine and he like bought two cans of Coke.
[34:20] So he like got a pen out and stabbed the bottle.
[34:23] He said, mate, I just shotgunned two cans of Coke.
[34:26] I had Coke, as in Coca-Cola, I had Coca-Cola dripping out my eyeballs and I sprinted back and I said, mate, I'm back, we're on.
[34:32] Why didn't you just open it?
[34:33] Because he wanted to really properly inhale.
[34:37] I felt like he just felt like I can't be gone for too long here, so I'll shotgun both of them.
[34:40] That's the quickest way to do it.
[34:42] Knowing Rack, I can't imagine him drinking a can of Coke in any other way.
[34:48] It's his normal way of drinking Coke.
[34:50] That must be.
[34:51] And so that was in my mind.
[34:54] I didn't shotgun cans of Coke, but I remember that was the, I'm going to be so, I'm always so inspired by Rack, but I was like, no, I'm going to follow his, I'm going to be so present here.
[35:03] I remember at one point the thing that was really making it hard for me was how hungry I was.
[35:07] Oh, yeah, what about a problem?
[35:12] Just like have like the Uber Eats app open under the bed, just like scrolling.
[35:16] Yeah.
[35:19] That was my main thing of like the thing that I'm really struggling with here is how hungry I am but I can't say that.
[35:23] And when they were bringing food in occasionally, Penny didn't want it but I didn't feel like I could say, can I have that?
[35:28] Leave that.
[35:30] She probably wouldn't have liked the smell as well.
[35:32] You're so hypersensitive.
[35:33] Yeah, so I was like, no, no, don't worry, I don't need that.
[35:35] But then I think at one point I said, I might just go to the toilet but I'll go to...
[35:39] Shotgun a sandwich.
[35:40] Yeah.
[35:42] Just deep-throated a sandwich.
[35:48] Probably could have used a better terminology.
[35:51] No, the visual.
[35:54] And she said, yeah, just because she had a toilet in there.
[35:57] And I said, I might use a different one.
[35:59] I just want it just in case.
[36:00] It's just like you need to go in there.
[36:02] And I have sprinted so fast down the hospital hall to the cafeteria and then got there and realised how much I wanted it to be a toasted ham and cheese sandwich.
[36:08] I said, how long will that take?
[36:10] It's about five minutes.
[36:11] And I went, okay, I'm going to wait.
[36:13] Oh, I love it.
[36:15] This is classic.
[36:16] It's a detail I've never heard before.
[36:19] And I thought, well, I am actually quite tired.
[36:23] I haven't had coffee in age, so we'll get a coffee as well.
[36:25] So I got a coffee as well.
[36:28] I might have him in, actually.
[36:29] Just take it.
[36:33] And I had this toasted sandwich and it was the most wonderful, most wonderful toasted sandwich.
[36:40] Yeah.
[36:41] Well, you were going through something pretty tough.
[36:42] You need to look after yourself.
[36:44] People usually talk about the first meal they have after giving birth, but let's hear more about it.
[36:47] Yeah, yeah.
[36:49] I ran back in and I was like, of course Penny wouldn't have noticed how long I was going for.
[36:54] And her dad was there.
[36:55] He sort of took over the duty.
[36:56] She had that.
[36:57] What was that thing that people, we didn't do it for the second or third.
[37:00] It's like you put it on your back and it gives you electric shocks.
[37:03] The TENS machine.
[37:04] The TENS machine.
[37:05] So when Penny was, you did it?
[37:06] Yeah.
[37:07] Oh, I didn't.
[37:07] Soph did.
[37:08] Yeah.
[37:08] But I was on the.
[37:09] Yeah, you're on the dial.
[37:10] The boost button.
[37:11] The boost, yeah.
[37:12] Basically administer electric shock as the contraction happens.
[37:15] It's almost like a distraction of like, I know that hurts, but this is something that hurts more for you.
[37:20] That hurts, yeah.
[37:21] Is that the purpose of it?
[37:22] It like confuses the pain pathway.
[37:24] Oh, wow.
[37:25] I mean, it's like a vibration.
[37:27] It's not their full-blown electric shock.
[37:29] But it really rewires.
[37:30] So you think of that rather than the contraction, and I think they're the best.
