Episode 19: The Power of Birth Stories with Diana Forsell

In episode 19 of the Birth Like a Mammal™ podcast, Lindsay interviews Diana Forsell. Diana is a Mother to two boys, with two very different birth stories. She is the host of the Healing Birth podcast where she shares an incredible variety of birth stories from women all over the world. Diana brings an unshakeable trust in our biology and our bodies to her podcast episodes as she believes that birth is designed to work, especially when you leave it alone.

In this episode, Diana and Lindsay discuss what happens to women when we go from maiden to Mother in an undisturbed, mammalian passage of giving birth. They both share the same sentiments in the confidence that giving birth like a mammal gave them to then Mother their babies with confidence. Diana also shares how traumatic her first baby’s Cesarean birth was after her trusted midwife suggested she transfer to the hospital, and how her healing came during her second baby’s pregnancy. His home birth was redeeming to both her and her sons.

Key Points:

1. Birth is deeply significant and affects us for the rest of our lives.
2. Who you choose as your care provider can make or break your baby's birth.
3. Birth directly affects Motherhood. 
4. Why it is important to share our birth stories.

Notable Quotes from Diana:

• “When we emerge from birth, feeling stripped of our power, feeling incapable, feeling like we didn't have agency, feeling like someone else did it to us or someone else managed our birth, that can carry into early motherhood as well, and affects so much.”
• “My approach to healing initially was just to pretend like the whole thing never happened and not talk about it, and cry when my other friends had natural births after that, and feel totally broken. I was just in my pain.”
• “It is my belief that that is the initiatory gift that all of us should receive when we're giving birth. I have come to look at birth as really a ceremony. I've come to look at pregnancy as a spiritual journey that's calling us to grow in certain ways and to trust ourselves on a very deep level.  And birth is the ceremony that's the culmination of this spiritual journey."

Where to find Diana:

The Healing Birth podcast - on all streaming services
Website
Instagram

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Questions?
Looking for further support during pregnancy?
Birth Like a Mammal™ offers coaching, classes, and a birth prep workbook to help you prepare for a truly mammalian birth.
Humans are mammals and we are designed to birth like mammals.

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Music Credit:

Snow Path by Vlad Gluschenko | https://soundcloud.com/vgl9

Creative Commons / Attribution 3.0 Unported License (CC BY 3.0)
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en_US

Edited by: Stefanie Wenninger | Pine Peak Productions