[37:34] It's like if you've got a headache, you pinch your hand or something.
[37:38] Yeah, it's similar philosophy.
[37:41] I think one of the other things that is common for people to discuss and think about beforehand is whether or not to have an epidural.
[37:47] And I know Penny for the first one was like, no, no, I'm definitely going to have that.
[37:50] And I think Riosi, the second one, I think when she got to the hospital, she said, I'm having an epidural before she said her name.
[37:58] Of a latte and an epidural, please.
[38:01] Yeah.
[38:03] which is the injection into the spine to numb, so it takes away all the pain below the hips basically.
[38:08] Yeah.
[38:09] Which can make it a bit more difficult because you don't know when you're feeling the pressure to push all that kind of stuff.
[38:13] But these are the discussions that people have.
[38:15] But I remember with Elsie,
[38:17] they said you need to have it by a certain time, otherwise it just doesn't work or it works.
[38:22] It can hinder things.
[38:23] It can slow things down.
[38:25] Yeah, because there is a point apparently where, I think you just referred to it before, where the pain pretty much, I think I'm remembering Lael saying to me, the pain will pretty much double.
[38:34] There's a point where...
[38:36] when you're getting closer, the pain goes from the worst pain I've ever had to this is now twice as bad as what I had before.
[38:42] And that's when people say, no, I'm not going to do this actually.
[38:45] I'll change my mind.
[38:45] Thank you for having me.
[38:46] And they're usually at the finish.
[38:47] Yeah.
[38:48] Yeah, but they're so close.
[38:50] So Penny said, I'm going to have an epidural this time.
[38:52] And about an hour and a half in, she said, I'm ready to have it.
[38:54] And I said, okay, great.
[38:56] I'm so relieved to hear that.
[38:57] Let's do that.
[38:58] So...
[38:59] We then said to the midwife who'd like to get the epidural and the midwife said, yeah, okay, I'll call the lady now, the epidural lady.
[39:06] And she called and said, yeah, she'll be here probably in about 45 minutes, maybe an hour.
[39:10] She's got some other epidurals.
[39:12] And I went, no, no, we need her now.
[39:14] We'll pay double.
[39:17] Turned out to be 45 minutes.
[39:18] And when she came in, they said, okay, just sit up and the lady said to her.
[39:24] Anesthesiologist.
[39:26] Yeah.
[39:26] That's why they are there.
[39:27] Yeah.
[39:28] Well done.
[39:28] Very good.
[39:30] Said, so just so you know, and we hadn't been told this, but part of the disclaimer before it is, which really rattled both of us, and it shouldn't have, but if we'd been prepared for it.
[39:42] And she said, just so you know, this might...
[39:44] cause you to – you may never get feeling in your league's back ever again or it could lead to death.
[39:49] I think that was – is that something like that?
[39:51] Yeah.
[39:52] And you're signing your waivers.
[39:53] Yeah, so you're signing them.
[39:54] I think I had to sign as well maybe.
[39:56] I can't remember.
[39:56] But then Penny went, no, hang on, what?
[39:58] I didn't know that.
[39:59] Yeah.
[39:59] I said, no, I think it's just an disclaimer.
[40:00] It'll be totally fine.
[40:01] I don't think that's going to happen.
[40:03] But she just said it could.
[40:04] Yeah.
[40:04] And meanwhile, trying to – you know, the intensity of the whole thing is going on, the lady said –
[40:09] Her social skills were probably the worst I've ever seen.
[40:12] And she said, do you want this or not?
[40:13] Like snapped at Penny.
[40:15] And Penny said, I don't know.
[40:16] And she said, well, make up your mind.
[40:18] She was awful.
[40:19] Anyway, I wrote a long letter about her and I didn't send it because I didn't want to.
[40:22] But she said, you need to sit up.
[40:25] So Penny sits up and Penny said, oh, I can kind of feel something.
[40:27] There's something there.
[40:28] And she said, no, no, it's fine.
[40:29] We're doing it anyway.
[40:30] And I said to the midwife, do you want to check?
[40:32] What can Penny feel?
[40:34] And he said, I feel like I can feel the head.
[40:35] And then she said, no, it won't be that.
[40:36] No.
[40:37] And I said, do we want to check this before we go and give the epidural before it's too late?
[40:41] And then the lady was still getting ready to do it.
[40:44] I said, do you want to wait for one second?
[40:45] Because I just want to...
[40:47] So the midwife checked and said, oh, no, that's the head.
[40:49] The head's there.
[40:50] Gosh, okay, we're really close.
[40:51] It's too late for the epidural.
[40:52] Yeah.
[40:53] An epidural lady, the anaesthetist.
[40:55] Anaesthetist.
[40:56] Yeah, anaesthetist.
[40:57] Yeah, that's not, an amethesiologist is not it.
[40:59] Anaesthetist.
[41:00] Sorry.
[41:00] Yeah, yeah, good.
[41:02] We got there.
[41:03] She cracked it.
[41:04] She went, oh, you're kidding me.
[41:05] Okay, no worries, I'll just leave then.
[41:06] And Pacta got really angry.
[41:08] She got really angry at Penny for the fact that the head had just dropped all of a sudden.
[41:12] Yeah.
[41:13] And so an hour later, Penny had Elsie.
[41:15] So it was three hours that time and it was all of a sudden it was on again and Penny had this 45 minutes of going, the pain's about to be taken away.
[41:24] We had a plan.
[41:24] We'd planned for everything but all of a sudden it just went from, you know, we were 16 hours of bed and it was an hour and a half we were being told it's happening now.
[41:31] The epidural is taken away.
[41:32] So these things just happen throughout.
[41:34] They're just, and I'm thinking, oh, not again.
[41:35] This is happening again.
[41:36] Oh, no, we're going back to the same place right before.
[41:39] And then Elsie was just like, bang, I'm here.
[41:41] And she just came out.
[41:42] So it wasn't quite what we had with.
[41:44] But that moment there where we had someone we didn't know come in, and that's always going to be the case with the anaesthetist.
[41:49] You're not going to know them.
[41:50] The epidural is a big decision for people to make.
[41:54] but you need to have it by a certain time.
[41:56] And we realised that but we also didn't plan for the fact that Elsie was going to turn up literally 15 hours before her brother did.
[42:02] So why am I telling this story?
[42:05] I don't really know.
[42:06] But I think it just brings up a few things.
[42:09] Like it brings up the continuity of care thing.
[42:11] You had a random person, you were in the throes of labour and you had to negotiate that and then unfortunately it sounds like she was perhaps burnt out and overworked and didn't handle it as well as she should have.
[42:21] So you don't want to be deciding whether you want that risk factor in that point in between contractions trying to stay still.
[42:27] Similarly, things like episiotomies where they make an incision so the baby can come out.
[42:31] You don't want to be learning what that is in the middle.
[42:33] Like you don't want to be deciphering the pros and cons at that point.
[42:35] They're the discussions and they're the kind of point of educating yourselves beforehand so that you're not, you're like, hang on, we know what we want there.
[42:43] Like we talked about that and we both agreed we'll do this.
[42:46] And yeah, I just think, and it's like that go with the flow and show up and the experts will know.
[42:51] It's like just has been disproven that you are more likely to be traumatised and not have the birth experience you want.
[42:58] Because going with the flow is not an option really.
[43:00] Yeah, I mean, I do need to say we put in so much effort into planning everything.
[43:04] And I also don't want to sound like I'm having a go at hospital staff because, I mean, they saved Penny's life the first time around and they were incredible.
[43:11] And second time wasn't so good.
[43:13] But with Patrick, it was extraordinary to see how good they were and how wonderful the whole thing was.
[43:18] It's, yeah, so I'm not...
[43:20] Yeah, and I think one other thing that I picked up from that too was that people are dismissive of like, yeah, but you've got a healthy baby, you're fine now, you move on.
[43:28] But you remember the detail of those three separate births.
[43:32] clearly.
[43:33] And I think that comes up in the podcast too.
[43:35] People are like, I'm not sure if I'll remember.
[43:36] And then they tell you every minute detail because it is such a pivotal life altering moment for you.
[43:42] And it's dismissive to say, oh, it's one hellish day and then you've got a parent and that's the hard bit, which is hard.
[43:48] But you can't dismiss the importance of how you cared for in that moment.
[43:52] I realise I didn't answer your question that you asked me before very well.
[43:56] I kind of moved on to something else and I've got a better answer now, which is about hearing...
[44:01] Sorry, it's too late.
[44:03] The moment's gone.
[44:04] We have to move on, Josh.
[44:07] Hearing about Hugh and Penny's birth, if that helped.
[44:11] It definitely did.
[44:12] And I also realised that I, it's a strange sidestep, but my, in a previous job before this, I was filming things and making video content.
[44:23] And I was really fortunate enough to do a lot of work with a bunch of robotic surgeons who are robotic assisted surgery.
[44:30] So I was going into in the year before that, I was going into surgeries and seeing all types of surgeries, some of which were extremely graphic and things I'd never seen before.
[44:41] And some of the most graphic stuff I've ever seen.
[44:43] The amount of times I walked into your office when you were editing those videos and nearly fainted.
[44:48] Yeah, it was full on.
[44:50] There was one time I walked into your office and you had like a VR headset on doing.
[44:53] Oh, yeah, yeah, because it was VR.
[44:55] They were VR.
[44:56] It was incredible work these people are doing of taking the surgeries, putting them into VR so then surgeons can train in VR for future surgery.
[45:07] But what it meant for me that was when I got to the hospital, I'd been into a hospital environment and been in amongst surgery that was a lot more graphic and traumatic and well, I mean, it's not a competition, but it was extremely graphic stuff.
[45:26] So then a lot of the things, the machines, the people, the different roles, I was a lot more familiar with.
[45:33] So none of it really threw me.
[45:35] Whereas I remember hearing you having not been in there, all these people coming in, all the different scenarios you hadn't been exposed to.
[45:42] And obviously it's just a small exposure I had from sort of 10 or 15 surgeries I'd been to.
[45:46] However, being in there, hearing Hugh's story, the more variety of stuff that I've heard and experienced helps so much.
[45:55] So my answer to that is not just that hearing Hugh's story is helpful, but the more variety of what can happen and what happens and the different roles and who that person is and why that person's there and why is there now six people in here when there wasn't before.
[46:09] All of that...
[46:11] And also the casualness in which medical professionals operate, I find really reassuring.
[46:17] Whereas I imagine if you hadn't experienced it and you go into this scenario where it's like the biggest thing that has ever happened and suddenly there's all these people seeming really casual about it, could feel like they're not taking it seriously.
[46:30] Whereas I had that prep to know that this just means they're extremely good at their job.
[46:34] Yeah, this is normal.
[46:36] This is normal.
[46:36] Yeah, especially if you've gone from a dimly lit room where you're trying to birth your baby, you've got the fairy lights, you've got the playlist, and then they're like, bang, emergency caesarean.
[46:46] If you know you're going to be flying down the hallway...
[46:48] And when you get into that surgical room, there'll be 10 people quite literally.
[46:51] And these are their roles.
[46:52] And this is not abnormal.
[46:54] You're not like an anomaly here.
[46:56] This is what they do.
[46:57] Then that can be reassuring, I think, in a time of flux.
[47:00] I think there's a danger as well in men in the excuse of like, well, there's only so much I can do in a way that... And I think it can come from a good place of like respecting the fact that at the end of the day it's your... Or the person giving birth, I should say.
[47:18] But in my case as a man, there's only so much I could do.
[47:22] To use that as an excuse to not...
[47:24] Do the work.
[47:25] Do the work.
[47:26] Yeah.
[47:27] And you'd be like, well, she's the one going through it, so she has to do all that, you know.
[47:31] But there's so much you can do in educating yourself.
[47:33] So you're not thrown and you can be the best person you can to support the person going through the physical birth.
[47:40] Yeah, definitely.
[47:41] I would say the more present you are, the easier it becomes for them, would be my, if I could simplify it.
[47:46] The more present you are...
[47:48] I don't think easy is going to be the word, but the greatest thing you can do is be as present as possible in whichever way they want you to be present, I would say.
[47:58] And for me, that means hearing as many versions, doing the research, like doing it.
[48:03] It's like, how do you want to fail?
[48:07] Do you want to fail by being casual about the whole thing or do you want to fail by doing as much possible research
[48:14] research and understand as you can.
[48:16] So even if you have the perfect birth that is easy, well, you didn't have to pull out all the knowledge and stuff that you've required.
[48:23] Yeah, yeah.
[48:25] With Penny's history of mental ill health, I was, well, we were both, I guess, on the lookout for signs of postnatal depression or anxiety.
[48:34] And Penny was lucky in it that that was never something that happened for her.
[48:39] I'm so curious to know with the conversations you've had, what have you learned about, I mean, it's so common and it's such a tough thing for any family to go through.
[48:50] What have you learned about postnatal depression?
[48:52] Yeah, I think there's definitely risk factors and you can see that care providers, even though they've got limited time, like those antenatal appointments are so short, but they do often ask and screen for risk factors in your family or say you've got a history of mental illness, then you are at an increased risk of developing these things.
[49:10] You can perhaps pre-book in some, if you're already seeing a psychologist, you can pre-book them in or be ready for like, these are some of
[49:22] real hormonal shift where a lot of people sort of are really emotional at that time and there's tears and you kind of think is this the baby blues or is this more significant and I think in Australia we're really lucky we've got incredible organisations COPE which is the centre of perinatal excellence
[49:39] um they're just cope.org and then panda who are incredible and um there's a lot of online resources that you can um go to to kind of peg do I need some more support and perhaps you're not feeling ready to to share with friends and family because again those kind of shoulds and I should be able to do this I should instinctively know how to breastfeed or I should instinctively be able to cope everybody else is coping why can't I do this I think
[50:04] that comes up very early in mothering and yet there's a point where, okay, this is more significant and you do need an expert or extra support.
[50:16] And also I think it's worth mentioning that it's not just the person who gave birth who can suffer from it.
[50:22] I feel like we don't talk enough about a lot of the time men, but just anyone who is the non-birthing partner in the relationship can also go through significant challenges.
[50:33] Actually, we had Jack Post on the podcast and I've never heard someone speak so vulnerably and honestly about their experience with postnatal depression.
[50:43] Yeah, it's an incredibly moving episode.
[50:45] And if that's you right now going through something like this, then yeah, there is hope.
[50:50] And we'll definitely pop a link to that in the show notes.
[50:53] It actually makes me think of something which we were warned about but didn't really give it the...
[50:59] I guess the gravity it deserved is day three blues.
[51:02] Yeah.
[51:03] Like the third day after giving birth can be a really, really low point for the mum.
[51:10] And I remember we sort of braced for it and went, here it comes.
[51:15] And it was, I mean, I remember Penny and myself and Penny's dad went for a walk just to get a coffee down the road.
[51:21] And she was trying her hardest, but it was just overwhelming.
[51:25] I remember I think the...
[51:27] She was sitting, the only chair left was sitting right near the door and people get over the door into her chair.
[51:32] She nearly threw the chair through the window.
[51:35] It was like she was so distressed and upset and down and low and then it happened for the second time as well.
[51:42] And then the third time with Patrick, it was me.
[51:43] I had it.
[51:44] I was bracing for Penny and she didn't have it and I just...
[51:47] That's the most disconnect that I've ever felt from my family ever.
[51:49] I was so, I barely even engaged with Penny or the kids that whole day.
[51:55] I was so flat.
[51:56] And I didn't know it was a thing that could happen to men as well.
[51:58] But I was literally fine the next day.
[52:00] But it was just a, and it hits you out of nowhere.
[52:03] Yeah.
[52:03] What are the thoughts?
[52:05] What are the day three blues?
[52:07] Like what is it?
[52:07] Is it just like down mood or specifically?
[52:09] Extremely low mood.
[52:11] I mean I don't know how common it is for the partner to get it.
[52:13] I'm not sure maybe if that's a thing.
[52:14] No, it can be, yeah, because you're actually picking up on a lot of the hormones in the pregnancy and things as well and it's the life change and the understanding of like and I think that reminder of, oh, I know what's coming now, like with the subsequent child.
[52:26] Yeah, I mean how wrong was I?
[52:28] Patrick has just been a dream.
[52:30] He sleeps...
[52:32] it's not what we've had with the first two, put it that way.
[52:34] But I was just, here we go again, what are we doing?
[52:37] Like why on earth are we this?
[52:38] And I think I was sort of angry at Penny, but I just, I wouldn't even really talk to her.
[52:44] And she went with my son, because I remember, we both remember it really well, but I just didn't want to, I've never done this in how long we've been together for.
[52:50] I didn't even want to look at her, but I was so angry that we were back here again.
[52:53] Actually, I was thinking we were so nearly out of it.
[52:55] We had like a, you know, the five and three role was so nearly there and now we're back here again.
[52:59] I feel like Patrick maybe even heard me telling Penny that because he went, all right, I'll be fine.
[53:04] I'll pull up my socks.
[53:06] I'm not going to do it.
[53:08] I won't do it.
[53:08] The other two did.
[53:08] It's fine.
[53:10] Extreme emotions though.
[53:11] And I think it can be classically just crying for no reason, crying with joy, crying with sadness, just like the emotions are everywhere.
[53:17] And am I right in thinking it's partly, part of it is triggered by the hormonal, what your body's been through.
[53:23] So you're depleted.
[53:24] Yeah, and you've built up extra hormones over the nine months.
[53:27] And as soon as you birth that placenta, a huge number of your hormones, it's the biggest hormonal drop you'll ever have in your life.
[53:32] And it happens in three days and you've accumulated it over a lifetime.
[53:36] So it's just like you literally, they talk about a postpartum cliff of falling off that cliff of support and a lot of things.
[53:42] And it's like a hormonal cliff drop too.
[53:44] Yeah.
[53:45] And it's, it's, um, it's something that we don't ever, you don't see because now I think it's exacerbated the feeling if someone's going through it, I feel like no one else goes through this because on social media, we will say, I'm fair enough as well.
[53:57] People are posting the beautiful photos of their child and the connected photos with the partner and.
[54:02] the best photos they can find, which makes sense.
[54:03] Of course you can do that.
[54:05] But I do think when the day three blues hit, you feel like, why am I?
[54:09] Look at everyone else has just got beautiful photos.
[54:11] Yeah, they're discreetly feeding at a cafe, having the time of their life.
[54:15] Yeah, and I couldn't feel worse right now.
[54:17] And you do feel alone because you've had this support building up to it and the excitement.
[54:21] It's like dropping off a cliff.
[54:22] Yeah.
[54:23] And I say that from experience.
[54:24] I felt that myself.
[54:25] Someone who's never, ever had any mental health problems, very, very lucky.
[54:30] But that day, that day three, it was, I just, I think about that when I'm talking to someone who's really struggling with mental health, I always reflect on that day that I had.
[54:38] It was like, for a day I felt that.
[54:41] So yeah, it's quite severe.
[54:43] Yeah.
[54:44] One thing that came up then that I don't think is talked about a lot as well is, and you mentioned it, in the amount of support you get, and we've spent so much time today focusing on the birth and the amount of support and necessary support and preparation you do.
[55:01] And then you go home and you buy yourself with a baby with you get a maternal child health nurse turns up, has a little bit of a look around and leaves.
[55:11] And for a lot of people, some people have more support than others.
[55:15] But is there any kind of is there anything people can be doing to prepare for that?
[55:21] Because I feel like you're so unsupported once you have the kids.
[55:24] It's huge and I've just written a book on it actually, so coming out.
[55:27] Oh, great.
[55:28] No, but it's true.
[55:29] And even the budget, the Australian Federal Maternity Budget, 6% is allocated to postpartum.
[55:36] That just says a lot of how it's valued and how the support is there and you kind of have that six-week check and you've been flying blind basically for six weeks trying to learn and navigate everything and then you go to your six-week appointment and they're like, okay, so you're good to go.
[55:51] to do and they usually ask you about contraception and it's the last thing you're thinking about.
[55:55] And it's like, good luck with the parenting side.
[55:57] So, yeah, it's huge and that's, yeah, probably a whole another episode.
[56:02] Yeah.
[56:02] I'll just invite myself back.
[56:08] I wanted to ask something which it's sort of a sad question.
[56:12] I'm sort of nervous to ask it because it's – but I feel like it's a very real part of it where the child like doesn't make it.
[56:23] And like I just feel – it just feels – really I feel I was like nervous to ask it because it's kind of like –
[56:28] makes me really sad to think about it.
[56:30] But that must be a story that you hear a lot.
[56:34] Yeah, we definitely share that on the podcast as well with a disclaimer.
[56:37] Yeah.
[56:38] What brave individuals who come on and tell you those stories.
[56:40] Yeah, incredible.
[56:42] I think it's beautiful to see how people are so vulnerable and open in sharing loss of at any stage in their pregnancy.
[56:48] It's alarming that in Australia, those rates haven't decreased.
[56:51] And I don't want to...
[56:53] I've
[56:53] I've got a number in my head, but I'm not sure if it's accurate.
[56:55] But there's a really huge number of babies that are sadly lost daily and they haven't been able to bring those numbers down.
[57:01] And it's been incredibly cathartic for people who've been through that loss to listen.
[57:07] And I feel like now there's a responsibility to make the category and the kind of rich library of stories to encompass everything available.
[57:15] so that people can come and debrief and process their own trauma by listening to others and go, yeah, no one gets it that I want you to say their name or no one gets it the way that somebody else has been through it.
[57:26] Has hearing those stories in amongst all the other stories that you've heard, has it affected or changed in any way your view of birth?
[57:41] I think it's just a reminder that we're animals and that it's such a primal thing.
[57:45] And it's just a reminder that we're part of this ecosystem and that death is sadly a component to this whole process.
[57:53] And it's a miracle, I think, at the end of the day.
[57:56] And I think it's just baffling to think that you can grow something inside your body and birth it, whether that's through a cesarean or vaginally, and create life.
[58:08] It's a reminder of that.
[58:09] And it's that cycle, I think.
[58:10] Yeah.
[58:12] In the framing of what we went through, it was a really clear feeling of so much of life is we spent so much of our life trying to sort of ignore the fact that we're just animals.
[58:27] And like almost everything in my every day is to avoid that fact that I'm basically just an animal.
[58:33] Yeah.
[58:34] And then this I was like it was the closest I was like to feeling like, oh, yeah, we are.
[58:40] We're just an animal.
[58:41] Yeah.
[58:43] And there's no avoiding it.
[58:44] Because it's primitive in the smells and in the placenta and all of those things, that earthiness, like it smells earthy.
[58:51] Yeah, and rather than it being for me a confronting thing, I actually found it in the moment incredibly beautiful, this feeling of like a connect, like I'm not really a very spiritual person, but I felt so connected to just like this is what it's about and has been forever.
[59:10] Yeah.
[59:10] Yeah.
[59:12] Wowie.
[59:13] Yeah, certainly a fear.
[59:14] It's still the most surreal thing to have all of a sudden just another human being in the room, like this tiny little human being that feels so much like an animal really, like a helpless animal.
[59:24] It is the strangest but most wonderful feeling.
[59:28] It's unbelievable.
[59:29] I cannot believe it happens all the time.
[59:32] Everyone's doing it right.
[59:33] Lots of people are doing it right now.
[59:35] Every time I drive past a hospital, I think, oh, I hope they're okay.
[59:38] Whoever's having a baby right now, I hope they're okay.
[59:40] Yeah.
[59:41] We might cut this out, but I'm curious to know if someone, if you're not having the child, you're in jam, but someone important in your life said to you, I really would like you to be there to support me and be there.
[59:51] How would you feel?
[59:53] Is it a corporate gig or what?
[59:57] Are you expected to have light entertainment?
[1:00:00] You know, it sort of depends like what my role is.
[1:00:03] Catching.
[1:00:04] Yeah.
[1:00:06] I mean, I would be really, really, I feel like it would be a really privileged opportunity to be able to witness something like that.
[1:00:14] I think for the very, I feel like we've just got a very small snapshot of how incredible your podcast is here because I think in everything we've just said, I feel like what you just said before about the best way to prepare is to hear as many stories as possible, Josh.
[1:00:27] I feel like I didn't think that or I did not think that before this interview, but it's so true.
[1:00:34] That is such a great way to prepare for anyone.
[1:00:38] And so go listen to the podcast, Australian Birth Stories.
[1:00:41] It's a fantastic, incredible podcast and what a great way to prepare for what will be one of the most memorable things that you'll ever go through.
[1:00:50] Sophie, thank you so much for joining us.
[1:00:51] Thanks for having me.
[1:00:52] It was great.
[1:00:53] So lovely to meet you.
[1:00:54] You too.

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